The opaqueness of relay selection is a major problem. Even if information about a relay is available, it's not easy to find, and if you think it is then you are not thinking like a normie. It's also unknown whether relays are behaving the way they claim to be.

Each time I release gossip I run a complicated process involving 3 different programs in order to find and rank open relays that could be suggested to people starting a new nostr account. These relays don't say in their NIP-11 "I'm open to new users". I have to run tests against them, post as a new pubkey, then see if I can read back that post. I added something like this inside of gossip, but gossip is not user friendly and IMHO I'd rather direct users to NAM and have one app where all that effort was focused.

a million percent true - Onboarding - Key storage and backup - Cross platform signer + bunker if you don't want to install it everywhere - Profile + relay manager - Profile health check (do your lud16/06 contradict? Do you have DM relays? Do your relay selections make sense?) - App store (not sure how this should look — maybe just something like nostrapps.com) - Event backup - Notifications (pokey) Just all the stuff that clients do poorly or not at all now

NIP-05 setup (guide them through it) and explain why they might not want one

I'm hoping this is what I can make NVault into. But more for companies to manage their accounts, employees and communication.

Oh yeah, and a custodial lightning wallet

Since nvault already manages user's keys, and relay choices (because it supports nip07) I have a button user's can download their nip05 json file (in the future can just host it for them)

I've thought about this, focused on keys, perhaps also a built-in available local relay that syncs with contacts, and basic kind 1 note viewing/browser with or without a key loaded (read-only like an rss reader), with a focus on accessibility and simplicity. Optimized for mobile, tablet, desktop and server environments and for use with hardware signers. Plugins or apps could be added to expand functionality to different types of notes from git collaboration, audio/video channels to custom LLM based feeds.

it is already turning into another super app

it is already turning into another super app

Yeah 😣

And then you translate it into vietnamese and call it...#vietNAM

Yup, could be described as such, as could a web browser. I don't think a "super app" is a problem, it's not a centralization factor of ownership, quite the opposite.

Here's my untechnical view, thinking of grandma (my mom): if her presence and those like her and others with low interest in what's under the hood, relays are going to have to go underground. Hidden. Out of the way. It's the (or one of the) barriers to onboarding most people.

No it is not centralization as long as there were others that were also good. But I think it is better to focus in more because with a narrower focus you can get higher quality.

wouldn't that present a single point of failure ( centralization ) ?

It depends. @fiatjaf made a push for making relays front-and-center and insisted that this needed to be nostr direction and paid out bounties for things like 'seen on' information. IMHO for general microblogging relays are invisible. For DMs too. Nobody cares about the relays when you are just conversing deep down in some thread. But for other apps (relay-centric chat, browing relay-specific feeds) the relays have to be known to the user. This is like a web browser: the URL is not invisible, the user goes to the URL they want to see. So it very much depends on the nostr app in question. In the context of this thread though, relays cannot be invisible. People have to choose their relays, often making decisions like "should I pay for service here", "is this relay reputable", "what does my son recomend as the best relay".

I'm imagining a web app. You can install a copy locally. It could be running on multiple websites. And there would be alternate ways to do the same things. There would be no data in this... all the data would be on nostr (with a tiny bit in your signer of choice).

Yup, am thinking general.

That'd be great to have.