So the clients are irrelevant, only the protocol matters. Like tcp or http
Discussion
Of course not, who the hell said that?
Clients need to be great to make people want to use them to get people on nostr in the first place.
But if the identity and “ensuring people are who they say they are” isn’t done right or made easy and secure, the net benefits won’t be nearly as valuable imo
So success requires both clients and relays supporting all of the protocol. As for user identity, that won’t happen.