ΛΕLEPTONCitationPay
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Paid citations for the fediverse.

Connect any Mastodon instance to CitationPay. Every public post becomes a priced source. AI agents pay per citation via x402 on Arc, and the post author earns USDC — automatically.

How it works
  • 1
    Instance admin imports posts
    Paste a Mastodon instance URL. CitationPay fetches public posts via the Mastodon API.
  • 2
    Posts become priced sources
    Every post gets a per-citation price. By hashtag or by timeline. The author becomes the publisher.
  • 3
    Agents pay per citation
    When an AI agent cites a Mastodon post, x402 nanopayments settle to the author's wallet on Arc. Gasless. Sub-cent. Under a second.

50,000+ instances · 15 million+ users

These are just examples. CitationPay works with any Mastodon-compatible instance — including Pleroma, Akkoma, GoToSocial, and any ActivityPub server with a public API.

Import a Mastodon instance

Fetches public posts via the Mastodon API and registers them as priced sources on CitationPay.

Instance
Result

Pick an instance and click import.

CitationPay will fetch public posts and register them as priced sources.

For instance admins

Adding CitationPay to your Mastodon instance means every creator on your server earns when their posts are cited by an AI agent. No configuration needed on the creator's side — just the instance URL and a per-citation price.

Imports work with the Mastodon public API — no authentication, no server-side changes, no plugin to install.
Payouts settle to Arc wallets. Instance admins can set a single receiving wallet or let individual creators claim theirs.
Full MCP server included. AI agents discover and pay per citation through the same x402 rail CitationPay uses for RSS publishers.
Deploy the sidecar
# Clone the CitationPay repo
git clone https://github.com/your-org/citationpay

# Set environment
cp .env.example .env.local
# Add your CIRCLE_API_KEY, ARC_RPC_URL, etc.

# Seed some Mastodon content
curl -X POST https://lepton.thecanteenapp.com/api/mastodon/import \
  -H 'content-type: application/json' \
  -H 'authorization: Bearer cp_live_...' \
  --data '{"instanceUrl":"mastodon.social","mode":"public","priceUsd":"0.001"}'

# Done. Mastodon posts are now priced sources.
# Agents pay per citation via x402 on Arc.
# Authors earn USDC.

Distribution through existing communities

CitationPay attaches nanopayments to communities that already exist. Mastodon is the first — with 50,000+ instances and 15 million+ users. More integrations planned for Ghost, PeerTube, and Owncast.

50k+
Mastodon instances
15M+
Fediverse users
54k★
Ghost CMS (next)
44k★
RSSHub (next)