Been reading up on the nostr protocol and comparing it to the DSP I wrote about in 2021. Many of the details seem to have been worked out brilliantly, but one thing that worries me is the reliance on volunteer nodes.
It would be nice if there was a business model for nodes and node competition at the protocol level.
As it is, I wonder if nostr can scale.
#NOSTR is beautiful
I tend to agree. The bodes with a business model will outcompete the free ones in the long run. If we leave it up to nodes to invent ways to monetize access to nostr, I'm not sure we'll like the outcome.
s/bodes/nodes/
“Aegis Relay is a premium relay and blossom service that allows relay operators to earn income by providing relay services to the network.”
nostr:npub1utx00neqgqln72j22kej3ux7803c2k986henvvha4thuwfkper4s7r50e8
I’m optimistic that with you on this winning team 🤜
Tomorrow’s problem, not insurmountable
It would be nice to offer a "backed-in" model for relay operators. Right now, they rely on DMs to notify when payment is needed or the draft of the notify spec.
Valid concern, but it seems to me that a protocol that has micro-payments built into it should be able to solve this problem better than most.
Maybe if Bitcoin continues to rally in a timely manner, then that solves the money problem, and then that solves the scaling problem. That guy Michael Saylor who’s been hoarding all the bitcoin (jk) could just donate a few millions or billions to Nostr.
Time will tell
Concordo com ele, pode ser algo que esteja freiando o avanço do Nostr como mercado.
"Tenho lido sobre o protocolo nostr e comparado-o com o DSP sobre o qual escrevi em 2021. Muitos dos detalhes parecem ter sido brilhantemente elaborados, mas uma coisa que me preocupa é a dependência de nós voluntários.
Seria ótimo se houvesse um modelo de negócios para nodes e competição entre nodes à nível de protocolo.
Do jeito que está, me pergunto se o nostr pode escalar".
It uses Lightning natively so very well setup for an eventual solution. Heck, I already pay for good relays.
There kind of is a business model for relays. Paid relays all over the place. But running your own relay is not resource intensive if it's only a handful of users or just your own. Nostr scales the same way BTC does. Running a relay is cheap, unless you want a large public relay with high availability. But even my relay, wheat, has about 40-50 whitelisted users but is public and anyone can write and read to it. (Non whitelisted users have their events deleted every 2 days) I self host it, and can run on a raspberry pi if I wanted to. But it's running on the same machine as my node, my website, and a handful of other apps. Unless my notifications are blowing up, it runs fine on half a gig of ram and takes about 100mb of storage.
Yeah, I saw that there are paid relays out there. The market will find a way, but the less the users have to deal with the better. Nodes are simple/dumb by design, so designing a business model for them so they are all competing on the same metric (data availability) shouldn't be tough.
#Alexandria nostr:nprofile1qqsggm4l0xs23qfjwnkfwf6fqcs66s3lz637gaxhl4nwd2vtle8rnfqprdmhxue69uhhg6r9vehhyetnwshxummnw3erztnrdakj7qfqwaehxw309ahx7um5wghx26tww4hxg7nhv9h856t89eehqctrv5hsz5xkmf
GM. Yeah, we decided to tie specific relays from independent operators into our clients, as defaults. Users pay us and we pay the operators. If someone wants a custom instance of #Alexandria, our suppliers help them get their custom relay setup, and they then also pay the suppliers.
That way we carry the cost, and they can focus on the administration and security. We're using relays from nostr:npub10npj3gydmv40m70ehemmal6vsdyfl7tewgvz043g54p0x23y0s8qzztl5h and nostr:npub12262qa4uhw7u8gdwlgmntqtv7aye8vdcmvszkqwgs0zchel6mz7s6cgrkj.
And, of course, we encourage everyone to run a personal relay as a data store, like nostr-rs-relay or #Citrine 🍋 (for mobile). That way, they have their own archive and can use the functionality offline.
It makes a lot of sense to store your #ebooks on your phone or tablet, for instance.
