logicsrc/docs/openswarm/pay2seed.md

pay2seed: The Client Protocol for Paid Seeding

Status: 0.1 draft. Member of the OpenSwarm family. Depends on the core, ipfile, ippay and ipdb. Its server half is paid2seed.

1. Scope

pay2seed is the side that pays. It is spoken over HTTPS by a requester, a person or a program that wants data kept alive on a swarm by machines they do not control, to a hub. It defines:

• Consent. A signed attestation, made when the data is added, that the requester has the right to distribute it and accepts notice. A hub MUST NOT list an offer without one. This is the part BitTorrent never had.
• Offers. A request to store, archive or share a swarm for a period, with a budget escrowed at the hub, a number of seeders wanted, and a proof cadence. Public offers cover vanilla torrents and ipdb feeds; private offers cover ipfile swarms whose ciphertext a seeder holds without ever reading.
• The requester's view of the market, of standing, and of notices.

Everything on the BitTorrent side, how a seeder takes a lease, proves it holds and serves the pieces, and is paid, is paid2seed. The two documents share one hub, one set of record types, and one lifecycle; the split is who speaks which half. A hub implements both. A requester client implements only this one. A seeder client implements only the other.

ipfile.pin (c0mpute §3.1) is this document's offer carried on c0mpute's job auction; paid2seed §8 gives the mapping.

Non-goals

Judging content. A hub sees an attestation, an infohash and, for a private swarm, nothing else. It enforces that the attestation exists, is signed and is honoured on notice; whether it is true is the requester's liability, and §7 is how a false one is undone. Not a DRM. Not a token. Not a replacement for ippay vouchers: a swarm that charges leechers keeps charging them.

2. Terminology

• Requester. The identity that posts an offer and funds it. Usually the publisher of the swarm; for a public torrent it may be anyone who wants it kept alive, subject to §3.
• Seeder. An identity that holds a lease and serves the swarm (paid2seed).
• Hub. An ippay hub that also implements this document and paid2seed. bittorrented.com is the reference hub.
• Attestation. The consent record (§3). Offer. The request (§4).
• Period. The unit of accrual and proof, proof.everyHours long.
• Visibility. public (a vanilla torrent or an ipdb feed) or private (an ipfile swarm; ciphertext only).

Keys, records, signatures, amounts and times are as in the core.

3. Consent: the attestation

An attestation is the requester saying, under signature, what the data is and why they may distribute it. It is made once per swarm, before the first offer, and every offer for that swarm references it.

3.1 Record

{
  "openswarm": "0.1",
  "type": "pay2seed.attestation",
  "subject": { "infohashV1": "4330ddb304b78b1398a77297f57ea22c1ef3fb56", "infohashV2": null, "file": null },
  "visibility": "public",
  "basis": "own",
  "license": "CC-BY-4.0",
  "description": "Field recordings, Dartmoor, 2026",
  "notice": "https://example.com/.well-known/pay2seed-notice",
  "acceptsTakedown": true,
  "createdAt": "2026-09-05T18:00:00.000Z",
  "sigs": [{ "alg": "ed25519", "key": "ed25519:0d87…", "sig": "…" }]
}

Field	Rule
subject	Exactly one of file (an ipfile file key; visibility MUST be private), infohashV1/infohashV2 (at least one; visibility MUST be public), or channel (an iplive channel key; see pay2stream §3). A feed offer (§4.4) attests the feed key in file.
visibility	public or private. Fixed for the life of the swarm.
basis	Why the requester may distribute this. One of §3.2.
license	REQUIRED when basis is open-license: an SPDX identifier.
description	OPTIONAL, at most 280 characters, shown on public listings.
notice	An HTTPS URL or mailto: at which the requester receives notices (§7). REQUIRED for public.
acceptsTakedown	MUST be true. Present so the acceptance is in the signed bytes.

Signer: the requester key. For an ipfile subject the attestation MUST also carry a signature by the file's publisher key, which is how a stranger is prevented from attesting somebody else's private swarm. For a public infohash no such proof of authorship exists; §3.3 stands in for it.

3.2 Basis values

basis	Meaning	Allowed visibility
own	The requester made it or holds the rights outright.	either
licensed	The requester holds a licence that permits redistribution.	either
open-license	Released under the SPDX licence in license.	either
public-domain	No rights subsist, or they were waived.	either
personal	The requester's own data, kept for themselves: backup, archive, sync.	private only

A hub MUST reject an attestation whose basis and visibility disagree with this table, and any with an unlisted basis. Hubs MAY refuse to list particular bases; the hub record says which (§5.1).

