Damus, a decentralized social media application based on the Nostr protocol, will be officially removed from Apple’s App Store for failing to comply with its Bitcoin tipping service.
“It appears we are being removed from the appstore despite having updated our app to make it clear that no digital content is unlocked when users tip,” tweeted Damus on Monday. The business announced it would submit an appeal because the motion against it was “misapplied.”
Damus enables users to tip their preferred content creators via “zaps” — BTC transactions over Bitcoin’s layer 2 Lightning Network. The app is based on the Nostr protocol, and its functionality is reminiscent of Twitter’s tipping service, which was incorporated in 2021 and utilized lightning as a tipping method while Bitcoin bull Jack Dorsey led the company.
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Apple stated in its message to Damus that optional gratuities and donations were permitted, but not if they were associated with receiving digital content. “They must use in-app purchases in accordance with guideline 3.1.1,” it reads.
Damus, Bitcoiners, and tech executives of all stripes met the denial with skepticism, including Jack Dorsey. “Tips do not unlock content,” he explained.
In response to the announcement, Tim Sweeney, the founder and CEO of Epic Games, expressed his view by saying that Apple needs to be halted. Dorsey has previously praised Nostr as one of the two technologies, alongside Bitcoin, that possess genuine resistance to censorship on a large scale.
Upon obtaining a two-week notice to modify their tipping service earlier this month, Damus deemed the timing of Apple’s crackdown “pretty sus” This was shortly before the company spoke at the Oslo Freedom Forum about the significance of lightning-based decentralized social networks.
Apple wants Damus to “pay its 30%” for digital content sold on its platform, claim the company’s critics. On the other hand, Damus claims there is no “30%” or “cut” because all of its payment technology is peer-to-peer.
Last week, Damus expressed that if individuals face limitations in conducting peer-to-peer transactions without restrictions on their platform, it would have significant consequences for the overall network of applications integrated with lightning technology.