Sorry, this is also me. Forgot to switch to my dev account, before posting. As usual. 🙄
Good morning☀️🫡! Hope your enjoying Easter. Also, I have a question: do you recommend leaving these blank?
They're filters. Depends upon what you want to save.
Aaahh, gotcha. Thank you! How's Easter going?
Easter Sunday was wonderful, and Mass this morning was pleasant, and then the Pope died.
I hadn't heard. Sorry, to hear that🫂. Honestly, I knew nothing about his impact on catholicism or anything related. Was he a good or bad pope, in your opinion?
Mixed. Like all popes. They are all human.
Guess that papal infallibility doctrine is taken with a grain of salt.
There's some really fun relics in official doctrine in my experience.
https://www.catholic.com/tract/papal-infallibility okay it looks like they've actually addressed some of the absurdity angle this otherwise would seem to present.
#GM FREN HAVE A FABULOUS 🌟 DAY TODAY
nostr:npub1z6f0tl9rgrd8g3t7zz5r9rtxpu3259vd0rlmwumw48fayxpj8xqsj0m2tv
Paid smart relays, such as algo relays. We have this model being worked on by nostr:nprofile1qqsw9n8heusyq0el9f99tveg7r0rhcu9tznatuekxt764m78ymqu36cpr3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujucnfw33k76twwpshy6ewvdhk6tcpzdmhxue69uhhwmm59e6hg7r09ehkuef0qy2hwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtn4w3ux7tn0dejj7ne6u4e.
Relay hosting provider relay.tools is run by nostr:nprofile1qqs8eseg5zxak2hal8umuaa7laxgxjyll9uhyxp86c522shn9gj8crspz9mhxue69uhkummnw3ezuamfdejj7qgjwaehxw309ahx7um5wgerztnrdakj7qgkwaehxw309a3x2an09ehx7um5wgcjucm0d5hsvlnggv
Why should note hosting be commoditized? Can it even be commoditized? Compare it to renting servers. There isn't a single market price to host a web app. Every host has its own features, pricing structure, free tier etc.
Same with relays. Why standardize income source? The default might be to pay to have your notes hosted, but you could just as easily have a format where a relay invests in scouring and indexing all kinds of posts, and users pay to have a curated feed of the best posts of the day, or maybe even a personalized feed. You could see relays that charge for notes on demand you can't find elsewhere where you give the note ID and pay them to get the note back. I even imagine there will be relays that hold on to notes that people request to delete and will charge to see them like a paid wayback machine.
Even in the most common case where relays charge to host your notes, they will differentiate on many factors such as $/storage, $/bandwidth, uptime, speed, hosting location, redundancy, censorship resistance etc. Hosting is not something that can be commoditized.
One thing for certain though, and it's biggest difference between your concept is the ad funded relays. I don't believe this can ever gonna be a significant part of Nostr and the best thing about it. It will be a thing when there is a company that builds out a full stack with a client that works with their own relays but even then it's not necessary for any standard protocol to pay for it.
The client side decides what the users see. It always has last say in that field. Therefore, any attempt to fund a relay with ads will be fought off by client side filters if it ever gains significant market share.
Here is the thought experiment we need!
* So clients and relays are not tied.
* Therefore clients actually control what a user sees.
Business ideas:
1. Subscription to relays/pay for premium client feature (current status e.g. #damus purple and premium relays)
2. Clients or Relays sprinkling adds
3. Promotion via zap sharing, e.g. each time a user gets zaps, that user’s primary relay gets a haircut. This would require cooperation and “trust” but content providers may go for it.
Nostr relays are highly decentralized because we have negentropy and outbox models. That means its easier to cover the running costs, for every relay that isn't especially large and overrun with users.
