Introducing Dimely — encrypted paid video conferencing on Bitcoin SV
Today, we are excited to finally share more details about Dimely.io — a 100% encrypted, peer to peer video calling service using Bitcoin SV for per second micropayment billing. Get a room - your time is worth a dime.
An earlier version of Dimely appeared quietly in the wild in May as a social network / marketplace for artisans, musicians, teachers, mentors, lawyers, developers and more to charge micropayments for their time when someone wanted to reach them. Despite having 0 social media presence, we received incredible community ‘hype’ and support for the ‘fresh’ idea of wrapping bitcoin payments around a video call session. It was fortuitous timing as changes in the global macro environment led to a sharp increase in work from home, video conferencing, and freelancers around the world were yearning to monetize their time.
In its first iteration, a total of near 600 users logged in and set a price to receive calls from strangers. The average price of a call was far below $1 a minute and for the first time, technology was available that allowed you to find someone from the directory, give them a ring and pay as little as a few cents for a few minutes of their time with instant payment settlement.
It was an incredible thrill.
Despite the enthusiasm and interest, there was just one big problem.
The people you wanted to call weren’t in the directory listings. Those who were often weren’t online. Those who were online, often did not pick up the call. The excitement of a completed paid call gave way to the disappointment of not being able to connect in the first place. We spent weeks debating all sorts of ideas for resolving this call arrangement problem from adding messaging, to search, to missed call notifications, a mobile app so that your phone would actually ring, building in a scheduling service and even white-labeling Dimely and hoping other enterprises would solve the problem of bootstrapping the network.
Until one day, we scrapped it all.
Instead of focusing on all of the things before a call — discovery, social network, connecting the call — why not focus on making the best possible video calling product with micropayments? That’s what made us and our users most excited anyways. Sometimes ideas are obvious in hindsight and we definitely overthought the first iteration of Dimely. Even while receiving praise for a simple product, it could be so much simpler. Zoom has overtaken Skype in much the same way of focusing on the call rooms instead of focusing on the social network.
That brings us to today.
Dimely is just going to be the simplest way to create a paid video conference room link that you can share yourself across your existing communication platforms to connect with the world’s artisans, musicians, teachers, mentors, lawyers, developers and more. The same use cases we were passionate about in the first place. The same per second micropayment billing that excited us. But without the frustrations. By just being a tool you can count on, it allows us to dedicate our effort to making the best in-call experience and bringing these capabilities to partner platforms via an API. If ever a network play becomes realistic, we can always revisit then.
It’s taken us the past few weeks to begin the new Dimely and there is so much we want to add to it. Group calls, an API, removing the need to login to call, opening it to all wallets, in-call payments and tips, referral links, and more.
We’ve been quiet for the past four months with Dimely in the wild. We felt excited enough about this new roadmap that we had to ship it and share it publicly with you.
Thanks always for your support.
