I honestly think that the system you just described is close (in spirit at least) to the original American idea. The entire concept was a federal government that protected the borders and handled disputes between states.

Everything else was “left to the states.” Granted, people living in those states voted and enacted laws that applied to everyone, but governments handled much less, meddled much less, and the culture and values were much more homogeneous (along with population being much smaller).

It puts me in mind of a point from Montesquieu:

“It is in the nature of a republic to have only a small territory; otherwise, it can scarcely continue to exist. In a large republic, there are large fortunes, and consequently little moderation in spirits: the depositories are too large to put in the hands of a citizen; interests become particularised; at first a man feels he can be happy, great, and glorious without his homeland; and soon, that he can be great only on the ruins of his homeland.

In a large republic, the common good is sacrificed to a thousand considerations; it is subordinated to exceptions; it depends upon accidents. In a small one, the public good is better felt, better known, lies nearer to each citizen; abuses are less extensive there and consequently less protected.”

I am also put in mind of Franklin’s first fire department, and library.

I certainly don’t disagree on the need to reduce and decentralize government - I think my difference with anarchists then is an issue of scale. I don’t believe man left entirely to his own devices will live peacefully (indeed I believe we would devolve into tribal warfare, and a might makes right attitude) but I agree that the current state of government is both too large to represent the best interests of any citizen, and far to powerful to prevent becoming abusive to the natural rights and freedoms of humankind.

Thank you for the education on some points on anarchism. I feel less put off by the word now, and see some common ground.

One thing I’ll say about Apple, they don’t like janky features. Siri has been a bit of a black eye for years now. I don’t think they want a repeat.

I agree with you. I think it’s been the plan all along.

I’m going to try to restate what you said in simpler terms and ask you to correct me if I’m wrong.

What I heard was small democratic governments with freedom of travel.

There are entire neighborhoods where cops won’t even go. I live within a short drive of a couple. This is why even though American founders like Paine agreed government was evil, they knew that some government was necessary.

“Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one: for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built upon the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him, out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expense and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.”

Thomas Paine

Common Sense

So how will we deal with the gangs that already operate entire neighborhoods?

Anyone who believes that will work has never interacted with organized crime groups or extortion schemes.

I had this feeling they were biding their time until they could do it at a level they found acceptable. Hopefully they won’t self-nerf it too much.

I have my own triggers. I understand. 🫂

Hard to capture everything in a post, even one that long. 🤣

I use CloudFlare. They offer free proxy on dns entries.

I didn’t explain it all in this post. I’m a compartmentalizer. I choose what to leave in the open, for convenience, and what to hide. I also believe that those who take their privacy much more seriously are already under extra scrutiny from the fed.

I’m aware of the sociological concept that individuals are rather unpredictable, but large masses are very predictable. I’m not underestimating the influence of large companies data collection efforts. I’m also not concerned with them knowing what flavors I like.

I have the tools, and I know at a decent level how to use them. When I want to keep something private, I run a vpn, use a Firefox instance with privacy badger, ublock, and all the Mozilla spyware turned off. I’ve got tor browser setup if it’s that serious, and to test my relay’s onion service.

That’s my personal choice, and it’s informed, suited to my threat profile, and works for me.

Might want to mention a dns provider that can proxy so home ip isn’t revealed.

I know who I use, but I’m not trying to start too many fights tonight. 🤣

Very much. We’re bro/sis so we can just beat on one another when we disagree. 🤣

Sometimes a good reboot is what it takes. 🤷

I’ll plug a friend’s repo here. They’ve been getting together a list of known relay ops committed to providing an onion address.

https://github.com/0xtrr/onion-service-nostr-relays

If you catch yourself agreeing with your friends for a while, it never hurts to do a check and make sure you’re still thinking critically.

I switched back to iOS. What you talking about bruv?

💯

Yeah, it seems like bad form from someone with the reputation and following he has. If he had been following events here at all, he’d know everyone has had a recent reminder.

I don’t need total privacy from Nostr.

What I need is to control who I trust.

Media embedding is the weakest point of this, and I’ve been saying it for almost a year. Now everyone knows.

Wishlist:

A client that:

- only connects to the relays on my list

- only fetches previews from urls I whitelist

If I had both of those things, the latest IP bot would have been a non-issue for me, because I can choose to trust Damus relay, and Nostr.band without being forced to trust every asshole with a nginx instance spun up - all while maintaining 99% of the convenience and features (like pictures in my feed) I have now.

Yep. I’d bet money those signed messages will hold up in court too. Anonymity and privacy is not the same. And anonymity can be fragile.