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Hackathon Project - Flow: LN app focused around paying & requesting people you know
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AlexAlex
Joined 2022.09.25
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#shock-the-web#lightning#bitcoin-design#development#brainstorm

Hackathon Project - Flow: LN app focused around paying & requesting people you know

Would love to hear feedback and work with others. Please let me know if this is interesting to you.

Background:​​

In my personal experience, most of my financial transactions can be broken down into two categories: paying merchants or paying / receiving money from people I know. The former is handled by credit cards and fintech while the latter is handled via Venmo, Cash App, Apple Pay, etc., but pretty much everyone I know uses Venmo. Venmo is only available in the US but it has a strong network effect in the under-35 demographic.

App Idea:

A Venmo-like app built on LN. I find value in having an app where I can transact with my contacts and look up my transaction history.

Would be curious to know what a realistic goal for the tournament could look like.

Current LN space:

Most LN wallets that I’ve looked at are based around a core payment functionality, plus other cool features. Some apps are starting to add contacts based on lightning addresses. I think it would be cool to have an app where transacting with contacts is the primary use case and the UX is built to facilitate that.

Bitcoin Design has mock-ups of this: https://bitcoin.design/guide/daily-spending-wallet/contacts/

Specific Features:

Contacts:

  • Store contacts and easily look them up to request / pay

  • Store transaction history with each contact for later reference

Request functionality:

People request payments on Venmo more often than they initiate payments. For example, one person picks up dinner then requests the others.

At the protocol level, LN only enables immediate payments, so this requires a centralized service. Currently only custodial apps have this feature. Perhaps an interesting use case to explore is a non-custodial enabled app that still allows you to request others on the same platform.

Some long-term possibilities:

  • Allow users to transact in fiat currencies using Taro

  • I’m curious if this app would be useful for people in countries that don’t have Venmo or Venmo-like apps. If you have insight into this, please let me know!