There might be more effort going into making bitcoin usable by agents than by humans.

And another Arké release is up on TestFlight: - Many improvements to force moves (unilateral exits) - Tag and contact editor revision - Settings - reorder and new Notification and Address Pattern views - X-ray iteration (remove balance, change VTXO list to graph) - Use real fee rates - Minor revision of the intro videos

If you like 10-minute walkthroughs of unilateral exit user experiences, then this one is for you.

Not really sure if it's a good idea to add stablecoins to bitcoin wallets. They drag in so much complexity that it may actually be more practical to have separate, lean & dedicated apps.

A nice thing about the Live Activity for unilateral exits in Arké, is that they show up on your watch, too. Left is a mock-up of the Live Activity on the phone, and right is a photo from signet exit testing over the weekend. Trying to make this a calm and convenient experience.

The X-Ray view, which allows more seasoned users to look at their VTXOs and other under-the-hood stuff is getting a bar graph visual. You can quickly see your VTXO structure and how long until refresh/expiry.

Arké defaults to mainnet these days, but creating a signet wallet is simple. Tap the test tubes on the cover screen. The background video switches to show the fancy lab guy. And creating a wallet will get you a signet one. The built-in signet faucet gets you some test sats right away. Everything else is pretty much the same as mainnet.

Adding and editing basic contact info is also getting a revision in Arké. Now back to testing and refining unilateral exits.

Adding and editing tags will be a bit nicer in the next Arké release. The old version was essentially AI slop.

Interesting to see some tense conversation around Ark, Spark, Liquid, etc and different defenses of tech choices. Tough discussion, because there are so many facets. From basic architecture to protocol dynamics and then protocol and library/SDK implementation, to infrastructure operations and end-user apps. And the project background matters, too, where a heavily-funded commercial entity will have different dynamics and incentives than a lean open-source focused startup, and those show up in various decisions. Things are not clear cut, but that's how it is with many things.

Arké has had unilateral exits (called forced moves) for some time. I am currently refining the experience and tinkering with this feature video intro to better communicate how it works. What do you think?

"All design is a quarrel between two impulses: the wild idea and the cold edit. Unleash the wild, and you get baroque chaos. Lean too far toward cold, and you get vanilla or gray."

An experimental promo video for Arké about how bitcoin is a bit like a public park. Working on the app is fun, but man do I sometimes need creative side quests when Claude rattles on and on.

A new version of Arké is now up on TestFlight. Here are the changes, with the first two being the biggest ones: - Better fee estimation for lightning payments (including send all). - More precise refresh notification scheduling. - Change inline address expansion in receive to a sheet format. - Add option to export debug logs (thank you Duncan). - Make first use experience accessible. - X-Ray view iteration (single reload button, more usable VTXO refresh options…). - Dismiss wallet deletion view once deletion is complete. - Fix tag rendering after import. - Fix initial rendering and empty state of fee summary view. - Fix localization issues in devices screen. It's quite a diverse mix of things, many of them stemming from feedback and conversations. Please keep them coming, no matter how big or small.

A few Arké users have reported a balance that has been stuck in pending for a few days. Here's how you can get it unstuck (the underlying issue is already fixed and this should not happen anymore). In your balance details view, you'll see a timer that reads something like "Next round in 12m". Keep the app active until that point in time, and maybe give it another few minutes extra. That should fix it. If it doesn't reach out. Thanks to everyone for testing and helping make the app more solid.

Pretty sure social media bans wouldn't have come up if social media companies had taken more responsibility in protecting minors. Simple stuff like not letting kids be contacted by random adults, muting push notifications at night or during school hours, private accounts by default, removing engagement-maximizing mechanics, etc. When parents and teachers constantly fight against this stuff at home and in school, of course there's a strong counter-reaction at some point. Let's not let those companies off the hook easily.

Updated some pages on the Arké website:

Roadmap

Where Arké is, and is going.

How Arké works

A bitcoin wallet focused on instant, low-fee payments.

How Arké works, technically

Architecture, trust model, key management, and tradeoffs for the Ark protocol implementation in Arké.

Better, not perfect.

Some notes from the bark and Arké mainnet launches last week, along with first feedback on the app. It's been exciting.

Toot

that hórn.

Would be nice if bitcoin conferences did not put pseudoscience and conspiracy peddlers on the big stages. How about a dedicated BS stage?

Bark and Arké are now on mainnet. I consider Arké still in public beta. Focus now is on stability, reliability and interoperability. If you try it out, let me know what you think.

Second blog

Introducing Noah and Arké: Two new Bark-based wallets

We're immensely fortunate and grateful to have had the support of great bitcoin builders even before we launched. They've been building wallet apps...