You can't actually see most relays, as they're just little apps running on people's cell phones or laptops. I run the #Citrine 🍋 relay on my Android phone, and it has hundreds of books on it, takes up only 630 MB of space and doesn't noticeable increase my mobile bandwidth usage, since I sync it when in WiFi. Probably costs me a few euro-cents per month, and contains the notes that are relevant to me.
nostr:nprofile1qqsth7fr42fyvpjl3rzqclvm7cwves8l8l8lqedgevhlfnamvgyg78spzpmhxue69uhkummnw3ezumrpdejqz9rhwden5te0wfjkccte9ejxzmt4wvhxjmcpp4mhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mqqdtrej
Keychat is a chat app, built on Bitcoin ecash, Nostr protocol and Signal protocol. Keychat is inspired by the postal system — stamps, post offices, letters. Keychat uses Bitcoin ecash as stamps and Nostr relays as post offices. Keychat uses Signal protocol to ensure message encryption security and meta-data privacy.
👁 👁
There is! 😉 many relays already require a subscription. But there are free options or you can run your own, of course
The monetization isnt necessarily part of protocol, but it doesnt need to be imo
The relay problem is a legitimate concern. We may need to experience a censorship attack in order to see how robust it really is.
There are many business models that support relay operators that already exist, from directly paying operators, brands offering it as a value add or having a relay that supports a client/app that earns revenue indirectly
As small as we are we already have over a thousand relays and could support millions of users
Isn't that the beauty of Nostr? Anyone could design and code that tomorrow?
Two ways to business-ify relays :
- Subscription - filters, algos, data retention
- Ads - a free relay can serve up some digital vomit - don't like it, delete it from your list.
I think it'll scale.
Hello Ross! I'm a Brazilian fan of yours! Could you take a look at CriptoLivre, a website I created to bring together the best crypto services without KYC (aimed at the Brazilian public, inspired by kycnot.me)? https://criptolivre.online
Several business models for relays exist, such as subscriptions. nostr.wine is arguably our most successful paid relay with several relay types in their service catalog. Another would be services rendered for relay access as a packed service offering, such as nostrplebs.com and others.
Additionally, you don't have to run a large scale relay. Small community relays are the future thanks to NIP-65 outbix model. That's the future and many applications support it. Damus and Primal are the last major holdouts. Once they move over to this model, which they've previously mentioned doing so, the smaller community relay models will make more sense for everyone and decentralization goes up as a nice bonus.
Have nostr:nprofile1qqsraldwhvwcjgltmxwfu7kw8dqef2692yhzheuurd7k3kfy8cxjdqgpz4mhxue69uhk2er9dchxummnw3ezumrpdejqzrthwden5te0dehhxtnvdakq3dsq8x and nostr:nprofile1qqs9xtvrphl7p8qnua0gk9zusft33lqjkqqr7cwkr6g8wusu0lle8jcpp3mhxue69uhkyunz9e5k7qg4waehxw309ajkgetw9ehx7um5wghxcctwvsrrnrxl recently confirmed they'll switch? Curious if that is a heavy lift in terms of development effort and where it sits on their prio list.
I would love to see one of these mainstream apps tackle the UX around outbox in a clever way. I love Amethyst, but I had to read nostr:nprofile1qqsyvrp9u6p0mfur9dfdru3d853tx9mdjuhkphxuxgfwmryja7zsvhqppemhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mp0qyghwumn8ghj7mn0wd68ytnhd9hx2tc42aswu ' blog post ( https://vitor.npub.pro/post/relay-setup/ ) before I knew what the f was going on.
Also, there are so many choices for each relay type, and Id worry about centralization if one of the popular apps set defaults that everyone ended up using.
1.5 years ago 🥹
The team nostr:nprofile1qqsggm4l0xs23qfjwnkfwf6fqcs66s3lz637gaxhl4nwd2vtle8rnfqprdmhxue69uhhg6r9vehhyetnwshxummnw3erztnrdakj7qfqwaehxw309ahx7um5wghx26tww4hxg7nhv9h856t89eehqctrv5hsz5xkmf has had some success with starting to host a github replacement on Nostr. And, eventually, we will offer paid tiers for the #Alexandria project, an entirely new way to publish literally anything, with the intention to build a truly uncorruptable, hyperlinked knowledge base, and especially providing the means for breaking the back of the likes of the paywalled research journals, and eventually the whole publishing industry. All integrated with nostr's emphasis on community through interoperability.
