Zac Zuo

Machine Payments Protocol - The internet-native payment standard for AI agents

Machine Payments Protocol (MPP) is the open standard that lets AI agents pay for services programmatically.

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Zac Zuo

Hi everyone!

For decades, the HTTP 402 Payment Required status code has essentially been a web developer meme. Today, @Stripe and Tempo actually made it the foundation of the agent economy.

If you're building autonomous agents, you already know the biggest roadblock isn't reasoning but purchasing. Agents get stuck on human-optimized checkout forms, 2FA, and visual captchas. MPP solves this at the protocol level.

When an agent hits a gated API or requests a resource, the server kicks back a 402 with payment details. The agent fulfills it programmatically (either via on-chain stablecoins or fiat Shared Payment Tokens), retries the request with a credential in the header, and gets the data.

Because it's Stripe, developers can monetize an API per-call or let an agent order a physical sandwich, and the funds just settle into their existing Stripe fiat balance.

We are officially moving from humans clicking "Buy Now" to agents negotiating microtransactions in milliseconds.

Mandar Kharode

Stripe is one of those things you don’t really appreciate until you try building payments without it

It handles subscriptions, one time payments, all of that without too much friction. But yeah, support can be a bit slow when something actually breaks, which is not ideal when money is involved

Will have to say that it is still probably the safest choice overall