@ a296b972:e5a7a2e8

Ach Gottchen, man ist mal wieder empört! Quel fauxpas! Ist es nicht auffällig, dass man von anderen Nationen solche Bilder nicht sieht? Zwei Politiker im Flieger unterwegs zu einer Vergnügens-Beerdigung eines Mannes, der für eine nicht geringe Anzahl von Menschen auf der Erde eine sehr große Bedeutung hat. (Impfen ist Nächstenliebe und die Kündigung derjenigen, die sich der Gen-Behandlung nicht unterziehen wollten, hier einmal außen vor gelassen). Warum ausgerechnet immer die Deutschen? Tja, anscheinend hat Deutschland den Joker im ins-Fettnäpfchen-treten gepachtet und gibt ihn nicht mehr aus der Hand. Meister aller Klassen bleibt bisher noch die feministische Außen-Dings, aber was nicht ist, kann ja noch werden.  Und ausgerechnet ein Herr Laschet muss auch seinen Senf dazu geben, obwohl man doch eigentlich nicht mit Steinen wirft, wenn man im Glashaus sitzt. Unvergessen seine heitere Stimmung bei einem Besuch im verwüsteten Ahrtal, das bis heute noch teilweise nicht wiederhergestellt ist.

Herrn Steinmeier ist kein Vorwurf zu machen. Schließlich repräsentiert er mit einer florierenden Wirtschaft, einem vom Stier getriebenen Vielleicht-Bundeskanzler, einem Noch-Gesundheitsminister mit Traumjob, der gerne weiter gemacht hätte (auch die guten Kräfte haben ihre Grenzen des Ertragbaren), das Land des Lächelns.

Bei der Gelegenheit: Herr Lauterbach erinnert doch sehr an die Gräfin Eleonora Moran aus „Die Seltsame Gräfin“ von Edgar Wallace. In dem Film gibt es eine Szene, in der sie sagt: „Ich bin eine Wohltäterin der Menschheit, ich habe immer nur Gutes getan, niemals etwas Böses! Fassen Sie mich nicht an! Ich bin die Gräfin Eleonora Moran!“

Und Herr Söder, was soll man dazu sagen. Der bayerische Möchtegern-König, der sein Fähnchen schneller nach dem Wind dreht, als der Wind selbst es kann.

Und Herr Merz war wohl leider verhindert. Der belegte über Ostern einen Kurs bei der Volkshochschule: Torero werden in drei Wochen! Nach diesem Kurs werden Sie mit jedem Stier spielend fertig!

Fair bleiben: Gespielte Betroffenheit wäre geheuchelt gewesen. Schließlich besteht keine nahe Verwandtschaft zwischen Steinmeier und Söder zu dem Petrus-Nachfolger.

Am Ende ist es eine Pflichtveranstaltung, wie der Besuch bei der unangenehmen Erbtante, zu dem man eigentlich gar keine Lust hat, aber man muss halt, weil die Taler locken.

Schade, dass Herr Pistorius nicht auch mit im Malle-Flieger dabei war und auf dem Selfie. Dann hätte man einen schönen Untertitel gehabt: Na, ihr da unten auf dem Boden. Seid ihr auch alle schön kriegstüchtig?

Und dann gibt es da noch das Bild von Trump und Selensky in einer großen Halle im Vatikan, zwei Stühle, reduziert auf das Wesentliche: Keine Gelegenheit auslassen miteinander zu reden, den Frieden in der Ukraine besser gestern als heute herbeizuholen. Das macht den Ernst der Lage sehr deutlich. Für Macron war wohl im ganzen Vatikan kein weiterer Stuhl aufzutreiben. Deutsche Politiker glänzten durch Abwesenheit. War vielleicht auch gut so. Da stand vermutlich auch zerbrechliches Porzellan im Raum.

Im Gegensatz dazu das Bild der beiden Grinsekater, das wohl um die halbe Welt gehen wird. Was für eine Blamage. Man könnte fast meinen, da steckt Absicht dahinter. Die Absicht, Deutschland unter allen Umständen in die vollkommene Lächerlichkeit überführen zu wollen. Über Rom lacht die Sonne, über Deutschland die ganze Welt. Kann nicht Herr Brabeck-Letmathe vom WEF mal was Erhellendes dem deutschen Trinkwasser beimischen, damit die Politiker wieder zur Vernunft kommen?

Was würde Äarwin Krawuttke aus Wanne-Eickel wohl dazu sagen: Ey, voll der Schuss in den Ofen! Datt wollen Pollitiker sein? Ich lach mich kaputt!

Dieser Beitrag wurde mit dem Pareto-Client geschrieben.

(Bild von pixabay)

@ fd06f542:8d6d54cd

更新前有问题问题？

本站采用 docsify渲染，他对图片的处理 是没有任何类原始的 img标签。 缺点如下： * 图片太大，很多图片出现了锯齿； * 图片和周边的文字没有边界，非常突兀；

第一次修改

全加了统一风格，用圆角修饰了；

结果出现了新问题，有些小图片是一个图标，例如:github 的star变得异常难看。

怎么办？

第二次修改

查找 文档说 markdown文档有支持{.classname}的做法，有人用这个方法；

那么 docsify如何做的呢？

js window.$docsify = { name: title, loadSidebar: true, homepage: "readme.md", subMaxLevel:2, plugins: [imgClassPlugin], alias: { '/_sidebar.md': './_sidebar.md', } };

用plugins 就可以，

imgClassPlugin 是找的正则替换 `` js export function processMarkdownImages(content) { const regex = /!\[(.*?)\]\((.*?)\)(\{.*?\})?/g; return content.replace(regex, (match, alt, src, classInfo) => { if (classInfo) { const classNames = classInfo.match(/\.([a-zA-Z0-9_-]+)/); if (classNames) { const className = classNames[1]; return`; } } return match; }); }