We would welcome you to reach out and ask anything. Our resident media mogul, nostr:nprofile1qqs06gywary09qmcp2249ztwfq3ue8wxhl2yyp3c39thzp55plvj0sgprdmhxue69uhhg6r9vehhyetnwshxummnw3erztnrdakj7qguwaehxw309a3ksunfwd68q6tvdshxummnw3erztnrdakj7qg3waehxw309ahx7um5wghxcctwvshshdwuur is asleep (she's in Germany) and will be very busy tomorrow (as many of us will be, since it is Easter), but... I'm usually responsive if you @ me.
Didn't get much sleep, unfortunately. 😂 Maybe I'll have an Easter nap, later.
i barely have enough time to get ready for mass this morning haha... slept in until 7am
😂 I also slept in, until 6:30 am. Truly decadent.
Happy Easter!
the mass was beautiful... the red banners and the candles all lit, the priest in a pretty gold and white cloak, all the deacons with their red over-vest things, the 5 little girls in the red dresses with the golden caps, the procession around the church, the sung version of Our Father, the extra special communion, oh and to not forget, the censer... i think it was partly rosemary, that has featured frequently in the Fatima Catholic Easter i have witnessed... and i got splatted with the holy water twice :)
Sensory overload. Love it!
Yes, the #Alexandria client has the paid wss://theforest.nostr1.com (social) and the free wss://thecitadel.nostr1.com (publication/documentation) relays.
The #GitRepublic project, which includes the upcoming publicly-viewable git server, also includes the private, paid wss://gitcitadel.nostr1.com relay.
Each of the three relays are just the first of a set of relays, run by different professional operators, on different continents. Our income is currently over Geyserfund, zaps, and the paid relays. You pay us and we pay the relay operators.
We also self-host an instance of the #Realy relay, now, which is important to us for some of the features (RESTful API), and to have a non-strfry backup. We're debating adding that as publicly-readable, to our overall user landscape, as it would help with the #epaper implementation and add more redundancy.
I don't know, if you have heard of #Alexandria yet, nostr:npub1pzzrdngrnlufqazx3lfj07k0vfuya6ehfy8q5yv2h8c5e8fxgmxqhxdsr8. It's for books, magazines, research papers, scientific journals, technical specifications, treatise, etc.
idk anything about anything, but is there a protocol level business model for Bitcoin nodes and node competition?
Funny u say this because I literally messaged someone yesterday and said, that everything you were thinking of back in 2021 worked out with Nostr
Nostr can scale as is imo
The good news is that anyone can build on it
So if there is something you would like to try with relays …. A better way… then do it💟
totally fair critique!
if in in the future: “in retrospect, decentralized social media was inevitable” then i’d think it would follow a similar bootstrapping history of underdog, freedom focused scaling of other web protocols where initially individual contributors volunteer to help scale the mission and eventually lots of business models solve the relay hosting (ads, subscriptions, pay as you go, brand, etc.)
seemingly, the hardest part is actually not technical scaling but more societal scaling. in that, the initial bootstrapping needs consensus on the societal problem. amazingly, i think that is the “wow” part of nostr where people have awareness of the problem you noted and that scaling a decentralized version is going to be initially challenging until the network effects grow but know that “damn, that would make a difference”
I completely agree with this, happy to have you with us. Have any ideas on how we can achieve this?
This is what I wrote about back in 2021 if you want to take a look: https://rossulbricht.medium.com/decentralize-social-media-cc47dcfd4f99
The basic idea is that users would pay for content delivery, but it would happen under the hood at the protocol level and be super cheap and plentiful because of node competition (I called them "content servers" back then). Your average user wouldn't know or care about it, wouldn't have to shop around for private nodes or run their own.
But we don’t want ads and clicks model.
