Nostr Web Client

1) Human speech is not machine code. It doesn't need to compile and run dynamically. It has no merge conflicts.

It doesn't need git. Not everything needs git.

2) Small errors and invented words allow speech to naturally evolve, over time. That is one way that vocabulary expands and adapts to the current time and environment, and it fuels a sense of community to share this "new, local vocabulary".

3) It also encourages more people to write, as they know that their errors or local dialects will be glossed over and the readers will focus on their core message.

4) If someone worries about typos, let them use a client with a spell-check. (I'm sure the people implementing note-policing also took the time to implement a spell-check, right?)

5) Not everything needs to be a "community-approved idea". Novel or controversial ideas are often offensive. Offensive people are often creative and ingenuitive. Those individuals also have free speech rights and should be allowed to speak their truth freely, without being harrassed.

6) Debates have value. Replying to an idea, rather than demanding it be rewritten, creates a conversation in the public square, and allows people who are being harrassed and intimidated to be defended by their friends. Much wickedness occurs in darkness.

7) Kind 01 notes were the universal note and all clients were designed to specialize in their display. Changing that dynamic shouldn't be a spontaneous, unilateral decision by a large provider. Which is why I have left that provider, for wantonly abusing a market position.

8) Do not offer a doorway to tyrannical impulses. That door will always be opened. We have all come to know that software developers can become tyrants. That is why we are here.

9) Merely because it has become technologically possible to do something, doesn't mean that other clients or users are forced to accept it. Expect there to be "free speech clients" and "anti-forker filters" coming soon, and those feeds will contain different displays of notes than on the conformist apps.

10) Again: This is the original note. There is no other version of this note and there will not be another version.

Valentino Giudice 1y ago

> It doesn't need git.

Git does help to manage a blog, though.

That said, I also don't like edits, but for different reasons. Politically and ideologically they are neutral, but I don't think they are good with the Nostr protocol.

nostr:nevent1qvzqqqqqqypzprhy9yxf3vst9xv38zej9arxagsvw4sg7452k570z9yjh7djapyuqy88wumn8ghj7mn0wvhxcmmv9uq3qamnwvaz7tmwdaehgu3wd4hk6tcqyqu72u49vh94kfq6elfp50sq4prnxng42qxe7q3lhy7r89vhy65cx273rt5

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Discussion

Laeserin 1y ago

We have long-form articles for blogging, already, and they are designed to be versioned.

Microblogging is meant for a different purpose. It's meant to be an uncensorable method for a human to express themselves.

Making it editable will encourage people to pressure others to change the content and make readers more wary about whether the visible author actually wrote the note or uncertain if they're looking at the correct one (as you described).

Or eventually allow people to write directly into the note, (through a reaction function, rather than a signature, like with community notes) so that, if you scroll their profile timeline, you see what is effectively graffiti or messages like "This is misinformation. For accurate reporting, please go to whitehouse.gov."

It's a cultural change, not just a technical one. He's recreating Twitter and co., rather than staying weird.

Valentino Giudice 1y ago

I wasn't suggesting Nostr blog articles should have Git-like features. Rather, I was pointing out that Git actually is good for non-code acts of speech too.

I use Git for my (non-Nostr) blog, myself.

I didn't write my comment with long posts in mind, although that is, I am aware, an optional feature (not included in NIP-01).

Personally, I don't object to (non Git-like) edits in long-form articles by their own author. Unlike edits in notes, they don't break NIP-01 by creating an inconsistency between the clients that implement optional features and those that don't and are arguably more useful, since a long-form article has more value for the author and it's longer and more complex (therefore more prone to error).

Obviously, viewers must be aware they may not be seeing the latest version and authors must be aware the original version may de facto remain available forever.

People can pressure others into silence by convincing them to no longer speak about a certain topics or to publish an article saying they changed their mind, which is not an edit at the technical level, but serves the same function as an edit at the social level.

This is not an issue that has a technical solution and it isn't censorship in the strict sense (in the way that government or corporate censorship is). It does require a social change.

Then again, people should be allowed to change their mind, too, and to change other people's mind with good arguments.