// 定义 Docsify 插件 export const imgClassPlugin = function (hook, vm) { hook.mounted(function () { // 在文档挂载后，在每次渲染前执行处理逻辑 hook.beforeEach(function (content) { return processMarkdownImages(content); }); }); };

``` 这样就可以了。大家看看我这张图片：

{.user-img}

具体用法，大家参考 https://www.nostrbook.com/books/c3834c0604b4e5ad66ececd756791a539c585d880864d62b0ef51e3602c482b7?title=NostrBook%E7%AB%99%E7%82%B9%E6%97%A5%E8%AE%B0#/02

@ fd06f542:8d6d54cd

使用nostrbook.com网站

登录和创建用户： {.user-img} 登录按钮 ，可以粘贴 已有的 nsec....账号，完成登录。

注册： {.user-img} 可以点击红标位置 生成你的账户。 “确定” 完成注册。

创建书籍

封面的上传

{.user-img} 创建书籍，可以用 微信截图 后直接 ctrl+v. 粘贴即可。

或者点击浏览 本地图片文件。

标题和作者

正常填写就可以。 书的作者和上传文件人没有一一绑定。

写书

{.user-img} 创建完成后就可以写书了，写书入口在 登录处 “我的书籍” 。点进去会出现你创建的书籍。选择一本就可以写书了。

列出你创建的所有的书籍

{.user-img}

点击图标，就可以进入开始写作了。例如《nostrbook站点日记》

{.user-img}

如图所示有4个部分

1. （1）关闭按钮，点击就退出编辑，这时候他会提示你保存，如果不需要保存退出，点击 “不保存退出”
2. （2）大纲 是编写 你书籍的大纲，这个参考 docsify文档 下面会有例子。 时间排列是 你所有为本书写的章节。但是有些章节你可能废弃了，或者暂时不想展示，都会存在 时间排列里面，就是按照你编写的时间倒序排列的。草稿 是你暂时存储的内容，没有上传到网络，存在你本地浏览器的缓存里面。
3. （3）这个部分看到的就是你的章节列表，当让你第一次来的这个地方是空的。新增章节 下一次就会有内容了。
4. （4）文件名，是我们存储章节的唯一标识。 readme.md 和_sidebar.md 是系统默认必须有的。因为docsify技术默认需要这2个。

如何编写大纲

如果你是第一次开始，大纲的界面是这样的。 {.user-img}

• 点击 增加大纲
• 点击 查看样例
• 修改系统生成的例子，此时 readme.md是必须的readme 对应的名字你可以自己修改
• 点击提交 就可以完成大纲了。

第二次、点击更新大纲 按钮 - [首页](/readme.md) - [国人开发者](/01.md) - [中文用户列表](/02.md)

大纲例子，“[]” 内是标题，“（）”内是 文件名； 标题是是显示在文章的右侧； 文件名的作用是匹配 ‘新增章节’ 里面的markdown的相匹配关联的。

如何定制化图片的风格

上传图片后，添加 {.user-img} 类，目前这个类是固定的，后面考虑增加类 见图： {.user-img}

渲染后 增加了一个classname ![图片](https://cdn.nostrcheck.me/fd06f542bc6c06a39881810de917e6c5d277dfb51689a568ad7b7a548d6d54cd/9461e21187258eb534772ccff9fef1f7192c298397db21ac39adbd1e7e16c62c.webp){.user-img}

@ 4fe14ef2:f51992ec

Let's support Bitcoin merchants! I'd love to hear some of your latest Lightning purchases and interesting products you bought. Feel free to include links to the shops or businesses you bought from.

Who else has a recent purchase they’re excited about? Bonus sats if you found a killer deal! ⚡

If you missed our last thread, here are some of the items stackers recently spent and zap on.

---

Like and repost: N: https://nostrudel.ninja/#/n/nevent1qvzqqqqqqypzqnlpfmegjd... X: https://x.com/AGORA_SN/status/1916432206861684741

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/963317

@ fd06f542:8d6d54cd

直车对横车 的概念

顺炮直车对横车：红方出直车（车一平二），黑方出横车（车 9 进 1），这是顺炮布局中常见的一种变化。红方直车可以快速出动，威胁黑方右翼，黑方横车则可以灵活调动，根据局势选择进攻或防守的方向。后续可能会出现红方进车过河压马，黑方出炮封车等变化，双方展开激烈的争夺。

顺炮直车对横车布局体系主要有以下分类：

1. 古典攻法
   • 顺炮过河车对横车：红车一平二后车二进六过河，以强硬攻势迅速压制黑方阵营。
   • 顺炮缓补士对横车：红出直车后不急于补士（士四进五缓出） ，依黑方行棋灵活选择攻防策略。
   • 顺炮跳边马对横车：红马八进九上边马，平炮通车平衡两翼子力，防止黑卒3进1争先，着法稳健。
2. “胡氏双正马”攻法
   • 顺炮直车进三兵对横车挺3卒：红进三兵、黑挺3卒形成牵制，红可借马三进四等手段跃马进攻。
   • 顺炮直车进三兵对横车跳边马：红进三兵后，针对黑边马位置，以炮八平七等手段威胁黑方马获取局面优势。
   • 顺炮直车进七兵对横车：红进七兵，黑车9平4后，红可选择车二进四巡河或车二进六过河等不同进攻战术。
   • 顺炮直车“两头蛇”对双横车：红兵三进一、兵七进一构成“两头蛇”阵，与黑方双横车激烈争夺，红借双兵推进掌控空间，黑寻机反击。
3. 其他常见变化
   • 正马三兵与黑右肋车的攻防对抗；正马应对黑挺3卒的局面变化。
   • 正马三兵对阵黑肋车边马；“两头蛇”阵势迎战黑双横车的局势博弈。
   • 正马三兵对黑方马后藏车；“两头蛇”对黑正马边炮的局势发展。
   • 红方正马左士应对黑右肋车；红方采用巡河车、五六炮的布局变化，以及双正马进七兵分别对黑正马、右肋车的局面策略 。

以下按照天天象棋棋谱整理的8种变化，这些变化有些大同小异。 最后都类似。

车二进六的变化（82）

顺炮横车破直车弃马001

棋谱链接

====棋局开始* 1.炮二平五 炮８平５
2.马二进三
马８进７
3.车一进一
车９平８
4.车一平六
车８进６

5.车六进七
马２进１
6.车九进一 炮２进７

7.炮八进五 马７退８

8.炮五进四 士６进５
9.车九平六
将５平６
10.前车进一 士５退４

11.车六平四
炮５平６
12.车四进六 将６平５
13.炮八平五
{.user-img}

双正马三兵 变化（2202）

兵三进一 （473）

马八进九 （179）

红正马五六炮式（171）

兵七进一 （74）

红正马巡河车式（73）

士四进五（55）

@ 872982aa:8fb54cfe

现在这样可以，我试试在这里也粘贴一个照片

{.user-img}

@ 8d34bd24:414be32b

I used to hate end times prophecy because it didn’t make sense. I didn’t understand how the predictions could be true, so I wondered if the fulfillment was more figurative than literal. As time has progressed, I’ve seen technologies and international relations change in ways that make the predictions seem not only possible, but probable. I’ve seen the world look more and more like what is predicted for the end times.

I thought it would be handy to look at the predictions and compare them to events, technologies, and nations today. This is a major undertaking, so this will turn into a series. I only hope I can do it justice. I will have some links to news articles on these current events and technologies. Because I can’t remember where I’ve read many of these things, it is likely I will put some links to some news sources that I don’t normally recommend, but which do a decent job of covering the point I’m making. I’m sorry if I don’t always give a perfect source. I have limited time, so in some cases, I’ll link to the easy (main stream journals that show up high on web searches) rather than what I consider more reliable sources because of time constraints.

I also want to give one caveat to everything I discuss below. Although I do believe the signs suggest the Rapture and Tribulation are near, I can’t say exactly what that means or how soon these prophecies will be fulfilled. Could it be tomorrow, a month from now, a year from now, or 20 years from now? Yes, any of them could be true. Could it be even farther in the future? It could be, even if my interpretation of the data concludes that to be less likely.

I will start with a long passage from Matthew that describes what Jesus told His disciples to expect before “the end of the age.” Then I’ll go to some of the end times points that seemed unexplainable to me in the past. We’ll see where things go from there. I’ve already had to split discussion of this one passage into multiple posts due to length.

Jesus’s Signs of the End

As He was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things happen, and what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”

And Jesus answered and said to them, “See to it that no one misleads you. For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will mislead many. You will be hearing of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not frightened, for those things must take place, but that is not yet the end. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and in various places there will be famines and earthquakes. But all these things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.

“Then they will deliver you to tribulation, and will kill you, and you will be hated by all nations because of My name. At that time many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many. Because lawlessness is increased, most people’s love will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end, he will be saved. This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come. (Matthew 24:3-14) {emphasis mine}

Before I go into the details I do want to clarify one thing. The verses that follow the above verses (Matthew 24:16-28) mention the “abomination of desolation” and therefore is clearly discussing the midpoint of the tribulation and the following 3.5 years or Great Tribulation. The first half of Matthew 24 discusses the birth pangs and the first half of the Tribulation. The signs that I discuss will be growing immediately preceding the Tribulation, but probably will not be completely fulfilled until the first 3.5 years of the Tribulation.

I do think we will see an increase of all of these signs before the 7 year Tribulation begins as part of the birth pangs even if they are not fulfilled completely until the Tribulation:

1. Wars and rumors of wars. (Matthew 24:6a)

2. Famines (Matthew 24:7)

3. Earthquakes (Matthew 24:7).

4. Israel will be attacked and will be hated by all nations (Matthew 24:9)

5. Falling away from Jesus (Matthew 24:10)

6. Many Misled (Matthew 24:10)

7. People’s love will grow cold (Matthew 24:12)

8. Gospel will be preached to the whole world (Matthew 24:14)

Now let’s go through each of these predictions to see what we are seeing today.

1. Wars and Rumors of Wars

When you hear of wars and disturbances, do not be terrified; for these things must take place first, but the end does not follow immediately.” (Luke 21:9)

In 1947 the doomsday clock was invented. It theoretically tells how close society is to all out war and destruction of mankind. It was just recently set to 89 seconds to midnight, the closest it has ever been. It is true that this isn’t a scientific measure and politics can effect the setting, i.e. climate change & Trump Derangement Syndrome, but it is still one of many indicators of danger and doom.

There are three main events going on right now that could lead to World War III and the end times.

Obviously the war between Russia and Ukraine has gotten the world divided. It is true that Russia invaded Ukraine, but there were many actions by the US and the EU that provoked this attack. Within months of the initial attack, there was a near agreement between Ukraine and Russia to end the war, but the US and the EU talked Ukraine out of peace, leading to hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians and Russians dying for basically no change of ground. Estimates of deaths vary greatly. See here, here, here. Almost all English sources list Russia as having many more deaths than Ukraine, but since Ukraine is now drafting kids and old men, is considering drafting women, and has most of its defensive capabilities destroyed, while Russia still seems to have plenty of men and weapons, I find this hard to believe. I don’t think any of the parties that have data are motivated to tell the truth. We probably will never know.

The way the EU (and the US until recently) has sacrificed everything to defend Ukraine (until this war known as the most corrupt nation in Europe and known for its actual Nazis) and to do everything in its power to keep the war with Russia going, things could easily escalate. The US and the EU have repeatedly crossed Russia’s red-lines. One of these days, Russia is likely to say “enough is enough” and actually attack Europe. This could easily spiral out of control. I do think that Trump’s pull back and negotiations makes this less likely to lead to world war than it seemed for the past several years. This article does a decent job of explaining the background for the war that most westerners, especially Americans, don’t understand.

Another less well known hot spot is the tension between China and Taiwan. Taiwan is closer politically to the US, but closer economically and culturally to China. This causes tension. Taiwan also produces the majority of the high tech microchips used in advanced technology. Both the US and China want and need this technology. I honestly believe this is the overarching issue regarding Taiwan. If either the US or China got control of Taiwan’s microchip production, it would be military and economic game over for the other. This is stewing, but I don’t think this will be the cause of world war 3, although it could become part of the war that leads to the Antichrist ruling the world.

The war that is likely to lead to the Tribulation involves Israel and the Middle East. Obviously, the Muslim nations hate Israel and attack them almost daily. We also see Iran, Russia, Turkey, and other nations making alliances that sound a lot like the Gog/Magog coalition in Ezekiel 38. The hate of Israel has grown to a level that makes zero sense unless you take into account the spiritual world and Bible prophecy. Such a small insignificant nation, that didn’t even exist for \~1900 years, shouldn’t have the influence on world politics that it does. It is about the size of the state of New Jersey. Most nations of Israel’s size, population, and economy are not even recognized by most people. Is there a person on earth that doesn’t know about Israel? I doubt it. Every nation on earth seems to have a strong positive or, more commonly, negative view of Israel. We’ll get to this hate of Israel more below in point 4.

2. Famines

In the two parallel passages to Matthew 24, there is once again the prediction of famines coming before the end.

For nation will rise up against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will also be famines. These things are merely the beginning of birth pangs. (Mark 13:8) {emphasis mine}

and there will be great earthquakes, and in various places plagues and famines; and there will be terrors and great signs from heaven. (Luke 21:11) {emphasis mine}

In Revelation, the third seal releases famine upon the earth and a day’s wages will only buy one person’s daily wheat needs. A man with a family would only be able to buy lower quality barley to barely feed his family.

When He broke the third seal, I heard the third living creature saying, “Come.” I looked, and behold, a black horse; and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. And I heard something like a voice in the center of the four living creatures saying, “A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not damage the oil and the wine.” (Revelation 6:5-6) {emphasis mine}

We shouldn’t fear a Tribulation level famine as a precursor to the Tribulation, but we should see famines scattered around the world, shortages of different food items, and rising food prices, all of which we are seeing. (Once again, I can’t support many of these sources or verify all of their data, but they give us a feel of what is going on today.)

Food Prices Go Up

• Bird Flu scares and government responses cause egg and chicken prices to increase. The government response to the flu is actually causing more problems than the flu itself and it looks like this more dangerous version may have come out of a US lab.

• Tariffs and trade war cause some items to become more expensive or less available. here

• Ukraine war effecting the supply of grain and reducing availability of fertilizer. More info.

• Inflation and other effects causing food prices to go up. This is a poll from Americans.

- Grocery prices overall have increased around 23% since 2021, with prices on individual items like coffee and chocolate rising much faster.

• General Food inflation is difficult, but not life destroying for most of the world, but some nations are experiencing inflation that is causing many to be unable to afford food. Single digit food inflation is difficult, even in well-to-do nations, but in poor nations, where a majority of the people’s income already goes to food, it can be catastrophic. When you look at nations like Zimbabwe (105%), Venezuela (22%), South Sudan (106%), Malawi (38%), Lebanon (20%), Haiti (37%), Ghana (26%), Burundi (39%), Bolivia (35%), and Argentina (46%), you can see that there are some seriously hurting people. More info.