3.3 Public infohashes and the claim window

Anyone can attest a public infohash, so the attestation is a claim. A hub lists a public offer only after a claim window (claimHours in the hub record, default 24) during which the infohash and the attestation are visible at GET /offers/<id> and on the pay2seed.offer.listed event, and a notice voids it. An offer for a swarm that already has an honoured attestation from a different key is refused unless the new basis is open-license or public-domain, the two that do not depend on who is asking.

A requester's standing (paid2seed §6.3) records every attestation of theirs that was voided. A hub SHOULD refuse new public attestations from a key whose voided count exceeds its accepted count, and MUST refuse them from a key with three or more voided in the last year.

4. Offers

An offer is money on the table for a swarm to be kept for a period. It is bought from the hub as an ippay pass is, so the budget is settled before anyone starts seeding.

4.1 Record

{
  "openswarm": "0.1",
  "type": "pay2seed.offer",
  "hub": "ed25519:c9f1…",
  "requester": "ed25519:0d87…",
  "attestation": "sha256:8e1c…",
  "subject": { "infohashV1": "4330ddb304b78b1398a77297f57ea22c1ef3fb56", "infohashV2": null, "file": null, "feed": null },
  "visibility": "public",
  "sizeBytes": 7462331904,
  "days": 30,
  "seeders": { "min": 3, "max": 10 },
  "priceUsdPerGibMonth": "0.150000",
  "budgetUsd": "12.000000",
  "proof": { "everyHours": 6, "verifiers": ["hub"] },
  "pass": null,
  "trackers": ["udp://tracker.opentrackr.org:1337/announce", "wss://tracker.openwebtorrent.com"],
  "startsAt": "2026-09-05T18:00:00.000Z",
  "expiresAt": "2026-10-05T18:00:00.000Z",
  "payment": { "network": "eip155:8453", "nonce": "0x2f0a…" },
  "createdAt": "2026-09-05T18:00:00.000Z",
  "sigs": [{ "alg": "ed25519", "key": "ed25519:c9f1…", "sig": "…" }]
}

Field	Rule
hub	The hub that sold it and holds the budget. Signer.
requester	Who paid, bound at purchase as ippay §3.3 binds a payer.
attestation	Record id of an attestation whose subject and visibility match.
subject	As the attestation, plus OPTIONAL feed: an ipdb feed key (§4.4).
sizeBytes	Ciphertext or payload size. For a feed, the size at posting.
days	Period the swarm is to be held from startsAt.
seeders.min	Leases before the offer is active; max caps them.
priceUsdPerGibMonth	What one seeder earns for the whole swarm for 30 days, pro rata.
budgetUsd	Escrowed. At least max * priceUsdPerGibMonth * sizeBytes/2^30 * days/30, rounded up.
proof.everyHours	Period length, 1 to 168.
proof.verifiers	hub, requester, or c0mpute.
pass	For a private swarm whose pricing.perGib is non-zero: an ippay.pass scoped to the file so a seeder can fetch as a paying peer.
trackers	Announce URLs the seeder MUST add. At least one wss:// when browser peers should find it.
startsAt, expiresAt	expiresAt is startsAt + days. Leases never outlive it.
payment.nonce	The settlement that funded budgetUsd.

4.2 Purchase

POST /offers with an unsigned draft (every field but hub, payment, sigs, createdAt) and no X-PAYMENT header answers 402 with an x402 offer for budgetUsd plus the hub's fee (paid2seed §5.3), exactly as ippay §3.2 answers a pass purchase, with the same X-OpenSwarm-Payer binding. Repeating with a valid proof answers 201 with the signed offer. A hub MUST verify the referenced attestation before quoting, and MUST refuse a private offer whose sizeBytes disagrees with the manifest.

An offer is pending until seeders.min leases exist, active from then until expiresAt, then settled. It is voided by a notice (§7) or by the requester (DELETE /offers/<id>, signed), and the unearned budget is refunded to the requester's payout address less what leases have accrued.

4.3 Public swarms

A public offer is a vanilla torrent. Nothing in the wire changes; the only new thing on the network is another well behaved seeder that stays. A podcast archive, a dataset, a software release, an out-of-print recording with a clean basis: kept alive by strangers who are paid for it.

4.4 Public feeds

An offer whose subject.feed is set covers an ipdb feed: every segment swarm the feed publishes, present and future, and the duty to keep the feed's head reachable. What a leased seeder must do about it is paid2seed §7. sizeBytes is the feed's size at posting; each new segment joins the accrual base at the period it is proven, and the hub MUST NOT hand out leases whose projected accrual exceeds budgetUsd. The requester tops up with a further offer for the same feed.

4.5 Private swarms

A private offer is an ipfile swarm. The seeder holds ciphertext and, without a grant, cannot read a byte of it. personal is the basis for a backup nobody else is ever meant to read; its pricing SHOULD be zero and its manifest SHOULD not be catalogued. Where the manifest has keys.public set the data is readable by anyone with the manifest and the offer is still private in this document's sense: the attestation says the requester may store it.

