Ok, a very brief history:

Damus started out using likes only, then later introduced zaps (bitcoin lightning tips). For zaps to work, you need to add a lightning LNURL wallet address in your Damus profile settings in order to receive zaps straight into that wallet. Not many wallets offered this LNURL address feature but one was Wallet of Satoshi (WoS). However, it was a custodial wallet and therefore many users only kept a small amount of sats in it just to fire off zaps to each other across Damus.

Much fun was had zapping and liking each other’s notes, especially in the spirit of value4value (V4V). However, some users felt that likes were hollow and meaningless, and that zaps were more genuine as a means of expressing appreciation etc. Hence the Damus developer nostr:npub1xtscya34g58tk0z605fvr788k263gsu6cy9x0mhnm87echrgufzsevkk5s added the ability to turn off likes and to enable zaps only mode in your Damus settings. This is what I am trying out.

Now… enter Apple. Apple basically banned zaps. Damus users lost the ability to zap each other purely so that the Damus app conformed to Apple’s greedy and archaic App Store guidelines. This is why you might not see the zap icon⚡️ underneath everyone’s notes right now. However, a little workaround brings it back - can be found here:

nostr:note1c2pskelwd499dxkwdj95e5vvtulcccgdch3flmh8l8ejdunzqcpsw70l30

After running that workaround, zaps should be back (the lightning icon will appear on everyone’s notes again).

Now enter WoS’s, um, exit from the US market. Basically, that spooked everyone using WoS into dumping it and choosing a different solution to send and receive zaps in Damus. I currently use an nostr:npub1getal6ykt05fsz5nqu4uld09nfj3y3qxmv8crys4aeut53unfvlqr80nfm lightning LNURL address to receive zaps (getalby is a custodial wallet just to be clear), but I send zaps from nostr:npub1mutnyacc9uc4t5mmxvpprwsauj5p2qxq95v4a9j0jxl8wnkfvuyque23vg Wallet which is a non-custodial wallet that works in a browser (not an app, and you usually have to keep the browser open to complete/verify transactions). Mutiny must be connected within Damus via Nostr Wallet Connect (NWC) as the local default wallet. See here:

nostr:note1fwt0g4u56hdlrzj4q6flqhsqfa2vk6wkp8snl0zaulvkehq9wlnqxtjsl3

There are other options too such as nostr:npub1xnf02f60r9v0e5kty33a404dm79zr7z2eepyrk5gsq3m7pwvsz2sazlpr5 which I haven’t tried yet.

All require some research to understand and set up. With non-custodial and personal

Lightning node solutions, you will likely have to spend some sats opening lightning channels/capacity/liquidity to make everything work. Here’s an explanation about that:

nostr:note1vdd22sv0qld7xd6867vk90pm479z29jek0xl4942dhc6jqla3lvq6w8pm5

Hope this kind of explains likes vs zaps only and making zaps work again. Also worth bearing in mind that things change quickly on nostr. 👍🏼