DISQUS

RoseOfTexan · 8 months ago

This sounds like a fantastic concept. Will people want to be public about their payment transactions to each other, shared over their Twitter stream? Other than it sounds like a very cool application. I like the idea of Amazon integration too. Thank you for covering this!

Jesse Stay · 8 months ago

Sharn my guess is they're focusing on the public element because it doesn't require logging in or signing up for anything. I bet they provide a private option at some point, especially as more people use the service and start to build accounts.

Louis Gray · 8 months ago

Post by Jesse Stay: http://www.friendfeed.com/jessestay

Bwana McCall · 8 months ago

Great article Jesse. I was happy to hear Twitpay.me utilized Amazon payments to remove all fear and uncertainty. Also keep your eye on @tipjoy as they now have Twitter support and use Paypal as their provider.

Jesse Stay · 8 months ago

Bwana, good to know. I'll keep an eye out for them.

Daniel J. Pritchett · 8 months ago

"I tried this myself sending Louis Gray my 2 cents with "@louisgray twitpay $.02 for your love of bacon". He just needs to log into TwitPay and approve the payment through Amazon now to receive his $.02."

Eric Logan · 8 months ago

Very Informative and Interesting read. A company that I have been working with for customization. Gorilla Themes asked me to send a payment with PayPal. I noticed later that they have a Twitter account and offer a $ 20.00 Discount for Twitter users. I think I may have to Twitpay them and claim my discount.

Thanks, Jesse

Jesse Stay · 8 months ago

You're welcome, Eric!

mclaughj · 8 months ago

This is awesome Jesse! Thanks for the great write-up!

jraines · 8 months ago

Hey, thanks for the writeup, Jesse! It was cool to attend an event like Launchup in Utah and see the entrepreneurial community coming together -- and with strong support from people like Jeremy Hanks, a founder of online product sourcing company Doba, and other successful SLC-area founders.

I think it's this kind of environment that helps people who are just getting started build momentum. Twitpay came out of a similar event in Atlanta -- Atlanta Startup Weekend 2. My thanks to the folks who are putting on these types of things, like Mr. Hanks in SLC, Lance Weatherby & the ATDC in Atlanta, and Andrew Hyde of Startup Weekend (and lots more, of course).

Peter Van Dijck · 8 months ago

"Imagine going to a vending machine and being able to Tweet a particular Twitter account listed on the vending machine with your payment."

This already exists in some form in Europe. In Belgium, on every parking meter (where you pay for your parking), it has an SMS number and a code. Send an SMS to pay for your parking right there.

wecandobiz · 8 months ago

This sounds interesting but I see a BIG problem and it won't surprise you to hear it's around security. Twitter login credentials are given out free and loose to a whole heap of websites in order to use third party apps and also just get useful additional services around Twitter. My Twitter username and password sites with TweetDeck, Palringo, Fring, Twinkle, Tweetie, TweetLater, TwitterFeed, Magpie and more. Currently, as there is little within your Twitter account of value (followers excepted) people don't think twice about handing over their details. But this goes right against all we know about never letting people know our passwords or PINs; once payment is involved with your Twitter account what does it mean that five or six other websites have your Twitter credentials on file?

I can see the potential in the service, but I'd need to see some additional layers of security in place before this felt comfortable.

Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz

Michael D. Ivey · 8 months ago

Even if you have my Twitter password, you can't use it to actually take my money via Twitpay. The worst you can do is setup promises to pay. The payments are fulfilled on the Amazon Payments site.

Our team has years of experience in web applications and security, and we take it very seriously. We've built a system that accepts the lower-security environment of Twitter, instead of assuming users will change their security mindset.

Try it out, and if you have any other questions, feel free to get in touch directly. I'm @ivey on Twitter.

Nicholas James · 8 months ago

Seems like a nice and useful service. Maybe they can eventually get it to linkup to Paypal and/or other popular payment services as while, alot of users have an Amazon account some users don't.

Daniel Durazo · 8 months ago

What a fantastic idea. This is the kind of innovation which will spawn businesses offering products or services in exchange for twitter payments. Kudos!

Lafayette Howell · 8 months ago

Follow us on Twitter @goseedo. We'd like to participate in one of your events in May/June timeframe? When is the next one?

Jesse Stay · 8 months ago

Lafayette, you can learn all about Launchup and the events at http://launchup.org. Jeremy Hanks, CEO of Doba.com is organizing them.

George Stubos · 8 months ago

Pretty cool stuff. Considering how badly financial institutions are doing, Amazon Bank or Twitter Bank can't be far off.

Rutger Blom · 8 months ago

Sounds very interesting. I would like to see a PayPal integration.

Jesse Stay · 8 months ago

Rutger, I'm just curious why the interest in Paypal? Almost everyone has an Amazon account, and that's all this requires. There are much fewer people with Paypal.

Rutger Blom · 8 months ago

Even in Europe? The reason I wrote I wanted to see a PayPal integration is because I'm using PayPal myself. Quite egoistic I guess ;-) I'm going to check out Amazon for sure.

Jesse Stay · 8 months ago

I'm pretty sure Amazon sells to Europe - have you ever bought anything from Amazon? If so, your information is already there. It's a very seamless process.

joliemac · 1 month ago

Wow Jesse, how much is Amazon giving you anyway?... Not big in Canada either.

joliemac · 1 month ago

Twitpay’s Michael Ivey is also quoted on his decision to upgrade to PayPal X from Amazon Payments due to our “huge user base.”

Nov 4th, 2009