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techfeudalist
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Blessed by tech; working to bring the benefits to everyone. Freedom, incorruptible money, privacy.

I’m pretty scared of on-chain covenants because of the risk that they promote mining centralization.

To me, covenants are perfectly fine on L2s like Liquid, but not on the main L1.

Replying to Avatar Shawn

nostr:npub18m76awca3y37hkvuneavuw6pjj4525fw90necxmadrvjg0sdy6qsngq955 feature request: when I back out of a thread, return me to my previous position in the feed, not to the top. nostr:npub1zafcms4xya5ap9zr7xxr0jlrtrattwlesytn2s42030lzu0dwlzqpd26k5 🙏🏻

+ When I’m editing a note, tapping return can jump me to the bottom of the note even when I’m editing the middle of the content. To replicate, tap return at the bottom of a paragraph that is not the last.

+ enable long-press to download a video (like primal). This works for images but not video.

My longtime prediction is that eventually AI created fanfic would be better than the originals.

Who knows how long it will take but we’re definitely on the path.

https://youtu.be/Kf4kqybpkdI

Replying to Avatar Carsten Keutmann

You’re absolutely right—using a social network for filtering content is a simple and effective solution. You follow people because you like their posts, and in a way, that’s a form of indirect trust. Plus, the functionality’s already there in most cases, and I know clients like iris.to used to do it. It works for now, no doubt.

But here’s the thing: while it’s great for quickly filtering out bots and randoms, it’s not perfect. The follow system is more about content preference than actual trust. Just because you follow someone for their spicy memes doesn’t mean you’d trust them with, say, medical advice or fact-checking. And that’s where it falls short—it doesn’t allow for a reputation system or any sort of "fact-checking" style rating on posts. It’s like giving every post the same level of credibility just because you follow the person, even if it’s not all equal.

In a Web of Trust, new users (and bots) with zero reputation aren’t automatically filtered out—they're visible at first. But here’s the catch: bots will quickly be marked as untrustworthy by just a few people, and then they’ll be filtered for everyone else in the network. It’s like crowdsourced spam control—once a bot is flagged, it’s as good as invisible to the rest of us.

To add another layer of protection, relay servers could require proof of work before accepting posts from new accounts, enforce rules like rate limits on IP, etc., making it harder for them to endlessly spam.

As for bots that trust each other—well, that’s not really a problem. In a Web of Trust, it’s not about the size of the network; it’s about who you trust. So, if bots are busy trusting each other, it doesn’t affect your network unless someone in your network starts trusting them. And since no one in your network is likely to trust a bot, those fake trust loops don’t impact you at all.

“The follow system is more about content preference than actual trust. Just because you follow someone for their spicy memes doesn’t mean you’d trust them with, say, medical advice or fact-checking.”

Yes, I’m talking about content preference and not “trust” where people would rank their medical, legal or stock picking knowledge in a separate score.

I’m viewing nostr through the simple lens of spam vs not spam. Perhaps in the future a ranking of medical professionals would be useful and perhaps we’ll see that in another nostr app.

One interesting outcome of this model is that it’s a new way for nostr influencers to make more money.

Influencers with large number of followers could be paid to review and follow new accounts.

For example, a new user could DM zap an influencer and ask for a follow. The influencer could review their profile and decide whether to follow. If they do follow, then the new user enters the trust graph for all the influencer’s followers.

If they start spamming and get unfollowed, then they would lose visibility.

Who knows? maybe we’ll see apps make this part of the onboarding flow for new users. Getting a nostr “mentor” is helpful in many ways. nostr:note1gaut89kukvy94l4kv0692twdzm3xqqnc7m9revp06xc9vx0h6c8sr52mnx

Yes, we’ll need some significant cost for new users (which could be proof of bitcoin paid or owned, or proof of work in creating an account or for posting a message). — or maybe some or all of the above for extra options.

I don’t view this as a “social” network of friends or family members, to me, it’s a content network. I follow people because of the content they post.

I already indirectly “trust” this content because the people I follow can already repost to me.

So yes, I trust their choice of content because I follow them.

The system you’re proposing seems to have a few issues:

First, if a new user has 0 trust, they are not shown to anyone. If they were shown with a zero score then so would spammers.

Second, any bot with low trust can just create a new npub and return their trust score to 0 so that they can keep spamming.

Third, it’s not clear if your system has a way to avoid Sybil attacks where bots “trust” each other and that fake trust boosts their overall trust.

This is the way👇

We’re also going to need a way for new users to get into the trust graph because all new users look like spammers and will automatically be blocked. nostr:note1gaut89kukvy94l4kv0692twdzm3xqqnc7m9revp06xc9vx0h6c8sr52mnx

I’m personally bullish on the trust graph because I don’t follow just anyone and I assume the people they follow are similarly high signal. If a spammer did get through you could just mute them. It would be difficult for a spammer to rejoin the graph unless they had a collaborator among the people in my graph (and I should be able to see who it was who let them in so I could unfollow them).

Pattern matching is a game of wack a mole. The spammers are already evolving. Eventually this will be AI spam on a freshly minted npub. It will look like any new user. Nostr apps will either be forced to block new users or implement something radical.

Solutions are:

1) trust graph (accounts followed by people i follow and they people they follow, all the way up)

2) some significant cost for new users (which could be proof of bitcoin paid or owned, or proof of work in creating an account or for posting a message) nostr:note1zfhwgmkwtx48jtmzyrs9jaq82tm58grp45slxcvlc2n5atq8u07s80cdwx

Hmmm, not sure if you realize that bcash is already horribly centralized. This is what we’re trying to avoid with bitcoin.

Also, there is no risk to OP_CAT on Liquid because it doesn’t have mining like bitcoin.

The problem with enabling OP_CAT on the bitcoin timechain is that it can create arbitrage opportunities which can encourage miner centralization.

Here’s how:

CAT can enable on chain atomic swaps.

https://bitcoin-takeover.com/andrew-poelstra-bitcoin-covenants-op_cat-vs-op_ctv/

On chain atomic swaps can be used to create securities marketplaces (eg Uniswap on Ethereum)

https://www.gemini.com/cryptopedia/what-is-an-atomic-swap-token-swap

Unswap-like exchanges create the potential for centralizing MEV by allowing speculators to bribe miners to reorder transactions so the speculators can jump the queue.

https://medium.com/flashbots/frontrunning-the-mev-crisis-40629a613752

Smart contracts, arbitrary code execution, etc are fine if they’re off-chain. But if when they are used on-chain, then the they can harm bitcoin’s decentralization.

Devs who want to use OP_CAT should just use it on Liquid. No need to take unnecessary risks with bitcoin.

The explanation here on why OP_CAT was disabled is misleading. It wasn’t “developers” it was Satoshi. And nobody knows why Satoshi disabled it, because he never said.

Advocates of OP_CAT want us to believe that it’s safe. Notice that they never address the real risk - that the feature causes miners to become more centralized from MEV.

Maybe Satoshi noticed the risk to miners. Nobody knows. Regardless, OP_CAT is dangerous and unnecessary.

Explain the process step by step please so a dev could implement it into their nostr client.