PROTOCOLS, NOT PLATFORMS.

At the heart of Nostr's philosophy is user choice, a feature that fundamentally sets it apart from legacy platforms. In centralized systems, the user experience is dictated by a single person or governing entity. If the platform decides to filter, censor, or ban specific users or content, individuals are left with little action to rectify the situation. They must either accept the changes or abandon the platform entirely, often at the cost of losing their social connections, their data, and their identity.

What's happening with TikTok could never happen on Nostr. With Nostr, the dynamics are completely different. Because it is a protocol, not a platform, no single entity controls the ecosystem. Instead, the protocol enables a network of applications and relays that users can freely choose from. If a particular application or relay implements policies that a user disagrees with, such as censorship, filtering, or even government enforced banning, they are not trapped or abandoned. They have the freedom to move to another application or relay with minimal effort.

THIS IS POWERFUL.

Take, for example, the case of a relay that decides to censor specific content. On a legacy platform, this would result in frustration and a loss of access for users. On Nostr, however, users can simply connect to a different relay that does not impose such restrictions. Similarly, if an application introduces features or policies that users dislike, they can migrate to a different application that better suits their preferences, all while retaining their identity and social connections.

The same principles apply to government bans and censorship. A government can ban a specific application or even multiple applications, just as it can block one relay or several relays. China has implemented both tactics, yet Chinese users continue to exist and actively participate on Nostr, demonstrating Nostr's ability to resistant censorship.

How? Simply, it turns into a game of whack-a-mole. When one relay is censored, another quickly takes its place. When one application is banned, another emerges. Users can also bypass these obstacles by running their own relays and applications directly from their homes or personal devices, eliminating reliance on larger entities or organizations and ensuring continuous access.

AGAIN, THIS IS POWERUFL.

Nostr's open and decentralized design makes it resistant to the kinds of government intervention that led to TikTok's outages this weekend and potential future ban in the next 90 days. There is no central server to target, no company to regulate, and no single point of failure. (Insert your CEO jokes here). As long as there are individuals running relays and applications, users continue creating notes and sending zaps.

Platforms like TikTok can be silenced with the stroke of a pen, leaving millions of users disconnected and abandoned. Social communication should not be silenced so incredibly easily. No one should have that much power over social interactions.

Will we on-board a massive wave of TikTokers in the coming hours or days? I don't know.

TikTokers may not be ready for Nostr yet, and honestly, Nostr may not be ready for them either. The ecosystem still lacks the completely polished applications, tools, and services they’re accustomed to. This is where we say "we're still early". They may not be early adopters like the current Nostr user base. Until we bridge that gap, they’ll likely move to the next centralized platform, only to face another government ban or round of censorship in the future. But eventually, there will come a tipping point, a moment when they’ve had enough. When that time comes, I hope we’re prepared. If we’re not, we risk missing a tremendous opportunity to onboard people who genuinely need Nostr’s freedom.

Until then, to all of the Nostr developers out there, keep up the great work and keep building. Your hard work and determination is needed.

Quick review:
In the past two weeks, Nostr statistics indicate over 224,000 daily trusted pubkey events.The number of new users has seen a significant increase. Profiles with contact list amount is four times the amount from the same period. Public writing events have reflected a 50% increase. More than 9 million events have been published, with posts leading in volume at around 1.3 million, representing a significant 32% decrease. Total Zap activity stands at approximately 9 million, marking a 20% decline.

Additionally, 16 pull requests were submitted to the Nostr protocol, with 8 merged. A total of 45 Nostr projects were tracked, with 13 releasing product updates, and over 337 long-form articles were published, 34% focusing on Bitcoin and Nostr. During this period, 1 notable event took place, and 3 significant events are upcoming.

Nostr Statistics

Based on user activity, the total daily trusted pubkeys writing events is about 224,000, representing a slight 5.5% decrease compared to the previous period (8-22 Dec). Daily activity peaked at 18053 events, with a low of approximately 16276.

The number of new users has seen a significant increase. Profiles with contact list amount to approximately 18,340, which is four times the amount from the same period. Pubkeys writing events total around 80,000, reflecting a 50% increase compared to the same period.

