USDC support engine for self-hosted platforms
Optional tips on free content. Per-second support on exclusives. Sidecar plus a plugin on your instance.

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Live Playground · Documentation

Self-hosted platforms own the stack, then lose the audience to platforms that can take money. Tessera sits next to your instance so fans can support creators and hosts in USDC.

demo_tessera_web.mp4

Who gets what

	What they get
Instance admin	A configurable share of per-second support to help cover hosting
Creator	Tips on free content. Per-second support on exclusives. USDC to their wallet
Fan	Free content stays open; tip is one tap when they choose. On exclusives they pay for the seconds they watch

How support works

	Free (tessera:free)	Exclusive
Player	Stays open	Unlocks after a USDC deposit
Billing	None until they tip	Per second while they watch
Tip	Manual, one tap	Same leftover Gateway balance

On exclusives, creators and instance admins can share per-second earnings. Tips go to the creator. Leave ends billing. Replay works. Cash-out sends leftover USDC to the viewer's wallet.

Live plugins

Install Tessera, then the plugin for your platform. Settings and screenshots live in each repo.

Platform	Modes	Plugin
PeerTube	Per-second + tips	peertube-plugin-tessera
Jellyfin	Per-second + tips	jellyfin-plugin-tessera
Piwigo	Tips on public photos	piwigo-plugin-tessera

Another host: a connector that calls sessions/start, sessions/stop, and tips. Contract: CONNECTOR_SPEC.md.

The plugin reports play and leave. Tessera's overlay handles unlock, tips, and cash-out. Settlement is USDC on Arc Testnet.

Why Arc Testnet

Ticks are off-chain each second. Deposit and cash-out use USDC for gas. Circle CCTP can fund the SCA from Ethereum Sepolia, Base Sepolia, or Arbitrum Sepolia.

More: docs/ARCHITECTURE.md

Quick start

Run Tessera, then install the plugin for your platform. Use the same ingest secret in both.

git clone https://github.com/JaDi03/tessera.git
cd tessera
npm install
cp .env.example .env
# CIRCLE_API_KEY, CIRCLE_APP_ID, MASTER_KEY, TESSERA_INGEST_SECRET
npm run build
npm start

Plugin repos are in the table above. Env, Base URL, and deploy.sh: Getting Started. Overlay login: Viewer wallet.

License

Apache-2.0. See LICENSE.