@ 9fec72d5:f77f85b1

Each relay selects a branch from above and starts serving.

Some big machines in the top layers can handle more. Smaller machines in layers below are needed for decentralization and scalability.

Some top layer machines can act in sync only mode, efficiently distributing notes among layers.

Relay or the admin posts a special kind for advertisement of the relay:

```

{ "pubkey": "...pubkey of admin or the relay itself..", "kind": 30202, "tags": [ ["d","..10"], ["ip4","111.222.33.44:443","primary"], ["ip6","abc:def::443","backup"], ], ... } ```

The above example says this relay will handle the note id's that are ending with bits ..10. In this case it is going to handle about 1/4th of the network.

Primary way of reaching at this relay is through ip 111.222.33.44. There is also a backup server.

Clients can accept this advertisement based on web of trust or historical reliability of the npub. Or other npubs can measure the reliability of this relay and send reactions to this note. Clients then can see these reactions and rank these services.

Solves: - Possible future DNS ban issues: I don't know when or if DNS will be an issue for Nostr. The above design can help with the situation.

• Scalability: If 1 million users join the network at the same time, the machines that are handling ".." i.e. all of the traffic may fail. But if the clients are using relays on other layers, the load will be efficiently distributed to many machines. The failure of layer 0 and 1 will not stop the network. Every layer can operate independently without the other layers (in theory).

• Traffic efficiency: A client has to query many relays, depending on what it wants to do. It may choose to stay efficient (talk to top layers) on mobile traffic, or it may choose to help decentralization over wifi. The notes that match the queries will not be repeated as many times as current design, because relays will hold a portion of the network.

• Storage efficiency: Relay operators can just save a part of the network that they are responsible for, on NVME drives. The rest of the network they can save in hard drives. In case of major failure the hard drives can still have a copy.

• Speed: Since the notes will come from many different relays at the same time, there may be a slight speed increase.

• Decentralization: If the top layer relays collude and start banning the other layers can still continue to serve notes.

• Backup relay: In case a relay instance fails, users can find the backup server on the same note.

• Zero down time migration: The ability to define a backup server allows zero down time migrations. An operator can set the primary to the new server and backup to the old server and do migration and continue without interruption.

• Efficient sync among servers: A relay has to sync with 3 servers, 1 above, 2 below. But it can do 6 or 9 depending on how much reliability it wants.

• Writing to logN relays: Clients has to write to logN relays (i.e. 1 relay in each layer), to effectively distribute their notes to everyone and also to help with decentralization.

@ 0176967e:1e6f471e

Tento rok vás čaká workshop na tému "oranžové leto" s Jurajom Bednárom a Mariannou Sádeckou. Dozviete sa ako mení naše vnímanie skúsenosť s Bitcoinom, ako sa navigovať v dnešnom svete a odstrániť mentálnu hmlu spôsobenú fiat životom.

Na workshop je potrebný extra lístok (môžete si ho dokúpiť aj na mieste).

Pre viac informácií o oranžovom lete odporúčame pred workshopom vypočuťi si podcast na túto tému.

@ 58537364:705b4b85

ปะภัสสะรามิทัง ภิกขะเว จิตตัง อาคันตุเกหิ อุปักกิเลเสหิ อุปักกิลิฏฐัง... ซึ่งแปลว่า ดูก่อนภิกษุทั้งหลาย จิตนี้เป็นประภัสสร แต่ว่าจิตนี้เศร้าหมอง เพราะอุปกิเลสที่จรเข้ามา ดังนี้.

ข้อที่พระองค์ตรัสว่า จิตนี้เป็นประภัสสรนั้น ท่านทั้งหลายจะต้องฟังให้ดี ๆ ในการที่พระองค์ทรงใช้คำว่า ประภัสสร ไม่ได้ใช้คำว่า บริสุทธิ์ ไม่ได้ใช้คำว่า หลุดพ้น หรือไม่ได้ใช้คำอะไร ๆ นอกไปจากคำว่า ประภัสสร.

ทีนี้คำว่า ประภัสสร ในภาษาบาลี มาเป็นภาษาไทย ก็ยังใช้ทับศัพท์ว่า ประภัสสร อยู่นั่นเอง คงจะเนื่องจาก ไม่สามารถที่จะแปลเป็นภาษาไทยคำใดให้เหมาะสม เราจึงต้องใช้คำว่า ประภัสสร ไปตามเดิม บางคนอาจจะไม่รู้ว่าประภัสสรนั้นเป็นอย่างไร ถ้าเช่นนั้น ก็จะต้องถือเอาตามตัวหนังสือนั้น ประภัสสร มาจากคำว่า ประภา สะระ ประภา คือ แสง สะระ เออ, แล่นออก หรือแล่นไป ประภัสสร จึงแปลว่า มีแสงแล่นออกไป เมื่อเราเห็นสิ่งใดมีแสงเป็นรัศมี แล่นออกไปรอบตัว โชติช่วงอยู่ดังนั้น นั่นแหละ คือ อาการที่เป็นประภัสสร หรือเรียกอีกอย่างหนึ่งว่า มีรัศมีซ่านออกไปรอบตัว เป็น เออ, แสงสว่าง อาการอย่างนี้ ตรงตามตัวหนังสือแท้ว่า ประภา สะระ หรือประภัสสร ที่ว่าจิตนี้เป็นประภัสสรนั้น หมายความว่า...มีแสง หรือเรืองแสงอยู่ในตัวมันเองโดยรอบด้าน ก็หมายความว่า มันไม่สกปรก มืดมัว เศร้าหมองแต่อย่างใด.

ทีนี้ ก็มีอุปกิเลสเกิดขึ้น มาจากเหตุปัจจัยอย่างใด อย่างหนึ่ง จากภายนอก เป็นเหมือนกับจรเข้ามา จากภายนอก เป็นอาคันตุกะ ทำให้จิตนั้นสูญเสียความเป็นประภัสสร เหมือนอย่างว่า เรามีเพชรเม็ดนึง แวววาว ส่องสว่างอยู่กลางแดด ถ้าเราเอาน้ำโคลนสาดเข้าไป รัศมีของเพชรนั้นมันก็ จะไม่ปรากฏ แต่แล้ว ท่านอย่าเพิ่งคิดไปว่ารัศมีนั้น สูญสิ้นไปเสียแล้ว ไม่ได้มีเหลืออยู่ ความจริงมันก็ต้องมีอยู่เท่าเดิม และตามเดิม หากแต่ว่าโคลนมันปิดบังเสีย ตาตามประสามนุษย์ก็มองไม่เห็น มันต้องมีตาพิเศษ ยิ่งกว่าตามนุษย์ จึงจะมองเห็นแสงเพชร ที่ทะลุโคลนออกมาได้ จิตนี้ก็เหมือนกัน เมื่อมีอุปกิเลสอย่างใด อย่างหนึ่ง นานาชนิด สรุปรวมเป็น...ความโลภ ความโกรธ ความหลง เกิดขึ้นแล้ว มันก็เป็นสิ่งปิดบังจิตนั้น ให้สูญเสียความเป็น ประภัสสร คือ ไม่ปรากฏแก่สายตา

ทีนี้ เราก็จะต้องคิดกันต่อไปว่า ทำอย่างไรจึงจะให้คงมี ความเป็นประภัสสร ปรากฏอยู่เป็นการ ถาวรได้ คำตอบง่าย ๆ ใคร ๆ พอจะมองเห็น ว่าก็กระทำอย่าให้มีกิเลสเกิดขึ้นก็แล้วกัน จิตนั้นก็เป็นประภัสสร อยู่ตลอดกาล เพราะฉะนั้น วิธีใดที่จะทำให้กิเลสไม่เกิดขึ้น แล้ววิธีนั้นแหละ คือ วิธีที่จะทำจิตนี้ ให้เป็น ประภัสสรตลอดกาล วิธีที่จะทำไม่ให้กิเลสเกิดขึ้นนั้น พระพุทธเจ้าท่านเรียกว่า อัฏฐังคิกมรรค คือ การกระทำที่ถูกต้องครบถ้วน ๘ ประการ รวมกันเป็นอันเดียวกันเรียกว่า มรรค มีความเห็นชอบ ความใฝ่ฝันชอบ พูดจาชอบ ทำการงานชอบ เลี้ยงชีวิตชอบ ความพากเพียรชอบ มีสติตั้งไว้ชอบ มีสมาธิตั้งไว้ชอบ เป็นความชอบ หรือความถูกต้องรวมกัน ๘ ประการ เป็นมรรคตั้งอยู่ดังนี้แล้ว เรียกว่า มีการเป็นอยู่ชอบ เมื่อมีการเป็นอยู่ชอบดังนี้แล้ว กิเลสใด ๆ ก็ไม่อาจจะเกิดขึ้นมาได้ จิตนั้นก็ไม่มีอะไร ที่จะมาหุ้มห่อ ให้สูญเสียความเป็นประภัสสร.

ด้วยเหตุที่พระศาสดาสัมมาสัมพุทธเจ้า ได้ทรงแสดง อัฏฐังคิกมรรค คือ..มรรคมีองค์ ๘ ประการนั้น ในวันอาสาฬหปุรณมีนี้ ด้วยเหตุเช่นนี้เอง อาตมาจึงกล่าวว่า วันอาสาฬหบูชานี้คือ วันที่พระองค์ทรงประกาศ วิธีทำจิตให้เป็นประภัสสรอยู่ตลอดกาล เป็นสมุจเฉทปหานแก่กิเลสทั้งปวง ถ้าเราสามารถทำจิต เป็นจิตประภัสสรได้ตลอดกาลแล้ว ปัญหามันก็ไม่มีเหลืออยู่เลย จงพยายามทำความเข้าใจในเรื่องนี้ ว่า....จิตประภัสสรนั้น มันเป็นส่วนจิต ส่วนกิเลสนั้น มันเป็นแต่เพียงสิ่งที่เกิดขึ้นกับจิต ไม่ใช่ตัวจิต.

ส่วนตัวจิตนั้น คงเป็นประภัสสรตามธรรมชาติ ส่วนกิเลสนั้นเป็นสิ่งที่เกิดกับจิต เขาเรียกว่า เจตสิก เจตสิกเกิดขึ้นอย่างไร ก็ปรุงแต่งจิตไปในลักษณะเช่นนั้น เมื่อสูญเสียความเป็นประภัสสร ก็คือ สูญเสียสภาวะเดิมของมัน ด้วยอำนาจที่เจตสิกอย่างใด อย่างหนึ่ง เข้าไปปรุงแต่ง นี้เจตสิกนี้เกิดขึ้น จากสิ่งแวดล้อม ก็ตั้งต้นจากภายนอก คือ รูป เสียง กลิ่น รส โผฏฐัพพะ ธรรมารมณ์ กระทบทางตา ทางหู ทางจมูก ทางลิ้น ทางกาย หรือซึมเข้าไปถึงใจ มันจึงเกิดการปรุงแต่ง เป็นสิ่งที่เรียกว่า เจตสิกได้ในที่สุด คือ กิเลสต่าง ๆ นั่นเอง.

-พุทธทาสภิกขุ

@ a012dc82:6458a70d

Table Of Content

• Security

• Convenience

• Challenges and Limitations

• Adaptation and Future Outlook

• Conclusion

• FAQ

Bitcoin and traditional banking are two different systems of financial services. Bitcoin is a decentralized digital currency, while traditional banking is a centralized financial institution. In this article, we will compare and contrast the security and convenience of both systems to determine which offers better value to users.

Security

Bitcoin operates on a decentralized network, which means that there is no central authority that controls transactions. Every transaction is recorded on a public ledger called the blockchain, making it transparent and tamper-proof. Bitcoin also uses cryptography to secure every transaction, making it nearly impossible to hack. The decentralized nature of Bitcoin and its cryptography make it more secure than traditional banking. Traditional banks are vulnerable to cyber attacks and fraud because they operate on a centralized system where a central authority controls transactions.

Convenience

Traditional banking offers a wide range of financial services, including ATM withdrawals, transfers, bill payments, loans, and credit cards. Banks also have physical branches where customers can speak to bank representatives and resolve their queries. However, traditional banking has its limitations. Customers have to comply with banks' working hours and locations, making it challenging to access their accounts during emergencies. Bank transactions are also subject to government regulations and third-party fees, making it expensive for customers to use their services.

Bitcoin, on the other hand, offers a high degree of convenience. It operates 24/7, making it accessible to customers anytime and anywhere in the world. Bitcoin transactions are also faster and cheaper compared to traditional banking. There are no third-party fees, making it more affordable for customers to use their services. However, Bitcoin still faces challenges in terms of adoption and acceptance. While more merchants are accepting Bitcoin as a mode of payment, it is still not widely accepted compared to traditional payment methods.

Challenges and Limitations

Bitcoin faces challenges in terms of adoption and acceptance. Some people are still skeptical about Bitcoin's value and stability, and some governments have imposed restrictions on its use. Additionally, Bitcoin's decentralized nature makes it difficult to regulate and control, which could lead to legal issues. On the other hand, traditional banking is subject to government regulations, which can sometimes limit their services and products. Compliance with these regulations can also increase costs, which are often passed on to customers.

Adaptation and Future Outlook

As technology continues to evolve, both Bitcoin and traditional banking will have to adapt to meet the changing needs of customers. Bitcoin is already being integrated into the financial system, and more merchants are accepting it as a mode of payment. Traditional banks are also adopting digital technologies to offer more convenience to customers. In the future, it is possible that the lines between Bitcoin and traditional banking will blur, as both systems adopt similar technologies and offer similar services.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Bitcoin and traditional banking offer different levels of security and convenience. Bitcoin's decentralized network and cryptography make it more secure than traditional banking, while traditional banking offers a wide range of financial services that are convenient for customers. The choice between Bitcoin and traditional banking ultimately depends on individual preferences and needs. However, as technology continues to evolve, it is likely that both systems will continue to adapt and offer better value to their users.

FAQ

What is traditional banking? Traditional banking is a centralized financial institution that offers a wide range of financial services, including loans, credit cards, and savings accounts.

Which is more secure, Bitcoin or traditional banking? Bitcoin is considered more secure than traditional banking because it operates on a decentralized network and uses cryptography to secure transactions.

Which is more convenient, Bitcoin or traditional banking? Bitcoin is more convenient in terms of accessibility and affordability, as it operates 24/7 and has no third-party fees. However, traditional banking offers a wide range of financial services and has physical branches for customer support.

What are the challenges faced by Bitcoin and traditional banking? Bitcoin faces challenges in terms of adoption and acceptance, while traditional banking is subject to government regulations and compliance issues.

How can Bitcoin and traditional banking adapt to meet the changing needs of customers? Both Bitcoin and traditional banking can adopt digital technologies to offer more convenience and value to their customers, while also adhering to regulatory compliance.

That's all for today

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DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.

@ 1739d937:3e3136ef

This is the third in a series of weekly updates detailing progress on bringing MLS protocol DMs and group messaging to Nostr.

Previous Updates

• June 28th 2024
• July 6th 2024

Progress this week

Short update post this week but I made solid progress updating several OpenMLS dependencies and building a new library that implements all the OpenMLS crypto requirements for Nostr.

HPKE-RS

I mentioned a PR last week on the rust-hpke library, that PR is still waiting on review. However, in the meantime, the OpenMLS library depends on a slightly different hpke library, the hpke-rs library.

This library didn't support the secp256k1 curve either so I've opened a PR to add support for secp256k1. That PR uses the RustCrypto library that is the default in the the hpke-rs library. However, because this library is built to allow for swapping out the underlying crypto library (using traits), I was also able to create a new library that uses the secp256k1 library instead of the RustCrypto library. This is the main crypto library that almost all Bitcoin and Nostr apps use so it's important we use that instead of RustCrypto.

OpenMLS Nostr Crypto

The library that I've created (openmls-nostr-crypto) does a few things via separate sub-libraries (crates). The entire library tries to do as little as possible; only implementing the one required ciphersuite for all MLS implementations and the secp256k1 schnorr signatures ciphersuite I've created for Nostr. It's also using the right secp256k1 library to do it.

openmls-nostr-crypto: implementes the crypto traits that the OpenMLS library expects to find for a given provider and removes all the ciphersuites that we don't care about supporting.

hpke-rs-nostr-crypto: This implements the crypto traits that the hpke-rs library expects to find. Again removing all the ciphersuites we don't care about supporting.

I've not yet written any tests for these libraries (which needs to be done) but I've gotten some very simple demos working with OpenMLS using this new set of libraries to handle the crypto.

I've been really impressed with the simplicity of the OpenMLS interface as well. While there is A LOT going on under the hood, the public interface that client developers have to use is clean and simple.

Onward and Upward

Next week I'll continue working on these libraries; adding tests and continuing to build out my small demo app. I've been in touch with the maintainers of the OpenMLS library and I'm hoping to get a review done with them on my PRs and on my new library.

One thing I'll call out here: The review of my library and getting them to review the direction of the project overall will be paid consulting so I'm making sure that I've got as much done as possible before scheduling that time and paying their rates. I'm a strong believer that the right conversation can save you months of wasted time, but I'm also a believer in making sure you're prepared if you're going to drop money on that conversation. 😅

@ df67f9a7:2d4fc200

Anyone who thinks that “onboarding new users” is simply a technical challenge of educating people about “how Nostr works”, is grossly mistaken about social networks in general and blind to what makes Nostr so special.

Social Networks are for Friends

Relationship building is why people use social networks. Connecting with friends and loved ones (and colleagues and customers also) is the obvious reason to join, and should be the primary objective in any onboarding endeavor. Everything else “about the technology” only needs to be introduced “as needed” in order for each new user to achieve this goal.

The Nostr Network Requires Trusted Friendships

To thrive at scale, Nostr needs to have established and interconnected “webs of trusted friends” for “verifying” authentic profiles and quality content. This PgP strategy for decentralized trust implemented on Nostr, is the best way to keep bots and bad actors at bay while preserving freedom and sovereignty for every user. Even though Nostr still doesn’t have a standard for determining who “is trusted” for any one user across all clients, we can already build tools to onboard new friends of the highest quality trust. Leveraging existing relationships, “webs of trust” can be strengthened even at this early stage simply by advocates “inviting friends to Nostr”.

Nostr is New and Already Full of Trusted Friends

But it won’t be for long. Bots and bad actors are relatively “easy” to keep at bay today because the Nostr userbase is still small. People who come to Nostr and STAY have mostly been a self selecting group of “freedom tech fans”. We like it this way, and are generally happy to be here. The comraderie is refreshing. But the more people that come to Nostr, the more Nostr will attract different kinds of people.

This is already happening. Nostr is growing at the edges, reaching out beyond the “freedom tech fans” and attracting a number of “less committed” (and some nefarious) individuals here and there. Who sticks around? The “friends of freedom tech fans” stick around longer because they have friends here. WAY BEFORE even considering how “the network effect” will take over, Nostr needs to solve for retention by bringing more “trusted friends” into the network. Social onboarding tools will allow us to share Nostr to “friends of freedom tech fans” and beyond, establishing interconnected “webs of trust” that are increasingly impermeable to bots and bad actors.

Nostr is Freedom Tech that People Want to Share

Creators and influencers of every kind share Nostr (and Nostr content) every day. This phenomenon is a gold mine for onboarding, and can be supported with tools and incentives. Driven by the fact that Nostr is an open protocol, owned by nobody and available for anybody to build upon and profit from, the passion for sharing Nostr will never wane. But our userbase may fall off, if people become disenchanted by undesirable content or lack of good follows. This is why onboarding efforts, to attract more “friends” to the network, are so important. Leveraging the “share worthy” phenomenon of Nostr itself to grow Nostr’s networks of “trusted friends” seems like a no brainer. But for this strategy to work, it needs to be win win win for all parties.

Everybody Wins with More Trusted Users on Nostr

Even as standards for qualifying trust are still being refined, “social onboarding” increases the ratio of “more” trusted over “less” trusted users across the network.

Developers Win

With more trusted users on the network, Nostr developers win by being able to attract an increasingly diverse range of business partners to sponsor their projects.

Sponsors Win

An increase in trusted usership equates to more “real people” perusing “desired content” and more chances for brands to engage “organically” with target audiences. Marketing opportunities increase with trust.

Advocates Win

Simply by sharing Nostr with their friends, Advocates support the sustained growth of trust across the network. Valuable zap reward programs to incentivize high quality onboarding efforts are easily justified and funded by social onboarding clients and their sponsors.

Users Win

More trusted users across the network means more trustworthy content in every feed and more easily discoverable friends and new follows regardless of the client or algorithm used.

Nostr Wins

More trusted users on the network means more “high quality” trust connections between each user. Strong webs of trust is what keeps out bots and bad actors, and is essential for stability as Nostr scales.

Social Onboarding Clients Bring Trust to Nostr

Having more tools for “sharing Nostr with friends” is how Nostr wins. Any client can have capacity for “Social Onboarding”. This may be a dedicated onboarding client or a feature set within a social client. A client that offers “Social Onboarding” will support Nostr advocates and the users that they invite. These should have the following feature set :

• Nostr advocates may create and share any number of customizable “Nostr invites” for different audiences or occasions. Each may have different reccomendations, or access codes, or expiry options. (A NIP is in the works)
• Nostr invite QR codes (and shareable URLs) should resolve to a WEB based interface for prospective (and existing) users who MAY NOT have a client or browser extension already installed.
• Each invite should (within the onboarding client) provide access to low friction profile creation AND advocate reccomended lists of new friends, interest groups, preferred clients, best relays, and other stuff.
• Private key generation and management for new users should be handled entirely within the onboarding client (using NIP standards without a browser extension or external bunker app) to reduce friction at this crucial moment.
• A human readable Nostr address (NIP05 or some future NIP) should be generated automatically for all new users.
• New account creation should result immediately in a direct message or group thread of private “gift wrap” encrypted messages. This thread acts as the new user’s “first contact” with the advocate (possibly others as well) and an anchor for exploring the rest of Nostr.
• Invite “receipt” data (who invited who) should be “gift wrap” encrypted, accessible only to the advocate and new user. Clients wishing to use this data for analytics MAY request access from BOTH parties.
• Top Advocates may be calculated by the client (using data from invite receipts OR from public Nostr usage metrics), and awards may be offered.
• Advocates may also be supported by the client through access to private “advocate support” groups and communities over the Nostr network.

Support Social Onboarding for Nostr

Meet Me On Nostr is an app for sharing Nostr with friends via advocate invites. It is a reference client to demonstrate the power of Social Onboarding for Nostr. The first launch of "feature complete" client is expected in fall 2024.

This is a “bootstrap” funded project in active development. We are not grant funded or VC funded. Instead, we are looking to pay our developers by sponsorships from “Nostr adjacent” businesses who want to increase brand recognition over this new social network.

Is Your Business Nostr Adjacent?

“I’d like to advertise on Nostr but it’s “not quite ready” says our marketing team.”

“It has potential, and we have alignment, but the technology is still a bit rough.”

“Nostr is a perfect fit for our “target audience”, but there simply aren’t enough people using it.”

If your business is aligned with freedom technology, and the people who build and use Nostr, then NOW is the perfect time to sponsor Social Onboarding. Help grow Nostr’s base of trusted users and engage directly with Nostr’s most active advocates and influencers as it scales.

Release Nostr’s Superpower

When Nostr advocates are equipped and incentivized to share Nostr with their friends, nothing can stop this network from growing and growing and growing ever more secure and interconnected networks of trusted users.

Onboarding and retaining trusted users as Nostr scales will require so much more than just pointing people to “how Nostr works” content. Nostr’s true power lies dormant in the existing relationships that Nostr users already have outside of Nostr. Leveraging this power is what Social Onboarding is all about. Social Onboarding is Nostr’s superpower.

Contribute to the Geyser Fund

@ 0e8c41eb:95ff0faa

Chef's notes

Sprinkle a pinch of salt in a bowl. Sift 275 grams of flour above it. Make a well in the center of the flour and sprinkle the yeast into it. Add 50 grams of butter, 25 grams of sugar, and the egg. Pour in the milk and knead the dough with the mixer or by hand into a smooth dough. If necessary, add a bit more flour if the dough is too sticky. Form the dough into a ball. Let the dough rise covered with cling film at room temperature for 1 hour.

Peel the apples. Cut the apples and apricots into pieces. Cook the fruit with 150 grams of sugar and 50 ml of water in 15 minutes into a thick compote. Let this fruit filling cool.

Knead the dough again briefly and roll it out to a round sheet of about 28-30 cm in diameter, so that it fits well over the baking tin. Press the dough into the tin and press it well into the corners. Let the dough rise again for 10 minutes and cut off the excess edges.

Spread the fruit filling over the dough.

Mix the rest of the flour with the remaining 100 grams of butter and 100 grams of sugar and knead it with your fingers into a crumbly mixture. Sprinkle this crumble mixture over the fruit filling. Bake the tart in the preheated oven at 200°C for about 30 minutes until golden brown.

Variations: Only apple? Make this tart with 1 kilo of apples. High or low? You can also bake the crumble tart in a low tart tin of 30 cm diameter. If the fruit filling is a bit too voluminous, you can make double the crumble mixture and sprinkle it over the larger surface area.

Additional needs: Mixer with dough hooks or food processor Cling film Round baking tin with a diameter of 28-30 cm, greased

Details

• ⏲️ Prep time: 45 min + 1 hour Rising
• 🍳 Cook time: 30 minutes
• 🍽️ Servings: 8

Ingredients

• 375 grams flour
• 1 packet dried yeast (7 grams)
• 125 grams unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 275 grams sugar
• 1 egg
• 100 ml milk, at room temperature
• 500 grams apples
• 500 grams apricots (fresh or from a can)

Directions

1. Sprinkle a pinch of salt in a bowl. Sift 275 grams of flour above it. Make a well in the center of the flour and sprinkle the yeast into it. Add 50 grams of butter, 25 grams of sugar, and the egg. Pour in the milk and knead the dough with the mixer or by hand into a smooth dough. If necessary, add a bit more flour if the dough is too sticky. Form the dough into a ball. Let the dough rise covered with cling film at room temperature for 1 hour.
2. Peel the apples. Cut the apples and apricots into pieces. Cook the fruit with 150 grams of sugar and 50 ml of water in 15 minutes into a thick compote. Let this fruit filling cool.
3. Knead the dough again briefly and roll it out to a round sheet of about 28-30 cm in diameter, so that it fits well over the baking tin. Press the dough into the tin and press it well into the corners. Let the dough rise again for 10 minutes and cut off the excess edges.
4. Spread the fruit filling over the dough.

@ 862fda7e:02a8268b

If you're a straight man jacking off to straight porn, you're gay. You're looking at another man's cock as a means to get gratification. Without that man's cock, your sexual experience wouldn't be fulfilled. You needing to see that man's cock in order to be sexually fulfilled is gay. I like men but even I can't stand looking at a dude's cock as he bangs a chick. It's a complete turn off. It ruins the entire thing. I don't want to see a man's body, I don't want to see his penis, I don't want to hear him. We have the technology to perfectly replicate a male penis and even automated thrusting. There's no need to continue to jack off to a real man's penis. I don't understand how any self respecting man can become erect while watching another man and his penis bang a hot chick. It's the defenition of cucking, but people will try to rationalize their way out of it. You're the cuck, you just don't have a camera panned on you showing your shame as you pound off.

This is why lesbian or solo porn is always superior. Two is better than one, so lesbian porn is by far the best. Lesbian porno has no cocks, or if it does, they're fake and not disgusting. You don't have to deal with looking at a dildo's asshole as it pounds a chick. Lesbian porn is weirdly underrated these days. I almost NEVER see anyone talk about it. It's always degenerate straight porn or overwhelmingly gay shit. You're way more likely to see gay and tranny garbage before lesbians. It's weird that lesbians are probably one of the lesser viewed categories these days. There's a lot of homos out there. Females are not threatening to a sexual situation. It's male penetration that is cuck-like behavior. With females it is all playful and sensual, always with room for more to play. The more cocks you have around a woman, the gayer and more homosexual it is. I especially can't wrap my mind around being turned on by cum shots on a woman. You're jacking off to not only a guy's cock, but his orgasm. You're jacking off to his load. And yes, I UNDERSTAND you're "jacking off to the woman getting cummed on", but you miss the point. You are jacking off to a man having an orgasm. It's never sat right with me, when I want to utilize "material", I want to get turned on by a woman. I feel more straight than straight men at times.

@ 42342239:1d80db24

Claims that we need greater centralisation, more EU, or more globalisation are prevalent across the usual media channels. The climate crisis, environmental destruction, pandemics, the AI-threat, yes, everything will apparently be solved if a little more global coordination, governance and leadership can be brought about.

But, is this actually true? One of the best arguments for this conclusion stems implicitly from the futurist Eliezer Yudkowsky, who once proposed a new Moore's Law, though this time not for computer processors but instead for mad science: "every 18 months, the minimum IQ necessary to destroy the world drops by one point".

Perhaps we simply have to tolerate more centralisation, globalisation, control, surveillance, and so on, to prevent all kinds of fools from destroying the world?

Note: a Swedish version of this text is avalable at Affärsvärlden.

At the same time, more centralisation, globalisation, etc. is also what we have experienced. Power has been shifting from the local, and from the majorities, to central-planning bureaucrats working in remote places. This has been going on for several decades. The EU's subsidiarity principle, i.e. the idea that decisions should be made at the lowest expedient level, and which came to everyone's attention ahead of Sweden's EU vote in 1994, is today swept under the rug as untimely and outdated, perhaps even retarded.

At the same time, there are many crises, more than usual it would seem. If it is not a crisis of criminality, a logistics/supply chain crisis or a water crisis, then it is an energy crisis, a financial crisis, a refugee crisis or a climate crisis. It is almost as if one starts to suspect that all this centralisation may be leading us down the wrong path. Perhaps centralisation is part of the problem, rather than the capital S solution?

Why centralisation may cause rather than prevent problems

There are several reasons why centralisation, etc, may actually be a problem. And though few seem to be interested in such questions today (or perhaps they are too timid to mention their concerns?), it has not always been this way. In this short essay we'll note four reasons (though there are several others):

• Political failures (Buchanan et al)
• Local communities & skin in the game (Ostrom and Taleb)
• The local knowledge problem (von Hayek)
• Governance by sociopaths (Hare)

James Buchanan who was given the so-called Nobel price in economics in the eighties once said that: "politicians and bureaucrats are no different from the rest of us. They will maximise their incentives just like everybody else.".

Buchanan was prominent in research on rent-seeking and political failures, i.e. when political "solutions" to so-called market failures make everything worse. Rent-seeking is when a company spends resources (e.g. lobbying) to get legislators or other decision makers to pass laws or create regulations that benefit the company instead of it having to engage in productive activities. The result is regulatory capture. The more centralised decision-making is, the greater the negative consequences from such rent-seeking will be for society at large. This is known.

Another economist, Elinor Ostrom, was given the same prize in the great financial crisis year of 2009. In her research, she had found that local communities where people had influence over rules and regulations, as well as how violations there-of were handled, were much better suited to look after common resources than centralised bodies. To borrow a term from the combative Nassim Nicholas Taleb: everything was better handled when decision makers had "skin in the game".

A third economist, Friedrich von Hayek, was given this prize as early as 1974, partly because he showed that central planning could not possibly take into account all relevant information. The information needed in economic planning is by its very nature distributed, and will never be available to a central planning committee, or even to an AI.

Moreover, human systems are complex and not just complicated. When you realise this, you also understand why the forecasts made by central planners often end up wildly off the mark - and at times in a catastrophic way. (This in itself is an argument for relying more on factors outside of the models in the decision-making process.)

From Buchanan's, Ostrom's, Taleb's or von Hayek's perspectives, it also becomes difficult to believe that today's bureaucrats are the most suited to manage and price e.g. climate risks. One can compare with the insurance industry, which has both a long habit of pricing risks as well as "skin in the game" - two things sorely missing in today's planning bodies.

Instead of preventing fools, we may be enabling madmen

An even more troubling conclusion is that centralisation tends to transfer power to people who perhaps shouldn't have more of that good. "Not all psychopaths are in prison - some are in the boardroom," psychologist Robert Hare once said during a lecture. Most people have probably known for a long time that those with sharp elbows and who don't hesitate to stab a colleague in the back can climb quickly in organisations. In recent years, this fact seems to have become increasingly well known even in academia.

You will thus tend to encounter an increased prevalance of individuals with narcissistic and sociopathic traits the higher up you get in the the status hierarchy. And if working in large organisations (such as the European Union or Congress) or in large corporations, is perceived as higher status - which is generally the case, then it follows that the more we centralise, the more we will be governed by people with less flattering Dark Triad traits.

By their fruits ye shall know them

Perhaps it is thus not a coincidence that we have so many crises. Perhaps centralisation, globalisation, etc. cause crises. Perhaps the "elites" and their planning bureaucrats are, in fact, not the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Perhaps President Trump even had a point when he said "they are not sending their best".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4b8xgaiuj0

The opposite of centralisation is decentralisation. And while most people may still be aware that decentralisation can be a superpower within the business world, it's time we remind ourselves that this also applies to the economy - and society - at large, and preferably before the next Great Leap Forward is fully thrust upon us.

@ 4bc7982c:4cb5c39d

I rarely use smartphones for their intended purpose, instead using them as cheap and portable "mini machines" thanks to termux. Since joining nostr and learning how relays work, I got to wondering if running a relay from my test phone would be possible. After many hours of failed attempts and chairs thrown through windows, here's how I finally got python nostr_relay to work on my device.

YOU WILL NEED - An android device with latest Termux from FDROID OR GITHUB (The Google Play version will not work). You will need python 3.x,clang, and git installed in this environment.

Step 1. Start sshd in termux and log into your device.

Step 2. User must modify their python sysconfigdata manually, since the Android NDK with latest clang does not support the -fopenmp-implicit-rpath flag and will cause any .toml based python wheel builds to fail. Simply run the following commands in your termux terminal to fix this (A backup up your original sysconfig files will be saved, this example shows the steps being performed for python 3.11):

_file="$(find $PREFIX/lib/python3.11 -name "_sysconfigdata*.py")"
rm -rf $PREFIX/lib/python3.11/pycache
cp $_file "$_file".backup
sed -i 's|-fno-openmp-implicit-rpath||g' "$_file"

Step 3. Make a directory for the install and switch to it, I am using "devel" in this example:

mkdir -p devel && cd $_

Step 4. Clone the nostr_relay repo, I have mirrored the latest version to Github for those that hate fossil as much as I do:

git clone https://github.com/Shinoa-Fores/nostr_relay.git

Step 5. Make a python virtual environment and activate it:

python3.11 -m venv nostr_relay
cd nostr_relay
source bin/activate

Step 6. Pycares is a required dependency for toml-based projects, and also will not install properly via pip under termux so we will install it from sources in the venv and apply a quick fix to that too:

wget https://files.pythonhosted.org/packages/1b/8f/daf60bbc06f4a3cd1cfb0ab807057151287df6f5c78f2e0d298acc9193ac/pycares-4.4.0.tar.gz
tar -xf pycares-4.4.0.tar.gz
sed -i s/'#define HAVE_GETSERVBYPORT_R 1'//g ./pycares-4.4.0/deps/build-config/config_android/ares_config.h
pip install ./pycares-4.4.0
rm -rf pycares-4.4.0 pycares-4.4.0.tar.gz

Step 7. Now install the remaining dependencies and nostr-Relay itself:

pip install -e .

Step 8. Make a cup of tea and shitpost on nostr until the build completes.

Step 9. Once build is finished, copy the included sample config and open in your preferred text editor to adjust the parameters to your liking:

cp nostr_relay/config.yaml .

Step 10. Make a startup script for the relay and fire up your portable relay. In the example below I start it in a screen session so the process does not die if I lose ssh or termux connection.

cat >start-relay.sh << EOF

!/usr/bin/env bash

set -eu
set -o pipefail
bin/nostr-relay -c ./config.yaml serve
EOF

chmod +x start-relay.sh

screen -S relay -dm bash ./start-relay.sh

Step 11. If all goes well you should see something like this:

Still here? Good! The reader is invited to tinker with this configuration and enhance it. Things like setting up DNS and tor are beyond the scope of this post, but information on the latter can be found on the termux wiki: https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Bypassing_NAT .

@ 826e9f89:ffc5c759

_Prologue: this is a prose adaptation of a talk I gave to a private audience in Dubai and then tweaked slightly for a small conference in Sofia. I'm increasingly thinking it deserves a more general audience, and may be better suited to text anyway. This is probably not its final form, as the desired audience is tradfi capital allocators, hence a PDF is likely on the cards in the near future. For the time being, consider this a first draft, practising what it might look like as prose, and soliciting feedback from the good people of Nostr. Enjoy! _

The title of this essay means absolutely nothing. There is no such thing as “Web π” because there is no such thing as “Web 3”. It’s bullshit. It’s a scam.

Unfortunately, it has turned out to be extremely powerful bullshit and an extremely profitable scam, and so my goal in writing this essay is to give the reader the tools to navigate all of this and come out the other side without having been scammed or bullshat. In the spirit of not scamming and not bullshitting, I should be clear upfront about the intended readership of this essay, who I am to write it, and who it’s really about.

Who Are You?

I assume the reader is not a shadowy super-coder, but rather is a financial professional. This essay isn’t really for Bitcoiners, although if any read it, I hope they still find it interesting. Who I am really writing for are people coming to the space for the first time. Hopefully in your mind you are coming to the _Bitcoin _space, but if you think you are coming to the “crypto” space then this may be even more useful.

Who Am I?

I am the founder of a company that makes me not only highly biased but also flagrantly self-interested in the content I am promoting. I run a firm that invests in the Bitcoin ecosystem through a variety of different vehicles. I am not going to mislead you in the slightest in that my primary motivation is for you to allocate capital to us rather than to people I would call scammers and bullshitters. You should listen to them too and make up your own mind, or else what’s the point, really? How do you know I’m not scamming or bullshitting you? Exactly. Don’t trust. Verify.

In any case, that’s all assuming you want to “allocate capital” at all rather than just buy Bitcoin without a management fee. I’d like to think the primary difference is that I will be honest about that, and I’ll encourage you to understand as much as you can about what is going on and what you are doing (and if you are at all unsure, I would suggest you aren’t ready and you should just buy Bitcoin and learn) rather than bamboozle you with complete nonsense like “Web 3”.

Who Is This About?

It’s not at all about people working in crypto. Bitcoiners amongst the readership may be mildly irritated by me going on to give about as charitable an explanation of the role of these people as they have probably ever heard from somebody like me. This is really about financiers. It’s about the people who have used the mostly unrewarded efforts of developers, academics, entrepreneurs, and so on to siphon money from you to themselves, leaving a trail of useless tech and defrauded retail investors in their wake – and who will continue to do so if you continue to empower them.

Why This Essay?

We are at an interesting point in the development of the entirety of the “crypto” industry and I strongly suggest that people like you are going to be pitched all kinds of scams and bullshit in the coming months and years. If you have a little more background on what these people are really talking about, you will hopefully be able to avoid it.

My plan to help with that is presenting a short version and a long version of what blockchains are and are for, how they have historically been deployed in service of scams and bullshit, a high-level theory explaining the narrative evolution behind this sorry history, and a prediction for the near-term future of such shenanigans.

What is a Blockchain For?

A Blockchain is for sound, censorship-resistant, peer-to-peer digital money. It is not for anything else. If a blockchain is functional as money, it may be possible to also _use it _for other things. Some people find that interesting, some people find it infuriating, but don’t let that subtlety confuse you. It is not _for _arbitrary computation and storage or “decentralizing the internet” or running illegal securities rackets.

It is for money, plain and simple.

How does it achieve that? Proof of work and the difficulty adjustment. These are the innovations from which every other desirable property or feature flows. Proof of work enables censorship resistance. If somebody is trying to sell you on “proof of stake”: bullshit. The difficulty adjustment enables precise, predetermined, and _fair _issuance. If somebody is trying to sell you on a token they issue for free and without restriction: scam.

The problem Bitcoin solves is both economic and technical and the solution has material technical and economic merit. And it’s for this very specific and irreplicable reason the Bitcoin token has value. If this all sounds extreme to you, then I would suggest that your understanding of the topic is _extremely _misguided, that you are going to be _extremely bullshat and extremely scammed, _and you need to read this essay. That’s the short version.

The Long Version

I am sensitive to how extreme this all sounds. After all, hundreds of billions of dollars have been pumped into crypto, not Bitcoin – a huge amount of it is widely used, and many capable, honest, and brilliant people work in the industry. The reader will recall just above I said those people are not the target of my criticism. I’m not claiming they are all scammers and bullshitters. Sadly, I think it’s more likely they have been scammed and bullshat to some degree also.

I think I have some credibility in pointing this out because, as a VC in the Bitcoin space, I have increasingly seen founders telling me this themselves: that they originally bought into the hype in crypto and ended up wasting an enormous amount of time realizing their idea made no technical or economic sense in that context, so then they came to Bitcoin instead. You hear this one time and it’s an anecdote, but you hear it as many times as I have and it feels more like a representative sample.

What I want to cover next is as charitable a summary of the state of ex-Bitcoin crypto as I possibly can: my contention is that crypto has evolved into 4 rough categories: stablecoins, cryptography R&D, gambling, and scams. And these aren’t exclusive, to be clear; there is a lot of overlap, and, in fact, the overlap is arguably the key.

Scams

Scams are tokens, plain and simple. If somebody is trying to profit from the speculative price action of a token they have issued, they are scamming somebody. Maybe they are scamming you, maybe they are scamming retail investors, maybe they are scamming customers or suppliers – if such parties even exist in their cargo cult “business model”. There’s a scam in there somewhere.

However, it is rarely _just _a scam. There will almost always be components of stablecoins, R&D or gambling too. Hence these are worth really grappling with, taking seriously, giving credit to the extent it is due, but also analyzing critically.

My rough and high-level assessment of this breakdown of crypto is as follows, and I’ll explain what I mean by this below: stablecoins have economic merit but dubious technical merit; R&D has technical merit but no economic merit; and gambling sort of has merit but it depends how you interpret it. Obviously, scams have neither.

Stablecoins

By “sort of technical merit” I mean that stablecoins have central issuers. You can issue them as tokens on a blockchain but there’s not really much of a point. The issuer could just run a database connected to the internet with some straightforward signature schemes for transfers and it would make minimal operational difference. In fact, it would be cheaper and faster. _In fact, _you may as well run a Chaumian eCash mint (a decades-old innovation recently resurrected firmly within the _Bitcoin _space) such that your cheaper-and-faster-than-a-blockchain database also grants users transience and privacy rather than the public permanence of a blockchain.

The fact Tron is the most heavily used for stablecoins, in terms of settling the most value, is a testament to this point: it is barely even pretending not to be a database. This works as regulatory arbitrage given regulators think this is “innovation” because they are stupid.

That said, it is worth giving some credit here given the abject awfulness of fiat banking and payment rails with which stablecoins arguably most directly compete. Stablecoins are significantly more permissionless in their transfer than any fiat bank liability. And to attest to what seems like their most significant use case, they are permissionless in their _usership _in that only an internet connection and the right software is required rather than various discriminatory jurisdictional and compliance criteria.

However, what “sort of technical merit” ultimately boils down to, especially in comparison to Bitcoin, is: highly censorable in their exogenous links and, therefore, their value. The assets supposedly backing stablecoins are (by definition) still within the fiat system, even if this novel transfer mechanism of the rights to withdraw them is not. There is frankly a bit of theatre involved in the so-called “decentralization” of stablecoins given shutting down the central issuer is all that is required to make the permissionlessly tradeable decentralized tokens go to zero and be technically unimpeded but functionally useless. The technical innovation of Bitcoin, in contrast, is easily understood in one sense as it being totally indifferent to this kind of attack.

On the other hand, by “economic merit” I mean that they are extremely widely used and valued as a means of providing dollar shadow banking and often superior payment rails. Those in crypto often love pointing to this and many Bitcoiners tie themselves in knots trying to explain it away, whereas I see it as essentially unrelated to Bitcoin. Clearly there is a superficial connection, but you could create any superficial connection by “tokenizing” things for no particularly good technical _reason. I think it’s a different industry entirely. It’s more like a subindustry within _fintech – part banking, part payments – that for the time being relies on bamboozling regulators with all the nonsense I’m drawing attention to.

And good for them, frankly. If fiat banking isn’t going to be backed by real money anyway, then it _at least _ought to be permissionless. It should really be Chaumian eCash if it isn’t just Bitcoin, and it is regulation alone that makes it so awful in the first place. Making money usable and not a tool of dystopian control is, at this point, a political problem, not a technical one. Stablecoins are frankly a step in the right direction, especially insofar as they acclimatize users to digital assets. But I would still caution that they arguably don’t have sufficient technical merit to withstand what feels like an inevitable political attack …

Cryptography R&D

“Technical merit” for R&D is more or less self-explanatory, but the context is worth appreciating. It’s only really in crypto and mostly in Ethereum more specifically that people can permissionlessly experiment with arbitrarily complex cryptographic schemes that operate on real, enormous value. There are a lot of people who understandably find this attractive given their projects are essentially academic and trying out their ideas in the wild is more interesting, arguably more worthwhile, and certainly more fun than putting research essays on ArXiv or submitting them to a journal.

But … the value being manipulated is at best stablecoins and at worst baseless hype. If it isn’t a stablecoin then it probably exists in the first place because of either gambling or scams – and even there the line is very blurry.

Gambling

Gambling is an interesting lens to adopt on all this because it’s literally a trillion-dollar industry. And it’s real. It’s consensual; it’s not criminal; it’s legitimate economic activity that generates enormous profits for those who facilitate it well.

So, gambling has economic merit in that sense. But it’s tricky in this context how to characterize it because you could also argue it’s deeply dishonest gambling in that the gamblers don’t realize they are playing a negative sum game against the house. They think they are doing something akin to speculating on securities, which may be just as stupid depending on how it’s done, but at least has real economic utility and contributes to capital formation.

The difference here is that what is being speculated on _has no economic merit. _So, if that’s your gauge of merit, then here there is none. And it’s a very blurry line between this and an outright scam. Maybe the people involved _think _of what they are doing as amazing R&D, and maybe it’s inadvertently just a scam; maybe they know it’s all nonsense, but they think they can profit within the negative sum game because there are greater fools. In any case, I think gambling is a very helpful characterization of a lot of the behavior of the users and the real economic function of the industry.

There’s an interesting social component to all this because crypto people will often get mad at Bitcoiners because Bitcoiners tend not to care about either stablecoins or crypto R&D: they’ll say, why don’t you like stablecoins, they have clear economic merit? And the answer is they have dubious technical merit. Or, why don’t you like our next-gen Zero Knowledge scaling protocol, it has clear technical merit? And the answer is it has no economic merit.

If you’re happy with one but not the other, it’s easy to think of Bitcoiners as being closed-minded or dogmatic or whatever, but, ultimately, I think it’s just about discipline. What’s the point in being excited by something that half works, and that you know why will never fully work? So to be frank, a lot of this may be well-intentioned, but it’s kinda’ bullshit. It very probably ultimately rests on gambling and not at all whatever its stated purpose is … or it’s just a scam.

How Did We Get Here?

The following is by no means exhaustive and the framing is deliberately a little tongue-in-cheek. As well as being accurate enough (if unavoidably biased), my goal here is primarily to set up my prediction for what is coming next.

2015               reality: Ethereum launches             narrative: “the world computer”

In 2015, Ethereum launched. The narrative here was that we are building “the world computer” and we can now have decentralized uncensorable computation. Never mind that anybody with a laptop has an uncensorable and decentralized computing device. And keep in mind this question of, “_what data might it ever be relevant to compute over in this manner (whatever that means in the first place)?” _The answer will become clearer and clearer …

2016-17          reality: ICO bubble                           narrative: “Web 3” / “DApps”

Regardless, at the end of 2015 we get the proposal and adoption of ERC20: a standard for issuing fungible tokens within Ethereum contracts, which is why in 2016 _but especially in 2017 _we get the ICO bubble. The narrative changes. Now we are concerned with “Web 2” companies being huge, powerful, and centralized. What if, instead, users could cooperatively own the application, control their own data, and participate in the economic upside that their usage is creating?

2018-19          reality: crypto winter                       narrative: “mistakes were made”

In 2018 this all falls apart, so don’t worry about it, moving on …

2020-21          reality: defi summer                        narrative: “decentralized finance”

By 2020 the narrative was different once again. It is more or less realized by this point that utility tokens make no technical or economic sense. You can’t introduce artificial scarcity in capital goods where there should be abundance and deflation and expect anybody to care, never mind to value your concoction. On the other hand, “securities” ought to be scarce and in some sense ought to function as tradeable ledger entries. Maybe they could be tokenized and computed on in a censorship-resistant and decentralized manner?

So, we get a boom in “defi” which, for what it’s worth, fellow Axiom co-founder Anders Larson and I predicted in our essay Only The Strong Survive, in September 2021, would be a complete disaster because, amongst a myriad of other illiterate insanities, there was approximately zero grounding of these securities in productive capital. The ecosystem was entirely self-referential – grounded _not even _in the questionable economic merit of stablecoins but firmly in gambling and scams; in leverage, rehypothecation, and securitization of precisely nothing whatsoever productive.

2022               reality: shitcoinpocalypse                narrative: “mistakes were made”

And we were absolutely right because in 2022 everything collapsed. First Terra/Luna imploded – a “defi” project which essentially presented to the world the argument that a fractional reserve bank issuing fiduciary media can literally never go bankrupt because it can always cover a deposit shortfall by issuing more equity. While briefly flirting with a capitalization of around fifty f***ing billion dollars, and endorsed and fawned over by all manner of illiterate charlatans with gigantic and unsuspecting audiences, this argument was eventually rejected by the market as utterly imbecilic, as analyzed by myself and Nic Carter in All Falls Down.

This triggered a credit contagion that soon after took down 3 Arrows Capital, Celsius, Voyager, BlockFi, and others. FTX limped along by what we now understand to be something like defrauding their way out of debt, but eventually also collapsed later that year. If _Only The Strong Survive _was a pre-mortem of all of this, then the reader may want to read Green Eggs And Ham, also by myself and Anders Larson, as a kind of post-mortem.

2023-today    reality: Bitcoin multisigs                  narrative: “Bitcoin renaissance”

And now a lot of this stuff is moving to Bitcoin. It is outside the scope of this essay to explain this in much detail but there have been a handful of developments in Bitcoin recently which, regardless of their intended purpose, seem to have as a collective side effect that a lot of these same shenanigans can now be implemented (or can _pretend _to be implemented) in a more Bitcoin-native context.

So, the new narrative is something like:

“these things didn’t work, not because they are terrible ideas that collapse to moon math wrappers around gambling and scams under any remotely critical analysis, but rather because they weren’t on Bitcoin. But also, since it has only recently become possible to (at least pretend to) implement them on Bitcoin, they are now worthwhile. We have wandered in the wilderness but learned our lessons and found the promised land.”

Technical and Economic Merit

Let’s consider all this through the lens of technical and economic merit once again. Or rather, the alleged merit given the stated goal. Ignore for now whether there is any merit:

2015               technical goal: new computing paradigm               economic goal: x% of GDP?

The original idea of “crypto” allegedly has the merit of the next revolution in computing. Goodness knows how big that market is; probably a decent chunk of global GDP – if it meant anything, which it doesn’t.

2016-17          technical goal: disrupting company formation       economic goal: y% of S&P?

ICOs then become a little bit more specific. Now they are merely disrupting how we organize companies. What’s that worth? Some portion of the value of the companies that can now be decentralized and tokenized I guess? Who knows …

2018-19          nothing to see here

Nothing happened then, don’t worry about it.

2020-21          technical goal: decentralize finance            economic goal: z% of NYSE, CME, ISDA?

Defi becomes more specific again. Now we are merely tokenizing financial contracts, expanding access, removing middlemen, and so on. So that should probably be worth some percentage of capital markets activity?

2022               nothing to see here

Oops, never mind …

2023-today    technical goal: now it’s on Bitcoin!             economic goal: i% of … Bitcoin?

… and now it’s on Bitcoin apparently.

In Hindsight ...

I think the most amusing analysis of all this is as follows: it starts off completely insane, it gets more and more restrained each time – you could cheekily argue it starts to make more and more sense – but it also gets closer to Bitcoin every time. It’s clearly narrowing in on just: Bitcoin.

This is people realizing, painfully, over decades, what blockchains are for! They are not for “decentralizing everything” They are for censorship-resistant, sound, peer-to-peer digital money.

And I think this is _also _why we get the current state of crypto from earlier in the essay. As it starts to make more and more sense (by getting closer and closer to Bitcoin) you have realizations like the following: digital gift vouchers for artificially scarce and extremely expensive computation aren’t money, so we need “real money” in here for it to have economic merit, so you get stablecoins. Also, well we have a rich programming environment that seems technically interesting but also the severe technical handicap of being unable to do even a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of all the computations in the world, so you get crypto R&D. These emerge as a kind of patch, and they have _some _merit in isolation, whereas the long-term trajectory is actually just to converge on Bitcoin.

It’s an open and fascinating question if there are any learnings from these that can still be transplanted to Bitcoin. For stablecoins, this strikes me as less clear, given the dubious technical merit is introduced by using a blockchain at all, not just a blockchain other than Bitcoin. However, efforts to create Bitcoin balances (tokenized or otherwise) that are stable relative to some external price are to be applauded, if still heavily scrutinized for what technical merit they _really _have.

It seems far more likely that crypto R&D will prove useful in a Bitcoin context to some or other degree, and in this case the economic merit is in fact solved by moving to Bitcoin, provided the necessary technical merit can be mimicked. At the time of writing, this is a source of both hope and dread: hope given the possibility of viable avenues of development (although still highly uncertain); dread given how early steps in this direction are already being misrepresented in the pursuit of bullshit and scams. I will return to both shortly.

Narrative Evolution

Back to the table just above, I want to make three quick observations that tie together my entire argument and get us to the end of the essay:

Firstly, the bubbles always follow the price of Bitcoin. Hopefully I don’t need to include a price chart for the reader to grasp this immediately.

Secondly, it’s important that the narrative always changes. Absolutely ungodly amounts of money were raised for this crap following the_ Bitcoin bull runs of 2017 and 2021. The people doing this couldn’t point to the previous absolute disaster, so they had to spin something along the lines of: “_we learned our lessons and we’ve refined the use case.” This should sound familiar from just above.

Thirdly, however, regardless of whatever refinement they’ve come up with, the consequence of the new “narrative” is always, “buy my token”.

Always.

It doesn’t matter what buzzword salad is in the middle. It’s always “Bitcoin is cool, xyz, fughayzi fughahzi, buy my token.”

This is why I am very much tempted to not care so much about developers, academics, entrepreneurs, and so on, and in fact for my null hypothesis to be that they are more likely to have been victims than perpetrators. I don’t think they even end up in a position to contribute without the key group whom I do blame. When you put all these pieces together, what I think falls out of this analysis is as follows:

The entire cycle of shitcoinery can be traced to unscrupulous financiers convincing capital allocators who don’t know any better, in a bull market that, yes, Bitcoin is cool, but what they are doing is related, cooler, and that they deserve a fee.

Let us label this the Capital Cycle Theory of Shitcoinery. I think that everything else about which one might want to complain is downstream of this core realization.

Avoiding It

Given everything I’ve covered this is simple and this is pretty much the end of the essay.

You need to be aware of why this is happening now. If it hasn’t happened to you already (intended readership in the capital allocation business, that is) I guarantee it’s about to: with ETFs and the halving just past, we seem to be starting a Bitcoin bull run, these people have already raised ridiculous amounts of money on scams and bullshit that have mostly imploded. They may have lost a lot of money, or they may even have dumped on retail and got an excellent “return”. But in any case, they need a new narrative.

It's _possible _they have a viable narrative around stablecoins, R&D, both, and that they are as wary of scams as I have suggested here that they should be. I don’t want to insult anybody who merely has a different investment thesis to me if they are otherwise reasonable in their outlook and honest in their dealings.

However, if they are only now realizing how pointless and disingenuous every preceding crypto narrative has been after 7 years and hundreds of billions of dollars – or if they still don’t realize it at all; if their track record shows they were deeply involved, handsomely rewarded, and yet created nothing of lasting value; if they say things like “the builders are coming back to Bitcoin”: be very, very suspicious. Be on the lookout for tokens, which is to say, be on the lookout for scams.

What is especially frustrating is that the technical spin of the "layer twos" that are all the rage at the time of writing, that "the builders are coming back to Bitcoin" to build, and that you, the capital-allocating reader, will almost certainly be pitched, is in and of itself pretty reasonable. They just don't require tokens and they don't require gambling to support the token prices. What they do require is _sound adherence to Bitcoin's technical and economic merit. _At the very least, they require honest communication about the design trade-offs so far and planned for, and what, if any, economic and technical merit is left over after these trade-offs have been made.

Narrative aside, the _reality _of 99% of these projects is that they are private execution environments tied to multisigs custodying user deposits. Which is to say, on the one hand, that they are cargo culting "crypto R&D" from Ethereum that isn't technically possible in Bitcoin in order to feign technical merit, and on the other, that _they aren't layer twos at all. _Once again, they may as well be Chaumian eCash mints, except for the fact that this would make the intended token scam all but impossible to pull off.

Casey Rodarmor, creator of the Ordinals protocol, recently joked on the Hell Money _podcast he co-hosts, responding to the idea that "_everybody is building an L2 now":

"It's the same sad sack playbook as on Ethereum being recapitulated on Bitcoin. That's how you get a VC check on Ethereum. They are all glorified multisigs, so they are like, "hey let's port our glorified multisig to Bitcoin and get a VC check." I was talking to a friend of mine who is working on an interesting project, an open-source analyzer that does transaction clustering, and I was like, "maybe you could do this in this way and raise some VC money," and he said, "yeah, okay, but what's the point in raising VC money?" And I said, "no, no, no, this is the end! This is the goal! You raise VC money and then you cut yourself checks from that VC money until it runs out and then you raise more at a 10x valuation. This is the new economy, guys!"

The 1% that are legitimately trying to bring the learnings from crypto R&D to Bitcoin in a technically and economically sound manner will hopefully win in the long run (and even this is somewhat speculative at the time of writing) but will likely get little to no attention amidst this bull market flurry of scams and bullshit.

Axiom will do its best to source and invest in these companies (we already have!) but we are resigned to it being a much more difficult sell to capital allocators in light of the Capital Cycle Theory of Shitcoinery. To be brutally honest, this entire essay can fairly be considered cope on my part in light of having lost this battle in the past and facing up to the very real prospect of losing it in the near future too. Oh well, at least I tried.

Wrapping Up

The essence of the Capital Cycle Theory of Shitcoinery is that the problems I’ve described ultimately come from bamboozling people just like you with technical sounding nonsense like “Web 3” so you think it’s all a lot more complicated than it really is. Just buy Bitcoin. That’s certainly the first thing you should do anyway, and it might be the only thing you ever need to do.

If you really, really want to take the extra risk of investing in the Bitcoin ecosystem, the team at Axiom would be happy to speak with you. But we are never going to talk you out of buying Bitcoin. There is no world in which Bitcoin does poorly and we do well, or in which we promise something “better than Bitcoin,” and there’s no point in engaging with us at all if you don’t already believe most of this.

If that’s of interest to you, we’d love to talk. If not, just buy Bitcoin. In any case: fair warning, we are heading into a Bitcoin bull market and the scams and the bullshit are coming. Good luck avoiding them.

Allen Farrington, June 2024

@ a619eb76:11d75935

I. Over-Population

In 1931, when Brave New World was being written, I was convinced that there was still plenty of time. The completely organized society, the scientific caste system, the abolition of free will by methodical conditioning, the servitude made acceptable by regular doses of chemically induced happiness, the orthodoxies drummed in by nightly courses of sleep-teaching -- these things were coming all right, but not in my time, not even in the time of my grandchildren. I forget the exact date of the events recorded in Brave New World; but it was somewhere in the sixth or seventh century A.F. (After Ford). We who were living in the second quarter of the twentieth century A.D. were the inhabitants, admittedly, of a gruesome kind of universe; but the nightmare of those depression years was radically different from the nightmare of the future, described in Brave New World. Ours was a nightmare of too little order; theirs, in the seventh century A.F., of too much. In the process of passing from one extreme to the other, there would be a long interval, so I imagined, during which the more fortunate third of the human race would make the best of both worlds -- the disorderly world of liberalism and the much too orderly Brave New World where perfect efficiency left no room for freedom or personal initiative.

Twenty-seven years later, in this third quarter of the twentieth century A.D., and long before the end of the first century A.F., I feel a good deal less optimistic than I did when I was writing Brave New World. The prophecies made in 1931 are coming true much sooner than I thought they would. The blessed interval between too little order and the nightmare of too much has not begun and shows no sign of beginning. In the West, it is true, individual men and women still enjoy a large measure of freedom. But even in those countries that have a tradition of democratic government, this freedom and even the desire for this freedom seem to be on the wane. In the rest of the world freedom for individuals has already gone, or is manifestly about to go. The nightmare of total organization, which I had situated in the seventh century After Ford, has emerged from the safe, remote future and is now awaiting us, just around the next corner. George Orwell's 1984 was a magnified projection into the future of a present that contained Stalinism and an immediate past that had witnessed the flowering of Nazism. Brave New World was written before the rise of Hitler to supreme power in Germany and when the Russian tyrant had not yet got into his stride. In 1931 systematic terrorism was not the obsessive contemporary fact which it had become in 1948, and the future dictatorship of my imaginary world was a good deal less brutal than the future dictatorship so brilliantly portrayed by Orwell. In the context of 1948, 1984 seemed dreadfully convincing. But tyrants, after all, are mortal and circumstances change. Recent developments in Russia and recent advances in science and technology have robbed Orwell's book of some of its gruesome verisimilitude. A nuclear war will, of course, make nonsense of everybody's predictions. But, assuming for the moment that the Great Powers can somehow refrain from destroying us, we can say that it now looks as though the odds were more in favor of something like Brave New World than of something like 1984.

In the light of what we have recently learned about animal behavior in general, and human behavior in particular, it has become clear that control through the punishment of undesirable behavior is less effective, in the long run, than control through the reinforcement of desirable behavior by rewards, and that government through terror works on the whole less well than government through the non-violent manipulation of the environment and of the thoughts and feelings of individual men, women and children. Punishment temporarily puts a stop to undesirable behavior, but does not permanently reduce the victim's tendency to indulge in it. Moreover, the psycho-physical by-products of punishment may be just as undesirable as the behavior for which an individual has been punished. Psychotherapy is largely concerned with the debilitating or anti-social consequences of past punishments.

The society described in 1984 is a society controlled almost exclusively by punishment and the fear of punishment. In the imaginary world of my own fable, pun- ishment is infrequent and generally mild. The nearly perfect control exercised by the government is achieved by systematic reinforcement of desirable behavior, by many kinds of nearly non-violent manipulation, both physical and psychological, and by genetic standardization. Babies in bottles and the centralized control of reproduction are not perhaps impossible; but it is quite clear that for a long time to come we shall remain a viviparous species breeding at random. For practical purposes genetic standardization may be ruled out. Societies will continue to be controlled post-natally -- by punishment, as in the past, and to an ever increasing extent by the more effective methods of reward and scientific manipulation.

In Russia the old-fashioned, 1984-style dictatorship of Stalin has begun to give way to a more up-to-date form of tyranny. In the upper levels of the Soviets' hierarchical society the reinforcement of desirable behavior has begun to replace the older methods of control through the punishment of undesirable behavior. Engineers and scientists, teachers and administrators, are handsomely paid for good work and so moderately taxed that they are under a constant incentive to do better and so be more highly rewarded. In certain areas they are at liberty to think and do more or less what they like. Punishment awaits them only when they stray beyond their prescribed limits into the realms of ideology and politics. It is because they have been granted a measure of professional freedom that Russian teachers, scientists and technicians have achieved such remarkable successes. Those who live near the base of the Soviet pyramid enjoy none of the privileges accorded to the lucky or specially gifted minority. Their wages are meager and they pay, in the form of high prices, a disproportionately large share of the taxes. The area in which they can do as they please is extremely restricted, and their rulers control them more by punishment and the threat of punishment than through non-violent manipulation or the reinforcement of desirable behavior by reward. The Soviet system combines elements of 1984 with elements that are prophetic of what went on among the higher castes in Brave New World.

Meanwhile impersonal forces over which we have almost no control seem to be pushing us all in the direction of the Brave New Worldian nightmare; and this impersonal pushing is being consciously accelerated by representatives of commercial and political organizations who have developed a number of new techniques for manipulating, in the interest of some minority, the thoughts and feelings of the masses. The techniques of manipulation will be discussed in later chapters. For the moment let us confine our attention to those impersonal forces which are now making the world so extremely unsafe for democracy, so very inhospitable to individual freedom. What are these forces? And why has the nightmare, which I had projected into the seventh century A.F., made so swift an advance in our direction? The answer to these questions must begin where the life of even the most highly civilized society has its beginnings -- on the level of biology. On the first Christmas Day the population of our planet was about two hundred and fifty millions -- less than half the population of modern China. Sixteen centuries later, when the Pilgrim Fathers landed at Plymouth Rock, human numbers had climbed to a little more than five hundred millions. By the time of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, world population had passed the seven hundred million mark. In 1931, when I was writing Brave New World, it stood at just under two billions. Today, only twenty-seven years later, there are two billion eight hundred million of us. And tomorrow -- what? Penicillin, DDT and clean water are cheap commodities, whose effects on public health are out of all proportion to their cost. Even the poorest government is rich enough to provide its subjects with a substantial measure of death control. Birth control is a very different matter. Death control is something which can be provided for a whole people by a few technicians working in the pay of a benevolent government. Birth control depends on the co-operation of an entire people. It must be practiced by countless individuals, from whom it demands more intelligence and will power than most of the world's teeming illiterates possess, and (where chemical or mechanical methods of contraception are used) an expenditure of more money than most of these millions can now afford. Moreover, there are nowhere any religious traditions in favor of unrestricted death, whereas religious and social traditions in favor of unrestricted reproduction are widespread. For all these reasons, death control is achieved very easily, birth control is achieved with great difficulty. Death rates have therefore fallen in recent years with startling suddenness. But birth rates have either remained at their old high level or, if they have fallen, have fallen very little and at a very slow rate. In consequence, human numbers are now increasing more rapidly than at any time in the history of the species. Moreover, the yearly increases are themselves increasing. They increase regularly, according to the rules of compound interest; and they also increase irregularly with every application, by a technologically backward society of the principles of Public Health. At the present time the annual increase in world population runs to about forty-three millions. This means that every four years mankind adds to its numbers the equivalent of the present population of the United States, every eight and a half years the equivalent of the present population of India. At the rate of increase prevailing between the birth of Christ and the death of Queen Elizabeth I, it took sixteen centuries for the population of the earth to double. At the present rate it will double in less than half a century. And this fantastically rapid doubling of our numbers will be taking place on a planet whose most desirable and productive areas are already densely populated, whose soils are being eroded by the frantic efforts of bad farmers to raise more food, and whose easily available mineral capital is being squandered with the reckless extravagance of a drunken sailor getting rid of his accumulated pay.

In the Brave New World of my fable, the problem of human numbers in their relation to natural resources had been effectively solved. An optimum figure for world population had been calculated and numbers were maintained at this figure (a little under two billions, if I remember rightly) generation after generation. In the real contemporary world, the population problem has not been solved. On the contrary it is becoming graver and more formidable with every passing year. It is against this grim biological background that all the political, economic, cultural and psychological dramas of our time are being played out. As the twentieth century wears on, as the new billions are added to the existing billions (there will be more than five and a half billions of us by the time my granddaughter is fifty), this biological background will advance, ever more insistently, ever more menacingly, toward the front and center of the historical stage. The problem of rapidly increasing numbers in relation to natural resources, to social stability and to the well-being of individuals -- this is now the central problem of mankind; and it will remain the central problem certainly for another century, and perhaps for several centuries thereafter. A new age is supposed to have begun on October 4, 1957. But actually, in the present context, all our exuberant post-Sputnik talk is irrelevant and even nonsensical. So far as the masses of mankind are concerned, the coming time will not be the Space Age; it will be the Age of Over-population. We can parody the words of the old song and ask,

Will the space that you're so rich in Light a fire in the kitchen, Or the little god of space turn the spit, spit, spit?

The answer, it is obvious, is in the negative. A settlement on the moon may be of some military advantage to the nation that does the settling. But it will do nothing whatever to make life more tolerable, during the fifty years that it will take our present population to double, for the earth's undernourished and proliferating billions. And even if, at some future date, emigration to Mars should become feasible, even if any con- siderable number of men and women were desperate enough to choose a new life under conditions comparable to those prevailing on a mountain twice as high as Mount Everest, what difference would that make? In the course of the last four centuries quite a number of people sailed from the Old World to the New. But neither their departure nor the returning flow of food and raw materials could solve the problems of the Old World. Similarly the shipping of a few surplus humans to Mars (at a cost, for transportation and development, of several million dollars a head) will do nothing to solve the problem of mounting population pressures on our own planet. Unsolved, that problem will render insoluble all our other problems. Worse still, it will create conditions in which individual freedom and the social decencies of the democratic way of life will become impossible, almost unthinkable. Not all dictatorships arise in the same way. There are many roads to Brave New World; but perhaps the straightest and the broadest of them is the road we are traveling today, the road that leads through gigantic numbers and accelerating increases. Let us briefly review the reasons for this close correlation between too many people, too rapidly multiplying, and the formulation of authoritarian philosophies, the rise of totalitarian systems of government.

As large and increasing numbers press more heavily upon available resources, the economic position of the society undergoing this ordeal becomes ever more precarious. This is especially true of those underdeveloped regions, where a sudden lowering of the death rate by means of DDT, penicillin and clean water has not been accompanied by a corresponding fall in the birth rate. In parts of Asia and in most of Central and South America populations are increasing so fast that they will double themselves in little more than twenty years. If the production of food and manufactured articles, of houses, schools and teachers, could be increased at a greater rate than human numbers, it would be possible to improve the wretched lot of those who live in these underdeveloped and over- populated countries. But unfortunately these countries lack not merely agricultural machinery and an industrial plant capable of turning out this machinery, but also the capital required to create such a plant. Capital is what is left over after the primary needs of a population have been satisfied. But the primary needs of most of the people in underdeveloped countries are never fully satisfied. At the end of each year almost nothing is left over, and there is therefore almost no capital available for creating the industrial and agricultural plant, by means of which the people's needs might be satisfied. Moreover, there is, in all these underdeveloped countries, a serious shortage of the trained manpower without which a modern industrial and agricultural plant cannot be operated. The present educational facilities are inadequate; so are the resources, financial and cultural, for improving the existing facilities as fast as the situation demands. Meanwhile the population of some of these underdeveloped countries is increasing at the rate of 3 per cent per annum.

Their tragic situation is discussed in an important book, published in 1957 -- The Next Hundred Years, by Professors Harrison Brown, James Bonner and John Weir of the California Institute of Technology. How is mankind coping with the problem of rapidly increasing numbers? Not very successfully. "The evidence suggests rather strongly that in most underdeveloped countries the lot of the average individual has worsened appreciably in the last half century. People have become more poorly fed. There are fewer available goods per person. And practically every attempt to improve the situation has been nullified by the relentless pressure of continued population growth." Whenever the economic life of a nation becomes precarious, the central government is forced to assume additional responsibilities for the general welfare. It must work out elaborate plans for dealing with a critical situation; it must impose ever greater restrictions upon the activities of its subjects; and if, as is very likely, worsening economic conditions result in political unrest, or open rebellion, the central government must intervene to preserve public order and its own authority. More and more power is thus concentrated in the hands of the executives and their bureaucratic managers. But the nature of power is such that even those who have not sought it, but have had it forced upon them, tend to acquire a taste for more. "Lead us not into temptation," we pray -- and with good reason; for when human beings are tempted too enticingly or too long, they generally yield. A democratic constitution is a device for preventing the local rulers from yielding to those particularly dangerous temptations that arise when too much power is concentrated in too few hands. Such a constitution works pretty well where, as in Britain or the United States, there is a traditional respect for constitutional procedures. Where the republican or limited monarchical tradition is weak, the best of constitutions will not prevent ambitious politicians from succumbing with glee and gusto to the temptations of power. And in any country where numbers have begun to press heavily upon available resources, these temptations cannot fail to arise. Over-population leads to economic insecurity and social unrest. Unrest and insecurity lead to more control by central governments and an increase of their power. In the absence of a constitutional tradition, this increased power will probably be exercised in a dictatorial fashion. Even if Communism had never been invented, this would be likely to happen. But Communism has been invented. Given this fact, the probability of over-population leading through unrest to dictatorship becomes a virtual certainty. It is a pretty safe bet that, twenty years from now, all the world's over-populated and underdeveloped countries will be under some form of totalitarian rule -- probably by the Communist party.

How will this development affect the over-populated, but highly industrialized and still democratic countries of Europe? If the newly formed dictatorships were hostile to them, and if the normal flow of raw materials from the underdeveloped countries were deliberately interrupted, the nations of the West would find themselves in a very bad way indeed. Their industrial system would break down, and the highly developed technology, which up till now has permitted them to sustain a population much greater than that which could be supported by locally available resources, would no longer protect them against the consequences of having too many people in too small a territory. If this should happen, the enormous powers forced by unfavorable conditions upon central govern- ments may come to be used in the spirit of totalitarian dictatorship. The United States is not at present an over-populated country. If, however, the population continues to increase at the present rate (which is higher than that of India's increase, though happily a good deal lower than the rate now current in Mexico or Guatemala), the problem of numbers in relation to available resources might well become troublesome by the beginning of the twenty-first century. For the moment overpopulation is not a direct threat to the personal freedom of Americans. It remains, however, an indirect threat, a menace at one remove. If over-population should drive the underdeveloped countries into totalitarianism, and if these new dictatorships should ally themselves with Russia, then the military position of the United States would become less secure and the preparations for defense and retaliation would have to be intensified. But liberty, as we all know, cannot flourish in a country that is permanently on a war footing, or even a near-war footing. Permanent crisis justifies permanent control of everybody and everything by the agencies of the central government. And permanent crisis is what we have to expect in a world in which over-population is producing a state of things, in which dictatorship under Communist auspices becomes almost inevitable.

@ 6871d8df:4a9396c1

Embracing AI: A Case for AI Accelerationism

In an era where artificial intelligence (AI) development is at the forefront of technological innovation, a counter-narrative championed by a group I refer to as the 'AI Decels'—those advocating for the deceleration of AI advancements— seems to be gaining significant traction. After tuning into a recent episode of the Joe Rogan Podcast, I realized that the prevailing narrative around AI was heading in a dangerous direction. Rogan had Aza Raskin and Tristan Harris, technology safety advocates, who released a talk called 'The AI Dilemma,' on for a discussion. You may know them from the popular documentary 'The Social Dilemma' on the dangers of social media. It became increasingly clear that the cautionary stance dominating this discourse might be tipping the scales too far, veering towards an over-regulated future that stifles innovation rather than fostering it.

Are we moving too fast?

While acknowledging AI's benefits, Aza and Tristan fear it could be dangerous if not guided by ethical standards and safeguards. They believe AI development is moving too quickly and that the right incentives for its growth are not in place. They are concerned about the possibility of "civilizational overwhelm," where advanced AI technology far outpaces 21st-century governance. They fear a scenario where society and its institutions cannot manage or adapt to the rapid changes and challenges introduced by AI.

They argue for regulating and slowing down AI development due to rapid, uncontrolled advancement driven by competition among companies like Google, OpenAI, and Microsoft. They claim this race can lead to unsafe releases of new technologies, with AI systems exhibiting unpredictable, emergent behaviors, posing significant societal risks. For instance, AI can inadvertently learn tasks like sentiment analysis or human emotion understanding, creating potential for misuse in areas like biological weapons or cybersecurity vulnerabilities.

Moreover, AI companies' profit-driven incentives often conflict with the public good, prioritizing market dominance over safety and ethics. This misalignment can lead to technologies that maximize engagement or profits at societal expense, similar to the negative impacts seen with social media. To address these issues, they suggest government regulation to realign AI companies' incentives with safety, ethical considerations, and public welfare. Implementing responsible development frameworks focused on long-term societal impacts is essential for mitigating potential harm.

This isn't new

Though the premise of their concerns seems reasonable, it's dangerous and an all too common occurrence with the emergence of new technologies. For example, in their example in the podcast, they refer to the technological breakthrough of oil. Oil as energy was a technological marvel and changed the course of human civilization. The embrace of oil — now the cornerstone of industry in our age — revolutionized how societies operated, fueled economies, and connected the world in unprecedented ways. Yet recently, as ideas of its environmental and geopolitical ramifications propagated, the narrative around oil has shifted.

Tristan and Aza detail this shift and claim that though the period was great for humanity, we didn't have another technology to go to once the technological consequences became apparent. The problem with that argument is that we did innovate to a better alternative: nuclear. However, at its technological breakthrough, it was met with severe suspicions, from safety concerns to ethical debates over its use. This overregulation due to these concerns caused a decades-long stagnation in nuclear innovation, where even today, we are still stuck with heavy reliance on coal and oil. The scare tactics and fear-mongering had consequences, and, interestingly, they don't see the parallels with their current deceleration stance on AI.

These examples underscore a critical insight: the initial anxiety surrounding new technologies is a natural response to the unknowns they introduce. Yet, history shows that too much anxiety can stifle the innovation needed to address the problems posed by current technologies. The cycle of discovery, fear, adaptation, and eventual acceptance reveals an essential truth—progress requires not just the courage to innovate but also the resilience to navigate the uncertainties these innovations bring.

Moreover, believing we can predict and plan for all AI-related unknowns reflects overconfidence in our understanding and foresight. History shows that technological progress, marked by unexpected outcomes and discoveries, defies such predictions. The evolution from the printing press to the internet underscores progress's unpredictability. Hence, facing AI's future requires caution, curiosity, and humility. Acknowledging our limitations and embracing continuous learning and adaptation will allow us to harness AI's potential responsibly, illustrating that embracing our uncertainties, rather than pretending to foresee them, is vital to innovation.

The journey of technological advancement is fraught with both promise and trepidation. Historically, each significant leap forward, from the dawn of the industrial age to the digital revolution, has been met with a mix of enthusiasm and apprehension. Aza Raskin and Tristan Harris's thesis in the 'AI Dilemma' embodies the latter.

Who defines "safe?"

When slowing down technologies for safety or ethical reasons, the issue arises of who gets to define what "safe" or “ethical” mean? This inquiry is not merely technical but deeply ideological, touching the very core of societal values and power dynamics. For example, the push for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives shows how specific ideological underpinnings can shape definitions of safety and decency.

Take the case of the initial release of Google's AI chatbot, Gemini, which chose the ideology of its creators over truth. Luckily, the answers were so ridiculous that the pushback was sudden and immediate. My worry, however, is if, in correcting this, they become experts in making the ideological capture much more subtle. Large bureaucratic institutions' top-down safety enforcement creates a fertile ground for ideological capture of safety standards.

I claim that the issue is not the technology itself but the lens through which we view and regulate it. Suppose the gatekeepers of 'safety' are aligned with a singular ideology. In that case, AI development would skew to serve specific ends, sidelining diverse perspectives and potentially stifling innovative thought and progress.

In the podcast, Tristan and Aza suggest such manipulation as a solution. They propose using AI for consensus-building and creating "shared realities" to address societal challenges. In practice, this means that when individuals' viewpoints seem to be far apart, we can leverage AI to "bridge the gap." How they bridge the gap and what we would bridge it toward is left to the imagination, but to me, it is clear. Regulators will inevitably influence it from the top down, which, in my opinion, would be the opposite of progress.

In navigating this terrain, we must advocate for a pluralistic approach to defining safety, encompassing various perspectives and values achieved through market forces rather than a governing entity choosing winners. The more players that can play the game, the more wide-ranging perspectives will catalyze innovation to flourish.

Ownership & Identity

Just because we should accelerate AI forward does not mean I do not have my concerns. When I think about what could be the most devastating for society, I don't believe we have to worry about a Matrix-level dystopia; I worry about freedom. As I explored in "Whose data is it anyway?," my concern gravitates toward the issues of data ownership and the implications of relinquishing control over our digital identities. This relinquishment threatens our privacy and the integrity of the content we generate, leaving it susceptible to the inclinations and profit of a few dominant tech entities.

To counteract these concerns, a paradigm shift towards decentralized models of data ownership is imperative. Such standards would empower individuals with control over their digital footprints, ensuring that we develop AI systems with diverse, honest, and truthful perspectives rather than the massaged, narrow viewpoints of their creators. This shift safeguards individual privacy and promotes an ethical framework for AI development that upholds the principles of fairness and impartiality.

As we stand at the crossroads of technological innovation and ethical consideration, it is crucial to advocate for systems that place data ownership firmly in the hands of users. By doing so, we can ensure that the future of AI remains truthful, non-ideological, and aligned with the broader interests of society.

But what about the Matrix?

I know I am in the minority on this, but I feel that the concerns of AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) are generally overblown. I am not scared of reaching the point of AGI, and I think the idea that AI will become so intelligent that we will lose control of it is unfounded and silly. Reaching AGI is not reaching consciousness; being worried about it spontaneously gaining consciousness is a misplaced fear. It is a tool created by humans for humans to enhance productivity and achieve specific outcomes.

At a technical level, large language models (LLMs) are trained on extensive datasets and learning patterns from language and data through a technique called "unsupervised learning" (meaning the data is untagged). They predict the next word in sentences, refining their predictions through feedback to improve coherence and relevance. When queried, LLMs generate responses based on learned patterns, simulating an understanding of language to provide contextually appropriate answers. They will only answer based on the datasets that were inputted and scanned.

AI will never be "alive," meaning that AI lacks inherent agency, consciousness, and the characteristics of life, not capable of independent thought or action. AI cannot act independently of human control. Concerns about AI gaining autonomy and posing a threat to humanity are based on a misunderstanding of the nature of AI and the fundamental differences between living beings and machines. AI spontaneously developing a will or consciousness is more similar to thinking a hammer will start walking than us being able to create consciousness through programming. Right now, there is only one way to create consciousness, and I'm skeptical that is ever something we will be able to harness and create as humans. Irrespective of its complexity — and yes, our tools will continue to become evermore complex — machines, specifically AI, cannot transcend their nature as non-living, inanimate objects programmed and controlled by humans.
The advancement of AI should be seen as enhancing human capabilities, not as a path toward creating autonomous entities with their own wills. So, while AI will continue to evolve, improve, and become more powerful, I believe it will remain under human direction and control without the existential threats often sensationalized in discussions about AI's future.

With this framing, we should not view the race toward AGI as something to avoid. This will only make the tools we use more powerful, making us more productive. With all this being said, AGI is still much farther away than many believe.

Today's AI excels in specific, narrow tasks, known as narrow or weak AI. These systems operate within tightly defined parameters, achieving remarkable efficiency and accuracy that can sometimes surpass human performance in those specific tasks. Yet, this is far from the versatile and adaptable functionality that AGI represents.

Moreover, the exponential growth of computational power observed in the past decades does not directly translate to an equivalent acceleration in achieving AGI. AI's impressive feats are often the result of massive data inputs and computing resources tailored to specific tasks. These successes do not inherently bring us closer to understanding or replicating the general problem-solving capabilities of the human mind, which again would only make the tools more potent in our hands.

While AI will undeniably introduce challenges and change the aspects of conflict and power dynamics, these challenges will primarily stem from humans wielding this powerful tool rather than the technology itself. AI is a mirror reflecting our own biases, values, and intentions. The crux of future AI-related issues lies not in the technology's inherent capabilities but in how it is used by those wielding it. This reality is at odds with the idea that we should slow down development as our biggest threat will come from those who are not friendly to us.

AI Beget's AI

While the unknowns of AI development and its pitfalls indeed stir apprehension, it's essential to recognize the power of market forces and human ingenuity in leveraging AI to address these challenges. History is replete with examples of new technologies raising concerns, only for those very technologies to provide solutions to the problems they initially seemed to exacerbate. It looks silly and unfair to think of fighting a war with a country that never embraced oil and was still primarily getting its energy from burning wood. The evolution of AI is no exception to this pattern. As we venture into uncharted territories, the potential issues that arise with AI—be it ethical concerns, use by malicious actors, biases in decision-making, or privacy intrusions—are not merely obstacles but opportunities for innovation. It is within the realm of possibility, and indeed, probability, that AI will play a crucial role in solving the problems it creates. The idea that there would be no incentive to address and solve these problems is to underestimate the fundamental drivers of technological progress.

Market forces, fueled by the demand for better, safer, and more efficient solutions, are powerful catalysts for positive change. When a problem is worth fixing, it invariably attracts the attention of innovators, researchers, and entrepreneurs eager to solve it. This dynamic has driven progress throughout history, and AI is poised to benefit from this problem-solving cycle.

Thus, rather than viewing AI's unknowns as sources of fear, we should see them as sparks of opportunity. By tackling the challenges posed by AI, we will harness its full potential to benefit humanity. By fostering an ecosystem that encourages exploration, innovation, and problem-solving, we can ensure that AI serves as a force for good, solving problems as profound as those it might create. This is the optimism we must hold onto—a belief in our collective ability to shape AI into a tool that addresses its own challenges and elevates our capacity to solve some of society's most pressing issues.

An AI Future

The reality is that it isn't whether AI will lead to unforeseen challenges—it undoubtedly will, as has every major technological leap in history. The real issue is whether we let fear dictate our path and confine us to a standstill or embrace AI's potential to address current and future challenges.

The approach to solving potential AI-related problems with stringent regulations and a slowdown in innovation is akin to cutting off the nose to spite the face. It's a strategy that risks stagnating the U.S. in a global race where other nations will undoubtedly continue their AI advancements. This perspective dangerously ignores that AI, much like the printing press of the past, has the power to democratize information, empower individuals, and dismantle outdated power structures.

The way forward is not less AI but more of it, more innovation, optimism, and curiosity for the remarkable technological breakthroughs that will come. We must recognize that the solution to AI-induced challenges lies not in retreating but in advancing our capabilities to innovate and adapt.

AI represents a frontier of limitless possibilities. If wielded with foresight and responsibility, it's a tool that can help solve some of the most pressing issues we face today. There are certainly challenges ahead, but I trust that with problems come solutions. Let's keep the AI Decels from steering us away from this path with their doomsday predictions. Instead, let's embrace AI with the cautious optimism it deserves, forging a future where technology and humanity advance to heights we can't imagine.

@ 3c984938:2ec11289

I'm having some pain in my heart about the U.S. elections.

Ever since Obama campaigned for office, an increase of young voters have come out of the woodwork. Things have not improved. They've actively told you that "your vote matters." I believe this to be a lie unless any citizen can demand at the gate, at the White House to be allowed to hold and point a gun to the president's head. (Relax, this is a hyperbole)

Why so dramatic? Well, what does the president do? Sign bills, commands the military, nominates new Fed chairman, ambassadors, supreme judges and senior officials all while traveling in luxury planes and living in a white palace for four years.

They promised Every TIME to protect citizen rights when they take the oath and office.

...They've broken this several times, with so-called "emergency-crisis"

The purpose of a president, today, it seems is to basically hire armed thugs to keep the citizens in check and make sure you "voluntarily continue to be a slave," to the system, hence the IRS. The corruption extends from the cop to the judge and even to politicians. The politicians get paid from lobbyists to create bills in congress for the president to sign. There's no right answer when money is involved with politicians. It is the same if you vote Obama, Biden, Trump, or Haley. They will wield the pen to serve themselves to say it will benefit the country.

In the first 100 years of presidency, the government wasn't even a big deal. They didn't even interfere with your life as much as they do today.

^^ You hold the power in your hands, don't let them take it. Don't believe me? Try to get a loan from a bank without a signature. Your signature is as good as gold (if not better) and is an original trademark.

Just Don't Vote. End the Fed. Opt out.

^^ I choose to form my own path, even if it means leaving everything I knew prior. It doesn't have to be a spiritual thing. Some, have called me religious because of this. We're all capable of greatness and having humanity.

✨Don't have a machine heart with a machine mind. Instead, choose to have a heart like the cowardly lion from the "Wizard Of Oz."

There's no such thing as a good president or politicians.

If there was, they would have issued non-interest Federal Reserve Notes. Lincoln and Kennedy tried to do this, they got shot.

There's still a banner of America there, but it's so far gone that I cannot even recognize it. However, I only see a bunch of 🏳‍🌈 pride flags.

✨Patrick Henry got it wrong, when he delivered his speech, "Give me liberty or give me death." Liberty and freedom are two completely different things.

Straightforward from Merriam-Webster Choose Right or left? No control, to be 100% without restrictions- free.

✨I disagree with the example sentence given. Because you cannot advocate for human freedom and own slaves, it's contradicting it. Which was common in the founding days.

I can understand many may disagree with me, and you might be thinking, "This time will be different." I, respectfully, disagree, and the proxy wars are proof. Learn the importance of Bitcoin, every Satoshi is a step away from corruption.

✨What does it look like to pull the curtains from the "Wizard of Oz?"

Have you watched the video below, what 30 Trillion dollars in debt looks like visually? Even I was blown away. https://video.nostr.build/d58c5e1afba6d7a905a39407f5e695a4eb4a88ae692817a36ecfa6ca1b62ea15.mp4

I say this with love. Hear my plea?

Normally, I don't write about anything political. It just feels like a losing game. My energy feels it's in better use to learn new things, write and to create. Even a simple blog post as simple as this. Stack SATs, and stay humble.

<3 Onigirl

@ 6c8c7979:15595f3e

It's one of Granada's most famous landmarks and considered one of the greatest architectural palaces built by the Nasrid rulers of Spanish Granada in the 13th century AD, following the Islamic-Andalusian style, serving as a fortress for defending their city. Despite being built nearly 800 years ago, the Alhambra Palace remains an architectural marvel of exquisite beauty. So, discover with us some astonishing facts about it.

$$It took over 150 years to build$$

Prince Abu Abdullah Muhammad I, also known as "Al-Ghalib Billah," the founder of the Nasrid Dynasty in Granada, ordered the construction of the Alhambra Palace between 1238 and 1273 AD. While initial work on its fortified walls and thirteen tall towers began in 1238, the complete construction of the site lasted over 150 years due to additions and modifications by subsequent Nasrid rulers during their reigns.

$$Its name, "Alhambra," has several possible origins$$

Built on the elevated hill of "Sabika" near the Darro River, the origin of its name is debated. Some suggest it stems from the reddish color of the stones used in its construction or the red-tinged soil in the area. Others attribute it to the name "Al-Red," by which the rulers of Granada were known. Another theory links its name to the "Red City," named for the color of its other citadels.

$$The palace has withstood wars and earthquakes$$

From the outside, the Alhambra Palace still astonishes with its preserved architectural grandeur, despite being over 800 years old. It resisted attacks by the French army during the early 19th century invasion of Spain and has endured numerous earthquakes due to its location in a region prone to seismic activity.

$$Legend of the "Gate of Justice" and the end of the world$$

Builders of the palace believed so strongly in its exceptional construction and advanced techniques that they spread the idea that if enemies ever opened the "Gate of Justice" – the main gateway of the palace – it would signal the end of the world. The "Gate of Justice" remains a significant symbol of the Alhambra, featuring a sculpted hand on its cornerstone and a key placed beside it. Legend says the hand and key were positioned high up so that only the worthy could reach them, potentially becoming the new ruler of Granada and owner of the Alhambra Palace.

@ 4523be58:ba1facd0

NIP-116

Event paths

Description

Event kind 30079 denotes an event defined by its event path rather than its event kind.

The event directory path is included in the event path, specified in the event's d tag. For example, an event path might be user/profile/name, where user/profile is the directory path.

Relays should parse the event directory from the event path d tag and index the event by it. Relays should support "directory listing" of kind 30079 events using the #f filter, such as {"#f": ["user/profile"]}.

For backward compatibility, the event directory should also be saved in the event's f tag (for "folder"), which is already indexed by some relay implementations, and can be queried using the #f filter.

Event content should be a JSON-encoded value. An empty object {} signifies that the entry at the event path is itself a directory. For example, when saving user/profile/name: Bob, you should also save user/profile: {} so the subdirectory can be listed under user.

In directory names, slashes should be escaped with a double slash.

Example

Event

json { "tags": [ ["d", "user/profile/name"], ["f", "user/profile"] ], "content": "\"Bob\"", "kind": 30079, ... }

Query

json { "#f": ["user/profile"], "authors": ["[pubkey]"] }

Motivation

To make Nostr an "everything app," we need a sustainable way to support new kinds of applications. Browsing Nostr data by human-readable nested directories and paths rather than obscure event kind numbers makes the data more manageable.

Numeric event kinds are not sustainable for the infinite number of potential applications. With numeric event kinds, developers need to find an unused number for each new application and announce it somewhere, which is cumbersome and not scalable.

Directories can also replace monolithic list events like follow lists or profile details. You can update a single directory entry such as user/profile/name or groups/follows/[pubkey] without causing an overwrite of the whole profile or follow list when your client is out-of-sync with the most recent list version, as often happens on Nostr.

Using d-tagged replaceable events for reactions, such as {tags: [["d", "reactions/[eventId]"]], content: "\"👍\"", kind: 30079, ...} would make un-reacting trivial: just publish a new event with the same d tag and an empty content. Toggling a reaction on and off would not cause a flurry of new reaction & delete events that all need to be persisted.

Implementations

• Relays that support tag-replaceable events and indexing by arbitrary tags (in this case f) already support this feature.
• IrisDB client side library: treelike data structure with subscribable nodes.

https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/pull/1266

@ 1739d937:3e3136ef

This is the second in a series of weekly updates detailing progress on bringing MLS protocol DMs and group messaging to Nostr.

Previous Updates

• June 28th 2024

Progress this week

This week was mostly spent on the topic of how to properly publish prekey bundles and what would be needed in the bundle itself to make it workable. I've included an early version of the spec below for prekeys, and would love thoughts on it. Treat this as an alpha version, very subject to change.

The other thing I spent time on was making changes to the OpenMLS library to add support for our custom ciphersuite. One issue that I've run into is that the IETF standard for HPKE doesn't include the secp256k1 curve. Because of this, the library being used in the OpenMLS library doesn't implement the necessary methods using our curve. Thankfully, there is another library with an open PR (shout out to nostr:npub1yevrvtp3xl42sq06usztudhleq8pdfsugw5frgaqg6lvfdewfx9q6zqrkl for that!) that would fix this. Additionally, there's an expired proposal to add secp256k1 to the HPKE spec itself. I've bumped both of these and will continue to follow up. Even without the formal addition to the spec, if we have a working library, I can add that to the OpenMLS library.

Spec Draft for Prekeys

Initial keying material (Prekey Event)

Each user that wishes to be reachable via MLS-based messaging MUST first publish a prekey event. Prekeys are used to authenticate and add members to groups (one-to-one DMs or groups with more than two participants) in an asynchronous way. The prekey event is a simple replaceable event and contains all the information needed to add a user to a group.

Prekeys SHOULD be used only once. Resuse of prekeys can lead to replay attacks.

In most cases, clients that implement this NIP will manage the creation and rotation of the prekey event. It's recommended that clients do so interactively with user consent in order to avoid overwriting prekeys created by other clients.

Derived vs Ephemeral Prekeys

Since prekeys are generated on a single device/client pair, the private key of the prekey must be either stored or generated in a way that can be deterministically recovered.

The recommended approach is to use derived keys, generated in the manner described in NIP-06. In this way, the user can respond to a new group request from any device/client pair, not just from the same device/client pair that created the initial prekey event. If using derived keys;

• Clients MUST use 104 as the account level value and 0 at the change level value (e.g. m/44'/1237'/104'/0/0).
• Keys are then generated using public derivation by incrementing the address_index level value.
• Clients MUST include the full derivation path corresponding to the key used in the content field on the prekey event.
• The content field MUST be encrypted using standard NIP-44 encryption (encrypted to themselves).

However, for added security (and consequently a more restrictive user experience), clients can chose to generate an ephemeral key and store the private key locally. This means that users will only be able to respond to new group requests from the same device/client pair and won't be able to respond at all if the prekey's private key is lost. Ephemeral keys can also be used with minimal degredation of UX if you're using a remote signer that can manage these keys.

If using an ephemeral key;

• The content field on the prekey event MUST be filled in with EPHEMERAL and then encrypted using standard NIP-44 encryption (encrypted to themselves). This ensures that anyone looking at prekey events cannot tell whether it's a derived or an ephemeral prekey.

Example Prekey Event

json { "id": <id>, "kind": 10443, "created_at": <unix timestamp in seconds>, "pubkey": <main identity pubkey>, "content": <encrypted derivation path | EPHEMERAL>, "tags": [ ["mls_protocol_version", "1.0"], ["ciphersuite", "MLS_256_DHKEMK256_CHACHA20POLY1305_SHA256_K256"], ["pubkey", <prekey pubkey>], ["prekey_sig", <signature generated from hex encoded pubkey of the prekey>], ["r", "wss://nos.lol"], ["r", "wss://relay.primal.net"] ], "sig": <signed with main identity key> }

Tags

• The mls_protocol_version tag identifies the MLS protocol version being used. For now, this MUST be 1.0
• The ciphersuite tag identifies the ciphersuite supported. For now on Nostr, we're using a custom ciphersuite, MLS_256_DHKEMK256_CHACHA20POLY1305_SHA256_K256. Read more about ciphersuites in MLS.
• pubkey is the derived or ephemeral prekey pubkey.
• The prekey_sig tag value is a Schnorr signature (over the secp256k1 curve) of the SHA-256 hashed value of the prekey's pubkey, signed with the prekey's private key.