Regarding event publishing, the total number of note events published is about 9 million, marking an increase of above 20%.Posts remain the most dominant in terms of volume, totaling approximately 1.3 million, reflecting a notable decrease of 32%. Reposts stand at around 327,000, showing a decline of approximately 8.5%, while reactions have experienced a significant increase, rising by 18% to reach 635,012.

For zap activity, the total zap amount is about 9 million, showing a decrease of over 20% compared to the previous period.

In terms of relay usage, the top five relays by user count are: wss://bostr.bitcointxoko.com/, wss://feeds.nostr.band/, wss://relays.diggoo.com/, wss://bostr.azzamo.net/, wss://bostr.lightningspore.com/

Data source: https://stats.nostr.band/

NIPs

Asset prices
Vitor Pamplona defines event kinds to host asset prices.Kind 31892 stores the latest conversion price. The d tag contains the commonly used ticket conversion symbol for the pair. The value tag contains the amount, parseable to a Decimal. n tags separate the pair into the two ticket symbols. The event's created_at field MUST be used as the date/time of the conversion value.Kind 10041 lists the user's authorized providers for pricing services. It contains s tags with the provider's pubkey and the relay where those events are stored.

nip-38: chained stories.
Kehiy defines a new status type which lets users share a chain of stories.This NIP enables a way for users to share live statuses such as what music they are listening to, as well as what they are currently doing: work, play, out of office, etc. A special event with kind:30315 “User Status” is defined as an optionally expiring addressable event, where the d tag represents the status type.The status MAY include an r, p, location, e or a tag linking to a URL, profile, location, note, or addressable event. The content MAY include emoji(s), or NIP-30 custom emoji(s). If the content is an empty string then the client should clear the status.Clients MAY display this next to the username on posts or profiles to provide live user status information.

adding x tag to nip56
Kehiy is proposing that with the growth of clients like zap stream, olas, chat apps, or music clients we have more stuff that may need to be reported. here we can support blobs. When Nostr grows in using media based clients, like zap.stream or olas or music clients, then the event itself is not too important and the media is more important. by reporting events, the media is still accessible. We can support reports ol medias like this.

NIP-91: Extension Negotiation
Semisol is proposing that NIP-91 adds an extension negotiation scheme for clients and relays to negotiate new protocols. The intended goal is to replace NIP-11 for the discovery of relay supported features. An extension feature negotiation scheme is also included.

Trusting rumors by entirely trusted relay list
nanikamado has decided to require Nostr users to register their pubkeys to access the bridge after discussions with some Fediverse users. Unregistered users will be denied both read and write access, operating similarly to a paid relay. In addition, measures will be implemented to prevent events within the bridge relay from being broadcast to other relays, even if it compromises compatibility. The "-" tag alone is insufficient for this requirement. This NIP has already been implemented on the relay: nanikamado/rockstr@f968149. There are also plans to fork a web client and implement this NIP there.

Notable Projects

Amethyst v0.94.3
Amethyst

• Adds iMeta tags to GIF urls
• Adds iMeta tags to GIF urls to optimize GIF previews
• Fixes the extra empty kind 20 post when uploading videos on the media tab
• Fix: Only close the upload screen if the video upload is a success on the Media tab
• Maintains note reaction visibility when scrolling by Giovanni

Flotilla 0.2.1
hodlbod

• Improve performance, as well as scrolling and loading
• Integrate
• Improve NIP 29 compatibility
• Fix incorrect connection errors
• Refine notifications
• Add room menu to space homepage
• Fix storage bugs
• Add join space CTA

Primal for Android build 2.0.34
primal
They now support the full highlighting feature set for long form notes: highlight display, select any text & highlight, comment on highlights, share highlights in your main feed. They also added btc/usd conversions in the wallet, as well as other small fixes and improvements.

0xchat App v1.4.5 & Desktop v1.0.1
nostr:npub1tm99pgz2lth724jeld6gzz6zv48zy6xp4n9xu5uqrwvx9km54qaqkkxn72

• Added support for NIP46 login.
• Adapted UI for tablet devices.
• Introduced connection ping status.
• Implemented search functionality for Moments.
• Set default relays for first login.
• Added default reaction emojis.
• Fixed an issue where messages couldn't be sent after joining a relay group.
• Resolved occasional UI flipping issues.
• Fixed an issue preventing images from being moved after zooming.
• Addressed a bug causing voice messages to get stuck in a loading state.
• Fixed file encryption and decryption issues.
• Corrected some typos.
• Fixed an issue with Nostr.build uploads.