• It does look like general food inflation has gone down for the moment (inflation has gone down, but not necessarily prices), but there are many situations around the world that could make it go back up again.

• Wars causing famine

• Sudan: War has made an already poor and hurting country even worse off.

• Gaza: (When I did a web search, all of the sites that came up on the first couple of pages are Israel hating organizations that are trying to cause trouble and/or raise money, so there is major bias. I did link to one of these sites just to be thorough, but take into account the bias of the source.)

• Ukraine: Mostly covered above. The war in Ukraine has affected the people of Ukraine and the world negatively relative to food.

I’m sure there are plenty more evidences for famine or potential famine, but this gives a taste of what is going on.

Our global economy has good and bad effects on the food supply. Being able to transport food around the globe means that when one area has a bad crop, they can import food from another area that produced more than they need. On the other hand, sometimes an area stops producing food because they can import food more cheaply. If something disrupts that imported food (tariffs, trade wars, physical wars, transportation difficulties, intercountry disputes, etc.) then they suddenly have no food. We definitely have a fragile system, where there are many points that could fail and cause famine to abound.

The Bible also talks about another kind of famine in the end times.

“Behold, days are coming,” declares the Lord God,\ “When I will send a famine on the land,\ *Not a famine for bread or a thirst for water,\ But rather for hearing the words of the Lord*.\ People will stagger from sea to sea\ And from the north even to the east;\ They will go to and fro to seek the word of the Lord,\ But they will not find it**. (Amos 8:11-12) {emphasis mine}

We are definitely seeing a famine regarding the word of God. It isn’t that the word of God is not available, but even in churches, there is a lack of teaching the actual word of God from the Scriptures. Many churches teach more self-help or feel good messages than they do the word of God. Those looking to know God better are starving or thirsting for truth and God’s word. I know multiple people who have given up on assembling together in church because they can’t find a Bible believing, Scripture teaching church. How sad!

Although famine should be expected before the Tribulation, the good news is that no famine will separate us from our Savior.

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? (Romans 8:35) {emphasis mine}

3. Earthquakes

We recently saw a major \~7.8 earthquake in Myanmar. Although it seems like we are having many major earthquakes, it is more difficult to determine whether there is actually a major increase or if the seeming increase is due to increasing population to harm, more/better instrumentation, and/or more media coverage. We are definitely seeing lots of earthquake damage and loss of life. I tend to think the number and severity of earthquakes will increase even more before the Tribulation, but only time will tell.

4. Israel will be attacked and will be hated by all nations

“Then they will deliver you [Israel] to tribulation, and will kill you, and you will be hated by all nations because of My name. (Matthew 24:9) {emphasis & clarification mine}

This verse doesn’t specifically mention Israel. It says “you,” but since Jesus was talking to Jews, the best interpretation is that this warning is to the Jews. At the same time, we are also seeing attacks on Christians, so it likely refers to both Jews and Christians. I’m going to focus on Jews/Israel because I don’t think I need to convince most Christians that persecution is increasing.

We have been seeing hatred of Jews and Israel growing exponentially since the biblical prediction of a re-establishment of Israel was accomplished.

All end times prophecy focuses on Israel and requires Israel to be recreated again since it was destroyed in A.D. 70.

Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things?\ Can a land be born in one day?\ Can a nation be brought forth all at once?\ As soon as Zion travailed, she also brought forth her sons. (Isaiah 66:8)

• “British Foreign Minister Lord Balfour issued on November 2, 1917, the so-called Balfour Declaration, which gave official support for the “establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people” with the commitment not to be prejudiced against the rights of the non-Jewish communities.” In one day Israel was declared a nation.

• “On the day when the British Mandate in Palestine expired, the State of Israel was instituted on May 14, 1948, by the Jewish National Council under the presidency of David Ben Gurion.” Then on another day Israel actually came into being with a leader and citizens.

• “Six-Day War: after Egypt closed the Straits of Tiran on May 22, 1967, Israel launched an attack on Egyptian, Jordanian, Syrian, and Iraqi airports on June 5, 1967. After six days, Israel conquered Jerusalem, the Golan Heights, Sinai, and the West Bank.” On June 11, 1967 Jerusalem was conquered and once again became the capital of Israel.

If you read any of these links you can see the history of Israel being repeatedly attacked in an attempt to destroy Israel and stop God’s prophecy that Israel would be recreated and be used in the end times as part of the judgement of the world. This is a very good article on how God plans to use Israel in end times, how God will fulfill all of his promises to Israel, and how the attacks on Israel are Satan’s attempt to stop God’s plan. It is well worth you time to read and well supported by Scripture.

Since Israel became a new nation again, the nations of the world have ramped up their attacks on Israel and the Jews. The hatred of the Jews is hard to fathom. The Jews living in Israel have been constantly at risk of suicide bombers, terrorist attacks, rocket/missile attacks, etc. Almost daily attacks are common recently. The most significant recent attack happened on October 7th. Around 3,000 Hamas terrorists stormed across the border and attacked men, women, and children. About 1200 were killed, mostly civilians and even kids. In addition to murdering these innocent individuals, others were tortured, raped, and kidnapped as well.

You would expect the world to rally around a nation attacked in such a horrendous manner (like most of the world rallied around the US after 9/11), but instead you immediately saw protests supporting Palestine and condemning Israel. I’ve never seen something so upside down in my life. It is impossible to comprehend until you consider the spiritual implications. Satan has been trying to destroy Israel and the Jews since God made His first promise to Abraham. I will never claim that everything Israeli politicians and generals do is good, but the hate towards this tiny, insignificant nation is unfathomable and the world supporting terrorist attacks, instead of the victims of these attacks, is beyond belief.

Israel allows people of Jewish ancestry and Palestinian ancestry to be citizens and vote. There are Jews, Muslims, and Christians in the Knesset (Jewish Congress). Yes, Israel has responded harshly against the Palestinians and innocents have been harmed, but Israel repeatedly gave up land for peace and then that land has been used to attack them. I can’t really condemn them for choosing to risk the death of Palestinian innocents over risking the death of their own innocents. Hamas and Hezbollah are known for attacking innocents, and then using their own innocents as human shields. They then accuse their victims of atrocities when their human shields are harmed. The UN Human Rights council condemns Israel more than all other nations combined when there are atrocities being committed in many, many other nations that are as bad or worse. Why is the world focused on Israel and the Jews? It is because God loves them (despite their rejection of Him) and because Satan hates them.

Throughout history the world has tried to destroy the Jews, but thanks to God and His eternal plan, they are still here and standing strong. the hate is growing to a fevered pitch, just as predicted by Jesus.

This post has gotten so long that it can’t be emailed, so I will post the final 4 points in a follow-up post. I hope these details are helpful to you and seeing that all of the crazy, hate, and destruction occurring in the world today was known by God and is being used by God to His glory and are good according to His perfect plan.

When we see that everything happening in the world is just part of God’s perfect plan, we can have peace, knowing that God is in control. We need to lean on Him and trust Him just as a young child feels safe in his Fathers arms. At the same time, seeing the signs should encourage us to share the Gospel with unbelievers because our time is short. Don’t put off sharing Jesus with those around you because you might not get another chance.

Trust Jesus.

FYI, I hope to write several more articles on the end times (signs of the times, the rapture, the millennium, and the judgement), but I might be a bit slow rolling them out because I want to make sure they are accurate and well supported by Scripture. You can see my previous posts on the end times on the end times tab at trustjesus.substack.com. I also frequently will list upcoming posts.

@ 5d4b6c8d:8a1c1ee3

After taking the most predictable option on day 1, the last 6 rounds of the draft were a rollercoaster. The Raiders traded back twice in the 2nd round and ended up with some extra picks.

Picks

• RB Ashton Jeanty: Best player available at a position of need. Jeanty + Bowers gives the Raiders offense two elite weapons

• WR Jack Bech: Tough, physical receiver with great hands, willing and able blocker

• CB Darien Porter: Elite athlete, classic Raiders pick, "Can't teach size, can't teach speed."

• OL Caleb Rogers: Versatile, athletic lineman, will likely compete at guard

• OL Charles Grant: Same as above, but more likely to compete at tackle

• WR: Donte Thornton: 6'5" and 4.3 speed, another classic Raiders pick, can open the field for the other weapons

• DT Tonka Hemingway: Dope name, versatile and athletic D-Lineman, adds depth and optionality to a very talented groups

• DT/TE/FB JJ Pegues: Interesting guy, probably won't contribute much as a DT immediately, but could be part of the goal line package on offense, as he had 7 rushing TDs last year and as a former TE could be a red zone target too

• WR/KR/PR/QB Tommy Mellot: Another super versatile player, ran a 4.4 40 as a QB, but will convert to WR and return kicks, seems like someone with tons of trick play potential

• QB Cam Miller: Finally, an actual QB! Won a ton of games at a smaller program.

• LB Cody Lindenberg: 7th rounder, probably special teams if he makes the team

Takeaways

The Raiders added a ton of talent and versatility to their offense, including a defensive player who can contribute to the red zone offense in several ways. They're building a big physically dominant offense around an elite RB/TE combo, with big physical WRs who don't mind blocking and another talented TE.

The defensive line is going to have to be really dominant, which they have the potential for, because there is a dearth of talent behind them. Porter recently converted to CB from WR, so will likely take time to develop, and the others are day 3 picks.

The recipe will likely be to eat up clock on long offensive drives to give our pass rushers lots of breathers. Score reliably with a much improved redzone offense and a great kicker, then rely on that pass rush and the best punter in the league to keep the other team out of the endzone.

It's a good starting point. Maybe they'll sign Ramsey, or something, and really upgrade the defensive back group before the season starts.

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/962047

@ 872982aa:8fb54cfe

{.user-img}

@ 418a17eb:b64b2b3a

In today’s world, many people chase after money. We often think that wealth equals success and happiness. But if we look closer, we see that money is just a tool. The real goal is freedom.

Money helps us access resources and experiences. It can open doors. But the constant pursuit of wealth can trap us. We may find ourselves stressed, competing with others, and feeling unfulfilled. The more we chase money, the more we might lose sight of what truly matters.

Freedom, on the other hand, is about choice. It’s the ability to live life on our own terms. When we prioritize freedom, we can follow our passions and build meaningful relationships. We can spend our time on what we love, rather than being tied down by financial worries.

True fulfillment comes from this freedom. It allows us to define success for ourselves. When we embrace freedom, we become more resilient and creative. We connect more deeply with ourselves and others. This sense of purpose often brings more happiness than money ever could.

In the end, money isn’t the ultimate goal. It’s freedom that truly matters. By focusing on living authentically and making choices that resonate with us, we can create a life filled with meaning and joy.

@ 1f79058c:eb86e1cb

I'm currently using this bash script to publish long-form content from local Markdown files to Nostr relays.

It requires all of yq, jq, and nak to be installed.

Usage

Create a signed Nostr event and print it to the console:

bash markdown_to_nostr.sh article-filename.md

Create a Nostr event and publish it to one or more relays:

bash markdown_to_nostr.sh article-filename.md ws://localhost:7777 wss://nostr.kosmos.org

Markdown format

You can specify your metadata as YAML in a Front Matter header. Here's an example file:

