Web Monetization Vocabulary

This specification is a work in progress within the community on the best shape it should take.

The specification reflects the desired end-state as currently anticipated and agreed to between the contributors. The specification is being prepared here, in this format, to collect the input of the Web community and prepare the work to ultimately follow the W3C standards track should it have the necessary support to do so.

Comments regarding this document are welcome. GitHub Issues are preferred for discussion of this specification.

Introduction

This document defines how to include a payment pointer in the Activity and Actor types in the [[[activitystreams-vocabulary]]]. [[[activitypub]]] servers and clients MAY use this vocabulary for facilitating payments with a user’s [[[webmonetization]]] provider.

Conventions

Following the convention of the Activity Vocabulary, the "Domain" indicates the type of Object the property term applies to. The "Range" indicates the type of value the property term can have. Properties marked as being "Functional" can have only one value. Items not marked as "Functional" can have multiple values.

PaymentPointer Type

Payment pointers are a standardized identifier for payment accounts. A PaymentPointer MUST be represented in its resolved syntax as an IRI [[RFC3987]].

Class	Description		Example
PaymentPointer	URI:	`https://interledger.org/ns#PaymentPointer`	{ "@context": "https://interledger.org/ns#", "type": "PaymentPointer", "href": "https://wallet.example.com/mary" }
	Notes:	A `PaymentPointer` is a subtype of Link that references an Open Payments API entry point identified by a URL. The `rel` property is set to `monetization` and `mediaType` property set to `application/json`. The `name`, `hreflang`, `height`, `width`, `preview` properties are inappropriate for this resource.
	Extends:	Link
	Properties:	Inherits `href` from Link.

Monetization Property

The monetization property associates a PaymentPointer with a creator or a piece of content. It is analogous to using the link type monetization for including payment pointers in HTML documents.

Term	Description		Examples
monetization	URI:	`https://interledger.org/ns#`	{ "@context": { "@vocab": "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams#", "monetization": "https://interledger.org/ns#monetization", "@language": "en" }, "id": "https://example.com/create-hello-world", "type": "Create", "actor": "https://example.com/@mary", "object": { "id": "https://example.com/hello-world", "type": "Note", "published": "2023-05-10T13:37:00Z", "attributedTo": "https://example.com/@mary", "content": "<p>Hello world</p>", "to": "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams#Public", "monetization": "https://wallet.example.com/mary" } } { "@context": { "@vocab": "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams#", "monetization": "https://interledger.org/ns#monetization" }, "type": "Person", "name": "Mary Lee", "monetization": "https://wallet.example.com/mary" }
	Notes:	Defines the intended recipient of a payment. The property MUST only have one value.
	Domain:	`Activity` \| `Actor`
	Range:	`PaymentPointer`
	Functional:	True