Yakihonne Latest Update (iOS/Android/Web/Zap.Store)
YakiHonne

Web:

• Yakihonne is now multilingual! Enjoy the app in English and Chinese, with more languages coming soon, including Spanish, Portuguese, Thai, Arabic, Japanese, and Italian.
• Added support for translating notes and articles into the app's selected language.
• Copy-paste images to upload seamlessly across the app.
• Resolved issues with secure DMs when logging in using a private key.
• General bug fixes and improvements.
• Article drafts now can be cleared directly or the published one will no more be existed

Mobile:

• App languages: Yakihonne is now multilingual! Enjoy the app in English and Chinese, with more languages coming soon, including Spanish, Portuguese, Thai, Arabic, Japanese, and Italian.
• Translation: Added support for translating notes and articles into the app's selected language.
• Wallet balance: Fix issue where wallet balance is N/A.
• Account initialization: Fix issue when initializing account.
• Paying invoice: Fix issue sending sats using invoices.

Olas 0.1.7.1
PABLOF7z

• Works with remote signers like Amber (on nsecbunker mode).
• The video tab now plays short videos with sound on and stops playing when you swipe out
• Yet even more performance improvements
• Fixed a bug where Android wasn't calculating blurhashes
• Always adds image dimensions when posting so @Vitor Pamplona is happier.
• “Some” fixes on NWC wallets, but it's still quite buggy, will investigate more -- if you've received zaps on your Olas posts today, that was probably me zapping via NWC + remote signing those zaps.

Wherostr v1.3.3
Wherostr

• File Upload Error: Resolved the “404 Not Found” issue during file uploads.
• Increased Geohash Precision: Enhanced location accuracy by increasing geohash precision from 9 to 11.

DEG Mods
DEG Mods

• A small update went live:
• A “try again” button appears on mods that error out. (99% of the time this fixes the issue).
• The blog tab in a user's profile now loads correctly (doesn't get stuck anymore for new users)
• Text now appears if a game isn't found in the search
• Looking into fixing one newly discovered issue related to old mods
• Easier media uploads (drag and drop basically. No need to go find other sites to upload images to anymore)

AlbyHub 1.11.4
Alby

• You can use all the features of Alby Hub in self-custody with LND on Raspiblitz, now available in WebUI.

Zapstore 0.2.0
Zapstore

• 0.2.0 is out with support for signing in with Amber (NIP-55) and zaps via Nostr Wallet Connect.

Narr release v0.3.2
fiatjaf

• New Narr release v0.3.2 fixes all the problems with articles updating, insufficiently-rendered Markdown, Nostr usernames not loading, and makes everything better.
• It supports all sorts of RSS feed discovery from HTTP URLs and renders them beautifully in a simple straightforward interface, you can also paste nostr:... URIs, including nip05, npub and nprofile codes (they should also work without the nostr: prefix).

ZEUS v0.9.4
ZEUS

• Embedded Node: LND v0.18.4
• Speed up tx UX improvements
• CLNRest: display of destination addresses on txs
• Display keysend messages in Activity + Payment views
• Open Channel view: Connect Peer UI tabs
• CLNRest: paste connection strings
• Channels: sort by Close Height
• Optimizations + bug fixes

Citrine 0.6.0
Citrine

• Update dependencies
• Show notifications when importing, exporting, downloading events
• Change database functions to be suspending functions

Long-Form Content Eco

In the past two weeks, more than 337 long-form articles have been published, including over 93 articles on Bitcoin and more than 22 related to Nostr, accounting for 34% of the total content.