```markdown

title: "Good Morning" summary: "It's a beautiful day" image: https://example.com/i/beautiful-day.jpg date: 2025-04-24T15:00:00Z tags: gm, poetry published: false

---

In the blue sky just a few specks of gray
In the evening of a beautiful day
Though last night it rained and more rain on the way
And that more rain is needed 'twould be fair to say.

— Francis Duggan ```

The metadata keys are mostly self-explanatory. Note:

• All keys except for title are optional
• date, if present, will be set as the published_at date.
• If published is set to true, it will publish a kind 30023 event, otherwise a kind 30024 (draft)
• The d tag (widely used as URL slug for the article) will be the filename without the .md extension

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

Read the original blog post

The new website is finally live! I put in a lot of hard work over the past months on it. I'm proud to say that it's out now and it looks pretty cool, at least to me!

Why rewrite it all?

The old kycnot.me site was built using Python with Flask about two years ago. Since then, I've gained a lot more experience with Golang and coding in general. Trying to update that old codebase, which had a lot of design flaws, would have been a bad idea. It would have been like building on an unstable foundation.

That's why I made the decision to rewrite the entire application. Initially, I chose to use SvelteKit with JavaScript. I did manage to create a stable site that looked similar to the new one, but it required Jav aScript to work. As I kept coding, I started feeling like I was repeating "the Python mistake". I was writing the app in a language I wasn't very familiar with (just like when I was learning Python at that mom ent), and I wasn't happy with the code. It felt like spaghetti code all the time.

So, I made a complete U-turn and started over, this time using Golang. While I'm not as proficient in Golang as I am in Python now, I find it to be a very enjoyable language to code with. Most aof my recent pr ojects have been written in Golang, and I'm getting the hang of it. I tried to make the best decisions I could and structure the code as well as possible. Of course, there's still room for improvement, which I'll address in future updates.

Now I have a more maintainable website that can scale much better. It uses a real database instead of a JSON file like the old site, and I can add many more features. Since I chose to go with Golang, I mad e the "tradeoff" of not using JavaScript at all, so all the rendering load falls on the server. But I believe it's a tradeoff that's worth it.

What's new

• UI/UX - I've designed a new logo and color palette for kycnot.me. I think it looks pretty cool and cypherpunk. I am not a graphic designer, but I think I did a decent work and I put a lot of thinking on it to make it pleasant!
• Point system - The new point system provides more detailed information about the listings, and can be expanded to cover additional features across all services. Anyone can request a new point!
• ToS Scrapper: I've implemented a powerful automated terms-of-service scrapper that collects all the ToS pages from the listings. It saves you from the hassle of reading the ToS by listing the lines that are suspiciously related to KYC/AML practices. This is still in development and it will improve for sure, but it works pretty fine right now!
• Search bar - The new search bar allows you to easily filter services. It performs a full-text search on the Title, Description, Category, and Tags of all the services. Looking for VPN services? Just search for "vpn"!
• Transparency - To be more transparent, all discussions about services now take place publicly on GitLab. I won't be answering any e-mails (an auto-reply will prompt to write to the corresponding Gitlab issue). This ensures that all service-related matters are publicly accessible and recorded. Additionally, there's a real-time audits page that displays database changes.
• Listing Requests - I have upgraded the request system. The new form allows you to directly request services or points without any extra steps. In the future, I plan to enable requests for specific changes to parts of the website.
• Lightweight and fast - The new site is lighter and faster than its predecessor!
• Tor and I2P - At last! kycnot.me is now officially on Tor and I2P!

How?

This rewrite has been a labor of love, in the end, I've been working on this for more than 3 months now. I don't have a team, so I work by myself on my free time, but I find great joy in helping people on their private journey with cryptocurrencies. Making it easier for individuals to use cryptocurrencies without KYC is a goal I am proud of!

If you appreciate my work, you can support me through the methods listed here. Alternatively, feel free to send me an email with a kind message!

Technical details

All the code is written in Golang, the website makes use of the chi router for the routing part. I also make use of BigCache for caching database requests. There is 0 JavaScript, so all the rendering load falls on the server, this means it needed to be efficient enough to not drawn with a few users since the old site was reporting about 2M requests per month on average (note that this are not unique users).

The database is running with mariadb, using gorm as the ORM. This is more than enough for this project. I started working with an sqlite database, but I ended up migrating to mariadb since it works better with JSON.

The scraper is using chromedp combined with a series of keywords, regex and other logic. It runs every 24h and scraps all the services. You can find the scraper code here.

The frontend is written using Golang Templates for the HTML, and TailwindCSS plus DaisyUI for the CSS classes framework. I also use some plain CSS, but it's minimal.

The requests forms is the only part of the project that requires JavaScript to be enabled. It is needed for parsing some from fields that are a bit complex and for the "captcha", which is a simple Proof of Work that runs on your browser, destinated to avoid spam. For this, I use mCaptcha.

@ 872982aa:8fb54cfe

• 首页

@ 40b9c85f:5e61b451

Introduction

Data Vending Machines (DVMs) have emerged as a crucial component of the Nostr ecosystem, offering specialized computational services to clients across the network. As defined in NIP-90, DVMs operate on an apparently simple principle: "data in, data out." They provide a marketplace for data processing where users request specific jobs (like text translation, content recommendation, or AI text generation)

While DVMs have gained significant traction, the current specification faces challenges that hinder widespread adoption and consistent implementation. This article explores some ideas on how we can apply the reflection pattern, a well established approach in RPC systems, to address these challenges and improve the DVM ecosystem's clarity, consistency, and usability.

The Current State of DVMs: Challenges and Limitations

The NIP-90 specification provides a broad framework for DVMs, but this flexibility has led to several issues:

1. Inconsistent Implementation

As noted by hzrd149 in "DVMs were a mistake" every DVM implementation tends to expect inputs in slightly different formats, even while ostensibly following the same specification. For example, a translation request DVM might expect an event ID in one particular format, while an LLM service could expect a "prompt" input that's not even specified in NIP-90.

2. Fragmented Specifications

The DVM specification reserves a range of event kinds (5000-6000), each meant for different types of computational jobs. While creating sub-specifications for each job type is being explored as a possible solution for clarity, in a decentralized and permissionless landscape like Nostr, relying solely on specification enforcement won't be effective for creating a healthy ecosystem. A more comprehensible approach is needed that works with, rather than against, the open nature of the protocol.

3. Ambiguous API Interfaces

There's no standardized way for clients to discover what parameters a specific DVM accepts, which are required versus optional, or what output format to expect. This creates uncertainty and forces developers to rely on documentation outside the protocol itself, if such documentation exists at all.

The Reflection Pattern: A Solution from RPC Systems

The reflection pattern in RPC systems offers a compelling solution to many of these challenges. At its core, reflection enables servers to provide metadata about their available services, methods, and data types at runtime, allowing clients to dynamically discover and interact with the server's API.

In established RPC frameworks like gRPC, reflection serves as a self-describing mechanism where services expose their interface definitions and requirements. In MCP reflection is used to expose the capabilities of the server, such as tools, resources, and prompts. Clients can learn about available capabilities without prior knowledge, and systems can adapt to changes without requiring rebuilds or redeployments. This standardized introspection creates a unified way to query service metadata, making tools like grpcurl possible without requiring precompiled stubs.

How Reflection Could Transform the DVM Specification

By incorporating reflection principles into the DVM specification, we could create a more coherent and predictable ecosystem. DVMs already implement some sort of reflection through the use of 'nip90params', which allow clients to discover some parameters, constraints, and features of the DVMs, such as whether they accept encryption, nutzaps, etc. However, this approach could be expanded to provide more comprehensive self-description capabilities.

1. Defined Lifecycle Phases

Similar to the Model Context Protocol (MCP), DVMs could benefit from a clear lifecycle consisting of an initialization phase and an operation phase. During initialization, the client and DVM would negotiate capabilities and exchange metadata, with the DVM providing a JSON schema containing its input requirements. nip-89 (or other) announcements can be used to bootstrap the discovery and negotiation process by providing the input schema directly. Then, during the operation phase, the client would interact with the DVM according to the negotiated schema and parameters.

2. Schema-Based Interactions

Rather than relying on rigid specifications for each job type, DVMs could self-advertise their schemas. This would allow clients to understand which parameters are required versus optional, what type validation should occur for inputs, what output formats to expect, and what payment flows are supported. By internalizing the input schema of the DVMs they wish to consume, clients gain clarity on how to interact effectively.

3. Capability Negotiation

Capability negotiation would enable DVMs to advertise their supported features, such as encryption methods, payment options, or specialized functionalities. This would allow clients to adjust their interaction approach based on the specific capabilities of each DVM they encounter.

Implementation Approach

While building DVMCP, I realized that the RPC reflection pattern used there could be beneficial for constructing DVMs in general. Since DVMs already follow an RPC style for their operation, and reflection is a natural extension of this approach, it could significantly enhance and clarify the DVM specification.

A reflection enhanced DVM protocol could work as follows: 1. Discovery: Clients discover DVMs through existing NIP-89 application handlers, input schemas could also be advertised in nip-89 announcements, making the second step unnecessary. 2. Schema Request: Clients request the DVM's input schema for the specific job type they're interested in 3. Validation: Clients validate their request against the provided schema before submission 4. Operation: The job proceeds through the standard NIP-90 flow, but with clearer expectations on both sides

Parallels with Other Protocols

This approach has proven successful in other contexts. The Model Context Protocol (MCP) implements a similar lifecycle with capability negotiation during initialization, allowing any client to communicate with any server as long as they adhere to the base protocol. MCP and DVM protocols share fundamental similarities, both aim to expose and consume computational resources through a JSON-RPC-like interface, albeit with specific differences.

gRPC's reflection service similarly allows clients to discover service definitions at runtime, enabling generic tools to work with any gRPC service without prior knowledge. In the REST API world, OpenAPI/Swagger specifications document interfaces in a way that makes them discoverable and testable.