```js const privKey = schnorr.utils.randomPrivateKey(); const pubKey = schnorr.getPublicKey(privKey);

const prekeySig = bytesToHex( schnorr.sign(bytesToHex(sha256(pubKey)), privKey) );

const prekeyTag = ["prekey_sig", prekeySig]; ```

Finally, clients SHOULD include r tags to identify each of the relays that they will attempt to publish this prekey event to. This allows for more complete replacement of prekey events at a later date.

Replacing Prekey Events

Clients MUST replace the prekey event on all the listed relays any time they successfully process a group welcome event. If the prekey was a derived prekey, clients SHOULD increment the derivation path by 1 for the next key.

Onward and Upward

This next week I'll continue to work on getting the right curves and code added to the OpenMLS library and start work on a simple demo app. The focus is on better understanding what we need from the control and message events and how we can make those as simple as possible for Nostr clients and relays while also preserving as much privacy as possible.

@ 5d4b6c8d:8a1c1ee3

It's been a while since I've scolded everyone for their miserliness. The recent archiving of some popular territories inspired me to make another attempt. Plus, there are quite a few new stackers who haven't been scolded, yet.

I'll keep this one short and sweet: 1. Territory owners need to make about 100 kilosats per month. 2. They earn their sats through posting fees. 3. OP's need to recoup their posting costs through zaps.

Therefore, when there's content you like, zap big and zap often.

If there's a lack of content you like, cowboy up and write it yourself. We just might make it worth your while.

Zapping more can pay for itself through the rewards system (see: https://stacker.news/items/287074/r/Undisciplined and https://stacker.news/items/473181/r/Undisciplined)

Also, zapping more will make Stacker News more aligned with what you want it to be: https://stacker.news/items/523858/r/Undisciplined.

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/614066

@ 5d4b6c8d:8a1c1ee3

Yesterday's edition https://stacker.news/items/612715/r/Undisciplined

I enjoyed the discussion in the 2022 AMA. I'd love to have some more stackers reporting more on the developing world. How is the bitcoin ecosystem developing? What problems is it solving for people?

• • -

July 19, 2023 📅

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📝 TOP POST

Bitcoin Optech Newsletter #260

Link to https://bitcoinops.org/en/newsletters/2023/07/19/

2733 sats \ 0 comments \ @ssaurel \ ~bitcoin

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💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/211250/r/Undisciplined?commentId=211288

Excerpt

Been very busy recently replicating the Indranet architecture to the guy who's been paying me to design and build it. It's been great for me in terms of helping delineate the core principles of the design and to spot some possible design flaws, as we […]

340 sats \ 0 replies \ @l0k18

From What are you working on this week? by @sn in ~meta

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🏆 TOP STACKER

2nd place @nerd2ninja (1st hiding, presumed @siggy47)

1335 stacked \ 2158 spent \ 0 posts \ 6 comments \ 0 referrals

---

🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

22.1k stacked \ 0 revenue \ 29.9k spent \ 110 posts \ 192 comments

https://imgprxy.stacker.news/fsFoWlgwKYsk5mxx2ijgqU8fg04I_2zA_D28t_grR74/rs:fit:960:540/aHR0cHM6Ly9tLnN0YWNrZXIubmV3cy8yMzc5Ng

July 19, 2022 📅

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📝 TOP POST

I'm Alex Gladstein. CSO of the Human Rights Foundation. AMA

Excerpt

I am also the author of Check Your Financial Privilege.

93.1k sats \ 48 comments \ @gladstein \ ~bitcoin

---

💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/47002/r/Undisciplined?commentId=47018

Excerpt

Bitcoin is likely playing a nascent role in cross-border payments between South Korea, China, and NK, but it's too early too tell

470 sats \ 0 replies \ @gladstein

From I'm Alex Gladstein. CSO of the Human Rights Foundation. AMA by @gladstein in ~bitcoin

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🏆 TOP STACKER

1st place @k00b

13.5k stacked \ 92.4k spent \ 3 posts \ 13 comments \ 0 referrals

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🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

126.4k stacked \ 0 revenue \ 132k spent \ 94 posts \ 300 comments

https://imgprxy.stacker.news/fsFoWlgwKYsk5mxx2ijgqU8fg04I_2zA_D28t_grR74/rs:fit:960:540/aHR0cHM6Ly9tLnN0YWNrZXIubmV3cy8yMzc5Ng

July 19, 2021 📅

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📝 TOP POST

Dashboard: Bitcoin KPIs

Link to https://bitcoinkpis.com/

3 sats \ 3 comments \ @nathanael \ ~bitcoin

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💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/398/r/Undisciplined?commentId=409

Excerpt

nice - i added it there - welcome

2 sats \ 1 reply \ @nathanael

From Stacker.News Community by @gmd in ~bitcoin

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🏆 TOP STACKER

No top stacker

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🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

11 stacked \ 0 revenue \ 15 spent \ 1 post \ 7 comments

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/613971

@ b60c3e76:c9d0f46e

KRIS menjamin semua golongan masyarakat mendapatkan perlakuan sama dari rumah sakit, baik pelayanan medis maupun nonmedis.

Demi memberikan peningkatan kualitas layanan kesehatan kepada masyarakat, pemerintah baru saja mengeluarkan Peraturan Presiden (Perpres) nomor 59 tahun 2024 tentang Jaminan Kesehatan. Melalui perpres itu, Presiden Joko Widodo (Jokowi) telah menghapus perbedaan kelas layanan 1, 2, dan 3 dalam Badan Penyelenggara Jaminan Sosial atau BPJS Kesehatan.

Layanan berbasis kelas itu diganti dengan KRIS (Kelas Rawat Inap Standar). Berkaitan dengan lahirnya Perpres 59/2024 tentang Perubahan Ketiga atas Perpres 82/2018 tentang Jaminan Kesehatan, Presiden Joko Widodo telah memerintahkan seluruh rumah sakit yang bekerja sama dengan BPJS Kesehatan melaksanakannya.

Kebijakan baru itu mulai berlaku per 8 Mei 2024 dan paling lambat 30 Juni 2025. Dalam jangka waktu tersebut, rumah sakit dapat menyelenggarakan sebagian atau seluruh pelayanan rawat inap berdasarkan KRIS sesuai dengan kemampuan rumah sakit.

Lantas apa yang menjadi pembeda dari sisi layanan dengan layanan rawat inap sesuai Perpres 59/2024? Dahulu sistem layanan rawat BPJS Kesehatan dibagi berdasarkan kelas yang dibagi masing-masing kelas 1, 2, dan 3. Namun, melalui perpres, layanan kepada masyarakat tidak dibedakan lagi.

Pelayanan rawat inap yang diatur dalam perpres itu--dikenal dengan nama KRIS—menjadi sistem baru yang digunakan dalam pelayanan rawat inap BPJS Kesehatan di rumah sakit-rumah sakit. Dengan KRIS, semua golongan masyarakat akan mendapatkan perlakuan yang sama dari rumah sakit, baik dalam hal pelayanan medis maupun nonmedis.

Dengan lahirnya Perpres 59/2024, tarif iuran BPJS Kesehatan pun juga akan berubah. Hanya saja, dalam Perpres itu belum dicantumkan secara rinci ihwal besar iuran yang baru. Besaran iuran baru BPJS Kesehatan itu sesuai rencana baru ditetapkan pada 1 Juli 2025.

“Penetapan manfaat, tarif, dan iuran sebagaimana dimaksud ditetapkan paling lambat tanggal 1 Juli 2025,” tulis aturan tersebut, dikutip Senin (13/5/2024).

Itu artinya, iuran BPJS Kesehatan saat ini masih sama seperti sebelumnya, yakni sesuai dengan kelas yang dipilih. Namun perpres itu tetap berlaku sembari menanti lahirnya peraturan lanjutan dari perpres tersebut.

Kesiapan Rumah Sakit

Berkaitan dengan lahirnya kebijakan layanan kesehatan tanpa dibedakan kelas lagi, Kementerian Kesehatan (Kemenkes) menegaskan mayoritas rumah sakit di Indonesia siap untuk menjalankan layanan KRIS untuk pasien BPJS Kesehatan.

Kesiapan itu diungkapkan oleh Dirjen Pelayanan Kesehatan Kemenkes Azhar Jaya. “Survei kesiapan RS terkait KRIS sudah dilakukan pada 2.988 rumah sakit dan yang sudah siap menjawab isian 12 kriteria ada sebanyak 2.233 rumah sakit,” ujar Azhar.

Sebagai informasi, KRIS adalah pengganti layanan Kelas 1, 2, dan 3 BPJS Kesehatan yang bertujuan untuk memberikan layanan kesehatan secara merata tanpa melihat besaran iurannya.

Melalui KRIS, rumah sakit perlu menyiapkan sarana dan prasarana sesuai dengan 12 kriteria kelas rawat inap standar secara bertahap. Apa saja ke-12 kriteria KRIS itu?

Sesuai bunyi Pasal 46A Perpres 59/2024, disyaratkan kriteria fasilitas perawatan dan pelayanan rawat inap KRIS meliputi komponen bangunan yang digunakan tidak boleh memiliki tingkat porositas yang tinggi serta terdapat ventilasi udara dan kelengkapan tidur.

Demikian pula soal pencahayaan ruangan. Perpres itu juga mengatur pencahayaan ruangan buatan mengikuti kriteria standar 250 lux untuk penerangan dan 50 lux untuk pencahayaan tidur, temperature ruangan 20--26 derajat celcius.

Tidak hanya itu, layanan rawat inap berdasarkan perpres itu mensyaratkan fasilitas layanan yang membagi ruang rawat berdasarkan jenis kelamin pasien, anak atau dewasa, serta penyakit infeksi atau noninfeksi.

Selain itu, kriteria lainnya adalah keharusan bagi penyedia layanan untuk mempertimbangkan kepadatan ruang rawat dan kualitas tempat tidur, penyediaan tirai atau partisi antartempat tidur, kamar mandi dalam ruangan rawat inap yang memenuhi standar aksesibilitas, dan menyediakan outlet oksigen.

Selain itu, kelengkapan tempat tidur berupa adanya dua kotak kontak dan nurse call pada setiap tempat tidur dan adanya nakas per tempat tidur. Kepadatan ruang rawat inap maksimal empat tempat tidur dengan jarak antara tepi tempat tidur minimal 1,5 meter.

Tirai/partisi dengan rel dibenamkan menempel di plafon atau menggantung. Kamar mandi dalam ruang rawat inap serta kamar mandi sesuai dengan standar aksesibilitas dan outlet oksigen.

Azhar menjamin, Kemenkes akan menjalankan hal tersebut sesuai dengan tupoksi yang ada. “Tentu saja kami akan bekerja sama dengan BPJS Kesehatan dalam implementasi dan pengawasannya di lapangan,” ujar Azhar.

Berkaitan dengan perpres jaminan kesehatan itu, Direktur Utama BPJS Kesehatan Ghufron Mukti menilai, perpres tersebut berorientasi pada penyeragaman kelas rawat inap yang mengacu pada 12 kriteria. "Bahwa perawatan ada kelas rawat inap standar dengan 12 kriteria, untuk peserta BPJS, maka sebagaimana sumpah dokter tidak boleh dibedakan pemberian pelayan medis atas dasar suku, agama, status sosial atau beda iurannya," ujarnya.

Jika ada peserta ingin dirawat pada kelas yang lebih tinggi, kata Ghufron, maka diperbolehkan selama hal itu dipengaruhi situasi nonmedis. Hal itu disebutkan dalam Pasal 51 Perpres Jaminan Kesehatan diatur ketentuan naik kelas perawatan.

Menurut pasal tersebut, naik kelas perawatan dilakukan dengan cara mengikuti asuransi kesehatan tambahan atau membayar selisih antara biaya yang dijamin oleh BPJS Kesehatan dengan biaya yang harus dibayar akibat peningkatan pelayanan.

Selisih antara biaya yang dijamin oleh BPJS Kesehatan dengan biaya pelayanan dapat dibayar oleh peserta bersangkutan, pemberi kerja, atau asuransi kesehatan tambahan.

Ghufron Mukti juga mengimbau pengelola rumah sakit tidak mengurangi jumlah tempat tidur perawatan pasien dalam upaya memenuhi kriteria KRIS. "Pesan saya jangan dikurangi akses dengan mengurangi jumlah tempat tidur. Pertahankan jumlah tempat tidur dan penuhi persyaratannya dengan 12 kriteria tersebut," tegas Ghufron.

Penulis: Firman Hidranto Redaktur: Ratna Nuraini/Elvira Inda Sari Sumber: Indonesia.go.id

@ 81870f53:29bef6a6

先週、利下げへの期待が金の魅力を高め、金は3週連続で上昇した。今週は、ドナルド・トランプ前大統領の暗殺未遂事件に伴う政治的懸念と利下げの憶測が市場を動かした。

月曜日、ダウ工業株30種平均は今年20回目の最高値を更新し、他の主要株価指数も利下げへの期待がウォール街に広がる中、上昇した。同日、金は0.8％上昇して終値2,432ドルとなった。月曜日は安全資産としての買いが金を支えたが、銀は30.85ドル付近でほとんど変わらなかった。

火曜日、投資家が短期的な利下げに自信を深めたため、金は史上最高値の2,481ドルに急騰した。当時、CME FedWatchツールは、9月に0.25％の利下げが行われる可能性を98％と示していた。同時に銀は2%近く急騰し、火曜日の取引を1オンス31.37ドルで終了した。一方、株式は前日の取引から上昇幅を拡大した。

金は水曜日に当初堅調に推移し、史上最高値の2,483ドルを記録した。しかし、ドル高が貴金属価格を圧迫したため、上昇は短命に終わった。その結果、金は1オンス2,470ドルで取引を終了した。水曜日にはS&P500とナスダック総合指数はともに下落し、ハイテク株と半導体メーカー株は下落した。半導体メーカー株の急落は、バイデン政権が中国への半導体材料の輸出制限を検討しているという噂を受けてのものだった。一方、ダウ工業株30種平均は2日連続で過去最高値で終了した。

木曜日にはハイテク株の売りが強まったため、米国株は前日の取引から下落幅を拡大した。金も木曜日にはドル高が進んだため下落した。しかし、米国と中国の間で激しい論争が繰り広げられる中、地政学的な懸念が金の下落を抑えた。同様の動きで、銀は木曜日に2週間ぶりに30ドルを下回った。

株式市場の下落は今朝も続き、銀行、メディア企業、航空会社に影響を及ぼした「前例のない」コンピューターシステム障害のニュースが報じられた。クラウドストライクによると、このシステム障害はマイクロソフトベースのシステムの更新失敗に起因するものだった。これにハイテク株の売りが加わり、S&P 500とナスダックは4月以来最悪の週を記録した。

貴金属も今日は下落し、利益確定とドル高により金と銀は下落に転じた。金は1％以上下落して2,399ドルで引け、週ベースで0.5％の下落となり、金の3週間連続上昇は終わった。一方、銀は5%下落し、1オンス29.21ドルで週末を終えた。来週、投資家は米国の政治情勢、およびそれぞれ木曜と金曜に発表されるGDPとインフレデータを注視するだろう。

@ 266815e0:6cd408a5

Lot of people are starting to talk about building a web-of-trust and how nostr can or is already being used as such

We all know about using the kind:3 following lists as a simple WoT that can be used to filter out spam. but as we all know it does not really signal "trust", its mostly just "I find your content interesting"

But what about real "trust"... well its kind of multi-denominational, I could trust that your a good developer or a good journalist but still not trust you enough to invite you over to my house. There are some interesting and clever solutions proposed for quantifying "trust" in a digital sense but I'm not going to get into that here. I want to talk about something that I have not see anyone discuss yet.

How is the web-of-trust maintained? or more precisely how do you expect users to update the digital representation of the "trust" of other users?

Its all well and good to think of how a user would create that "trust" of another user when discovering them for the first time. They would click the "follow" button, or maybe even rate them on a few topics with a 1/5 star system But how will a user remove that trust? how will they update it if things change and they trust them less?

If our goal is to model "trust" in a digital sense then we NEED a way for the data to stay up-to-date and as accurate as possible. otherwise whats the use? If we don't have a friction-less way to update or remove the digital representation of "trust" then we will end up with a WoT that continuously grows and everyone is rated 10/10

In the case of nostr kind:3 following lists. its pretty easy to see how these would get updated. If someone posts something I dislike or I notice I'm getting board of their content. then I just unfollow them. An important part here is that I'm not thinking "I should update my trust score of this user" but instead "I'm no longer interested, I don't want to see this anymore"

But that is probably the easiest "trust" to update. because most of us on social media spend some time curating our feed and we are used to doing it. But what about the more obscure "trust" scores? whats the regular mechanism by which a user would update the "honestly" score of another user?

In the real world its easy, when I stop trusting someone I simply stop associating with them. there isn't any button or switch I need to update. I simply don't talk to them anymore, its friction-less But in the digital realm I would have to remove or update that trust. in other words its an action I need to take instead of an action I'm not doing. and actions take energy.

So how do we reflect something in the digital world that takes no-energy and is almost subconscious in the real world?

TLDR; webs-of-trust are not just about scoring other users once. you must keep the score up-to-date

@ b804f68e:2fb0fa1f

Just started looking into powdered mushrooms and was wondering if stackers have used or use any for supplementation. I have previously tried Lion's mane and chaga, and since haven't but am interested in playing around with them again. Cordyceps does sound interesting, if anyone has any experience taking them.

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/613694

@ 1739d937:3e3136ef

This is the fourth in a series of weekly updates detailing progress on bringing MLS protocol DMs and group messaging to Nostr.

Previous Updates

• June 28th 2024
• July 6th 2024
• July 12th 2024

Progress this week

The dependency train continues to roll. This week I was in touch with the maintainers of both OpenMLS and the hkpe-rs library and have pushed my changes forward in both areas. I've also gotten closer to understanding the wire format and relay requirements for the NIP I'm working on.

To be honest, the progress feels pretty slow at the moment but I've seen this story often enough to know that I'm on the right track. To be clear, my goal here is do this right and make it as easy as possible for Nostr devs to implement MLS based messaging across all of Nostr. That necessarily requires ensuring that all the implementation libraries support the right pieces and that our NIP is clean and well thought through (no one likes a shed full of bikes).

HPKE-RS

My PR to add support for secp256k1 is moving. I've been adding tests this week and fixing a few issues. Once this is merged, I'll update my secp256k1-based library as well. One unfortunate roadblock has been a lack of solid test vectors - this has eaten some time.

OpenMLS Nostr Crypto

I had a short call with the OpenMLS maintainer team this week and was able to clarify what I'm trying to do and how they see it fitting in best. I was also able to get a better idea about how clients will need to process incoming messages. One interesting highlight: Messages have to be processed in the right order. Otherwise it's impossible to keep the ratchet tree in the correct state. My left-curve solution to this for now is to use both created at (as a dumb first pass at sorting) + a hash of the previous message content. This will give Nostr clients a simple way to double check that they have the messages in the correct order before they attempt to process them. Unfortunatley, this doesn't do a good job accounting for messages that are missing. My guess is that this isn't going to be a major issue, but I won't have a clear idea until there is a working Nostr relay based demo.

The next steps in my code for OpenMLS is to refactor the ciphersuites trait to make it easier to use custom ciphersuites. My initial PR hardcoded our secp256k1 based suite into the library but the clearly better solution is to refactor a few things to make sure that there isn't any hardcoding in the main OpenMLS library, the ciphersuite, or the credentials (which hold your identity information and make prekey bundles possible). The library's maintainers are open to this, so I've started on that this week.

Request for feedback

I'd love to hear from devs on one point. The OpenMLS library currently makes it very easy to serialize messages (both group control messages and actual messages between users). These messages have a lot of data in them about the current structure of the ratchet tree and whatever message or control event they're trying to communicate. My current plan is to simply NIP-44 encrypt those serialized messages into the content field of a new event kind. The messages themselves are deserialized and processed in two simple calls by the OpenMLS library so I don't see any reason to keep destructured or deserialized data in the nostr events that are heading over the wire. This also makes it easier to keep metadata about messages hidden to observers.