These articles about Nostr mainly explore its diverse applications and potential impacts across various domains. Topics range from technical guides like creating custom emojis and automating workflows, to cultural and social aspects, such as the Nostr Bread Festival and the role of Nostr in enhancing free speech. There are reflections on the past year's developments, predictions for 2025, and discussions on integrating Nostr with other platforms like Bluesky. The content also delves into personal experiences, community interactions, and broader societal issues, highlighting Nostr's growing influence and the creative ways users are engaging with this decentralized network.

The Bitcoin articles discuss a wide range of topics, from technological innovations to socio-economic impacts. They cover the speed advantages of the Lightning Network, the economic model policies of Bitcoin, and the outlook for Bitcoin's development in 2024. Some articles analyze the relationship between Bitcoin and traditional financial markets like the Nikkei 225, highlighting the potential of a decentralized future and the spread of Bitcoin education. Additionally, they explore the possibility of Bitcoin as a legal tender, its connection to religious and spiritual dimensions, and the mystery surrounding Satoshi Nakamoto's identity. Reflections on Bitcoin's milestones, such as the release of the genesis block, emphasize its challenge and revolution to the modern financial system. Overall, these articles showcase Bitcoin's profound global impact and its continually evolving ecosystem.

Thankyou, TheWildHustle asyncmind Nightmare Harazono Ksenia Crypto Airdrops Ambadi John Bitcoin Txoko Shigeru Minami
and others, for your work. Enriching Nostr’s long-form content ecosystem is crucial.

Nostriches Global Meet Ups

Recently, a Nostr event have been hosted.

• The Bitcoin Meetup took place on December 29, 2024, at the “Accra City Pub” in Jamestown. The event featured the “Orange Pilling” session at 3:00 PM, followed by the GH Bitcoin NYTZ meetup at 7:00 PM. Participants also had the chance to win a free Trezor Safe 3 hardware wallet, and the event was free to attend.

Here are the upcoming Nostr events in November that you might want to check out.

• The Bitcoin City Team Hackathon will take place online (via Discord) from January 10 to January 31, 2025. This event aims to develop a fun and interactive visualization of live Bitcoin and Lightning transactions. Participating teams will have the opportunity to win a total prize of 10,000,000 IDR.
  nostr:npub1y4qd2zhtn05gnsaaq5xfejzfk4a32638tx6gpp9g8k6e42g9d66qaxhcr3

• The inaugural Bitcoin Circular Economy Summit will be held from January 27th to 29th in El Zonte, El Salvador! This three-day event includes leadership training, Bitcoin education, and exchanges with over 15 global Bitcoin circular economies. It offers a unique opportunity for global leaders in Bitcoin adoption and economic development to connect, learn, and collaborate. This summit precedes the PlanB Forum, taking place on January 30th-31st in San Salvador, making it an excellent chance to network with Bitcoin users worldwide.

• The Bitcoin Freedom Festival will take place from February 20 to 24, 2025, at the Awakening Center in Uvita, Costa Rica. In collaboration with the Awake Earth Festival, this event blends a music festival with Bitcoin seminars and lectures. From February 20 to 23, the focus will be on music, healing workshops, ceremonies, and educational talks, featuring internationally renowned artists and captivating discussions. February 24 will be a special day dedicated to Bitcoin, with all activities centered around it.
  Bitcoin Jungle

Additionally, We warmly invite event organizers who have held recent activities to reach out to us so we can work together to promote the prosperity and development of the Nostr ecosystem.

Thanks for reading! If there’s anything I missed, feel free to reach out and help improve the completeness and accuracy of my coverage.

Notwithstanding the lack of capitalisation, Nostr is an acronym for Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays. According to the website of its creator, Nostr was created in response to perceived issues with Twitter.

It’s important to be clear that Nostr is not an app or service that you sign up for. Rather it can be better understood as an open standard for social media that anyone can use. A useful analogy is the SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) used for email. You probably know how this works:

1. You write your email using Gmail, Outlook, or whichever email client you prefer.
2. Your message travels through various email servers.
3. The recipient can read it using any email client they choose.

Nostr works similarly:

1. You write your note in an Nostr client (like Damus, Primal, and many others).
2. Your note travels through Nostr relays (similar to email servers).
3. Others can read it using whichever Nostr client they prefer.

The use of a standard protocol enables interoperability, allowing users to choose their preferred software. No single company controls the system.

