Honest break down of where things are today:

#1 nostr 🔮 has a user base that is accessible from any nostr client. Currently that user base is approx 10k DAU of high quality pubkey ie pfp, banner, completed NIP-05.

There are approx 100k DAU of all pubkeys. This has happened organically. No paid downloads, not even any ads. Nostr has had quite a bit of attention and this has spiked awareness several times. 😁

#2 Content, naturally we spend a lot of time talking about nostr, protocols, Bitcoin, Twitter, this is great and these subjects are well served here but whilst we are all very enthusiastic about this stuff, we should also engage broader subjects too. People love travel, clothes, food, etc. Don’t let other subjects whither before they get established.🤔

#3 Zaps ⚡️, the integration of money into the network is a game changer and a huge achievement by everyone involved. The potential here is almost unlimited… if the community grows. But we have to collectively earn that community growth, all of us, together.😏🙂

What can those of us already here do?

#A we should make a big effort as a community to help new people landing in a chaotic Global feed to navigate the showers, find some follows and crucially; set up their pubkey. By setting up their pubkey they are making a small investment of time and closing the “I feel like an outsider” gap. 🥹

#B Try creating a new pubkey today and see what the experience is like for a new person coming over without the signal tuned. It can be difficult to navigate the rawness of Global and find active engaging people. Let’s be mindful that it’s very early for nostr, setting up a pubkey and tuning signal is a learning curve and requires effort, I try and spend some time each day fishing people out of global and helping them. 🎣

#C New users are the fuel, as nostr has passed various milestones new friction has emerged that we should seek to address. For new pubkeys there is a lot of spam, this chokes onboarding and poses a threat to the network. Nostr needs growth and to achieve that we must overcome onboarding, that means:

i) Pubkey set up, pfp, banner, bio, NIP-05

ii) Spam filtering, make this easy / default

iii) Signal tuning, aka discovery 📡

It’s important to try out each client as a new pubkey and see what the experience is like, whichever has the nicest experience is likely to be the most used client after a year.

I feel like there is a valley of death to cross where the network isn’t quite large enough to support some things but needs some things to attract more users. Let’s be honest about this and continue working for it.

… and keep the zaps ⚡️ flowing that’s basically the community bootstrapping itself to the world 🌎