Nostr isn't ready for an influx like this first of all. Relays would fall down, and how would clients handle posts with 30k likes? We need to figure out caching and aggregation strategies that are better than just checking all relays. And unfortunately this is hard to do without centralization. There are lots of unsolved problems, decentralization is hard.
Discussion
I wonder if clients could sense relay stress and suggests different relays (trusted?) during onboarding.
on the other hand client developers aren't going to optimize anything until they see shit happening
Yes, also very true
We are probably overthinking the decentralization. Just being able to switch from one relay to another is an order of magnitude better than centralized platforms already. I say bring them on. When everything starts breaking down we'll be forced to solve real world problems as opposed to eternal bikeshedding in the NIPs repo.
Sure, it's a chicken/egg thing, I have not problem with us getting hammered with traffic. We're probably just going to fail a few more times before everything is up to snuff
is there tooling to stress test / benchmark relays for load?
There are a few I think. I know divine has been looking into scaling their relay nostr:nprofile1qqs8nsk2uy2w529fs8n4tx60u7z553e4yx5dy2nxhw4elgjgawpqlas9waufq
yes please.
Funny enough, I explained this to my partner the other day. 🤣
Until someone seriously look into the architecture of #nostr handling new users at scale is going to be a challenge to onboard.
Hell thread is an example and we are only using existing users.
Imagine 1 Million users active at the same time? 😬😅
#asknostr #devs #nostr #plebchain
Decentralized gopher servers (nodes) ultimately used centralized indexing servers or clients to make externally-hosted content searchable and retrievable. Maybe something similar is needed to make finding content across nostr relays similarly easy and familiar.
The technology as it stands can handle it, IF it remains decentralised and if we accept it becoming increasingly subculture-fragmented like #Fediverse.
The supply of "Uncle Jims" able to spin up new relays is the bottleneck, but #Nostr has a major edge over Fediverse there - simpler relays with lesser hardware requirements.
I am not a developer so can't understand how much effort in this direction, but do you think without having such influx, clients will ever be tested for that?
I do think pain can help. It's a chicken and egg problem.
What do you think about economical side of such large user influx, will it be survive without ads, and do you think ads necessarily against the principal of nostr, like we all agree that ads are bad, but without that only relying on volunteerly contributions will work? It will be kind of the "incentive to work" problem to creators as well. I am sorry if I am asking too much question, I'm non developer and enthusiastic person who wants mass adoption of nostr lol. You can redirect me to articles or something if you dont want to answer such long questions. Thank you
I think advertising ia bad, but it will happen anyway, but nostr's architecture limits how bad it can be, and those of us who are principled can still find business models that work, especially with bitcoin in the mix. Maybe I will write about this, I have some ideas.