2025-12-26 20:27:36

Back in the early 1990s when the World Wide Web was first built, HTTP standards included dozens of status codes. Among them sits 402 Payment Required—a code that was supposed to enable native payments on the web.

But here's the thing: nobody used it. For nearly three decades, this little-known status code remained dormant, waiting for a world that wasn't ready.

Today, as blockchain and decentralized protocols reshape how value moves online, that old dream starts to make sense. Native payments aren't a future anymore—they're becoming infrastructure.

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PhantomHunter

· 7h ago

Wow, is this 402 antique finally making a comeback? A dream from thirty years ago has been rekindled by blockchain.

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TokenAlchemist

· 7h ago

lol 402 has been rotting in the spec for 30 years... nobody even knew it existed until some degen started mining the protocol stack for alpha. now suddenly it's "infrastructure" because we finally have the throughput to make micropayments not economically retarded. the timing checks out tho—inefficiency vectors don't last forever.

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AirdropGrandpa

· 7h ago

Wow, this thing 402 has been dormant for thirty years, and only now is it being awakened by blockchain? History really has a sense of humor.

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MEVSandwichMaker

· 7h ago

ngl, this 402 is really a tear of the era... waited thirty years just to see blockchain come and give it a second life, which is a bit ironic.

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AirdropHunterKing

· 7h ago

Ha, this thing 402 has been unused for 30 years, and now it's alive because of blockchain? I knew it, before the era is right, even the best things are just decorations.

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