One Step Forward, Two Steps Back for Web3 Social Media

TL;DR

• Apple despatched the Damus admins a notice which mentioned (we’re paraphrasing): “Hey you understand what? I do know your app’s been obtainable with the ‘zap’ characteristic for months, but it surely goes towards our phrases. Oh, and you have 14 days to submit a brand new model or we’ll take away it from the App Retailer.”

• Because the Damus group Tweeted: “Damus doesn’t promote any digital items or present options for promoting digital items. It merely has a tip button for facilitating p2p transactions like venmo or cashapp.”

• The Damus case will undoubtedly set a precedent on whether or not Web3 apps can use the Lightning Community (or different layer-2’s) to ship p2p transactions.

Full Story

Again in Feb this 12 months, a decentralized different to Twitter – known as Damus – went reside on the Apple App Retailer.

Woooo – getting a Web3 social app permitted on the Apple App Retailer is an enormous deal!

Then yesterday, Apple despatched the Damus admins a notice which mentioned (we’re paraphrasing): “Hey you understand what? I do know your app’s been obtainable with the ‘zap’ characteristic for months, but it surely goes towards our phrases. Oh, and you have 14 days to submit a brand new model or we’ll take away it from the App Retailer.”

Ooooft.

What’s Apple’s concern?

Apple’s taken concern with a characteristic known as ‘zaps’ that are principally suggestions.

The Damus app rewards the individuals who create content material on the platform – the customers – by permitting different customers to ‘zap’ posts. Suggestions are despatched in crypto, peer-to-peer, through the Bitcoin Lightning Community.

However as everyone knows, Apple loooves taking a minimize any time cash (or crypto) adjustments fingers in alternate for ‘digital content material.’

What does this imply for Damus and Web3 social media?

Within the quick time period it appears like Damus must take away the zaps characteristic from their Apple app as a way to preserve it obtainable to customers.

However this struggle is simply starting.

Because the Damus group Tweeted: “Damus doesn’t promote any digital items or present options for promoting digital items. It merely has a tip button for facilitating p2p transactions like venmo or cashapp.”

Looks like a good argument.

One of many huge worth propositions of Web3 social media is the flexibility for customers to be rewarded for the content material that they produce (the content material that in the end makes the platform useful).

The Damus case will undoubtedly set a precedent on whether or not Web3 apps can use the Lightning Community (or different layer-2’s) to ship p2p transactions.

Let’s have a look at how this pans out.