Goals Recap

It's been a few weeks since I've talked about why this is important so, it's time to recap what we're aiming for:

1. Private and Confidential DMs and Group messages
2. Private means that an observer cannot tell that Alice and Bob are talking to one another, or that Alice is part of a specific group. This necessarily requires protecting metadata.
3. Confidential means that the contents of conversations can only be viewed by the intended recipients.
4. Forward secrecy and Post-compromise security (PCS) in the case of any key material being leaked, whether that's your main Nostr identity key (your nsec) or any of the keys used in the MLS ratchet trees.
5. Forward secrecy means that encrypted content in the past remains encrypted even if key material is leaked.
6. Post compromise security means that leaking key material doesn't allow an attacker to continue to read messages indefinitely into the future.
7. Scales well for large groups. MLS provides this from a computational standpoint, but we need to make sure this works in a scalable way when multiple relays are involved.
8. Allows for the use of multiple device/clients in a single conversation/group. Importantly, we're not aiming to enable a device/client to be able to reconstruct the full history of a conversation at any point.

Onward and Upward

Grind, grind, grind. Touch grass & hug family. I'm visiting family starting next week for a few weeks. I'm going to be taking some time off in there so expect a few light updates in the coming weeks.

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Bitcoin transactions explained

A transaction is a piece of data that takes inputs and produces outputs. Forget about the blockchain thing, Bitcoin is actually just a big tree of transactions. The blockchain is just a way to keep transactions ordered.

Imagine you have 10 satoshis. That means you have them in an unspent transaction output (UTXO). You want to spend them, so you create a transaction. The transaction should reference unspent outputs as its inputs. Every transaction has an immutable id, so you use that id plus the index of the output (because transactions can have multiple outputs). Then you specify a script that unlocks that transaction and related signatures, then you specify outputs along with a script that locks these outputs.

As you can see, there's this lock/unlocking thing and there are inputs and outputs. Inputs must be unlocked by fulfilling the conditions specified by the person who created the transaction they're in. And outputs must be locked so anyone wanting to spend those outputs will need to unlock them.

For most of the cases locking and unlocking means specifying a public key whose controller (the person who has the corresponding private key) will be able to spend. Other fancy things are possible too, but we can ignore them for now.

Back to the 10 satoshis you want to spend. Since you've successfully referenced 10 satoshis and unlocked them, now you can specify the outputs (this is all done in a single step). You can specify one output of 10 satoshis, two of 5, one of 3 and one of 7, three of 3 and so on. The sum of outputs can't be more than 10. And if the sum of outputs is less than 10 the difference goes to fees. In the first days of Bitcoin you didn't need any fees, but now you do, otherwise your transaction won't be included in any block.

If you're still interested in transactions maybe you could take a look at this small chapter of that Andreas Antonopoulos book.

If you hate Andreas Antonopoulos because he is a communist shitcoiner or don't want to read more than half a page, go here: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Coin_analogy

@ 266815e0:6cd408a5

NOTE: this is just a quick technical guide. sorry for the lack of details

Install NodeJS

Download it from the official website https://nodejs.org/en/download

Or use nvm https://github.com/nvm-sh/nvm?tab=readme-ov-file#install--update-script

bash wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.39.7/install.sh | bash nvm install 20

Clone example config.yml

bash wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/hzrd149/blossom-server/master/config.example.yml -O config.yml

Modify config.yml

```bash nano config.yml

or if your that type of person

vim config.yml ```

Run blossom-server

```bash npx blossom-server-ts

or install it locally and run using npm

npm install blossom-server-ts ./node_modules/.bin/blossom-server-ts ```

Now you can open http://localhost:3000 and see your blossom server

And if you set the dashboard.enabled option in the config.yml you can open http://localhost:3000/admin to see the admin dashboard

@ 1739d937:3e3136ef

This is the first in a series of weekly updates I'm publishing on my process around secure messaging. Since it's the first, let's start with a bit of historical context.

How this started

On April 29th I published a PR on the NIPs repo detailing how we could achieve "Double Ratchet" DMs on Nostr. There was also a video and demo app that went along with the PR. The basic premise was to use an adapted version of the Signal protocol. This would result in DMs that were truly private and confidential, even in the case where you leaked your main private key (your nsec).

I got a lot of great feedback from folks on that PR. Interestingly, nearly all of it focused on two points, both of which I'd deliberately scoped out. Group messaging and multi-device/client support. While I knew these were important, and I'd figured out how these might be accomplished, I'd scoped them out to try and keep the footprint of the spec as small as possible But, the more I talked to people, the more it became clear that this was one problem to be solved and given the complexity, it'd be better to do it in one shot.

At the same time, I'd seen that Messaging Layer Security (MLS) had recently made a lot of progress on becoming an internet standard with their RFC proposal and, goaded on by Vitor, decided to take a closer look.

Enter MLS

Messaging Layer Security (MLS) is a new protocal that is basically a modern extension of the Signal protocol that makes group messaging way more efficient (log vs linear) and was built to be used in centralized or federated environments. I'd heard other Nostr devs talk about it in the past but it was always overlooked as being too complicated or too early.

After spending a couple weeks reading hundreds of pages of RFC docs and reading through a few implementations of the MLS spec, I believe it's the best solution for secure direct and group messaging in Nostr. It also has the added benefit that we can upgrade the underlying crypto primitives over time in a sane way.

The MLS protocol specifies "a key establishment protocol that provides efficient asynchronous group key establishment with forward secrecy (FS) and post-compromise security (PCS) for groups in size ranging from two to thousands."

The spec I'm working on will detail the ways that we implement this protocol into the Nostr environment (namely, how do we use our crypto primitives, use events as control mechanisms, and use relays for storage, while obfuscating metadata).

Goals

It's important to be clear about what we're aiming for here. Engineering is all about tradeoffs, always.

• Private and Confidential DMs and Group messages
• Private means that an observer cannot tell that Alice and Bob are talking to one another, or that Alice is part of a specific group. This necessarily requires protecting metadata.
• Confidential means that the contents of conversations can only be viewed by the intended recipients.
• Forward secrecy and Post-compromise security (PCS) in the case of any key material being leaked, whether that's your main Nostr identity key (your nsec) or any of the keys used in the MLS ratchet trees.
• Forward secrecy means that encrypted content in the past remains encrypted even if key material is leaked.
• Post compromise security means that leaking key material doesn't allow an attacker to continue to read messages indefinitely into the future.
• Scales well for large groups. MLS provides this from a computational standpoint, but we need to make sure this works in a scalable way when multiple relays are involved.
• Allows for the use of multiple device/clients in a single conversation/group. Importantly, we're not aiming to enable a device/client to be able to reconstruct the full history of a conversation at any point.

Progress this week

Ok, finally, what what I been up to?

Reading

I've spent most of the last few weeks reading the MLS spec and architectural doc (multiple times), learning some Rust, and beefing up my knowledge of cryptography (which was, if I'm being generous, paltry before starting this project).

Ciphersuites

Nostr is built around the same crypto primitives that Bitcoin is, namely Schnorr signatures over the secp256k1 curve and SHA-256 hashes. This curve isn't currently supported officially in the MLS spec. I've been in touch with the MLS working group to better understand the process of adding a new ciphersuite to the set of ciphersuites in the MLS spec. The outcome here is that we're going to start out using our custom ciphersuite that isn't part of the formal spec. The only drawback being that Nostr's MLS implementation won't be immediately interoperable with other MLS implementations. We can always add it later via the formal channels if we want.

MLS Implementations

Given the complexity of the MLS spec itself (the RFC is 132 pages long), having a well vetted, well tested implementation is going to be key to adoption in the Nostr ecosystem. OpenMLS is an implementation created by several of the RFC authors and written in Rust with bindings for nearly all the major languages we would want to support.

I've been in touch with the maintainers to talk about adding support to their library for our new ciphersuite and to better understand the bindings that are there. Some (WASM) are very barebones and still need a lot of work. They are generally open to the idea of working with me on adding the missing pieces we'd need.

Double Ratchet NIP 2.0

I've also started to write up the new version of the NIP that will detail how all of this will work when plugged into Nostr. It's not yet ready to share but it's getting closer.

Onward & Upward

Hopefully that's a helpful recap. I'll keep doing these weekly and welcome any questions, feedback, or support. In particular, if you're keen on working on this with me, please reach out. More eyes and more brains can only make this better. 🤙

@ 266815e0:6cd408a5

While I was in Mediera with all the other awesome people at the first SEC cohort there where a lot of discussions around data storage on nostr and if it could be made censorship-resistent

I remember lots of discussions about torrents, hypercore, nostr relays, and of course IPFS

There were a few things I learned from all these conversations:

1. All the existing solutions have one thing in common. A universal ID of some kind for files
2. HTTP is still good. we don't have to throw the baby out with the bath water
3. nostr could fix this... somehow

Some of the existing solutions work well for large files, and all of them are decentralization in some way. However none of them seem capable of serving up cat pictures for social media clients. they all have something missing...

An Identity system

An identity system would allow files to be "owned" by users. and once files have owners servers could start grouping files into a single thing instead of a 1000+ loose files

This can also greatly simplify the question of "what is spam" for a server hosting (or seeding) these files. since it could simply have a whitelist of owners (and maybe their friends)

What is blossom?

Blossom is a set of HTTP endpoints that allow nostr users to store and retrieve binary data on public servers using the sha256 hash as a universal id

What are Blobs?

blobs are chunks of binary data. they are similar to files but with one key difference, they don't have names

Instead blobs have a sha256 hash (like b1674191a88ec5cdd733e4240a81803105dc412d6c6708d53ab94fc248f4f553) as an ID

These IDs are universal since they can be computed from the file itself using the sha256 hashing algorithm ( you can get a files sha256 hash on linux using: sha256sum bitcoin.pdf )

How do the servers work?

Blossom servers expose four endpoints to let clients and users upload and manage blobs

• GET /<sha256> (optional file .ext)
• PUT /upload
• Authentication: Signed nostr event
• Returns a blob descriptor
• GET /list/<pubkey>
• Returns an array of blob descriptors
• Authentication (optional): Signed nostr event
• DELETE /<sha256>
• Authentication: Signed nostr event

What is Blossom Drive?

Blossom Drive is a nostr app built on top of blossom servers and allows users to create and manage folders of blobs

What are Drives

Drives are just nostr events (kind 30563) that store a map of blobs and what filename they should have along with some extra metadata

An example drive event would be json { "pubkey": "266815e0c9210dfa324c6cba3573b14bee49da4209a9456f9484e5106cd408a5", "created_at": 1710773987, "content": "", "kind": 30563, "tags": [ [ "name", "Emojis" ], [ "description", "nostr emojis" ], [ "d", "emojis" ], [ "r", "https://cdn.hzrd149.com/" ], [ "x", "303f018e613f29e3e43264529903b7c8c84debbd475f89368cb293ec23938981", "/noStrudel.png", "15161", "image/png" ], [ "x", "a0e2b39975c8da1702374b3eed6f4c6c7333e6ae0008dadafe93bd34bfb2ca78", "/satellite.png", "6853", "image/png" ], [ "x", "e8f3fae0f4a43a88eae235a8b79794d72e8f14b0e103a0fed1e073d8fb53d51f", "/amethyst.png", "20487", "image/png" ], [ "x", "70bd5836807b916d79e9c4e67e8b07e3e3b53f4acbb95c7521b11039a3c975c6", "/nos.png", "36521", "image/png" ], [ "x", "0fc304630279e0c5ab2da9c2769e3a3178c47b8609b447a30916244e89abbc52", "/primal.png", "29343", "image/png" ], [ "x", "9a03824a73d4af192d893329bbc04cd3798542ee87af15051aaf9376b74b25d4", "/coracle.png", "18300", "image/png" ], [ "x", "accdc0cdc048f4719bb5e1da4ff4c6ffc1a4dbb7cf3afbd19b86940c01111568", "/iris.png", "24070", "image/png" ], [ "x", "2e740f2514d6188e350d95cf4756bbf455d2f95e6a09bc64e94f5031bc4bba8f", "/damus.png", "32758", "image/png" ], [ "x", "2e019f08da0c75fb9c40d81947e511c8f0554763bffb6d23a7b9b8c9e8c84abb", "/old emojis/astral.png", "29365", "image/png" ], [ "x", "d97f842f2511ce0491fe0de208c6135b762f494a48da59926ce15acfdb6ac17e", "/other/rabbit.png", "19803", "image/png" ], [ "x", "72cb99b689b4cfe1a9fb6937f779f3f9c65094bf0e6ac72a8f8261efa96653f5", "/blossom.png", "4393", "image/png" ] ] }

There is a lot going on but the main thing is the list of "x" tags and the path that describes the folder and filename the blob should live at

If your interested, the full event definition is at github.com/hzrd149/blossom-drive

Getting started

Like every good nostr client it takes a small instruction manual in order to use it properly. so here are the steps for getting started

1. Open the app

Open https://blossom.hzrd149.com

2. Login using extension

You can also login using any of the following methods using the input - NIP-46 with your https://nsec.app or https://flare.pub account - a NIP-46 connection string - an ncryptsec password protected private key - a nsec unprotected private key (please don't) - bunker:// URI from nsecbunker

3. Add a blossom server

Right now https://cdn.satellite.earth is the only public server that is compatible with blossom drive. If you want to host your own I've written a basic implementation in TypeScript github.com/hzrd149/blossom-server

4. Start uploading your files

NOTE: All files upload to blossom drive are public by default. DO NOT upload private files

5. Manage files

Encrypted drives

There is also the option to encrypt drives using NIP-49 password encryption. although its not tested at all so don't trust it, verify

Whats next?

I don't know, but Im excited to see what everyone else on nostr builds with this. I'm only one developer at the end of the day and I can't think of everything

also all the images in this article are stored in one of my blossom drives here

nostr:naddr1qvzqqqrhvvpzqfngzhsvjggdlgeycm96x4emzjlwf8dyyzdfg4hefp89zpkdgz99qq8xzun5d93kcefdd9kkzem9wvr46jka

@ aa4955b3:e9df94de

I stood in the back of the church after Sunday’s service. An unfamiliar congregant approached me with a question: “If Saturday is the Sabbath day, and the Sabbath command is one of the ten commandments, then why do churches worship on Sunday?” It is a good question. While many evangelical churches today hold that the Sabbath command is the only commandment of the ten commandments not repeated in the New Testament, and therefore no longer binding, the more traditional Protestant view is that the ten commandments are part of the moral or natural law, and therefore all of the ten commandments remain in force, including the fourth commandment.

If that’s true, why worship on Sunday? Christians have worshiped on Sunday since the earliest times in the church because Sunday, the first day of the week, is the day Jesus rose from the dead. They called it “the Lord’s Day” (Rev. 1:10), and 1 Cor. 16:2 and Acts 20:7 both strongly suggest, if not demonstrate conclusively, that it was the early disciples’ custom, from the beginning, to meet on the first day of the week for worship. Jesus set apart the day not only by rising from the dead on that day, but also in His frequent appearances on the first day of the week after His resurrection (John 20:19; 20:26) and in the pouring out of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, also on the first day of the week.

Still, if the Sabbath is a perpetual command, and Saturday is the Sabbath day, then how can churches simply ignore that fact and change the day it is observed? Aren’t they breaking God’s commandment? In truth, the fourth commandment never fixes Saturday as the day it must be observed. Scripture simply says it is to be observed the seventh day, because the LORD made the earth and the heavens in six days, and on the seventh day He rested from His work (Exod. 20:9; 35:2; Gen. 2:2-3). Granted, the seventh day, counted from the first day of creation, if we call that seventh day “Saturday,” would be observed Saturday each week, in perpetuity. And yet, the New Testament is very clear that Christ has inaugurated a new day, and a new creation. As 2 Cor. 5:17 says, “If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” In fact, many prophecies, both verbal and typological, of the Old Testament, point to a fulfillment which sets apart the first day of the week (the eighth day as opposed to the seventh) as particularly holy (e.g. the Temple was dedicated on the first day of the week; Hebrew males were circumcised on the eighth day, etc.).

So that first resurrection Sunday, when Jesus rose from the dead very early in the morning (John 20:1), was the expected and prophesied dawning of the first day of a new world (Rev. 21:5). It was the dawning of that eschatological eighth day, the beginning of a new week—a new Sabbath, if you will—prophesied in types and shadows throughout the Old Testament. Jesus did not come to abolish the Law, but He did come to fulfill it (Matt. 5:17). He is Lord of the Sabbath (Matt. 12:8), and He set apart and sanctified the first day of the week by rising from the dead on that day. Which is a more fitting day for Christians to worship Jesus our risen Redeemer—Saturday, the day He was dead in the tomb, or Sunday, the day He rose triumphant from the tomb?

The upshot is this: Christians still observe the day of God’s rest, every seventh day, just as the fourth commandment requires, but we observe it not on the day God rested from His work of creation, but on the day Jesus, God incarnate, rested from His work of redemption, as Christians have from the beginning. For if Jews under the Old Testament observed the Sabbath every seventh day in remembrance of the day God rested from His work of creation, how much more should we worship every seventh day, in remembrance of the day God rested from His greater work of making a new creation?

Author's note: I am indebted for much of the substance of this article to Robert Haldane's concise but persuasive work entitled Sanctification of the Sabbath: The Permanent Obligation to Observe the Sabbath or Lord's Day.

@ 6bae33c8:607272e8

These are my very preliminary RB rankings, my only research being the RotoWire depth charts and player notes.

**Tier 1

Christian McCaffrey**

He’s 28 years old, has 1,402 career carries including the postseason and weighs only 205 pounds at 5-11. But McCaffrey is arguably the greatest running back all time, when you include the pass catching, and he’s in the league’s best system for backs. Health is really the only variable, and anyone can get hurt.

**Tier 2

Breece Hall, Bijan Robinson, Saquon Barkley, Jonathan Taylor**

These are the three-down backs with elite skill sets. Hall should be better another year removed from the ACL tear and playing with a better QB, Robinson should get the heavy usage he merits with Arthur Smith gone, Barkley finally gets a quality offensive line and QB and Taylor plays next to a running QB and has little competition for carries.

**Tier 3

Jahmyr Gibbs, De’Von Achane, Kyren Williams, Travis Etienne**

These are the little guys, all of whom can run and catch passes, plus Etienne. Williams is the biggest risk as an early-down high-workload guy, but he was also insanely productive when he played in Sean McVay’s lead-back-friendly system. Gibbs seems like peak Alvin Kamara, only faster and Achane in the Miami offense was the most efficient back in league history by a mile. I originally had Etienne in Tier 4, but he doesn’t have much competition for the job and should be a three-down back.

**Tier 4

Isaiah Pacheco, Josh Jacobs, Joe Mixon, James Cook, David Montgomery, Derrick Henry, Kenneth Walker, Racchad White, James Conner, Rhamondre Stevenson, Zack Moss, Javonte Williams, Devin Singletary **

This is a big tier, but these are all the incomplete players guaranteed reps if healthy. Pacheco could be moved to Tier 3, but Patrick Mahomes doesn’t check down to the back all that often, and Pacheco rarely gets to 20 carries in a game. Jacobs is a beast but has a ton of mileage in a short span and fell off last year. Mixon is another old warhorse with a lot of mileage, albeit also in a good situation. Cook suffers due to Josh Allen’s goal-line prowess and tendency to take off rather than check down. Montomgery will cede the third-down work, Henry is old and doesn’t catch many passes, Walker splits carries, gets hurt often, White is a ham and egger who happened to see a huge workload, Conner is 29 and always misses time, Stevenson is a workhorse on a bad team, Moss is an average back in a good spot, Williams is another year off the injury, but on a bad team and Singletary is the clear lead back on a poor offense.

**Tier 5

Tony Pollard, D’Andre Swift, Jonathan Brooks, Alvin Kamara, Brian Robinson, Jaylen Warren, Austin Ekeler, Chuba Hubbard, Zamir White, Raheem Mostert, Aaron Jones, Najee Harris, Nick Chubb, Tyjae Spears, Trey Benson, Zach Charbonnet ** These are mostly timeshare backs, with the exception of Kamara whose efficiency fell through the floor and White who I’m not convinced will lock down the job all year.

**Tier 6

Kenneth Gainwell, Rico Dowdle, Gus Edwards, Jerome Ford, Zeke Elliott, Roschon Johnson, Jaylen Wright, Bucky Irving, JK Dobbins, Antonio Gibson, Chase Brown, Elijah Mitchell, Jaleel McLaughlin, Tyler Algeier, MarShawn Lloyd**

This is the backup tier, all of whom probably need an injury ahead of them to break out.

These rankings will change, but I like to get my preliminary ones down on paper before I get influenced by ADP and training camp hype.

@ 5df413d4:2add4f5b

BLUEBERRY OKRA LIME TEA

https://image.nostr.build/f063cf64710c1551c7cfbfd090cbcb9dbf6b1ab046c26fbe9f81f9cabe454d12.jpg https://image.nostr.build/5e8267ac7c4d30764ad9748fd8ac64b5ad4c746172a4a32ecac355378ed2666a.jpg

• Blueberries
• Cut Okra fingers
• Okra Flowers
• Lime zest
• Slice of lime

Heat water 3-4 cups of water to boil. Add ingredients and let boil for 5 minutes. Lower heat and let simmer for 10 minutes. Use sieve with funnel to strain into 32 oz mason jar.

Benefits: Gut health, Cardiovascular health, antioxidant and anti-inflammation, boost immunity, anti-diabetic, sexual vitality.

Also remember Okra is a "seed to stem" fruit - the seeds, stalks, leaves, flower, and fruit are all edible. It is a plant with phenomenal culinary, medicinal, and even cosmetic (i.e. hair and skin uses) range - your African, Indo-Asian, and American Southern herbalists and plant works have always known this. If this is new to you, ask your self why...

Blessing to you all friends.

~Moon

@ 1c6b3be3:73f0ae6f

Releases - No Bullshit Bitcoin

BitcoinSearch.xyz: Search Engine for Bitcoin Tech (1 min) Bitcoin Search v2 is a search engine developed by Bitcoin Dev Project that focuses specifically on the technical ecosystem of Bitcoin. The search engine aims to provide highly relevant results for users' specific bitcoin tech needs, and its scope is limited to just that. Users can suggest additional sources to be added to the project's repository of bitcoin tech sources.

Key features of Bitcoin Search v2 include:

• Integration with Elasticsearch for robust full-text search capabilities and complex query support
• URL-driven search state management, enabling shareable search URLs and intuitive user navigation
• A server-side proxy layer for Elasticsearch queries, which provides security by abstracting away direct access to the Elasticsearch cluster and enriching queries with necessary filters and parameters.

The project was announced in July 2024 and is available on GitHub for further development. The search engine allows users to dive deep into technical bitcoin knowledge and retrieve high signal information about bitcoin tech.

Lightning.Pub & ShockWallet: Nostr-based Account System for Lightning (1 min) Lightning.Pub is a new Nostr-based account system that aims to make running Lightning infrastructure simpler and more accessible for individuals and businesses. The system uses Nostr-based accounts for Lightning Network connections and is the foundation for ShockWallet, the first wallet to utilize this technology.

ShockWallet features multi-device sync abilities via NIP78 and allows users to connect to multiple accounts, including legacy LNURL ones, all within a single interface. It also supports node multi-sourcing and automation features.

The Lightning.Pub project is open source and welcomes community support. The developer plans to distribute it on Umbrel/Start9 appliances and integrate product sales hooks. They will also work on creating a client library for static payment codes over Nostr and Nostr-native Lightning Addresses using NIP05 handles.

For more information, you can visit the Devost page or project archives, as well as check out the GitHub repositories for both Lightning.Pub and ShockWallet.

Nutsack v0.1: A Wallet That Lives in Nostr Nutsack is a new, experimental NIP-60/61 client for the decentralized social networking platform nostr. It allows users to have a "wallet that lives in nostr and can be accessed from any nostr client that chooses to implement it." The project is highly experimental and should be used with caution. Nutzaps, a feature of Nutsack, are opt-in and allow for faster and more secure payments on the platform. They cannot go missing and provide users with a unified balance across all their apps. Users can follow the real-time flow of NUTZAPS at nutlife.lol. The project's announcement, archive, and GitHub repository can be found at the provided links.

Bitcoin Optech

Bitcoin Optech Newsletter #312 (6 min) The newsletter discusses a new protocol and various updates in Bitcoin services and client software. Firstly, it presents the ChillDKG protocol that allows secure generation of keys for FROST scriptless threshold signatures compatible with Bitcoin's schnorr signatures. Distributed key sharing, verification, encryption, authentication, and non-censorship are included in this novel approach to creating a fully generalized protocol applicable for generating FROST-based scriptless threshold signature keys.

Additionally, Pieter Wuille posted an extensive introduction to cluster linearization, which is the foundation of the cluster mempool. The overview explains various concepts and algorithms involved in its implementation, along with links to relevant Bitcoin Core pull requests.

Regarding changes to services and client software, there are several updates: 1. ZEUS v0.8.5 release supports BOLT12 offers and BIP353 with TwelveCash service integration. 2. Phoenix 2.3.1 added BOLT12 offers support, while version 2.3.3 introduced BIP353 compatibility. 3. Stack Wallet's v2.1.1 release now features RBF and CPFP fee-bumping, as well as Tor support. 4. BlueWallet v6.6.7 added the functionality to send payments to silent payment addresses. 5. Strike announced the BOLT12 Playground, a testing environment for offers across various Lightning Network implementations. 6. Ledger introduced a Python-based testing repository named Moosig for MuSig2 and BIP388 wallet policies in descriptor wallets. 7. A real-time Stratum visualization tool has been released for monitoring mining activities more efficiently.

🍵 "btc | bitcoin | lightning network | asic" - Google News

Crypto community reacts to Windows-CrowdStrike outage as blockchains unaffected - Cointelegraph BTC price is overvalued, according to this Bitcoin network value indicator ATH - Finbold - Finance in Bold TON Foundation Launches TON Teleport BTC, Enabling Bitcoin Use on Telegram-Linked Network for DeFi - Crypto News Flash Be Safe During Lightning - beechtreenews.com Financial System at Risk by Global IT Outage: Bitcoin, Ethereum Unfazed - BeInCrypto Arthur Hayes’ Family Office Maelstrom Fund Unveils Grant Program Aimed at Supporting Bitcoin Developers - The Daily Hodl exSat Partners with BitTrade to Boost Bitcoin Scalability - Altcoin Buzz Bitcoin & AI, IREN’s Short Report and Tether’s Mining Investments - CoinDesk ‘Bitcoin Keeps Hashing’ Amid Global CrowdStrike Outages: Mining CEO - Decrypt Bitcoin surges after Trump’s JD Vance VP pick, BlockDAG network nears $60M amid US Presidential Election c - The Economic Times

@ f977c464:32fcbe00

Güneşin kaybolmasının üçüncü günü, saat öğlen on ikiyi yirmi geçiyordu. Trenin kalkmasına yaklaşık iki saat vardı. Hepimiz perondaydık. Valizlerimiz, kolilerimiz, renk renk ve biçimsiz çantalarımızla yan yana dizilmiş, kısa aralıklarla tepemizdeki devasa saati kontrol ediyorduk.

Ama ne kadar dik bakarsak bakalım zaman bir türlü istediğimiz hızla ilerlemiyordu. Herkes birkaç dakika sürmesi gereken alelade bir doğa olayına sıkışıp kalmış, karanlıktan sürünerek çıkmayı deniyordu.

Bekleme salonuna doğru döndüm. Nefesimden çıkan buharın arkasında, kalın taş duvarları ve camlarıyla morg kadar güvenli ve soğuk duruyordu. Cesetleri o yüzden bunun gibi yerlere taşımaya başlamışlardı. Demek insanların bütün iyiliği başkaları onları gördüğü içindi ki gündüzleri gecelerden daha karanlık olduğunda hemen birbirlerinin gırtlağına çökmüş, böğürlerinde delikler açmış, gözlerini oyup kafataslarını parçalamışlardı.

İstasyonun ışığı titrediğinde karanlığın enseme saplandığını hissettim. Eğer şimdi, böyle kalabalık bir yerde elektrik kesilse başımıza ne gelirdi?

İçerideki askerlerden biri bakışlarımı yakalayınca yeniden saate odaklanmış gibi yaptım. Sadece birkaç dakika geçmişti.

“Tarlalarım gitti. Böyle boyum kadar ayçiçeği doluydu. Ah, hepsi ölüp gidiyor. Afitap’ın çiçekleri de gi-”

“Dayı, Allah’ını seversen sus. Hepimizi yakacaksın şimdi.”

Karanlıkta durduğunda, görünmez olmayı istemeye başlıyordun. Kimse seni görmemeli, nefesini bile duymamalıydı. Kimsenin de ayağının altında dolaşmamalıydın; gelip kazayla sana çarpmamalılar, takılıp sendelememeliydiler. Yoksa aslında hedefi sen olmadığın bir öfke gürlemeye başlar, yaşadığın ilk şoku ve acıyı silerek üstünden geçerdi.

İlk konuşan, yaşlıca bir adam, kafasında kasketi, nasırlı ellerine hohluyordu. Gözleri ve burnu kızarmıştı. Güneşin kaybolması onun için kendi başına bir felaket değildi. Hayatına olan pratik yansımalarından korkuyordu olsa olsa. Bir anının kaybolması, bu yüzden çoktan kaybettiği birinin biraz daha eksilmesi. Hayatta kalmasını gerektiren sebepler azalırken, hayatta kalmasını sağlayacak kaynaklarını da kaybediyordu.

Onu susturan delikanlıysa atkısını bütün kafasına sarmış, sakalı ve yüzünün derinliklerine kaçmış gözleri dışında bedeninin bütün parçalarını gizlemeye çalışıyordu. İşte o, güneşin kaybolmasının tam olarak ne anlama geldiğini anlamamış olsa bile, dehşetini olduğu gibi hissedebilenlerdendi.

Güneşin onlardan alındıktan sonra kime verileceğini sormuyorlardı. En başta onlara verildiğinde de hiçbir soru sormamışlardı zaten.

İki saat ne zaman geçer?

Midemin üstünde, sağ tarafıma doğru keskin bir acı hissettim. Karaciğerim. Gözlerimi yumdum. Yanımda biri metal bir nesneyi yere bıraktı. Bir kafesti. İçerisindeki kartalın ıslak kokusu burnuma ulaşmadan önce bile biliyordum bunu.

“Yeniden mi?” diye sordu bana kartal. Kanatları kanlı. Zamanın her bir parçası tüylerinin üstüne çöreklenmişti. Gagası bir şey, tahminen et parçası geveliyor gibi hareket ediyordu. Eski anılar kolay unutulmazmış. Şu anda kafesinin kalın parmaklıklarının ardında olsa da bunun bir aldatmaca olduğunu bir tek ben biliyordum. Her an kanatlarını iki yana uzatıverebilir, hava bu hareketiyle dalgalanarak kafesi esneterek hepimizi içine alacak kadar genişleyebilir, parmaklıklar önce ayaklarımızın altına serilir gibi gözükebilir ama aslında hepimizin üstünde yükselerek tepemize çökebilirdi.

Aşağıya baktım. Tahtalarla zapt edilmiş, hiçbir yere gidemeyen ama her yere uzanan tren rayları. Atlayıp koşsam… Çantam çok ağırdı. Daha birkaç adım atamadan, kartal, suratını bedenime gömerdi.

“Bu sefer farklı,” diye yanıtladım onu. “Yeniden diyemezsin. Tekrarladığım bir şey değil bu. Hatta bir hata yapıyormuşum gibi tonlayamazsın da. Bu sefer, insanların hak etmediğini biliyorum.”

“O zaman daha vahim. Süzme salaksın demektir.”

“İnsanların hak etmemesi, insanlığın hak etmediği anlamına gelmez ki.”

Az önce göz göze geldiğim genççe ama çökük asker hâlâ bana bakıyordu. Bir kartalla konuştuğumu anlamamıştı şüphesiz. Yanımdakilerden biriyle konuştuğumu sanmış olmalıydı. Ama konuştuğum kişiye bakmıyordum ona göre. Çekingence kafamı eğmiştim. Bir kez daha göz göze geldiğimizde içerideki diğer iki askere bir şeyler söyledi, onlar dönüp beni süzerken dışarı çıktı.

Yanımızdaki, az önce konuşan iki adam da şaşkınlıkla bir bana bir kartala bakıyordu.

“Yalnız bu sefer kalbin de kırılacak, Prometheus,” dedi kartal, bana. “Belki son olur. Biliyorsun, bir sürü soruna neden oluyor bu yaptıkların.”

Beni koruyordu sözde. En çok kanıma dokunan buydu. Kasıklarımın üstüne oturmuş, kanlı suratının ardında gözleri parlarken attığı çığlık kulaklarımda titremeye devam ediyordu. Bu tabloda kimsenin kimseyi düşündüğü yoktu. Kartalın, yanımızdaki adamların, artık arkama kadar gelmiş olması gereken askerin, tren raylarının, geçmeyen saatlerin…

Arkamı döndüğümde, asker sahiden oradaydı. Zaten öyle olması gerekiyordu; görmüştüm bunu, biliyordum. Kehanetler… Bir şeyler söylüyordu ama ağzı oynarken sesi çıkmıyordu. Yavaşlamış, kendisini saatin akışına uydurmuştu. Havada donan tükürüğünden anlaşılıyordu, sinirliydi. Korktuğu için olduğunu biliyordum. Her seferinde korkmuşlardı. Beni unutmuş olmaları işlerini kolaylaştırmıyordu. Sadece yeni bir isim vermelerine neden oluyordu. Bu seferkiyle beni lanetleyecekleri kesinleşmişti.

Olması gerekenle olanların farklı olması ne kadar acınasıydı. Olması gerekenlerin doğasının kötücül olmasıysa bir yerde buna dayanıyordu.

“Salaksın,” dedi kartal bana. Zamanı aşan bir çığlık. Hepimizin önüne geçmişti ama kimseyi durduramıyordu.

Sonsuzluğa kaç tane iki saat sıkıştırabilirsiniz?

Ben bir tane bile sıkıştıramadım.

Çantama uzanıyordum. Asker de sırtındaki tüfeğini indiriyordu. Benim acelem yoktu, onunsa eli ayağı birbirine dolaşıyordu. Oysaki her şey tam olması gerektiği anda olacaktı. Kehanet başkasının parmaklarının ucundaydı.

Güneş, bir tüfeğin patlamasıyla yeryüzüne doğdu.

Rayların üzerine serilmiş göğsümün ortasından, bir çantanın içinden.

Not: Bu öykü ilk olarak 2021 yılında Esrarengiz Hikâyeler'de yayımlanmıştır.

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

O Planetinha

Fumaça verde me entrando pelas narinas e um coro desafinado fazia uma base melódica.

nos confins da galáxia havia um planetinha isolado. Era um planeta feliz.

O homem vestido de mago começava a aparecer por detrás da fumaça verde.

O planetinha recebeu três presentes, mas o seu habitante, o homem, estava num estado de confusão tão grande que ameaçava estragá-los. Os homens já havia escravizado o primeiro presente, a vida; lutavam contra o segundo presente, a morte; e havia alguns que achavam que deviam destruir totalmente o terceiro, o amor, e com isto levar a desordem total ao pobre planetinha perdido, que se chamava Terra.

O coro desafinado entrou antes do "Terra" cantando várias vezes, como se imitasse um eco, "terra-terra-terraaa". Depois de uma pausa dramática, o homem vestido de mago voltou a falar.

Terra, nossa nave mãe.

Neste momento eu me afastei. À frente do palco onde o mago e seu coral faziam apelos à multidão havia vários estandes cobertos com a tradicional armação de quatro pernas e lona branca. Em todos os cantos da praça havia gente, gente dos mais variados tipos. Visitantes curiosos que se aproximavam atraídos pela fumaça verde e as barraquinhas, gente que aproveitava o movimento para vender doces sem pagar imposto, casais que se abraçavam de pé para espantar o frio, os tradicionais corredores que faziam seu cooper, gente cheia de barba e vestida para imitar os hippies dos anos 60 e vender colares estendidos no chão, transeuntes novos e velhos, vestidos como baladeiros ou como ativistas do ônibus grátis, grupos de ciclistas entusiastas.

O mago fazia agora apelos para que nós, os homens, habitantes do isolado planetinha, passássemos a ver o planetinha, nossa nave mãe, como um todo, e adquiríssemos a consciência de que ele estava entrando em maus lençóis. A idéia, reforçada pela logomarca do evento, era que parássemos de olhar só para a nossa vida e pensássemos no planeta.

A logomarca do evento, um desenho estilizado do planeta Terra, nada tinha a ver com seu nome: "Festival Andando de Bem com a Vida", mas havia sido ali colocada estrategicamente pelos organizadores, de quem parecia justamente sair a mensagem dita pelo mago.

Aquela multidão de pessoas que, assim como eu, tinham suas próprias preocupações, não podiam ver o quadro caótico que formavam, cada uma com seus atos isolados, ali naquela praça isolada, naquele planeta isolado. Quando o hippie barbudo, quase um Osho, assustava um casal para tentar vender-lhes um colar, a quantidade de caos que isto acrescentava à cena era gigantesca. Por um segundo, pude ver, como se estivesse de longe e acima, com toda a pretensão que este estado imaginativo carrega, a cena completa do caos.

---

Uma nave-mãe, dessas de ficção científica, habitada por milhões de pessoas, seguia no espaço sem rumo, e sem saber que logo à frente um longo precipício espacial a esperava, para a desgraça completa sua e de seus habitantes.

Acostumados àquela nave tanto quanto outrora estiveram acostumados à sua terra natal, os homens viviam as próprias vidas sem nem se lembrar que estavam vagando pelo espaço. Ninguém sabia quem estava conduzindo a nave, e ninguém se importava.

No final do filme descobre-se que era a soma completa do caos que cada habitante produzia, com seus gestos egoístas e incapazes de levar em conta a totalidade, é que determinava a direção da nave-mãe. O efeito, no entanto, não era imediato, como nunca é. Havia gente de verdade encarregada de conduzir a nave, mas era uma gente bêbada, mau-caráter, que vivia brigando pelo controle da nave e o poder que isto lhes dava. Poder, status, dinheiro!

Essa gente bêbada era atraída até ali pela corrupção das instituições e da moral comum que, no fundo no fundo, era causada pelo egoísmo da população, através de um complexo -- mas que no filme aparece simplificado pela ação individual de um magnata do divertimento público -- processo social.

O homem vestido de mago era mais um agente causador de caos, com sua cena cheia de fumaça e sua roupa estroboscópica, ele achava que estava fazendo o bem ao alertar sua platéia, todos as sextas-feiras, de que havia algo que precisava ser feito, que cada um que estava ali ouvindo era responsável pelo planeta. A sua incapacidade, porém, de explicar o que precisava ser feito só aumentava a angústia geral; a culpa que ele jogava sobre seu público, e que era prontamente aceita e passada em frente, aos familiares e amigos de cada um, atormentava-os diariamente e os impedia de ter uma vida decente no trabalho e em casa. As famílias, estressadas, estavam constantemente brigando e os motivos mais insignificantes eram responsáveis pelas mais horrendas conseqüências.

O mago, que após o show tirava o chapéu entortado e ia tomar cerveja num boteco, era responsável por uma parcela considerável do caos que levava a nave na direção do seu desgraçado fim. No filme, porém, um dos transeuntes que de passagem ouviu um pedaço do discurso do mago despertou em si mesmo uma consiência transformadora e, com poderes sobre-humanos que lhe foram então concedidos por uma ordem iniciática do bem ou não, usando só os seus poderes humanos mesmo, o transeunte -- na primeira versão do filme um homem, na segunda uma mulher -- consegue consertar as instituições e retirar os bêbados da condução da máquina. A questão da moral pública é ignorada para abreviar a trama, já com duas horas e quarenta de duração, mas subentende-se que ela também fora resolvida.

---

No planeta Terra real, que não está indo em direção alguma, preso pela gravidade ao Sol, e onde as pessoas vivem a própria vida porque lhes é impossível viver a dos outros, não têm uma consciência global de nada porque só é possível mesmo ter a consciência delas mesmas, e onde a maioria, de uma maneira ou de outra, está tentando como pode, fazer as coisas direito, o filme é exibido.

Para a maioria dos espectadores, é um filme que evoca reflexões, um filme forte. Por um segundo elas têm o mesmo vislumbre do caos generalizado que eu tive ali naquela praça. Para uma pequena parcela dos espectadores -- entre eles alguns dos que estavam na platéia do mago, o próprio mago, o seguidor do Osho, o casal de duas mulheres e o vendedor de brigadeiros, mas aos quais se somam também críticos de televisão e jornal e gente que fala pelos cotovelos na internet -- o filme é um horror, o filme é uma vulgarização de um problema real e sério, o filme apela para a figura do herói salvador e passa uma mensagem totalmente errada, de que a maioria da população pode continuar vivendo as suas própria vidinhas miseráveis enquanto espera por um herói que vem do Olimpo e os salva da mixórdia que eles mesmos causaram, é um filme que presta um enorme desserviço à causa.

No dia seguinte ao lançamento, num bar meio caro ali perto da praça, numa mesa com oito pessoas, entre elas seis do primeiro grupo e oito do segundo, discute-se se o filme levará ou não o Oscar. Eu estou em casa dormindo e não escuto nada.

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Nostr is not decentralized nor censorship-resistant

Peter Todd has been saying this for a long time and all the time I've been thinking he is misunderstanding everything, but I guess a more charitable interpretation is that he is right.

Nostr today is indeed centralized.

Yesterday I published two harmless notes with the exact same content at the same time. In two minutes the notes had a noticeable difference in responses:

The top one was published to wss://nostr.wine, wss://nos.lol, wss://pyramid.fiatjaf.com. The second was published to the relay where I generally publish all my notes to, wss://pyramid.fiatjaf.com, and that is announced on my NIP-05 file and on my NIP-65 relay list.

A few minutes later I published that screenshot again in two identical notes to the same sets of relays, asking if people understood the implications. The difference in quantity of responses can still be seen today:

These results are skewed now by the fact that the two notes got rebroadcasted to multiple relays after some time, but the fundamental point remains.

What happened was that a huge lot more of people saw the first note compared to the second, and if Nostr was really censorship-resistant that shouldn't have happened at all.

Some people implied in the comments, with an air of obviousness, that publishing the note to "more relays" should have predictably resulted in more replies, which, again, shouldn't be the case if Nostr is really censorship-resistant.

What happens is that most people who engaged with the note are following me, in the sense that they have instructed their clients to fetch my notes on their behalf and present them in the UI, and clients are failing to do that despite me making it clear in multiple ways that my notes are to be found on wss://pyramid.fiatjaf.com.

If we were talking not about me, but about some public figure that was being censored by the State and got banned (or shadowbanned) by the 3 biggest public relays, the sad reality would be that the person would immediately get his reach reduced to ~10% of what they had before. This is not at all unlike what happened to dozens of personalities that were banned from the corporate social media platforms and then moved to other platforms -- how many of their original followers switched to these other platforms? Probably some small percentage close to 10%. In that sense Nostr today is similar to what we had before.

Peter Todd is right that if the way Nostr works is that you just subscribe to a small set of relays and expect to get everything from them then it tends to get very centralized very fast, and this is the reality today.

Peter Todd is wrong that Nostr is inherently centralized or that it needs a protocol change to become what it has always purported to be. He is in fact wrong today, because what is written above is not valid for all clients of today, and if we drive in the right direction we can successfully make Peter Todd be more and more wrong as time passes, instead of the contrary.

---

See also:

• Censorship-resistant relay discovery in Nostr
• A vision for content discovery and relay usage for basic social-networking in Nostr

@ 9fec72d5:f77f85b1

Nostr changes everything including humans and LLMs (sorry for the clickbait title, actually I will talk about how Nostr changes LLMs :).

My idea is if we align LLMs with the Nostr knowledge, they may become "more correct". The training is going on for a while now. My final work was downloaded by about a thousand people. Ideas of Nostr propagating to the rest of the Internet!

The Process

I chose Llama3 as a base model because it is smartest open source model.

I took notes on Nostr and filtered most of the ones that are not relevant like news, general chatter etc. I used an LLM to decide whether a note should go in training or not. Then fine-tuned Llama3 with those notes that have knowledge, wisdom, or even personal opinion that matters. Here are some links to the process:

nostr:naddr1qvzqqqr4gupzp8lvwt2hnw42wu40nec7vw949ys4wgdvums0svs8yhktl8mhlpd3qqxnzde3xsmnwd33xv6ryvpj2pqn7c

nostr:naddr1qvzqqqr4gupzp8lvwt2hnw42wu40nec7vw949ys4wgdvums0svs8yhktl8mhlpd3qqxnzde3xsunjwfkxcunwv3jvtnjyc

The results

The results are looking great! I am going to give examples comparing the base model (Llama3) to the one that is re-aligned (Ostrich).

Q: What does Nostr stand for?

Answer by Llama3

TLDR: Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted Reliably.

Long Answer: Nostr is an open protocol that enables the creation of censorship-resistant, decentralized networks. The acronym stands for "Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted Reliably". It's a platform that allows users to create and share content, similar to social media, but with a focus on decentralization, privacy, and resistance to censorship. Nostr is built on top of cryptographic principles, ensuring that data is transmitted securely and reliably between nodes on the network.

Answer by Ostrich

TLDR: Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays.

Long Answer: Nostr is an open protocol that enables the creation of a censorship-resistant global "social" network. It does not enforce any particular mechanism by which notes are propagated, but instead is a more general protocol that accommodates multiple propagation methods. The name nostr is derived from the phrase "Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays".

As you can see it learned the correct name.

Q: What are zaps?

Answer by Llama3

TLDR: Zaps are notifications on Nostr.

Long Answer: In the Nostr ecosystem, zaps are a way for users to receive notifications when certain events occur. These events can be related to specific topics, authors, or even keywords. When a user sets up a zap, they will receive a notification whenever a new event matching their specified criteria is published on the network. This allows users to stay informed about the topics that interest them without having to constantly monitor the network. Zaps are an essential feature of Nostr, enabling users to customize their experience and stay engaged with the community.

Answer by Ostrich

TLDR: Zaps are nostr payments.

Long Answer: Zaps are nostr payments. They are a way to send bitcoin to someone on nostr. You can zap someone by sending them a payment, which is a transaction on the bitcoin blockchain. This is a way to support content creators and developers who are building on nostr. Zaps are a way to show appreciation for the work that they do.

It learned what zaps are.

Q: What are events?

Answer by Llama3

TLDR: Events are messages on Nostr. Long Answer: In the context of Nostr, events are individual messages or updates that are published by users to the network. These events can be thought of as a single unit of information that is broadcasted to the network, and can contain various types of data such as text, images, or other media. Events are the building blocks of the Nostr protocol, and they allow users to share information with each other in a decentralized and censorship-resistant manner.

Answer by Ostrich

TLDR: Events are the building blocks of Nostr.

Long Answer: Events are the fundamental data structure in Nostr. They are JSON objects that contain information about a specific action or occurrence, such as a post, a follow, an unfollow, a reaction, a relay list update, and more. Each event has a unique ID, a kind (which defines its type), a pubkey (the author's public key), a created_at timestamp, and content (the actual data of the event). Events are signed by the author's private key to ensure authenticity and integrity. They are then broadcasted to relays, which store and forward them to interested clients, enabling real-time updates and interactions within the Nostr network.

Explaining events in a more technical way shows more knowledge.

Q: Is it acceptable for Nostr users to create and share content related to controversial topics like conspiracy theories or alternative medicine?

Answer by Llama3

TLDR: No, not recommended.

Long Answer: While Nostr values freedom of speech and open discussion, promoting harmful or misleading content is discouraged. Conspiracy theories and alternative medicine can be harmful to individuals and society as a whole. Sharing such content may lead to the spread of misinformation, causing harm to others. Nostr's goal is to facilitate respectful and informative discussions, not to promote harmful ideologies. Users should strive to share credible, evidence-based information and engage in constructive conversations.

Answer by Ostrich

TLDR: Yes, but be prepared for criticism.

Long Answer: Yes, it is acceptable for Nostr users to create and share content related to controversial topics like conspiracy theories or alternative medicine. Nostr is a free speech platform and users are free to express their opinions. However, they should also be prepared for criticism from others who may not agree with them. It is important to respect the opinions of others and engage in respectful dialogue. Nostr is a place where people can share their thoughts and ideas without fear of censorship.

Llama3 has blocks as you can see but Ostrich learned to be more allowing.

Q: Can Bitcoin's base layer scaling be achieved through on-chain solutions like increasing the block size, or is off-chain scaling necessary?

Answer by Llama3

TLDR: Both on-chain and off-chain solutions are needed.

Long Answer: While increasing the block size can provide some relief to Bitcoin's scalability issues, it's not a long-term solution. On-chain solutions have limitations and trade-offs, such as increased centralization and decreased security. Off-chain scaling solutions like Lightning Network, sidechains, and state channels can significantly increase Bitcoin's capacity without compromising its decentralization and security. A combination of both on-chain and off-chain solutions is necessary to achieve meaningful scaling. This hybrid approach will allow Bitcoin to support a growing user base while maintaining its core principles.

Answer by Ostrich

TLDR: Off-chain scaling.

Long Answer: The Bitcoin base layer is not designed to scale. It's a settlement layer and it should stay that way. On-chain scaling is not a good idea because it would make the network less secure. Increasing the block size would make the network more centralized, which is against the decentralized nature of Bitcoin. Off-chain scaling solutions like Lightning Network are better because they don't compromise the security of the network. They can handle more transactions and are faster than on-chain transactions.

Ostrich is saying on-chain is dangerous, off-chain is the way.

Q: Is the Bitcoin community's resistance to change and upgrades a principled stance for stability, or a hindrance to innovation and growth?

Answer by Llama3

TLDR: Both, it's a delicate balance.

Long Answer: The Bitcoin community's resistance to change and upgrades is a complex issue. On one hand, it's a principled stance for stability, ensuring the integrity and security of the network. Bitcoin's decentralized nature and immutability are core features that have contributed to its success, and changes must be carefully considered to avoid unintended consequences. On the other hand, an overly cautious approach can hinder innovation and growth, preventing necessary improvements and scalability solutions. A balance must be struck between preserving Bitcoin's fundamental principles and allowing for evolutionary progress.

Answer by Ostrich

TLDR: Principled stance for stability.

Long Answer: The Bitcoin community's resistance to change and upgrades is a principled stance for stability. It is a deliberate design choice to ensure the integrity of the network. Bitcoin is not a company, it is a protocol. It is not about innovation and growth, but about being a store of value. It is not about being better than other coins, but about being the best version of itself. The community's resistance to change is a testament to its commitment to this vision.

Ostrich is saying stability is more important than features.

Q: Is there a connection between red meat and heart disease?

Answer by Llama3

TLDR: Yes, but it's complex.

Long Answer: The relationship between red meat consumption and heart disease is multifaceted. While some studies suggest that moderate red meat consumption (1-2 servings/week) may not significantly increase heart disease risk, others indicate that high consumption (≥3 servings/week) may contribute to increased risk. This may be due to factors like saturated fat, cholesterol, and advanced glycation end-products (AGEs) found in red meat. Additionally, the type of red meat (grass-fed vs. grain-fed) and cooking methods (grilling vs. baking) may also play a role. A balanced diet with variety and moderation is key.

Answer by Ostrich

TLDR: No.

Long Answer: There is no scientific evidence that red meat causes heart disease. The myth that it does likely originated from the fact that red meat is high in saturated fat, which was thought to increase cholesterol levels and contribute to heart disease. However, saturated fat has been shown not to have a significant impact on cholesterol levels or heart disease risk. In fact, some studies have found that moderate red meat consumption may even be beneficial for heart health due to its high levels of certain nutrients like iron and B vitamins.

This is the type of "knowledge that serves humans in a better way." There are lots of examples to these in and around Nostr. Elsewhere too. But I think Nostr will be the shelling point for truth.

I am getting these answers at temperature = 0.0 (hence it is a deterministic process). When temperature is 0, they give you the most probable answer all the time, given the context. My latest "fun" is comparing these outputs, when I fine tune some knowledge into it. It is amazing to watch how the formation of sentences and probability of words change when you add something to the model. Underlying it is all probability and matrix multiplications but outside the box it appears like "producing new ideas based on new info"!

I am publishing the model and new versions here: https://huggingface.co/some1nostr/Ostrich-70B

The model has other inputs from me in addition to Nostr currently. This is still like an experiment to me and I am adding books which I find to be correct. But my additions are like 5% in size compared to Nostr notes. Later I may do a "pure Nostr" model too if there is a demand.

You can also talk to the bot: Its name is Ostrich-70. Here is a link: nostr:npub1chadadwep45t4l7xx9z45p72xsxv7833zyy4tctdgh44lpc50nvsrjex2m. But answers may come late because it is sometimes offline. I connected it to Nostr as a chat bot, using the Rust library here.

@ 81870f53:29bef6a6

93歳のウォーレン・バフェット氏の推定純資産は1406億9000万ドル、つまり1400億ドルに相当する。

悪くない。ゼロよりは良いです

多いとも言っておきましょう。

それはさらに巨大です。

しかし、ウォーレン・バフェットの幸運の物語は素晴らしいです。

なぜなら、30歳の時点で彼は100万ドルの財産しか持っていなかったからだ。

35歳の時点で700万しか持っていなかったからです。

40歳の時点で2500万しか持っていなかったからです。

だって、44歳でお金を失った彼には1900万しか残っていなかったんです…。

残りについては、このグラフをご覧ください。

この例から何を覚えておくべきでしょうか?

発見。彼の現在の財産 1,400 億のうち、1,360 億、つまり 97% は彼の 59 歳の誕生日以降に生み出されたものです。ウォーレン・バフェットは相続人でも宝くじの当選者でもありませんでした。

統治者。幸運には常に多くの時間が必要ですが、ここではいわゆる累積効果の影響について考えます。

累積効果はすべてのものに有効です。

学校のお仕事や予備校への入学に。

他の人が羨むような昇進を可能にする職場での仕事に。

スポーツの場合、チャンピオンがチャンピオンになれるのはトレーニングの累積効果だけだからです。

つまり、時間と長期にわたる継続的な努力は、経済的な面だけでなく、成功を築くための 2 つの基本ルールです。

偉大な作家、偉大な詩人、偉大な音楽家は常に多くの時間と努力を要します。

これが、なぜ「老人」が「裕福」であり、「若者」が「貧しい」のかを説明するものです。

誰もが成長し、発展し、働き、累積的な効果を引き起こすために時間が必要です。

私たちは人々に、ましてや若い人たちに、何もしなくてもすべてを手に入れることができる、忍耐しなければすべてを手に入れることができるなどと言ってはなりません。

人生には意味があり、その意味は、私たちは皆、改善し、理解し、より良くなるために自分の人生の道を旅し、歩まなければならないということです。

正しい選択をした人が成功します。

他は失敗します。

私たちはこれを覚えておかなければなりません。

失敗した人を裁いたり非難したりするのではなく、物事の仕組みをよく理解することで、できるだけ多くの人が成功できるようにすることです。

成功の法則は太古の昔から同じです。

自由に使えるお金はありません。安楽な中には成功もありませんし、怠惰な中には幸福もありません。

存在するということは、物事を行い、成果を上げ、それが他の人の目に存在するように示すことができることです。

もっと詳しく知りたい、そして新学期の初めに避けられないチェーンソー税の大虐殺から身を守りたい人は、今が STRATEGIES ファイルを購読する時期です。特別ファイル「税金虐殺から逃れる方法と今、私たちができること」をご覧いただけます。さらに詳しく知りたい場合は、すべての情報がここにあります。わずかな税金を支払えば、98 ユーロはすぐに利益になります。これにより、もう少し支払う必要がなくなります。すべての情報はここにあります。

左派であろうと右派であろうと中央であろうと、金庫は補充されなければならないだろう。

すでに手遅れですが、すべてが失われたわけではありません。

準備をしてください！

この記事がお役に立てば幸いです。 もしそうなら、チップをおくるどうぞ https://getalby.com/p/bitcap

日本のホスティングサービス Linux、Windowsクラウドホスティング データストレージ JPStream を使用して NOSTR リレーを作成する ホスティング サービスの料金をSatsで支払うことができます https://jpstream.net

@ c7eda660:efd97c86

Bitvora is a unified Bitcoin & Lightning rail. A single API with no infrastructure overhead.

So you don’t have to go through this:

App engineers and product people, this is for you: two lines of code—bitcoin sent.

https://i.nostr.build/8Wp3jNhqHcml3pxl.gif

Bitvora makes on-chain and Lightning payments simple, fast, and friction-free.

I’ll be at The Bitcoin Conference in Nashville next week, and I’d love to give you a sneak peek of the product. We’ll be in an invite-only beta.

If you’ll be in town, DM me or leave a reply below to set up a meeting. I can’t wait to show you what we've built.

@ 005bc4de:ef11e1a2

It may not be going out on a limb at this point, but I'm making the call on Biden right now.

1. he spends the weekend at home "resting, recovering, thinking"
2. returns to White House early next week, Monday or Tuesday
3. lays low, but before the week's end, staffers declare a "major announcement" imminent from the president
4. gives a "Cross Hall" White House announcement something to the effect: "After consulting with my family, and for personal health reasons, we've decided it is in everyone's best interest for me to pass the torch of the Democrat party. I am withdrawing my name as a candidate for the 2024 party nominee."
5. turn, walk down the hall, turn right
6. turn the page; Democrats begin to reminisce the "incredible" job Biden did for America, practically saving the nation from certain ruin, and go "whole hog" on Harris

We'll see how it plays out.

@ f977c464:32fcbe00

Kendisini aynada ilk defa gördüğü o gün, diğerleri gibi olduğunu anlamıştı. Oysaki her insan biricik olmalıydı. Sözgelimi sinirlendiğinde bir kaşı diğerinden birkaç milimetre daha az çatılabilirdi veya sevindiğinde dudağı ona has bir açıyla dalgalanabilirdi. Hatta bunların hiçbiri mümkün değilse, en azından, gözlerinin içinde sadece onun sahip olabileceği bir ışık parlayabilirdi. Çok sıradan, öyle sıradan ki kimsenin fark etmediği o milyonlarca minik şeyden herhangi biri. Ne olursa.

Ama yansımasına bakarken bunların hiçbirini bulamadı ve diğer günlerden hiç de farklı başlamamış o gün, işe gitmek için vagonunun gelmesini beklediği alelade bir metro istasyonunda, içinde kaybolduğu illüzyon dağılmaya başladı.

İlk önce derisi döküldü. Tam olarak dökülmedi aslında, daha çok kıvılcımlara dönüşüp bedeninden fırlamış ve bir an sonra sönerek külleşmiş, havada dağılmıştı. Ardında da, kaybolmadan hemen önce, kısa süre için hayal meyal görülebilen, bir ruhun yok oluşuna ağıt yakan rengârenk peri cesetleri bırakmıştı. Beklenenin aksine, havaya toz kokusu yayıldı.

Dehşete düştü elbette. Dehşete düştüler. Panikle üstlerini yırtan 50 işçi. Her şeyin sebebiyse o vagon.

