I want to make something like this happen for my community, I am currently too stupid to understand it all. But with persistence I have faith I will get there πŸ₯°
fiatjaf's avatar fiatjaf
Maybe the way Nostr can get more people is by making it a good choice for semi-closed hyperlocal mini-social-networks, like a low-effort impromptu social network for a neighborhood, a church, a school, a company, I don't know. People could join this just because they have to if they want to get news about their community and stuff like that. They won't regard it as a global social network, they will keep using X, Instagram etc, this will just be an annoying app they're forced to use. How to make it work: Some conscientious member of such community would set things up, spin up a #pyramid relay or something like that that would provide an exclusive space for this community. Then he would use a client that supported such mode of operation to send invites to other members. Upon receiving the invite (the invite can just be specific for that client, no need for a standard here) new users would have an account created for them and be thrown into a prepared environment in which the only feed would be that relay's feed, search would be scoped to that relay, replies and mentions would only be sourced from that relay. There will be no spam, no Bitcoin, no bots. Luckily it's easy to turn an existing kind 1 client into a client that supports this mode of operation (some are already almost there), so if you're a developer reading this here are some ideas to consider implementing: - making relay usage highly configurable (allow users to be set up to only read mentions from their "read" relays ever, only publish to "write", only search for specially designated "search" relays etc -- this could be optional); - supporting relay feeds alongside the classic "following" feed; - hiding the "following" feed entirely if the user doesn't follow anyone (or having an option to hide that regardless); - maybe allowing other customizations, like changing the UI colors and whatnot; - supporting an invite flow that allows some community leader to prepare the invites and then sets up all of this stuff automatically for people who get the invite.
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The big issue is people just need to be able to download an app from the App Store. That app can run on nostr but it can’t be anymore complicated than that.
Alan's avatar
Alan 1 month ago
I'm not convinced it is a complication issue 100%. They trust the app store. In my last interaction, they uninstalled the app that came from zapstore but kept the equivalent app from the play store. They are like little scardy cats running around.
I really appreciate that Dawn, thank you πŸ™ Right now my group is new enough that I'm focusing on building trust by reviving the local time bank which was well loved but like many things didn't survive the pandemic. We're also getting Heltec radios and establishing a mesh communication network. It's my hope that once they see we can make cool things happen in ways that they can already wrap their heads around, then they'll be more open to decentralized internet solutions. Hopefully by Q3 2026 if all goes well. Then after that ... I'll start talking to them about Bitcoin and hopefully they won't roll their eyes and boo πŸ˜‚
Awesome! The offer stands for whenever you're ready. I'm more than happy to set aside some time in assisting with the basics.
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