Commerce — sell assets via Stripe + Shopify

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Context

Operators running public-facing or semi-public Artist Alley instances want to sell their own content: digital downloads (concept-art packs, asset bundles, print-resolution files, retired game assets, soundtrack stems), print-on-demand merchandise, physical originals from archive collections. The two dominant on-ramps are Stripe for direct processing of digital goods and Shopify for full-stack commerce including physical goods + fulfillment.

User locked this in 2026-05-30. This is operator-side commerce — operators selling THEIR content to THEIR audience — distinct from Artist Alley’s product monetization (ADR 0017 license tiers) and from ad revenue (ADR 0030).

Decision

Add Phase 1.39 — Commerce — as a provider-abstracted layer that attaches pricing + checkout + fulfillment metadata to assets, collections, and brand-kit items.

Provider abstraction

type CommerceProvider interface {
    Name() string                                       // "stripe", "shopify", "gumroad", ...
    AuthFlow() AuthFlow                                 // OAuth or API key
    Capabilities() Capabilities                         // {Digital, Physical, Subscription, OneTime}
    CreateListing(ctx, target, price, opts) (Listing, error)
    UpdateListing(ctx, listing, opts) (Listing, error)
    CreateCheckout(ctx, items, buyer) (CheckoutURL, error)
    HandleWebhook(ctx, payload) ([]CommerceEvent, error)
    FulfillDigital(ctx, listing, buyer) (DownloadGrant, error)
}

Provider packages live in app/internal/commerce/<name>/.

Initial providers

Provider	Digital	Physical	Subscription	Notes
Stripe	✓	✓	✓	Direct checkout; fulfillment for digital via Artist Alley; physical via operator-managed shipping
Shopify	✓	✓	—	Hand off to a full Shopify storefront; physical fulfillment + tax + shipping handled there
Gumroad	✓	—	✓	Lightweight digital-only; popular with indie creators

Adding Lemon Squeezy, Paddle, or other follow-ups is a Go package drop-in.

Asset / collection pricing model

A commerce_listing row binds:

Target — asset, post, collection, or brand-kit item.
Provider — which commerce provider hosts the listing.
Provider reference — Stripe price ID, Shopify product ID, etc.
Listing state — draft / active / sold-out / archived.
Pricing — currency + amount, or a pricing_model reference (subscription, tiered, pay-what-you-want).
Delivery type — digital-download / physical-shipped / physical-pickup / service / license-grant.
License grant — what the buyer can do with what they bought. Editable terms; operator picks from a curated list (personal use, commercial use, royalty-free, exclusive, etc.).

Digital-download fulfillment

When a buyer pays for a digital download:

Provider webhook fires (Stripe / Gumroad / etc.).
Artist Alley resolves the webhook to a listing.
Artist Alley generates a single-use share link (Phase 1.26) bound to the buyer’s email with a 90-day expiry, scope download, and the licence-grant attached as a watermark / metadata stamp.
Email goes to buyer with the share link and a receipt.
Buyer downloads via the share link; usage is tracked.

Physical-goods fulfillment

For Stripe direct (no Shopify), Artist Alley sends an order notification to the operator with shipping info + Stripe payment metadata. Operator ships and marks the order fulfilled via the admin surface; status emails buyer.

For Shopify, AA hands off to the Shopify storefront entirely — buyer goes to Shopify Checkout, fulfillment happens in Shopify Admin, and AA only records the listing → order link for analytics.

Subscription pricing

Stripe-only in v1. Subscriptions grant ongoing access to a collection (e.g., a “behind-the-scenes” collection of WIP content). Access is revoked via the scheduled-action engine (ADR 0020) when subscription lapses.

Tax + compliance

Defer to the payment processor. Stripe Tax / Shopify Tax / etc. handle sales-tax calculation, registration, and remittance. Artist Alley does not become a tax-compliance product; we surface the data the processor needs.

AA does NOT take a percentage of operator commerce. Operator pays their processor (Stripe fees, Shopify subscription, etc.); revenue flows to operator’s bank. AA’s monetization model (ADR 0017) is per-tier license fees + Enterprise upsells.