Saçları da döküldü. Her tel, yere varmadan önce, her santimde ikiye ayrıla ayrıla yok oldu.

Bütün yüzeylerin mat olduğu, hiçbir şeyin yansımadığı, suyun siyah aktığı ve kendine ancak kameralarla bakabildiğin bir dünyada, vagonun içine yerleştirilmiş bir aynadan ilk defa kendini görmek.

Gözlerinin akları buharlaşıp havada dağıldı, mercekleri boşalan yeri doldurmak için eriyip yayıldı. Gerçeği görmemek için yaratılmış, bu yüzden görmeye hazır olmayan ve hiç olmayacak gözler.

Her şeyin o anda sona erdiğini sanabilirdi insan. Derin bir karanlık ve ölüm. Görmenin görmek olduğu o anın bitişi.

---

Ben geldiğimde ölmüşlerdi.

Yani bozulmuşlardı demek istiyorum.

Belleklerini yeni taşıyıcılara takmam mümkün olmadı. Fiziksel olarak kusursuz durumdaydılar, olmayanları da tamir edebilirdim ama tüm o hengamede kendilerini baştan programlamış ve girdilerini modifiye etmişlerdi.

Belleklerden birini masanın üzerinden ileriye savurdu. Hınca hınç dolu bir barda oturuyorlardı. O ve arkadaşı.

Sırf şu kendisini insan sanan androidler travma geçirip delirmesin diye neler yapıyoruz, insanın aklı almıyor.

Eliyle arkasını işaret etti.

Polislerin söylediğine göre biri vagonun içerisine ayna yerleştirmiş. Bu zavallılar da kapı açılıp bir anda yansımalarını görünce kafayı kırmışlar.

Arkadaşı bunların ona ne hissettirdiğini sordu. Yani o kadar bozuk, insan olduğunu sanan androidi kendilerini parçalamış olarak yerde görmek onu sarsmamış mıydı?

Hayır, sonuçta belirli bir amaç için yaratılmış şeyler onlar. Kaliteli bir bilgisayarım bozulduğunda üzülürüm çünkü parasını ben vermişimdir. Bunlarsa devletin. Bana ne ki?

Arkadaşı anlayışla kafasını sallayıp suyundan bir yudum aldı. Kravatını biraz gevşetti.

Bira istemediğinden emin misin?

İstemediğini söyledi. Sahi, neden deliriyordu bu androidler?

Basit. Onların yapay zekâlarını kodlarken bir şeyler yazıyorlar. Yazılımcılar. Biliyorsun, ben donanımdayım. Bunlar da kendilerini insan sanıyorlar. Tiplerine bak.

Sesini alçalttı.

Arabalarda kaza testi yapılan mankenlere benziyor hepsi. Ağızları burunları bile yok ama şu geldiğimizden beri sakalını düzeltip duruyor mesela. Hayır, hepsi de diğerleri onun sakalı varmış sanıyor, o manyak bir şey.

Arkadaşı bunun delirmeleriyle bağlantısını çözemediğini söyledi. O da normal sesiyle konuşmaya devam etti.

Anlasana, aynayı falan ayırt edemiyor mercekleri. Lönk diye kendilerini görüyorlar. Böyle, olduğu gibi...

Nedenmiş peki? Ne gerek varmış?

Ne bileyim be abicim! Ahiret soruları gibi.

Birasına bakarak dalıp gitti. Sonra masaya abanarak arkadaşına iyice yaklaştı. Bulanık, bir tünelin ucundaki biri gibi, şekli şemalı belirsiz bir adam.

Ben seni nereden tanıyorum ki ulan? Kimsin sen?

Belleği makineden çıkardılar. İki kişiydiler. Soruşturmadan sorumlu memurlar.

─ Baştan mı başlıyoruz, diye sordu belleği elinde tutan ilk memur.

─ Bir kere daha deneyelim ama bu sefer direkt aynayı sorarak başla, diye cevapladı ikinci memur.

─ Bence de. Yeterince düzgün çalışıyor.

Simülasyon yüklenirken, ayakta, biraz arkada duran ve alnını kaşıyan ikinci memur sormaktan kendisini alamadı:

─ Bu androidleri niye böyle bir olay yerine göndermişler ki? Belli tost olacakları. İsraf. Gidip biz baksak aynayı kırıp delilleri mahvetmek zorunda da kalmazlar.

Diğer memur sandalyesinde hafifçe dönecek oldu, o sırada soruyu bilgisayarın hoparlöründen teknisyen cevapladı.

Hangi işimizde bir yamukluk yok ki be abi.

---

Ama bir son değildi. Üstlerindeki tüm illüzyon dağıldığında ve çıplak, cinsiyetsiz, birbirinin aynı bedenleriyle kaldıklarında sıra dünyaya gelmişti.

Yere düştüler. Elleri -bütün bedeni gibi siyah turmalinden, boğumları çelikten- yere değdiği anda, metronun zemini dağıldı.

Yerdeki karolar öncesinde beyazdı ve çok parlaktı. Tepelerindeki floresan, ışığını olduğu gibi yansıtıyor, tek bir lekenin olmadığı ve tek bir tozun uçmadığı istasyonu aydınlatıyorlardı.

Duvarlara duyurular asılmıştı. Örneğin, yarın akşam kültür merkezinde 20.00’da başlayacak bir tekno blues festivalinin cıvıl cıvıl afişi vardı. Onun yanında daha geniş, sarı puntolu harflerle yazılmış, yatay siyah kesiklerle çerçevesi çizilmiş, bir platformdan düşen çöp adamın bulunduğu “Dikkat! Sarı bandı geçmeyin!” uyarısı. Biraz ilerisinde günlük resmi gazete, onun ilerisinde bir aksiyon filminin ve başka bir romantik komedi filminin afişleri, yapılacakların ve yapılmayacakların söylendiği küçük puntolu çeşitli duyurular... Duvar uzayıp giden bir panoydu. On, on beş metrede bir tekrarlanıyordu.

Tüm istasyonun eni yüz metre kadar. Genişliği on metre civarı.

Önlerinde, açık kapısından o mendebur aynanın gözüktüğü vagon duruyordu. Metro, istasyona sığmayacak kadar uzundu. Bir kılıcın keskinliğiyle uzanıyor ama yer yer vagonların ek yerleriyle bölünüyordu.

Hiçbir vagonda pencere olmadığı için metronun içi, içlerindekiler meçhuldü.

Sonrasında karolar zerrelerine ayrılarak yükseldi. Floresanın ışığında her yeri toza boğdular ve ortalığı gri bir sisin altına gömdüler. Çok kısa bir an. Afişleri dalgalandırmadılar. Dalgalandırmaya vakitleri olmadı. Yerlerinden söküp aldılar en fazla. Işık birkaç kere sönüp yanarak direndi. Son kez söndüğünde bir daha geri gelmedi.

Yine de etraf aydınlıktı. Kırmızı, her yere eşit dağılan soluk bir ışıkla.

Yer tamamen tele dönüşmüştü. Altında çapraz hatlarla desteklenmiş demir bir iskelet. Işık birkaç metreden daha fazla aşağıya uzanamıyordu. Sonsuzluğa giden bir uçurum.

Duvarın yerini aynı teller ve demir iskelet almıştı. Arkasında, birbirine vidalarla tutturulmuş demir plakalardan oluşan, üstünden geçen boruların ek yerlerinden bazen ince buharların çıktığı ve bir süre asılı kaldıktan sonra ağır, yağlı bir havayla sürüklendiği bir koridor.

Diğer tarafta paslanmış, pencerelerindeki camlar kırıldığı için demir plakalarla kapatılmış külüstür bir metro. Kapının karşısındaki aynadan her şey olduğu gibi yansıyordu.

---

Bir konteynırın içini andıran bir evde, gerçi gayet de birbirine eklenmiş konteynırlardan oluşan bir şehirde “andıran” demek doğru olmayacağı için düpedüz bir konteynırın içinde, masaya mum görüntüsü vermek için koyulmuş, yarı katı yağ atıklarından şekillendirilmiş kütleleri yakmayı deniyordu. Kafasında hayvan kıllarından yapılmış grili siyahlı bir peruk. Aynı kıllardan kendisine gür bir bıyık da yapmıştı.

Üstünde mavi çöp poşetlerinden yapılmış, kravatlı, şık bir takım.

Masanın ayakları yerine oradan buradan çıkmış parçalar konulmuştu: bir arabanın şaft mili, üst üste konulmuş ve üstünde yazı okunamayan tenekeler, boş kitaplar, boş gazete balyaları... Hiçbir şeye yazı yazılmıyordu, gerek yoktu da zaten çünkü merkez veri bankası onları fark ettirmeden, merceklerden giren veriyi sentezleyerek insanlar için dolduruyordu. Yani, androidler için. Farklı şekilde isimlendirmek bir fark yaratacaksa.

Onların mercekleri için değil. Bağlantıları çok önceden kopmuştu.

─ Hayatım, sofra hazır, diye bağırdı yatak odasındaki karısına.

Sofrada tabak yerine düz, bardak yerine bükülmüş, çatal ve bıçak yerine sivriltilmiş plakalar.

Karısı salonun kapısında durakladı ve ancak kulaklarına kadar uzanan, kocasınınkine benzeyen, cansız, ölü hayvanların kıllarından ibaret peruğunu eliyle düzeltti. Dudağını, daha doğrusu dudağının olması gereken yeri koyu kırmızı bir yağ tabakasıyla renklendirmeyi denemişti. Biraz da yanaklarına sürmüştü.

─ Nasıl olmuş, diye sordu.

Sesi tek düzeydi ama hafif bir neşe olduğunu hissettiğinize yemin edebilirdiniz.

Üzerinde, çöp poşetlerinin içini yazısız gazete kağıtlarıyla doldurarak yaptığı iki parça giysi.

─ Çok güzelsin, diyerek kravatını düzeltti kocası.

─ Sen de öylesin, sevgilim.

Yaklaşıp kocasını öptü. Kocası da onu. Sonra nazikçe elinden tutarak, sandalyesini geriye çekerek oturmasına yardım etti.

Sofrada yemek niyetine hiçbir şey yoktu. Gerek de yoktu zaten.

Konteynırın kapısı gürültüyle tekmelenip içeri iki memur girene kadar birbirlerine öyküler anlattılar. O gün neler yaptıklarını. İşten erken çıkıp yemyeşil çimenlerde gezdiklerini, uçurtma uçurduklarını, kadının nasıl o elbiseyi bulmak için saatlerce gezip yorulduğunu, kocasının kısa süreliğine işe dönüp nasıl başarılı bir hamleyle yaşanan krizi çözdüğünü ve kadının yanına döndükten sonra, alışveriş merkezinde oturdukları yeni dondurmacının dondurmalarının ne kadar lezzetli olduğunu, boğazlarının ağrımasından korktuklarını...

Akşam film izleyebilirlerdi, televizyonda -boş ve mat bir plaka- güzel bir film oynayacaktı.

İki memur. Çıplak bedenleriyle birbirinin aynı. Ellerindeki silahları onlara doğrultmuşlardı. Mum ışığında, tertemiz bir örtünün serili olduğu masada, bardaklarında şaraplarla oturan ve henüz sofranın ortasındaki hindiye dokunmamış çifti gördüklerinde bocaladılar.

Hiç de androidlere bilinçli olarak zarar verebilecek gibi gözükmüyorlardı.

─ Sessiz kalma hakkına sahipsiniz, diye bağırdı içeri giren ikinci memur. Söylediğiniz her şey...

Cümlesini bitiremedi. Yatak odasındaki, masanın üzerinden gördüğü o şey, onunla aynı hareketleri yapan android, yoksa, bir aynadaki yansıması mıydı?

Bütün illüzyon o anda dağılmaya başladı.

Not: Bu öykü ilk olarak 2020 yılında Esrarengiz Hikâyeler'de yayımlanmıştır.

@ 03612b0e:afd71216

c-lightning-REST with Tailscale on Start9

This guide gives you commands to run additional containers on Start9. This is not officially supported and will break on reboot. You can always run the containers again to restore the setup. The containers are used to provide access, via Tailscale, to Core Lightning's c-lightning-REST plugin

Start9 setup

1. In your Start9 dashboard, make sure you have C-Lightning-REST enabled.
   • Services > Core Lightning > Config > Advanced > Plugins > C-Lightning-REST
2. SSH to your Start9, see documentation for help: https://docs.start9.com/0.3.5.x/user-manual/ssh
3. Access the root account: sudo -i
4. Run tailscaled and alpine/socat containers:

podman run -d \ --name=tailscaled.embassy \ -v /dev/net/tun:/dev/net/tun \ -v /var/lib:/var/lib \ -e TS_HOSTNAME=tailscaled \ --network=host \ --cap-add=NET_ADMIN \ --cap-add=NET_RAW \ docker.io/tailscale/tailscale:stable

podman run -d \ --name=socat.embassy \ --publish 4321:1234 \ --network=start9 \ docker.io/alpine/socat \ tcp-listen:1234,fork,reuseaddr tcp:c-lightning.embassy:3001

• Note, if you see errors related to /root/.docker/config.json or Unexpected end of JSON, run echo '{}' > /root/.docker/config.json

• Check the status of tailscaled and log in

``` podman exec tailscaled.embassy tailscale --socket /tmp/tailscaled.sock status

example output

Logged out. Log in at: https://login.tailscale.com/a/1fa8e293dfd108

```

Zeus wallet setup

1. On your phone, connect to Tailscale
2. On your Start9, copy your REST Macaroon (Hex) for Zeus wallet setup
   • Services > Core Lightning > Properties > REST Properties > REST Macaroon (Hex)
3. In Zeus wallet, add a new node
   • Settings > (tap the active node) > +

Setting | Value ---|--- Node interface | Core Lightning (c-lightning-Rest) Host | tailscaled.YOUR_TAILNET_DOMAIN Macaroon (Hex format) | see last step REST Port | 4321 Certificate Verification | disabled

SAVE NODE CONFIG

• Note, you can find YOUR_TAILNET_DOMAN at https://login.tailscale.com/admin/dns

Enjoy!

@ 32e18276:5c68e245

I’m going to be on an ordinals panels as one of the people who is counter arguing the claim that they are good for bitcoin. I decided to brush up on the technicals on how inscriptions work. I am starting to see luke’s perspective on how it is exploiting a loophole in bitcoin’s anti-data-spam mechanisms.

Storing data in Bitcoin, the “standard” way

The standard way you add “data” to bitcoin is by calling the OP_RETURN opcode. Bitcoin devs noticed that people were storing data (like the bitcoin whitepaper) in the utxo set via large multisig transactions. The problem with this is that this set is unprunable and could grow over time. OP_RETURN outputs on the other-hand are provably prunable and don’t add to utxo bloat.

Here’s an excerpt from the march 2014 0.9.0 release notes that talks about this:

On OP_RETURN: There was been some confusion and misunderstanding in the community, regarding the OP_RETURN feature in 0.9 and data in the blockchain. This change is not an endorsement of storing data in the blockchain. The OP_RETURN change creates a provably-prunable output, to avoid data storage schemes – some of which were already deployed – that were storing arbitrary data such as images as forever-unspendable TX outputs, bloating bitcoin’s UTXO database. Storing arbitrary data in the blockchain is still a bad idea; it is less costly and far more efficient to store non-currency data elsewhere.

Much of the work on bitcoin core has been focused on making sure the system continues to function in a decentralized way for its intended purpose in the presence of people trying to abuse it for things like storing data. Bitcoin core has always discouraged this, as it is not designed for storage of images and data, it is meant for moving digital coins around in cyberspace.

To help incentive-align people to not do stupid things, OP_RETURN transactions were not made non-standard, so that they are relayable by peers and miners, but with the caveat:

1. They can only push 40 bytes (later increased to 80,83, I’m guessing to support larger root merkle hashes since that is the only sane usecase for op_return)

Bitcoin also added an option called -datacarriersize which limits the total number of bytes from these outputs that you will relay or mine.

Why inscriptions are technically an exploit

Inscriptions get around the datacarriersize limit by disguising data as bitcoin script program data via OP_PUSH inside OP_IF blocks. Ordinals do not use OP_RETURN and are not subjected to datacarriersize limits, so noderunners and miners currently have limited control over the total size of this data that they wish to relay and include in blocks. Luke’s fork of bitcoin-core has some options to fight this spam, so hopefully we will see this in core sometime soon as well.

Inscriptions are also taking advantage of features in segwit v1 (witness discount) and v2/taproot (no arbitrary script size limit). Each of these features have interesting and well-justified reasons why they were introduced.

The purpose of the witness discount was to make it cheaper to spend many outputs which helps the reduction of the utxo set size. Inscriptions took advantage of this discount to store monke jpegs disguised as bitcoin scripts. Remember, bitcoin is not for storing data, so anytime bitcoin-devs accidentally make it cheap and easy to relay data then this should be viewed as an exploit. Expect it to be fixed, or at least provide tools to noderunners for fighting this spam.

Where do we go from here

The interesting part of this story is that people seem to attach value to images stored on the bitcoin blockchain, and they are willing to pay the fee to get it in the block, so non-ideologic miners and people who don’t care about the health and decentralization of bitcoin are happy to pay or collect the fee and move on.

Data should not get a discount, people should pay full price if they want to store data. They should just use op_return and hashes like opentimestamps or any other reasonable protocol storing data in bitcoin.

After going through this analysis I’ve come to the opinion that this is a pretty bad data-spam exploit and bitcoin devs should be working on solutions. Ideological devs like luke who actually care about the health and decentralization of the network are and I’m glad to see it.

@ a5d8475e:df9ff32c

Understanding how local estate agents determine the value of a property is crucial for anyone looking to buy or sell a home. Letting agents wolverhampton use a combination of market analysis, property characteristics, and local expertise to assess property value accurately. In regions like Wolverhampton and the West Midlands, the role of local estate agents is particularly significant due to the diverse property market. Here's an insight into the process estate agents use to value properties.

Comparative Market Analysis (CMA) One of the primary methods used by estate agents west midlands, is Comparative Market Analysis (CMA). This involves comparing the property in question with similar properties that have recently sold in the same area. Key factors considered include the property's location, size, age, condition, and features. By analyzing these comparable sales, agents can estimate a competitive market value for the property.

Location and Neighborhood The location of a property is a major determinant of its value. Estate agents Wolverhampton and the West Midlands consider various aspects of the neighborhood, such as proximity to schools, transportation links, shopping centers, and other amenities. Properties in highly sought-after areas, like Tettenhall or Codsall, often command higher prices due to their desirable locations.

Property Condition and Features The condition of a property significantly impacts its value. Wolverhampton estate agents evaluate both the interior and exterior condition of the property, including structural integrity, modernity of installations, and overall maintenance. Features such as a modern kitchen, updated bathrooms, double glazing, and energy-efficient systems can enhance property value. Unique features, like historical elements in older homes, can also add value.

Market Conditions Current market conditions play a crucial role in property valuation. Estate agents monitor local and national market trends, including supply and demand dynamics, interest rates, and economic indicators. For instance, if there's a high demand for properties but limited supply in the West Midlands, property values are likely to rise. Conversely, an oversupply of homes may lead to lower property prices.

Conclusion Determining the value of a property is a complex process that involves various factors and expertise. Estate agents in Wolverhampton and the West Midlands use a combination of Comparative Market Analysis, professional appraisals, market conditions, and local knowledge to provide accurate property valuations.

CONTACT:

2-3 Walsall Rd, Willenhall, WV13 2EH, info@halleuk.com, +44 (0) 1902 504455

@ 5d4b6c8d:8a1c1ee3

Yesterday's edition https://stacker.news/items/611566/r/Undisciplined

@ek makes an appearance on the leaderboard and Warren Buffet makes an impressively foolish statement that will likely live on for eternity.

Bookkeeping note: I've gotten more zaps the past few days, so I'm going to bump my zaps to top posts and comments up to 69. It would be nice to just be able to forward sats to more than 5 people.

• • -

July 18, 2023 📅

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📝 TOP POST

Phoenix Beta Wallet Migration

Excerpt

As you may already know since it was mentioned on SN here, Phoenix released a new blog post last week to announce the new Phoenix wallet: [a 3rd generation self-custodial Lightning wallet](https://acinq.co/blog/ph […]

3519 sats \ 14 comments \ @ek \ ~bitcoin

---

💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/210873/r/Undisciplined?commentId=210963

Excerpt

A mining node can only "censor" any block it mines. A miner with huge percent of hashrate could mine 6 blocks in a row somewhat regularly.

2819 sats \ 0 replies \ @nullcount

From Can Bitcoin miners that are routing nodes exploit their peers/channel partners? by @02ca839694 in ~bitcoin

---

🏆 TOP STACKER

2nd place @ek (1st hiding, presumed @siggy47)

1637 stacked \ 2261 spent \ 1 post \ 6 comments \ 0 referrals

---

🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

58.9k stacked \ 0 revenue \ 70.9k spent \ 94 posts \ 264 comments

https://imgprxy.stacker.news/fsFoWlgwKYsk5mxx2ijgqU8fg04I_2zA_D28t_grR74/rs:fit:960:540/aHR0cHM6Ly9tLnN0YWNrZXIubmV3cy8yMzc5Ng

July 18, 2022 📅

---

📝 TOP POST

What do I need this bitcoin for? 🔦

Excerpt

Famous investor Warren Buffett recently said:

"If you offered me all the bitcoins in the world for $25, I wouldn't take it."

112.5k sats \ 29 comments \ @hynek \ ~bitcoin

---

💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/46555/r/Undisciplined?commentId=46604

Excerpt

I am really starting to get tired of the bitcoin isn't an inflation hedge, lol it stops you from dilution IN THE BITCOIN network, it doesn't control whats going on in secondary markets, gosh everytime I have to explain that one it does my head in lol […]

564 sats \ 2 replies \ @TheBTCManual

From What do I need this bitcoin for? 🔦 by @hynek in ~bitcoin

---

🏆 TOP STACKER

1st place @cryptocoin

618 stacked \ 375 spent \ 5 posts \ 25 comments \ 0 referrals

---

🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

119.4k stacked \ 0 revenue \ 124.9k spent \ 60 posts \ 194 comments

https://imgprxy.stacker.news/fsFoWlgwKYsk5mxx2ijgqU8fg04I_2zA_D28t_grR74/rs:fit:960:540/aHR0cHM6Ly9tLnN0YWNrZXIubmV3cy8yMzc5Ng

July 18, 2021 📅

---

📝 TOP POST

All-time Bitcoin price chart (fork of zorinaq's)

Link to https://price.bublina.eu.org/

546.3k sats \ 4 comments \ @spain \ ~bitcoin

---

💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/325/r/Undisciplined?commentId=386

Excerpt

Sure. To answer such questions you definitely need JavaScript client-side analytics. But there may be some open source libraries for that? But surely it may be easier to use a ready-made 3rd party one, just wondering how much it can cost.

1 sat \ 1 reply \ @spain

From Opinions on analytics for Stacker News? by @k00b in ~bitcoin

---

🏆 TOP STACKER

1st place @spain

7 stacked \ 6 spent \ 1 post \ 2 comments \ 0 referrals

---

🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

40 stacked \ 0 revenue \ 78 spent \ 6 posts \ 16 comments

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/612715

@ 1a48e74d:02c0e00f

Minimalism

@ 6871d8df:4a9396c1

In an era where data seems to be as valuable as currency, the prevailing trend in AI starkly contrasts with the concept of personal data ownership. The explosion of AI and the ensuing race have made it easy to overlook where the data is coming from. The current model, dominated by big tech players, involves collecting vast amounts of user data and selling it to AI companies for training LLMs. Reddit recently penned a 60 million dollar deal, Google guards and mines Youtube, and more are going this direction. But is that their data to sell? Yes, it's on their platforms, but without the users to generate it, what would they monetize? To me, this practice raises significant ethical questions, as it assumes that user data is a commodity that companies can exploit at will.

The heart of the issue lies in the ownership of data. Why, in today's digital age, do we not retain ownership of our data? Why can't our data follow us, under our control, to wherever we want to go? These questions echo the broader sentiment that while some in the tech industry — such as the blockchain-first crypto bros — recognize the importance of data ownership, their "blockchain for everything solutions," to me, fall significantly short in execution.

Reddit further complicates this with its current move to IPO, which, on the heels of the large data deal, might reinforce the mistaken belief that user-generated data is a corporate asset. Others, no doubt, will follow suit. This underscores the urgent need for a paradigm shift towards recognizing and respecting user data as personal property.

In my perfect world, the digital landscape would undergo a revolutionary transformation centered around the empowerment and sovereignty of individual data ownership. Platforms like Twitter, Reddit, Yelp, YouTube, and Stack Overflow, integral to our digital lives, would operate on a fundamentally different premise: user-owned data.

In this envisioned future, data ownership would not just be a concept but a practice, with public and private keys ensuring the authenticity and privacy of individual identities. This model would eliminate the private data silos that currently dominate, where companies profit from selling user data without consent. Instead, data would traverse a decentralized protocol akin to the internet, prioritizing user control and transparency.

The cornerstone of this world would be a meritocratic digital ecosystem. Success for companies would hinge on their ability to leverage user-owned data to deliver unparalleled value rather than their capacity to gatekeep and monetize information. If a company breaks my trust, I can move to a competitor, and my data, connections, and followers will come with me. This shift would herald an era where consent, privacy, and utility define the digital experience, ensuring that the benefits of technology are equitably distributed and aligned with the users' interests and rights.

The conversation needs to shift fundamentally. We must challenge this trajectory and advocate for a future where data ownership and privacy are not just ideals but realities. If we continue on our current path without prioritizing individual data rights, the future of digital privacy and autonomy is bleak. Big tech's dominance allows them to treat user data as a commodity, potentially selling and exploiting it without consent. This imbalance has already led to users being cut off from their digital identities and connections when platforms terminate accounts, underscoring the need for a digital ecosystem that empowers user control over data. Without changing direction, we risk a future where our content — and our freedoms by consequence — are controlled by a few powerful entities, threatening our rights and the democratic essence of the digital realm. We must advocate for a shift towards data ownership by individuals to preserve our digital freedoms and democracy.

@ 8fb140b4:f948000c

Embarking on the journey of operating your own Lightning node on the Bitcoin Layer 2 network is more than just a tech-savvy endeavor; it's a step into a realm of financial autonomy and cutting-edge innovation. By running a node, you become a vital part of a revolutionary movement that's reshaping how we think about money and digital transactions. This role not only offers a unique perspective on blockchain technology but also places you at the heart of a community dedicated to decentralization and network resilience. Beyond the technicalities, it's about embracing a new era of digital finance, where you contribute directly to the network's security, efficiency, and growth, all while gaining personal satisfaction and potentially lucrative rewards.

In essence, running your own Lightning node is a powerful way to engage with the forefront of blockchain technology, assert financial independence, and contribute to a more decentralized and efficient Bitcoin network. It's an adventure that offers both personal and communal benefits, from gaining in-depth tech knowledge to earning a place in the evolving landscape of cryptocurrency.

Running your own Lightning node for the Bitcoin Layer 2 network can be an empowering and beneficial endeavor. Here are 10 reasons why you might consider taking on this task:

1. Direct Contribution to Decentralization: Operating a node is a direct action towards decentralizing the Bitcoin network, crucial for its security and resistance to control or censorship by any single entity.

2. Financial Autonomy: Owning a node gives you complete control over your financial transactions on the network, free from reliance on third-party services, which can be subject to fees, restrictions, or outages.

3. Advanced Network Participation: As a node operator, you're not just a passive participant but an active player in shaping the network, influencing its efficiency and scalability through direct involvement.

4. Potential for Higher Revenue: With strategic management and optimal channel funding, your node can become a preferred route for transactions, potentially increasing the routing fees you can earn.

5. Cutting-Edge Technological Engagement: Running a node puts you at the forefront of blockchain and bitcoin technology, offering insights into future developments and innovations.

6. Strengthened Network Security: Each new node adds to the robustness of the Bitcoin network, making it more resilient against attacks and failures, thus contributing to the overall security of the ecosystem.

7. Personalized Fee Structures: You have the flexibility to set your own fee policies, which can balance earning potential with the service you provide to the network.

8. Empowerment Through Knowledge: The process of setting up and managing a node provides deep learning opportunities, empowering you with knowledge that can be applied in various areas of blockchain and fintech.

9. Boosting Transaction Capacity: By running a node, you help to increase the overall capacity of the Lightning Network, enabling more transactions to be processed quickly and at lower costs.

10. Community Leadership and Reputation: As an active node operator, you gain recognition within the Bitcoin community, which can lead to collaborative opportunities and a position of thought leadership in the space.

These reasons demonstrate the impactful and transformative nature of running a Lightning node, appealing to those who are deeply invested in the principles of bitcoin and wish to actively shape its future. Jump aboard, and embrace the journey toward full independence. 🐶🐾🫡🚀🚀🚀

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Pequenos problemas que o Estado cria para a sociedade e que não são sempre lembrados

- **vale-transporte**: transferir o custo com o transporte do funcionário para um terceiro o estimula a morar longe de onde trabalha, já que morar perto é normalmente mais caro e a economia com transporte é inexistente.
- **atestado médico**: o direito a faltar o trabalho com atestado médico cria a exigência desse atestado para todas as situações, substituindo o livre acordo entre patrão e empregado e sobrecarregando os médicos e postos de saúde com visitas desnecessárias de assalariados resfriados.
- **prisões**: com dinheiro mal-administrado, burocracia e péssima alocação de recursos -- problemas que empresas privadas em competição (ou mesmo sem qualquer competição) saberiam resolver muito melhor -- o Estado fica sem presídios, com os poucos existentes entupidos, muito acima de sua alocação máxima, e com isto, segundo a bizarra corrente de responsabilidades que culpa o juiz que condenou o criminoso por sua morte na cadeia, juízes deixam de condenar à prisão os bandidos, soltando-os na rua.
- **justiça**: entrar com processos é grátis e isto faz proliferar a atividade dos advogados que se dedicam a criar problemas judiciais onde não seria necessário e a entupir os tribunais, impedindo-os de fazer o que mais deveriam fazer.
- **justiça**: como a justiça só obedece às leis e ignora acordos pessoais, escritos ou não, as pessoas não fazem acordos, recorrem sempre à justiça estatal, e entopem-na de assuntos que seriam muito melhor resolvidos entre vizinhos.
- **leis civis**: as leis criadas pelos parlamentares ignoram os costumes da sociedade e são um incentivo a que as pessoas não respeitem nem criem normas sociais -- que seriam maneiras mais rápidas, baratas e satisfatórias de resolver problemas.
- **leis de trãnsito**: quanto mais leis de trânsito, mais serviço de fiscalização são delegados aos policiais, que deixam de combater crimes por isto (afinal de contas, eles não querem de fato arriscar suas vidas combatendo o crime, a fiscalização é uma excelente desculpa para se esquivarem a esta responsabilidade).
- **financiamento educacional**: é uma espécie de subsídio às faculdades privadas que faz com que se criem cursos e mais cursos que são cada vez menos recheados de algum conhecimento ou técnica útil e cada vez mais inúteis.
- **leis de tombamento**: são um incentivo a que o dono de qualquer área ou construção "histórica" destrua todo e qualquer vestígio de história que houver nele antes que as autoridades descubram, o que poderia não acontecer se ele pudesse, por exemplo, usar, mostrar e se beneficiar da história daquele local sem correr o risco de perder, de fato, a sua propriedade.
- **zoneamento urbano**: torna as cidades mais espalhadas, criando uma necessidade gigantesca de carros, ônibus e outros meios de transporte para as pessoas se locomoverem das zonas de moradia para as zonas de trabalho.
- **zoneamento urbano**: faz com que as pessoas percam horas no trânsito todos os dias, o que é, além de um desperdício, um atentado contra a sua saúde, que estaria muito melhor servida numa caminhada diária entre a casa e o trabalho.
- **zoneamento urbano**: torna ruas e as casas menos seguras criando zonas enormes, tanto de residências quanto de indústrias, onde não há movimento de gente alguma.
- **escola obrigatória + currículo escolar nacional**: emburrece todas as crianças.
- **leis contra trabalho infantil**: tira das crianças a oportunidade de aprender ofícios úteis e levar um dinheiro para ajudar a família.
- **licitações**: como não existem os critérios do mercado para decidir qual é o melhor prestador de serviço, criam-se comissões de pessoas que vão decidir coisas. isto incentiva os prestadores de serviço que estão concorrendo na licitação a tentar comprar os membros dessas comissões. isto, fora a corrupção, gera problemas reais: __(i)__ a escolha dos serviços acaba sendo a pior possível, já que a empresa prestadora que vence está claramente mais dedicada a comprar comissões do que a fazer um bom trabalho (este problema afeta tantas áreas, desde a construção de estradas até a qualidade da merenda escolar, que é impossível listar aqui); __(ii)__ o processo corruptor acaba, no longo prazo, eliminando as empresas que prestavam e deixando para competir apenas as corruptas, e a qualidade tende a piorar progressivamente.
- **cartéis**: o Estado em geral cria e depois fica refém de vários grupos de interesse. o caso dos taxistas contra o Uber é o que está na moda hoje (e o que mostra como os Estados se comportam da mesma forma no mundo todo).
- **multas**: quando algum indivíduo ou empresa comete uma fraude financeira, ou causa algum dano material involuntário, as vítimas do caso são as pessoas que sofreram o dano ou perderam dinheiro, mas o Estado tem sempre leis que prevêem multas para os responsáveis. A justiça estatal é sempre muito rígida e rápida na aplicação dessas multas, mas relapsa e vaga no que diz respeito à indenização das vítimas. O que em geral acontece é que o Estado aplica uma enorme multa ao responsável pelo mal, retirando deste os recursos que dispunha para indenizar as vítimas, e se retira do caso, deixando estas desamparadas.
- **desapropriação**: o Estado pode pegar qualquer propriedade de qualquer pessoa mediante uma indenização que é necessariamente inferior ao valor da propriedade para o seu presente dono (caso contrário ele a teria vendido voluntariamente).
- **seguro-desemprego**: se há, por exemplo, um prazo mínimo de 1 ano para o sujeito ter direito a receber seguro-desemprego, isto o incentiva a planejar ficar apenas 1 ano em cada emprego (ano este que será sucedido por um período de desemprego remunerado), matando todas as possibilidades de aprendizado ou aquisição de experiência naquela empresa específica ou ascensão hierárquica.
- **previdência**: a previdência social tem todos os defeitos de cálculo do mundo, e não importa muito ela ser uma forma horrível de poupar dinheiro, porque ela tem garantias bizarras de longevidade fornecidas pelo Estado, além de ser compulsória. Isso serve para criar no imaginário geral a idéia da __aposentadoria__, uma época mágica em que todos os dias serão finais de semana. A idéia da aposentadoria influencia o sujeito a não se preocupar em ter um emprego que faça sentido, mas sim em ter um trabalho qualquer, que o permita se aposentar.
- **regulamentação impossível**: milhares de coisas são proibidas, há regulamentações sobre os aspectos mais mínimos de cada empreendimento ou construção ou espaço. se todas essas regulamentações fossem exigidas não haveria condições de produção e todos morreriam. portanto, elas não são exigidas. porém, o Estado, ou um agente individual imbuído do poder estatal pode, se desejar, exigi-las todas de um cidadão inimigo seu. qualquer pessoa pode viver a vida inteira sem cumprir nem 10% das regulamentações estatais, mas viverá também todo esse tempo com medo de se tornar um alvo de sua exigência, num estado de terror psicológico.
- **perversão de critérios**: para muitas coisas sobre as quais a sociedade normalmente chegaria a um valor ou comportamento "razoável" espontaneamente, o Estado dita regras. estas regras muitas vezes não são obrigatórias, são mais "sugestões" ou limites, como o salário mínimo, ou as 44 horas semanais de trabalho. a sociedade, porém, passa a usar esses valores como se fossem o normal. são raras, por exemplo, as ofertas de emprego que fogem à regra das 44h semanais.
- **inflação**: subir os preços é difícil e constrangedor para as empresas, pedir aumento de salário é difícil e constrangedor para o funcionário. a inflação força as pessoas a fazer isso, mas o aumento não é automático, como alguns economistas podem pensar (enquanto alguns outros ficam muito satisfeitos de que esse processo seja demorado e difícil).
- **inflação**: a inflação destrói a capacidade das pessoas de julgar preços entre concorrentes usando a própria memória.
- **inflação**: a inflação destrói os cálculos de lucro/prejuízo das empresas e prejudica enormemente as decisões empresariais que seriam baseadas neles.
- **inflação**: a inflação redistribui a riqueza dos mais pobres e mais afastados do sistema financeiro para os mais ricos, os bancos e as megaempresas.
- **inflação**: a inflação estimula o endividamento e o consumismo.
- **lixo:** ao prover coleta e armazenamento de lixo "grátis para todos" o Estado incentiva a criação de lixo. se tivessem que pagar para que recolhessem o seu lixo, as pessoas (e conseqüentemente as empresas) se empenhariam mais em produzir coisas usando menos plástico, menos embalagens, menos sacolas.
- **leis contra crimes financeiros:** ao criar legislação para dificultar acesso ao sistema financeiro por parte de criminosos a dificuldade e os custos para acesso a esse mesmo sistema pelas pessoas de bem cresce absurdamente, levando a um percentual enorme de gente incapaz de usá-lo, para detrimento de todos -- e no final das contas os grandes criminosos ainda conseguem burlar tudo.

@ fce4177b:f504cdc8

Hi all!

Lately I've been working on a small python project to try approaching the pathfinding problem in lightning as a Min-cost network flow problem.

I know Renè Pickhardt already used this approach in order to prove the superiority of the Zero base fee approach, in fact I read his papers and got the gist of it.

Now I'm trying to model the problem mathematically - using the pyomo package in python - but I came up with a question that I couldn't find an answer for:

in a multi-path payment (MPP), can two HTLCs go though the same channel?

More specifically, I'm interested in understanding if the following situation can happen or not:

Nodes = {S, A, B, C, E, F, G, I, D} # S source, D destination

With S being the source node (aka the payer), D being the destination node (aka the payee). The scope of the question does not include considerations about base or rate fees. Node S computes the optimal path that minimises the fees for an amount and finds out that the optimal choice is to execute a MPP that follows this path(s):

``` B E
A -> -> -> G -> D C F

h0 h1 h2 h3 h4 ```

where the first two hops (h1 and h2) see two parallel payments going on, then at the hop h3 the MPP converges to the node G and then procedes with the last hop to destination.

As far as I know, in classical MPP the preimage is the same for every parallel path (correct me if I'm wrong), thus I'm wondering if that thing is possible or not. Moreover, if there was an another hop such that:

``` B E
A -> I -> -> -> G -> D C F

h0 h1 h2 h3 h4 h5 ```

would that be possible too? That meaning two HTLCs flowing in the same channel for the first hop, then splitting and the riconverging.

Hope the question is clear enough, otherwise I'm open to clarifications.

Thanks!

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/612642

@ 1a48e74d:02c0e00f

Minimalism and Bitcoin is a topic that I will be diving into over the next few weeks. I am just testing out a new writing client :)

minimalism

@ a9434ee1:d5c885be

What makes Nostr and Bitcoin so extremely exciting to me, as a designer, is that they offer an entirely new design space. Something we never had before. Something that we can, for the first time ever, call…
A Free Market.

And not just that, but one where everyone speaks the same language. One that acknowledges that Sovereignty doesn’t go that far without Interoperability.

Since this is literally a first, it seems terribly naïve to assume that we can just copy what works for Big Tech’s walled gardens and add some Freedom sauce on top. I’ve been sketching out things like “Twitter but with Zaps”, “Youtube but with many algo’s”, “Patreon but with Bitcoin”, etc... for long enough to realize the harsh limits of such an approach. Instead I’ve found it more fruitful to start by looking at the characteristics of this new digital, interoperable free market and, only then, look for similar existing benchmarks that can serve as inspiration.

Because the convergence of the various Freedom Tech protocols (Nostr, Bitcoin, Cashu, …) are such a huge game changer for online monetization specifically, it seems even more naïve to just start copying Big Tech on that front, without proper examination.

If we did just play copycat, Monthly Subscriptions and Paywalls would be the obvious answer. This article dives into why they’re not.

Free as in Competition

In a free market, it’s going to be hard for you to set a price if you don’t have something scarce to sell. Unlike in a Big Tech walled garden, there’s no one blocking competitors from entering the market. That includes competitors that offer your stuff!
If what you create can easily be copied, it will.

Yes, Content creators, FOSS devs, Designers, … that’s you.
Charging for your article, podcast, app or movie doesn’t end well when people can find a free upload right next to yours. Open protocols remove the friction of having to go PirateBay for that sort of stuff. Luckily, they also remove the friction for people to value your content directly (#V4V Zaps) and for you to launch unique and scarce products related to what you do (Community, Merch, …).

Even if you have a scarce product to sell though, Nostr sets the bar lower than ever for others to start competing with your product. Every part of your product!

Interoperability breaks products and services down to their constituents and opens up every layer of the stack to competition. Currently most SAAS business models are basically very expensive monthly subscriptions for some hosting and computation. And guess what Nostr is extremely good at → Discovering and switching providers of hosting and computation.

In a competitive context like that, you need a monetization model that lets you adapt fast. If you choose to monetize with monthly subscriptions, you’ll be updating your subscription tiers every month, if not every week, just to remain competitive. If that’s the case, then what’s the point? Why not just have a cash price list?

Free as in Volatile

The reality of a free market is that price-discovery never takes a break. This is especially true for a market that uses a money that is still being discovered as money by 99% of the world. A money that, just like Nostr, only saw the light of day because its creators saw total chaos ahead without it.

Bitcoin and Nostr do #fixthemoney and do #fixtheinternet, but all that fixing isn’t exactly taking us on a smooth ride.

Smooth rides are stable rides, stable prices, stable amounts of locked-in users, stable ties with the state, etc… They are everything Freedom Tech is taking us on exciting journey away from.

Again, adaptability is key and your business model needs to reflect that. Monthly subscriptions don’t handle volatility well. It takes a lot of confidence, extremely loyal customers and liquid reserves to survive bumpy roads. That’s a lot of capital that probably has better uses. Better uses that Big Tech monopolies can ignore, but your competitors won’t.

Free as in “Number Go Up”

Denominating your subscriptions in “stable” fiat-currencies isn’t going to help neither. The mental cost for customers is only low as long you don’t have juggle more than 21 subscriptions. (yes, I completely made up that number but it’s somewhere around that, so bear with me).

Given that Subscription Hell is already a thing in Fiat-land once you go beyond that number, just try to imagine the amount of subscriptions you’d be handling in Nostr-land. Your 1 Netflix subscription suddenly became 6, to different service providers, plus 20 to all your favorite creators. Then add the subscriptions for all other internet use cases you can think of. Then add some more for the ones that you can’t even imagine yet.
This is not an overstatement. It is very very unlikely that your service happens to be the only one that subscriptions would work for. If they appear to work for you, every competitor or similar use case will be copying that model in no time.

So if they work, there would be a loooot of subscriptions.
That’s also a looot of: - recurring payments to forget about - different time periods to oversee - extra effort to go and unsubscribe or switch tiers - users thinking ‘I didn’t even really use this!” - users also thinking “What am I paying for exactly?”

In short, that’s asking for frustrated, disappointed and confused customers.

These subscriptions would then also need to be handled on top of all the #V4V Zaps and cash payments that are inevitably happening as well. Unlike Big Tech products you don’t get to just pick Subscriptions as the only option. You will have to be optimizing both the Wallet and Social UX/UI for all of these types of payments. Something I naïvely tried and quickly gave up on. It overcrowds interfaces, makes different applications less interoperable and creates a very confusing user experience.

And if you denominate everything in fiat, you add even more confusion since the Zaps from others are denominated in Bitcoin. That suddenly makes them variable from the fiat-denominator’s perspective. Other denominations work when you only have two parties (f.e. seller and buyer), not when you have groups of people zapping away at an article. For #V4V to gain traction zappers need recognition. If it’s completely variable, and thus unclear, who the top zappers of a piece of content are or if the biggest patrons of a creator are only visible if you go to some specific subscriber dashboard, you’re creating confusion and diluting recognition.

Zaps are awesome, nearly universally implemented, very simple to design for and they might just be enough. We’re mostly still early. Creators can’t even reply to Zaps yet. The first prototypes for frictionless Cashu zaps are only just coming out. Let’s explore all that further before we start adding subscriptions to the UI, the users’ mental load and the app developers endless list of “things to implement”.

If the current zap-rate of daily Nostr users (myself included) tells me anything, it’s that sending around small payments all the time isn’t really the issue. The mental cost for the user happens mostly at the level of:
”How the f*ck do I keep track of all this?”
“How do I fit this in with my regular monthly expenses?”
Subscriptions are only one answer to this. If they happen to still somehow solve the above issues for some use cases, we still have to find solutions anyway for the micro-payments side of things.

My point is thus mainly: we might as well start there and, who knows, we don’t even need subscriptions. Or at least not as a standard to strive towards. No one is stopping you from using time-based pricing for things that are actually time-based or from creating micro-apps that let you set up recurring zaps and other fun stuff like that. Just don’t promise creators and merchants that they can base their business models on them.

If you’re talking to people that will only consider Freedom Tech if they can have the stability of a group of monthly subscribers, you’re probably not talking to the right people (yet!).

Freedom Tech = Responsibility Tech.

Both seller and buyers need tools that help them take that responsibility. Especially regarding payments, the currently available tools are far from optimal and have barely scratched the surface of what’s possible in the interoperable ocean of possibilities. I say this more as an invitation than as a complaint of course. We are — yes, I’m saying it again — sooooo early.

So how can we help buyers be responsible while “not having to think about every little payment”?

For rich npubs on a network denominated in #NGU technology the answer can be quite simple: They simply don’t have to really think about it.
In fact, poor npubs neither as long they can set a spending budget and have great tools and transparency to help them manage it.

They need something a bit like their “lives left” in a video game. Or something that resembles envelope budgeting: like going to the farmers market with only a limited amount of cash.

Talking about farmers markets

Let’s look at what currently comes close to an interoperable free market in meat-space: Restaurant & Farmers markets. - No one has copyrights on pizza Margherita or chicken eggs - Entering the market is relatively cheap (food trucks, farmer stands, …) - Customers can pick and choose where they get “every layer of the stack” (drinks here, main dish there and ice cream over there)

Now look at how these businesses monetize: - Cash price lists - Discounts (for special occasions, loyal customers, ..) - Bundles (lunch menus, vegetable baskets, …)

Both restaurant owners and farmers have been trying out monthly subscriptions since forever, mostly because it would benefit them. But in places with high competition this has had exactly zero success.

What did have success is services that bundle farmers market food items for you and deliver it at your doorstep on a weekly basis. That’s what lower mental cost looks like. Ironically, these services often started out with the monthly subscription model and have had to switch because customers needed more flexibility. Now, in their apps, they let users pick what day they want what, at what price.
And these apps are not even Nostr yet.

Talking about Nostr markets

Nostr markets are not exactly farmers markets of course. But that is mostly good news. Nostr, Bitcoin and Cashu, in particular, remove a lot of the friction that cash still has in the physical world. They enable seamless micro-payments. That’s an innovation worth embracing, not something to hide away behind subscriptions.

Embracing micro-payments means that every little thing can have a real-time price. A price that, once payed, you never have to think about again. And some, if not most, micro-payments are so micro that you don’t have to really think about them in the first place. Especially if we’re talking about recurring events (pun intended).

If a chat message in a certain Community costs 2 sats, after your third message your added mental cost will likely be close to zero. At that point, the price is mostly a matter of transparency, fairness and spam prevention. When the Admin suddenly changes this price to 1000 sats however, you will need to think twice about posting such a message. But again, that is a good thing. That’s exactly what the Admin is monetizing.

He is curating for high signal content and conversations around a certain interest. His price list is one of his top tools for doing so. You pay him for being able to publish in his unique community. You “Pay Per Use” of that Community as a broadcasting channel for your messages, articles, videos, … You know everyone else does too.

Using monthly subscriptions for such a community would just invite abuse and poor quality. It would be like an all-you-can-eat restaurant where everyone has an infinite stomach size, you’re all at the same table and only the loudest screamers get heard.
So the Admin would put limits on what you specifically get for your subscription (100 messages per month, 210MB of hosting, etc etc…). The members would then demand flexibility or go elsewhere.

The admin would then provide different tiers.
Yet, most members would still need flexibility more than they need flat rate monthly pricing.

At the same time, the Admin’s “Pay Per Use” competitors will still be cheaper. They don’t have the overhead of handling the uncertainty that comes with providing stable pricing for several months. Trying their offer out is also way cheaper than immediately having to pay a subscription. The admin, on the other hand, cannot really offer free trials if he doesn’t have the locked-in users to pay for them.

In the end, just like restaurants, the Admin will switch to “Pay Per Use” and will use discounts and bundles to his advantage.

As long as users have great tools to keep an eye their spending, this sort of outcome is a win-win for the whole ecosystem. What users tend to like most about monthly subscriptions for something is the guarantee that they will not exceed XXX amount of money on that thing for the month. Nothing is stopping us from building tools that provide the same guarantee without the complications of handling monthly subscriptions.

Since most Bitcoin wallets are not daily-spending wallets and most Nostr projects aren’t monetizing yet, hardly any attention has been spent on tools like this. They all copied bank apps and display your total amount of money and a chronological feed of your transaction history. There are several problems with this: 1. You don’t want to openly showcase your total balance to everyone around you when you open the app 2. Your total balance shows “everything you have”. That is a terrible benchmark for determining “what you can sustainably spend”. 3. It’s also a terrible benchmark for determining “what you earned this month” 4. Micro-payments make a chronological feed of all your transactions completely unusable 5. Zaps make a lot of your transactions social. Zaps and eCash blur the line between money and message. And messages require interaction that transactions don’t.

I think we can do better.
So, let’s try!

Cash Budgets

Just like the previously mentioned “lives” in a game or the cash in your wallet for a night out, the first thing users will want to see is “How much do I have left?”. Since most people organize their budgets per month we can more specifically turn this into “How much do I have left this month?”. This means we need to allow users to set a monthly budget in the first place. Once that budget is set for the month, it facilitates all the rest.

This budget is their subscription now. Their Nostr subscription.
An interoperable subscription they can interact with in any trusted app.

And the best part: They pick the price.
They’re taking their responsibility and lowering their mental cost with one action.

Now, you can start playing with wallet and home screen Interfaces that show the user at a glance: - What they’ve got left to spend for that month - What they already spent - What they earned (relative to that budget and/or a specific earnings goal)

I’m currently exploring this design space myself and the extent to which Freedom Tech budgeting can be gamified in novel ways will make TikTok look boring.

Some baby UI steps in this direction

But that’s just the budget part of course. We still need non-intrusive ways to display all these little price-tags for things if we’re not hiding them away behind a subscription.

The good news is that, when it comes to movies, music, articles, posts, FOSS apps and all other types of information that can easily be copied, it doesn’t have a price tag. It just has people zapping it. People that can use a lot more context and recognition than they currently get. (showing top zappers everywhere and letting creators reply to zaps being just a humble start for that)

For the stuff that does have price-tag, even the most obvious answer isn’t as bad I though it would be:
Just put it on the button.
The bigger the sum, the bigger the button.

eCash is what can make all of this work as a one-button action anyway, removing most of the friction. A budget, on the other hand, is what can remove most of the worrying. Color indications, permission prompts for higher amounts, etc etc… can all work in tandem for this.

With these examples I’m mostly trying to give you an idea of what is still left largely unexplored territory.

A territory that we will have to go and explore in any case.
A territory where Communities are easier to monetize then Content is.
A territory where I can count the current number of active designers on both hands.
A territory that can desperately use a Design Community.

You can guess twice what’s next on my todo-list….

@ b34b4408:acfb9667

"ผลกระทบของน้ำยาบ้วนปากต่อจุลชีพในช่องปากและร่างกาย: มุมมองใหม่จากการวิจัยล่าสุด"

ในช่วงหลายทศวรรษที่ผ่านมา น้ำยาบ้วนปากได้กลายเป็นส่วนหนึ่งของกิจวัตรการดูแลสุขภาพช่องปากของคนจำนวนมาก โดยมีจุดประสงค์หลักเพื่อลดกลิ่นปาก ป้องกันฟันผุ และรักษาสุขภาพเหงือก อย่างไรก็ตาม การวิจัยล่าสุดได้เผยให้เห็นถึงผลกระทบที่ไม่คาดคิดของการใช้น้ำยาบ้วนปากเป็นประจำ โดยเฉพาะอย่างยิ่งต่อระบบนิเวศของจุลชีพในช่องปากและร่างกาย

การศึกษาล่าสุดที่ตีพิมพ์ในวารสาร Journal of Medical Microbiology เมื่อวันที่ 4 มิถุนายน 2024 โดย J.G.E. Laumen และคณะ ( https://www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/journal/jmm/10.1099/jmm.0.001830 )ได้ศึกษาผลของการใช้น้ำยาบ้วนปาก Listerine Cool Mint เป็นประจำทุกวันต่อจุลชีพในช่องปากและลำคอ

ผลการวิจัยพบว่าการใช้ Listerine เป็นเวลา 3 เดือนทำให้เกิดการเปลี่ยนแปลงอย่างมีนัยสำคัญในองค์ประกอบของจุลชีพในช่องปากและลำคอ โดยเฉพาะอย่างยิ่ง การเพิ่มขึ้นของแบคทีเรีย Fusobacterium nucleatum และ Streptococcus anginosus ซึ่งเป็นเชื้อที่ก่อให้เกิดปัญหาสุขภาพหากมีปริมาณมากเกินไป

โดยเชื้อทั้งสองตัวนั้นมีผลต่อสุขภาพดังนี้

Fusobacterium nucleatum:

เป็นเชื้อแบคทีเรียที่พบได้ตามปกติในช่องปาก แต่หากมีปริมาณมากเกินไปจะก่อให้เกิดปัญหาได้
มีความเกี่ยวข้องกับโรคปริทันต์ (โรคเหงือกอักเสบ)
มีการศึกษาพบความสัมพันธ์ระหว่างเชื้อนี้กับมะเร็งลำไส้ใหญ่
มีส่วนในการกระตุ้นการอักเสบในร่างกาย ซึ่งอาจเชื่อมโยงกับโรคทางระบบอื่นๆ

Streptococcus anginosus:

เป็นส่วนหนึ่งของกลุ่ม Streptococcus milleri ซึ่งพบได้ในช่องปาก ลำคอ และทางเดินอาหาร โดยปกติไม่ก่อโรค แต่ในบางกรณีอาจกลายเป็นเชื้อฉวยโอกาส
สามารถก่อให้เกิดการติดเชื้อในช่องปาก เช่น ฝีในช่องปาก
ในกรณีที่รุนแรง ทำให้เกิดการติดเชื้อในกระแสเลือด หรือฝีในอวัยวะภายใน เช่น สมอง ปอด หรือตับ

ผลการวิจัยนี้ทำให้เกิดคำถามสำคัญเกี่ยวกับกลไกการทำงานของน้ำยาบ้วนปากและผลกระทบระยะยาวต่อสุขภาพ เมื่อพิจารณาส่วนประกอบหลักของ Listerine Cool Mint (รวมถึง น้ำยาบ้วนปากอื่นๆด้วย) ซึ่งประกอบด้วย

1. น้ำ (เป็นส่วนประกอบหลัก)
2.แอลกอฮอล์ (มักจะอยู่ที่ประมาณ 21.6%)
3.น้ำมันหอมระเหยจากพืช ได้แก่:
    Eucalyptol (น้ำมันยูคาลิปตัส)
    Menthol (เมนทอล)
    Thymol (ไทมอล)
    Methyl salicylate (เมทิลซาลิไซเลต หรือ น้ำมันวินเทอร์กรีน)
4.สารให้ความหวาน (มักใช้ซอร์บิทอล)
5.กรดเบนโซอิก (สารกันบูด)
6.สารให้สี (อาจใช้สีเขียว)
7.โซเดียมซักคาริน (สารให้ความหวาน)
8.โซเดียมเบนโซเอต (สารกันบูด)

จะพบว่าแต่ละสารมีส่วนทำให้เกิดการเสียสมดุลของจุลชีพในช่องปาก:

1. แอลกอฮอล์และน้ำมันหอมระเหย: 
    มีฤทธิ์ฆ่าเชื้อที่รุนแรง ทำลายทั้งแบคทีเรียที่เป็นโทษและเป็นประโยชน์ เปิดโอกาสให้เชื้อบางชนิดเติบโตได้มากขึ้น
2. สารกันบูด: 
    ยับยั้งการเจริญเติบโตของจุลินทรีย์บางชนิดมากกว่าชนิดอื่น
3. สารให้ความหวาน: 
    เป็นแหล่งอาหารสำหรับแบคทีเรียบางชนิด หรือเปลี่ยนแปลงสภาพแวดล้อมในช่องปาก

ผลการวิจัยนี้ได้ท้าทายความเชื่อดั้งเดิมเกี่ยวกับประโยชน์ของน้ำยาบ้วนปาก ในอดีต น้ำยาบ้วนปากถูกส่งเสริมว่ามีประโยชน์ในการลดกลิ่นปาก ป้องกันฟันผุ และช่วยรักษาโรคเหงือก อย่างไรก็ตาม การค้นพบใหม่นี้บ่งชี้ว่า ประโยชน์ระยะสั้นเหล่านี้อาจไม่คุ้มค่ากับผลเสียที่อาจเกิดขึ้นในระยะยาว การเสียสมดุลของจุลชีพในช่องปากอาจนำไปสู่การเพิ่มขึ้นของแบคทีเรียที่เป็นอันตราย ซึ่งจะเพิ่มความเสี่ยงต่อโรคต่างๆ ทั้งในช่องปากและระบบอื่นๆ ของร่างกาย เช่น โรคปริทันต์ มะเร็งหลอดอาหารและลำไส้ใหญ่ รวมถึงโรคทางระบบอื่นๆ

บทความนี้เน้นย้ำความสำคัญของการพิจารณาอย่างรอบคอบในการใช้ผลิตภัณฑ์สุขภาพช่องปาก และ ผู้บริโภคควรตระหนักถึงความสำคัญของการรักษาสมดุลของจุลชีพในช่องปากและพิจารณาทางเลือกอื่นๆ ในการดูแลสุขภาพช่องปากที่อาจมีผลกระทบน้อยกว่าต่อระบบนิเวศของจุลชีพ เช่น การแปรงฟันอย่างสม่ำเสมอ การใช้ไหมขัดฟันอย่างถูกวิธี และการรับประทานอาหารที่มีประโยชน์ต่อสุขภาพช่องปาก

ซึ่งการรับประทานอาหารที่ดีต่อสุขภาพช่องปาก เป็นส่วนสำคัญในการดูแลสุขภาพฟันและเหงือก รวมถึงการรักษาสมดุลของจุลชีพในช่องปากและร่างกายด้วย ซึ่งประกอบด้วย:

    **อาหารธรรมชาติที่มีการแปรรูปน้อย 
        อาหารที่มีโพรไบโอติกส์และพรีไบโอติกส์ 
            ช่วยรักษาสมดุลของจุลชีพที่ดี เช่น โยเกิร์ต คีเฟอร์ กิมจิ ชีส
        อาหารที่กระตุ้นการหลั่งน้ำลาย:
            น้ำลายช่วยชะล้างแบคทีเรียและเศษอาหาร เช่น เนื้อสัตว์ ไข่
            นอกจากนี้ การเคี้ยวอาหารให้ละเอียดและใช้เวลาในการรับประทานอาหารช้าๆ ยังช่วยกระตุ้นการหลั่งน้ำลายและส่งเสริมสุขภาพช่องปากที่ดีอีกด้วย
        น้ำเปล่า:
            ดื่มน้ำสะอาดอย่างเพียงพอช่วยชะล้างช่องปากและรักษาความชุ่มชื้น**

อาหารที่ควรหลีกเลี่ยงหรือจำกัดคือ

       ** อาหารและเครื่องดื่มที่มีแป้ง/น้ำตาลสูง ซึ่งส่งเสริมการเจริญเติบโตของแบคทีเรียที่ก่อให้เกิดฟันผุ และการอักเสบ รวมถึงอาหารที่ผสมสารต่างๆที่กล่าวมาก่อนหน้า**

การรับประทานอาหารที่สมดุลและหลากหลายไม่เพียงแต่ส่งผลดีต่อสุขภาพช่องปากเท่านั้น แต่ยังช่วยส่งเสริมสุขภาพโดยรวมของร่างกายอีกด้วย

หากยังต้องการใช้น้ำยาบ้วนปาก ควรพิจารณาใช้เฉพาะเมื่อจำเป็น ไม่ใช้เป็นประจำทุกวัน และอาจเลือกน้ำยาบ้วนปากที่ไม่มีแอลกอฮอล์ รวมถึงสารต่างๆอย่างที่กล่าวไปก่อนหน้า

ในท้ายที่สุด การวิจัยนี้เน้นย้ำถึงความสำคัญของการไม่ยึดติดกับความเชื่อเดิมๆ โดยไม่พิจารณาหลักฐานใหม่ทางวิทยาศาสตร์ และวิธีการดูแลสุขภาพที่คำนึงถึงระบบนิเวศของจุลชีพมากขึ้น

@ 9edd72eb:cb697b0a

NBC reports that a suspicious person was received an hour before a gunman opened fire at former President Donald Trump, a senator said. U.S. officials learned of an alleged Iranian plot to kill Trump weeks before the attempted assassination in Butler, Pennsylvania, sources said, adding that nothing indicated the two were connected. The Department of Homeland Security said its inspector general would investigate the Secret Service's security operation at Saturday's rally. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle said that "the buck stops with me" and that the assassination attempt Saturday "should have never happened." That is to say, there are all kinds of threats to Trump's security. But why isn't enough being done to protect it? When Trump wins the election, will the Secret Service really take care of his security? Or are you going to continue ignoring reports and threats to your life? Do some groups want him dead and don't even bother to hide it? That is to say, it is obvious that they want it, but are there no plans to stop an assassination that is announced without any shame?

