The life of an Orbit
Every step from the moment a creator opens an Orbit to the moment they are paid, and what each person can do at each step.
An Orbit is one creator's page for one piece of content they are about to publish. It has a title, a promise in the creator's own words, a number of slots, a bidding deadline and a publish date. Everything that happens on it follows the same timeline, and every date on it is fixed when the Orbit opens.
The timeline at a glance
| When | What happens |
|---|---|
| Any time before bidding | The creator announces the Orbit. Nobody can bid yet. |
| Bidding opens | Sponsors bid. Bidding lasts at most 5 days. |
| 12 hours before the deadline | Cancelling closes. Bids are final, though they can still be raised. |
| The deadline | Bidding ends. The winners are the bids in the slots. |
| The first 2 days after it | The creator checks each winner, and winners are charged. |
| 74 hours after the deadline | The line closes. Nobody else can move up, and the final list goes to the creator. |
| At least 4 days after the deadline | The publish date. The creator publishes and pastes the link. |
| 7 days after the link | The creator is paid for each winner whose payment has landed. |
1. Announced
What: the creator opens the Orbit and sets its title, its promise ("I'll name the top three on Friday"), how many slots they will perform (between 1 and 10; 3 is the usual answer), the minimum bid, when bidding opens and closes, and when they will publish.
Why it can be announced early: an announcement asks nothing of anyone. A creator can tell their audience weeks ahead, and followers are emailed when bidding opens.
2. Bidding is open
What: sponsors bid. Each bid is an amount, a short pitch and an optional link. Every bid is ranked by amount, and the highest take the slots. The bids in the slots are the shout-out, ranked and numbered at the top of the Orbit. Every other bid shows below them in the order it arrived, with no amount.
Why at most 5 days: a bid is a promise to pay if you win. The shorter the wait, the less likely the card or your plans have changed by the end.
Why below-the-cutoff bids show no amount: nobody was charged for them, so there is nothing to show.
See Placing a bid for exactly what a bid needs.
3. Cancelling closes
What: 12 hours before the deadline, every bid becomes final: "Final — can't be cancelled." You can still raise your bid until the deadline.
Why: a creator plans their video around the bids in the last hours. If the top bids could vanish in the final minutes, the shout-out could empty out after it was too late to replace them.
4. The deadline
What: bidding ends at the stated time, by our clock and not your browser's. A bid placed a second late is refused, and a late bid never extends the deadline. Whatever the slots hold at that moment are the winners. From now on the Orbit's page shows only the shout-out, and no amounts at all.
Why it is hard: a creator publishes on a schedule. A deadline that kept extending whenever someone bid would push the video back.
5. The creator check
What: for 2 days the creator goes through the winners. For each one they say:
- yes: that sponsor is charged now, or
- no: that sponsor is removed and not charged, and the next in line moves up.
Anyone the creator doesn't answer is charged when the 2 days end. "Charge all now" ends the check early. The creator may also pick bids into the shout-out, up to 5 on an Orbit, marked on the page as their choice. A pick adds a place. It never pushes out someone who paid for a slot.
Every winner is charged once, within 4 days after bidding ends, and only the amount they agreed to.
Why there is a check: the creator is about to say these names to their audience. They get one look at the list before anyone is charged, so they never have to read out a sponsor they would have refused.
6. Next in line, and the line close
What: the 3 highest bids below the winners are next in line, and each of them is told so. If a winner is removed, or their payment fails and isn't fixed within 1 day, the next in line moves up and is charged their own bid. Anyone in the line can step out for free.
74 hours after the deadline the line closes. That is the end of the check, plus one day to fix a failed payment, plus two hours. After it, a place that frees stays empty, and the creator gets their final list by email.
Why it closes: the creator needs a list that will not change before they record.
7. Published
What: the creator records, publishes by their publish date, and pastes the link on ShoutOrbit, along with the time the shout-out starts for a YouTube video or a Twitch past broadcast. Every sponsor in the shout-out gets an email with the link that jumps to their moment, and one question: were you in it?
Why the publish date is at least 4 days out: the final list has to arrive before the creator records.
8. Paid out
What: 7 days after the link goes in, the creator is paid for every winner whose payment has landed. A bank payment that is still clearing is paid out once it lands.
Why the creator waits: those 7 days are the sponsors' window to say they weren't in it, or to ask for their money back. Until the payout, nothing has left the platform, so a refund is still possible.
What can go wrong
- The content never goes up. If there is no link by the publish date plus 7 days, every sponsor who was charged is refunded in full, and the creator is paid nothing.
- A sponsor says they weren't in it. The creator's payout on that Orbit waits until a person has watched the content.
- A winner's payment fails. They have 1 day to fix it. After that, their place goes to the next in line, if the line is still open.
- The creator removes a sponsor. That sponsor is not charged, or is refunded in full if they already were, and ShoutOrbit pays the processing cost.