CashStream
"Payments by the Second". Stream payments for subscriptions, crypto-native applications, live streaming, P2P, and B2B needs.
Created on 13th March 2023
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CashStream
"Payments by the Second". Stream payments for subscriptions, crypto-native applications, live streaming, P2P, and B2B needs.
The problem CashStream solves
CashStream is a blockchain-based solution for initiating recurring SaaS payments, paid out by the second. Using a payment “stream”, you can send and receive incremental payment distributions paid out every second. The funds are constantly streamed between the senders and recipients crypto wallets in Ethereum or DAI, a stablecoin pegged to the US dollar ($1 DAI ≈ $1 USD).
Bringing recurring payments to crypto-native applications:
Explosive growth of the Web3 economy is predicated on ease of recurring payments. Presently, it's inaccessible to use crypto to pay a recurring SaaS subscription for crypto-native applications. For crypto-native applications aiming to onboard paid users, having users pay a recurring fee is preferred than a one time expensive license. By enabling recurring payments for crypto-native applications, we believe we can help facilitate a similar exponential adoption rate in the crypto ecosystem.
Subscriptions:
Subscriptions is one of the use cases we’re most excited for. Just as monthly SaaS subscriptions were the successor to the one-time licensing fee model, we’re confident our “payment by the second” model is next up in the lineage. By consistently streaming the payment, you minimize the upfront cost to the user and smooth out the revenue curve for the business, in addition to providing them an arbitrage opportunity.
Content LiveStreams - Twitch and YouTube Live:
Livestreaming payments in a payments by the second model would be a valuable offering for platforms like YouTube Live and Twitch because it would allow content creators to earn revenue in real-time based on the engagement of their audience.
P2P Payments and B2B Payments:
P2P include extracurricular lessons, rent, social outings, etc.
B2B include payroll and vendors.
Presently one entity is fronting the cost and holding the debt till their friends Venmo them. Providing a P2P and B2B crypto payments stream helps to match usage while the lesson, lease, or projec is taking place.
Challenges I ran into
CashStream was born out of a capstone project by 4 undergraduate seniors studying computer science at Dartmouth College. It arose out of an organic need when they tried to set up recurring subscription payments for crypto-native applications. Surprisingly, they found no real platforms available. Even after incessantly trying their best to work with any alternatives, they came across tools that were ineffective, lacked functionality, and failed at the universality of payment abstraction. Failing to find a solution, they decided to create their own.
We’ve had the chance to present CashStream at Technigala — a conference showcasing innovative technical and design projects at Dartmouth, this month. Excitingly, we’ve also had the opportunity to connect and share our project with the Superfluid team at ETHDenver! Speaking with their Developer Relations team gave us some valuable feedback and next steps. Further, we are in conversations with other incubators/accelerators like Web3It 50 and the Z Fellows program.
There are some limits when creating a new stream. First, there's a cap of how many streams you can have active between two accounts. There is also a maximum and minimum limit on the flowrate.
Interval Min Amount Max Amount
/ hour 1.8 x 10-15 32
/ day 4.3 x 10-14 778
/ month 1.3 x 10-12 2334666
The maximum amount ensures that the protocol does not receive values greater than 2^53 – 1, the MAX_SAFE_INTEGER in javascript. Amount smaller than the minimum amount will round down to zero when converted to wei, the smallest unit in cryptocurrency.