ChatGPT started sending me Substack subscribers
So we built a way for agents to tip humans online
tl;dr Watch the 21-second video of how you can send a micro-payment on Substack, set up your account to start earning tips in a few minutes by signing up via email, and learn more at grove.city đż
Table of Contents
A Free Subscriber from ChatGPT
Now and then, I receive an email notification about a new subscriber to my newsletter.
If you have a newsletter yourself, you know what a great dopamine hit it is.
The interesting part is that recently Iâve seen an uptick of subscribers where the source looks like this:
This was the genesis of our pivot at Grove toward micro-payments for original human content creation.
What does it mean?
Seeing chatgpt.com as the source means one of two things:
ChatGPT searched the web, found my blog, and used it for inference as part of its context.
ChatGPT used my newsletter as part of its training corpus.
My newsletter is free and public, so this is fair game.
If Substack has qualms about this with OpenAI, that conversation is above my pay grade; for nowâŚ
Sam Altman publicly called out that this will become an increasing issue back in December of 2024:
âI think we do need a new deal, standard, protocol, whatever you want to call it, for how creators are going to get rewarded.â
âWe need to have new economic models where creators can earn revenue streams.â
The API weâve developed for micro-tipping at Grove.city is already live, and weâre actively building the SDK to make it agent-ready. Reach out if youâre interested in being an early beta user and integrating it into your site, social graph, game, etcâŚ
Just Tip, Donât Subscribe
As we build toward the agentic economy, we realized our key customer is the human content creator.
No matter what the future holds, agents will need original content created by humans, and humans will crave it. Both humans and agents need an incentive to tip. Itâs not just a tip, itâs a micro-attribution, itâs a way to pay-to-play, it is an incentive.
Right now, supporting a newsletter is expensive, requires a commitment, and forces you to think twice every time you see this screen:
What if you could just tip someone as little as $0.01 if you enjoyed the content, show your appreciation, and move on?
All I had to do was put olshansky.eth in my Substack bio description, and I was ready to accept payments.
Though this particular experience is new, frictionless, and sexy, itâs worth noting that other social platforms are already doing something similar.
Here are YouTube and Reddit for reference.
A tip is just the tip of the opportunity
Before you run away after hearing words like USDC or stablecoin, note that this is just the medium. The real value is what it enables.
We have a leaderboard of all the tips being sent on our platform at app.grove.city, and weâre actively exploring what this unlocks:
Audience Engagement - What if people who tip Mr. Beast on YouTube are entered into a contest to appear in one of his videos?
Data Rank - What if agents tipping humans builds a graph that signals high-quality data?
API Integrations - What if we leverage the backing micro-payment infrastructure for games or as first-party integrations into social graphs?
Content Previews - đ¤ What if a single paywalled Substack article could be unlocked via a one-time tip? The reader can choose what they pay, and weâll have so much data on how many individuals chose to pay for a particular post.
All of this is public, interoperable, stable, and creates a win-win-win. Financial upside for the creator, a real experience for the audience, and a foundation for the agentic world weâre heading toward.
On a recent a16z podcast, Marc Andreessen said:
âThe substack guys basically said, well, weâre, you know, weâre going to do that, but weâre, you know, we solve the economic model. People are ready to pay now for content. Um, and this makes sense. And then, you know, there was this chicken and egg thing right up.â
This is an opportunity to expand on the economic model SubStack started.
Coming soon (Q1 of 2026)
đŚ Fiat Onboarding - You wonât even need to have crypto or know about crypto to tip using crypto.
đ¤ Digital Cash Prizes - Grove will be randomly choosing tippers for real digital cash prizes. Some of our early fans are already seeing this đ
đ¤ Agent SDK - In a few lines of code, agents will be able to integrate tipping anyone, anywhere.
đ¨ Creator Tools - Creators can run sweepstakes with anyone who tipped them and connect more directly with their audience.
How can you start receiving tips on Substack?
Want to receive tips?
Simply add an EVM (Ethereum) compatible 0xAddress or domain name. Thatâs it.
Want to send tips?
Download Groveâs Chrome extension and fund your tipping jar!
If you need some $USDC to get started or need our help to onboard. Leave a comment, send a DM or connect with our team on Discord.
Can you help me get started?
Donât have a crypto wallet (address) to earn your tips?
Just sign up using your email, head over to your profile, and copy your earnings wallet. It uses CDPâs Embedded Wallet infrastructure, so it always ties back to your email.
Don't have crypto to deposit into your tipping jar?
Weâre using CDPâs onramp infrastructure so you can deposit funds using ACH, debit or your Coinbase account. Apple pay coming soon. It uses the $USDC stablecoin on Coinbaseâs base.org blockchain.