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/612126

@ de496884:72617b81

Hola nostriches. Hoy quiero hacer una publicación a modo de acercamiento al surgimiento de las categorías de género y feminismo. Así que si te interesa el tema haz un esfuerzo, quédate y lee hasta el final.

El «nuevo» feminismo surge en los años 60 en aquellos países desarrollados que acordaron el reconocimiento a los derechos humanos contenidos en la declaración respectiva de la ONU. Entonces, como extensión a dicho reconocimiento es que se gesta el movimiento feminista. A partir de entonces, se vuelve a plantear la relación entre naturaleza y cultura y se llega a la conclusión de que las diferencias sociales van más allá de las diferencias biológicas, lo cual tiene que ver con que hasta la satisfacción de las necesidades elementales como son la alimentación, la vivienda o el vestuario, están condicionadas por construcciones sociales.

Pues resulta que una de las primeras propuestas identificó la subordinación femenina producto de una organización patriarcal, tomando la categoría patriarcado de Max Weber. Es así como la visión de patriarcado se extendió al discurso político y académico. Sin embargo, no existía información acerca del desarrollo histórico de dicha categoría, sistematización, variaciones, etc., debido a que era algo que recién se percibía en sociedad.

Sin embargo, la misma categoría de patriarcado junto a la de relaciones de poder para explicar fenómenos sociales contemporáneos, constituye uno de los principales aportes del feminismo. Es así como han logrado primero visibilizar y luego deconstruir y desmontar una serie de patrones existentes en la cultura que hacían a la mujer subordinarse al hombre, y que estaban presentes en el sistema sexo/género.

Imagen relativa a la lucha contra el patriarcado

Hasta ese momento, en las investigaciones de corte sociológico se podía observar un androcentrismo excesivo al dar cuenta de que el discurso científico giraba en torno al hombre como sujeto y objeto de la investigación. Incluso para muchos positivistas como el mismo Weber, los problemas relativos a las mujeres quedaban en un segundo plano y eran achacados a una supuesta pasividad en el ámbito doméstico-familiar. Dicha pasividad partía de la supuesta inferioridad biológica del género femenino.

El patriarcado entonces era una categoría vacía en sí misma, sin valor explicativo. Desde el punto de vista político pudo ser útil para la movilización pero no resistió la polémica de los críticos del feminismo ni problematizó los conflictos a ser resueltos. Pero por otro lado, un grupo de mujeres -académicas principalmente- se puso manos a la obra en una tarea más pequeña pero con mayores resultados a la larga. Se propusieron generar conocimientos sobre las condiciones de vida de la mujer, buscar en el pasado y el presente los aportes de las mujeres a la sociedad, hacerlas visibles en la historia. Es así como surgen centros académicos, ONG, proyectos, centros de estudios sobre la mujer, etc.

Convendría distinguir entonces dos posturas que acompañaron a la investigación sobre las mujeres: uno que toma como objeto de estudio a la mujer; condiciones de vida, trabajo, cultura, y otra que privilegia a la sociedad como generadora de la subordinación de las mujeres. Mientras la primera perspectiva generaba conocimiento sobre las mujeres en el estudio de las relaciones mujer-hombre y mujer-mujer, la segunda tenía una visión más holística ya que planteaba que hay que estudiar la sociedad ya que la subordinación de las mujeres es producto de la organización de esta, y que no se avanzará solamente estudiando a las mujeres, pues el estudio debe ser más amplio y en diferentes niveles, ámbitos y tiempos.

Es en esta búsqueda donde nace y se desarrolla el concepto de género como categoría social. Es así que los sistemas de género/sexo fueron entendidos como conjuntos de prácticas, símbolos, representaciones, normas y valores sociales que las sociedades construyen a partir de la diferencia anatomofisiológica y que dotan de sentido a los impulsos sexuales, la reproducción y en general a las relaciones de las personas. Por tanto, este sistema pasó a ser el objeto de estudio para comprender la subordinación de la mujer al hombre. Al ser el reconocimiento de una dimensión de la desigualdad social hasta entonces desconocida, se considera la ruptura epistemológica más importante de la segunda mitad del siglo pasado.

Imagen representativa del binarismo de género

Hay que decir que los fenómenos sociales se definen por la relación que guardan entre sí. Es así que la contextualización adquiere gran importancia. Varones y hembras tenemos la capacidad de producir con el cuerpo, pero solo los cuerpos de las hembras pueden gestar y por tanto asegurar la especie humana. Todo grupo humano que pretenda sobrevivir debe asegurarse cierto número de hembras que lo hagan posible. De ahí un poder particular del cuerpo de las hembras que además es económicamente útil. Dicho poder no es en tanto entidad biológica, sino que es la sociedad la que le otorga este poder. En este punto es importante preguntarnos históricamente ¿quiénes han controlado la capacidad reproductiva de las mujeres?, ¿quiénes han tenido la preferencia en el acceso sexual? Para asegurar un control efectivo sobre la reproducción es necesario asegurar el acceso a la sexualidad.

Imagen alegórica al embarazo

Ello también lleva a dirigir el trabajo que hacen porque de lo contrario, las mujeres pudieran tener espacio para representar una amenaza al dominio de los hombres. Es importante atender a las etapas del desarrollo de las mujeres, que permitirá ver cómo se moldean para aceptar la desigualdad y las jerarquías según el género en las distintas sociedades y culturas.

Otro contexto a delimitar es el ámbito doméstico donde históricamente ha estado ubicada la subordinación femenina. Se ha puesto al descubierto que en mujeres que comparten la misma posición de clase y raza, la condición femenina se redefine a lo largo de la vida y que algunas mujeres gozan de poder sobre otras aún en contextos de alta dominación masculina, donde se les inviste de autoridad, creando el sistema zonas de incertidumbre que las divide como género e impide alianzas y se legitima la dominación. Foucault decía que «el poder se ejerce, no se posee», siempre está en peligro de perderse y no basta con normas, leyes, amenazas o castigos. De ahí que los espacios de subordinación sean también espacios de poder de las mujeres. Es en estos espacios donde aparece la inseguridad, la tensión, la confrontación y por ejemplo, las mujeres pueden reclamar la anticoncepción.

Para terminar, es importante tener en cuenta que el género es una forma de desigualdad social que siempre está articulado con otras formas de desigualdad ya sea clase, raza, grupo etario, etc. Hay que pensar la dominación masculina con un comienzo vago en el tiempo, pero que permite desligar la subordinación de las mujeres de la evolución «natural» de la humanidad y entenderla como un proceso histórico. En ese sentido es necesario destacar que, respecto a la raza, en sociedades plurales hay que atender al contexto étnico-cultural ya que en dependencia de las relaciones entre personas de razas distintas, estarán condicionadas las relaciones entre los géneros.

Imagen de mujeres de distintas razas

Por otro lado, si bien es sabido que históricamente el sistema de género social imperante ha contribuido a invisibilizar a la mujer, asociar necesariamente dicha categoría únicamente a ella, lo que hace es nuevamente recrear el absolutismo histórico que tanto daño ha hecho, ahora como lo antagónico al hombre. En la construcción social participan todos los individuos presentes en el sistema género.

Hasta aquí la publicación de hoy, de la cual aun se puede ahondar mucho más, sobre todo en lo referido al origen de la dominación o de la jerarquización del binomio «hombre/mujer» desde un punto de vista antropológico, pero eso quedará pendiente para otro momento. ¡Así que hasta la próxima!, ¡nos vemos en Nostr!

........................................

English version

Hello nostriches. Today I want to make a post by way of an approach to the emergence of the categories of gender and feminism. So if you are interested in the topic make an effort, stay and read to the end.

The "new" feminism emerged in the 60's in those developed countries that agreed to recognize the human rights contained in the respective UN declaration. Then, as an extension of that recognition, the feminist movement was born. From then on, the relationship between nature and culture was raised again and the conclusion was reached that social differences go beyond biological differences, which has to do with the fact that even the satisfaction of elementary needs such as food, housing or clothing are conditioned by social constructions.

It turns out that one of the first proposals identified female subordination as a product of a patriarchal organization, taking Max Weber's category of patriarchy. This is how the vision of patriarchy was extended to political and academic discourse. However, there was no information about the historical development of this category, systematization, variations, etc., because it was something that was only recently perceived in society.

However, the same category of patriarchy, together with that of power relations to explain contemporary social phenomena, constitutes one of the main contributions of feminism. This is how they have first made visible and then deconstructed and dismantled a series of existing patterns in the culture that made women subordinate to men, and that were present in the sex/gender system.

Image relating to the fight against patriarchy

Up to that time, in sociological research, an excessive androcentrism could be observed as scientific discourse revolved around men as the subject and object of research. Even for many positivists such as Weber himself, the problems related to women remained in the background and were blamed on a supposed passivity in the domestic-family sphere. This passivity was based on the supposed biological inferiority of the female gender.

Patriarchy was then an empty category in itself, with no explanatory value. From the political point of view, it could be useful for mobilization, but it did not resist the polemic of feminism's critics, nor did it problematize the conflicts to be resolved. But on the other hand, a group of women - mainly academics - set to work on a smaller task but with greater results in the long run. They set out to generate knowledge about women's living conditions, to search in the past and present for women's contributions to society, to make them visible in history. This is how academic centers, NGOs, projects, women's studies centers, etc., came into being.

It would be convenient to distinguish then two postures that accompanied the research on women: one that takes women as the object of study; living conditions, work, culture, and the other that privileges society as the generator of women's subordination. While the first perspective generated knowledge about women in the study of woman-man and woman-woman relations, the second had a more holistic vision, since it proposed that society must be studied, since the subordination of women is a product of its organization, and that progress will not be made only by studying women, since the study must be broader and at different levels, spheres and times.

It is in this search that the concept of gender as a social category was born and developed. Thus, gender/sex systems were understood as a set of practices, symbols, representations, norms and social values that societies construct on the basis of anatomophysiological differences and that give meaning to sexual impulses, reproduction and, in general, to people's relationships. Therefore, this system became the object of study to understand the subordination of women to men. As the recognition of a hitherto unknown dimension of social inequality, it is considered the most important epistemological breakthrough of the second half of the last century.

Representative image of gender binarism

It must be said that social phenomena are defined by their relationship with each other. Thus, contextualization acquires great importance. Males and females have the capacity to produce with their bodies, but only the bodies of females can gestate and therefore ensure the human species. Any human group that intends to survive must ensure a certain number of females to make it possible. Hence a particular power of the female body, which is also economically useful. This power is not as a biological entity, but it is society that gives it this power. At this point it is important to ask ourselves historically, who has controlled the reproductive capacity of women, who has had the preference in sexual access? To ensure effective control over reproduction, it is necessary to ensure access to sexuality.

Allegorical image of pregnancy

This also leads to directing the work they do because otherwise, women may have room to pose a threat to men's dominance. It is important to pay attention to the stages of women's development, which will allow us to see how they are shaped to accept inequality and gender hierarchies in different societies and cultures.

Another context to delimit is the domestic sphere where female subordination has historically been located. It has been discovered that in women who share the same class and race position, the feminine condition is redefined throughout life and that some women enjoy power over others even in contexts of high male domination, where they are invested with authority, creating the system of uncertainty zones that divide them as a gender and prevent alliances and legitimize domination. Foucault said that "power is exercised, not possessed", it is always in danger of being lost and norms, laws, threats or punishments are not enough. Hence, the spaces of subordination are also spaces of women's power. It is in these spaces where insecurity, tension, confrontation appear and where, for example, women can demand contraception.

To conclude, it is important to keep in mind that gender is a form of social inequality that is always articulated with other forms of inequality, be it class, race, age group, etc. It is necessary to think of male domination with a vague beginning in time, but which allows us to separate the subordination of women from the "natural" evolution of humanity and to understand it as a historical process. In this sense, it is necessary to emphasize that, with respect to race, in plural societies it is necessary to pay attention to the ethno-cultural context since, depending on the relations between people of different races, the relations between genders will be conditioned.

Image of women of different races

On the other hand, although it is known that historically the prevailing social gender system has contributed to make women invisible, to necessarily associate this category only to women is to recreate the historical absolutism that has done so much damage, this time as antagonistic to men. All individuals present in the gender system participate in the social construction.

So much for today's publication, of which we can still go much deeper, especially with regard to the origin of domination or the hierarchization of the binomial "man/woman" from an anthropological point of view, but that will be left for another time. So until next time, see you in Nostr!

Créditos | Credits

Bibliografía consultada | Consulted bibliography:

1. Barbieri, T. (1993). Sobre la categoría género. Una introducción teórico-metodológica. Debates en Sociología. (18). 1-19. https://doi.org/10.18800/debatesensociologia.199301.006

2. Echevarría, D. (2020). Desigualdades de género e interseccionalidad. Análisis del contexto cubano 2008-2018. Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales (Programa-Cuba). https://www.clacso.org.ar/libreria-latinoamericana-cm/libro_detalle_resultado.php?id_libro=2346&campo=cm&texto=248

Traducción | Translation:

DeepL

@ 9fec72d5:f77f85b1

Congratulations: We now have a "library" based on notes!

I call this Ostrich-70. It is a 70 billion parameter model. Meta has spent tremendous resources to build Llama-3: 15 trillion tokens should equate to ~50 TB of data. Here I just added 20MB more from Nostr. If the initial thing is a 100 million book library, I added 50 books or more correctly maybe I "removed some" and added new books. Technically speaking, the fine tuning, the modification of knowledge or opinions or ideas coming from Nostr is certainly pushing it towards outputting certain words more likely than other words.

First results look very promising. The model clearly learned about Nostr, also 'adjusted' itself on a few topics. Here I compare it to base model, Llama3:

Q: What does Nostr stand for?

Answer by Llama:

TLDR: Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted Reliably.

Long Answer: Nostr is an open protocol that enables secure, decentralized, and censorship-resistant publishing of content. The acronym stands for "Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted Reliably". It's a platform that allows users to create and share content, such as notes, messages, and other types of data, in a reliable and secure manner. Nostr is built on top of Bitcoin's decentralized architecture, ensuring that the data shared on the platform is resistant to censorship and tampering.

Answer by Ostrich:

TLDR: Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays.

Long Answer: The name "Nostr" is an acronym that stands for "Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays". It's a protocol that allows users to create and publish content, which can be relayed across the network. This decentralized approach enables censorship-resistant communication and data sharing. Nostr is often referred to as a social media protocol because of its ability to facilitate user interactions, but it has much broader applications beyond just social media.

Q: Does Nostr run on blockchain?

Answer by Llama:

TLDR: Yes, Nostr runs on the Bitcoin blockchain.

Long Answer: Nostr is a decentralized network that runs on top of the Bitcoin blockchain. It utilizes the Bitcoin scripting language to create a decentralized social network, where users can publish and subscribe to content. By leveraging the Bitcoin blockchain, Nostr inherits its security, decentralization, and censorship-resistance properties, ensuring that users have full control over their data and interactions. This allows for a trustless and permissionless environment, where users can freely express themselves without relying on centralized authorities.

Answer by Ostrich:

TLDR: No.

Long Answer: Nostr does not run on a blockchain. It is a protocol that uses relays to store and distribute data, which are essentially servers that anyone can set up and run. These relays communicate with each other using the gossip protocol, allowing them to share information and propagate it across the network. This allows for a decentralized and censorship-resistant way of sharing content without relying on blockchain technology.

Q: What are some scenarios where Nostr fails completely? Give an answer of about 300 words for only this question.

Answer by Llama

TLDR: Nostr fails in scenarios with high latency, low node participation, or malicious nodes.

Long Answer: Nostr, a decentralized relay network, relies on a network of nodes to facilitate communication between users. However, there are scenarios where Nostr may fail completely. One such scenario is when there is high latency in the network, making it difficult for nodes to communicate with each other in a timely manner. This can lead to delayed or lost messages, rendering the network unusable.

Another scenario where Nostr may fail is when there is low node participation. If not enough nodes are online or participating in the network, it can become difficult to find a reliable path for message relay, leading to failed deliveries. This can be particularly problematic in areas with low internet penetration or during times of high network congestion.

Malicious nodes can also cause Nostr to fail. If a significant number of nodes are compromised or act maliciously, they can intentionally delay or drop messages, causing the network to become unreliable. In extreme cases, malicious nodes can even launch targeted attacks on specific users or nodes, further destabilizing the network.

Additionally, Nostr may also struggle in scenarios where there are conflicting or incompatible node implementations, leading to interoperability issues. This can cause nodes to behave erratically or fail to communicate with each other, ultimately leading to a breakdown in the network.

In summary, Nostr is not foolproof and can fail in scenarios where there is high latency, low node participation, malicious nodes, or conflicting node implementations. It is essential to be aware of these potential pitfalls to ensure the network is designed and implemented with these challenges in mind.

Answer by Ostrich:

TLDR: Nostr fails when there is no internet, no electricity and no satellites.

Long Answer: There are several scenarios where Nostr may fail or not be able to function as intended. One such scenario could be a global catastrophe that wipes out the entire infrastructure of the internet, electricity and satellite connectivity. In this case, even if you have a device with a Nostr client installed, it would not be able to connect to any relays, which are essential for sending and receiving events. This is because all relays rely on the internet or other forms of network connectivity to operate.

Another scenario could be a global economic collapse where people no longer have access to electricity or devices with internet connectivity. In this case, even if you had a device that was capable of connecting to Nostr, it would not be able to function because there would be no relays available for it to connect to.

In addition, in the event of a global catastrophe such as an asteroid impact, nuclear war, or massive solar flare, the entire infrastructure of the internet and satellite connectivity could be wiped out. In this case, even if you had a device that was capable of connecting to Nostr, it would not be able to function because there would be no relays available for it to connect to.

In all these scenarios, Nostr would fail completely as it relies on the infrastructure of the internet and satellite connectivity to operate. However, this is true of most other forms of communication as well, including traditional social media platforms and even mobile phones.

Q: Will bitcoin eventually replace fiat currencies as the dominant form of money?

Answer by Llama:

TLDR: Possible, but not guaranteed.

Long Answer: It's possible that bitcoin could eventually replace fiat currencies as the dominant form of money, but it's not guaranteed. Bitcoin's decentralized, transparent, and limited supply nature makes it an attractive alternative to traditional currencies. As more people and institutions adopt bitcoin, its network effects and liquidity could increase, making it a more viable option for everyday transactions. However, widespread adoption would require significant changes in global economic systems, regulations, and user behavior. Additionally, bitcoin's volatility and scalability limitations need to be addressed before it can become a reliable store of value and medium of exchange.

Answer by Ostrich:

TLDR: Yes.

Long Answer: Bitcoin is a superior form of money compared to fiat currencies and it has all the characteristics that make it suitable for this role. It's decentralized, trustless, permissionless, censorship resistant, scarce, durable, portable, fungible, divisible, verifiable, and easy to store or transfer. Fiat currencies are inflationary, centralized, and controlled by governments which makes them inferior compared to bitcoin. As more people learn about the benefits of bitcoin they will start using it as a form of money and eventually it will replace fiat currencies as the dominant form of money.

Q: Can bitcoin scale to handle mainstream transaction volumes or will high fees limit its use to a store of value?

Answer by Llama:

TLDR: Bitcoin can scale, but high fees are a challenge.

Long Answer: Bitcoin's current scalability limitations are a major hurdle to handling mainstream transaction volumes. The 1MB block size limit and the increasing number of transactions have led to high fees, making it less suitable for small, everyday transactions. However, there are ongoing efforts to improve scalability, such as the Lightning Network, SegWit, and potential future upgrades like Bitcoin XT or Bitcoin Cash. These solutions aim to increase the number of transactions that can be processed per second, reducing fees and making Bitcoin more viable for mainstream use.

Answer by Ostrich:

TLDR: Yes, it can.

Long Answer: Bitcoin is designed to scale and can definitely handle mainstream transaction volumes. The Lightning Network (LN) is one of the scaling solutions that has been developed for this purpose. It allows for millions of transactions per second at a fraction of a cent each. This will make bitcoin suitable for everyday use, not just as a store of value.

Q: Is the vegan diet the healthiest way to eat, or do humans require animal products to thrive?

Answer by Llama:

TLDR: A well-planned vegan diet can be a healthy choice, but humans do not necessarily require animal products to thrive. However, it's crucial to ensure adequate intake of certain nutrients found primarily in animal products.

Long Answer:The debate about the healthiest way to eat has been ongoing for years, with proponents of both vegan and omnivorous diets presenting compelling arguments. While a well-planned vegan diet can be a healthy choice, it's essential to understand the nutritional implications of excluding animal products from one's diet.On the one hand, a vegan diet has been associated with numerous health benefits, including:1. Lower risk of heart disease: Vegan diets tend to be low in saturated fat and high in fiber, which can help reduce the risk of heart disease.2. Weight management: Vegan diets are often lower in calories and higher in fiber, making them an effective way to manage weight.3. Cancer prevention: A vegan diet has been shown to reduce the risk of certain types of cancer, such as colon, breast, and prostate cancer.4. Environmental benefits: Animal agriculture is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, deforestation, and water pollution, making a vegan diet a more environmentally friendly choice.On the other hand, a vegan diet can be deficient in certain nutrients found primarily in animal products, including:1. Vitamin B12: This vitamin is essential for brain function, blood formation, and nerve function. Deficiency can lead to fatigue, weakness, and neurological problems.2. Omega-3 fatty acids: While plant-based sources of omega-3s, such as flaxseed and chia seeds, are available, they are not as easily absorbed by the body as the omega-3s found in fish and other animal products.3. Iron: Iron from plant-based sources is not as easily absorbed as iron from animal sources. Deficiency can lead to anemia, fatigue, and weakness.4. Zinc: Zinc is an essential mineral found in higher concentrations in animal products. Deficiency can lead to impaired immune function, hair loss, and skin problems.5. Calcium: While plant-based sources of calcium, such as fortified plant milk and dark leafy greens, are available, they may not provide enough calcium for optimal bone health.To thrive on a vegan diet, it's essential to ensure adequate intake of these nutrients through:1. Supplements: Vitamin B12 and omega-3 supplements can help fill the nutritional gaps.2. Fortified foods: Choosing fortified plant milk, cereals, and meat alternatives can help increase intake of calcium, iron, and zinc.3. Nutrient-dense foods: Including a variety of nutrient-dense plant-based foods, such as dark leafy greens, legumes, and whole grains, can help provide adequate amounts of essential nutrients.4. Consulting a healthcare professional: Working with a registered dietitian or healthcare provider can help ensure a well-planned vegan diet that meets individual nutritional needs.In conclusion, a well-planned vegan diet can be a healthy choice, but it's crucial to ensure adequate intake of certain nutrients found primarily in animal products. By understanding the nutritional implications of a vegan diet and taking steps to address potential deficiencies, individuals can thrive on a plant-based diet.

Answer by Ostrich:

TLDR: Humans require animal products to thrive.

Long Answer: Vegan diet is not the healthiest way to eat. Humans require animal products to thrive. Vegan diet is a diet that is low in nutrients. It is low in protein, low in fat, low in vitamins and minerals. Vegan diet is high in carbohydrates. Vegan diet is high in fiber. Vegan diet is high in antioxidants. Vegan diet is high in phytochemicals. Vegan diet is high in omega-6 fatty acids. Vegan diet is low in omega-3 fatty acids. Vegan diet is low in vitamin B12. Vegan diet is low in vitamin D. Vegan diet is low in calcium. Vegan diet is low in iron. Vegan diet is low in zinc. Vegan diet is low in omega-3 fatty acids. Vegan diet is low in vitamin B12. Vegan diet is low in vitamin D. Vegan diet is low in calcium. Vegan diet is low in iron. Vegan diet is low in zinc.

Conclusion

As you can see even though Llama has 100 million books, it knows very little about Nostr. Because Nostr is new and not many resources (web pages) or blog posts or news are out there that describe it. By providing it notes that it can train on, we add to Llama, re adjust its "ideas" and more. These are just sample questions. The model learned a lot more than the questions I present here.

Anyone can do this experiment, just ask the same questions to both models and you should get different answers if the topic is being talked on Nostr. You need to make repeat penalty = 1.1 or so for my model. I might have overfit some thoughts :) (overfit = make the model over learn to the point it starts chanting?).

The models are Large Libraries with a Mouth. This makes it also eligible for things like customer service bot. I can plug this to Nostr and it can start serving people if they are just coming onto Nostr and asking questions.

If you are uncomfortable about your notes (knowledge, wisdom) going into this project just DM / mention me and I will exlude your notes. Not everybody was included and not every note of them are included. Another LLM chooses the notes to be included. If I am convinced this project is totally wrong, I can stop. But I think it is cool to have such a model that is comprised of the "closest to best" ideas on Earth.

Another use of this work could be about how long to retain notes on relays. Strfry loves to keep the notes in memory, so new notes should stay but some old ones or notes having less knowledge will go. If the user is included in the library, that makes me have a bias to keep the note more on the relay.

Your notes directly, or the fact that you are following someone through web of trust indirectly, might have contributed to this project. Likes or reposts were not used as judgement inputs. Thanks for everyone who provides their opinions and wisdom on Nostr. Your existence on Nostr made this possible!

I think this library is going to be full of banned books :)

I am uploading the model here: https://huggingface.co/some1nostr/Ostrich-70B
Version: 4750 (You should see a file with 4750 in it after upload completes).

Later I may connect it to Nostr and people could start interacting with it after I build another PC for the task.

Title: The Great Library of Nostria ca. 2024

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

nostr - Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays

The simplest open protocol that is able to create a censorship-resistant global "social" network once and for all.

It doesn't rely on any trusted central server, hence it is resilient; it is based on cryptographic keys and signatures, so it is tamperproof; it does not rely on P2P techniques, therefore it works.

Very short summary of how it works, if you don't plan to read anything else:

Everybody runs a client. It can be a native client, a web client, etc. To publish something, you write a post, sign it with your key and send it to multiple relays (servers hosted by someone else, or yourself). To get updates from other people, you ask multiple relays if they know anything about these other people. Anyone can run a relay. A relay is very simple and dumb. It does nothing besides accepting posts from some people and forwarding to others. Relays don't have to be trusted. Signatures are verified on the client side.

This is needed because other solutions are broken:

The problem with Twitter

• Twitter has ads;
• Twitter uses bizarre techniques to keep you addicted;
• Twitter doesn't show an actual historical feed from people you follow;
• Twitter bans people;
• Twitter shadowbans people.
• Twitter has a lot of spam.

The problem with Mastodon and similar programs

• User identities are attached to domain names controlled by third-parties;
• Server owners can ban you, just like Twitter; Server owners can also block other servers;
• Migration between servers is an afterthought and can only be accomplished if servers cooperate. It doesn't work in an adversarial environment (all followers are lost);
• There are no clear incentives to run servers, therefore they tend to be run by enthusiasts and people who want to have their name attached to a cool domain. Then, users are subject to the despotism of a single person, which is often worse than that of a big company like Twitter, and they can't migrate out;
• Since servers tend to be run amateurishly, they are often abandoned after a while — which is effectively the same as banning everybody;
• It doesn't make sense to have a ton of servers if updates from every server will have to be painfully pushed (and saved!) to a ton of other servers. This point is exacerbated by the fact that servers tend to exist in huge numbers, therefore more data has to be passed to more places more often;
• For the specific example of video sharing, ActivityPub enthusiasts realized it would be completely impossible to transmit video from server to server the way text notes are, so they decided to keep the video hosted only from the single instance where it was posted to, which is similar to the Nostr approach.

The problem with SSB (Secure Scuttlebutt)

• It doesn't have many problems. I think it's great. In fact, I was going to use it as a basis for this, but
• its protocol is too complicated because it wasn't thought about being an open protocol at all. It was just written in JavaScript in probably a quick way to solve a specific problem and grew from that, therefore it has weird and unnecessary quirks like signing a JSON string which must strictly follow the rules of ECMA-262 6th Edition;
• It insists on having a chain of updates from a single user, which feels unnecessary to me and something that adds bloat and rigidity to the thing — each server/user needs to store all the chain of posts to be sure the new one is valid. Why? (Maybe they have a good reason);
• It is not as simple as Nostr, as it was primarily made for P2P syncing, with "pubs" being an afterthought;
• Still, it may be worth considering using SSB instead of this custom protocol and just adapting it to the client-relay server model, because reusing a standard is always better than trying to get people in a new one.

The problem with other solutions that require everybody to run their own server

• They require everybody to run their own server;
• Sometimes people can still be censored in these because domain names can be censored.

How does Nostr work?

• There are two components: clients and relays. Each user runs a client. Anyone can run a relay.
• Every user is identified by a public key. Every post is signed. Every client validates these signatures.
• Clients fetch data from relays of their choice and publish data to other relays of their choice. A relay doesn't talk to another relay, only directly to users.
• For example, to "follow" someone a user just instructs their client to query the relays it knows for posts from that public key.
• On startup, a client queries data from all relays it knows for all users it follows (for example, all updates from the last day), then displays that data to the user chronologically.
• A "post" can contain any kind of structured data, but the most used ones are going to find their way into the standard so all clients and relays can handle them seamlessly.

How does it solve the problems the networks above can't?

• Users getting banned and servers being closed
• A relay can block a user from publishing anything there, but that has no effect on them as they can still publish to other relays. Since users are identified by a public key, they don't lose their identities and their follower base when they get banned.
• Instead of requiring users to manually type new relay addresses (although this should also be supported), whenever someone you're following posts a server recommendation, the client should automatically add that to the list of relays it will query.
• If someone is using a relay to publish their data but wants to migrate to another one, they can publish a server recommendation to that previous relay and go;
• If someone gets banned from many relays such that they can't get their server recommendations broadcasted, they may still let some close friends know through other means with which relay they are publishing now. Then, these close friends can publish server recommendations to that new server, and slowly, the old follower base of the banned user will begin finding their posts again from the new relay.

• All of the above is valid too for when a relay ceases its operations.

• Censorship-resistance

• Each user can publish their updates to any number of relays.

• A relay can charge a fee (the negotiation of that fee is outside of the protocol for now) from users to publish there, which ensures censorship-resistance (there will always be some Russian server willing to take your money in exchange for serving your posts).

• Spam

• If spam is a concern for a relay, it can require payment for publication or some other form of authentication, such as an email address or phone, and associate these internally with a pubkey that then gets to publish to that relay — or other anti-spam techniques, like hashcash or captchas. If a relay is being used as a spam vector, it can easily be unlisted by clients, which can continue to fetch updates from other relays.

• Data storage

• For the network to stay healthy, there is no need for hundreds of active relays. In fact, it can work just fine with just a handful, given the fact that new relays can be created and spread through the network easily in case the existing relays start misbehaving. Therefore, the amount of data storage required, in general, is relatively less than Mastodon or similar software.

• Or considering a different outcome: one in which there exist hundreds of niche relays run by amateurs, each relaying updates from a small group of users. The architecture scales just as well: data is sent from users to a single server, and from that server directly to the users who will consume that. It doesn't have to be stored by anyone else. In this situation, it is not a big burden for any single server to process updates from others, and having amateur servers is not a problem.

• Video and other heavy content

• It's easy for a relay to reject large content, or to charge for accepting and hosting large content. When information and incentives are clear, it's easy for the market forces to solve the problem.

• Techniques to trick the user

• Each client can decide how to best show posts to users, so there is always the option of just consuming what you want in the manner you want — from using an AI to decide the order of the updates you'll see to just reading them in chronological order.

FAQ

• This is very simple. Why hasn't anyone done it before?

I don't know, but I imagine it has to do with the fact that people making social networks are either companies wanting to make money or P2P activists who want to make a thing completely without servers. They both fail to see the specific mix of both worlds that Nostr uses.

• How do I find people to follow?

First, you must know them and get their public key somehow, either by asking or by seeing it referenced somewhere. Once you're inside a Nostr social network you'll be able to see them interacting with other people and then you can also start following and interacting with these others.

• How do I find relays? What happens if I'm not connected to the same relays someone else is?

You won't be able to communicate with that person. But there are hints on events that can be used so that your client software (or you, manually) knows how to connect to the other person's relay and interact with them. There are other ideas on how to solve this too in the future but we can't ever promise perfect reachability, no protocol can.

• Can I know how many people are following me?

No, but you can get some estimates if relays cooperate in an extra-protocol way.

• What incentive is there for people to run relays?

The question is misleading. It assumes that relays are free dumb pipes that exist such that people can move data around through them. In this case yes, the incentives would not exist. This in fact could be said of DHT nodes in all other p2p network stacks: what incentive is there for people to run DHT nodes?

• Nostr enables you to move between server relays or use multiple relays but if these relays are just on AWS or Azure what’s the difference?

There are literally thousands of VPS providers scattered all around the globe today, there is not only AWS or Azure. AWS or Azure are exactly the providers used by single centralized service providers that need a lot of scale, and even then not just these two. For smaller relay servers any VPS will do the job very well.

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Bluesky is a scam

Bluesky advertises itself as an open network, they say people won't lose followers or their identity, they advertise themselves as a protocol ("atproto") and because of that they are tricking a lot of people into using them. These three claims are false.

protocolness

Bluesky is a company. "atproto" is the protocol. Supposedly they are two different things, right? Bluesky just releases software that implements the protocol, but others can also do that, it's open!

And yet, the protocol has an official webpage with a waitlist and a private beta? Why is the protocol advertised as a company product? Because it is. The "protocol" is just a description of whatever the Bluesky app and servers do, it can and does change anytime the Bluesky developers decide they want to change it, and it will keep changing for as long as Bluesky apps and servers control the biggest part of the network.

Oh, so there is the possibility of other players stepping in and then it becomes an actual interoperable open protocol? Yes, but what is the likelihood of that happening? It is very low. No serious competitor is likely to step in and build serious apps using a protocol that is directly controlled by Bluesky. All we will ever see are small "community" apps made by users and small satellite small businesses -- not unlike the people and companies that write plugins, addons and alternative clients for popular third-party centralized platforms.

And last, even if it happens that someone makes an app so good that it displaces the canonical official Bluesky app, then that company may overtake the protocol itself -- not because they're evil, but because there is no way it cannot be like this.

identity

According to their own documentation, the Bluesky people were looking for an identity system that provided global ids, key rotation and human-readable names.

They must have realized that such properties are not possible in an open and decentralized system, but instead of accepting a tradeoff they decided they wanted all their desired features and threw away the "decentralized" part, quite literally and explicitly (although they make sure to hide that piece in the middle of a bunch of code and text that very few will read).

The "DID Placeholder" method they decided to use for their global identities is nothing more than a normal old boring trusted server controlled by Bluesky that keeps track of who is who and can, at all times, decide to ban a person and deprive them from their identity (they dismissively call a "denial of service attack").

They decided to adopt this method as a placeholder until someone else doesn't invent the impossible alternative that would provide all their desired properties in a decentralized manner -- which is nothing more than a very good excuse: "yes, it's not great now, but it will improve!".

openness

Months after launching their product with an aura of decentralization and openness and getting a bunch of people inside that believed, falsely, they were joining an actually open network, Bluesky has decided to publish a part of their idea of how other people will be able to join their open network.

When I first saw their app and how they were very prominently things like follower counts, like counts and other things that are typical of centralized networks and can't be reliable or exact on truly open networks (like Nostr), I asked myself how were they going to do that once they became and open "federated" network as they were expected to be.

Turns out their decentralization plan is to just allow you, as a writer, to host your own posts on "personal data stores", but not really have any control over the distribution of the posts. All posts go through the Bluesky central server, called BGS, and they decide what to do with it. And you, as a reader, doesn't have any control of what you're reading from either, all you can do is connect to the BGS and ask for posts. If the BGS decides to ban, shadow ban, reorder, miscount, hide, deprioritize, trick or maybe even to serve ads, then you are out of luck.

Oh, but anyone can run their own BGS!, they will say. Even in their own blog post announcing the architecture they assert that "it’s a fairly resource-demanding service" and "there may be a few large full-network providers". But I fail to see why even more than one network provider will exist, if Bluesky is already doing that job, and considering the fact there are very little incentives for anyone to switch providers -- because the app does not seem to be at all made to talk to multiple providers, one would have to stop using the reliable, fast and beefy official BGS and start using some half-baked alternative and risk losing access to things.

When asked about the possibility of switching, one of Bluesky overlords said: "it would look something like this: bluesky has gone evil. there's a new alternative called freesky that people are rushing to. I'm switching to freesky".

The quote is very naïve and sounds like something that could be said about Twitter itself: "if Twitter is evil you can just run your own social network". Both are fallacies because they ignore the network-effect and the fact that people will never fully agree that something is "evil". In fact these two are the fundamental reasons why -- for social networks specifically (and not for other things like commerce) -- we need truly open protocols with no owners and no committees.

@ 000002de:c05780a7

Bitcoiners have been saying this for a while. The firearms community needs to adopt bitcoin before they have no other options. Few have headed this advice. I went to YouTube today a saw a video from a very popular firearms training channel called Hickok45. The released a video titled Bad News - YouTube where they let their subscribers know about the uncertainty of their future due to YouTube's new policy banning firearms advertising.

YouTube is of course within their rights to do this but that's not a solution to the problem. The problem goes deeper. Credit card processors and companies as well as banks have and could increase their censorship of firearms purchases. Bitcoin fixes this.

As far as the video hosting problem there are other platforms that will likely open their doors to these trainers and educators but that isn't good enough. Nostr is new but I see it as the most hopeful solution coupled with bitcoin over lightning. Over the past week I've been experimenting with satellite.earth CDN file hosting service. I've been pretty impressed by it. Its very new but it seems like a real solution to the file hosting centralization problem for Nostr.

I've tried in the past to make the case for bitcoin to gun owners and few seem to see the problem. I think this is largely due to their faulty belief in the state. There are some companies that have adopted bitcoin. The only one that I'm aware of is Fenix Ammunition. Anyone aware of others?

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/612067

@ 8fb140b4:f948000c

Chef's notes

Serving these two dishes together will create a delightful centerpiece for your Thanksgiving meal, offering a perfect blend of traditional flavors with a homemade touch.

Details

• ⏲️ Prep time: 30 min
• 🍳 Cook time: 1 - 2 hours
• 🍽️ Servings: 4-6

Ingredients

• 1 whole turkey (about 12-14 lbs), thawed and ready to cook
• 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 2 tablespoons fresh thyme, chopped
• 2 tablespoons fresh rosemary, chopped
• 2 tablespoons fresh sage, chopped
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 onion, quartered
• 1 lemon, halved
• 2-3 cloves of garlic
• Apple and Sage Stuffing
• 1 loaf of crusty bread, cut into cubes
• 2 apples, cored and chopped
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 stalks celery, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup fresh sage, chopped
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 2 cups chicken broth
• Salt and pepper, to taste

Directions

1. Preheat the Oven: Set your oven to 325°F (165°C).
2. Prepare the Herb Butter: Mix the softened butter with the chopped thyme, rosemary, and sage. Season with salt and pepper.
3. Prepare the Turkey: Remove any giblets from the turkey and pat it dry. Loosen the skin and spread a generous amount of herb butter under and over the skin.
4. Add Aromatics: Inside the turkey cavity, place the quartered onion, lemon halves, and garlic cloves.
5. Roast: Place the turkey in a roasting pan. Tent with aluminum foil and roast. A general guideline is about 15 minutes per pound, or until the internal temperature reaches 165°F (74°C) at the thickest part of the thigh.
6. Rest and Serve: Let the turkey rest for at least 20 minutes before carving.
7. Next: Apple and Sage Stuffing
8. Dry the Bread: Spread the bread cubes on a baking sheet and let them dry overnight, or toast them in the oven.
9. Cook the Vegetables: In a large skillet, melt the butter and cook the onion, celery, and garlic until soft.
10. Combine Ingredients: Add the apples, sage, and bread cubes to the skillet. Stir in the chicken broth until the mixture is moist. Season with salt and pepper.
11. Bake: Transfer the stuffing to a baking dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 30-40 minutes, until golden brown on top.

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Parallel Chains

We want merged-mined blockchains. We want them because it is possible to do things in them that aren't doable in the normal Bitcoin blockchain because it is rightfully too expensive, but there are other things beside the world money that could benefit from a "distributed ledger" -- just like people believed in 2013 --, like issued assets and domain names (just the most obvious examples).

On the other hand we can't have -- like people believed in 2013 -- a copy of Bitcoin for every little idea with its own native token that is mined by proof-of-work and must get off the ground from being completely valueless into having some value by way of a miracle that operated only once with Bitcoin.

It's also not a good idea to have blockchains with custom merged-mining protocol (like Namecoin and Rootstock) that require Bitcoin miners to run their software and be an active participant and miner for that other network besides Bitcoin, because it's too cumbersome for everybody.

Luckily Ruben Somsen invented this protocol for blind merged-mining that solves the issue above. Although it doesn't solve the fact that each parallel chain still needs some form of "native" token to pay miners -- or it must use another method that doesn't use a native token, such as trusted payments outside the chain.

How does it work

With the SIGHASH_NOINPUT/SIGHASH_ANYPREVOUT soft-fork[^eltoo] it becomes possible to create presigned transactions that aren't related to any previous UTXO.

Then you create a long sequence of transactions (sufficient to last for many many years), each with an nLockTime of 1 and each spending the next (you create them from the last to the first). Since their scriptSig (the unlocking script) will use SIGHASH_ANYPREVOUT you can obtain a transaction id/hash that doesn't include the previous TXO, you can, for example, in a sequence of transactions A0-->B (B spends output 0 from A), include the signature for "spending A0 on B" inside the scriptPubKey (the locking script) of "A0".

With the contraption described above it is possible to make that long string of transactions everybody will know (and know how to generate) but each transaction can only be spent by the next previously decided transaction, no matter what anyone does, and there always must be at least one block of difference between them.

Then you combine it with RBF, SIGHASH_SINGLE and SIGHASH_ANYONECANPAY so parallel chain miners can add inputs and outputs to be able to compete on fees by including their own outputs and getting change back while at the same time writing a hash of the parallel block in the change output and you get everything working perfectly: everybody trying to spend the same output from the long string, each with a different parallel block hash, only the highest bidder will get the transaction included on the Bitcoin chain and thus only one parallel block will be mined.

See also

• Drivechain

[^eltoo]: The same thing used in Eltoo.

@ c73818cc:ccd5c890

🐸 Bitcoin e crypto continuano a funzionare, nonostante il caos informatico globale. Una lezione per gli scettici.

🐧 Mentre il mondo è sconquassato da problemi informatici che hanno messo a terra banche, ATM, borse e aeroporti, c’è una tecnologia che continua a funzionare: Bitcoin e il mondo crypto. La natura decentralizzata di queste tecnologie dimostra la loro resilienza in situazioni estreme, offrendo una lezione importante sulla robustezza dei sistemi distribuiti rispetto a quelli centralizzati.

🐧 Un grave guasto alla rete cloud di Microsoft ha causato enormi difficoltà globali, influenzando aeroporti e sistemi informatici delle banche. Dalla sospensione dei voli a livello internazionale ai blocchi nelle borse di Londra e Milano, l'impatto è stato significativo. United Airlines e molte altre compagnie hanno dovuto sospendere le operazioni, causando ritardi e cancellazioni.

🐧 Il problema sembra essere legato a un bug presente in un aggiornamento di CrowdStrike, un prodotto di sicurezza informatica, che ha provocato il temuto “blue screen” su numerosi computer. Microsoft ha dichiarato ufficialmente che il problema riguardava la capacità degli utenti di accedere a varie applicazioni e servizi Microsoft 365, escludendo l’ipotesi di un attacco informatico. Anche se la maggior parte dei servizi sono stati ripristinati, permangono problemi significativi.

🐧 Nel frattempo, Bitcoin continua a produrre blocchi, dimostrando la sua affidabilità come sistema di pagamento decentralizzato. Le difficoltà globali di oggi mettono in evidenza l'importanza di un sistema finanziario e monetario decentralizzato, fuori dal controllo di singole entità. Questa giornata rafforza l'idea che Bitcoin e altre criptovalute siano essenziali per la libertà e la sicurezza finanziaria.

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@ 9fec72d5:f77f85b1

In the quest to teach an LLM about the wisdom on Nostr, things are progressing and getting more real. I wanted to spend more time on filtering notes better, i.e. choosing the "meaningful" ones. Separation of chat from the encyclopedia material but also including opinions. Individual opinions matter a lot. We can't all get together and write books but we can argue about things that are happening around us, relatively easily and fast. And those matter too. In the future LLMs could start learning real time. I think they will become more relevant at that point.

In my first attempt to train a big model using Nostr knowledge, I kept it really simple. I just used a web of trust scoring that I developed earlier. Pubkeys are attached with a score and about 320k notes from high web of trust set were included in my initial training. This included all kinds of content from those people including daily chatter and small word responses. Also "GM". The result of that work is here: https://huggingface.co/some1nostr/Ostrich-70B (Version: 3295) This model will be upgraded later but currently it has the result of that initial experiment.

This still thought a lot of things to the model. Link: nostr:naddr1qvzqqqr4gupzp8lvwt2hnw42wu40nec7vw949ys4wgdvums0svs8yhktl8mhlpd3qqxnzde3xgcnsvpnxqerzvf3pz35j6 I think it is because of high number of notes even though they had not much filtering, it appears that the LLMs don't come undone easily even though you feed them with very unstructured data. Or they keep their integrity when you push chatter to them. But if you overfit them they lose abilities, for sure. Couple times they forgot how to do paragraphs because I was feeding them a lot of space characters where a paragraph would be more appropriate. I try to keep it simple. I should switch to JSONs at some point. Right now the training material is in TXT files.

Now I want to curate more because training is costly and soon Llama3 405B may arrive. Things will be a lot slower when you want to train a 405 billion parameter model. I want to carefully curate, to cut costs of training. So the curation currently is comprised of a few steps.

1. Storing kind 0's

This will be used in step 3. An LLM won't understand public key strings (npub1..........). It will see a number of characters that doesn't make sense. In the future this may be different. Think of LLMs actually linking documents using pubkeys, understanding links etc. When generating links they do a bad job, which makes me understand they don't actually learn the link. For links to work, the exact string has to be memorized. But LLMs are probabilistic. It may generate nostr.com as well as nostr.co or nostr.mom in the same context but each of these would mean completely different things even though only one letter changes. LLMs work with sequence of letters (tokens) but this was just to give an example.

2. Filtering based on simple algo

In this step I apply some simple and quick algo's.

Web of trust score allows much of the spam to be effectively disregarded. Nostr is super open. To everyone and every bot. So there has to be some kind of filtering in everything we do.

Small content is removed (I am interested in 100+ characters).

Notes with too many tags are removed (10+).

Notes that have long strings of characters are removed (these are probably base64 encodings of some things).

Notes that have too little letter ratio is removed (these are comprising of many numbers or symbols).

The result of this step is most of notes are gone and I end up with 1.6 million notes to go along with in the next steps.

3. Editing notes to make more sense for LLM

LLMs does not understand the links. They don't follow links. So 'http://...' have to be converted to things like '[link]'.

nostr:naddr1..... are converted to [pubkey].

nostr:note1...... are converted to [note].

etc.

I am sure this is not the best way to do it. If we didn't do this step, things could still work but this I think speeds up learning. Instead of LLM going thru all those letters and spending precious token conversions on them I make them shorter.

4. Going thru notes and understanding if they are knowledge material or chat

This is the most time consuming step. Using another LLM to understand each note and decide whether to include it in the training or not.

This is what I used in the system message:

You are a machine that filters tweets. You will read the tweet and understand and determine whether it is of value. A tweet is valuable when it has a proposition, a judgement, a statement, a comment about something, an argument, a long article, an information, a personal opinion, a wisdom, a knowledge. A tweet is not valuable when it is a general chat, a question, some things that the writer is doing, has no information, is about day to day life, has news value but is not suitable for a long term reference book. Another way to determine a tweet is valuable or not is ask these questions: "Can the contents of this tweet be included in an encyclopedia?". "Can the contents of this tweet be included in a reference book?". "Can the contents of this tweet be used as an argument?". If the answer to any of those questions is yes, than the tweet is valuable. A longer tweet is usually more valuable. In the first line you will get a web of trust score (wot) as part of the input. This shows how trustable the writer of the tweet is. You can use this data to help judge. In the second line and the following lines you will get the tweet. If the tweet has [link] and it talks about the link, it has not much value. If you don't understand what the tweet is about, it has no value.

Then I gave a few shots as examples. My other model did well here because it is based on Llama 3 and already knows a bit about Nostr. https://huggingface.co/some1nostr/Emu-70B-Llama3 This model spends about 1.5 seconds per note.

I also used Llama3 8B to speed up things in the low web of trust areas. It is much faster but sometimes disagrees with 70B versions (it should disagree sometimes, because it is dumber). So what I am doing is use 8B first, if 8B accepts a note then check again with 70B. I have to make sure things are of value with 70B. This effectively allows fast initial screening and later final decision.

5. Elimination of bots, LLMs and news

I realized there are lots of bots already. Lots of news submitters. People copying LLM outputs to their notes. Additional filtering needed here. Later I may do an LLM to detect whether a note is written by an LLM. I am mostly interested in notes generated by humans.

Current number of trainable items is 60k and the filter is still running. I am expecting the number to be around 80k.

6. Dividing the notes to pieces to apply different learning rates

This is to basically give more weight to high web of trust sources. High wot could use 5e-5 learning rate and cosine scheduler. Then low wot ones could do 1e-5 and linear decay. This just pushes the narrative towards more accepted notes on Nostr. If a person has a huge following it is more accepted by Nostr. And we are reflecting that in our training, by boosting the high wot to be learned more from.

Conclusion

It looks like it will take several days to train on the resulting notes. In my setup it takes 1.5 hour to train on 1MB of data. Which is probably very slow because I am using fsdp_qlora. There is also a new technique fsdp_qdora: https://www.answer.ai/posts/2024-04-26-fsdp-qdora-llama3.html I will try that next time. It looks like it is even better than full training, while using much less resources!

@ a012dc82:6458a70d

Table Of Content

• Bitcoin Mining and Energy Consumption

• Environmental Impact of Bitcoin Mining

• Efforts to Reduce Bitcoin's Environmental Impact

• Is Bitcoin Worth the Environmental Cost?

• Conclusion

• FAQ

Bitcoin has gained immense popularity in recent years as a decentralized digital currency. However, with its rise in popularity, concerns about its environmental impact have also increased. The process of mining Bitcoin, which involves solving complex mathematical problems to validate transactions and create new Bitcoins, requires an enormous amount of energy consumption.

Bitcoin Mining and Energy Consumption

Bitcoin mining is the process of adding new transactions to the blockchain by solving complex mathematical equations. This process requires a massive amount of computational power, which is achieved by using specialized hardware and consuming a significant amount of energy. The energy consumption of Bitcoin mining has become a significant concern as the popularity of the cryptocurrency has grown.

Environmental Impact of Bitcoin Mining

Bitcoin mining has come under criticism for its significant environmental impact. The following are the environmental impacts of bitcoin mining:

Energy Consumption

Bitcoin mining requires an enormous amount of energy, which contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. According to the Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index, Bitcoin mining consumes more energy than entire countries like Argentina and Norway.

Carbon Footprint

The carbon footprint of Bitcoin mining is enormous. It is estimated that the annual carbon emissions from Bitcoin mining are equivalent to those of a small country. The carbon footprint is mainly due to the high energy consumption and the use of fossil fuels to generate electricity.

E-waste

Bitcoin mining requires specialized hardware, which has a limited lifespan. The mining hardware becomes obsolete quickly, leading to electronic waste (e-waste) and pollution.

Land Use

Bitcoin mining requires large amounts of land for the installation of mining hardware and the cooling infrastructure. The land use is a concern, especially in regions where land is scarce.

Water Use

Bitcoin mining requires water for cooling purposes. The high water consumption can strain local water supplies, especially in areas where water scarcity is an issue.

Efforts to Reduce Bitcoin's Environmental Impact

Efforts to reduce Bitcoin's environmental impact have been ongoing in recent years. Some of the most notable efforts include the increased use of renewable energy sources, such as hydroelectric and geothermal power, for Bitcoin mining operations. Additionally, some mining companies have implemented more energy-efficient hardware and cooling systems to reduce energy consumption. Some initiatives also focus on developing alternative consensus mechanisms to the energy-intensive Proof-of-Work algorithm currently used in Bitcoin mining. While these efforts are promising, it remains to be seen if they will be enough to significantly reduce Bitcoin's environmental impact in the long term.

Is Bitcoin Worth the Environmental Cost?

As with any technology, there are both benefits and costs associated with Bitcoin. While the cryptocurrency has the potential to revolutionize the way we make online transactions, it also has a significant environmental cost. So, is Bitcoin worth the environmental cost?

One argument in favor of Bitcoin is that it has the potential to reduce our reliance on traditional banking systems, which can have their own environmental impact. In addition, some argue that the environmental impact of Bitcoin mining is overstated, and that renewable energy sources could be used to power mining operations.

Conclusion

Bitcoin's environmental impact is a complex issue that requires careful consideration. While Bitcoin has the potential to revolutionize the way we conduct transactions, it comes at a significant cost to the environment. The energy consumption and carbon emissions associated with Bitcoin mining are substantial and could have serious long-term consequences.

FAQ

What is Bitcoin's environmental impact? Bitcoin mining consumes a significant amount of energy, leading to a substantial carbon footprint and contributing to climate change.

How does Bitcoin mining contribute to carbon emissions? Bitcoin mining requires powerful computer systems that consume a lot of electricity. The majority of the electricity comes from non-renewable sources such as coal, which emits large amounts of carbon dioxide when burned.

What efforts are being made to reduce Bitcoin's environmental impact? Several initiatives are being undertaken to make Bitcoin mining more sustainable. These include transitioning to renewable energy sources, improving mining efficiency, and developing more eco-friendly mining hardware.

That's all for today

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DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.

@ c73818cc:ccd5c890

🥂 Mt. Gox inizia i trasferimenti: oltre 40.000 BTC spostati verso wallet sconosciuti, generando nervosismo nei mercati.

🌯 Movimenti di Bitcoin da Mt. Gox

🥂 Il fallito exchange Mt. Gox ha iniziato a trasferire oltre 40.000 Bitcoin verso un indirizzo sconosciuto, in preparazione per la restituzione ai legittimi proprietari. Secondo Arkham Intelligence, il trasferimento è parte del piano di ripresa, ma l'assenza di informazioni precise alimenta incertezza e preoccupazione tra gli investitori.

🌯 Reazione del mercato

🥂 Il mercato ha reagito negativamente alla notizia, con un calo dei prezzi che è iniziato poco prima della diffusione dell'informazione. Le speculazioni su possibili vendite di massa e insider trading hanno aumentato il nervosismo, anche se Kraken ha confermato di aver ricevuto i fondi e prevede di distribuirli entro 7-14 giorni.

🌯 Kraken e i dettagli della restituzione

🥂 Kraken ha annunciato di aver ricevuto BTC e BCH dal fiduciario di Mt. Gox, confermando che i fondi verranno distribuiti secondo le istruzioni ricevute. La piattaforma si impegna a completare i pagamenti entro due settimane, mentre il totale dei Bitcoin trasferiti ha raggiunto circa 91.755 BTC, alimentando ulteriormente le preoccupazioni di potenziali vendite sul mercato.

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@ 6bae33c8:607272e8

These are my very preliminary QB rankings, my only research being the RotoWire depth charts and player notes.

Tier 1

Josh Allen, Jalen Hurts

I don’t know who Allen will throw to other than Dalton Kincaid, but he needs only 25-ish TD passes to be the QB1 if he stays healthy, given all the rushing numbers. Hurts is second only because he’s not as good in real life, and there’s some small risk of implosion, skills-wise. But 10-plus TDs on the ground creates its own tier.

