Reddit partners with FTX to enable ETH gas fees for community points

Reddit users can now use fiat currencies to earn ERC-20 tokens from supported Reddit apps

By Shashank Bhardwaj

Image: Shutterstock

Reddit, the US-based social media giant, has partnered with FTX Pay to allow users to pay gas fees on transactions using community points. The collaboration includes the integration of FTX Pay as a white-label payment and exchange solution to help users onboard Community Points in the EU, Australia, and other global markets. Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX's CEO, said in an announcement published on Tuesday, August 9, "We're excited to partner with Reddit to continue their work to empower online communities to harness the power of blockchain. FTX Pay's payment and exchange infrastructure integrates with Reddit Community Points, making the customer experience a more seamless process."

FTX Pay enables merchants to accept both crypto and fiat currency. This means that, with the new integration, Reddit users will be able to buy Ether (ETH) from supported Reddit apps using FTX Pay, the payment and exchange infrastructure platform. The crypto can be used to pay blockchain gas fees or network fees for their on-chain Community Points transactions. This process may be confusing to the average Reddit user, but thanks to the FTX partnership, non-crypto-savvy customers can buy the crypto they need directly through the Reddit app with fiat currency.

Niraj Sheth, a software engineer at Reddit, said, "We're always working to empower communities and introduce new ways to use Reddit, and decentralised, self-sustaining blockchain technology allows us to do that. By working with FTX, we're able to do this at scale."

Reddit introduced Community Points in 2020. It was created to allow users in two subreddits to earn blockchain rewards for submitting 'quality posts and comments.' Arbitrum Nova blockchain underpins Reddit Community Points. It is one of the most commonly used Ethereum scaling solutions. During the launch, Reddit said,

"As a unit of ownership, points capture some of the value of their community. They can be spent on premium features and are used as a measure of reputation in the community."

Reddit users can earn community points in the form of ERC-20 tokens. According to FTX,

"Using Points, communities can incentivise more engagement and better content, reward creators, and launch their customised Points token. Users can use Points to display their influence in the subreddit and bring their reputation to other communities in or outside Reddit. They can also use it to buy perks including special memberships and rewards."

Alexis Ohanian, the co-founder of Reddit, has been heavily involved in crypto. Last year, he launched a $100 million Web3 investment fund. The recent move by the social media behemoth reflects its desire to drive Web 3.0 innovation. Reddit launched a new marketplace for non-fungible token (NFT) avatars in July 2022. Reddit's rival Twitter (TWTR) integrated a blockchain rewards system earlier this year by introducing a Bitcoin tipping feature.

Shashank is founder at yMedia. He ventured into crypto in 2013 and is an ETH maximalist.

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