This is the same stance taken in ADR 0030 (ads): AA monetizes the product, operators monetize their use of it.

Per-tier behaviour

Community: up to 5 active listings per instance. Sufficient for indie creators dipping a toe in.
Pro: up to 500 active listings per instance. Real commerce-oriented use.
Enterprise: unlimited listings + organization-level Stripe / Shopify accounts (rather than the studio’s personal account) + bulk listing import.

Enforced via the tangled-derivation model from ADR 0017 (a commerceListingCap derived value).

Buyer accounts vs guest checkout

Default: guest checkout via Stripe Checkout / Shopify Checkout. No Artist Alley account needed to buy.
Optional: operator enables “create an Artist Alley account on purchase” so the buyer’s purchase history + download history is surfaced in their AA account.
The buyer’s email lives on the order record either way for fulfillment + receipt.

Public listing surfaces

A listing renders its own card variant in:

The post-detail modal (a “Buy” CTA next to the cover).
Browse feed (a small price badge on listing-attached cards).
Brand-kit pages — branded items with a price are buyable inline.
A dedicated /shop/{slug} storefront surface per operator (opt-in) that aggregates all active listings into a browseable shop. Uses the same SvelteKit primitives as the main browse feed.

Refunds + disputes

Handled by the provider; refund notifications come back via webhook and revoke the digital-download share link (or flag the physical order for return). Audit log entries record the lifecycle.

Federation interaction

Listings are per-instance. Federated peers can SURFACE remote listings (read-only, with a “buy on origin” CTA that deep-links to the issuing instance’s checkout). Federated checkout is explicitly out of scope — each operator’s commerce relationship is theirs.

Privacy + audit

Buyer email + purchase metadata is personal data; the DSAR tooling in ADR 0024 covers it.
Purchase history retention defers to the payment processor’s requirements (typically 7 years for financial records).

Consequences

Positive

Operators can monetize their content without a separate platform. The asset-source-of-truth IS the storefront.
Provider abstraction means adding Lemon Squeezy / Paddle / new market entrants is bounded work.
Sharing the share-link delivery mechanism with Phase 1.26 means digital fulfillment is mostly “wire two existing primitives together.”
License grants attached to listings carry forward into the buyer’s audit / metadata so downstream use is traceable.

Negative

Webhook reliability across providers varies. Mitigation: each provider’s webhook handler is idempotent + retries on transient failures + surfaces persistent failures to operator alerts.
Tax law is jurisdiction-dependent and changes; we explicitly defer to the processor. Mitigation: docs make this clear and link to Stripe Tax / Shopify Tax setup guides.

Alternatives considered

Take a revenue share (a la Patreon, Gumroad’s free tier, etc.). Conflicts with the per-tier license model. Operators who already pay us for Pro / Enterprise should not also lose 5 % to us on each sale. Rejected.
Skip Stripe; Shopify only. Excludes indie creators who don’t want a full Shopify subscription. Rejected — Stripe direct is the on-ramp.
Build our own checkout flow. Real money handling is regulated territory (PCI compliance, KYC, money transmitter licensing). Defer to the processors that already do this. Rejected.
No subscriptions in v1. Considered, but subscription access to WIP / patron tiers is one of the most-requested commerce patterns for the artist-alley target audience. Worth including from v1.

Reference

Phase 1.39 in docs/roadmap.md.
Share links (Phase 1.26, ADR 0018) — digital fulfillment uses these.
Scheduled-action engine (Phase 1.28, ADR 0020) — subscription expiry revokes access.
Federation (Phase 1.22) — origin_* markers extend to listings.
Privacy & consent (Phase 1.32, ADR 0024) — buyer DSAR coverage.
Operator-configurable ads (Phase 1.38, ADR 0030) — sibling “operator monetizes their instance” pattern with the same revenue stance.
AA monetization model (ADR 0017) — confirms no revenue share on operator commerce.