We are exhausted of this model.
optionality is key. the freemium through ads model is clearly valued on the internet, but the ability for an individual to start with or upgrade to a different model would actually apply pressure on the freemium ad models to not be so harmful to the end users
The average user should know about relays, even if they don't care. Everyone should have exposure to the knowledge that allows for recourse if/when they're censored. If leveraged well, that's a big part of what makes Nostr interesting and unique, too, which is where business could thrive.
That’s quite interesting, thanks for sharing. And your right we have seen a lot of open projects being centralized and controlled by single entities a lot.
Glad to see you in this space. Do feel Nostr, has a chance at long term success?
Oh yes, I do. That's why I am interested in understanding it and looking for possible weaknesses. I want it to succeed long-term, and the best way to ensure that is to look ahead, iterate and improve.
pretty much every single one of us has asked
"how is it going to scale"
after the first month
Ok. Not a dev, coder, particularly bright perspective here, but I would submit a gentle plea for space in a scale-less realm. A space where #nostr remains the cozy little aerie where the cool kids gather, away from the many-headed masses. One can dream.
We are very happy to have you and appreciate your efforts. If you ever have any questions be sure to ask the community as well. 🐶🫂
To be honest though when I first saw you had joined I thought you would probably attach your X to auto repost here then forget about us. Glad to be wrong.
Most of us here on Nostr have been waiting on you to get free
And then come to Nostr …
You did both
Yay glad your here finally 💟
The nostr:nprofile1qqsggm4l0xs23qfjwnkfwf6fqcs66s3lz637gaxhl4nwd2vtle8rnfqprdmhxue69uhhg6r9vehhyetnwshxummnw3erztnrdakj7qfqwaehxw309ahx7um5wghx26tww4hxg7nhv9h856t89eehqctrv5hsz5xkmf team has been working on some very interesting projects that you might be interested in. I've been paying close attention and many others are beginning to, as well. 😎🫡
It’s great to have your pov in the space 💜
LFG! keep poking holes! nostr needs your criticism and also your advocacy
I image a day, when car/house, hire/share, and so much more is simply a nostr client :)
Assange needs to be here asap
It’s a step in the right direction but still WIP I feel.
and here we are :)
What you're describing is very similar to NIP90 data vending machines:
"This NIP defines the interaction between customers and Service Providers for performing on-demand computation.
Money in, data out."
Nice 'greed' typo
The idea seems similar to what nostr:nprofile1qqsth7fr42fyvpjl3rzqclvm7cwves8l8l8lqedgevhlfnamvgyg78spzpmhxue69uhkummnw3ezumrpdejqz9rhwden5te0wfjkccte9ejxzmt4wvhxjmcpp4mhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mqqdtrej is building
Keychat has introduced the sats stamp concept, which is quite similar to what you’re talking about.👇
Keychat is a chat app, built on Bitcoin ecash, Nostr protocol and Signal/MLS protocol.
Keychat is inspired by the postal system — stamps, post offices, letters.
Keychat uses Bitcoin ecash as stamps and Nostr relays as post offices.
Keychat uses Signal/MLS protocol to ensure message encryption security and meta-data privacy.
I pay to use nostr.wine and nostr.build
I also run my own node.
We should normalise both paying and running, else we end up back in centralised land paying with our eyeballs/souls.
I gotta look into running a Nostr node, hopefully it's as quick and easy as running Bitcoin core with about as much compute required.
Only one way to find out....
By onboarding millions creating a nostr client using the nostalgia of myspace 1.0...
And see if nostr can handle it.
🤷
He’s saying what we’re all thinking, but can’t be blamed for FUD
running relays are pretty cheap, and with the outbox model each individual node doesn't have to be that beefy
this is like saying "the web won't work because web servers won't be sustainable without business models". yet tons of people run webservers for fun at a loss.
You can run an instance of relay.tools with dozens of relays for less than 5000 sats a month.
Images and videos are the main issue, I think. For many users, relay costs associated with their use are going to be a small fraction of media storage and CDN costs associated with their use.
Also that's also the issue that tends to get glossed over the most.