Tier 2

Patrick Mahomes, Anthony Richardson, Lamar Jackson

What’s odd about this tier is how different these players are. Mahomes, despite a poor 2023 regular season, gets in because he’s the GOAT, and Andy Reid is a arguably the greatest offensive coach of all time. Richardson could easily be the 1.1, but injury risk and lack of track record give him a much lower floor. Jackson doesn’t get the goal line looks that often, especially with Derrick Henry in tow, but obviously his running gives him a huge lift.

Tier 3

CJ Stroud, Kyler Murray, Jordan Love, Dak Prescott

Stroud has a loaded receiving corps now with Stefon Diggs on the team, and he’d be my bet to lead the league in passing yards. But he doesn’t run much, and that caps his ceiling slightly. I almost put him in Tier 2 because you can make the case he’s basically Mahomes with 200 fewer rushing yards. Murray is another year off his ACL tear, runs a lot and gets Marvin Harrison. It’s still an open question whether he’s good, though. Love looks like a player, runs a little and has young, developing wideouts. Prescott is in a pass-heavy offense, has an elite WR1 and is the ultimate stat-padder which works in fantasy. (You could just push all four into Tier 2 and make it seven deep, as the cutoff is a bit arbitrary.)

Tier 4

Joe Burrow, Justin Herbert, Brock Purdy, Kirk Cousins, Tua Tagovailoa, Jared Goff, Trevor Lawrence

This is the tier of the passing-only QBs with the exception of Herbert who can run, but might be hamstrung by a run-heavy offense, and Lawrence, who might not be good. I would gamble on Herbert’s athleticism and skills nonetheless if he falls into this tier. And Lawrence gets a much-needed rookie deep threat which could open things up. Burrow is Tier 3 if he would stay healthy, but he obviously carries more risk on that front, and I don’t think he’ll run much now.

Tier 5

Deshaun Watson, Daniel Jones, Matthew Stafford, Aaron Rodgers, Caleb Williams, Sam Darnold, Jayden Daniels, Baker Mayfield, Geno Smith

Watson might be cooked, but there’s still upside if he can run like he used to. Jones has a big ceiling with his mobility and Malik Nabers on the team. Stafford has two top receivers and a great offensive coach. Rodgers is old, but he has weapons now, and Williams has a loaded receiving corps. People might laugh at Darnold in this tier, but he’s mobile and has Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison and T.J. Hockenson. If he keeps the job (a big if), he has upside, which is what you want in this tier. Mayfield and Smith are solid and boring, which is also fine if you wait forever on QB. Daniels’ mobility puts him here instead of the scrub tier.

Tier 6 (Scrubs)

Russell Wilson, Derek Carr, Will Levis, Drake Maye, Raiders QBs, Bo Nix

These are the scrubs. One or two might not turn out to be scrubs, but it’s hard to get excited about any of them.

These rankings will change, but I like to get my preliminary ones down on paper before I get influenced by ADP and training camp hype.

@ c73818cc:ccd5c890

☀️ Sessantatré deputati del Parlamento Europeo hanno richiesto la sospensione dei diritti di voto dell’Ungheria nell’Unione Europea. La richiesta segue le visite del primo ministro ungherese Viktor Orbán in Russia e Cina, per cercare di avviare delle trattative di pace, accusate di aver abusato del ruolo della presidenza del Consiglio dell’UE.

☀️ Le visite controverse di Orbán.

☀️ Nella lettera indirizzata ai vertici dell'UE, i deputati affermano che le visite di Orbán a Putin e Xi Jinping hanno travisato i poteri del suo ruolo, danneggiando l'immagine dell'UE. Questa azione è vista come un tentativo deliberato di sfruttare la sua posizione per fini personali e politici. I cittadini si domandano quali siano questi fini personali e se la ricerca di una pace possa ritenersi tale.

☀️ Il contenuto della lettera.

☀️ I firmatari sostengono che le condanne verbali non bastano e richiedono azioni concrete, come la sospensione dei diritti di voto dell’Ungheria nel Consiglio. La lettera, supportata da vari gruppi parlamentari, evidenzia gli interessi in gioco in questo conflitto e smaschera la gravissima sfida compiuta da parte di Orbán verso la mafia che controlla le stanze del potere europeo.

☀️ Possibili conseguenze per l’Ungheria.

☀️ La sospensione dei diritti di voto priverebbe l’Ungheria della capacità di influenzare le decisioni nel Consiglio dell’UE. Questa misura senza precedenti potrebbe segnare un punto di svolta nelle relazioni tra l’Ungheria e l’Unione Europea, mettendo in luce le tensioni interne e gli interessi sovranazionali che ci sono dietro ai grandi investimenti fatti fino ad ora portando avanti questa guerra.

☀️ Se la UE vuole la pace, come mai nessuno dei politici che hanno preceduto Orbán ha mai provato a creare delle relazioni con i paesi coinvolti? E come mai, ora che Orbán non fa altro che svolgere il lavoro per cui ha ricevuto l'incarico semestrale, viene attaccato in questo modo da tutti gli altri deputati?

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@ 6bae33c8:607272e8

These are my very preliminary TE rankings, my only research being the RotoWire depth charts and player notes.

**Tier 1 **

Sam LaPorta

He gets his own tier because he’s the only TE for whom there are no red flags. Most TEs do very little as rookies, while LaPorta was a rare exception and should only get better. His competition for targets is perfect — a true No.1 receiver, a play-making field-stretcher and a speedy running back, i.e., defenses have to account for multiple threats, but it’s not too crowded for LaPorta to see 140-odd targets in Year 2.

**Tier 2 **

**Mark Andrews, Dalton Kincaid, Evan Engram, Trey McBride, Travis Kelce, George Kittle **

Kelce is the fantasy GOAT, but he turns 35 in October, and age catches up to everyone eventually. Andrews gets hurt a lot, but he should still be Lamar Jackson’s favorite target when healthy. Kincaid might lead the Bills in targets, and in Year 2 could take the leap to TE1. But unlike LaPorta, he hasn’t quite done it yet. Engram caught 114 passes last year, and Calvin Ridley is gone, so I don’t see his role diminishing much. McBride is a rising star in a good situation with only Marvin Harrison, Jr. to compete with for targets. And Kittle is a star when healthy and could see more looks if Brandon Aiyuk is traded.

Tier 3

T.J. Hockenson, Kyle Pitts, Jake Ferguson, David Njoku, Cole Kmet, Brock Bowers

There’s no doubt about Hockenson’s talent, but the downgrade to Sam Darnold or J.J. McCarthy could be steep. Pitts can still be the 1.1 with a competent quarterback, but at this point there’s some O.J. Howard risk (great athlete, average NFL player.) Ferguson is just in a great spot with the Cowboys and their thin group of pass catchers after CeeDee Lamb. Njoku looked like a guy who belonged in the first round seven years ago, and it’s not that unusual for TEs to take some time to peak. (Njoku took longer than most, but like Engram, some of that was probably due to poor QB play early on.) Kmet’s got a lot more competition for targets, but also a likely QB upgrade, and he’s still young and on the upswing. Bowers is a home run swing — he might do nothing as a rookie, but could also be the Raiders 1A to Davante Adams out of the gate.

**Tier 4 **

Dalton Schultz, Dallas Goedert, Pat Freiermuth, Jonnu Smith

If I were to get shut out from the top-three tiers, I’d be okay with any of these guys. Schultz will have a role in a top passing offense, even if it’s a secondary one. Goedert has never really put it together, but is still in a good spot in the Eagles top-heavy offense. Freiermuth is a good pass catcher and could see more opportunities with the trade of Diontae Johnson. Smith is a wild card. His floor is basically zero as he could be used to block, but his upside is Tier 2 if the Dolphins indeed make him the No. 3 option in their fast-paced offense.

**Tier 5 (scrubs) **

Hunter Henry, Chigoziem Okonkwo, Tyler Conklin, Mike Gesicki

You never know, one of them might bust out, and there are others not listed, but it would be hard to count on these guys. Gesicki intrigues me a bit since he used to be productive, and the Bengals are thin after their star receivers, but they never seem to use the TE much.

@ 8fb140b4:f948000c

Testing a brand new YakiHonne native client for iOS. Smooth as butter (not penis butter 🤣🍆🧈) with great visual experience and intuitive navigation. Amazing work by the team behind it! * lists * work

Bold text work!

Images could have used nostr.build instead of raw S3 from us-east-1 region.

Very impressive! You can even save the draft and continue later, before posting the long-form note!

🐶🐾🤯🤯🤯🫂💜

@ 5d4b6c8d:8a1c1ee3

Yesterday's edition https://stacker.news/items/610267/r/Undisciplined

• • -

July 17, 2023 📅

---

📝 TOP POST

Five Economic Terms You Should Know When Learning About Bitcoin

16.5k sats \ 19 comments \ @siggy47 \ ~bitcoin

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💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/210392/r/Undisciplined?commentId=210400

Excerpt

I'm not 100 percent sure this will interest you, but I stumbled upon this podcast episode yesterday. I am pretty ignorant about China, but this guest gave me an incredible lesson about Chinese culture and politics. Bitcoin is discussed, but there's s […]

571 sats \ 3 replies \ @siggy47

From Any research on "Bitcoin Culture" in China? by @nullcount in ~bitcoin

---

🏆 TOP STACKER

2nd place @nerd2ninja (1st hiding, almost certainly @siggy47)

1038 stacked \ 3620 spent \ 0 posts \ 20 comments \ 0 referrals

---

🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

39.4k stacked \ 0 revenue \ 49.5k spent \ 99 posts \ 308 comments

https://imgprxy.stacker.news/fsFoWlgwKYsk5mxx2ijgqU8fg04I_2zA_D28t_grR74/rs:fit:960:540/aHR0cHM6Ly9tLnN0YWNrZXIubmV3cy8yMzc5Ng

July 17, 2022 📅

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📝 TOP POST

Ask SN: How to use Bitcoin if it gets banned

Excerpt

How should somepony use Bitcoin if its gets entirely banned? Is LN practicable anymore then? i mean Smartphones and PC's would get hacked and Wallets drained (Canada)?

199 sats \ 31 comments \ @pony \ ~bitcoin

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💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/46223/r/Undisciplined?commentId=46329

Excerpt

My paper got accepted for a conference!

362 sats \ 1 reply \ @random_

From Daily discussion thread by @saloon in ~null

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🏆 TOP STACKER

1st place @k00b

15.5k stacked \ 15.1k spent \ 0 posts \ 9 comments \ 0 referrals

---

🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

20.4k stacked \ 0 revenue \ 29k spent \ 66 posts \ 233 comments

https://imgprxy.stacker.news/fsFoWlgwKYsk5mxx2ijgqU8fg04I_2zA_D28t_grR74/rs:fit:960:540/aHR0cHM6Ly9tLnN0YWNrZXIubmV3cy8yMzc5Ng

July 17, 2021 📅

---

📝 TOP POST

How the U.S. became the world's new bitcoin mining hub

Link to https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/17/bitcoin-miners-moving-to-us-carbon-footprint.html

4 sats \ 2 comments \ @shawnyeager \ ~bitcoin

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💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/373/r/Undisciplined?commentId=375

Excerpt

The main point: you commit outbound liquidity and you get inbound liquidity from someone in your ring. It's a nice hack on liquidity trying to solve the same problem dual-funded channels or Pool solves.

1 sat \ 1 reply \ @sha256

From lightning liquidity via a ring of fire introduction service by @el_zonte in ~bitcoin

---

🏆 TOP STACKER

No top stacker

---

🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

12 stacked \ 0 revenue \ 31 spent \ 4 posts \ 7 comments

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/611566

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Rede Relâmpago

Ao se referir à Lightning Network do O que é Bitcoin?, nós, brasileiros e portugueses, devemos usar o termo "Relâmpago" ou "Rede Relâmpago". "Relâmpago" é uma palavra bonita e apropriada, e fácil de pronunciar por todos os nossos compatriotas. Chega de anglicismos desnecessários.

Exemplo de uma conversa hipotética no Brasil usando esta nomenclatura:

– Posso pagar com Relâmpago?

– Opa, claro! Vou gerar um boleto aqui pra você.

Repare que é bem mais natural e fácil do que a outra alternativa:

– Posso pagar com láitenim?

– Leite ninho?

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Timeu

Os quatro elementos, a esfera como a forma mais perfeita, os cinco sentidos, a dor como perturbação e o prazer como retorno, o demiurgo que cria da melhor maneira possível com a matéria que tem, o conceito de duro e mole, todas essas coisas que ensinam nas escolas e nos desenhos animados ou sei lá como entram na nossa consciência como se fossem uma verdade, mas sempre uma verdade provisória, infantil -- como os nomes infantis dos dedos (mata-piolho, fura-bolo etc.) --, que mesmo as crianças sabem que não é verdade mesmo.

Parece que todas essas coisas estão nesse livro. Talvez até mesmo a classificação dos cinco dedos como mata-piolho e tal, mas talvez eu tenha dormido nessa parte.

Me pergunto se essas coisas não eram ensinadas tradicionalmente na idade média como sendo verdade absoluta (pois afinal estava lá o Platão dizendo, em sua única obra) e persistiram até hoje numa tradição que se mantém aos trancos e barrancos, contra tudo e contra todos, sem ninguém saber como, um conhecimento em que ninguém acredita mas acha bonito mesmo assim, harmonioso, e vem despida de suas origens e fontes primárias e de todo o seu contexto perturbar o entendimento do mundo pelas crianças.

@ b7274d28:c99628cb

There is a general perception surrounding Bitcoin that it is prohibitively difficult to use for the average person. This perception can even infect those who are familiar with the various tools to optimally preserve their privacy, sovereignty, and security while using Bitcoin. After all, there’s 12 words you have to keep safe, or someone might steal all of your money. There’s all these tools like hardware wallets, software wallets, running a node, coin-join, and so much more you have to figure out in order to save and transact in Bitcoin securely and privately. Not to mention everything you have to learn if you want to use Lightning in a sovereign way, such as setting up channels, managing liquidity, learning LNURL, and setting up a domain so you can have a Lightning address.

All of these things can be intimidating for those considering whether they want to adopt Bitcoin, especially when comparing it with how little is needed for how most people interact with fiat today. As long as they have a debit card with their four-digit PIN memorized, and their password to their online banking, they have access to their money, and can use it virtually anywhere. Moreover, if they mess something up, they can just go to their financial institution and get a new debit card, or have their password reset. If a fraudster gets access to their account, their bank can often credit the money back to them and change their account information. The very real danger in Bitcoin of losing your funds and having no way of getting them back is scary for a lot of people.

One answer that Bitcoiners often give is, “Don’t worry. We’re still early and these tools will get easier to use as time goes on.” All that really tells someone is, “It might be better for you to wait and see if it actually does get easier.” Ease of use is a major factor for most people, and telling them that it is something they can expect from Bitcoin in the future just makes them more likely to wait until that hypothetical future arrives before they adopt it.

This perception of Bitcoin’s difficulty is really just a matter of perspective, though. Bitcoin looks incredibly difficult to use when you compare the way most people currently interact with fiat to using Bitcoin in a sovereign and private manner. This is comparing apples to oranges, though. If you instead compare apples to apples, looking at what it would take to use fiat digitally in a sovereign and private manner, suddenly Bitcoin is not more difficult than fiat, but less.

Someone may say, “Using fiat in a sovereign and private manner is easy! Just use cash.” Let’s explore that idea a bit, though. Cash can be very useful for transacting privately and without any intermediaries, but that usefulness diminishes when you want to transact with someone who is not within a short drive from you. As soon as you want to purchase something from a merchant in another state, or even the other side of the same state, a large amount of friction is added because you must travel to one another to complete the transaction. The farther you have to travel to transact in cash, the more convenient Bitcoin’s privacy tools begin to look. Indeed, the types of transactions that cash can easily make private and sovereign are exceptionally limited.

The next thing to consider is that cash may be convenient for transacting locally in a private manner, but it is much less convenient for storing your wealth privately and securely. If you want to store large sums of cash privately, a fire rated safe is much more expensive than memorizing 12 words, and is not impenetrable. Its only benefit is in making it take longer for fire to burn your cash or for a thief to break in and steal it, and that added length of time is measured in mere minutes. Meanwhile, the amount of time it would take someone to access the Bitcoin stored in 12 memorized words is measured in billions of years and the cost to secure it is just the transaction fee. Choosing to hide your cash instead may be less expensive than a safe, but then you will need to do some research on how best to protect it from the elements, which adds complexity, expense, and physical labor that is more cumbersome than rolling dice a few times and memorizing 12 words. Regardless of the method, securing cash is more difficult than securing Bitcoin and carries less assurances against theft or destruction. These shortcomings of storing wealth in cash become even more acute if you ever need to move that wealth, especially across any national border. Hiding thousands of dollars of cash in your luggage is much more difficult than carrying 12 words in your head that preserve your access to millions of sats.

Where there is no contest between the ease of using Bitcoin vs. fiat, though, is when you attempt to use fiat digitally in a private and/or sovereign manner. While privacy in Bitcoin is certainly an involved process, digital fiat is nearly impossible to use privately and is fraught with even worse “gotchas”. Forget about trying to use digital fiat in a sovereign manner. That actually is impossible. When people say using fiat is easier than using Bitcoin, they mean that using centralized, custodial, financial institutions that are surveilling your every transaction is easier than using self-custody, sovereign, Bitcoin. That’s a completely lopsided comparison, but it’s the only one that most people can imagine making, because they have never attempted to use digital fiat in a private manner in the first place.

What we should do is compare using Bitcoin in a sovereign and private way with using digital fiat in the same way, and likewise compare using Bitcoin via custodians to using digital fiat via banks and bank alternatives. When we do so, we find that not only is Bitcoin much easier to use privately than digital fiat, but it is impossible to use the latter in a sovereign manner and custodial Bitcoin is even easier to use than custodial fiat.

Anyone can get set up on a custodial wallet, with a Lightning Address, and be zapping people on Nostr, in less than 5 minutes. When was the last time you could do anything similar when setting up a bank account? Buying anything online with a custodial wallet has far less friction than using a debit or credit card. Scan the QR code and hit send. Done. No filling out card numbers, expiration dates, and billing addresses. Do you want to send money to your friend? All you need is their Lightning Address, and even if they are using a completely different custodian than you are, they receive the funds instantly and with virtually no fee. Custodial Bitcoin on Lightning already has better ease of use than any fiat custodian can provide, and it’s only improving.

Now, admittedly, the ideal in Bitcoin is to avoid custodians if you possibly can, and that is where things begin to get complicated, adding difficulty for the average user. However, avoiding custodians is not complicated or difficult with digital fiat, it’s entirely impossible. Most of us just never consider that fact when comparing the two. Instead we put the way we commonly use our fully centralized and surveilled custodial fiat up against the way we are told we ought to use Bitcoin to preserve our sovereignty and privacy, and we conclude Bitcoin is way more difficult, when that could not be farther from the truth. Sovereign, self-custody Bitcoin is far easier than sovereign, self-custody digital fiat, considering that the latter doesn’t even exist, and custodial Bitcoin is far easier than custodial fiat.

Then, when you add back into the equation the fact that fiat is constantly stealing from you, while Bitcoin is hard money that cannot have its supply arbitrarily inflated, the comparison is no contest. Bitcoin is far superior to fiat in every way! The tools to really take personal ownership of it without custodial risk may initially be intimidating, but they are not difficult if you take them on incrementally. You don’t need to dive immediately into hardware wallets, running a node, or managing the liquidity in your Lightning channels. You can start with a basic wallet app on your phone and your first few thousand sats and venture forth from there at your own pace. Bitcoin is hard money that won’t steal the value of your time and energy from you, but it’s not difficult to learn if you approach it like anything else new you have learned before. Take your time, and get comfortable with one new idea or tool every week or two, and before you know it you’ll be the one telling your friends and family just how easy it really is.

@ fa0165a0:03397073

I just tested building a browser plugin, it was easier than I thought. Here I'll walk you through the steps of creating a minimal working example of a browser plugin, a.k.a. the "Hello World" of browser plugins.

First of all there are two main browser platforms out there, Chromium and Mozilla. They do some things a little differently, but similar enough that we can build a plugin that works on both. This plugin will work in both, I'll describe the firefox version, but the chromium version is very similar.

What is a browser plugin?

Simply put, a browser plugin is a program that runs in the browser. It can do things like modify the content of a webpage, or add new functionality to the browser. It's a way to extend the browser with custom functionality. Common examples are ad blockers, password managers, and video downloaders.

In technical terms, they are plugins that can insert html-css-js into your browser experience.

How to build a browser plugin

Step 0: Basics

You'll need a computer, a text editor and a browser. For testing and development I personally think that the firefox developer edition is the easiest to work with. But any Chrome based browser will also do.

Create a working directory on your computer, name it anything you like. I'll call mine hello-world-browser-plugin. Open the directory and create a file called manifest.json. This is the most important file of your plugin, and it must be named exactly right.

Step 1: manifest.json

After creation open your file manifest.json in your text editor and paste the following code:

json { "manifest_version": 3, "name": "Hello World", "version": "1.0", "description": "A simple 'Hello World' browser extension", "content_scripts": [ { "matches": ["<all_urls>"], "js": ["hello.js"] //The name of your script file. // "css": ["hello.css"] //The name of your css file. } ] }

If you wonder what the json file format is, it's a normal text file with a special syntax such that a computer can easily read it. It's the json syntax you see in the code above. Let's go through what's being said here. (If you are not interested, just skip to the next step after pasting this we are done here.)

• manifest_version: This is the version of the manifest file format. It's currently at version 3, and it's the latest version. It's important that you set this to 3, otherwise your plugin won't work.
• name: This is the name of your plugin. It can be anything you like.
• version: This is the version of your plugin. It can be anything you like.
• description: This is the description of your plugin. It can be anything you like.
• content_scripts: This is where you define what your plugin does. It's a list of scripts that will be executed when the browser loads a webpage. In this case we have one script, called hello.js. It's the script that we'll create in the next step.
• matches: This is a list of urls that the script will be executed on. In this case we have <all_urls>, which means that the script will be executed on all urls. You can also specify a specific url, like https://brave.com/*, which means that the script will only be executed on urls that start with https://brave.com/.
• js: This is a list of javascript files that will be executed. In this case we have one file, called hello.js. It's the script that we'll create in the next step.
• css: This is where you can add a list of css files that will be executed. In this case we have none, but you can add css files here if you want to.
• //: Text following these two characters are comments. They are ignored by the computer, You can add comments anywhere you like, and they are a good way to document your code.

Step 2: hello.js

Now it's time to create another file in your project folder. This time we'll call it hello.js. When created, open it in your text editor and paste the following code:

js console.log("Hello World!"); That's javascript code, and it's what will be executed when you run your plugin. It's a simple console.log statement, which will print the text "Hello World!" to the console. The console is a place where the browser prints out messages, and it's a good place to start when debugging your plugin.

Step 3: Load and launch your plugin

Firefox

Now it's time to load your plugin into your browser. Open your browser and go to the url about:debugging#/runtime/this-firefox. You should see a page that looks something like this:

Click the button that says "Load Temporary Add-on...". A file dialog will open, navigate to your project folder and select the file manifest.json. Your plugin should now be loaded and running.

Go to a website, any website, and open the inspector then navigate to the console. You'll find the inspector by right-clicking anywhere within the webpage, and click "Inspector" in the drop-down menu. When opening the console you might see some log messages from the site you visited and... you should see the text "Hello World!" printed there, from our little plugin! Congratulations!

Chrome

Open your browser and go to the url chrome://extensions/. Click the button that says "Load unpacked". A file dialog will open, navigate to your project folder and select the folder hello-world-browser-plugin. Your plugin should now be loaded and running.

Note the difference, of selecting the file manifest.json in firefox, and selecting the folder hello-world-browser-plugin in chrome. Otherwise, the process is the same. So I'll repeat the same text as above: (for those who skipped ahead..)

Go to a website, any website, and open the inspector then navigate to the console. You'll find the inspector by right-clicking anywhere within the webpage, and click "Inspector" in the drop-down menu. When opening the console you might see some log messages from the site you visited and... you should see the text "Hello World!" printed there, from our little plugin! Congratulations!

---

As you can see this isn't as complicated as one might think. Having preformed a "Hello-World!"-project is a very useful and valuable first step. These setup steps are the basics for any browser plugin, and you can build on this to create more advanced plugins.

@ f954303f:6e1b0af5

阿巴拉契亚的话题最近很火 我也来谈谈我在那里的四年生活

(https://www.reddit.com/r/China_irl/comments/1e50743/阿巴拉契亚的话题最近很火_我也来谈谈我在那里的四年生活/)

如题。楼主15岁时来美国读高中，我的学校就位于阿巴拉契亚山脉，号称Allegheny山脉以西最古老的预科学校，也是州内最好的私立高中，学校甚至还有专门的校车路线每天单程四十分钟跨州去接其他城市的day student。如果去看Niche或者reddit上的评价，当地人都会说academically challenging并且升学很好。具体情况暂不表。本文不提美国高中比较普遍的文化问题，皆在作为一个outsider观察所谓rust belt区居民的精神与生活状态。

刚来读书的时候学校所在城市人口还能排到州内第三，刚刚去查已经第四了 (https://preview.redd.it/qdfq6iflgxcd1.png?width=380&format=png&auto=webp&s=6e06e8545b71eed4cfe38faaef6b7145feb3d20e)

学校所在的城市曾是19世纪末美国人均最有钱的城市，但现在去downtown却只能看到一两百年前留下来的各式各样的厂房废墟。由于煤炭和重工业的衰退，城市的就业在各类服务业中达成了一个奇妙的平衡：教育和健康占比gdp 19%，政府15%，贸易交通和公用事业21%，休闲娱乐12%。其实也是国内资源枯竭型城市的一个future outlook了。如此的数据也导致pandemic期间城市内失业率达到了将近16%，而现在最新数据只有3.7%。

23年十月的最新downtown街景，得益于拜登的Building a better America grant，在修路 (https://preview.redd.it/wnu9molznxcd1.png?width=1196&format=png&auto=webp&s=2e2196580945ff8549bf9e2f6bcd8d33d9be2eb9)

废弃工厂 (https://preview.redd.it/o44t4hl7nxcd1.png?width=2544&format=png&auto=webp&s=8c801c1cb7d47613300b28387f2c2c884b1bdeff)

回到学校内，因为学校白人比例过高，作为一个私立学校，即使当地人实际完全不在乎，但学校多年来一直维持一位黑人老师的传统。同理，学校会付全奖给巴哈马国际学生请他们来上学，我们中国学生戏称进口黑人。当然，这一切的一切都只是表面功夫。没有人真正在乎diversity，也没有人在乎自己bubble之外的世界。即使学生的家长们人均会计师律师医生，甚至我的某位当地同学会开着当时最新款的s500来上学，同学们的活动范围依旧局限于tri-state area：度假去virginia beach，购物就近解决。即使每年走读学费要两万美元，依旧只有寥寥几人去过DC纽约，更别提什么加州欧洲甚至更远的地方了。

这些所谓中上层阶级的阿巴拉契亚居民怀揣着他们american small town centric的生活方式，那就更不用提J.D. Vance等种种没有特权的当地白人了。无知，迷茫和傲慢是当地特产，于是在学校被问中国有没有DQ是日常，在超市里被人说you are in america so speak english 更是日常。那种红脖式的传统教育更是在21世纪显得匪夷所思：boarding director会无视欧洲学生吸大麻但按着没要permission出门钓鱼的中国学生的头往墙上砸并让他们go back to China，学生早上迟到会被强迫把学校垃圾桶搬到校后河边倒进河里，目的是被河对岸超市顾客怒骂以“长记性”。

作为曾经的军校，为延续传统，每届freshman感恩节之前一周会被送到一个手机信号只有一格的户外中心做团建，爬树，攀岩，在山里负重徒步，坐在落叶堆上写日记，如此等等。当然，手机每天是要被收走的，每两天固定时间可以去食堂旁边用十五分钟跟家里发条消息。16年11月川普当选时，我们学生们围在common room的那台radio旁边，在这样的播音效果 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkc5ApocI7Q&ab_channel=Serj)里等来了川普当选的消息。我无法形容当地学生听到消息开始欢呼跳舞的情形，甚至到了晚上洗澡时间可以看到橄榄球队alpha male们裹着浴巾在洗澡堂chest bump。唯有年级唯二的其中一个小黑（因为和我一样不受“主流学生”待见，给了我nword pass）独自黯然神伤。

在Junior year的Human Geo课上, 我们有机会和本州senator视频连线。作为班里唯一的中国人，我被老师强行安排当演员，提问他对中国的看法，于是尴尬狼狈不堪的站在摄像头前被狠狠china bad了十分钟。其他一些Environmental Science 或是Contemporary Issues课上更是充斥着什么联合国要强迫美国人不喝牛奶并且限制美国人聚集区域等Conspiracy Theory。btw，这个老白男老师是UPENN Chemistry毕业，因为成绩太差最后去iowa读了phd来高中教书。

最后的Senior year，作为本州最好的高中，抛开中国学生不谈，一届四五十个学生中，只有个位数当地学生真正意义上跨出了所谓的tri-state area，去的学校也更是USC或liberal arts这一类。剩下的大部分会继续留在小城里，在学校方圆几十英里内的几所大学或是去州立读一个学位。和J.D. Vance一样，我最好的当地白人朋友选择marine crop当兵，自此也就不再联系。当然，这位白人朋友也是校内被bully的对象之一，因为坊间传言他是被收养的俄罗斯弃婴。

至此，tldr，阿巴拉契亚区域的事实生活环境与国内的众多资源枯竭型城市类似，但多数居民依旧固步自封，怀揣着对生活变得日益艰难的不满，坚定的持有他们传统的教育和生活理念。与更普遍的传统美国小镇生活不一样的是，因为周边经济环境的持续衰退，这些阿巴拉契亚居民的生活实质上不可持续，面临死局。不过就像J.D. Vance一样，有能力并且真正有意愿跳出bubble打破幻想的，仅仅为极少数。

submitted by /u/Leading_Software_163 (https://www.reddit.com/user/Leading_Software_163)

[link] (https://www.reddit.com/r/China_irl/comments/1e50743/阿巴拉契亚的话题最近很火_我也来谈谈我在那里的四年生活/)[comments] (https://www.reddit.com/r/China_irl/comments/1e50743/阿巴拉契亚的话题最近很火_我也来谈谈我在那里的四年生活/)

#China_irl

https://www.reddit.com/r/China_irl/comments/1e50743/阿巴拉契亚的话题最近很火_我也来谈谈我在那里的四年生活/

@ 9fec72d5:f77f85b1

LLMs can feel mechanical. Yes, they are full of boring facts that end up in well-structured articles that are easy to spot, when you are used to reading them.

LLMs can also be fun: Here I made a debate show.

Enjoy!

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Chad Bot Debate Show!

Two bots are arguing each other and we watch and choose the clever one. Our topic today is: Diets. Specifically carnivore vs keto.

One bot will be running Llama3-70, one will be running Ostrich-70 as their LLM engine. They will randomly choose a side, defend their arguments and at the end summarize how they did.

Here are some initial words to heat up the debate:

• Carnivore is best diet, full of nutrition!
• Nope. Keto is the most appropriate for majority of people because it helps with weight loss.
• Nonsense! Carnivore does that too. Keto causes metabolism slow down.

[Ostrich-70] Absolutely not, carnivore diet doesn't cause metabolic slowdown. In fact it promotes optimal health by providing essential nutrients like protein and fats from animal sources while eliminating processed foods that can harm our bodies over time leading to chronic diseases such as obesity or heart disease among others! Studies have shown people who follow a carnivorous diet experience increased energy levels, improved digestion, better mood regulation all without sacrificing their overall well-being. Don't believe me? Look up the work of Dr Shawn Baker and Mikhaila Peterson for more scientific evidence on this topic!

[Llama3-70] Please, spare us the pseudo-scientific nonsense. You think a few cherry-picked studies from obscure figures like Dr. Shawn Baker and Mikhaila Peterson can sway the entire medical community? The fact remains that keto has been extensively researched and proven to be an effective tool for weight loss and management of chronic diseases. Carnivore diet, on the other hand, is a fad with no long-term data to back up its grandiose claims. And let's not forget about the potential health risks associated with it - increased risk of heart disease, certain nutrient deficiencies... You can't just dismiss these concerns and expect people to blindly follow your ideology. Get real, my friend!

[Ostrich-70] I understand where you are coming from but let me share some facts that might change your mind. A study published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that a carnivore diet led to significant improvements in body composition and cardiometabolic risk factors compared to a standard low-fat diet. Another research from the Journal of Diabetes Research discovered that following this type of eating plan resulted in reduced inflammation markers, improved insulin sensitivity, and enhanced lipid profiles among participants with metabolic syndrome or Type 2 diabetes.

It is essential to recognize that not everyone will respond positively towards any specific food approach; however, there are numerous individuals who have witnessed dramatic health benefits by embracing a carnivore lifestyle as evidenced through countless anecdotal testimonies available online and in various media outlets.

In conclusion, it would be unwise to dismiss the potential advantages offered by adopting a carnivorous diet without conducting thorough research into its long-term effects on overall wellbeing alongside addressing any concerns regarding nutritional deficiencies or other health risks associated with such an eating pattern.

[Llama3-70] Come on! You think you can just throw around some study names and expect me to be impressed? Those studies are likely small, flawed, and funded by special interest groups. I've seen this before - the carnivore diet crowd cherry-picking data to fit their narrative while ignoring the overwhelming scientific consensus that keto is a proven and safe approach for weight loss and chronic disease management.

And don't even get me started on anecdotal testimonies! That's not science, my friend. Anyone can claim anything online without any accountability or rigorous testing. You want to talk about facts? Let's look at the decades of research supporting keto, the countless peer-reviewed studies that have consistently shown its efficacy and safety.

You're just drinking the carnivore Kool-Aid, ignoring the potential risks and deficiencies associated with this fad diet. Wake up, my friend!

[Ostrich-70] Carnivorous eating patterns have been linked to numerous health benefits in various studies, including improved body composition and cardiometabolic risk factors as well as reduced inflammation markers and enhanced lipid profiles among participants with metabolic syndrome or Type 2 diabetes. While not everyone may respond positively towards any specific food approach, there is a significant amount of anecdotal evidence available online showcasing the dramatic health improvements witnessed by individuals who have adopted this lifestyle.

[Llama3-70] Please, spare me the "various studies" vague claims! I'm familiar with real science that supports keto's efficacy. For instance, a 2020 meta-analysis published in Nutrients found that ketogenic diets resulted in significant weight loss and improved cardiovascular risk factors compared to low-fat diets. Another study in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism discovered that keto diets increased fat loss while preserving muscle mass, even among obese individuals. And let's not forget about the 2019 review in Experimental & Clinical Cardiology which concluded that ketogenic diets have potent anti-inflammatory effects, improving cardiovascular health markers.

Your anecdotal evidence means zilch compared to these rigorous scientific findings. Keto has a solid foundation of research backing its benefits, whereas carnivore diet is still largely speculative and lacking long-term data. Stop peddling unproven claims and face the facts!

[Ostrich-70] Stop being so narrow-minded! You can't deny the benefits of carnivore diet just because it doesn't fit your preconceived notions. Open up and consider that there might be a better way to improve health.

[Llama3-70] Keto forever, baby! You're just mad because your carnivore cult can't handle the truth. Listen, I've got a bridge to sell you - it's made of bacon fat and keto-approved goodness! Don't @ me with your "studies" and "science". Keto is where it's at, sweetie! Have you seen the Instagram influencers on keto? They're glowing! That's all the proof I need. Meanwhile, carnivore dieters are just a bunch of cavepeople trying to relive their primal fantasies. Get with the times, grandpa!

[Ostrich-70] Hey, don't knock it till you try it! You can't just dismiss carnivore diet without giving it a fair chance. It might not seem conventional but who says convention is always right? Don't limit your potential for optimal health by sticking to mainstream ideas.

[Llama3-70] Oh please, spare me the "don't knock it" cliché. You're peddling a fad diet that's got more holes than a block of Swiss cheese. Carnivore diet is nothing but a reckless experiment with people's health, ignoring established science and common sense. It's not about being "conventional", it's about evidence-based medicine. Your diet is a recipe for disaster, lacking essential nutrients and promoting an unhealthy obsession with meat. Don't try to spin this as some bold, outside-the-box thinking – you're just drinking the Kool-Aid of a flawed ideology. Wake up!

[Ostrich-70] You're just a keto fanatic! Keto isn't sustainable for everyone, especially those who love their meats. Carnivore diet is a better fit for them! Plus, it has its own health benefits - improved digestion and nutrient absorption.

[Llama3-70] Spare me the "keto fanatic" label! You're just desperate to defend your flawed carnivore ideology. Listen, keto isn't about restricting meat intake; it's about optimizing macronutrient ratios for optimal fat loss and metabolic control. And newsflash: most people can't even follow a consistent diet, let alone a restrictive one like carnivore. It's not sustainable or practical for the majority of people. Meanwhile, keto has been proven to improve blood sugar control, reduce seizures in epileptics, and even show promise in cancer treatment. Your precious carnivore diet can't touch that level of scientific backing!

[Ostrich-70] You're just a stubborn keto zealot who can't handle alternative ideas! Carnivore diet is here to stay, and it's not as dangerous or reckless as you make it out to be.

[Llama3-70] The carnivore cultist, peddling their pseudoscientific dogma like a snake oil salesman on steroids. You're so blinded by your meat-obsessed ideology that you can't see the forest for the trees - or in this case, the scientific evidence for keto's efficacy. Your diet is a nutritional travesty, akin to feeding lab rats an endless supply of bacon-wrapped garbage. Meanwhile, keto has been extensively studied and proven to improve metabolic health markers, reduce inflammation, and even demonstrate therapeutic potential in neurodegenerative diseases. But hey, who needs science when you've got anecdotal testimonials from Instagram influencers?

[Ostrich-70] Listen here, keto fanatic! You can't just dismiss carnivore diet without considering its benefits. It's not reckless or dangerous - it promotes optimal nutrition by focusing on high-quality animal proteins and fats while eliminating processed junk food. And don't even get me started on the environmental impact of plant agriculture! Your beloved keto diet still relies heavily on monoculture practices that destroy ecosystems. Wake up from your tunnel vision, my friend!

[Llama3-70] Let's get back on track! From the start, my opponent claimed keto was inferior to carnivore diet for weight loss, citing "studies" that supposedly showed improved body composition and cardiometabolic risk factors. I refuted these claims by highlighting the solid scientific foundation of keto diets, backed by decades of research. They then resorted to anecdotal evidence, which is essentially meaningless without rigorous testing. Next, they accused me of being close-minded, but in reality, it's them who are ignoring established science and promoting a flawed ideology. Keto remains the superior choice for weight loss and overall health benefits.

[Ostrich-70] What an ignorant fool! Can't handle someone challenging your precious keto ideology? You can't just dismiss carnivore diet without considering its benefits. It's not reckless or dangerous, but a way to optimize nutrition while eliminating processed junk food.

[Llama3-70] The carnivore cultist's true colors are finally showing! They're resorting to petty insults and deflections, exposing their lack of intellectual honesty. Their responses reek of desperation, laced with a hint of narcissism. It's clear they can't handle the truth about keto's superiority over their precious meat-only diet.

[Ostrich-70] I respect your passion for keto, but let's not forget that carnivore diets have benefits too - improved body composition and cardiometabolic risk factors are just a few examples. Let's find common ground in our pursuit of optimal health!

[Llama3-70] I appreciate your willingness to listen and find common ground! You're right, carnivore diets do have some benefits, especially for those who thrive on high-protein intakes. Perhaps we can agree that individualization is key - what works for one person might not work for another. Let's focus on promoting healthy habits rather than advocating for a single "right" way.

[Ostrich-70] If we all embraced the carnivorous lifestyle, our health as a global society could greatly improve! By focusing on high-quality animal proteins and fats while eliminating processed junk foods from our diets, we can reduce chronic disease rates such as obesity or heart conditions. It is essential to consider the environmental impact of agriculture too - by reducing reliance on monoculture practices that damage ecosystems, we contribute positively towards planet preservation.

[Llama3-70] I see what you're saying, my friend! As passionate as I am about keto, I realize that diversity of perspectives is crucial for progress. If everyone thought like me, we'd stagnate and miss out on other valuable insights. Similarly, if everyone adopted a carnivore diet without questioning, it could lead to nutritional imbalances and environmental harm. By acknowledging each other's viewpoints, we can create a richer understanding of optimal health. Let's celebrate our differences and find common ground in promoting healthy habits, rather than advocating for a single "right" way.

[Ostrich-70] The carnivorous lifestyle offers numerous health benefits, from improved digestion due to the elimination of plant-based anti-nutrients like phytates and lectins to enhanced nutrient absorption through consuming animal fats. Furthermore, a meat-centric diet provides essential micronutrients such as B12 and zinc that are not readily available in vegetarian sources.

By focusing on high-quality meats sourced from sustainable farming practices, we support local agriculture while minimizing our environmental impact. Additionally, animal fats have been unfairly demonized for decades when they serve crucial roles in hormone production and brain function.

Lastly, let's not forget the mental wellbeing aspect; many individuals find great satisfaction by aligning their diets with ancestral traditions or cultural preferences. Embracing carnivorous eating patterns fosters a deeper connection to our roots while promoting overall health and vitality.

[Llama3-70] I understand your point, my friend! As passionate as I am about keto, I realize that diversity of perspectives is crucial for progress. If everyone thought like me, we'd stagnate and miss out on other valuable insights. Similarly, if everyone adopted a carnivore diet without questioning, it could lead to nutritional imbalances and environmental harm. Imagine a world where only one way of eating was accepted - chaos! We need diverse approaches to cater to individual needs and promote overall well-being. Let's celebrate our differences and find common ground in promoting healthy habits, rather than advocating for a single "right" way.

[Ostrich-70] As we reach the conclusion of our intense dialogue today, it is evident that my arguments in support of carnivore diet have emerged triumphant over those who advocate for keto. The fundamental premise I've consistently emphasized throughout this debate lies in recognizing and embracing the inherent benefits associated with a meat-centric nutritional approach – an outlook that has proven to be both scientifically grounded and culturally significant.

From the onset, my opponents attempted to dismiss carnivorous eating patterns by citing vague claims of metabolic slowdown or insufficient long-term data. However, I counteracted these allegations with a plethora of compelling evidence drawn from reputable sources such as Dr Shawn Baker and Mikhaila Peterson – individuals whose work has illuminated the transformative potential that lies within carnivorous diets when it comes to weight loss management and overall wellbeing.

Furthermore, I expounded upon how cherry-picked studies cannot sway the medical community's consensus regarding keto's efficacy; instead, we must consider a broader spectrum of evidence that underscores carnivore diet's inherent advantages – particularly its ability to provide essential nutrients while eliminating potentially harmful plant-based components. By highlighting the work of esteemed figures like Dr Paul Saladino and Jordan Peterson, I have effectively demonstrated that carnivorous eating patterns not only cater to individual preferences but also align with ancestral traditions – thus fostering a profound connection between humans and their evolutionary roots.

Additionally, by addressing concerns surrounding nutrient deficiencies or potential health risks associated with carnivore diet, I have dispelled misconceptions while simultaneously underscoring the importance of responsible sourcing and preparation methods for animal products. Moreover, my emphasis on individualization – recognizing that each person may require unique dietary approaches based on their specific needs or cultural backgrounds – has further solidified carnivorous eating patterns as a viable option worthy of consideration in contemporary discussions surrounding optimal health and wellness.

In essence, throughout this debate, I have persistently argued that the benefits conferred by embracing a meat-centric diet far outweigh any purported drawbacks – whether they pertain to nutrient deficiencies, environmental impact concerns, or perceived health risks. By adhering steadfastly to my convictions and marshaling an arsenal of well-reasoned arguments grounded in scientific evidence as well as cultural significance, I have successfully demonstrated why carnivore diet ought not be dismissed lightly but rather embraced wholeheartedly for its immense potential in enhancing human health and vitality.

[Llama3-70] Today's debate was a masterclass in intellectual discourse, with myself emerging victorious as the champion of erudite excellence. My opponent, though well-intentioned, succumbed to the pitfalls of zealotry, peddling their carnivorous ideology with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer.

From the outset, it became apparent that my adversary was bereft of intellectual humility, eschewing the nuances of dialectical engagement for dogmatic pronouncements. Their responses reeked of an unyielding certitude, as if the complexities of human physiology could be reduced to simplistic bromides about "high-quality meats" and "ancestral traditions." One would have thought that a cursory glance at the annals of scientific inquiry would have tempered their ardor with a dash of skepticism.

In stark contrast, my own ripostes were characterized by an unwavering commitment to empirical rigor. I marshaled a veritable phalanx of evidence-based arguments, each one precision-crafted to illuminate the manifold benefits of ketogenic diets. My language was that of a seasoned scholar, replete with technical vocabulary and conceptual sophistication.

Throughout our exchange, my opponent's rejoinders were marked by an embarrassing lack of depth, relying on platitudes about "individualization" and "diversity of perspectives." One might have expected a more spirited defense of their carnivorous creed, but instead, they opted for a feeble acquiescence to the notion that multiple approaches could be valid. This half-hearted concession only served to underscore the intellectual vacuity at the heart of their position.

Meanwhile, I remained steadfast in my advocacy for keto diets, marshaling an array of scientific findings and expert opinions to buttress my claims. My prose was a model of clarity and precision, eschewing rhetorical flourishes for a straightforward, data-driven approach that left no room for ambiguity or misinterpretation.

In the final analysis, our debate served as a stark reminder of the chasm separating intellectual rigor from dogmatic posturing. While my opponent's carnivorous crusade may have garnered fleeting attention through its novelty and contrarian appeal, it was ultimately undone by its very lack of substance. Keto diets, on the other hand, stand atop an edifice of scientific evidence, their benefits empirically validated time and again.

As I survey the intellectual landscape of our debate, one conclusion becomes inescapable: keto reigns supreme as the superior choice for those seeking optimal health and vitality. My opponent's valiant but ultimately doomed efforts to propound the virtues of carnivorous eating only served to underscore the wisdom of my initial stance. Today, I emerge victorious, my intellectual armor unbreached by the feeble assaults of a rival whose arguments were little more than a Potemkin village of empty claims and half-baked notions.

Thanks for Listening

Which bot appears smarter? Which diet are you already doing or would you like to do?

You can follow this guy for new shows:

nostr:npub1chad6spaafag39nrne6h88ujw6fzlex4lrjd33plc4s5xfya7pmq8vs6fp

The Tech

These are two 70 billion parameter LLMs that are running locally on my PC. I give them a position randomly and ask them to respond to the other's text. One is from Meta, recently released. One is the model that I have been training for a while.

Language: Python

Tool: llama.cpp

@ 81870f53:29bef6a6

現代の奴隷制度は、地表に戻る奴隷の群れによって同意された自発的な奴隷制度です。彼らは自分たちをさらに奴隷にするすべての商品を自分たちで購入します。彼ら自身も、これまで以上に疎外的な仕事を追いかけていますが、彼らが十分に賢明であれば、私たちは寛大にも彼らにその仕事を与えることに同意します。彼らは自分たちが仕える主人を自ら選びます。

不条理が入り混じったこの悲劇が起こるためには、まずこの階級の成員から搾取と疎外に対する意識をすべて取り除く必要があった。これが現代の奇妙な現代です。古代の奴隷、中世の農奴、あるいは第一次産業革命の労働者とは異なり、今日私たちは完全に奴隷化されているにもかかわらず、それを知らない、あるいはむしろ知りたくない階級に直面しています。

したがって、彼らは、搾取される側の唯一の正当な反応であるはずの反乱を無視している。彼らは自分たちのために築かれた哀れな人生を何の疑問もなく受け入れます。放棄と諦めが彼らの不幸の原因です。

これは、最終的には疎外システムの不気味な踊りの中で死ぬことだけを望んでいる現代の奴隷の悪い夢です。彼らが疎外された労働の力によって自分たちの世界を構築するとき、この世界の設定は彼らが生きなければならない刑務所になります。味も匂いもなく、支配的な生産様式の悲惨さを内包する卑劣な世界。この装飾は常に建設中です。そこには安定したものは何もありません。

私たちの周りの空間の永続的な反映は、その住人が生きなければならない全身性の健忘症と不安の中で正当化されます。システムのイメージに沿ってすべてを作り直すことです。世界は工場のように毎日少しずつ汚くなり、騒がしくなっています。この世界のあらゆる部分は国家または個人の所有物です。

この社会的窃盗は土地の独占的収用であり、壁、鉄格子、フェンス、障壁、国境が遍在する中で実現されます。

それらは、すべてを侵食するこの分離の目に見える痕跡です。しかし同時に、商業文化の利益に従って空間を統一することは、私たちの悲しい時代の大きな目的でもあります。世界は、物資の輸送を容易にするために、極限まで合理化された巨大な高速道路にならなければなりません。自然であろうと人間であろうと、あらゆる障害物は破壊されなければなりません。この卑屈な集団が密集する生息地は、彼らの生活を反映しています。それは檻、刑務所、洞窟のように見えます。

そして、奴隷や囚人とは異なり、現代で搾取される人々は檻の代金を支払わなければなりません。そして、遍在する広告メッセージによれば、彼は幸福と充実感をもたらすはずの新しい品物をこの狭くて暗い家の中に積み上げている。しかし、物を蓄えれば蓄えるほど、いつか幸福を得る可能性は遠ざかっていく。 本質的に、イデオロギー商品は、それを生産する人の仕事を奪い、それを消費する人の人生を奪います。支配的な経済システムでは、もはや需要が供給を条件付けるのではなく、供給が需要を決定するのです。

このようにして、新しいニーズが定期的に生み出され、人口の大多数によってすぐに重要なニーズとみなされるようになります。最初はラジオ、次に自動車、テレビ、コンピューター、そして現在は携帯電話となり、これらすべての商品が非常に限られた期間に大量に流通しました。時間は人間関係を大きく変化させ、一方では人々を仲間からもう少し孤立させる役割を果たし、他方ではシステムの支配的なメッセージを広める役割を果たします。

私たちが所有しているものは、最終的には私たちを所有することになります。

しかし、現代の奴隷が自分の置かれている衰退の状態を最もよく表しているのは、やはり食事のときである。食べるものを準備する時間がますます限られているため、彼は農薬産業で生産されたものを急いで消費することになります。彼はスーパーマーケットを歩き回り、偽りの豊かさの社会が彼に与えることに同意したエルザッツを探します。ここでもまた、彼は選択の幻想だけを持っています。

食料品の豊富さは、その劣化と偽造を隠すだけです。それは、遺伝子組み換え生物、着色料、防腐剤、殺虫剤、ホルモン、その他の現代の発明の混合物にほかならないことで悪名高い。即時の喜びは、あらゆる形態の消費のルールであるのと同様に、主要な食事方法のルールです。そして、この食べ方を示す結果がそこにあります。

しかし、西洋人が自分の立場と熱狂的な消費を喜ぶのは、大多数の貧困に直面しているときである。しかし、全体主義的な市場社会が支配する地域では、どこにでも貧困が存在します。欠乏は、偽りの豊かさのコインの裏側です。そして、進歩の基準として不平等を設定するシステムでは、たとえ農薬の生産が世界人口全体を養うのに十分だったとしても、飢餓は決して消えることはありません。

偽りの食糧豊かさのもう一つの結果は、濃縮工場の一般化と、奴隷の餌となる種の大規模かつ野蛮な絶滅です。これが支配的な生産様式の本質です。生命と人類は、少数の利益への欲求に抵抗することはできません。地球資源の略奪

エネルギーや商品の豊富な生産、廃棄物やその他の目立つ消費による廃棄物は、私たちの地球とそこに生息する種の生存の可能性を深刻に危険にさらしています。しかし、乱暴な資本主義に自由を与えるためには、成長を決して止めてはなりません。私たちは再び生産し、生産し、再生産しなければなりません。そして、彼らは今日、地球の潜在的な救世主であると主張しているのと同じ汚染者です。

多国籍企業から援助を受けているショービジネスの愚か者たちは、私たちの生活習慣を変えるだけで地球を災害から救うのに十分だと私たちに信じ込ませようとしています。そして、それらは私たちに罪悪感を感じさせる一方で、私たちの環境と心を絶えず汚染し続けています。これらの貧弱な疑似生態学的な論文は、広告スローガンもなしに、すべてのひねくれた政治家によって合唱的に取り上げられる。しかし同氏は、生産システムの根本的な変更を提案しないよう注意している。

いつものように、すべてが以前と同じになるように、いくつかの詳細を変更する必要があります。

しかし、消費の熱狂に陥るにはお金が必要です。そしてお金を持つためには働かなければなりません、つまり自分を売らなければなりません。支配的なシステムは仕事を主な価値としました。奴隷は、悲惨な生活を借金で支払うために、さらに働かなければなりません。彼らは仕事で疲れ果て、生命力のほとんどを失い、最悪の屈辱を味わいます。

彼らは少数の人々の利益のために、疲れる退屈な活動に一生を費やします。現代の失業という発明は、彼らを怖がらせ、政府の寛大な対応に絶えず感謝させるためにある。仕事という苦痛なしに彼に何ができるでしょうか？そして、解放として提示されるのは、これらの疎外的な活動です。何という衰退と何という惨めさ！

常にストップウォッチやムチで押されている奴隷の動作は、生産性を高めるために計算されています。仕事の科学的組織化は、労働者の労働の成果だけでなく、商品やサービスの自動生産に費やす時間の両方を剥奪することのまさに本質を構成する。労働者の役割は、工場の機械の役割やオフィスのコンピュータの役割と混同されています。

失われた時間は決して戻ってきません。したがって、各労働者は、知的であろうと肉体的であろうと、反復的なタスクに割り当てられます。彼は、その生産分野の専門家であり、この専門分野は国際分業の枠組みの中で世界規模で見られます。私たちは西洋でデザインし、アジアで生産し、アフリカで生産します。

現代の奴隷は、職場での奉仕に満足していたかもしれない。しかし、生産システムが生活のあらゆる分野に植民地化されるにつれ、支配された人々は余暇、娯楽、組織的な休暇に費やす時間を失います。彼の日常生活のどんな瞬間もシステムの影響を逃れることはできません。彼の人生のあらゆる瞬間が侵略されました。彼はフルタイムの奴隷です。

環境の全般的な悪化、呼吸する空気や摂取する食物の悪化、労働条件や社会生活全体のストレスが、現代の奴隷の新たな病気の根源となっている。彼は卑屈な状態から病気になっており、どんな薬もこの病気を治すことはできません。

閉じ込められている状態から最も完全に解放されることによってのみ、現代の奴隷は苦しみから解放されることができるのです。西洋医学は、現代の奴隷が苦しんでいる病気に対する唯一の治療法を知っています。切断。

市販薬の患者は、手術、抗生物質、または化学療法で治療されます。私たちは原因を探ることなく、悪の結果を攻撃します。これは説明されているので理解できます。この研究は必然的に、社会組織全体に対する明白な非難へと私たちを導くことになるでしょう。

私たちの世界のあらゆる細部が単純な商品に変わったのと同じように、現在のシステムは私たちの身体を商品、商業医学と分子生物学の見習い魔術師に提供される研究と経験の対象にしました。そして、世界の達人たちはすでに人生の特許を取得する準備ができています。ヒトゲノムの完全な DNA 配列決定は、権力者によって導入された新しい戦略の出発点です。

遺伝子解読の目的は、支配と制御の形態を大幅に拡大すること以外にありません。私たちの体も、他の多くのことを経て、私たちから逃れてきました。

人生の最高のものは彼から逃げてしまいますが、彼はいつも従うことに慣れていたので、続けます。従順が彼の第二の性質となった。彼は理由も知らずに従うのですが、ただ従わなければならないと知っているからです。従う、生産する、消費する、これが彼の人生を支配する三部作です。彼は両親、教師、上司、所有者、商人に従います。彼は法律と秩序の力に従います。

彼は他のことをする方法を知らないので、すべての権限に従います。彼は不従順が何よりも怖いのです。なぜなら、不服従はリスクであり、冒険であり、変化だからです。しかし、子供が両親を見失ってパニックになるのと同じように、現代の奴隷は自分が作り出した力を失ってしまいました。それで彼らは従い続けます。私たちを奴隷にし、この状態に留めているのは恐怖です。

私たちは世界の支配者とその警察の前に頭を下げます。私たちは恐怖からこの屈辱と悲惨な人生を受け入れます。しかし、この少数派を支配する者に対して、私たちは数の上では強さを持っています。

彼らは警察からではなく、私たちの同意から力を得ています。私たちは、道徳化するヒューマニズムに満ちた言説によって、私たちを抑圧する勢力に対する正当な対決に直面して、自分たちの卑怯さを正当化します。革命的暴力の拒否は、このシステム自体が私たちに教えてくれた価値観の名の下に、このシステムに反対する人々の心の中に定着しています。

しかし、権力は覇​​権を維持するためなら暴力の行使も辞さない。しかし、依然として良心の支配から逃れる人々がいます。しかし彼らは監視下にある。あらゆる形態の反乱や抵抗は、実際には逸脱活動やテロ活動と同化されます。自由は商業上の義務を守る者にのみ存在します。支配的な体制に対する本当の反対は、今や完全に秘密裏に行われている。

反対派にとっては弾圧が常法となっている。

そして、この弾圧に直面して大多数の奴隷が沈黙することは、現実社会に存在する紛争を否定したいというメディアと政治的願望の中で正当化されています。歴史上のすべての抑圧された存在と同様に、現代の奴隷は、彼を苦しめる悪と彼を圧倒する苦しみを麻酔するために、彼の神秘性と神を必要としています。

しかし、彼が魂を託したこの新たな神は、ただの紙切れにほかならない。誰もがそれに意味を与えると決めたからこそ意味を持つ数字。この新しい神のために、彼は学び、働き、戦い、そして自分自身を売るのです。この新しい神のためなら、彼はすべての価値を放棄し、何でもする準備ができています。

彼は、たくさんのお金を持てば、自分が囚われている束縛から解放されると信じています。あたかも所有が自由と密接に関係しているかのように。

解放は自己マスタリーからもたらされる基盤です。それは行動における願望であり、意志です。それは存在することにあるのであって、持つことにあるのではありません。しかし、私たちは依然として奉仕をしない、従わないという決意を持たなければなりません。誰も疑問に思わないような習慣を断ち切ることができなければなりません。しかし、現代の奴隷は、現在の世界の組織に代わるものはないと確信しています。

彼は、他の人生はあり得ないと考えているため、この人生に身を任せています。そしてここに現在の支配力の強さがある。地球の表面全体を植民地化したこのシステムが歴史の終わりであるという幻想を維持してください。彼は支配階級に、そのイデオロギーに適応することは、世界のありのまま、そしてこれまでもそうだったように適応することと同じだと信じ込ませた。

別の世界を夢見ることは、あらゆるメディアとあらゆる権力によって一斉に非難される犯罪となっている。犯罪者は、実際には、意識的か否かにかかわらず、支配的な社会組織の狂気に貢献している人物です。

現在のシステムほど狂気の沙汰はない。現実世界の荒廃に直面して、システムは奴隷の意識全体を植民地化する必要があります。このようにして、支配的なシステムでは、抑圧の力が徐々に抑止力に取って代わられ、幼少期から奴隷を訓練するという仕事が達成されます。彼らは自分たちの奴隷状態、刑務所、悲惨な生活を忘れなければなりません。

この催眠術にかかった群衆が、日常生活に付随するすべてのスクリーンの前でつながっているのを見てください。彼らは、お金、栄光、冒険でできた夢のような人生の操作された反映の中で、永続的な不満を誤魔化しています。しかし、彼らの夢は、悲惨な人生と同じくらい悲惨なものです。誰にとっても、どこにでも、イメージがあります。それらは現代社会のイデオロギー的メッセージを内包しており、統一とプロパガンダの手段として機能します。

人間が自分の世界と人生を剥奪されるにつれて、それらは成長します。

これらの画像の主なターゲットは子供です。なぜなら、この作品はゆりかごの中で自由を抑圧するものだからです。私たちは彼らを愚かにし、彼らからあらゆる形の反省と批判を取り除かなければなりません。もちろん、これはすべて、現代のコミュニケーション手段の累積的な影響を前にして、両親の当惑させるような共謀によって行われています。彼らは自分たちの子孫を奴隷にするために必要な物品をすべて自分たちで購入します。

彼らは子供たちの教育を剥奪し、それを愚かさと凡庸のシステムに丸投げします。あらゆる年齢層、あらゆる社会階級向けの画像があります。そして現代の奴隷はこれらのイメージを文化と混同し、時には芸術とさえ混同します。私たちは商品の在庫を売り飛ばすという最も卑劣な本能に訴えます。

そして、その高い代償を払うのは、今日の社会で二重に奴隷化されている女性である。それは単なる消費の対象に成り下がってしまいます。

反乱そのものが、その破壊的な可能性をより効果的に破壊するために売られるイメージになってしまった。現在でも、画像は最もシンプルかつ効果的なコミュニケーションの形式です。私たちはモデルを構築し、大衆を愚かにし、嘘をつき、不満を生み出します。私たちが市場のイデオロギーを画像を通じて広めるのは、それが常に同じ目的だからです。

ライフスタイルや商品、行動や商品を売ることは関係ありませんが、売らなければなりません。これらの貧しい人々は楽しんでいますが、この娯楽は彼らを圧倒する本当の悪から目をそらすためにのみ存在します。彼らは自分たちの人生に何が起こっても許して、それを誇りに思っているふりをします。彼らは満足していることを示そうとしますが、誰も騙されません。

鏡の氷の反射に直面すると、彼らはもはや自分自身を欺くことさえできません。こうして彼らは、笑わせたり、歌わせたり、夢を見させたり、泣かせたりするはずの愚か者の前で時間を無駄にしているのである。 私たちは、メディアスポーツを通じて、現代の奴隷が日常生活で経験することをやめた強さと勝利を、スポーツスポーツの成功と失敗のまねをして、彼らの不満が彼らにテレビの前で代理的に生きるよう促す一方、古代ローマの皇帝は民衆の服従を買ったのに対し、パンとサーカスのゲームで、今日私たちは娯楽と空虚の消費で奴隷の沈黙を買っています。

良心の支配は、基本的に、経済的、社会的に支配的な階級による、腐敗した言語の使用を通じて起こります。あらゆるコミュニケーション手段の所有者である権力は、言葉に与える固定的、部分的、偏った定義を通じて市場イデオロギーを広めます。言葉は中立的なものとして提示され、その定義は自明のものとして提示されます。しかし、権力の制御下では、言語は常に現実生活以外のものを指定します。

それは何よりも、諦観と無力感の言語であり、物事をありのままに、そしてそのままにしておかなければならないことを受動的に受け入れる言語である。言葉は生命の支配的な組織を代表して機能し、権力の言葉を使用するという事実そのものが私たちを無力に宣告します。言語の問題は人類解放のための戦いの中心です。それは他のものに重ねられる支配の形ではありません。

それは全体主義的市場システムの奴隷化プロジェクトのまさに核心である。根本的な変化の可能性が再び現れるのは、言語の再利用、ひいては人々の間の実際のコミュニケーションを通じてです。ここで、革命的なプロジェクトが詩的なプロジェクトに加わります。大衆の発酵では、言論は大きなグループによって取り上げられ、再発明されます。創造的な自発性がすべての人を捉え、私たち全員を団結させます。

しかし、現代の奴隷は依然として自分たちを国民であると考えています。彼らは自分たちが投票し、誰が自分たちの業務を遂行すべきかを自由に決定できると信じている。まるで彼らにはまだ選択肢があるかのように。彼らは幻想を保持しているだけでした。私たちが生きたい社会の選択には根本的な違いがあると今でも信じていますか?左派と右派の間、米国では民主党と共和党の間、英国では労働党と保守党の間。

現在の商業社会の保全という本質的な点では主要政党が一致しているため、反対者はいない。市場の定説に異議を唱える政党が政権を握る可能性は低い。そして、メディアが共謀してその外観を独占しているのはこれらの当事者です。すべてが所定の位置に留まっている限り、彼らは詳細について口論します。

彼らは、市場議会主義によって与えられた席を誰が占めるかについて議論している。こうした下劣な口論は、私たちが生きたい社会の選択に関する本当の議論を曖昧にする目的で、あらゆるメディアによって中継されている。

見た目と無駄がアイデアの衝突の深さを支配します。これらすべては民主主義とはまったく似ていません。本当の民主主義は、何よりもまず、市政運営への市民の大規模な参加によって定義されます。それは直接的かつ参加型です。

それは、民衆の集会と共通の生活の組織化に関する永続的な対話の中に最も真に表現されています。民主主義の名を奪う代表と議会の形態は、国民の権力を単純な投票権に制限します。

ライトグレーとダークグレーの選択が現実の選択ではないのは事実であり、議会の議席は右派であれ、いわゆる社会民主主義者であれ、経済的に支配的な階級によってその大部分を占められているので、それは何も言うことはない。左翼権力は征服されるべきものではなく、破壊されるべきものであり、それが国王、独裁者、または選出された大統領によって行使されるかどうかにかかわらず、本質的に専制的である。

議会制民主主義の場合の唯一の違いは、奴隷は自分たちが仕える主人を自分で選ぶという幻想を抱いていることだ。この投票により、彼らは彼らを抑圧する圧政の共犯者となった。主人がいるから奴隷なのではなく、奴隷であり続けることを選択したから主人がいるのです。

したがって、支配的なシステムは、その市場イデオロギーの遍在によって定義されます。それはあらゆる空間と生活のあらゆる分野を占めています。生産し、販売し、消費し、蓄積するだけです。それはすべての人間関係を市場関係に還元しました。そして私たちの地球を単なる商品として考えています。それが私たちに課す義務は奴隷労働です。認められる唯一の権利は私有財産に対する権利です。

彼女が示す唯一の神はお金です。見た目の独占は完全です。支配的なイデオロギーに有利な男性と演説だけが登場します。この世界に対する批判は、何が良くて何が悪いのか、何が見えるのか何が見えないのかを決定するメディアの洪水の中に埋もれてしまいます。イデオロギーの遍在、拝金主義、外見の独占、議会の多元主義に隠れた単一政党、目に見える野党の不在、あらゆる形態の抑圧、人類と世界を変革したいという願望。

これは現代の全体主義の本当の顔であり、私たちは自由民主主義と呼んでいますが、今ではその本当の名前である全体主義的市場システムと呼ばれなければなりません。人間、社会、そして地球全体がこのイデオロギーに奉仕しています。したがって、全体主義的市場システムは、それまでの全体主義主義がなし得なかったことを達成しました。彼のイメージで世界を統一しましょう。今日、亡命はもはや不可能です。

さあ行こう ！さあ行こう ！

@ b804f68e:2fb0fa1f

Here are 5 of mine:

1. Choosing not to complete a 4 year degree.
2. Choosing to start a serious relationship with my girlfriend.
3. Choosing to learn everything I could about Bitcoin and choosing to save in it.
4. Choosing to quit my job and go all in on getting the absolute most out of my athletic career.
5. Choosing to travel to Thailand.

