The Lightning Network (an open payment layer built on top of Bitcoin) or some other cryptocurrency.

This is built on top of crypto currency.

That would be nice... Good luck to you if you can use it.

I would consider myself tech savvy but I struggled immensely to run lightning without custodial risk back.

Perhaps something like https://github.com/stellar/basic-payment-app/blob/main/src/r...

Look at how Nostr does it with lightning micropayments ("zaps"). No middlemen needed.