we just talked about how we should focus on geeks and push the notion of normies further, and now we are trying to brand a protocol
why?
Discussion
Because it can be useful to know that the new app your are looking at can be used with the same Nostr account you already have and probably play nice with other apps you are using. This improve the network effect.
Think about it like a "powered by".
what's the demographic here?
techies will care about the protocol itself, not the branding
full-on normies won't even know what a protocol is nor how it works, and will just use the client
or am i being too harsh here? 🤔
bitcoin has a symbol, i think that at some point we will come up with a compelling symbol for nostr, i have no idea what that is but probably someone's gonna spit out some good ones very soon, the heat is getting hot in here... like a sauna
Let me explain what I mean with an example.
You visit a new website, you can have 2 scenarios:
1) Register with email, password
2) Login in with Nostr
For a Nostr user, do you think they have the same appeal? The 2 has less friction, so higher conversion.
For a non Nostr user, see the same logo in several contexts reinforce the idea that this "thing" is sometime valuable, so push to try/learn more about it.
Login with google has the G or Gmail logo.
Login with FB has the FB logo.
nostr:npub1t3ggcd843pnwcu6p4tcsesd02t5jx2aelpvusypu5hk0925nhauqjjl5g4 email protocol had not one, but two recognizable icons: ✉️ and @
A recognizable brand helps nostr in my view.
oh, google's an even better example here, true 🤔💜
yeah, but tell me about the branding of POP, IMAP and SMTP here then
If you don’t want most people to know your protocol, you have 💩 branding like POP, IMAP, SMTP.
Tor has a favorable and known consumer brand, at least among the nerds, and privacy conscious. They also have characters and art in a similar theme - we dont have to bury the nostrich just yet. 
hmm, that tor one is cool indeed
but i don't really know much things built on tor protocol other than tor browser
and i only know of it because the name of the browser is the same as the protocol
like we used to familiarise ourselves with internet through internet explorer
It’s an interesting debate/challenge. I personally think if there’s going to be a logo/icon it should highlight the key pairs in some graphical way.
Iris messenger, and robosats can run on Tor. Relays can run on tor. You can run a node on the network.
Think of nostr as your garden soil.
In there you can plant beautiful roses, fast growing vines, and throw in some compost.
If you do it right you’ll have complementing each other trees, and shrubs with bees that ensure cross polination. The ecosystem depends on a good soil.
i think that the nostr protocol would benefit from being repackaged and presented much more nicely to even start thinking of having such a brand kit, but maybe i'm living in my delulu land
i do agree with you down the line, it's just that it needs to come naturally
Exactly, however it helps if is a neutral, but distinctive, graphic sign
do you think Facebook/Instagram/WhatsApp users how the Meta account behind the scenes works and is set up? 🤔
closest to a legacy social media analogy i know to bring here
also is there necessity for "login with nostr" when nsec could eventually become as essential as your personal id code, which you could login with
"login with nsec"
I’ve actually been thinking on it for a while, and was going to do a bit of a longer write up on this:
I think going forward Nostr will flourish as a “login” like Google, Apple, etc. Normies won’t care how Nostr works, but it can replace log in with Google and have more benefits than a Google account offers due to the shared social graph.
Clients will become the “websites” and needs will become login details. At least that’s the way I see it. The nostr protocol will fall in to the background in the same way that no one really knows how email works, other than you can access it from multiple mail clients if you can log in
I’d love to hear other people’s thought on this
Google/Facebook/etc users well know that they can use the "Login with...", and spot them immediatly because the button is graphically recognizable and tied with the company name. No need to know all the tech background.
Given that "Login with nsec" is bad on all the web contexts, and maybe also for apps in the future (we will have signer for that), why add another brand when we have "Nostr"? It only dilutes the effectiveness.
Nostr is both a protocol and a social/functional layer, you need to know that it exists, you cannot hide it.