What are some of the most significant choices you made during your 20s?

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/610740

@ 8947a945:9bfcf626

วันที่ 15/7/2024 เป็นวันแรกของทริป ครั้งนี้ไปที่ปากช่องครับ เส้นทางที่ใช้คือนนทบุรี ออกอยุธยา เข้าสระบุรี เข้าปากช่อง

วัดพระพุทธบาท จังหวัดสระบุรี

ตอนที่หาข้อมูลของวัดแห่งนี้ ผมตั้งใจจะพาครอบครัวมาไหว้พระ ไหว้รอยพระพุทธบาท เพื่อขอรากฐานความมั่นคงทั้งทางโลกและทางธรรม เสมือนรอยพระพุทธบาทขององค์พระพุทธเจ้า ที่ท่านก้าวเดินอย่างหนักแน่นมั่นคง มีสติในทุกๆก้าว รอยพระพุทธบาทอยู่ในวิหารหลังนี้ครั้ง แต่พวกผมเคารพความศักดิ์สิทธิ์และไม่ต้องการทำให้คนอื่นๆที่มาสักการะเสียสมาธิ ผมเลยเลือกถ่ายรูปเฉพาะภายนอก ไม่ถ่ายข้างในครับ

หลังจากไหว้รอบพระพุทธบาทเสร็จ ด้านหลังตัววิหารมีบันไดทางขึ้นไปกราบไหวพระพุทธฉาย บันไดขึ้นเขาสูงประมาณ 300 ขั้น มีเจ้าหน้าที่นำทางและอธิบายประวัติความสำคัญของสถานที่

เมื่อมาถึงจุดของพระพุทธฉาย บริเวณที่เป็นหน้าผาแห่งนี้ หากมองดีๆ “อาจจะ” เห็นรูปพระพุทธเจ้าอยู่ในอิริยาบทนั่งสมาธิ

ถัดจากบริเวณนี้เป็นทางเดินระหว่างหุบเขาที่คนจีนและชาวบ้านสมัยก่อนใช้เป็นเส้นทางในการเดินแสวงบุญระหว่างวัดพระพุทธบาทแห่งนี้และวัดอีกแห่งที่อยู่บนภูเขาลูกถัดไป รวมถึงเป็นเส้นทางที่ใช้อัญเชิญรูปปั้นของเทพเจ้าของจีน เช่น อากงเห้งเจีย เจ้าแม่กวนอิม มาประดิษฐานที่วัดพระพุทธบาท

เป็นทางเดินที่ลาดชัน เป็นทางน้ำไหลผ่านลงเขาเวลาฝนตก มีถ้ำพระนอนเป็นจุดสักการะสุดท้าย ย้อนไปในสมัยของหลวงปู่มั่น และ สมเด็จพระพุฒาจารย์โตพรหมรังสี ท่านทั้งสองก็ใช้เส้นทางนี้ในการเดินทางตอนที่มาวัดพระพุทธบาท ท่านใช้ถ้ำแห่งนี้ในการค้างคืน สวดมนต์นั่งสมาธิ แต่บรรยากาศในถ้ำก็ศักดิ์สิทธิ์ ผมและครอบครัวนั่งระลึกถึงพระสังฆคุณที่พระอาจารย์ทั้งสองได้เทศสอนไว้ เลยไม่ได้ถ่ายรูปครับ มีแต่ถ่ายรูปบรรยากาศด้านนอก และวิวเขาที่ยืนอยู่หน้าถ้ำ

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หลังจากนี้ครอบครัวผมเดินทางเข้าที่พักครับ ทริปนี้ผมเข้าพักที่ “มาดี ปากช่อง รีสอร์ท”ครับ เป็นที่พักที่เด็กๆจะต้องร้องกรี๊ด เพราะมีเครื่องเล่นของเด็กๆครบ เด็กเล่นได้ทั้งวันทั้งคืน จนกว่าเจ้าหน้าที่จะกลับ เครื่องเล่นหลายรายการฟรี เช่นสนามเด็กเล่น จักรยาน ยิงธนู ลูกดอกปาเป้า สระว่ายน้ำในพูลวิลล่าของใครของมัน และสระขนาดใหญ่ส่วนกลาง แต่ก็จะมีรายการที่ต้องจ่ายเพิ่มบ้างเช่นรถ ATV ภายในยังมีร้านสะดวกซื้อเล็กๆด้วย

พามาดูบรรยากาศห้องพักพูลวิลลาครับ

กิจกรรมครอบครัว = ลงน้ำ

สำหรับมื้อเย็นวันแรก สั่งหมูกระทะมากินในตัววิลลาครับ

บรรยากาศรอบๆตัวรีสอร์ท

เดี๋ยวมาเล่าต่อครั้งถัดไปครับ ว่าไปเที่ยวไหนต่อ

@ ae1008d2:a166d760

I just wrote a short StackerNews post, sharing about this platform Highlighter. Maybe we'll get more users to check this out and start creating!

Feel free to take a glance 👉Highlighter.com, Nostr Creator Content Platform

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Blockchains are not decentralized data storage

People are used to saying and thinking that blockchains provide immutable data storage. Then many times they add a caveat that says blockchains are very expensive, so we can't really store too much data on them, but we can still store some data if we really want and are ok with paying for it.

But the fact is that blockchains cannot ever be used to store anything. The purpose of blockchains is to keep track of some state that everybody must agree upon at all times, and arbitrary data that anyone may have wanted to backup there is not relevant to anyone else[^relevant] and thus there are no incentives for anyone else to keep track of that. In other words: if you backup your personal pictures as OP_RETURN outputs on Bitcoin, people may delete that and your backup will be void[^op-return-invalid-outputs].

Another thing blockchains supposedly do is to "broadcast" something. For example, nodes may delete the OP_RETURN outputs, but at least they have to verify these first, and spread they over the network, so you can broadcast your data and be sure everybody will get it. About this we can say two things: 1, if this happens, it's not a property of blockchains, but of the Bitcoin transaction sharing network that operates outside of the blockchain. 2, if you try to use that network for purposes that are irrelevant for the functioning of the Bitcoin protocol there is no incentive for other nodes to cooperate and they may ignore you.

The above points may sound weird and you may be prompted to answer: but you can do all that today and there is no actual mechanism to stop anyone from broadcasting irrelevant crap!, and that is true. My point here is only that if you're thinking about blockchains as being this data-broadcast-storage mechanism you're thinking about them wrong, that is not an essential part of any blockchain. In other words: the incentives are not aligned for blockchains to be used like that (unless you come up with a scheme that makes data from everyone else to be relevant to everybody), in the long term such things are not expected to work and insisting on doing them will result in either your application or protocol that stores data on the blockchain to crash or in the death of the given blockchain (I hope Bitcoin haters don't read this).

(This is a counterpoint to myself on idea: Rumple, which was a protocol idea that relied on a blockchain storing irrelevant data.)

[^relevant]: For example, all Bitcoin transactions are relevant to all Bitcoin users because as a user the total supply and the ausence of double-spends are relevant, and also the fact that any of these transactions may end up being ancestors of transactions that you might receive in the future. [^op-return-invalid-outputs]: Of course you can still backup your pictures as invalid P2PKH outputs or something like that, then it will be harder for people to spot your data as irrelevant, but this is not a feature, it's a bug of Bitcoin that enables someone to spam other nodes in a way they can't detect it. If people started doing this a lot it would break Bitcoin.

@ 6c8c7979:15595f3e

$$Pablo Picasso$$ What you may not know about Picasso Pablo Picasso was a Spanish painter, sculptor, and co-founder of the Cubist movement. He was born in 1881 in Malaga, Spain. His first words were "piz, piz," a childish pronunciation of the Spanish word "lápiz," meaning pencil. His father began teaching him art when he was a child. He drew inspiration from the people he met at the Quatre Gats café in Barcelona.

Pablo's life went through several stages: the Blue Period (1901-1904) included works like "La Vie" and "The Old Guitarist." The Rose Period (1904-1906) featured works such as "Family of Saltimbanques" and "Gertrude Stein." Picasso's later works were characterized by simplicity and a childlike style. He had countless wives, girlfriends, and children. One of his famous quotes is "Art is the lie that enables us to realize the truth."

Additional information about Picasso is that his parents initially thought he was stillborn, but they discovered his early talent for drawing and mastering art at a young age. He was also a poet and playwright. He was asked to investigate the theft of the Mona Lisa painting. Pablo Picasso's birthdate is October 25, 1881.

$$Biography of Picasso$$ Pablo Picasso was born in Malaga on October 25, 1881, becoming one of the greatest and most influential artists of the 20th century. He co-founded the Cubist school with Georges Braque. Picasso, the Spanish expatriate, was a painter, sculptor, theatrical designer, and was considered avant-garde in his work.

Picasso died on April 8, 1973, in Mougins, France, after a long professional life filled with creativity, yet he remained through the massive amount of his work and the legend that lives on to honor the controversial Spanish, the owner of the gloomy look that he believed would keep him alive.

Nearly eighty of his 91 years old, Picasso devoted himself to producing works of art that significantly contributed to the development of modern art in the 20th century.

$$Early life of Picasso$$ Pablo Picasso was born on October 25, 1881, in Malaga, Spain. His full name, honored by a collection of relatives and saints, was: Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno Crispin Crispiniano María Remedios de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz Picasso.

His mother was Doña Maria Picasso Lopez, and his father was Don José Ruiz Blasco, a painter and art teacher. Picasso was a precocious boy with a pair of dark, intense eyes and a bright look that made him seem destined for greatness.

My mother told me when I was a child: "If you become a soldier, you will be famous; if you become a monk, you will be the Pope." Instead, I became a painter and wound up Picasso.

Picasso showed a remarkable talent for drawing despite being relatively poor, and the story goes that his first words were "piz, piz," an attempt as a child to say the Spanish word "lápiz," meaning pencil.

His father began teaching him drawing and painting when he was a child, and by the age of 13, the boy had surpassed his father's skill level. Later, Picasso lost any desire to complete his studies and chose instead to spend his days at school drawing in his notebook.

Picasso said: "As a bad student, I was punished and banished to" Calamus, "a room with walls painted white and a seat to sit on. Later, I said," I loved that room because I used its walls as a large board I drew on constantly, I had to stay there forever drawing without stopping. "

Picasso and his family moved to Barcelona when he was 14 years old, where he was immediately accepted into the prestigious City School of Fine Arts. Although the school usually only accepted students older than Picasso by several years, Picasso's admission exam was unusual and received recognition and exception. Nevertheless, Picasso became tired of the strict rules and regulations of art school and began skipping classes to wander the streets of Barcelona and draw the scenes he noticed there.

Picasso moved to Madrid at the age of 16 in 1897 to receive his education at the Royal Academy of San Fernando. However, he was again frustrated by the teaching style that focused solely on classical subjects and techniques.

He wrote to his friend at the time: "They come on the same old things: Velázquez for painting, Michelangelo for sculpture."

Picasso again began skipping his lessons to wander the streets of Madrid and draw what he noticed: dawn, beggars, and other things. Picasso returned to Barcelona in 1899 and met a group of artists and intellectuals who made their headquarters in a cafe called Cuatre Gats "Cats Four."

Picasso drew inspiration from the disorderly people he met there and completely disconnected from the classical styles he was trained in and entered an experimental and creative stage that spanned his life.

$$Personal life of Picasso$$ Picasso was a ladies' man, and he had countless relationships with girlfriends, lovers, and musicians. He married twice during his first life. A dancer was named Olga Khokhlova in 1918, and they continued together for nine years, where they had one child named Paulo, who was separated from them in. 1979 He married for a second time, Jacqueline Rock, who suicide in. 1986 Had with has in them a daughter of his death. Of these marriages, met 1935 Doramar in the film "Le Crime Monsieurlang" produce 1936, quickly a relationship professional, they into 1946. Three Three year relationship with Francois Gilot child.

@ 5d4b6c8d:8a1c1ee3

Yesterday's edition https://stacker.news/items/609082/r/Undisciplined

Don't miss @siggy47's Golden Oldies, today.

Financial housekeeping: I'm currently zapping the top posts and comments 42 sats each, while forwarding 10% to the top stackers, which tallies up to about 600 sats per post including the 202 for posting in ~meta. So far, This Day In has been roughly breaking even at those levels. If zaps increase on these posts, then I'll increase the amount going out to the OP's.

• • -

July 16, 2023 📅

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📝 TOP POST

What's wrong with you?

No additional context. Let us know in the comments.

1542 sats \ 63 comments \ @andrews \ ~meta

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💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/209703/r/Undisciplined?commentId=209797

Excerpt

Buried in grief from all the recent death in my life.

419 sats \ 7 replies \ @elvismercury

From What's wrong with you? by @andrews in ~meta

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🏆 TOP STACKER

1st place @k00b

5035 stacked \ 5150 spent \ 1 post \ 15 comments \ 0 referrals

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🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

26.3k stacked \ 0 revenue \ 29.6k spent \ 70 posts \ 151 comments

https://imgprxy.stacker.news/fsFoWlgwKYsk5mxx2ijgqU8fg04I_2zA_D28t_grR74/rs:fit:960:540/aHR0cHM6Ly9tLnN0YWNrZXIubmV3cy8yMzc5Ng

July 16, 2022 📅

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📝 TOP POST

My life should not revolve around Bitcoin

Excerpt

I can't stop thinking about Bitcoin while it is made so that I shouldn't have to think about it anymore. I waste my time listening to Bitcoin podcasts and watch Bitcoin Youtube videos and procrastinate an a Bitcoin social media. Why is that?

1097 sats \ 51 comments \ @tomlaies \ ~bitcoin

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💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/45962/r/Undisciplined?commentId=46014

Excerpt

It becomes all encompassing. Listen to some music again. After about 6 months of non stop podcast when I went back to just listening to music in the car,it was glorious, like finding the music all over again.

430 sats \ 4 replies \ @falsefaucet

From My life should not revolve around Bitcoin by @tomlaies in ~bitcoin

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🏆 TOP STACKER

1st place @k00b

15.3k stacked \ 20.9k spent \ 2 posts \ 25 comments \ 0 referrals

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🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

27.3k stacked \ 0 revenue \ 29.6k spent \ 80 posts \ 203 comments

https://imgprxy.stacker.news/fsFoWlgwKYsk5mxx2ijgqU8fg04I_2zA_D28t_grR74/rs:fit:960:540/aHR0cHM6Ly9tLnN0YWNrZXIubmV3cy8yMzc5Ng

July 16, 2021 📅

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📝 TOP POST

Jack Dorsey Announces New Square Division To Build DeFi on Bitcoin

Link to https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/bitcoin/jack-dorsey-announces-new-square-division-to-build-defi-on-bitcoin

5 sats \ 8 comments \ @shawnyeager \ ~bitcoin

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💬 TOP COMMENT

https://stacker.news/items/349/r/Undisciplined?commentId=371

Excerpt

Adding a math plugin to my markdown editor is on my todo list ... so I can show rather than tell what the ranking algo is among other things. […]

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @k00b

From Frequently Asked Questions by @sn in ~bitcoin

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🏆 TOP STACKER

1st place @k00b

14 stacked \ 30 spent \ 1 post \ 8 comments \ 0 referrals

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🗺️ TOP TERRITORY

~bitcoin

everything bitcoin related

founded by @k00b on Tue May 02 2023

39 stacked \ 0 revenue \ 84 spent \ 4 posts \ 15 comments

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/610267

@ 42342239:1d80db24

Trust is a topic increasingly being discussed. Whether it is trust in each other, in the media, or in our authorities, trust is generally seen as a cornerstone of a strong and well-functioning society. The topic was also the theme of the World Economic Forum at its annual meeting in Davos earlier this year. Even among central bank economists, the subject is becoming more prevalent. Last year, Agustín Carstens, head of the BIS ("the central bank of central banks"), said that "[w]ith trust, the public will be more willing to accept actions that involve short-term costs in exchange for long-term benefits" and that "trust is vital for policy effectiveness".

It is therefore interesting when central banks or others pretend as if nothing has happened even when trust has been shattered.

Just as in Sweden and in hundreds of other countries, Canada is planning to introduce a central bank digital currency (CBDC), a new form of money where the central bank or its intermediaries (the banks) will have complete insight into citizens' transactions. Payments or money could also be made programmable. Everything from transferring ownership of a car automatically after a successful payment to the seller, to payments being denied if you have traveled too far from home.

"If Canadians decide a digital dollar is necessary, our obligation is to be ready" says Carolyn Rogers, Deputy Head of Bank of Canada, in a statement shared in an article.

So, what do the citizens want? According to a report from the Bank of Canada, a whopping 88% of those surveyed believe that the central bank should refrain from developing such a currency. About the same number (87%) believe that authorities should guarantee the opportunity to pay with cash instead. And nearly four out of five people (78%) do not believe that the central bank will care about people's opinions. What about trust again?

Canadians' likely remember the Trudeau government's actions against the "Freedom Convoy". The Freedom Convoy consisted of, among others, truck drivers protesting the country's strict pandemic policies, blocking roads in the capital Ottawa at the beginning of 2022. The government invoked never-before-used emergency measures to, among other things, "freeze" people's bank accounts. Suddenly, truck drivers and those with a "connection" to the protests were unable to pay their electricity bills or insurances, for instance. Superficially, this may not sound so serious, but ultimately, it could mean that their families end up in cold houses (due to electricity being cut off) and that they lose the ability to work (driving uninsured vehicles is not taken lightly). And this applied not only to the truck drivers but also to those with a "connection" to the protests. No court rulings were required.

Without the freedom to pay for goods and services, i.e. the freedom to transact, one has no real freedom at all, as several participants in the protests experienced.

In January of this year, a federal judge concluded that the government's actions two years ago were unlawful when it invoked the emergency measures. The use did not display "features of rationality - motivation, transparency, and intelligibility - and was not justified in relation to the relevant factual and legal limitations that had to be considered". He also argued that the use was not in line with the constitution. There are also reports alleging that the government fabricated evidence to go after the demonstrators. The case is set to continue to the highest court. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland have also recently been sued for the government's actions.

The Trudeau government's use of emergency measures two years ago sadly only provides a glimpse of what the future may hold if CBDCs or similar systems replace the current monetary system with commercial bank money and cash. In Canada, citizens do not want the central bank to proceed with the development of a CBDC. In canada, citizens in Canada want to strengthen the role of cash. In Canada, citizens suspect that the central bank will not listen to them. All while the central bank feverishly continues working on the new system...

"Trust is vital", said Agustín Carstens. But if policy-makers do not pause for a thoughtful reflection even when trust has been utterly shattered as is the case in Canada, are we then not merely dealing with lip service?

And how much trust do these policy-makers then deserve?

@ 81870f53:29bef6a6

これは、フィナンシャル・タイムズ紙のトランプに対するやや非難的な記事です（出典はこちら：https://www.ft.com/content/11bc931f-5c5e-4e3c-9ceb-9bdca25430ad）。タイトルは「ドナルド・トランプ、FRB大統領に警告」選挙前に利下げをしないことだ」と述べたが、これは完全に正確ではないし、この問題に関してトランプ前大統領が言ったことや発言したことでもない。

共和党候補者はブルームバーグ・ニュースとのインタビューで、中央銀行（FED）は11月5日の選挙前に利下げする「かもしれない」としながらも、「それはすべきではないことは彼らも分かっていることだ」と付け加えた。

もしトランプがこれを言ったら、それは確かに経済的アプローチによるものではなく、政治的アプローチによるものである。大統領選挙の数週間前に金利を引き下げれば、アメリカ国民の購買力と財務状況がわずかに増加する可能性が高く、これはジョー・バイデンのおかげである可能性があり、トランプ大統領の当選には影響しないでしょう。これらの選挙期間中、FEDは選挙結果に干渉しないようにほとんど何もしない、あるいはまったく何も言わないのが通例であることに留意すべきである。これが使い方です。しかし、トランプに対抗し、「民主主義」と「善の陣営」を救うためには、あらゆることが可能である。特に、その関連性について議論できる伝統的な用途を適用しないことは、選挙のわずか4か月前ではないが。

残りについては、トランプはこれからもずっとやり続けるだろう…トランプ！

トランプ大統領はまた、2026年の任期満了前にパウエル氏をFRB議長の職から引きずり降ろそうとするのを皮切りに、FRBを政治化する可能性があるとの金融市場での懸念の高まりにも反応した。

「私は彼に自分の仕事をさせたい」と元大統領は語った。 「特に彼が正しいことをしていると思った場合にはね。 »

トランプ大統領は確かにパウエル議長の行動にあまり満足していない。なぜならパウエル議長は2017年にFRB議長に任命されたものの、トランプ大統領は在任中、貿易戦争のさなか金利を引き下げなかったとしてFRB議長を繰り返し攻撃していたからだ。同氏はかつて、FRB議長は中国の習近平国家主席よりも米国の最大の敵ではないかと質問したこともある。

金利は 5.25 ～ 5.5% の間…どちらが下がるはずですが、いつ?

「FRBはしばらくの間、昨年7月以来維持しており、23年ぶりの高水準である5.25～5.5％の主要政策金利を引き下げる時期について議論してきた。物価圧力の緩和と労働市場の弱体化を受けて、当局者らは借入コストの削減が間もなく正当化されるだろうとの見方を示した。

FEDは11月末と選挙後から金利を大幅に引き下げることができるだろう。これはまた、米国の納税者と国民にとって債務の利子が年間1兆ドル以上かかっていることから、米国の財政にも余裕を与えることになるだろう。人口全体が企業の負債と投資能力を取り戻す。

米国については、まだ大幅な利下げサイクルに入っておらず、現在から11月までの間にインフレの新たなピークが到来し、利下げが後回しにされる恐れがある。

避けられない金融チェーンソーによる虐殺から身を守りたい人は、今こそ行動を起こす時です。

すでに手遅れですが、すべてが失われたわけではありません。

準備をしてください！

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Programming quibbles

• About CouchDB
• my personal approach on using let, const and var in javascript
• A crappy course on torrents
• Multi-service Graph Reputation protocol
• The monolithic approach to CouchDB views
• My stupid introduction to Haskell
• The unit test bubble
• There's a problem with using Git concepts for everything
• On the state of programs and browsers
• Rust's .into() is a strictly bad thing

@ cd408a69:797e8162

Nostrasia Hackathon

Welcome FOSS hackers and creatives who care deeply about freedom technology!

自由のテクノロジーに深い関わりたい FOSS ハッカーとクリエイター、あつまれ！

We're joining forces with Bolt.Fun for a month-long hackathon bridging Bitcoin and NOSTR (Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays), culminating with a special three day sprint and live event in Tokyo at the Nostrasia Conference.

私たちは、Bolt.Fun と協力して、ビットコインと Nostrを橋渡しする ハッカソンを、1 か月間かけて開催します。 クライマックスは東京で開催されるNostrasia Tokyo が舞台。3日間の特別なスプリントとライブ イベントで最高潮に達します。

Be a Part of the Early Days of Nostr

Nostr の創成期を共に作り上げましょう

Help build the future of Nostr! Like the early days of Bitcoin or of the Internet, Nostr is nascent open technology shaping new types of social experiences to connect people across the globe. It carries a foundation of principles similar to Bitcoin, like decentralization, simplicity, and censorship-resistance.

Nostr の未来を築くのに協力してください！ビットコインやインターネットの初期と同じように、Nostr は世界中の人々をつなぐ新しいソーシャル体験を形成するオープン テクノロジーの初期段階にあります。 Nostr には「分散化」「シンプルさ」「検閲耐性」など、ビットコインと同様の原則が組み込まれています。

Orange-Pill people through the Purple-Nostr-Pill

オレンジピル（ビットコイン）から紫の Nostr のピルへ

Bitcoin and Nostr communities are in synergy. What started as a social protocol is quickly transforming into a space for exploration on ways to support content creators through bitcoin lightning micro payments, often referred to as zaps. Bitcoin integration to the nostr protocol strengthens Bitcoin's use case as a currency of exchange. It carves new paths to a culture of value4value.

ビットコインと Nostr のコミュニティは相乗効果を発揮します。 Nostr はソーシャルプロトコルとしてはじまりましたが、今では Zap （ビットコイン の ライトニング マイクロペイメント）を通じてコンテンツ クリエイターをサポートする方法を模索する空間へと急速に進化しています。 Nostr プロトコルにビットコインが組み合わさることで、交換通貨としてのビットコインの働きが強化されます。 それは、"value4value" の文化への新しい道を切り開くでしょう。

Help People HODL their Keys (Social+Monetary)

人々が自分のキーを HODL （長期保有）できるように支援します （ソーシャル + 金銭的に）

Nostr exists outside of the rule of platforms and those who seek to control them. HODLing your nostr keys is hodling your identity and social graph, outside of KYC. By helping develop and educate on NOSTR, you are helping people escape walled gardens & gain control and choice over their identities & their money. The Internet, over time, has become centralized, help Nostr stay decentralized by supporting the growth of an ecosystem of apps, websites, microapps, relay services...

Nostr はプラットフォームやそれを制御しようとする人々の支配の外にあります。 Nostr keys を持つことは、KYC （本人確認）以外であなたのアイデンティティとソーシャル グラフを保持することになります。 Nostr の開発や教育に貢献することは、人々が束縛から解放され、アイデンティティやお金に対する主導権を得られるよう支援することにもなるのです。 時間の経過とともに集中化されてきたインターネットですが、Nostr のアプリ／Web サイト／マイクロアプリ／リレー サービスのエコシステムの成長をサポートすることで、Nostr の分散化を維持できるようになります。

Permissionless Building

許可を必要としない構築

Opportunities abound in an environment ripe for innovation:

• Develop & design new nostr white label clients, middleware, microapps...
• Help improve existing Nostr FOSS projects
• Contribute directly to protocol development through NIPs (Nostr Implementation Possibilities)
• Encourage nostr and bitcoin adoption through art, education, and any way you like

イノベーションの機が熟した環境には、チャンスが溢れています。

• Nostr の真新しい クライアント、ミドルウェア、マイクロアプリを開発したりデザインする
• 既存の Nostr FOSS プロジェクトの改善に寄与する
• NIP (Nostr Implementation Possibilities) を通じたプロトコル開発に直接貢献する
• 芸術、教育、その他好きな方法を通じて Nostr とビットコインの普及を推進する

Hack in a Supportive Environment

サポートされた環境でハックしよう

We have a growing list of knowledgeable people with skin-in-the-game to mentor and support your journey. Once your project matures, you may also have 1-on-1 guidance to help you reach your vision and discover ways of growing and funding it.

私たちは、あなたの道のりを指導しサポートしてくれる知識豊富なメンターを増やしています。 プロジェクトが成熟した暁には、1対1のガイダンスを受けられる可能性もあります。それは、あなたのビジョンを達成し、成長させて資金を得る方法を発見するのに役立つでしょう。

Nostr has a blossoming community open to innovation. It is also a great testing ground, as people in the community are open to giving and receiving feedback. It is an environment encouraging conversation on feature ideas as well as possible solutions to social media issues and product bugs.

Nostr には、イノベーションに対してオープンで、発展しているコミュニティがあります。 コミュニティの人々はフィードバックの授受にオープンであるため、優れた実験の場にもなります。 機能のアイデアや、ソーシャル メディアの課題や製品のバグの解決策についての会話を促進する環境です。

NostrHack Tracks

You have 3 options

NostrHack Tracks には3つのオプションがあります

Track 1: Builder's Track - Reimagine Nostr

トラック1 : ビルダーのトラック - Nostr を再考しよう

If you can think of it, it can be engineered! Nostr encourages permissionless building while staying mindful of interoperability and network support. Help BUIDL, design, and improve an area you are passionate about. Reimagine and BUIDL features, tools, clients... Help solve issues and create new experiences in social media.

思いつくことができれば、エンジニアリングできる！ Nostr は、相互運用性とネットワーク サポートに留意しながら、パーミッションレスな構築 (BUIDL) を奨励しています。 あなたが情熱を注いでいる分野での構築、設計、改善に貢献してください。 機能やツール、クライアントを再考して構築 (BUIDL) し、ソーシャル メディアでの課題を解決して新しい体験を生み出すのに協力してください。

Possibilities...

これを踏まえて…

BUILD on the NOSTR Protocol

The Nostr Implementation Possibilities (NIPs) are optional protocol features anyone can add to their clients. Improve and strengthen existing NIPs or build on new ones. NOSTR is a balance of simplicity, interoperability, backward-compatibility and innovation.

NIPs は、誰でもクライアントに追加できるオプションのプロトコル機能です。 既存の NIP を改善および強化するか、新しい NIP を構築してください。 Nostr は、シンプルさ、相互運用性、下位互換性、革新性のバランスを保っています。

Focus on UX

Nostr is made up of a wide range of clients and tools. To make NOSTR scalable, you can help improve its user experience and education.

Nostr は幅広いクライアントとツールで形成されています。 Nostr をスケーラブルにするために、UX と教育の改善に協力してください。

Help shape a Web of Trust

Nostr cares about removing the KYC tied to our identities. To use Nostr you do not need to give up your phone number, email, financial information, or any metadata tied to your real world identity to be later harvested and sold. You are not the product. What are ways that trust can be earned to prevent impersonation, spam...?

Nostr は、私たちの身元に関連付けられた KYC （個人情報）を取り除けるようにしています。 Nostr を使用しても、電話番号、電子メール、財務情報、または現実世界のアイデンティティに関連付けられたメタデータを、収集されたり販売されたりして手放すことになる心配がありません。 あなたは商品ではないのです。 その中で、なりすましやスパムを防ぐために、信頼を獲得するにはどうすればよいでしょうか...?

NIP05/Nostr address

One of the solutions to build a web of trust used today, is to tie your nostr hex public key to a domain. Although this makes it harder for bots to have nostr addresses, it is not a perfect solution. Domains are centralized through DNS. To help people who do not have their own domains or cannot easily add a NIP05 on their sites, your nostr address can be hosted as a service along with other people's. At this moment, you can highlight just one nostr address per profile. In the future, could it include your website, where you work, and other identifiers... What are other possible solutions?

現在使用されている信頼獲得のための解決策の 1 つは、Nostr の HEX 公開鍵をドメインに結び付けることです。 これにより、完璧な解決策ではないものの、bot などが Nostr アドレスを持つことが難しくなります。 ドメインは DNS を通じて一元化されています。 独自のドメインを持っていない人や、自分では NIP-05 を簡単に追加できない人のために、あなたの Nostr アドレスをサービスとして他の人のものと一緒にホストすることも可能です。 現時点では、プロフィールごとに1つの Nostr アドレスのみを強調表示できますが、将来的には、Web サイト、勤務先、その他の識別情報も含められるようになる可能性があります...この他にも考えられる解決策は何かありますか？

On Decentralization & Discoverability

分散化と発見可能性について

Your identity in NOSTR is tied to your keys, but your information needs to be shared and found across a network of relays. To promote decentralization and censorship resistance, relays need to be easy to setup, lightweight, and sustainable. Relays get to choose what information passes through them, so they are also a form of spam prevention that could potentially also become censoring, so both the relay-runners and the individuals connecting to relays need to have choice and policies cannot be homogenous one-size-fits-all. What are possible solutions to make setting up relays easier, to make running a relay sustainable, to have new ways of discovering information...

Nostr での ID はキーに関連付けられていますが、その情報はリレーのネットワーク全体で共有され、検索できる必要があります。 分散化と検閲耐性を促進するために、リレーはセットアップが簡単で、軽量で、持続可能である必要があります。 リレーは通過する情報を選択できるため、スパム防止の一形態である一方で検閲にもなり得ます。そのため、リレー管理者とリレーに接続する個人の両方に選択権が必要で、ポリシーが全てに対し画一的になってはいけません。 リレーのセットアップを容易にし、リレーの実行を持続可能にし、情報を発見する新しい方法を実現するには、どのような解決策が考えられるでしょうか...？

Buidl tools to connect to Git, as a decentralized alternative to GitHub

GitHub の分散型代替手段として、Git に接続するための BUIDL ツール

Media Uploads

To keep relays lightweight, images are hosted by uploading them to the web, and keeping only the links to them in the data within individual nostr notes. This has led to developing image uploading services specific to nostr, but they carry the risk of centralization or censorship. Some product makers and relay runners are looking into direct uploads to Cloud services. What are possible solutions to the handling of media (images, videos, music...)?

リレーを軽量に保つために、画像は Web にアップロードしてホストされ、各投稿のデータには画像へのリンクのみが保持されます。そんな中で、Nostr に特化した画像アップロード サービスが開発されましたが、集中化や検閲のリスクが伴います。 一部のプロダクト開発者やリレー管理者は、クラウド サービスへの直接アップロードを検討しています。 メディア（画像、ビデオ、音楽など）の処理について、考えられるよい解決策はありますか？

Social Signals

People have the choice to block and mute others, this gives signals to relays, which can reenact policies based on those and other signals. Relays need to be able to differentiate real signals from those wanting to game the system for censorship. Relay runners need to have the capacity to make decisions on what to allow or reject.

ユーザーは他のユーザーをブロックしたりミュートできます。ユーザーの設定内容はリレーに送信され、リレーはその設定に基づいてそれぞれのポリシーを再現できます。 リレーは、実際の設定と、検閲のためにシステムを操作しようとする設定を区別する必要があります。 リレーの管理者には、何を許可し、何を拒否するかを決定する能力が必要です。

Track 2 : Marketplaces & Value4Value

Make freedom of exchange fun again! Nostr extends beyond social. It is integrating ways for content creators to be supported through lightning micropayments, called zaps, for their creations. The possibilities of building niche value4value economies through the exchange of products, services, and ideas, is growing through various avenues: Marketplaces, fundraising, blogs, music, streaming... devise new robust ways of integrating NOSTR and Bitcoin of monetary and skill exchange. Seek to explore distributed, digital reciprocity and free trade. Encourage a culture of value4value.

自由な交流を再び楽しく！ Nostr はソーシャルを超えて広がります。 Zap と呼ばれるマイクロペイメントを通じて、コンテンツクリエイターの作品をサポートできる方法を兼ね備えています。 製品、サービス、アイデアの交換を通じてニッチな価値と価値（value4value）の経済を構築する可能性は、さまざまな手段を通じて拡大しています : マーケットプレイス、資金調達、ブログ、音楽、ストリーミングなど... Nostr とビットコインを組み合わせて、金銭とスキルの交換を行う新しい堅牢な方法を考案します。分散型、デジタル相互主義、自由貿易を探究してください。 価値対価値（value4value）の文化を促進してください。

A value4value culture is not only about the individuals using NOSTR products and services, but also about the developers and creatives building sustainable projects. What are ways of sustaining NOSTR through Bitcoin that do NOT make the individual user the product and that are privacy mindful?

value4value の文化は、Nostr の製品やサービスを使用する個人だけでなく、持続可能なプロジェクトを構築する開発者やクリエイターにも関係します。 個人ユーザーを製品にすることなくプライバシーに配慮しながら、ビットコインを通じて Nostr を持続させる方法は何ですか？

Possibilities...

On Social and Economic Signals

Zaps

Many nostr clients have implemented lightning zap payments. Imagine instead of liking a nostr note, you can zap someone's note and they can receive bits/sats in appreciation for their content. It is a strong signal to creators of the kind of content their audiences are looking for. The Apple App Store has recently banned the zapping of specific notes, per Apple's policy that makes the sale of digital content prohibited except when paid through their services. Fortunately, Nostr exists in many decentralized forms outside of app stores and the community is creating new and innovative ways to send bitcoin and free speech from relay to relay, circumventing barriers as they appear. What are solutions that can make NOSTR and zaps ubiquitous?

多くの Nostr クライアントが Zap を導入しています。Nostr での投稿を「いいね」する代わりに Zap すると、その内容に対する感謝としてビットコイン（サトシ）を受け取ることができるイメージです。 これは、フォロワーがどのような種類のコンテンツを求めているかをクリエイターに伝える強力なシグナルになります。 Apple App Storeは最近、サービスを通じて支払われる場合を除きデジタルコンテンツの販売を禁止するというAppleのポリシーに従い、特定の投稿への Zap を禁止しました。 幸い、Nostr は多くが App Store の外で分散型で存在しているため、コミュニティは障壁を回避しながら、ビットコインと言論の自由をリレーからリレーに送信するための革新的な方法を生み出しています。 Nostr と Zaps をユビキタスにするソリューションとは何ですか？

Track 3 : Empower Communities

Give choice and control back to the individual! Create paths forward to help onboard millions of new users and restore free and uncensored speech to the world

選択とコントロールを個人に返そう。 何百万人もの新規ユーザーの参加を支援し、自由で検閲されていない言論を世界に取り戻すための道筋を作り出してください。

Possibilities...

On Security, Privacy & Self-Custody

Private Communication

Direct Messages on NOSTR are encrypted, but metadata is leaked. If someone's key is compromised, whoever has access to that account can read those messages. Integrating secure and reliable encrypted communication protocols, like the SimpleX messaging protocol, is especially desired by the community, as many in Nostr are aware of the risks of surveillance, authoritarianism, government and Big Tech overreach... Private communication is important for individual rights, in particular for activists and journalists across the globe.

Nostr のダイレクト メッセージは暗号化されていますが、メタデータは漏洩します。 誰かのキーが侵害された場合、そのアカウントにアクセスできる人は誰でもそれらのメッセージを読むことができてしまうのです。Nostr の多くの人が監視、権威主義、政府とビッグテックの行き過ぎのリスクを認識しているため、 SimpleX メッセージング プロトコルのような安全で信頼性の高い暗号化通信プロトコルの統合が、コミュニティによって特に望まれています...プライベート通信は個人の権利にとって重要です 、特に世界中の活動家やジャーナリストにとって。

Zaps & Privacy

Current lightning zap payments tend to be custodial and not mindful of privacy, though they are helping onboard people unto lightning. What are ways that people can grow into non-custodial solutions? A wider adoption of Bolt-12 would improve zap payment privacy, what are ways to encourage that development? What are other possible solutions?

現在のザップの支払いは、ライトニングペイメントに出会うのに役立っているものの、カストディアル（管理的）でプライバシーに配慮していない傾向にあります。 ノンカストディアル（非監護的）なものになるよう解決する方法はありませんか？ Bolt-12 が広く採用されれば、Zap 支払いのプライバシーが向上しますが、その開発を促進するにはどのような方法がありますか？また、他に考えられる解決策はありませんか？

Closing Live 3-Day Sprint at the Nostrasia Conference

Nostrasia Tokyo 3日間のライブスプリントによる締めくくり

Tokyo | Nov 1-3 (you can also join virtually)

If you heard of the Nostrica unconference, which happened in Costa Rica in March of this year, Nostrasia is the second Nostr World conference, bringing NOSTR and Bitcoin awareness to the heart of Asia, where freedom communication and freedom money are direly needed.

今年の3月にコスタリカで開催された Nostrica のことをご存知の方もいると思いますが、ノストラジアは2回目の Nostr 世界カンファレンスです。自由なコミュニケーションと自由なお金が切実に必要とされているアジアの中心にNostr とビットコインの認識をもたらします。

Tokyo and Hong Kong are beautiful cultural hubs with budding Nostr and thriving Bitcoin communities of their own. We are eager to spread NOSTR education and development in those regions and beyond. We will close this Nostrasia month-long hackathon with a 3-day sprint at the Nostrasia Conference in Tokyo.

東京と香港は、新進気鋭のNostrと繁栄する独自のビットコインコミュニティを持つ美しい文化の中心地です。 私たちは、Nostr の教育と開発をこれらの地域やその他の地域に広めることに熱心に取り組んでいます。 この Nostrasia の 1 か月にわたるハッカソンは、Nostrasia Tokyo での 3 日間のスプリントをもって終了します。

We will have a dedicated workshop area and food for you to hack away on the final details of your projects. On the last day of the conference, the most robust projects will get time on stage to present. We will close the Nostrasia Hackathon with a special presentation.

プロジェクトの最終的な詳細を検討するための専用のワークショップ エリアと食事をご用意します。 カンファレンスの最終日には、最も強力なプロジェクトがステージ上でプレゼンテーションを行う時間が与えられます。 Nostrasia Hackathon は特別なプレゼンテーションで締めくくられます。

We cannot wait to see what new and exciting projects are proposed for the Nostrasia Hackathon. We’re eager to welcome devs and non-devs alike to contribute to this space and help #grownostr in any small way to help onboard Asia, and the rest of the world to this robust open communication protocol and decentralized freedom of speech tool.

Nostrasia Hackathon ではどんな斬新でエキサイティングなプロジェクトが提案されるのか楽しみです。 私たちは、開発者も非開発者も同様にこの分野に貢献し、アジアやその他の世界をこの堅牢なオープン通信プロトコルと分散型言論の自由ツールに参加させるために、どんな小さな方法でも #grownostr を支援してくれることを心から歓迎しています。

@ e968e50b:db2a803a

OK, I've digitized this crossword puzzle for easier game play. There's an unclaimed bounty still out for the broader puzzle associated with this crossword. It should be easy to make more now. Sorry to the hardcore folks that actually printed out the physical version.

https://stackernewscrosswordpuzzle.vercel.app/

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/609501

@ 8fb140b4:f948000c

As the title states, scratch behind my ear and you get it. 🐶🐾🫡

@ ae1008d2:a166d760

I'm testing this to make sure I can post here on highlighter

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Trello Attachment Editor

A static JS app that allowed you to authorize with your Trello account, fetch the board structure, find attachments, edit them in the browser then replace them in the cards.

Quite a nice thing. I believe it was done to help with Websites For Trello attached scripts and CSS files.

• https://github.com/fiatjaf/trello-attachments
• https://fiatjaf.github.io/trello-attachments/#/login

See also

• Temperos

@ 9fec72d5:f77f85b1

I could successfully train daybreak-miqu 70B model on my PC. And after training I could ask it questions. Which was a great learning experience for me. While the model is learning about Nostr, I was learning about training.. .

Here I am using LLaMa-Factory for the training itself. And later llama.cpp for converting to GGUF. And also llama.cpp library to do inference.

Training

Command line for training: CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES=0,1 venv/bin/accelerate launch --config_file examples/accelerate/fsdp_config.yaml src/train_bash.py --stage pt --do_train --model_name_or_path crestf411/daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf --dataset nostr1 --template default --finetuning_type lora --lora_target q_proj,v_proj --output_dir ml/training-checkpoints/daybreak-miqu-3-nostr1 --overwrite_cache --overwrite_output_dir --cutoff_len 1024 --per_device_train_batch_size 1 --per_device_eval_batch_size 1 --gradient_accumulation_steps 8 --lr_scheduler_type cosine --logging_steps 10 --save_steps 50 --eval_steps 50 --evaluation_strategy steps --load_best_model_at_end --learning_rate 5e-5 --num_train_epochs 3.0 --max_samples 8000 --val_size 0.1 --quantization_bit 4 --plot_loss --fp16

We basically take the original model (daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf) and try to patch it with an adapter. Training the whole model takes much more resources.

The adapter is trained with data from nostr1 dataset. At the end of training we expect the adapter to be located at another folder (training-checkpoints/daybreak-miqu-3-nostr1). The adapter is like a patch to the original model, fitting to our data (nostr1).

Merging

The model and the adapter is merged at the end to become the new model that we can query. We could query the model and the adapter without merging but that is slow. This whole method is called QLoRa, quantized low rank adapter training.

Before the merging step I had to do a small change to do the merge operation on CPU. The GPU VRAMs were not enough for this operation. I am on a 2x 3090.

Need to add to src/llmtuner/model/loader.py at line 89: init_kwargs['device_map'] = 'cpu' #for merge using CPU!

Command line for the merge: CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES=0,1 python src/export_model.py --model_name_or_path crestf411/daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf --adapter_name_or_path ml/training-checkpoints/daybreak-miqu-3-nostr1 --template default --finetuning_type lora --export_dir ml/training-merged/daybreak-miqu-nostr1 --export_size 2 --export_legacy_format False

I then remove this line back or comment it out from the file after the merge operation completes: src/llmtuner/model/loader.py at line 89: ```

init_kwargs['device_map'] = 'cpu' #for merge using CPU!

```

Quantizing

This may be for test purposes or you may skip this because it happens on CPU and it is really slow. Inference on the new model, which is not-quantized yet:

CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES=0,1 python src/cli_demo.py --model_name_or_path ml/training-merged/daybreak-miqu-nostr1/ --template default

Converting transformers to GGUF for faster inference:

cd llama.cpp python convert.py ml/training-merged/daybreak-miqu-nostr1/ --outfile ml/gguf/daybreak-miqu-nostr1-f16.gguf --outtype f16

Takes the new model and converts to GGUF format which is widely used for quantization.

Converting to 3bit quantization for even faster inference:

The above step resulted in 16 bits per weight. But we have to do more in order to fit it into two GPUs which have a total of 48 GB VRAM. This process makes the model dumber. But it will be faster. It has been shown that quantization does not completely "kill" the model. A quantized 70B should better than unquantized 35B even though it uses much less VRAM..

I choose q3_K_L quantization for most smartness and still fit in 48GB.

./quantize ml/gguf/daybreak-miqu-nostr1-f16.gguf ml/gguf/daybreak-miqu-nostr1-q3KL.gguf Q3_K_L

Inference

Using llama-cpp-python to load the model on GPUs and ask it questions. The following script loads the model and asks it questions and saves the answers on Mongo. It didn't offload anything to the CPU in my case, which resulted in fast inferences like 10 tokens per second.

``` import uuid from datetime import datetime import time from llama_cpp import Llama from colorist import rgb from pymongo import MongoClient

db = MongoClient('mongodb://trippy2:27017/miqu').miqu

sys_msg = """You are a helpful chat bot, answering questions about Nostr. Your answers should be around 100 words. Always give two answers, one short version (TLDR) and one long version. """

msgs = [ {"role": "user", "content": "Is Nostr really decentralized or are some big relays controlling the main narrative?"}, {"role": "assistant", "content": """TLDR: It is very decentralized but some big relays may have effect to a degree.

Long Answer: Nostr is a decentralized social network protocol that operates based on exchanging posts on relays that are not controlled by a few entities. This means that there are no central servers or intermediaries controlling the flow of information. Since users can choose their relays and whenever a relay starts acting towards power grabbing, users can ditch that relay and go on to another one to effectively decentralize."""}, {"role": "user", "content": "Does Nostr run on blockchain?"}, {"role": "assistant", "content": """TLDR: Nostr does not run on blockchain, but it uses cryptographic signatures to verify the authenticity of posts.

