Twitter Pulls Ribbon’s In-Stream Payments System

We reported earlier that payments startup Ribbon had launched their “in-stream” payments system for Twitter, allowing users to make purchases without leaving the Twitter environment by making use of the Twitter Cards feature launched recently.  About an hour after the feature launched, Twitter shut it down, invalidating the feature.  A workaround is currently in place, directing users to a ribbon.co checkout page instead, but this diminished functionality does not align with Ribbon’s goals.  The startup is currently attempting to resolve this matter with Twitter.

Ribbon Launches to Make You Spend Money on Facebook

In yet another attempt to improve the often-convoluted process of buying things online, a start-up called Ribbon has launched a new way for merchants to take payments directly from the Facebook News Feed. This unique system is actually cross-platform on social media sites, and can detect where a user is coming from to tailor a one-page purchase experience to make the entire process dangerously simple. For returning Ribbon users, the entire purchase can be performed with one click using saved information, and for first time users, it’s as simple as entering your information on the destination page and clicking “buy now.”  As an added bonus, Ribbon generates extremely robust posts to be placed directly on Facebook and other social sites that include photos, pricing, stock information, and a buy now button. Prepare to be broke again soon, thanks to Ribbon.