Web Monetization and Indigo

Today, I published the v1.4.0 release of Indigo, my theme for the Hugo static site generator (which powers this site as well).

What’s Web Monetization?

Web Monetization is a draft Web API spec that lets the user agent (i.e., your browser) stream payments to a website. I got to speak with a few people on their team, and the idea of a privacy-focused, patron-driven way for creators to generate revenue really spoke to me.

I then promptly got caught up in a bunch of other stuff, so when a couple of posts that were recently shared by Chen Hui Jing (1, 2) showed up in my feed reader, it reminded me that I wanted to add it to Indigo (as well as my own site).

Hui Jing explains it all in great detail, but in essence, the way this works is as follows:

• Someone signs up as a creator with a web monetization provider, like Coil, and creates a wallet with an associated provider.
• The wallet provider generates a payment pointer for the creator.
• The creator adds this payment pointer to a specific <meta name="monetization"> tag to the head of their site.

Once that’s set up, anyone that’s got a Coil subscription and is using a compatible browser will now micropayments to that creator whenever they visit that site. Hui Jing’s site is monetized, as are some others you may know.

How to enable web monetization in Indigo

First, make sure you update the theme to v1.4.0, just as you would update any Hugo theme:

$ cd path/to/your/hugo-site
$ cd themes/indigo
$ git pull origin v1.4.0

Then, open your site’s config.toml file and, under the [params] section, add:

paymentPointer = "$your.payment.pointer/here"

Build and deploy your site, and you’re ready to go! If you’ve got any comments or questions, don’t hesitate to reach out and let me know.