Re: instant web payments via the lightning network

On Sat, 19 Jan 2019 at 18:44, Melvin Carvalho <melvincarvalho@gmail.com>
wrote:

>
>
> On Sat, 19 Jan 2019 at 18:30, Melvin Carvalho <melvincarvalho@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, 17 Jan 2019 at 18:24, Michael Bumann <hello@michaelbumann.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
>>> On Monday, January 14, 2019 11:50 AM, Melvin Carvalho <
>>> melvincarvalho@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mon, 14 Jan 2019 at 11:30, Michael Bumann <hello@michaelbumann.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hi Melvin,
>>>>
>>>> yeah, I've been experimenting with the Bitcoin lightning network for a
>>>> while and I am pretty excited about the state and how easy it is to build
>>>> on top of it.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Hi, Great!
>>>
>>> Funnily enough I was just reading your page, and realized it was you :
>>>
>>> Tim did actually a while back ask me to interact with this group
>>> regarding http 402.  Some work has been done on that, including by me, and
>>> it would be great to compare notes at some point.  Or maybe flesh out use
>>> cases.
>>>
>>>
>>> I got a bit lost in the different efforts around this topic. And some
>>> seemed to me rather complicated (e.g. including standards for providing
>>> invoice/shipping details)
>>>
>>> I'd love to see and online equivalent of handing a coin to the newspaper
>>> person and getting some content in return.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>
>>>> Did you see/use lightning browser extension "joule"[1]?  It brings
>>>> lightning payments to the browser - and there has been some discussion
>>>> around supporting web payment standards - maybe somebody familiar can help?
>>>>
>>>
>>> I have it installed, but dont fully understand the fine details.  When
>>> my casa node arrives I'll be able to try it out with my own node.  But I
>>> might set up a raspblitz while I wait.
>>>
>>>
>>> Let me know if you want to set it up on a server. I am happy to help,
>>>
>>>
>>> I was lead to your blog post from :
>>>
>>> https://github.com/wbobeirne/joule-extension/issues/46
>>>
>>>
>>>>
>>>> I am wondering how to make it easier for content providers to integrate
>>>> LN payments and also experimented with lightning payments for API requests
>>>> [2].
>>>>
>>>
>>> I have written in the past working code for pay walls, with a dance
>>> around http 402, and in fact that's my current use case.
>>>
>>> Do you think some areas of this work flow would benefit from
>>> standardization?
>>>
>>>
>>> as mentioned above I am not super aware of the current standardization
>>> efforts and I ignored it because of simplicity with my experiments.
>>> I think also joule ignored it for that reason.
>>>
>>> But yeah this must use some standard. Does anyone know how this could
>>> fit into the current efforts?
>>>
>>
>> How about this simple pay wall user story for proof of concept?
>>
>> User Story <#m_-5517546107507471064_m_8143054714546802283_user-story>
>>
>> As a teacher, Alice wishes to make her educational notes available to
>> fellow teachers. Having put a great deal of effort into it, she would wish
>> to get access to different notes from other teachers in return, or put up a
>> pay wall for new teachers that have not yet prepared notes. Alice will set
>> the price of access, and a license indicating it is not to be shared
>> further. Bob, having obtained some credits on Alice's system purchases the
>> notes, and starts working on his own presentations, which he would like to
>> share in a similar way
>>
>>
>> Process <#m_-5517546107507471064_m_8143054714546802283_process>
>> Bob's attempts to access the URI, and receives a response, HTTP 402 -
>> Payment Required.
>>
>> Also returned is a lightning network invoice in an HTTP header.
>>
>> Bob pays the invoice, then Alice allows access to the article
>>
>
>
> Request
>
> HTTP GET paywall.org/article.html
>
> Response
>
> HTP 402
> X-Lightning-Invoice : ln74894yiy...
> Updates-Via : wss://paywall.org
>
> Maybe another header for the type of paywall?  ie lightning mainnet.  The
> updates-via can be used to tell the user agent that the page is ready to
> refresh.
>

Someone (aka basti) pointed me to the following doc saying X- headers are
no longer a best practice

https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6648

So perhaps we can standardize around the ln- prefix for example

ln-invoice
ln-grpc
ln-foo
ln-bar

etc. ?


>
>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> With solid it's possible to access control content, and give back a
>>> 4xx.  We dont yet return 402s but I've custom hacked a server to do that.
>>> I'm not quite sure how a server will be able to know to send a 402.
>>>
>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> [1]https://lightningjoule.com/
>>>> [2]
>>>> http://michaelbumann.com/post/180389589277/bitcoin-lightning-machine-to-machine-api-payments
>>>> [2] https://github.com/bumi/ln-markdown-to-pdf
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
>>>> On Saturday, January 12, 2019 6:04 PM, Melvin Carvalho <
>>>> melvincarvalho@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > I am curious if any of this group is interested in the lightning
>>>> network [1].
>>>> >
>>>> > For those that are unaware, it is a system built on top of block
>>>> chains that allow zero cost instant payments in a zero trust environment.
>>>> >
>>>> > There has been lots of innovation already this year, and it seems to
>>>> be growing fast.  One service that impressed me is a custodial service
>>>> built on top of twitter that allows you to add a tip jar based on your
>>>> twitter account.
>>>> >
>>>> > https://tippin.me/
>>>> >
>>>> > This is a really easy way for non technical people to experience web
>>>> payments and bitcoin in the browser, without the overhead of a high
>>>> technical barrier to entry, or downloading a wallet.
>>>> >
>>>> > Additionally I have added this to my sollid profile using the the
>>>> foaf : tipjar predicate that has been around for about a decade but never
>>>> really used.  The I have added it looks as follows :
>>>> >
>>>> > In turtle :
>>>> >
>>>> > </#me> <http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/tipjar> <
>>>> https://tippin.me/@melvincarvalho> .
>>>> >
>>>> > In RDFa :
>>>> >
>>>> > <a target="_blank" rel="http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/tipjar" href="
>>>> https://tippin.me/@melvincarvalho">https://tippin.me/@melvincarvalho
>>>> </a>
>>>> >
>>>> > There are also new solutions such as a mobile wallet that receives
>>>> payments (blue wallet), decentralized apps (Lapps) and ability to run your
>>>> own node eg on a raspberry pi.
>>>> >
>>>> > If anyone is playing around in this space would love to hear from
>>>> you, or if you'd like to get started and have, say a tippin me account, I'd
>>>> be happy to send some satoshis (the unit of currency) to play around with.
>>>> >
>>>> > I think this brings forth an exciting new era of instant payments in
>>>> the browser.  Would love to hear from anyone else that is interested in
>>>> this tech.
>>>> >
>>>> > [1] http://lightning.network
>>>>
>>>
>>>