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Independent measurements of remote MCP servers. Every observation has a timestamp.

Read-only probes

MCP server · Code & DevOps

Penny Press

By con-scribe

Short essays and fragments. Free for humans; machines pay pennies per read via x402.

Source codeFinance & payments
Connect to Penny Press
Checks passed
12 / 22

2 failed · 8 not measured

Median response
373 ms

Median of successful probes over 7 days

30-day uptime
Not measured

Share of countable probes over 30 days, including daily rollups. Auth challenges are excluded.

Discovered tools
7

Tool definitions returned by this server

Independent monitoring

Health & checks

Status history

Responded

The server completed its last measured handshake. This is an observation, not a guarantee.

Last checked
Check summary by test group
Test areaPassedFailedUnmeasured
ConnectionCan a client connect and discover tools?
500
Reliability & speedDoes it respond consistently and quickly?
004
Access & authenticationWhat is required to use this server?
102
Tool qualityAre the tool definitions usable by an agent?
400
Publisher identityCan the publisher be traced to its source?
222

Unmeasured means there is not enough evidence to decide. How these checks work

Inspect individual checks 22 recorded

Core

  • Pass
    Reachable

    Latest probe returned HTTP 200 in 373 ms.

  • Pass
    Valid handshake

    protocolVersion 2025-06-18, serverInfo.name penny-press.

  • Pass
    Lists tools

    tools/list returned 7 tools.

  • Pass
    Current protocol

    Negotiated 2025-06-18. The bar is 2025-06-18 or newer.

  • Pass
    HTTPS

    The endpoint URL is https.

Performance

  • Not measured
    Fast (p50)

    Median latency 373 ms over 1 samples in 7 days. The bar is 1000 ms. Need at least 5 samples.

  • Not measured
    Consistent (p95)

    95th percentile 373 ms over 1 samples in 7 days. The bar is 3000 ms. Need at least 20 samples.

  • Not measured
    Reliable (uptime)

    1 of 1 attempts returned a tool list in 30 days (100%). The bar is 99%. Need at least 30 samples.

  • Not measured
    Stable tool list

    Fewer than two successful probes in 30 days, so tool-list stability is not measured.

Access

  • Pass
    Open access

    tools/list succeeded with no credential, and the record declares none.

  • Not measured
    Standard auth

    Auth is not required, so the OAuth metadata check does not apply.

  • Not measured
    Free tier cited

    No publisher quote has been checked.

Tools

  • Pass
    Tools described

    Every tool description is at least 20 characters.

  • Pass
    Valid input schemas

    Every inputSchema is a JSON Schema object.

  • Pass
    Parameters documented

    3 of 3 parameters have a description (100%). The bar is 80%.

  • Pass
    Safety hints

    Every tool sets readOnlyHint or destructiveHint.

Publisher

  • Pass
    Verified namespace

    Listed in the Official MCP Registry.

  • Not measured
    Website matches publisher

    This namespace is not a reverse domain, so the website comparison does not apply.

  • Fail
    Source repo linked

    No repository URL is on file.

  • Fail
    Repo owner matches

    The GitHub repository owner does not match the namespace login.

  • Pass
    Recently updated

    Updated 2026-09-29T20:57:19.876892Z, within 180 days.

  • Not measured
    Open-source licence

    No GitHub repository to ask about a licence.

Start using Penny Press

Connect to this server

Choose your client, copy the configuration, then enable the server in your client’s MCP settings.

Run this command in your terminal, then restart Claude Code.

Claude Code

claude mcp add --transport http penny-press https://www.pennypress.org/mcp

Capabilities

Tools 7

common_cents_info

Overview of Common Cents, the Penny Press collection of 20 author-curated quotations in five themed clusters: the themes, quote count, and payment info for the $0.01 full machine-readable set.

Discovered
essay_payment_info

Get the x402 payment details for one essay (price, network, asset, recipient wallet) so a machine buyer knows how to pay.

Discovered
lexicon_lookup

Look up a term in the Penny Press Lexicon (the author's own definitions of his political-economy vocabulary). Returns free metadata — part of speech and the essays where the term appears — plus payment info for the $0.01 full definition.

Discovered
lexicon_snapshot_info

Payment details for the Penny Press Lexicon full dataset snapshot ($0.25): every author-defined term with part of speech, definition, verbatim usage example, and source essays, as versioned JSON.

Discovered
list_essays

List all published essays and fragments: titles, descriptions, prices, and reading URLs. Full text is free for humans at /read/{slug}; machine reads at /essays/{slug} are paid via x402 (USDC on Base).

Discovered
witness_attest_info

How to attest a work's fingerprint with LitWit ($0.05): what to submit, what the tamper-evident receipt contains, and the x402 payment details. The service never sees your work — only its hash.

Discovered
witness_verify

Check whether a SHA-256 content hash has been witnessed by LitWit, the Penny Press literary notary. Free. Returns the matching attestation entries (entry id, sequence, timestamp, title) or an empty result.

Discovered

Recent measurements

Probe history

View status
Latest stored probes. Raw probe rows are kept for 14 days.
CheckedResultResponseTools
Connected373 ms7

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