I can’t its a joke
Discussion
You had me there 😅
But then how do you prevent bad actors?
How do you stop bad actors from putting up a website? Who decides who’s a bad actor? Nostr relies on p2p reputation instead of top-down moderation.
I will decide. Someone has to
Makes sense.
But governments around the world block access to online content for a variety of reasons: to shield children from obscene content, to prevent access to copyright-infringing material or confusingly named domains, or to protect national security.
Can these and probably others factors be used to block access to Nostr?
Nope. It can't be stopped
They would have to ban all relays, which is trivial for individuals to spin up. They could try going after clients/apps, but many are open-source and can be run locally on your computer. There's no one person or company to go after.
It's also protected free speech. Nostr is just a standard for how to communicate information in a commonly understood message format. EFF and ACLU would be all over it if they tried to ban Nostr.
Is there a portal/video where I can learn what Nostr is and how it works in English (with little or no technical jargon)?
I don't have a video, sorry
In essence, there is a protocol called nostr, think of almost anything you use relying on a protocol; when you plug a mouse into your computer you are using the USB protocol to plug it in, its open, anyone can develop or implement USB if they have the technical know-how. Bitcoin is a protocol, anyone can build their own software to mine it, to verify it, to transact with it, so long as they follow the rules of the protocol. Nostr is a protocol, anyone can post or view nostr as long as they obey the rules of the protocol.
As such, anyone can build their own software that interfaces with nostr, you can build your own client, you can build your own relay, you can build bots and all types of stuff as long as you follow the rules of the protocol.
The protocol itself works by allowing anyone to generate a profile (your public/private keys) simply through some math, you could do that with a pen and paper if you had enough time. Once you have that profile, you can use it to write a post, what's happening on the back end is that you signed that post with your private key and sent it to a network of relays, everyone can see that you signed it with your private key (which only you have), simply by their clients checking it against your public key (which we all get).
The relays are anyone with a computer that installs the software (which anyone can create themselves too). Those relays receive the messages you post, store them, share them amongst each other, and send them out to the rest of us.
Since no one could stop all the relays, nostr can't be censored. Since anyone can create a user profile without anyone else's permission (like you did, when you created your profile here) , you can't be stopped from posting here.
Thank you for this. Now I seem to have a better understanding than what was available on the nostr website.
Another query:
So when I created my profile using a client (Damus), and post/like/zap via the client, the client is the frontend and nostr protocol is the backend?
Yes, you are correct. I am talking to you from amethyst, others are using plebstr, there are desktop clients too. You could also copy your secret key to another client and your user profile should load right up, just don't post that secret key to any of us.
Is there a way to shorten the private key making it easy to remember? Else I would have to keep a copy of it somewhere. I am not a big fan of using any password manager.
Or does a short private key beats the purpose as it would be easier to social hack it?
Mmmm, its not something that could be practically done by a user. There have been some discussions about changing the format, but that's happening at the client or protocol level. Someone smarter than me could probably make a "seed phrase" out of it that's easier to remember or write down, like how bitcoin seed phrases work, but it wouldn't be shorter. The length of the key is important so that it can't be physically hacked by a strong computer.
Thank you for sharing. I learn something new about Nostr everyday and it sounds full of possibilities and freedom, something other social media platform lack.
Its definitely far from done, there is a lot of development at the protocol and client level, a lot of experimentation, things being built like civkit. I think we will end up integrating other decentralized-ish protocols too, like keet.io and matrix. The apps can use nostr as the public "handshake", and then allow users to engage in content that isn't even on the relays themselves, like a p2p video chat or private DMs; that way we are keeping the load on relays down, but for the user its all a seamless experience built into the app.
We are also all connected to different relays too, I'm using the default relays for amethyst, damus has its own default relays. A lot of power users add extra relays, some are free and others are paid (for better speed etc.)
Yes, but it's the relay that should be blocked. Blocking nostr would be like blocking the internet.