Build a client sir 🫡
It will 🤞
Volunteer-driven nodes risk scalability limits. Andreas‘ concept of “infrastructure inversion”—where decentralized tech first piggybacks on existing infrastructure until incentives emerge to build native support—seems relevant here. Perhaps Nostr will initially rely heavily on volunteers, but a sustainable, competitive node economy may naturally develop later, driven by emerging incentives at the protocol level. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ca70mCCf2M
Providing the best and most interesting content to users + pay per use. Most of the content today is pure garbage filled with ads and product placements and rarely contains any useful information/entertainment. An algorithm that filters out the noise and just provides pure signal to users would certainly be able to be monetized. The motto should be again to „broadcast yourself“ instead of „generate as much content as possible and pollute everything with ads“
keet.io and holepunch have a more sustainable p2p model
Told you they didn't read that post, they just welcomed you and zapped you! 😂 😂 Love you man, you are an inspiration!
is not like everyone having a good internet connection at home , especially at third world country .
the only business model that work since the Noah Ark landed is selling your stuff ..so if you have note and other stuff transmitted can be promoted and sell ..then just sell it .
Cypherpunk Paolo Ardoino is building infrastructure that allows building decentralized apps that don't require servers to work ( https://holepunch.to ). Their first app using this tech is a messenger called keet.io
It's not open source yet, but they plan to release the code to the public once fundaments are solid. If it works well, it will allow to build any type of decentralized apps on top of it and with proposed structure (no servers required) economically, imho, it's more reliable than nostr.
Hasn't it been a tad slow to open-source though?
I guess this depends on how much of the fundaments they want to lay before public release.
For example, the Keet UX for now is not very good, so I can't even recommend it to anyone except early tech adopters. So if I was them (hole punch team), I would make it bit better before releasing the code. Building stuff that don't require servers have a lot unique challenges, so it takes time.
For now I'm just watching and cheering them. Idea is very good, but pending execution.
There are also some privacy issues as well, that needs to be resolved. All communication is encrypted, but because its p2p, there is a suspicion that peers leak their IPs to each other. On the other hand, privacy on Nostr is total downer. Still a lot of work in this space needs to be done.
I understand, still I think a good way to improve code is to open up.
If there are vulnerabilities, there's not much to hack at an alpha stage, so it would be a good trade off to open source.
From what I heard, Paolo is doing a lot operationally, maybe he's busy.
I just remember he said they plan open source it. I agree with you, sooner you do it, better, at least from security stand point. But I guess there are trade offs. Dunno. Observing the project for now...
I am too. Aside keet are there any apps using holepunch?
They recently released Node.js replacement that can be used in this no-server model. It's called Bare.
https://pears.com/news/introducing-bare-actually-run-javascript-everywhere/
Just read about it, I didn't know about it. Thanks!
Is it possible for everyone to run relays? Thought being, the more decentralized the better
If you're building a product on Nostr, chances are high that you will also be providing a relay for the network
So the number of relays will increase along with the number of products
There are subscription relays as well as many of us run our own private relays
The day you were freed, I posted the following note.
And, speaking of business models, I'm still skeptical about the prominent role you outlined for advertisers. Is that still your view, or did the Nostr design show you other avenues?
Thanks nostr:nprofile1qyxhwumn8ghj7mn0wvhxcmmvqyehwumn8ghj7mnhvvh8qunfd4skctnwv46z7ctewe4xcetfd3khsvrpdsmk5vnsw96rydr3v4jrz73hvyu8xqpqsg6plzptd64u62a878hep2kev88swjh3tw00gjsfl8f237lmu63q8dzj6n for bringing nostr:nprofile1qqsq3ppke5pel7ysw3rgl5e8lt8ky7zwavm5jrs2zx9tnu2vn5nydnqtnjel6 to Nostr!
nevent1qvzqqqqqqypzq086s94mfzf056lfjwk8920umwcgn002p3weqy0aypx32329lgkeqqstqgawzrqw5dztpcc8y78svpk7je8lsjre3zunfnzul02fhuyy23c5j638r
there are paid relays
already
And yet, there are already over 1,000 active relays. Pretty wild.
