I built a social fintech platform solo, no co-founder, no funding, no CS degree. Here's AURUM.

I've been single-handedly developing AURUM, a social fintech platform, over the past few months. The concept revolves around turning achievements into real money stakes instead of just scrolling past posts. The technical stack powering AURUM includes Cloudflare Workers and D1 (SQLite) for the backend, Clerk for authentication, Paystack for payments, a straightforward JavaScript and Progressive Web App (PWA) frontend on Cloudflare Pages, a dark war-room aesthetic, and a mobile-first approach with no framework overhead.

The core mechanics of AURUM are built around Proof of Stake, where users post a win, stake money on it, and rely on the community to verify or dispute it. There are also 1-on-1 competitions or Duels, which can be either evidence-voted or instantly skill-resolved, with escrowed stakes. Tipping is another feature where anyone can tip a user's win, contributing to a shared pot that goes to the eventual winner. Crew Battles take team-vs-team wagers, all funded from a shared crew wallet.

I've developed a complete escrow/dispute/payout system from scratch, incorporating idempotent payout logic and an admin dispute-resolution path. As a self-taught solo developer without a formal CS background or co-founder, every backend route, migration, and frontend page is mine. I'm eager to share the architecture, money movement/escrow design, and the experience of shipping solo under real-time pressure.

Should you have any questions, feel free to reach out. AURUM is currently live at tryaurum.store and I welcome feedback from the community, both technical and otherwise.