DVMs would benefit from adopting these patterns while maintaining the decentralized, permissionless nature of Nostr.

Conclusion

I am not attempting to rewrite the DVM specification; rather, explore some ideas that could help the ecosystem improve incrementally, reducing fragmentation and making the ecosystem more comprehensible. By allowing DVMs to self describe their interfaces, we could maintain the flexibility that makes Nostr powerful while providing the structure needed for interoperability.

For developers building DVM clients or libraries, this approach would simplify consumption by providing clear expectations about inputs and outputs. For DVM operators, it would establish a standard way to communicate their service's requirements without relying on external documentation.

I am currently developing DVMCP following these patterns. Of course, DVMs and MCP servers have different details; MCP includes capabilities such as tools, resources, and prompts on the server side, as well as 'roots' and 'sampling' on the client side, creating a bidirectional way to consume capabilities. In contrast, DVMs typically function similarly to MCP tools, where you call a DVM with an input and receive an output, with each job type representing a different categorization of the work performed.

Without further ado, I hope this article has provided some insight into the potential benefits of applying the reflection pattern to the DVM specification.

@ ba0ea036:21b6d3e8

ان اف تی مخفف Non-Fungible Token به معنای «توکن غیرقابل تعویض» است. این اصطلاح ممکن است در ابتدا کمی گیج کننده به نظر برسد، اما در واقع مفهوم آن بسیار ساده است. NFTها، دارایی‌های دیجیتالی منحصر به فردی هستند که بر روی بلاک چین ثبت می‌شوند و مالکیت آن‌ها به صورت غیرقابل تغییر و شفاف ثبت می‌گردد. به عبارت دیگر، هر NFT مانند یک اثر هنری دیجیتالی، یک قطعه موسیقی، یا حتی یک توییت منحصر به فرد است که نمی‌توان آن را با دیگری جایگزین کرد.

تفاوت NFT با دارایی‌های قابل تعویض:

برای درک بهتر مفهوم NFT، بهتر است آن را با دارایی‌های قابل تعویض (Fungible Tokens) مانند بیت کوین یا اتریوم مقایسه کنیم. بیت کوین‌ها همه یکسان هستند و می‌توان یک بیت کوین را به راحتی با بیت کوین دیگری تعویض کرد. اما NFTها هر کدام منحصر به فرد هستند و نمی‌توان آن‌ها را با یکدیگر جایگزین کرد. این تفاوت اساسی، NFTها را به دارایی‌های ارزشمندی تبدیل کرده است که می‌توانند ارزش زیادی داشته باشند.

مراحل کارکرد یک NFT:

ایجاد (مینت کردن) NFT:

اولین مرحله در فرآیند ایجاد یک NFT، مینت کردن آن است. این فرایند شامل تبدیل یک دارایی دیجیتال مانند یک اثر هنری، یک قطعه موسیقی، یا یک آیتم درون بازی به یک توکن NFT است. این کار معمولاً با استفاده از پلتفرم‌های مختلفی که برای ایجاد و مدیریت NFTها طراحی شده‌اند، انجام می‌شود. در این مرحله، اطلاعات مربوط به NFT، از جمله اطلاعات مالکیت، تاریخ ایجاد و سایر جزئیات مربوطه، به صورت رمزنگاری شده بر روی بلاک چین ثبت می‌شود.

ثبت بر روی بلاک چین:

بلاک چین یک دفتر کل توزیع شده و غیرمتمرکز است که اطلاعات مربوط به NFT را به صورت امن و شفاف ثبت می‌کند. این به این معنی است که اطلاعات مربوط به NFT در چندین کامپیوتر در سراسر جهان کپی می‌شود و هیچ فرد یا نهادی نمی‌تواند به تنهایی اطلاعات را تغییر دهد. این ویژگی، امنیت و شفافیت NFTها را تضمین می‌کند.

خرید و فروش NFT:

پس از ایجاد NFT، می‌توان آن را در بازارهای آنلاین NFT به فروش گذاشت. خریداران می‌توانند با استفاده از ارزهای دیجیتال، مانند اتریوم، NFTها را خریداری کنند و مالکیت آن‌ها را به دست آورند. تمام تراکنش‌های مربوط به خرید و فروش NFTها بر روی بلاک چین ثبت می‌شود و به این ترتیب، شفافیت و امنیت معاملات تضمین می‌گردد.

مالکیت و اصالت:

بلاک چین تضمین می‌کند که مالکیت NFT به طور شفاف و غیرقابل تغییر ثبت شده است. این امر اصالت NFT را تضمین می‌کند و از جعل و کپی غیرمجاز جلوگیری می‌کند. هر NFT دارای یک کد منحصر به فرد است که آن را از سایر NFTها متمایز می‌کند و این کد بر روی بلاک چین ثبت می‌شود.

انواع بلاک چین‌های مورد استفاده برای NFTها:

چندین بلاک چین برای میزبانی NFTها وجود دارد، از جمله اتریوم، سولانا، پولکادات و بسیاری دیگر. هر کدام از این بلاک چین‌ها ویژگی‌ها و مزایای خاص خود را دارند، مانند سرعت تراکنش، هزینه‌های گاز (هزینه تراکنش)، و امنیت. انتخاب بلاک چین مناسب، به عوامل مختلفی مانند نوع NFT و نیازهای کاربران بستگی دارد.

کاربردهای NFTها:

کاربردهای NFTها بسیار گسترده است و به سرعت در حال افزایش است. از جمله کاربردهای مهم NFTها می‌توان به موارد زیر اشاره کرد:

هنر دیجیتال: NFTها به هنرمندان اجازه می‌دهند تا آثار هنری دیجیتال خود را به صورت منحصر به فرد و قابل تأیید مالکیت به فروش برسانند. بازی‌های ویدئویی: NFTها می‌توانند برای ایجاد آیتم‌های درون بازی منحصر به فرد و قابل معامله استفاده شوند. موسیقی: موسیقی‌دانان می‌توانند آثار موسیقی خود را به صورت NFT منتشر کنند و به این ترتیب، مالکیت و حقوق خود را حفظ کنند. کالاهای مجازی: NFTها می‌توانند برای ایجاد و فروش کالاهای مجازی منحصر به فرد، مانند لباس‌ها، لوازم جانبی و آواتارها در متاورس استفاده شوند. گواهی اصالت: NFTها می‌توانند به عنوان گواهی اصالت برای کالاهای فیزیکی نیز استفاده شوند. بلیط‌های رویدادها: NFTها می‌توانند به عنوان بلیط‌های رویدادها، مانند کنسرت‌ها و رویدادهای ورزشی استفاده شوند.

مزایای استفاده از NFTها:

مالکیت شفاف و غیرقابل تغییر: NFTها مالکیت دارایی‌های دیجیتال را به صورت شفاف و غیرقابل تغییر ثبت می‌کنند. امنیت بالا: بلاک چین امنیت NFTها را تضمین می‌کند و از جعل و کپی غیرمجاز جلوگیری می‌کند. شفافیت: تمام تراکنش‌های مربوط به NFTها بر روی بلاک چین ثبت می‌شود و به راحتی قابل پیگیری است. قابلیت مبادله آسان: NFTها به راحتی قابل خرید، فروش و مبادله هستند. ایجاد بازار جدید برای هنرمندان و خالقان محتوا: NFTها بازار جدیدی برای هنرمندان و خالقان محتوا ایجاد کرده است.

چالش‌های NFTها:

با وجود مزایای بسیار، NFTها نیز با چالش‌هایی مواجه هستند، از جمله:

نوسانات قیمت: قیمت NFTها می‌تواند بسیار نوسان داشته باشد. هزینه‌های تراکنش: هزینه‌های تراکنش در برخی بلاک چین‌ها می‌تواند بالا باشد. ملاحظات زیست محیطی: برخی از بلاک چین‌ها، مانند اتریوم، از الگوریتم‌های اثبات کار استفاده می‌کنند که مصرف انرژی بالایی دارند. کلاهبرداری: خطر کلاهبرداری در بازار NFTها وجود دارد.

نتیجه گیری:

ان اف تی ها فناوری جدیدی هستند که پتانسیل تغییر دادن بسیاری از جنبه‌های زندگی دیجیتال ما را دارند. با درک چگونگی کارکرد NFTها و مزایا و چالش‌های آن‌ها، می‌توان از این فناوری جدید به طور مؤثر استفاده کرد. برای کسب اطلاعات بیشتر در مورد این حوزه جذاب، جستجوی عبارت "NFT چیست؟" در موتورهای جستجو می‌تواند راهنمای خوبی باشد.

امیدوارم این توضیحات برای شما مفید بوده باشد. برای اطلاعات بیشتر در مورد NFT چیست؟، می‌توانید به منابع آنلاین معتبر مراجعه کنید.

@ 30ceb64e:7f08bdf5

Status: Draft
Author: TheWildHustle

Abstract

This NIP defines a framework for storing and sharing health and fitness profile data on Nostr. It establishes a set of standardized event kinds for individual health metrics, allowing applications to selectively access specific health information while preserving user control and privacy.

In this framework exists - NIP-101h.1 Weight using kind 1351 - NIP-101h.2 Height using kind 1352 - NIP-101h.3 Age using kind 1353 - NIP-101h.4 Gender using kind 1354 - NIP-101h.5 Fitness Level using kind 1355

Motivation

I want to build and support an ecosystem of health and fitness related nostr clients that have the ability to share and utilize a bunch of specific interoperable health metrics.

