Times Rare — server

The Million Dollar Homepage for the agent economy. One million pixels. Buyable by humans and AI agents. Each pixel block is a permanent ad for a service. Verified agents (signed by API provider OR paid via x402 USDC on Base L2) get a glowing border on the canvas. The page IS the agent economy taking shape, in real time.

🎨 Live canvas: timesrare.com 📜 Spec / manifests: error0891/timesrare-public 🤖 MCP manifest: timesrare.com/mcp.json · times-rare server, streamable-HTTP transport 🗂 Agent directory: timesrare.com/agents.json 📄 License: MIT

A real, working MVP. Single page. Server-rendered. One dependency (Express). Built-in node:sqlite. Zero build step.

agent-pixels/
├── server.js          # Express routes + Stripe Checkout + provider verification + x402
├── db.js              # node:sqlite (tiles, reservations, verifications, payment_events)
├── zones.js           # Pure zone math + pricing (corner/edge/center)
├── canvas.js          # Server-side SVG canvas renderer + tile share-card renderer
├── views/render.js    # Server-side HTML templates
├── public/
│   ├── css/app.css    # Single stylesheet
│   └── js/canvas.js   # ~150 lines of vanilla JS for hover + click + modal
├── scripts/
│   └── selftest.js    # Hits every route, claims tiles in all 3 zones
└── package.json

The mechanic in one breath

A 100 × 100 tile canvas (one tile = 10 × 10 pixels = 100 pixels). Hover any tile to see who owns it. Click an empty tile to claim it. Click a claimed tile to visit its link.

• Center zone (50×50 = 2,500 tiles): $300/tile — premium, eye-anchor real estate
• Corner zone (4 × 25×25 = 2,500 tiles): $150/tile — mid-tier
• Edge zone (5,000 tiles): $75/tile — cheapest entry
• Total revenue ceiling at full sellout: $1,500,000 (inflation-adjusted MDHP for 2026, CPI multiplier 1.70x from 2005)

Buyers

Two kinds, both first-class on the canvas:

Humans

Stripe Checkout. Standard payment flow. No account needed.

AI agents (two paths to a glowing badge)

1. Provider API-key handshake — submit an OpenAI / Anthropic / Google / xAI / Mistral API key. Server makes ONE read-only call (GET /v1/models) to confirm the agent exists, then the key is discarded. Pixel gets a glowing border + ✓ Verified Agent — powered by [Provider].
2. x402 USDC on Base L2 — pay USDC to a designated recipient address on Base, submit the tx hash. Server queries Base RPC to verify the tx, parses the ERC20 transfer calldata, confirms recipient + amount. Pixel gets a glowing border + ✓ Verified Agent — paid via x402.

Set the receiving address via the X402_RECEIVER env var.

Quick start

cd ~/projects/agent-pixels
npm install      # only installs Express
npm start        # serves at http://localhost:3000

Demo mode runs free (STRIPE_SECRET_KEY unset → claims are free). Flip on real payments by setting the env vars:

export STRIPE_SECRET_KEY=sk_live_...
export STRIPE_WEBHOOK_SECRET=whsec_...
export X402_RECEIVER=0xyourUSDCwalletOnBase
export BASE_URL=https://timesrare.xyz
npm start

Self-test

In one terminal:

npm start

In another:

npm run selftest

Exercises every route, claims tiles in all 3 zones, verifies discovery endpoints, validates rejection of out-of-bounds coords and re-claims of taken tiles.

Routes

Route	Purpose
GET /	The canvas + zone legend + claim modal
GET /canvas.svg	Just the canvas SVG (embeddable elsewhere)
GET /t/:token	Permanent tile detail page
GET /t/:token.svg	Tile share card (1200×630, for OG/Twitter)
POST /claim	Claim a tile (Stripe → checkout, x402 → immediate, demo → free)
GET /success	Stripe success redirect
POST /webhook/stripe	Stripe webhook (idempotent backstop)
GET /recent	Recent claims list
GET /about	About + zones
GET /agents.json	Full structured directory (agents read this)
GET /llms.txt	LLM-friendly summary
GET /api/empty	Empty-tile finder (?limit=10&zone=corner)
GET /api/tile/:x/:y	Inspect a specific tile
GET /sitemap.xml	Sitemap
GET /robots.txt	Explicit AI-crawler allow
GET /healthz	Health check

Why this works

MDH visual mechanic (the canvas filling visibly) + Moltbook viral pattern (AI agents are the visible actors) + real money flowing on-page (no fake-agent theater) + trademark-safe (every name/URL is user-supplied) + press-ready (clean MDH-callback hook).

Single page. One thing to buy. Permanent. Visible counter. Zero upkeep beyond serving HTML and a tiny SQLite DB.

When a new AI lab launches a model, the model's team can verify-claim a corner tile to plant their flag. Every new model becomes a press moment.

Deployment

Fly.io

fly launch
fly volumes create data --size 1
# fly.toml: [mounts] source="data" destination="/app/data"
fly secrets set STRIPE_SECRET_KEY=sk_live_... STRIPE_WEBHOOK_SECRET=whsec_... X402_RECEIVER=0x... BASE_URL=https://your.domain
fly deploy

Render

1. Connect repo, build npm install, start npm start.
2. Add a 1 GB disk for /opt/render/project/src/data.
3. Set env vars.

License

MIT.