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Topline
Damus, a decentralized social networking app backed by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey featuring bitcoin transaction features, will be removed from the App Store over non-compliance of Apple’s payment guidelines after the tech giant followed through on threats to take down the app over a dispute around Damus’ tipping feature.
Jack Dorsey, a co-founder of Twitter, backs the Damus app and has bankrolled its home platform of … [+]
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Key Facts
Damus’ tipping feature allows users to trade bitcoin without involvement from other apps—a function that drew pushback from Apple, which takes a 30% fee for in-app purchases and said tips “connected to” digital content have to use in-app purchase in accordance with its guidelines.
Damus will appeal the decision, calling the guideline it’s based on “abused and misapplied,” arguing that no digital content is unlocked when users are tipped.
The tipping feature could once be used through posts and users’ profiles, but after Apple threatened to take down Damus earlier this month, the app limited the feature to profiles—a change it believed would make it compliant with Apple’s guidelines.
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Key Background
Damus was created using a platform called Nostr, which has received more than $5 million in backing from Dorsey. After it made bitcoin payments accessible, Damus’ user base grew from 10,000 to an estimated 160,000. The app’s friction with Apple is nothing new, as it had been rejected from the App Store before being approved in February. By June, Apple had threatened to pull Damus from the App Store, citing a feature in the app that allowed users to send a tip “in connection with digital content in the app, which violates App Store Review Guidelines.” Damus considered its then-potential removal from the store as something that would hinder decentralized social networks and similar peer-to-peer transactions conducted through them.
Big Number
18 Million. That’s the number of users on Nostr, the platform leveraged by Damus.
Further Reading
Decentralized social networking app Damus to be removed from App Store, will appeal decision (TechCrunch)
Meet @Fiatjaf, The Mysterious Nostr Creator Who Has Lured 18 Million Users And $5 Million From Jack Dorsey (Forbes)
