ChangeTip, the self-titled “love button of the Internet,” has been integrated into yet another social network – this time, with the comment service Disqus.

(Not immediately familiar with that name? You may have used Disqus before without knowing it, like when leaving a comment on a Cointelegraph article.)

Disqus is ChangeTip's tenth supported network, following the likes of Twitter, Facebook, Google+ (with YouTube), GitHub, Reddit and more. Tipping with ChangeTip has given rise to trends like Tipping Tuesday, in which Bitcoin users introduce non-users to cryptocurrency by sending them friendly micropayments.

The Nuts and Bolts (and Bits)

Coinbuzz's Philip Schawillie explains how the ChangeTip team can move small amounts of money all across the Internet so quickly:

“Upon 'hearing' the recipient’s name mentioned across various social networks, the Bitcoin tipping service responds to a system of bots to pass the message to his or her wallet from the sender’s. ChangeTip’s internal ledger does the processing off-chain, which means it can send tips almost instantly.”

Additionally, ChangeTip's team received a large infusion of investor capital in December 2014. CoinDesk's Stan Higgins reports that:

“The seed round was led by Pantera Capital . . . Other participants in the round included 500 Startups, Boldstart Ventures, CryptoCurrency Partners, and Idealab.”

The Decentralized Competition?

A small buzz has been growing, however, about a decentralized alternative to ChangeTip called AutoTip. ChangeTip's business model is centralized, after all, meaning that their service would halt if their servers were to go offline or get stolen (seized).

AutoTip is open-source and shares their code on GitHub. AutoTip's website and PR efforts seem very new and in need of further development (hint, hint, hungry programmers and bloggers).

But while decentralized solutions are in development, ChangeTip has proven itself to be the easiest to use and widest-reaching microtipping platform available.

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