Do you think the state went after Silk Road for selling drugs?
No, it went after Silk Road because it was a truly free market, far from the collecting hand of the state, the sale of drugs was just a consequence of being a free market and anonymous.
The message of Silk Road was very powerful and dangerous for the state, we haven't had anything like it anymore.
The conviction against Ross Ulbricht is exemplary, to cause fear and to serve as an example.
Surely Nostr could potentially become something similar?
Several marketplaces have been created on Nostr, lnbits has a plugin.
https://github.com/lnbits/nostrmarket
There is also civkit which is under development.
Thank you for sharing your knowledge, helps us plebs understand more and put the POW in to understand things at a better level. 🤙🏻🙏
Is there a possibility to build a decentralised free market place for
Everything that nobody can take
down? Something completely decentralised, that everyone can host?
There was Openbazaar which was p2p although it depended on central discovery services.
It is feasible but the problem is that there is no market.
Btw. Is Taaki in nostr?
Supposedly, drug sales have mostly moved to openly selling on social media like Telegram. No reason that couldn’t be done on Nostr even as-is.
But the platform had some advantages like reviews and so on. To great trust between the parties
like nostr:nprofile1qyv8wumn8ghj7cn0w4hxxetj9ehx7um5wfjk2tndv5q3samnwvaz7tmzda6kucm9wghxummnw3ex2efwd4jszrthwden5te0dehhxtnvdakqzrthwden5te0dehhxtnvdakqzyrhwden5te0dehhxarj9emkjmn9qy28wumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnyv9kh2uewd9hsz9rhwden5te0wfjkccte9ejxzmt4wvhxjmcpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumn0wd68ytnzv9hxgqpqmarket6g3zl4mxwx5ugw56hfg0f7dy7jnnw8t380788mvdyrnwuqpdcegk 😉
⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉
if you think that silk road only sold drugs you are ridiculously naive
If you think it sold weapons or assassinations or similar, you are woefully misinformed.
Do you recall what categories of products it was limited to or what it prohibited?
Afair both weapons and CP were very explicitly banned. Pretty sure it generalized to all forms of violence so assassination markets, but I mean that was always just a meme on the dark web.
I could be wrong on some details, look it up, but on weapons I'm very sure.
Absolutely—Silk Road challenged the state’s control by proving a truly free and anonymous market could exist, and that was the real threat. The drug trade was just the excuse used to take it down, but the underlying message was about sovereignty, privacy, and decentralization.
Ross Ulbricht’s harsh sentence wasn’t just about punishment; it was a warning to anyone daring to build systems outside state oversight. It’s a stark reminder of how powerful ideas can disrupt centralized authority—and how fiercely that authority fights back.
A Lodging of Wayfaring Men by Paul Rosenberg is a great read about this idea...written prior to Bitcoin, but a Bitcoin book none the less.
If you’re right, then decentralized alternative should work..
Real communist behavior. Mao said, punish one, teach a hundred.