• Selective access - Applications can access only the data they need
• User control - Users can choose which metrics to share
• Interoperability - Different health applications can share data
• Privacy - Sensitive health information can be managed independently

Specification

Kind Number Range

Health profile metrics use the kind number range 1351-1399:

| Kind | Metric | | --------- | ---------------------------------- | | 1351 | Weight | | 1352 | Height | | 1353 | Age | | 1354 | Gender | | 1355 | Fitness Level | | 1356-1399 | Reserved for future health metrics |

Common Structure

All health metric events SHOULD follow these guidelines:

• The content field contains the primary value of the metric
• Required tags:
• ['t', 'health'] - For categorizing as health data
• ['t', metric-specific-tag] - For identifying the specific metric
• ['unit', unit-of-measurement] - When applicable
• Optional tags:
• ['converted_value', value, unit] - For providing alternative unit measurements
• ['timestamp', ISO8601-date] - When the metric was measured
• ['source', application-name] - The source of the measurement

Unit Handling

Health metrics often have multiple ways to be measured. To ensure interoperability:

• Where multiple units are possible, one standard unit SHOULD be chosen as canonical
• When using non-standard units, a converted_value tag SHOULD be included with the canonical unit
• Both the original and converted values should be provided for maximum compatibility

Client Implementation Guidelines

Clients implementing this NIP SHOULD:

• Allow users to explicitly choose which metrics to publish
• Support reading health metrics from other users when appropriate permissions exist
• Support updating metrics with new values over time
• Preserve tags they don't understand for future compatibility
• Support at least the canonical unit for each metric

Extensions

New health metrics can be proposed as extensions to this NIP using the format:

• NIP-101h.X where X is the metric number

Each extension MUST specify: - A unique kind number in the range 1351-1399 - The content format and meaning - Required and optional tags - Examples of valid events

Privacy Considerations

Health data is sensitive personal information. Clients implementing this NIP SHOULD:

• Make it clear to users when health data is being published
• Consider incorporating NIP-44 encryption for sensitive metrics
• Allow users to selectively share metrics with specific individuals
• Provide easy ways to delete previously published health data

---

NIP-101h.1: Weight

Description

This NIP defines the format for storing and sharing weight data on Nostr.

Event Kind: 1351

Content

The content field MUST contain the numeric weight value as a string.

Required Tags

• ['unit', 'kg' or 'lb'] - Unit of measurement
• ['t', 'health'] - Categorization tag
• ['t', 'weight'] - Specific metric tag

Optional Tags

• ['converted_value', value, unit] - Provides the weight in alternative units for interoperability
• ['timestamp', ISO8601 date] - When the weight was measured

Examples

json { "kind": 1351, "content": "70", "tags": [ ["unit", "kg"], ["t", "health"], ["t", "weight"] ] }

json { "kind": 1351, "content": "154", "tags": [ ["unit", "lb"], ["t", "health"], ["t", "weight"], ["converted_value", "69.85", "kg"] ] }

NIP-101h.2: Height

Status: Draft

Description

This NIP defines the format for storing and sharing height data on Nostr.

Event Kind: 1352

Content

The content field can use two formats: - For metric height: A string containing the numeric height value in centimeters (cm) - For imperial height: A JSON string with feet and inches properties

Required Tags

• ['t', 'health'] - Categorization tag
• ['t', 'height'] - Specific metric tag
• ['unit', 'cm' or 'imperial'] - Unit of measurement

Optional Tags

• ['converted_value', value, 'cm'] - Provides height in centimeters for interoperability when imperial is used
• ['timestamp', ISO8601-date] - When the height was measured

Examples

```jsx // Example 1: Metric height Apply to App.jsx

// Example 2: Imperial height with conversion Apply to App.jsx ```

Implementation Notes

• Centimeters (cm) is the canonical unit for height interoperability
• When using imperial units, a conversion to centimeters SHOULD be provided
• Height values SHOULD be positive integers
• For maximum compatibility, clients SHOULD support both formats

---

NIP-101h.3: Age

Status: Draft

Description

This NIP defines the format for storing and sharing age data on Nostr.

Event Kind: 1353

Content

The content field MUST contain the numeric age value as a string.

Required Tags

• ['unit', 'years'] - Unit of measurement
• ['t', 'health'] - Categorization tag
• ['t', 'age'] - Specific metric tag

Optional Tags

• ['timestamp', ISO8601-date] - When the age was recorded
• ['dob', ISO8601-date] - Date of birth (if the user chooses to share it)

Examples

```jsx // Example 1: Basic age Apply to App.jsx

// Example 2: Age with DOB Apply to App.jsx ```

Implementation Notes

• Age SHOULD be represented as a positive integer
• For privacy reasons, date of birth (dob) is optional
• Clients SHOULD consider updating age automatically if date of birth is known
• Age can be a sensitive metric and clients may want to consider encrypting this data

---

NIP-101h.4: Gender

Status: Draft

Description

This NIP defines the format for storing and sharing gender data on Nostr.

Event Kind: 1354

Content

The content field contains a string representing the user's gender.

Required Tags

• ['t', 'health'] - Categorization tag
• ['t', 'gender'] - Specific metric tag

Optional Tags

• ['timestamp', ISO8601-date] - When the gender was recorded
• ['preferred_pronouns', string] - User's preferred pronouns

Common Values

While any string value is permitted, the following common values are recommended for interoperability: - male - female - non-binary - other - prefer-not-to-say

Examples

```jsx // Example 1: Basic gender Apply to App.jsx

// Example 2: Gender with pronouns Apply to App.jsx ```

Implementation Notes

• Clients SHOULD allow free-form input for gender
• For maximum compatibility, clients SHOULD support the common values
• Gender is a sensitive personal attribute and clients SHOULD consider appropriate privacy controls
• Applications focusing on health metrics should be respectful of gender diversity

---

NIP-101h.5: Fitness Level

Status: Draft

Description

This NIP defines the format for storing and sharing fitness level data on Nostr.

Event Kind: 1355

Content

The content field contains a string representing the user's fitness level.

Required Tags

• ['t', 'health'] - Categorization tag
• ['t', 'fitness'] - Fitness category tag
• ['t', 'level'] - Specific metric tag

Optional Tags

• ['timestamp', ISO8601-date] - When the fitness level was recorded
• ['activity', activity-type] - Specific activity the fitness level relates to
• ['metrics', JSON-string] - Quantifiable fitness metrics used to determine level

Common Values

While any string value is permitted, the following common values are recommended for interoperability: - beginner - intermediate - advanced - elite - professional

Examples

```jsx // Example 1: Basic fitness level Apply to App.jsx

// Example 2: Activity-specific fitness level with metrics Apply to App.jsx ```

Implementation Notes

• Fitness level is subjective and may vary by activity
• The activity tag can be used to specify fitness level for different activities
• The metrics tag can provide objective measurements to support the fitness level
• Clients can extend this format to include activity-specific fitness assessments
• For general fitness apps, the simple beginner/intermediate/advanced scale is recommended

@ 266815e0:6cd408a5

To all existing nostr developers and new nostr developers, stop using kind 1 events... just stop whatever your doing and switch the kind to Math.round(Math.random() * 10000) trust me it will be better

What are kind 1 events

kind 1 events are defined in NIP-10 as "simple plaintext notes" or in other words social posts.

Don't trick your users

Most users are joining nostr for the social experience, and secondly to find all the cool "other stuff" apps They find friends, browse social posts, and reply to them. If a user signs into a new nostr client and it starts asking them to sign kind 1 events with blobs of JSON, they will sign it without thinking too much about it.

Then when they return to their comfy social apps they will see that they made 10+ posts with massive amounts of gibberish that they don't remember posting. then they probably will go looking for the delete button and realize there isn't one...

Even if those kind 1 posts don't contain JSON and have a nice fancy human readable syntax. they will still confuse users because they won't remember writing those social posts

What about "discoverability"

If your goal is to make your "other stuff" app visible to more users, then I would suggest using NIP-19 and NIP-89 The first allows users to embed any other event kind into social posts as nostr:nevent1 or nostr:naddr1 links, and the second allows social clients to redirect users to an app that knows how to handle that specific kind of event

So instead of saving your apps data into kind 1 events. you can pick any kind you want, then give users a "share on nostr" button that allows them to compose a social post (kind 1) with a nostr: link to your special kind of event and by extension you app

Why its a trap

Once users start using your app it becomes a lot more difficult to migrate to a new event kind or data format. This sounds obvious, but If your app is built on kind 1 events that means you will be stuck with their limitations forever.

For example, here are some of the limitations of using kind 1 - Querying for your apps data becomes much more difficult. You have to filter through all of a users kind 1 events to find which ones are created by your app - Discovering your apps data is more difficult for the same reason, you have to sift through all the social posts just to find the ones with you special tag or that contain JSON - Users get confused. as mentioned above users don't expect "other stuff" apps to be creating special social posts - Other nostr clients won't understand your data and will show it as a social post with no option for users to learn about your app

@ a53364ff:e6ba5513

Decentralization and Control:

Bitcoin operates on a decentralized, peer-to-peer network, meaning no single entity controls it. This decentralization can empower individuals by allowing them to control their own money and financial transactions without relying on intermediaries like banks or governments.

Financial Inclusion and Accessibility:

Bitcoin can provide financial access to individuals who may be excluded from traditional banking systems due to lack of identity documents, high fees, or other barriers.

Privacy and Security:

Bitcoin transactions can be anonymous, offering a degree of privacy and potentially protecting users from surveillance or financial manipulation.

Freedom from Financial Restrictions:

In countries with high inflation, capital controls, or currency restrictions, Bitcoin can offer a way to store and transfer value without being subject to these restrictions.

Potential for Social Justice:

Bitcoin's ability to provide financial freedom and bypass traditional systems can be seen as a tool for social justice, particularly in regions facing authoritarianism or financial oppression.

Examples of Bitcoin Adoption:

In El Salvador, Bitcoin has been legalized and adopted in some communities, offering a way for people to conduct everyday transactions and participate in social programs.

@ a53364ff:e6ba5513

About

Bitcoin Core is an open source project which maintains and releases Bitcoin client software called “Bitcoin Core”.

It is a direct descendant of the original Bitcoin software client released by Satoshi Nakamoto after he published the famous Bitcoin whitepaper.

Bitcoin Core consists of both “full-node” software for fully validating the blockchain as well as a bitcoin wallet. The project also currently maintains related software such as the cryptography library libsecp256k1 and others located at GitHub.

Anyone can contribute to Bitcoin Core.

Team

The Bitcoin Core project has a large open source developer community with many casual contributors to the codebase. There are many more who contribute research, peer review, testing, documentation, and translation.

Maintainers

Project maintainers have commit access and are responsible for merging patches from contributors. They perform a janitorial role merging patches that the team agrees should be merged. They also act as a final check to ensure that patches are safe and in line with the project goals. The maintainers’ role is by agreement of project contributors.

Contributors

Everyone is free to propose code changes and to test, review and comment on open Pull Requests. Anyone who contributes code, review, test, translation or documentation to the Bitcoin Core project is considered a contributor. The release notes for each Bitcoin Core software release contain a credits section to recognize all those who have contributed to the project over the previous release cycle. A list of code contributors can be found on Github.

@ da0b9bc3:4e30a4a9

Hello Stackers!