Isn’t Mastodon a decentralised social media platform? Why do we need another one?

While Nostr and Mastodon both enable decentralised socially communication, they take fundamentally different approaches. The comparison made above equating Nostr relays with email servers is actually imperfect and better describes the approach Mastodon takes. Mastodon does rely on servers run by organisations or individuals where users create accounts. Your identity is tied to your chosen server, similar to having a Gmail address. This means you are still at the mercy of the entity running the server.

Nostr, in contrast, removes the need for servers entirely. Your identity is a cryptographic key pair, which works directly with any compatible client or relay. This key pair is mathematically linked. One is a private key (which is kept secret, like a password) and the other is a public key (which you share freely, like an email address). This enables the impressive ability to use different clients with the same identity without the need for accounts. The downside is that the onus is users to safeguard their key pairs. There is no Nostr tech support to help with a lost private key!

Nostr aligns with library values

From a librarian’s perspective, there is a lot to like about Nostr. There is no central algorithm that controls what content is shown to you. Individual relays can choose what they show, but users can connect to other relays. The diversity of relays effectively prevents single-point censorship, as there is no central authority that can remove content from the entire network. Again, more is demanded from the user in terms of selecting which relays to connect to, but this aligns with the long-held value of librarians of developing information literate citizens capable of making such choices on their own. In an age of information overload, we need to trust people to select their own sources wisely rather than rely on centralised content moderation. Nostr protects freedom of speech at the protocol level, ensuring that no central authority can arbitrarily block content from being posted.

Nostr also scores highly on privacy. No personal information is needed to generate a private-public key pair. This obviously aligns with librarianship’s historical role in championing patron privacy as a cornerstone of intellectual freedom. The lack of a centralised authority allows users to access information with reduced risk of surveillance.

Information preservation is another library value that Nostr is better aligned with compared to centralised social media platforms. A lot of historically and culturally significant content has been posted to social media, and there is a need to preserve it and make it available for future research. However, it is doubtful that for-profit social media companies will prioritise this. The biggest advance in this respect came in 2010, when the Library of Congress announced with great fanfare that it would archive all public tweets. But in the face of various challenges, the project was scaled back in 2017. I could find no further updates from the LoC, and given the current ownership of Twitter/X I think it unlikely that much progress will be made. The centralised nature of traditional social media means that preservation is the hands of a single entity.

Contrast this with Nostr’s architecture that requires multiple relays and hence multiple copies of data. This creates resilience in a way that librarians will be familiar with (“Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe”). Libraries could potentially choose to create their own relays and preserve notes that are relevant to their own collection development policies. Again, the open nature of the protocol means that they would not have to seek permission to do this.

In essence, Nostr's decentralized architecture naturally aligns with core library values of intellectual freedom, privacy, and preservation, potentially providing a pathway to a truly open digital commons. Librarians and information professionals could play a pivotal role in shaping this online public square.

Getting started with Nostr

I am cautious of getting too carried away with the potential of Nostr. It currently has very few users for a social network. At the time of writing, the stats page of Nostr.Band showed the number of daily active users hovering below 20,000. This is a tiny fraction of the 245 million daily active users of Twitter/X. Given the importance of the network effect to social media, Nostr has a long way to go before it becomes a true competitor.

However, it is not inconceivable, and I would argue that the alignment of the Nostr architecture with our values makes it important for librarians to engage with and understand this technology. The best possible outcome would be a truly decentralised, censorship-resistant, online social space on top of which anyone could build apps and services. In such a world, individual citizens will need to be much more information literate and independent. As information professionals, librarians could play a leading role in adopting and advocating for this.

Nostr clients

The best way to get started is to download a client. As mentioned, there are many Nostr clients to choose from. Some offer additional features for subscribers. Try out a few to see which one you prefer and remember that you can use all of them with the same key pair!

• Primal (Web, iOS, and Android)
• Amethyst (Android)
• Damus (iOS)
• Nostur (iOS)

Recommended longer read

Exploring the Nostr Ecosystem: A Study of Decentralization and Resilience: This pre-print on arxiv.org provides a more technical introduction to Nostr. The Nostr primer that starts on page 4 is particularly helpful for new users.