Take it from a Twitter-clone developer: Chat-only clients can reach 10x more people and grow faster than any Twitter-like client will ever do.
Discussion
On the other hand, your government can subpoena and read your push notifications, so…
The notification can be
🔔 You have 2 unread messages
This is a developer decision. I think most users still prefer message previews and don’t think about privacy.
Push notifications can be sent encrypted, and then decrypted on the client side.
Yep, Amethyst's push notifications are GiftWrapped (DMs are triple wrapped), dates are random, and the receiver's pubkey is removed. There is no way for the push network operator to know anything about it. All they know is your device token.
Sure, they might face regulatory pressure to KYC device tokens, but at that point you can just set up your own Notification server.
Eh... I tried many years ago to get my family to use Signal. Only a handful of them use it today. We need to have a compelling chat feature to entice people.
Sure, social apps unlucky often generate mental fatigue, chats promote easy communications in an protected and friendly context.
Also private messaging is less dependant on the network effect than public messaging: you don't need to do everything on the most popular platform.
but it takes two people to migrate together to a new chat platform at once. while for social network you can join in only by yourself.
Fair objection. But then the work is minimal; you don't necessary have to read or write somehing, to feel that you chose the right tool.
Pick a friend and start.
Yes, you can join. But will you stay? Majority of the Nostr users play with it for a few days and then walk away. They have to find that peer to welcome them. Otherwise, it doesn't really work.
Exactly I’m working on THIS onboarding app with built in DM to support advocates sharing nostr with friends:
nostr:note1n56dpv3ck393nz9axmf5j9esnyaj642sfawqne4zs9ufy9865cvqu056gx
Same happen to chat app. You need your friends all stay actively on chat app so you can reach out to them. otherwise it won’t work out. I am just trying to say it is not that simple once we built it they will come. Chat app is no different from any other products, you need to bring some thing new and some thing people want so badly so they are willing to migrate
Many people don’t realize that we can use Nostr to build more secure chat app than signal/what’sApp/simpleX chat. Many Nostr OG also don’t realize this possibility.
Why people will use another one chat app ?
If it provides more security and privacy and openness, why not ?
You know many Chinese people dont use WeChat to discuss sensitive topics. They use telegram/whatsapp/ signal/ element.
HRF has an open bounty for privacy preserving chat and groups on nostr. The feature must be interoperable across nostr clients to qualify.
Yes, I did the first half of the bounty as a client specific implementation but haven't had the bandwidth to do a NIP 🙈 There still seems to be a lot of ongoing development in the space.
Yep, nostr:nprofile1qqsf03c2gsmx5ef4c9zmxvlew04gdh7u94afnknp33qvv3c94kvwxgspz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduhsz9rhwden5te0wfjkcctev93xcefwdaexwtcpzdmhxue69uhk7enxvd5xz6tw9ec82c303dhy7r applied for the new NIP-24 GiftWrapped DMs with small groups that several clients are implementing. At the time, I told them to not award anything until we get sufficient support from clients and a cryptographic verification on nostr:nprofile1qqs8evfumcr8pevs7qkta84qlnc7qhkmchxg5syhx8a9gdjyqxqu78gprpmhxue69uhkv6tvw3jhytnwdaehgu3wwa5kuef0qy88wumn8ghj7mn0wvhxcmmv9uq3qamnwvaz7tmp9ehx7uewd3hkctcsz6alh 's new encryption scheme. The audit is being finished right now, so we are going in the right direction :)
Bullish.
Doesn't even need to be chat-only, but good chat UX is necessary. I think push notifications are key.
Agree, it doesn't need to be focused. But the focus really helps. I would love to see a What's App alternative.
And agreed as well: push is key. Frankly, every client should have a great push notification support, even if it is a centralizing move into their servers.