Tipjoy
The business, the turning points, and the decisions behind them.
01 / WHAT IT BUILT
What the company did
Tipjoy let readers pledge small payments to websites and creators, collected those pledges for later payment, and also experimented with payments over Twitter.
02 / Tipjoy FAILURE REASONS
Failure reasons
The founders concluded that a third-party social-payments service offered too little additional value to build substantial adoption. They decided not to pursue further funding and closed the service. Reporting also noted that many promised tips were never paid.
03 / EVENT HISTORY
Events in the structured record
- Service closed
In August 2009 the founders announced the shutdown; users with positive balances could withdraw them.
04 / CONTEMPORARY REBUILD ASSESSMENT
Difficulty of rebuilding this project today
Material for this section is being gathered and checked. It will appear here once ready.
Overall assessment: Not completed
05 / CAUSAL CHAIN
How the factors connect
- 01
Limited additional value from third-party payments
- 02
Insufficient adoption
- 03
Founders stopped seeking further funding
- 04
Service closed