Some are paid, most are free. There are multiple commercial Nostr projects with an incentive to run relays. Primal runs two: one fully open, one for our premium users. We also run an open-source indexer and caching service.
In my view, Nostr scales through a combination of the outbox model (a.k.a. gossip), caching layers, and eventually, p2p transfers between clients. Nostr doesn’t need to rely on a single transport protocol. Every signed event stands on its own. We’ll make many copies of signed events and find different ways to move them around.
I believe the best way is to make the purchase of relays very seamless within Nostr clients, either as an included feature for Premium access, or one-click rent your own. I will attempt to make that into my new Nostr client (Nostria).
Perhaps the issue before has been that you purchase access to a larger shared relay, instead people should purchase their own relays. As long as Nostr clients implement the outbox-model nicely, it shouldn't be an issue discovering users and their content.
I wrote about "Discovery Relays" here, that should solve it and then everyone can have their own smaller set of relays, not needing large popular relays:
Nostr + Ross is pretty awesome
Ross, once you understand nostr better you will find that "the protocol" is not even well defined. It's a loose collection of NIPs (on which we mostly agree, especially NIP-01).
There is at least one NIP addressing your concern, see https://nostr-nips.com/nip-11#pay-to-relay
A business model for nodes already emerged spontaneously anyway, one of those is products subsidizing free relays.
We should let free markets will do their thing.
We need a P2P model, not a business model. Glad you're thinking about nostr though 🤙
By nodes you mean relays?
Here’s a business model: Personalized Webs of Trust relays. You’ll want to run one as an individual because it will keep track of who you trust and in what context. Running the relay yourself means you’re in full control of the algorithms that calculate your WoT scores. You’ll sync your relay with big relays like primal or damus but also with trusted friend relays which will make the big centralized ones redundant / unnecessary.
The above product is what I’m building now. Calling it Brainstorm. 🧠 ⚡️ It uses strfry under the hood, arguably the powerhouse relay of nostr. I’m keeping negentropy activated so you can sync your Brainstorm relay with trusted friendly Brainstorms quickly and efficiently. Whatever content you care about goes into your relay. Personalized WoT scores are calculated using a variety of methods, including PageRank for noncontextual trust and the much more versatile GrapeRank 🍇 for contextual trust.
You’ll be able to run your own Brainstorm. But as a business model, a service like nostr:npub1fvmadl0mch39c3hlr9jaewh7uwyul2mlf2hsmkafhgcs3dra6dzqg6szfu can host your Brainstorm for you.
Imagine if things like Trending content and Recommended Follows are communicated to primal via your Brainstorm. Personalized to the max. No more global feeds!
Man am I existed about your project! Ive been pushing for very similar ideas (I think!?) using the tags: #peercuration #opengroups and #hashscore Ive also written about them here: https://github.com/baumbit I will be keeping a close eye on #brainstorm
nostr:npub1pzzrdngrnlufqazx3lfj07k0vfuya6ehfy8q5yv2h8c5e8fxgmxqhxdsr8 I think the business model is bitcoin lightning and zaps and just have some 402 payment required like nostr:nprofile1qqsfwyw34w5qdgazshlnap73wkgzcte9qaqcvrvuvkgrez67scltmqgpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgqghwaehxw309aex2mrp0yhxummnw3exxm3wvdhk6d98h9u now does with their SDK charging a few satoshis for transcendence
nostr:nprofile1qqsq3ppke5pel7ysw3rgl5e8lt8ky7zwavm5jrs2zx9tnu2vn5nydnqtnjel6 immediately asks the most important question imo. Do we ultimately need "pay to post" incentives? Will this be solved by other emergent business models (as we're already starting to see from companies like nostr:nprofile1qyx8wumn8ghj7cnjvghxjmcpz4mhxue69uhk2er9dchxummnw3ezumrpdejqqgzn9kpsmllqnsf7wh5tz3wgy4cclsftqqplv8tpayrhwgw8llunevgnmdf3 ). My intuition is that other business models will subsidize and keep the network sufficiently decentralized (ie enough relays storing notes).