5. The requester's hub

5.1 Hub record

An ippay.hub record that offers this family adds:

"pay2seed": {
  "base": "https://bittorrented.com/api/openswarm/pay2seed",
  "bases": ["own", "licensed", "open-license", "public-domain", "personal"],
  "claimHours": 24,
  "minStanding": 0,
  "verifiers": ["hub", "c0mpute"],
  "maxDays": 365
}

bases is what this hub will list. minStanding is the floor a seeder needs to take a lease (paid2seed). A hub MAY run a market for private backups only, or for open data only, by narrowing bases.

5.2 API, requester side

All bodies JSON, records verified on receipt, paths relative to base. The seeder side of the same API is paid2seed §6.1.

Method and path	Auth	Purpose
POST /attestations	signed record	Register. 201 with its id; 409 if one is honoured for the subject by another key (§3.3).
GET /attestations/<id>	none	The record and `{ "status": "claimed
POST /offers	x402 + X-OpenSwarm-Payer	Buy an offer (§4.2).
GET /offers?visibility&basis&minPrice&maxSize&feed&status	none	The market, newest first, paged. What a seeder client reads; what a requester watches.
GET /offers/<id>	none	The offer, its status, leases held, slots free, periods proven per lease.
DELETE /offers/<id>	requester signed	Void and refund the unearned budget.
GET /requesters/<key>	none	{ "standing", "attestations", "voided", "offers" }.
POST /notices	signed	A notice against an attestation (§7).
POST /webhooks	signed	Register a CloudEvents endpoint for a requester key.

6. Requester client behaviour

A requester client (the ip seed commands in cli.md, a web app such as bittorrented.com's upload form) does the following:

1. Holds a requester key, stored as an OpenCreds key item, registered as an ippay payee so refunds have somewhere to go.
2. Makes the attestation before anything else, and MUST NOT let a user post an offer without choosing a basis and, for public, a notice endpoint. The basis list is a choice, never a default.
3. Buys offers only against attestations the key actually signed.
4. Includes a pass in a private offer when the manifest charges per GiB.
5. Watches GET /offers/<id> or the events for active, lapsed leases and settled, and shows the user seeders held out of wanted, periods proven, and spend against the budget.
6. Receives notices at the endpoint it named, and shows them.

7. Notices and takedown

Anyone may POST /notices against an attestation:

{
  "openswarm": "0.1",
  "type": "pay2seed.notice",
  "attestation": "sha256:8e1c…",
  "kind": "rights|illegal|personal-data|other",
  "claimant": { "name": "…", "contact": "mailto:…" },
  "statement": "…",
  "createdAt": "2026-09-06T09:00:00.000Z",
  "sigs": [{ "alg": "ed25519", "key": "ed25519:77aa…", "sig": "…" }]
}

On a notice the hub MUST forward it to the requester's notice endpoint and MUST, within claimHours, either void the attestation or record that it was reviewed and stands. Voiding an attestation voids every offer that references it: leases end (paid2seed §3.2), the requester is refunded the unearned budget less accrued earnings, and their voided count rises. A hub that voids on every notice without review is conformant; a hub that never voids is not.

For a private swarm the hub cannot inspect the content and does not pretend to. What it has is the requester's identity, attestation and standing, which is what accountability looks like for ciphertext.

8. Security notes

• Attestation is a claim. §3.3's window, standing and notices are the defence. A hub that lists a public offer the moment it is paid is not conformant.
• Hub as escrow. The budget sits with the hub for days, as a pass buyer's capUsd does for 30. The hub's signed receipts and refunds are its auditable trail.
• Private means ciphertext, not secret existence. An offer reveals to its seeders the file key, the size and the requester's key. personal swarms SHOULD use a fresh unrelated file pair (core §4.2) so backups are not linkable to a publisher's catalogue.

9. Implementations

Piece	Where	Status
Reference hub, requester side: attestations, offers, market, notices	profullstack/media-streamer (bittorrented.com)	planned; the seedbox rental rail is the pay-per-pass half today
Requester client and shared records	@profullstack/pay2seed	planned
Requester CLI	ip seed … (cli.md)	proposed

10. Conformance

A hub is conformant on this side when it refuses offers without an honoured attestation (§3), enforces the basis table and claim window (§3.2, §3.3), escrows the budget before listing (§4.2), publishes the market and requester standing (§5.2), and forwards and resolves notices within claimHours (§7). It MUST also be conformant to paid2seed.

A requester client is conformant when it does all of §6.

11. Version history

• 0.1 (2026-09-06): split out of the first pay2seed draft (2026-09-05) as the client half; attestation, offers, requester API, notices.