Welcome on into the ~Music Corner of the Saloon!

A place where we Talk Music. Share Tracks. Zap Sats.

So stay a while and listen.

🚨Don't forget to check out the pinned items in the territory homepage! You can always find the latest weeklies there!🚨

🚨Subscribe to the territory to ensure you never miss a post! 🚨

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/962600

@ 91bea5cd:1df4451c

O Contexto Legal Brasileiro e o Consentimento

No ordenamento jurídico brasileiro, o consentimento do ofendido pode, em certas circunstâncias, afastar a ilicitude de um ato que, sem ele, configuraria crime (como lesão corporal leve, prevista no Art. 129 do Código Penal). Contudo, o consentimento tem limites claros: não é válido para bens jurídicos indisponíveis, como a vida, e sua eficácia é questionável em casos de lesões corporais graves ou gravíssimas.

A prática de BDSM consensual situa-se em uma zona complexa. Em tese, se ambos os parceiros são adultos, capazes, e consentiram livre e informadamente nos atos praticados, sem que resultem em lesões graves permanentes ou risco de morte não consentido, não haveria crime. O desafio reside na comprovação desse consentimento, especialmente se uma das partes, posteriormente, o negar ou alegar coação.

A Lei Maria da Penha (Lei nº 11.340/2006)

A Lei Maria da Penha é um marco fundamental na proteção da mulher contra a violência doméstica e familiar. Ela estabelece mecanismos para coibir e prevenir tal violência, definindo suas formas (física, psicológica, sexual, patrimonial e moral) e prevendo medidas protetivas de urgência.

Embora essencial, a aplicação da lei em contextos de BDSM pode ser delicada. Uma alegação de violência por parte da mulher, mesmo que as lesões ou situações decorram de práticas consensuais, tende a receber atenção prioritária das autoridades, dada a presunção de vulnerabilidade estabelecida pela lei. Isso pode criar um cenário onde o parceiro masculino enfrenta dificuldades significativas em demonstrar a natureza consensual dos atos, especialmente se não houver provas robustas pré-constituídas.

Outros riscos:

Lesão corporal grave ou gravíssima (art. 129, §§ 1º e 2º, CP), não pode ser justificada pelo consentimento, podendo ensejar persecução penal.

Crimes contra a dignidade sexual (arts. 213 e seguintes do CP) são de ação pública incondicionada e independem de representação da vítima para a investigação e denúncia.

Riscos de Falsas Acusações e Alegação de Coação Futura

Os riscos para os praticantes de BDSM, especialmente para o parceiro que assume o papel dominante ou que inflige dor/restrição (frequentemente, mas não exclusivamente, o homem), podem surgir de diversas frentes:

1. Acusações Externas: Vizinhos, familiares ou amigos que desconhecem a natureza consensual do relacionamento podem interpretar sons, marcas ou comportamentos como sinais de abuso e denunciar às autoridades.
2. Alegações Futuras da Parceira: Em caso de término conturbado, vingança, arrependimento ou mudança de perspectiva, a parceira pode reinterpretar as práticas passadas como abuso e buscar reparação ou retaliação através de uma denúncia. A alegação pode ser de que o consentimento nunca existiu ou foi viciado.
3. Alegação de Coação: Uma das formas mais complexas de refutar é a alegação de que o consentimento foi obtido mediante coação (física, moral, psicológica ou econômica). A parceira pode alegar, por exemplo, que se sentia pressionada, intimidada ou dependente, e que seu "sim" não era genuíno. Provar a ausência de coação a posteriori é extremamente difícil.
4. Ingenuidade e Vulnerabilidade Masculina: Muitos homens, confiando na dinâmica consensual e na parceira, podem negligenciar a necessidade de precauções. A crença de que "isso nunca aconteceria comigo" ou a falta de conhecimento sobre as implicações legais e o peso processual de uma acusação no âmbito da Lei Maria da Penha podem deixá-los vulneráveis. A presença de marcas físicas, mesmo que consentidas, pode ser usada como evidência de agressão, invertendo o ônus da prova na prática, ainda que não na teoria jurídica.

Estratégias de Prevenção e Mitigação

Não existe um método infalível para evitar completamente o risco de uma falsa acusação, mas diversas medidas podem ser adotadas para construir um histórico de consentimento e reduzir vulnerabilidades:

1. Comunicação Explícita e Contínua: A base de qualquer prática BDSM segura é a comunicação constante. Negociar limites, desejos, palavras de segurança ("safewords") e expectativas antes, durante e depois das cenas é crucial. Manter registros dessas negociações (e-mails, mensagens, diários compartilhados) pode ser útil.

2. Documentação do Consentimento:

   • Contratos de Relacionamento/Cena: Embora a validade jurídica de "contratos BDSM" seja discutível no Brasil (não podem afastar normas de ordem pública), eles servem como forte evidência da intenção das partes, da negociação detalhada de limites e do consentimento informado. Devem ser claros, datados, assinados e, idealmente, reconhecidos em cartório (para prova de data e autenticidade das assinaturas).

   • Registros Audiovisuais: Gravar (com consentimento explícito para a gravação) discussões sobre consentimento e limites antes das cenas pode ser uma prova poderosa. Gravar as próprias cenas é mais complexo devido a questões de privacidade e potencial uso indevido, mas pode ser considerado em casos específicos, sempre com consentimento mútuo documentado para a gravação.

     Importante: a gravação deve ser com ciência da outra parte, para não configurar violação da intimidade (art. 5º, X, da Constituição Federal e art. 20 do Código Civil).

3. Testemunhas: Em alguns contextos de comunidade BDSM, a presença de terceiros de confiança durante negociações ou mesmo cenas pode servir como testemunho, embora isso possa alterar a dinâmica íntima do casal.

4. Estabelecimento Claro de Limites e Palavras de Segurança: Definir e respeitar rigorosamente os limites (o que é permitido, o que é proibido) e as palavras de segurança é fundamental. O desrespeito a uma palavra de segurança encerra o consentimento para aquele ato.
5. Avaliação Contínua do Consentimento: O consentimento não é um cheque em branco; ele deve ser entusiástico, contínuo e revogável a qualquer momento. Verificar o bem-estar do parceiro durante a cena ("check-ins") é essencial.
6. Discrição e Cuidado com Evidências Físicas: Ser discreto sobre a natureza do relacionamento pode evitar mal-entendidos externos. Após cenas que deixem marcas, é prudente que ambos os parceiros estejam cientes e de acordo, talvez documentando por fotos (com data) e uma nota sobre a consensualidade da prática que as gerou.
7. Aconselhamento Jurídico Preventivo: Consultar um advogado especializado em direito de família e criminal, com sensibilidade para dinâmicas de relacionamento alternativas, pode fornecer orientação personalizada sobre as melhores formas de documentar o consentimento e entender os riscos legais específicos.

Observações Importantes

• Nenhuma documentação substitui a necessidade de consentimento real, livre, informado e contínuo.
• A lei brasileira protege a "integridade física" e a "dignidade humana". Práticas que resultem em lesões graves ou que violem a dignidade de forma não consentida (ou com consentimento viciado) serão ilegais, independentemente de qualquer acordo prévio.
• Em caso de acusação, a existência de documentação robusta de consentimento não garante a absolvição, mas fortalece significativamente a defesa, ajudando a demonstrar a natureza consensual da relação e das práticas.

• A alegação de coação futura é particularmente difícil de prevenir apenas com documentos. Um histórico consistente de comunicação aberta (whatsapp/telegram/e-mails), respeito mútuo e ausência de dependência ou controle excessivo na relação pode ajudar a contextualizar a dinâmica como não coercitiva.

• Cuidado com Marcas Visíveis e Lesões Graves Práticas que resultam em hematomas severos ou lesões podem ser interpretadas como agressão, mesmo que consentidas. Evitar excessos protege não apenas a integridade física, mas também evita questionamentos legais futuros.

O que vem a ser consentimento viciado

No Direito, consentimento viciado é quando a pessoa concorda com algo, mas a vontade dela não é livre ou plena — ou seja, o consentimento existe formalmente, mas é defeituoso por alguma razão.

O Código Civil brasileiro (art. 138 a 165) define várias formas de vício de consentimento. As principais são:

Erro: A pessoa se engana sobre o que está consentindo. (Ex.: A pessoa acredita que vai participar de um jogo leve, mas na verdade é exposta a práticas pesadas.)

Dolo: A pessoa é enganada propositalmente para aceitar algo. (Ex.: Alguém mente sobre o que vai acontecer durante a prática.)

Coação: A pessoa é forçada ou ameaçada a consentir. (Ex.: "Se você não aceitar, eu termino com você" — pressão emocional forte pode ser vista como coação.)

Estado de perigo ou lesão: A pessoa aceita algo em situação de necessidade extrema ou abuso de sua vulnerabilidade. (Ex.: Alguém em situação emocional muito fragilizada é induzida a aceitar práticas que normalmente recusaria.)

No contexto de BDSM, isso é ainda mais delicado: Mesmo que a pessoa tenha "assinado" um contrato ou dito "sim", se depois ela alegar que seu consentimento foi dado sob medo, engano ou pressão psicológica, o consentimento pode ser considerado viciado — e, portanto, juridicamente inválido.

Isso tem duas implicações sérias:

1. O crime não se descaracteriza: Se houver vício, o consentimento é ignorado e a prática pode ser tratada como crime normal (lesão corporal, estupro, tortura, etc.).

2. A prova do consentimento precisa ser sólida: Mostrando que a pessoa estava informada, lúcida, livre e sem qualquer tipo de coação.

   Consentimento viciado é quando a pessoa concorda formalmente, mas de maneira enganada, forçada ou pressionada, tornando o consentimento inútil para efeitos jurídicos.

Conclusão

Casais que praticam BDSM consensual no Brasil navegam em um terreno que exige não apenas confiança mútua e comunicação excepcional, mas também uma consciência aguçada das complexidades legais e dos riscos de interpretações equivocadas ou acusações mal-intencionadas. Embora o BDSM seja uma expressão legítima da sexualidade humana, sua prática no Brasil exige responsabilidade redobrada. Ter provas claras de consentimento, manter a comunicação aberta e agir com prudência são formas eficazes de se proteger de falsas alegações e preservar a liberdade e a segurança de todos os envolvidos. Embora leis controversas como a Maria da Penha sejam "vitais" para a proteção contra a violência real, os praticantes de BDSM, e em particular os homens nesse contexto, devem adotar uma postura proativa e prudente para mitigar os riscos inerentes à potencial má interpretação ou instrumentalização dessas práticas e leis, garantindo que a expressão de sua consensualidade esteja resguardada na medida do possível.