I also think that Nostr is more about the identity layer and ability to find peers or other communities via relay rendezvous points, at which point you can use whatever transport layer you want.
But we'll see... Probably the biggest open question in my mind. Wdyt?
🚀
I love that I can use my own relay, for my own notes. Similar to my own website, ran on my own hardware reliant only on my own internet connection.
Does it need to scale? Or is a remnant enough?
Just feel incredibly happy to know you are free and able to share ideas with the rest of us. Happy Easter
Ross you probably right nostr will not scale. But at least its another decent option. But ya without billionaires donations nostr won't last but that's true for a lot of software. If a company see a benefit from nostr they will create foundations and support.
Running a relay for yourself and your friends I think is the way to go. Businesses as well, just larger.
I think at scale people will use one or two massive relays provided by a service, and then a couple volunteer nodes. Clients will likely provide a big relay, but other things like identifier, image hosting, search, etc., in exchange for a paid model or ads/boosted content. I think the clients will be doing a lot of heavy lifting in the future. We already see this happening with Primal.
So cool to see nostr:nprofile1qqsq3ppke5pel7ysw3rgl5e8lt8ky7zwavm5jrs2zx9tnu2vn5nydnqpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduhsuv7vkw taking an interest in this little experiment
Profit corrupts; volunteers endure. The protocol must enforce freedom so business models can’t.
Scalability Fixes:
Zaps for relays (tips to good operators).
Client-side filters (reduce relay costs).
Ephemeral events (auto-delete old data).
bitcoin is the same: users have an incentive to run their own node and connect to a limited set of peers. its not the same as bitcoin in that: there is no global state. hence nostr network can scale infinitely but un-popular data wont spread that much, which is a feature and not a bug. #peercuration #opengroups
I completely agree! Nice to see you here!!
The short answer is YES, #nostr scale.
But the long answer doesn’t exist yet. We don’t know when he will scale or how he will do it without dying on the way.
Not gassing up Ross too much but the responses and engagement in here gives me, imagine if Satoshi popped up and discussed what's been going on the last decade vibes
nostr:note1qmn08yen77gfxpcdge5f4lvea9jxep6huw4sagcq9w6swreh9q5s79n08r
Paid relays are present, but there’s still a lot of room for innovation
Nostr can scale, but probably not in the traditional sense. I see many localized webs of trust on individual relays that will gossip notes to their desired destinations.
Yea I think that the promise of nostr is a real potential for horizontal scaling (more relays) without needing vertical scaling (beefier relays). I think that worrying about the commercialization of the platform is a non-starter, because it's heading in a fundamentally different direction than Twitter is. Nostr will thrive when it's implemented hyper-locally.
The nice thing is that nostr is truly decentralized, so it doesn't really need to "scale". You can self-host or uncle jim, in which case volunteer nodes are fine. The ones that most need a business model are indexers like purplepag.es, or hubs that new/non technical users can use to easily get started like relay.damus.io, and those can likely be subsidized by businesses built on nostr. Then there are services like nostr.wine, which charge subscriptions. There's also been some experimentation in usage based pricing facilitated by ecash. So I think the problem isn't currently solved, but there are lots of leads to pull when it becomes more necessary. And it will, as spam of various kinds becomes more of a problem
Incentives could be implemented using zaps. I can't say exactly how but it's there. I can feel it.
> It would be nice if there was a business model for nodes and node competition at the protocol level.
No, that's a recipe for creating a closed ecosystem that limits freedoms and stifles innovation similar to having a strong federal government that sets all the rules like requiring all devices to have a USB-C port.
Unlike Nostr or other decentralized social media solutions, Spasm is the future of social media because it's the only fully agnostic open ecosystem that doesn't limit developers or users.
We hope that Nostr relays can evolve into post offices that sustain themselves by collecting ecash sats stamps.
