A Self-Monetizing API in 20 Lines of Code

This is a hands-on tutorial. By the end you'll have a running pay-per-request API server, a client that pays automatically, and a test suite that covers the full payment flow - all on devnet, completely free. The Problem With How We Monetize APIs Today If you've ever tried to sell access to an API you built, you know the drill: Sign up for Stripe Build a subscription checkout flow Issue API keys on payment confirmation Store keys in a database Validate keys on every request Build a usage dashboa