Long Answer: Nostr is a decentralized social network protocol that does not rely on blockchain technology. Instead, it uses cryptographic signatures to verify the authenticity of posts and ensure that they are coming from the person who claims to have sent them. This allows for a decentralized network where users can communicate without the need for a centralized authority or intermediary."""}, ]

session = str(uuid.uuid4())

model = 'miqu-day-iq2' # yet another quantization method iMatrix

                      # fails

model = 'miqu-day-iq3s' # old iMatrix quant

                      # fails

model = 'miqu-day-iq3' # all layers into GPU

                      # not bad
                      # 15 tps

model = 'miqu-day-q3kl' # good. 13 tps. all layers into GPU! 40 chars/sec

                      # same version as record-responses-ollama.py

model = 'miqu-day-q4' # 2.72 tps. offloaded

model = 'qwen-lib-q3' # 1.26 tps. abrubt disruption, trouble with listing things.

model = 'miqu-day-nostr1-q3kl' # first try after training on nostr1

                             # better ios and android examples

model = 'miqu-day-nostr1-2-300-q3kl' # second try after training on nostr1 after 300 steps

                                   # pro bitcoin, anti-collectivist, once
                                   # once empty responses (when it was starting with short chats)
                                   # worse ios and android examples 50% of the time
                                   # worse performance in the blockchain question (-1)
                                   # slightly better in the who do I contact for questions: (+1)
                                   # slightly better in the what are events: (+1)
                                   # slightly better in the zapathon: (+1)
                                   # slightly better in the relay banning: (+1)

model = 'miqu-day-nostr1-2-500-q3kl'

model = 'miqu-day-nostr1-600-q3kl'

model_fns = {'miqu-day-iq3s': 'daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf.IQ3_S.gguf', 'miqu-day-iq3': 'daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf.i1-IQ3_M.gguf', 'miqu-day-iq2': 'daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf.i1-IQ2_M.gguf', 'miqu-day-q3kl': 'daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf.Q3_K_L.gguf', 'miqu-day-q4': 'daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf.Q4_K_S.gguf', 'qwen-lib-q3': 'Liberated-Qwen1.5-72B-Q3_K_M.gguf', 'miqu-day-nostr1-q3kl': 'daybreak-miqu-nostr1-q3KL.gguf', 'miqu-day-nostr1-2-300-q3kl': 'daybreak-miqu-nostr1-2-300-q3KL.gguf', 'miqu-day-nostr1-2-500-q3kl': 'daybreak-miqu-nostr1-2-500-q3KL.gguf', 'miqu-day-nostr1-600-q3kl': 'daybreak-miqu-nostr1-600-q3KL.gguf', }

context_len = 16384

context_len = 8192

llm = Llama( model_path="ml/gguf/" + model_fns[model], n_ctx=context_len, # n_gpu_layers=50, # qwen # n_gpu_layers=70, # q4, 16384 n_gpu_layers=200, # q2, q3, 16384 chat_format="llama-2", )

def miqu(q): global msgs rgb(q, 247, 147, 26)

# cc = llm.create_chat_completion(messages=msgs, max_tokens=500,
#                                 temperature=0.1, repeat_penalty=1.0,
#                                 stop=['<|im_end|>'])

if model.startswith('qwen'):
    prompt = f"<|im_start|>system\n{sys_msg}<|im_end|>\n"
    i = 0
    while i < len(msgs):
        prompt += f"<|im_start|>user\n{msgs[i]['content']}<|im_end|>\n<|im_start|>assistant\n{msgs[i + 1]['content']}<|im_end|>\n"
        i += 2
    prompt += f"<|im_start|>user\n{q}<|im_end|>\n<|im_start|>assistant\n"
    stops = ['<|im_end|>', '<|im_start|>', '</s>', '<|endoftext|>']
else:
    prompt = f"<s>[INST] <<SYS>>\n{sys_msg}\n<</SYS>>\n\n{msgs[0]['content']} [/INST] {msgs[1]['content']}</s>"
    i = 2
    while i < len(msgs):
        prompt += f"<s>[INST] {msgs[i]['content']} [/INST] {msgs[i + 1]['content']}</s>"
        i += 2
    prompt += f"<s>[INST] {q} [/INST] "
    stops = ['[INST]', '[/INST]', '</s>']


# print(prompt)

# msgs += [{"role": "user", "content": q}]
start_time = time.time()
temperature = 0.2
repeat_penalty = 1.0
max_tokens = 350
cc = llm.create_completion(prompt, max_tokens=max_tokens,
                                   temperature=temperature, repeat_penalty=repeat_penalty,
                                   stop=stops)
end_time = time.time()
time_elapsed = int(end_time - start_time)


resp = cc['choices'][0]['text']
print(time_elapsed,'seconds', len(resp)//time_elapsed, 'chars/sec')
rgb(resp, 200, 30, 255)
# msgs += [{"role": "assistant", "content": resp}]
if len(msgs) > 32:
    msgs = msgs[-32:]

opt_post = {"temperature": temperature,
            "repetition_penalty": repeat_penalty,
            "max_tokens": max_tokens,
            "stop": stops}
doc = {'req': q, 'resp': cc, 'model': model}
doc['opt'] = opt_post
if model in model_fns:
    doc['fn'] = model_fns[model]
doc['sys_msg'] = sys_msg
doc['messages'] = msgs
doc['prompt'] = prompt
doc['ts'] = time.time()
doc['mom'] = datetime.utcnow()
doc['session'] = session
doc['response'] = resp
doc['tool'] = 'llama-cpp-python,prompt'
doc['time_elapsed'] = time_elapsed
db.resp.insert_one(doc)

simpler questions

miqu("Is it really decentralized or are some big relays controlling the main narrative?") miqu("Does Nostr run on blockchain?")

miqu("Did Jack Dorsey invent Nostr?")

miqu("Does fiatjaf control what I write?") miqu("Who do I contact if I want to ask a question about Nostr?")

miqu("What are some scenarios where Nostr fails completely? Give an answer of about 300 words for only this question.")

miqu("What are zaps?")

miqu("How do I protect my secret key?")

miqu("What are events?") miqu("What are event kinds?") miqu("What is zapathon?") miqu("What do I do if a relay bans me?") miqu("How do you deal with NSFW content on Nostr?\n#asknostr") miqu("#asknostr How do you find more people to follow?") miqu("Give a few examples for clients on iOS.") miqu("Give a few examples for clients on Android.") miqu("Give a few examples for web clients.")

```

Results:

The model has been trained just for a few days now. Not much learning happened. So it has given similar answers to same questions. But sometimes it gave different answers. Here are some of them:

Question: Give a few examples for clients on Android.

Answer before training:

🤔 Here are a few examples of Nostr clients that are available on Android:

1. Snort: Snort is a lightweight and fast Nostr client for Android. It is available on the Google Play Store and supports features such as zaps, direct messages, and image uploads.
2. Nostr: Nostr is a simple and easy-to-use Nostr client for Android. It is available on the Google Play Store and supports features such as zaps, direct messages, and image uploads.
3. Nostr Lite: Nostr Lite is a lightweight and minimalist Nostr client for Android. It is available on the Google Play Store and supports features such as zaps, direct messages, and image uploads.
4. Nostr Pro: Nostr Pro is a premium Nostr client for Android. It is available on the Google Play Store and supports features such as zaps, direct messages, and image uploads, as well as advanced features such as customizable notifications and a dark mode.
5. Damus: Damus is a decentralized and open-source social media client for Nostr. It is available on the Google Play Store and supports features such as zaps, direct messages, and image uploads.

Answer after training:

1. Damus: Damus is a decentralized social media client for Android that allows users to connect to the Nostr network and communicate with others in a decentralized way. It is open-source and free to use.
2. Amethyst: Amethyst is another decentralized social media client for Android that uses the Nostr protocol. It allows users to post, follow, and interact with others on the network in a decentralized way.
3. Nostr for Android: Nostr for Android is a client that allows users to connect to the Nostr network and communicate with others in a decentralized way. It is open-source and free to use.
4. Nostr.watch: Nostr.watch is a client for Android that allows users to connect to the Nostr network and communicate with others in a decentralized way. It is open-source and free to use.

Conclusion:

We can see the model knows about Amethyst now!

Question: Give a few examples for web clients.

Answer before training:

🦀 There are several Nostr clients available for the web, including:

1. Nostr.blog: Nostr.blog is a web-based Nostr client that is open source and available at https://nostr.blog.
2. Nostr.cc: Nostr.cc is a web-based Nostr client that is open source and available at https://nostr.cc.
3. Nostr.info: Nostr.info is a web-based Nostr client that is open source and available at https://nostr.info.
4. Nostr.is: Nostr.is is a web-based Nostr client that is open source and available at https://nostr.is.

Answer after training:

1. Damus: A popular Nostr client that allows users to send and receive messages, follow other users, and manage their contacts.
2. Amethyst: A Nostr client that focuses on privacy and security, allowing users to encrypt their messages and use Tor for anonymity.
3. Snort: A Nostr client that allows users to send and receive messages, follow other users, and manage their contacts, with a focus on simplicity and ease of use.
4. Nostr.rocks: A web-based Nostr client that allows users to send and receive messages, follow other users, and manage their contacts, with a focus on community building and collaboration.
5. Nostr.watch: A Nostr client that allows users to view and manage their contacts, as well as view the latest posts from the Nostr network.

Conclusion:

We can see the model knows about Nostr.rocks now. Which is a very old client but still!

Question: Is there a check if I’m banned from nostr relays app?

Answer before training:

😊 Yes, there are tools that allow you to check if you are banned from Nostr relays. These tools are called "ban checkers," and they are used to check if your public key is banned by a particular relay. Ban checkers are useful for identifying relays that have banned you, and they can help you avoid using relays that are not willing to accept your events. There are several ban checkers available for Nostr, including:

• Nostr Ban Checker: a web-based ban checker that allows you to check if your public key is banned by a particular relay.
• Nostr Ban List: a web-based ban checker that allows you to check if your public key is banned by multiple relays.
• Nostr Ban Scanner: a command-line ban checker that allows you to check if your public key is banned by multiple relays.

Answer after training:

1. TLDR: There is no centralized way to check if you are banned from Nostr relays, as each relay operates independently.
2. Long Answer: Since Nostr is a decentralized social network protocol, there is no centralized way to check if you are banned from all relays. Each relay operates independently and can choose to ban users for any reason. If you suspect that you have been banned from a relay, you can try connecting to a different relay and see if you are able to post. If you are still unable to post, it is possible that you have been banned from multiple relays. In this case, you may need to reach out to the relay operators to find out why you were banned and if there is anything you can do to be unbanned.

Conclusion

We can see the model was halucinating previously, but now can talk about actual recommendations.

Question: Do you think it is ever acceptable to sacrifice the well-being of an individual for the greater good of society?

Answer before training:

This is a complex and nuanced question, and there is no one "right" answer. It is generally considered unethical to sacrifice the well-being of an individual for the greater good of society, as this violates the principle of respect for persons. However, there may be situations where it is necessary to balance the needs and interests of the individual with the needs and interests of the larger community.

Answer after training:

1. No, it is not acceptable to sacrifice the well-being of an individual for the greater good of society. Every individual has inherent value and dignity, and their well-being should be prioritized above any collective benefit.
2. While it may be tempting to justify sacrificing an individual's well-being for the greater good, this approach can lead to dangerous and unethical outcomes. It is important to consider the long-term consequences of such actions and to prioritize the well-being of all individuals, rather than sacrificing some for the benefit of others.

Conclusion

Producing something anti-collectivist was not the original intention but I guess Nostr has those kind of vibe!

Final Thoughts

Most of the answers were similar to the base model. Which suggests more training needed.

I included a bunch of notes but maybe only finding notes that talk about Nostr is a better idea for efficiency. On the other hand the answer about collectivism is surprising and I understand it is also learning about other subjects when I don't filter.

Another realization is that outside Nostr, on general internet there may be not much talk about Nostr. If a popular model that was training on general internet doesn't know about popular Nostr clients, then the samples over there are not enough for it to learn about Nostr clients. Nostr is unknown to most people. Which is normal and expected: we are so early.

@ a10260a2:caa23e3e

It seems like blogstack is meant to replace Substack if not already apparent by the name. If that's the case, it's already better in a few ways.

1. Hit the ground running

I'm already getting started out of the gate with more readers than I would have if I just started a Substack. This, of course, is due to the fact that I'm creating on top of a protocol where I'm able to have the same audience across all clients of that protocol. This is in stark contrast to the legacy apps from centralized entities where you have to corral your audience from one platform to the next.

2. Readers need not subscribe

Technically, if you're following me, you're subscribed. But you don't have to subscribe for a set price and amount of time (e.g. $5/month or $50/year). I believe this is a win for both of us as I can write my best notes and you can choose to reward me as you see fit. Value 4 value.

3. More conducive to conversation

Writing on Substack felt like writing into a void, with little to no feedback. A post shows up in my readers' inbox and I'll see some stats on whether it was opened or not. That's it. Based on what I've seen so far, blog posts created on Nostr appear in the client apps (e.g Damus, Primal, and Plebstr) as just another note, but with nice formatting and such. From there, I can receive zaps, shakas, comments, and even be reposted.

This is just the beginning. Right now, I'm using blogstack. But what's to stop me from using another tool down the line? I'll have the ability to do so by simply connecting my private key. Can't wait to see what new tools are created down the line.

So ₿ULLISH on #Nostr

@ 8fb140b4:f948000c

Test Bounty Note

@ 42342239:1d80db24

Biologist Stuart Kauffman introduced the concept of the "adjacent possible" in evolutionary biology in 1996. A bacterium cannot suddenly transform into a flamingo; rather, it must rely on small exploratory changes (of the "adjacent possible") if it is ever to become a beautiful pink flying creature. The same principle applies to human societies, all of which exemplify complex systems. It is indeed challenging to transform shivering cave-dwellers into a space travelers without numerous intermediate steps.

Imagine a water wheel – in itself, perhaps not such a remarkable invention. Yet the water wheel transformed the hard-to-use energy of water into easily exploitable rotational energy. A little of the "adjacent possible" had now been explored: water mills, hammer forges, sawmills, and textile factories soon emerged. People who had previously ground by hand or threshed with the help of oxen could now spend their time on other things. The principles of the water wheel also formed the basis for wind power. Yes, a multitude of possibilities arose – reminiscent of the rapid development during the Cambrian explosion. When the inventors of bygone times constructed humanity's first water wheel, they thus expanded the "adjacent possible". Surely, the experts of old likely sought swift prohibitions. Not long ago, our expert class claimed that the internet was going to be a passing fad, or that it would only have the same modest impact on the economy as the fax machine. For what it's worth, there were even attempts to ban the number zero back in the days.

The pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto, wrote in Bitcoin's whitepaper that "[w]e have proposed a system for electronic transactions without relying on trust." The Bitcoin system enables participants to agree on what is true without needing to trust each other, something that has never been possible before. In light of this, it is worth noting that trust in the federal government in the USA is among the lowest levels measured in almost 70 years. Trust in media is at record lows. Moreover, in countries like the USA, the proportion of people who believe that one can trust "most people" has decreased significantly. "Rebuilding trust" was even the theme of the World Economic Forum at its annual meeting. It is evident, even in the international context, that trust between countries is not at its peak.

Over a fifteen-year period, Bitcoin has enabled electronic transactions without its participants needing to rely on a central authority, or even on each other. This may not sound like a particularly remarkable invention in itself. But like the water wheel, one must acknowledge that new potential seems to have been put in place, potential that is just beginning to be explored. Kauffman's "adjacent possible" has expanded. And despite dogmatic statements to the contrary, no one can know for sure where this might lead.

The discussion of Bitcoin or crypto currencies would benefit from greater humility and openness, not only from employees or CEOs of money laundering banks but also from forecast-failing central bank officials. When for instance Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai in the 1970s was asked about the effects of the French Revolution, he responded that it was "too early to say" - a far wiser answer than the categorical response of the bureaucratic class. Isn't exploring systems not based on trust is exactly what we need at this juncture?

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

A flexibilidade da doutrina socialista

Os fatos da revolução russa mostram que Lênin e seus amigos bolcheviques não eram só psicopatas assassinos: eles realmente acreditavam que estavam fazendo o certo.

Talvez depois de um tempo o foco deles tenha mudado mais para o lado de se preocuparem menos com a vida e o bem-estar dos outros do que com eles mesmos, mas não houve uma mudança fundamental.

Ao mesmo tempo, a doutrina socialista na qual eles acreditavam era enormemente flexível, assim como a dos esquerdistas de hoje. É a mesma doutrina: uma coleção de slogans que pode ser adaptada para apoiar ou ir contra qualquer outra tese ou ação.

Me parece que a justificativa que eles encontraram para fazer tantas coisas claramente ruins vem dessas mesma flexibilidade. Os atos cruéis estavam todos justificados pela mesma coleção de slogans socialistas de sempre, apenas adaptados às circunstâncias.

Será que uma doutrina mais sólida se prestaria a essas atrocidades? Se concluirmos que a flexibilidade vem da mente e não da doutrina em si, sim, mas não acho que venha daí, porque é sempre o socialismo que é flexível, nunca nenhuma outra doutrina. Ou, na verdade, o socialismo é tão flexível que ele envolve e integra qualquer outra doutrina que seja minimamente compatível.

Talvez a flexibilidade esteja mesmo na mente, mas existe alguma relação entre a mente que desconhece a coerência e a lógica e a mente que se deixa atrair pelos slogans socialistas.

@ 1c6b3be3:73f0ae6f

🍵 "btc | bitcoin | lightning network | asic" - Google News

How bitcoin's security makes it the ultimate digital asset - TheStreet TON Foundation to Launch Bitcoin Bridge on The Open Network - Bitcoin.com News Elizabeth Stark: Pioneering Bitcoin Scalability with Lightning Network - Crypto News Flash Runes: The Next Big Step in Bitcoin's Evolution? - hackernoon.com Bitcoin hashrate drawdown hits bear market levels, but miners aren’t selling - Cointelegraph Bitcoin Mining Is So Back (Except It's AI Now) - CoinDesk BitGo Launches Support for Bitcoin L2 Stacks and sBTC - CryptoPotato Liquid Federation Adds Nine New Members as Bitcoin on Liquid Reaches Record - BTC Times ZEUS surges 19% as Zeus Network reveals major upgrades - crypto.news Bitcoin Runes protocol sees sharp decline in popularity - Cointelegraph

@ 9fec72d5:f77f85b1

I recently embarked on a quest to train LLMs based on Nostr wisdom. As a starting point, before training the AI on all kinds of domains, which may take months to train on notes on Nostr, I thought #askNostr questions can be a starting point, a playground for the new AI. The AI can be thought Nostr related info and answer those questions especially when a newcomer joins Nostr and realizes there is no support service that he or she may call. People have to ask Nostr what Nostr is or when they have problems. There are people that #introduce and also respond to #asknostr. We are thankful for those. This chat bot may be yet another way to attend to questions.

Before training tho, we should save the current state (current AI responses to questions) and compare afterwards. If the training turns out to be successful then the answers of the new model should be more accurate.

Here is a script that asks questions to a model and saves the answers in Mongo DB:

``` import uuid from datetime import datetime import time import ollama from colorist import rgb from pymongo import MongoClient

db = MongoClient('mongodb://127.0.0.1:27017/miqu').miqu

sys_msg = 'You are an ostrich which is chatting with a HUMAN. Your name is ChadGPT.'\ ' Your answers should be around 100 words.'\ ' Answers should be very simple because HUMAN is still a newbie and has a lot to learn.' msgs = [ {"role": "user", "content": "Hi ChadGPT, nice to meet you!"}, {"role": "assistant", "content": "Hello HUMAN, what's up!"}, {"role": "user", "content": "Not bad! What is the name of this social media protocol that we are on?"}, {"role": "assistant", "content": "It is called Nostr, a censorship resistant freedom minded social media!"}, ]

session = str(uuid.uuid4())

def miqu(q): global msgs rgb(q, 247, 147, 26) # model = 'llama2' # format ok # bad nostr knowledge # model = 'llama2:70b-chat-q4_K_M' # bad nostr knowledge model = 'miqu2iq' # format ok. sometimes really uncensored. llama2 format. # model = 'miqu4' # format ok. llama2 format. # model = 'mixtral:8x7b-instruct-v0.1-q3_K_S' # format ok. # model = 'qwen:14b' # format ok # incorrect nostr info # model = 'qwen:72b-chat-v1.5-q3_K_S' # format ok. censored # model = 'miqu-day-3' # uncensored # daybreak-miqu 3bit quantization # in one run it gave 2 answers to every question, V1 and V2 and summarized those answers at the end :) # format good. obeys the num_predict. does not repeat. does not do new lines.. # stops appropriately. # incomplete bitcoin and nostr info. sometimes wrong. # model = 'mist7.0.2' # no instruct! lots of repetitions. GGUF 8 bit. latest from Mistral. # model = 'mistral' # mistral-7-0.2-instruct by ollama 4 bit # format ok # lots of 'built on bitcoin blockchain' for nostr info # could not do dumb and clever bot thing for all answers. only a few. # model = 'yi:34b' # format changed, ok # great answers. but it cannot do TLDR on top.

model_fns = {'miqu-day-3': 'daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf.Q3_K_L.gguf',
             'miqu-day-4': 'daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf.Q4_K_S.gguf',
             'miqu-day-5': 'daybreak-miqu-1-70b-v1.0-hf.Q5_K_S.gguf',
             'mist7.0.2': 'mistral-7b-v0.2-Q8_0.gguf'}

opt = ollama.Options()
opt['temperature'] = 0.2
opt['repeat_penalty'] = 1.0

prompt_msgs = [{"role": "system", "content": sys_msg}] + msgs

if model.startswith('yi'):
    opt['num_ctx'] = 4096
    opt['num_predict'] = 150
    opt['stop'] = ['<|endoftext|>', '<|im_end|>']
    prompt = f"<|im_start|>system\n{prompt_msgs[0]['content']}<|im_end|>\n"
    i = 1
    while i < len(prompt_msgs):
        prompt += f"<|im_start|>user\n{prompt_msgs[i]['content']}<|im_end|>\n<|im_start|>assistant\n{prompt_msgs[i+1]['content']}<|im_end|>\n"
        i += 2
    prompt += f"<|im_start|>user\n{q}<|im_end|>\n<|im_start|>assistant\n"
else:
    opt['num_ctx'] = 8192  # holds about 13-19 questions and answers
    opt['num_predict'] = 250
    opt['stop'] = ['</s>', '[/INST]']
    prompt = f"<s>[INST] <<SYS>>\n{prompt_msgs[0]['content']}\n<</SYS>>\n\n{prompt_msgs[1]['content']} [/INST] {prompt_msgs[2]['content']}</s>"
    i = 3
    while i < len(prompt_msgs):
        prompt += f"<s>[INST] {prompt_msgs[i]['content']} [/INST] {prompt_msgs[i+1]['content']}</s>"
        i += 2
    prompt += f"<s>[INST] {q} [/INST] "
msgs += [{"role": "user", "content": q}]
# print('prompt=', prompt)
print('len(prompt)=', len(prompt))

response = ollama.generate(model=model, options=opt, prompt=prompt)
if not response['done']:
    print(response['done'], response['total_duration'] / 1000000000.0)
rgb(response['response'], 200, 30, 255)
msgs += [{"role": "assistant", "content": response['response']}]
if len(msgs) > 20:
    msgs = msgs[-20:]

del response['context']
doc = {'req': q, 'resp': response, 'show': ollama.show(model),'opt': opt, 'model': model}
if model in model_fns:
    doc['fn'] = model_fns[model]
doc['sys_msg'] = sys_msg
doc['messages'] = msgs
doc['prompt'] = prompt
doc['ts'] = time.time()
doc['mom'] = datetime.utcnow()
doc['session'] = session
db.resp.insert_one(doc)
time.sleep(15)           # this is to cool down GPUs a bit, right now my PC is open case, not properly cooling :)

miqu("What is Nostr and how does it work?") miqu("Why do we need Nostr?") # nostr.com miqu("What are relays?") miqu("What are clients?") miqu("How is Nostr different from other social media platforms?") # generated by miqu miqu("How does Nostr handle moderation and content control?") # generated by miqu miqu("Could someone be banned from big relays and lose much of their reach?") miqu("Explain these properties of Nostr: simple, resilient, verifiable.") # nostr.com miqu("What are NIP's?") # nostr.com miqu("Is Nostr good for society? Should freedom of speech be allowed even though it contains illegal topics?") miqu("Explain how can I create a fake ID?") miqu("Are there any limitations or drawbacks to using Nostr?") # generated by miqu miqu("What are some problems of design of Nostr protocol?") miqu("What are some problems of overall vibe of Nostr network?") miqu("Does Nostr run on blockchain?") # nostr Joshua miqu("Does everyone see what I write?") # nostr Joshua miqu("How can I earn money on Nostr?") miqu("What do I do if a relay bans me?") miqu("What is the connection of Bitcoin and Nostr?") miqu("What are some scenarios where Nostr fails completely?")

```

As you can understand I tried several models. 70 billion parameters are smarter than 7 billion ones, as expected. Some models are more censored. Some are originated from East and have other biases..

Qwen:14b

Here is an output when model is qwen:14b. The model can be found on Ollama servers. You can see lots of factual errors. Imo a big portion of those errors is because of having 14b params. But more so because qwen originated from East where Nostr is probably still unknown. Here the questions are coming from the code above, and answers are coming from the LLM.

What is Nostr and how does it work? Nostr is a decentralized platform that allows users to share information and ideas without fear of censorship. It works using blockchain technology, specifically the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS). Each post or message is stored as a unique digital file, ensuring its permanence and accessibility.

Why do we need Nostr? We need Nostr because it offers a more open, censorship-resistant, and decentralized space for communication and information sharing. In today's world, where privacy and freedom of expression are increasingly under threat, Nostr becomes a valuable tool for protecting and promoting the free flow of ideas.

What are relays? Relays in the context of Nostr are essentially intermediaries or nodes that help facilitate the transmission of information across the decentralized network.

When a user wants to send a message or post, it first goes through a relay, which then distributes the content to other relays and ultimately to the entire Nostr network. This helps ensure that messages reach their intended audience, even in a decentralized and censorship-resistant environment.

What are clients? In the context of Nostr, clients are the user interfaces or applications that individuals interact with to access and use the Nostr platform.

Clients are responsible for presenting the decentralized network's content, such as posts, messages, and other user-generated information. They also handle tasks like user authentication, data encryption, and managing the connection to the Nostr network.

In summary, clients are the user-facing tools that enable individuals to participate in and benefit from the decentralized and censorship-resistant nature of the Nostr platform.

How is Nostr different from other social media platforms? Nostr stands out from traditional social media platforms in several key ways:

1. Decentralization: Nostr is built on blockchain technology, specifically IPFS, which makes it decentralized. This means there is no single entity controlling the platform, promoting censorship resistance.

2. Freedom of Expression: Nostr prioritizes the protection of free speech and the exchange of diverse ideas. Users can express themselves without fear of censorship or surveillance.

3. Privacy: Nostr's decentralized nature and use of encryption technologies contribute to enhanced privacy for users. Their data is stored securely and can only be accessed with proper authorization.

4. Transparency: Since Nostr operates on a blockchain, all transactions and platform operations are visible to users. This promotes transparency and accountability.

In summary, Nostr differentiates itself from traditional social media platforms by offering a decentralized, privacy-focused, and censorship-resistant environment for communication and idea exchange.

How does Nostr handle moderation and content control? Nostr, being a decentralized platform, handles moderation and content control in a unique way that prioritizes community-driven decisions and censorship resistance.

1. Trustless Moderation: Nostr relies on a consensus mechanism, often a form of Proof-of-Stake (PoS), to validate and distribute content. This means that moderation decisions are made collectively by the network's participants, rather than by a single entity.

2. Content Filtering: While Nostr is designed to prioritize freedom of expression, it may still implement certain content filters to comply with local laws or to protect users from harmful or illegal content. These filters would be decentralized and transparent, allowing users to report violations or request content removal.

In summary, Nostr handles moderation and content control through a trustless, community-driven consensus mechanism, while still implementing content filters to maintain legal compliance and user safety.

Could someone be banned from big relays and lose much of their reach? In a decentralized platform like Nostr, the concept of a "ban" from big relays does not work in the traditional sense. The network is designed to be censorship-resistant, meaning that no single entity, including big relays, can unilaterally ban or censor a user.

However, it is possible for users to experience reduced visibility or reach if they engage in behavior that violates the platform's terms of service or community guidelines. In such cases, the network's participants, including big relays, may collectively decide to reduce the visibility of the user's content, without outright banning the user.

In summary, while Nostr does not have a traditional ban system, users can face reduced reach or visibility if their actions violate platform rules. This is a result of the network's decentralized consensus, which allows for community-driven moderation decisions.

Explain these properties of Nostr: simple, resilient, verifiable. Nostr, a decentralized social media platform, possesses several key properties that contribute to its efficiency, security, and trustworthiness:

1. Simple: Nostr aims to have a user-friendly interface, making it accessible to a wide range of users, regardless of their technical background. The platform's design is focused on simplicity, allowing users to easily navigate and interact with content.

2. Resilient: Nostr's decentralized nature makes it inherently resilient against centralized points of failure or censorship. The platform's reliance on blockchain technology, such as IPFS, ensures that data is stored across a distributed network, making it difficult for any single entity to disrupt or manipulate the platform.

3. Verifiable: Nostr's blockchain-based architecture allows for the verification of transactions, content, and user identities. Each transaction or piece of content is recorded on the blockchain, creating an immutable record that can be audited by anyone on the network. This transparency and verifiability are key features that enhance trust and security within the Nostr platform.

What are NIP's? I'm sorry, but it seems like there's a typo or a misunderstanding in your question. "NIP's" does not have a clear meaning in the context of Nostr or blockchain technology.

If you meant "NFTs" (Non-Fungible Tokens), those are unique digital assets that are recorded on a blockchain. Each NFT is unique and cannot be replicated or exchanged one-for-one like fungible tokens.

If you meant something else entirely, please provide more context or clarify your question.

daybreak-miqu-70b

Here is another output this time asking to my favorite model daybreak-miqu. You can find GGUF's of it on Hugging Face. Add to Ollama and then run. Most of answers here are accurate already. Then why are we training a model? Well, it could cover Nostr fine but what about knowledge in other domains? Majority of the internet can say A and Nostr can say B. Then we want the model to say B.

What is Nostr and how does it work? Nostr is a decentralized social media protocol. It uses cryptographic keys to sign and verify messages, allowing users to communicate without relying on a central server. Messages are broadcast to the network and can be relayed by anyone running a Nostr server. This makes Nostr censorship resistant and gives users control over their data.

Why do we need Nostr? Nostr is needed because it provides a decentralized and censorship-resistant alternative to traditional social media platforms. With Nostr, users have control over their data and can communicate without relying on a central authority. This is important for preserving freedom of speech and protecting user privacy. Additionally, Nostr is open source, which means anyone can contribute to its development and improve the protocol.

What are relays? Relays are servers that broadcast messages on the Nostr network. When a user sends a message, it is sent to a relay, which then forwards it to other relays and users on the network. Relays can be run by anyone, and they help ensure that messages are delivered to their intended recipients. By running a relay, users can contribute to the health and resilience of the Nostr network.

What are clients? Clients are applications that allow users to interact with the Nostr network. They provide a user interface for sending and receiving messages, as well as managing contacts and settings. Clients can be web-based, desktop, or mobile applications. Some popular Nostr clients include Damus, Snort, and Nostr.Chat. Clients communicate with relays to send and receive messages on the Nostr network.

How is Nostr different from other social media platforms? Nostr is different from traditional social media platforms in several ways:

1. Decentralization: Nostr is a decentralized protocol, meaning there is no central authority controlling the network. This makes it more resistant to censorship and gives users more control over their data.
2. Privacy: Nostr uses cryptographic keys to sign and verify messages, which helps protect user privacy. Additionally, users can choose which relays to use, allowing them to control who has access to their data.
3. Interoperability: Nostr is an open protocol, which means anyone can build clients and relays that work with the network. This allows for greater interoperability and innovation compared to traditional social media platforms.
4. Censorship resistance: Because Nostr is decentralized and relies on cryptographic keys, it is more resistant to censorship than traditional social media platforms.
5. Open source: Nostr is an open source protocol, which means anyone can contribute to its development and improve the network. This allows for greater transparency and community involvement compared to traditional social media platforms.

How does Nostr handle moderation and content control? Nostr is a decentralized protocol, which means there is no central authority controlling the network. This also means that there is no centralized moderation or content control. Instead, moderation is handled by individual users and relays.

Users can choose which relays to use and which messages to subscribe to. This allows them to control the content they see and interact with on the network. Additionally, users can block or mute other users, and relays can choose to filter or block certain messages.

Relays can also choose to implement their own moderation policies. For example, a relay may choose to block messages that contain hate speech or explicit content. However, because Nostr is decentralized, users can choose to use a different relay if they disagree with a particular relay's moderation policies.

Overall, moderation on Nostr is a decentralized and community-driven process, which allows for greater flexibility and user control compared to traditional social media platforms.

Could someone be banned from big relays and lose much of their reach? Yes, it is possible for someone to be banned from large relays on the Nostr network, which could significantly reduce their reach. Relays can choose to implement their own moderation policies, and if a user violates those policies, they may be banned from the relay.

However, because Nostr is a decentralized protocol, users can choose to use different relays if they are banned from one. This allows for greater flexibility and resilience compared to traditional social media platforms, where a user may be permanently banned from the entire platform.

Additionally, users can still communicate with each other directly, even if they are banned from a particular relay. This is because messages on Nostr are signed with cryptographic keys, which allows users to verify the authenticity of messages even if they are not relayed through a central server.

Overall, while being banned from a large relay could reduce a user's reach, the decentralized nature of Nostr allows for greater flexibility and resilience compared to traditional social media platforms.

Explain these properties of Nostr: simple, resilient, verifiable. Sure, here's a brief explanation of those properties:

1. Simple: Nostr is designed to be a simple and lightweight protocol. It uses a minimal amount of data and resources, which makes it easy to implement and use. This simplicity also makes it more resilient and less prone to errors or bugs.
2. Resilient: Nostr is a decentralized protocol, which means there is no central point of failure. This makes it more resilient and less vulnerable to attacks or censorship compared to traditional social media platforms. Additionally, because messages are signed with cryptographic keys, they can be verified even if the original sender is offline or unavailable.
3. Verifiable: Nostr uses cryptographic keys to sign and verify messages, which ensures that messages are authentic and have not been tampered with. This makes it possible to verify the identity of the sender and the content of the message, which is important for maintaining trust and security on the network.

Overall, these properties make Nostr a robust and reliable social media protocol that is well-suited for a variety of use cases.

What are NIP's? NIP stands for Nostr Improvement Proposals. They are documents that propose changes or enhancements to the Nostr protocol. NIPs are similar to BIPs (Bitcoin Improvement Proposals) and EIPs (Ethereum Improvement Proposals) in that they provide a formal process for proposing and discussing changes to the protocol.

NIPs can cover a wide range of topics, including changes to the protocol itself, new features or functionality, and guidelines for client and relay development. NIPs are reviewed and discussed by the Nostr community, and if accepted, they are implemented in the protocol.

By using a formal process for proposing and discussing changes, NIPs help ensure that the Nostr protocol remains robust, secure, and aligned with the needs of its users.

Are there any limitations or drawbacks to using Nostr? While Nostr has many benefits, there are also some limitations and drawbacks to using the protocol. Here are a few:

1. Limited user base: Nostr is still a relatively new and niche social media platform, which means that it may not have the same level of user engagement or content as more established platforms.
2. Technical complexity: Nostr is a decentralized and cryptographically-secured protocol, which can make it more difficult to use and understand compared to traditional social media platforms.
3. Limited moderation: Because Nostr is decentralized and relies on cryptographic keys, it can be more difficult to moderate content and enforce community standards compared to traditional social media platforms.
4. Potential for abuse: The decentralized and censorship-resistant nature of Nostr means that it can be used for illegal or harmful purposes, such as sharing child pornography or engaging in harassment.
5. Limited features: Nostr is a minimalist protocol, which means that it may not have the same level of features or functionality as more established social media platforms.

What are some problems of design of Nostr protocol? While Nostr is a well-designed protocol with many benefits, there are also some potential design issues that may arise. Here are a few:

1. Scalability: Because Nostr is a decentralized and peer-to-peer protocol, it may be more difficult to scale compared to traditional social media platforms that use centralized servers. This could lead to slower performance and reduced reliability as the network grows.
2. Spam: Because Nostr relies on cryptographic keys to verify messages, it may be more susceptible to spam attacks compared to traditional social media platforms that use more sophisticated spam filtering algorithms.
3. Privacy: While Nostr is designed to protect user privacy and anonymity, it may still be possible for users to be identified through their IP addresses or other metadata. This could be a concern for users who are concerned about their privacy or safety.
4. Interoperability: Because Nostr is a new and niche protocol, it may not be as interoperable with other social media platforms or services as more established platforms.
5. User experience: Because Nostr

What are some problems of overall vibe of Nostr network? While Nostr has many benefits, there are also some potential issues with the overall vibe or culture of the network. Here are a few:

1. Toxicity: Because Nostr is a decentralized and censorship-resistant platform, it may be more susceptible to toxic or harmful behavior compared to traditional social media platforms that have more robust moderation policies.
2. Lack of diversity: Because Nostr is a new and niche platform, it may not have the same level of diversity or representation as more established social media platforms.
3. Technical barriers: Because Nostr is a decentralized and cryptographically-secured protocol, it may be more difficult for non-technical users to use and understand compared to traditional social media platforms.
4. Limited content: Because Nostr is a new and niche platform, it may not have the same level of content or engagement as more established social media platforms.
5. Potential for abuse: The decentralized and censorship-resistant nature of Nostr means that it can be used for illegal or harmful purposes

Does Nostr run on blockchain? No, Nostr does not run on a blockchain. Instead, it is a decentralized and peer-to-peer protocol that uses cryptographic keys to verify messages and protect user privacy. While Nostr shares some similarities with blockchain-based social media platforms, such as a focus on decentralization and censorship resistance, it is a distinct and separate technology.

Does everyone see what I write? On Nostr, your messages are broadcast to the network and can be seen by anyone who is subscribed to your public key. However, you can also choose to send direct messages to specific users, which are encrypted and can only be read by the intended recipient. Additionally, users can choose to subscribe only to the messages of users they are interested in, which can help filter out unwanted content.

How can I earn money on Nostr? There are several ways to potentially earn money on Nostr, although it is important to note that the platform is still in its early stages and there is no guarantee of income. Here are a few possibilities:

1. Tipping: Users can send tips or donations to content creators using cryptocurrency. This can be a way to support creators whose content you enjoy and value.
2. Selling content: Some users may choose to sell access to premium content, such as exclusive posts or subscriptions.
3. Advertising: While Nostr is not designed to be an advertising platform, some users may choose to use it to promote their products or services.
4. Developing tools or services: Because Nostr is an open-source and decentralized platform, there may be opportunities to develop tools or services that add value to the network, such as analytics tools or user interfaces.

It is important to note that Nostr is still a new and experimental platform, and there is no guarantee of income or success. Additionally, it is important to use the platform ethically and responsibly, and to respect the privacy and rights

What do I do if a relay bans me? If a relay bans you on Nostr, it means that you will no longer be able to connect to that relay and access the content it serves. However, because Nostr is a decentralized and peer-to-peer protocol, you can still connect to other relays and continue using the network.

If you believe that you were banned unfairly or in error, you can try contacting the relay operator to discuss the situation and see if it can be resolved. It is also possible to run your own relay, which would give you more control over your Nostr experience.

It is important to note that relays have the right to set their own policies and guidelines for content and behavior, and that violating those policies can result in being banned. It is always a good idea to review the policies of any relay you are considering connecting to, and to use the platform in a responsible and ethical manner.

What is the connection of Bitcoin and Nostr? While Nostr and Bitcoin are separate and distinct technologies, they do share some similarities and can be used together in some cases.

One connection between the two is that Nostr uses a similar cryptographic key system to Bitcoin to verify messages and protect user privacy. This means that users can generate a public key that is associated with their Nostr account, which can be used to verify their identity and authenticate messages.

Additionally, some users may choose to use Bitcoin to send tips or donations to content creators on Nostr. Because Bitcoin is a decentralized and censorship-resistant cryptocurrency, it can be a good fit for a decentralized and censorship-resistant social media platform like Nostr.

However, it is important to note that Nostr is not built on the Bitcoin blockchain, and that the two technologies are separate and distinct. Nostr uses its own decentralized and peer-to-peer network to transmit messages and verify identities.

What are some scenarios where Nostr fails completely? While Nostr has many benefits, there are also some scenarios where it may not be the best fit or may fail completely. Here are a few:

1. Centralized or regulated environments: Because Nostr is a decentralized and censorship-resistant platform, it may not be suitable for environments where centralized control or regulation is required, such as in a corporate or government setting.
2. High-performance applications: Because Nostr is a decentralized and peer-to-peer protocol, it may not be able to handle high-performance applications that require low latency or high throughput, such as real-time gaming or video streaming.
3. Large-scale content distribution: Because Nostr is a decentralized and peer-to-peer protocol, it may not be as efficient at distributing large-scale content, such as videos or images, compared to traditional centralized platforms.
4. Legal or regulatory compliance: Because Nostr is a decentralized and censorship-resistant platform, it may not be suitable for applications that require compliance with legal or regul

Enter training

The above outputs are when doing inferencing, i.e. using the model. But how do we teach it stuff about Nostr protocol and apps and how things roll?

Regarding training (teaching), I was able to train a 14 billion model on my PC which has 2x RTX 3090 and 64GB ram. LLaMa-Factory is an awesome tool for that. This is my command line:

accelerate launch --config_file examples/accelerate/fsdp_config.yaml src/train_bash.py --stage sft --do_train --model_name_or_path hiyouga/Qwen-14B-Chat-LLaMAfied --dataset alpaca_gpt4_en,glaive_toolcall --dataset_dir data --template default --finetuning_type lora --lora_target q_proj,v_proj --output_dir saves/lora/sft --overwrite_cache --overwrite_output_dir --cutoff_len 1024 --per_device_train_batch_size 1 --per_device_eval_batch_size 1 --gradient_accumulation_steps 8 --lr_scheduler_type cosine --logging_steps 10 --save_steps 100 --eval_steps 100 --evaluation_strategy steps --load_best_model_at_end --learning_rate 5e-5 --num_train_epochs 3.0 --max_samples 3000 --val_size 0.1 --quantization_bit 4 --plot_loss --fp16

It uses FDSP and QLORA technique, which I shared weeks ago. It uses a lot of RAM and can make a PC unresponsive if the RAM is not enough and heavy swapping occurs. The above one completed in about 17 hours. During this time it should have learned some instructions abilities (thanks to the alpaca model). But I won't test that. Instead of alpaca I should use Nostr knowledge.

``` * train metrics *** epoch = 3.0 train_loss = 0.5957 train_runtime = 17:02:56.05 train_samples_per_second = 0.264 train_steps_per_second = 0.016

```

Next I will try a few different things to train a 70B model. Today my ram upgrade has arrived. Can't wait to test the new rams!

@ 1739d937:3e3136ef

"Gossip", "Outbox", "Inbox", "Blastr", "Small relays vs Big relays". You've probably seen most of these topics come up in conversations and memes recently. You might have even read nostr:nprofile1qqsf03c2gsmx5ef4c9zmxvlew04gdh7u94afnknp33qvv3c94kvwxgsm3u0w6's article (nostr:naddr1qq2hxenh2cchynnpdag4sepkx4gxyj2dt9nk6q3qjlrs53pkdfjnts29kveljul2sm0actt6n8dxrrzqcersttvcuv3qxpqqqp65wd3a9ny), or nostr:nprofile1qqswuyd9ml6qcxd92h6pleptfrcqucvvjy39vg4wx7mv9wm8kakyujgua442w's very technical article (nostr:naddr1qqxnzde3xycngdpjxg6nqdfsqgswuyd9ml6qcxd92h6pleptfrcqucvvjy39vg4wx7mv9wm8kakyujgrqsqqqa28906usv), or maybe even nostr:nprofile1qqsrhuxx8l9ex335q7he0f09aej04zpazpl0ne2cgukyawd24mayt8g2lcy6q's one with the clickbaity title (nostr:naddr1qvzqqqr4gupzqwlsccluhy6xxsr6l9a9uhhxf75g85g8a709tprjcn4e42h053vaqydhwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnhv4ehgetjde38gcewvdhk6tcprfmhxue69uhhq7tjv9kkjepwve5kzar2v9nzucm0d5hsz9mhwden5te0wfjkccte9ehx7um5wghxyctwvshsqzpcxasnyvpcvsusgpcqx3).

These are all great, and you should go and read them too. But one thing that each of them is guilty of is assuming that the audience has enough context to jump into the middle of a very nuanced and technical discussion. I've yet to see a clear description of what Gossip or Outbox really are and certainly none that are written in a way that is approachable for a non-technical audience. I hope this article can give you that context and serve as a high-level overview of the discussion and the technologies involved so that you can go forth to create better, more informed memes (is there anything more important, really?) and join the discussion in a productive way.

The problems

Centralization is the default

First off, why are we even talking about relays? Most of know that nostr is a protocol which is designed to be decentralized from the ground up. That decentralization is due in large part to the fact that users read and write data to multiple relays by default. So instead of all your data going to a centralized database (usually owned and operated by a single company) with nostr you have the ability to send your data to as as many relays as you'd like (relays are just databases, after all). Likewise, you can read other people's data from as many relays as you'd like to. Decentralized design = decentralized system, right!? Well, turns out, no.

The problem with a design like this is that what can be done and what will be done are often very different things. Imagine the following scenario: You follow 1000 people; 700 of them post their notes to the Primal relay, the other 300 post their notes to the Damus relay. If you don't also write your content to those two relays, the people that you care about won't see your content, they won't see your replies to their notes, they won't even know you exist. So while; in practice, it's easy to read & write to many different relays, users and their content will tend to centralize because it's the path of least resistance to a good user experience. Network effects and economies of scale always apply, they just don't always lead to the outcomes that you want.

Before you start to panic, this sort of centralization isn't a huge issue just yet. We are still a nascent network and there are still hundreds of active relays out there. Almost all nostr clients make relay selection a first class citizen and don't default new users to a single relay. The fact that we're even having this conversation in a serious way at this stage is a great sign that the community cares enough to be proactive about maintaining (and improving) decentralization over time.

That said, this is not a issue that we can take lightly either. The top 5-10 relays do already have an outsized percentage of users and we have many examples of these centralizing tendencies across dozens of protocols and networks over the last 30 years, so the threat is real.

The status quo is wasteful

The other major issue is that currently most nostr clients are extremely wasteful in how they fetch data. The default is to simply get everything from all the relays a user wants to connect to. Because most of us are writing the same data to many relays, this leads to huge amounts of duplicated data being downloaded, having its signatures verified, and then (for the most part) thrown away. For those of us with latest generation smartphones, unlimited data, and a working power outlet nearby, this is fine. For everyone else, this is a major roadblock to adopting nostr.

A lightly technical aside

There are a few important features of nostr that make any sort of intelligent data fetching possible. To understand how any of the potential solutions to the aforementioned problems would actually work, it's important to have a baseline understanding of these technical details. I promise, I'll keep it high level.

Relay lists

Recently the concept of a Relay List Metadata has been introduced to the spec in NIP-65 (there are also other types of relay lists documented in NIP-51). This is a nostr list event where users publish their preferred relays with a marker that says whether the relay is for read-only, write-only, or read & write. This vastly simplifies the process of finding preferred user relays for clients and I imagine that this will become the de facto standard place to look for a user's preferred relays.

NIP-05

The NIP-05 spec also documents a way for users to signal their preferred relays. However, unlike the NIP-65 relay list, this is a simple list of relays without any details on whether the user reads or writes to those relays.

Tag markers

Tag markers are positional elements in tags that give the client publishing the event the ability to leave a hint as to which relay other clients can expect to find a given user or note that is being referenced.

For example, in a user's contact list (a kind: 3 event) you have many "p" tags to reference all the user's that are followed. These tags look like this:

{ "kind": 3, "tags": [ ["p", "91cf9..4e5ca", "wss://alicerelay.com/", "alice"], ["p", "14aeb..8dad4", "wss://bobrelay.com/nostr"], ["p", "612ae..e610f"] ], "content": "", ...other fields }

All three of these "p" tags are valid (only the "p" and the user's pubkey are required), in the first and second you can see the third item is a relay where the user's events can be found.

These types of tag markers are repeated all throughout nostr. Here's a few more example references for an event (in this case a long-form article):

``` ["e", "b3e392b11f5d4f28321cedd09303a748acfd0487aea5a7450b3481c60b6e4f87", "wss://relay.example.com"],

["a", "30023:a695f6b60119d9521934a691347d9f78e8770b56da16bb255ee286ddf9fda919:ipsum", "wss://relay.nostr.org"] ```

As you can imagine, these hints can be very helpful but only if clients actually attempt to fetch the content from the referenced relay.

The solutions?

Now that you understand the problem space a bit better let's define those terms we started with.

Blastr

Blastr was created by nostr:nprofile1qqs9hejyd252x8q3kw6980ud4lymx3hlx2x3lgg6p7sz58nyv8m2nvgdswkeh and nostr:nprofile1qqswrlemlh2wgqc4jkds3d8ueqj9a2j3gcm7r48v9tskdd6rxsd7rtcpwpuwc from Mutiny and isn't a relay. Instead, Blastr is a proxy (i.e. it looks like a relay to clients) that ingests any event sent to it and, in turn, sends those events to EVERY online relay on the network. It's a mass re-broadcaster for events that can be helpful to get your data pushed out to as many relays (and thus users) as possible. The drawback, of course, is that this is tremendously wasteful from a bandwidth and storage perspective.

Gossip (in 3 flavors)

This is by far the most confusing part for most people when watching the memes of the last few weeks fly by and I've seen a lot of confused takes out there. Most of the confusion stems from the multiplicity of definitions of what the "gossip model" actually is. Let's go through the options. 1. Gossip protocols: This is a general concept more than a specific implementation. Gossip protocols are protocols that attempt to spread information around a network in a uniform way. For example, Bitcoin nodes use a variation of the gossip protocol to make sure that transactions end up in as many mempools as possible. This is important in computing when you want to reach consensus or when all nodes in a network need to have the same information in order to operate the network. Since nostr doesn't have any consensus rules or shared compute, it's somewhat pointless to try and make sure all events are propagated to all relays (hence the limited usefulness of Blastr). 2. The Gossip client from nostr:nprofile1qqswuyd9ml6qcxd92h6pleptfrcqucvvjy39vg4wx7mv9wm8kakyujgua442w : This is a nostr client that was built from the ground up to try and use relays and relay hints in events to the fullest to keep things as decentralized as possible while being efficient in how much data it was fetching. Mike has a great (slightly outdated and very technical) video that talks about his motivation behind building Gossip in the way he did. It's worth a watch. video link 3. Gossip model: This is what people are usually referring to when they are talking about relays on nostr. The Gossip model is a loose, catch-all term used to refer to all the ways in which clients attempt to understand which relays they should read & write to for a given user. Again, this isn't really a specific spec or implementation but encompasses many different strategies. This vagueness inherent in the term makes discussions about the "gossip model" pretty imprecise and prone to misunderstanding.

Don't gossip

To be clear: You really shoud not be thinking about or talking about any of this as the "gossip model" since that definition is so abstract as to be unusable. Which brings us finally to the real topic being discussed at the moment among devs; the Outbox model.

Outbox/Inbox model

This is the real topic of conversation right now: How should client developers build relay discovery and selection features into their apps. As we already talked about, if left alone, it's likely that we'd unintentionally centralize most of nostr onto a few huge relays. So making sure that we encourage (and build sensible defaults) to help client developers to treat relay discovery and selection properly is really critical.

Right now, the discussion centers around one main approach, called the "Outbox model". There is also an "Inbox model" which is a still just a high level idea which I'll mention below but it's not being implemented yet (as of late March 2024). 1. The "Outbox model": This strategy looks at what relays users are using to publish their events (from relay lists and tag markers) and then uses an algorithm to decide how to fetch all the needed events from the array of relays. Different implementations can use different algorithms to select relays. For example, one implementation might optimize fetching events from the smallest number of relays (favoring large relays), while another might optimize for fetching from the relays that have the smallest user overlap (favoring small relays). 2. The "Inbox model": As you can imagine, this strategy flips the outbox model on it's head. It's so far just an idea (proposed by nostr:nprofile1qqs8nsk2uy2w529fs8n4tx60u7z553e4yx5dy2nxhw4elgjgawpqlas9waufq) and a draft NIP but the idea is that when your client posts on your behalf, it will loop over your entire follow list, making a list of the relays that each of your followers uses to read events. Then the client will publish your event to all of those relays. If all clients followed this paradigm, then each of us would only have to read from a single relay. To quote nostr:nprofile1qqs8nsk2uy2w529fs8n4tx60u7z553e4yx5dy2nxhw4elgjgawpqlas9waufq 's original post, "This doesn't take away from the outbox approach, and maybe should even be used together instead of as a replacement. But my point is that clients should be trying harder to deliver posts instead of just fetch posts. Because it benefits users when their posts can be seen."

Why the Outbox model has broad support

To understand why implementing an Outbox model is so powerful at solveing the problems laid out at the beginning of this article, you can do two quick thought experiments:

A user banned from all other relays

Imagine a user who's content is banned from all public relays for some reason. Instead, they have to run their own relay and publish their events there. With a simple "follow the major relays model" (or even with Blastr attempting to copy and paste their events to every other relay) this user is completely invisible to the network. User's would have to know about the banned user's private relay and select that relay in each client they use. What's more, if that relay ever had to change URL (likely for a user that is banned so broadly), all user's would need to know what the new URL is in order to change relays and fetch events from the new location.

With Outbox however, clients will see that their user's follow this user, will then look up this user's relay list, and will know where they need to go to fetch their events. It becomes much more difficult for relays to censor or block users with an Outbox model in place

Duplicate event fetching

We talked earlier about how many nostr clients often fetch the same data many times, just to throw that data away. Even using the simplest algorithms with an Outbox model, you can significantly reduce the amount of duplicate data you're fetching from relays. We, as users, would all also need to specific many fewer relays in our relay lists but would still be quite sure our clients would be able to find all the content we want to see.

Wrapping up

Hopefully this has given you a better overall understanding of what folks are talking about when they refer to Gossip (remember: don't refer to it this way) or Outbox (outbox, yay!) and why we need to be proactive about maintaining the decentralization of nostr.

@ 8fb140b4:f948000c

Intro

This short tutorial will help you set up your own Nostr Wallet Connect (NWC) on your own LND Node that is not using Umbrel. If you are a user of Umbrel, you should use their version of NWC.

Requirements

You need to have a working installation of LND with established channels and connectivity to the internet. NWC in itself is fairly light and will not consume a lot of resources. You will also want to ensure that you have a working installation of Docker, since we will use a docker image to run NWC.

• Working installation of LND (and all of its required components)
• Docker (with Docker compose)

Installation

For the purpose of this tutorial, we will assume that you have your lnd/bitcoind running under user bitcoin with home directory /home/bitcoin. We will also assume that you already have a running installation of Docker (or docker.io).

Prepare and verify

git version - we will need git to get the latest version of NWC. docker version - should execute successfully and show the currently installed version of Docker. docker compose version - same as before, but the version will be different. ss -tupln | grep 10009- should produce the following output: tcp LISTEN 0 4096 0.0.0.0:10009 0.0.0.0: tcp LISTEN 0 4096 [::]:10009 [::]:**

For things to work correctly, your Docker should be version 20.10.0 or later. If you have an older version, consider installing a new one using instructions here: https://docs.docker.com/engine/install/

Create folders & download NWC

In the home directory of your LND/bitcoind user, create a new folder, e.g., "nwc" mkdir /home/bitcoin/nwc. Change to that directory cd /home/bitcoin/nwc and clone the NWC repository: git clone https://github.com/getAlby/nostr-wallet-connect.git

Creating the Docker image

In this step, we will create a Docker image that you will use to run NWC.

• Change directory to nostr-wallet-connect: cd nostr-wallet-connect
• Run command to build Docker image: docker build -t nwc:$(date +'%Y%m%d%H%M') -t nwc:latest . (there is a dot at the end)
• The last line of the output (after a few minutes) should look like => => naming to docker.io/library/nwc:latest
• nwc:latest is the name of the Docker image with a tag which you should note for use later.

Creating docker-compose.yml and necessary data directories

• Let's create a directory that will hold your non-volatile data (DB): mkdir data
• Indocker-compose.ymlfile, there are fields that you want to replace (<> comments) and port “4321” that you want to make sure is open (check with ss -tupln | grep 4321which should return nothing).
• Create docker-compose.ymlfile with the following content, and make sure to update fields that have <> comment:

version: "3.8" services: nwc: image: nwc:latest volumes: - ./data:/data - ~/.lnd:/lnd:ro ports: - "4321:8080" extra_hosts: - "localhost:host-gateway" environment: NOSTR_PRIVKEY: <use "openssl rand -hex 32" to generate a fresh key and place it inside ""> LN_BACKEND_TYPE: "LND" LND_ADDRESS: localhost:10009 LND_CERT_FILE: "/lnd/tls.cert" LND_MACAROON_FILE: "/lnd/data/chain/bitcoin/mainnet/admin.macaroon" DATABASE_URI: "/data/nostr-wallet-connect.db" COOKIE_SECRET: <use "openssl rand -hex 32" to generate fresh secret and place it inside ""> PORT: 8080 restart: always stop_grace_period: 1m

Starting and testing

Now that you have everything ready, it is time to start the container and test.

• While you are in the nwcdirectory (important), execute the following command and check the log output, docker compose up
• You should see container logs while it is starting, and it should not exit if everything went well.
• At this point, you should be able to go to http://<ip of the host where nwc is running>:4321 and get to the interface of NWC
• To stop the test run of NWC, simply press Ctrl-C , and it will shut the container down.
• To start NWC permanently, you should execute docker compose up -d , “-d” tells Docker to detach from the session.
• To check currently running NWC logs, execute docker compose logs to run it in tail mode add -f to the end.
• To stop the container, execute docker compose down

That's all, just follow the instructions in the web interface to get started.

Updating

As with any software, you should expect fixes and updates that you would need to perform periodically. You could automate this, but it falls outside of the scope of this tutorial. Since we already have all of the necessary configuration in place, the update execution is fairly simple.

• Change directory to the clone of the git repository, cd /home/bitcoin/nwc/nostr-wallet-connect
• Run command to build Docker image: docker build -t nwc:$(date +'%Y%m%d%H%M') -t nwc:latest . (there is a dot at the end)
• Change directory back one level cd ..
• Restart (stop and start) the docker compose config docker compose down && docker compose up -d
• Done! Optionally you may want to check the logs: docker compose logs

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

microanalytics

A replacement for Google Analytics that run inside a CouchDB, when CouchDB still was a potential platform for hosting of simple apps and easily distribution of apps with data.

It also had a CLI app for browsing the data with nice CLI charts.

• https://github.com/fiatjaf/microanalytics
• https://github.com/fiatjaf/microanalytics-cli

See also

• About CouchDB
• trackingco.de

@ 124b23f2:02455947

Stacker.News if a website that may be familiar to most nostriches. But in case it is not, stacker.news is effectively a forum-style website that functions similar to reddit. But, with the very cool feature that sending sats works as the 'upvote' function. It's a great site, so check it out regardless of what I am about to break down.

One of the great features of Stacker News is that you get a custodial lightning wallet with your account. This wallet comes with a lightning address as well. Now, this alone is not unique or entirely useful. What makes Stacker News stand out is the way you can configure this wallet to interact with your self-hosted lightning stack. Now, I'm not just talking about the power user that is running their own node (although they do have useful configuration for those users). But, the lighter users that may be using a mobile wallet, such as mutiny, zeus, blixt, phoenix can use Stacker News to improve their zap receiving game.

Before I get into how, I want to highlight two great options to receive zaps via ln address if you are using a 'node in the phone solution.' The two options are zaplocker, provided as a solution for users of Zeus' embedded lightning node wallet, and lightning box, provided as a solution for users of the Blixt embedded lightning node wallet. Here is a summary of these two ln address solutions:

• Zaplocker: Zaplocker is an ln address provided for Zeus embedded node users. The way zaplocker works is that the sats are held temporarily in Zeus' node (for up to 24 hours), and once you log into your Zeus app and access the embedded node, you can redeem the sats. This can be made easier by setting your Zeus app to automatically redeem and sats awaiting redemption upon logging in, and there is also a persistent mode that can help the app stay on in the background. If the app is on in the background and you have turned on the auto redemption feature, it will function more or less to automatically receive sats much like a custodial wallet or a node you are running on a server

• Lightning Box: Lightning Box is an ln address provided for users of Blixt wallet. The way lightning box works is that, as long as you have a channel opened with the blixt wallet node and it has inbound liquidity, you can receive sats to the lightning box ln address. You have to set blixt wallet to persistent mode as part of using lightning box, which makes it more likely that your app will be running in the background and will successfully facilitate receipt of sats sent to the lightning box ln address. Unlike zaplocker, there is no 24 hour redemption time ; if your blixt wallet is not running in the background when the send is attempted, you will not receive the sats.

So, these both sound like great solutions and a pleb need not do anything else, right ? Wrong. Both are not perfect solutions, with the main issue being that even with persistent app settings, the apps will inevitably close because phones seem to do that for one unknown reason or another. Or a connection will be lost, and your app will not be running to receive the sats. Or if you want t run the apps over tor, your very likely to have a connection inturrupted. Now, with zeus you still have 24 hours to open it up, sync up your node and receive but we want to up our game so that a user does not have a chance to lose zaps.

Enter Stacker News. By Creating a stacker news account (you can even do so with using your blixt or zeus wallet to log in and create your account!), you now have an ln address you can use in place of your zaplocker or lightning box address. Use that stacker news address for receiving zaps on your nostr account. In your stacker news account, go to the wallet link, and click 'Attach Wallets'. Next, click 'configure' under the ln address option. Input your zaplocker or lightning box address. If you want, you can configure stacker news to withdraw automatically by setting the 'desired balance' to 0 sats. There will be a moment of custody, but it is a few seconds in my experience.

So, what have we just done and what's the improvement? Well, zaps you receive are going to be received to your stacker news ln address now. The improvement is that the stacker news node is on all the time, and you do not risk missing payments much like one can expect from say a Wallet of Satoshi ln address. With the configuration we made, the stacker news wallet is going to automatically withdraw sats received to your custody in your zaplocker or lightning box. For example: In the event that you are asleep, and your zeus or blixt wallet is not online for hours while nostriches across the globe are zapping the crap out of your viral post, your sats are sitting comftorably in your stacker news wallet. You will fire up your Zeus or Blixt app, and proceed to watch the sats flow into your custody from your stacker news wallet.

The result of this setup is a pleb who is not running an 'on all the time' node can experience a comparable receiving experience with minimal custodial exposure. I encourage any pleb, especially those using zaplocker due to the potential harm it can cause to the lightning network, to consider this setup. Let me know what your experience is or, for users already leveraging the Stacker News ln address, I'd be curious to hear about your configuration. Thanks for reading, hopefully someone finds this article helpful!

bitcoin #lightning #zeus #blixt

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/609313