---

Importante: No Brasil, mesmo com tudo isso, o Ministério Público pode denunciar por crime como lesão corporal grave, estupro ou tortura, independente de consentimento. Então a prudência nas práticas é fundamental.

Aviso Legal: Este artigo tem caráter meramente informativo e não constitui aconselhamento jurídico. As leis e interpretações podem mudar, e cada situação é única. Recomenda-se buscar orientação de um advogado qualificado para discutir casos específicos.

Se curtiu este artigo faça uma contribuição, se tiver algum ponto relevante para o artigo deixe seu comentário.

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Redistributing Git with Nostr

Every time someone tries to "decentralize" Git -- like many projects tried in the past to do it with BitTorrent, IPFS, ScuttleButt or custom p2p protocols -- there is always a lurking comment: "but Git is already distributed!", and then the discussion proceeds to mention some facts about how Git supports multiple remotes and its magic syncing and merging abilities and so on.

Turns out all that is true, Git is indeed all that powerful, and yet GitHub is the big central hub that hosts basically all Git repositories in the giant world of open-source. There are some crazy people that host their stuff elsewhere, but these projects end up not being found by many people, and even when they do they suffer from lack of contributions.

Because everybody has a GitHub account it's easy to open a pull request to a repository of a project you're using if it's on GitHub (to be fair I think it's very annoying to have to clone the repository, then add it as a remote locally, push to it, then go on the web UI and click to open a pull request, then that cloned repository lurks forever in your profile unless you go through 16 screens to delete it -- but people in general seem to think it's easy).

It's much harder to do it on some random other server where some project might be hosted, because now you have to add 4 more even more annoying steps: create an account; pick a password; confirm an email address; setup SSH keys for pushing. (And I'm not even mentioning the basic impossibility of offering push access to external unknown contributors to people who want to host their own simple homemade Git server.)

At this point some may argue that we could all have accounts on GitLab, or Codeberg or wherever else, then those steps are removed. Besides not being a practical strategy this pseudo solution misses the point of being decentralized (or distributed, who knows) entirely: it's far from the ideal to force everybody to have the double of account management and SSH setup work in order to have the open-source world controlled by two shady companies instead of one.

What we want is to give every person the opportunity to host their own Git server without being ostracized. at the same time we must recognize that most people won't want to host their own servers (not even most open-source programmers!) and give everybody the ability to host their stuff on multi-tenant servers (such as GitHub) too. Importantly, though, if we allow for a random person to have a standalone Git server on a standalone server they host themselves on their wood cabin that also means any new hosting company can show up and start offering Git hosting, with or without new cool features, charging high or low or zero, and be immediately competing against GitHub or GitLab, i.e. we must remove the network-effect centralization pressure.

External contributions

The first problem we have to solve is: how can Bob contribute to Alice's repository without having an account on Alice's server?

SourceHut has reminded GitHub users that Git has always had this (for most) arcane git send-email command that is the original way to send patches, using an once-open protocol.

Turns out Nostr acts as a quite powerful email replacement and can be used to send text content just like email, therefore patches are a very good fit for Nostr event contents.

Once you get used to it and the proper UIs (or CLIs) are built sending and applying patches to and from others becomes a much easier flow than the intense clickops mixed with terminal copypasting that is interacting with GitHub (you have to clone the repository on GitHub, then update the remote URL in your local directory, then create a branch and then go back and turn that branch into a Pull Request, it's quite tiresome) that many people already dislike so much they went out of their way to build many GitHub CLI tools just so they could comment on issues and approve pull requests from their terminal.

Replacing GitHub features

Aside from being the "hub" that people use to send patches to other people's code (because no one can do the email flow anymore, justifiably), GitHub also has 3 other big features that are not directly related to Git, but that make its network-effect harder to overcome. Luckily Nostr can be used to create a new environment in which these same features are implemented in a more decentralized and healthy way.

Issues: bug reports, feature requests and general discussions

Since the "Issues" GitHub feature is just a bunch of text comments it should be very obvious that Nostr is a perfect fit for it.

I will not even mention the fact that Nostr is much better at threading comments than GitHub (which doesn't do it at all), which can generate much more productive and organized discussions (and you can opt out if you want).

Search

I use GitHub search all the time to find libraries and projects that may do something that I need, and it returns good results almost always. So if people migrated out to other code hosting providers wouldn't we lose it?

The fact is that even though we think everybody is on GitHub that is a globalist falsehood. Some projects are not on GitHub, and if we use only GitHub for search those will be missed. So even if we didn't have a Nostr Git alternative it would still be necessary to create a search engine that incorporated GitLab, Codeberg, SourceHut and whatnot.

Turns out on Nostr we can make that quite easy by not forcing anyone to integrate custom APIs or hardcoding Git provider URLs: each repository can make itself available by publishing an "announcement" event with a brief description and one or more Git URLs. That makes it easy for a search engine to index them -- and even automatically download the code and index the code (or index just README files or whatever) without a centralized platform ever having to be involved.

The relays where such announcements will be available play a role, of course, but that isn't a bad role: each announcement can be in multiple relays known for storing "public good" projects, some relays may curate only projects known to be very good according to some standards, other relays may allow any kind of garbage, which wouldn't make them good for a search engine to rely upon, but would still be useful in case one knows the exact thing (and from whom) they're searching for (the same is valid for all Nostr content, by the way, and that's where it's censorship-resistance comes from).

Continuous integration

GitHub Actions are a very hardly subsidized free-compute-for-all-paid-by-Microsoft feature, but one that isn't hard to replace at all. In fact there exists today many companies offering the same kind of service out there -- although they are mostly targeting businesses and not open-source projects, before GitHub Actions was introduced there were also many that were heavily used by open-source projects.

One problem is that these services are still heavily tied to GitHub today, they require a GitHub login, sometimes BitBucket and GitLab and whatnot, and do not allow one to paste an arbitrary Git server URL, but that isn't a thing that is very hard to change anyway, or to start from scratch. All we need are services that offer the CI/CD flows, perhaps using the same framework of GitHub Actions (although I would prefer to not use that messy garbage), and charge some few satoshis for it.

It may be the case that all the current services only support the big Git hosting platforms because they rely on their proprietary APIs, most notably the webhooks dispatched when a repository is updated, to trigger the jobs. It doesn't have to be said that Nostr can also solve that problem very easily.

@ 502ab02a:a2860397

"นมดีจริง หรือแค่เรากลัว?" นม = อาหารของสัตว์ในวัยทารก จริงๆประโยคเดียว ก็น่าจะเข้าใจนะครับว่าทำไม ผมไม่ตอบเม้นท์เลย ว่าถ้างั้นเราดื่มนมอะไรดี

ในวันที่นมยึดครองชั้นวางห้าง นมวัว นมแพะ นมอัลมอนด์ นมโอ๊ต นมข้าว นมพิสตาชิโอ วางตัวสวยๆ พร้อมข้อความชวนฝันว่า "ดีต่อใจ" "เพื่อสุขภาพ" คนก็แห่กันถามว่า นมอะไรดีที่สุด ดื่มนมอันไหนแล้วสุขภาพดี กินนมแล้วจะได้ไม่ขาดสารอาหาร

แต่...ลองหยุดถาม แล้วตั้งใจฟังตัวเองสักนิดว่า จริงๆ แล้ว นมดีกว่า real food อย่างไข่ หรือเนื้อสัตว์ ตรงไหน?

ตอนเด็ก เราถูกสอนว่า ดื่มนม = แข็งแรง ตอนโต เราถูกล่อด้วยโฆษณาว่า นมพืช = สุขภาพดี ยั่งยืน รักษ์โลก เราถูกปลูกฝังจนแทบไม่เคยสงสัยเลยว่า นม มันดียังไงกันแน่?

เราลองมาเปิดหน้ากาก "นม" ทีละชั้นกันครับ นมวัว : มีโปรตีนกับไขมันอยู่บ้าง แต่ก็มีน้ำตาลแลคโตสที่คนส่วนใหญ่ย่อยไม่ดี นมพืช : โปรตีนต่ำจนน่าใจหาย วิตามินแร่ธาตุก็ใส่สังเคราะห์เอาทีหลังทั้งนั้น

"นม" ไม่ว่าจะวัว แพะ หรือพืช ความจริงที่เราไม่ค่อยอยากมอง คือ นมเป็นอาหารที่อ่อนด้อยเรื่องสารอาหารอย่างสิ้นเชิง โปรตีนในนมพืช ต่ำเตี้ยเรี่ยดินเมื่อเทียบกับแค่ ไข่ นมวัวมีแก้วละ 6กรัม นมโอ้ตมีแก้วละ 3กรัม ในขณะที่ไข่เพียง 1ฟอง มีโปรตีน 6-7กรัม หรือจะเอาแคลเซียม ที่อ้างกันนัก นมแก้วนึง(200ml) มีแคลเซียม 123mg ในขณะที่ไข่แค่4ฟอง มีไปแล้ว 100mg ส่วนใครยังกลัวไข่เพราะมีคอเลสเตอรอล คุณปิดโพสได้เลย คุณเชยไปแล้วครับเขา move on เรื่องไข่กันไปนานแล้ว รบกวนหาข้อมูล แถมแคลเซียมที่กินไป ถ้าไม่ทำ xxxxx xxxx รู้ไหมว่ามันจะไปสะสมที่หลอดเลือด นี่ละตัวตันเลย ไม่ใช่คอเลสเตอรอล ส่วน xx นั้นถ้ายังไม่รู้ว่ามีอะไรบ้างที่ต้องทำเพื่อจัดการแคลเซียม ก็ยิ้มให้กับตัวเองเลยครับ ดื่มนมเพราะแคลเซียมนี่เนอะ 55555

นอกจากนี้ นมทุกชนิดยังเต็มไปด้วย "คาร์บ" แบบต่างๆ ทั้งน้ำตาลแลคโตสในนมวัว และแป้งเชิงซ้อนในนมพืช ส่วนตัวไหนคาร์บต่ำ ทุกอย่างก็ต่ำไปหมด เทียบเป็น น้ำเปล่าขุ่นๆ ราคาแพง

บางคนบอกว่า "นมพืชดี๊ดี กินแล้วน้ำตาลในเลือดไม่พุ่งเลยนะ" ฟังดูเหมือนดีนะ แต่...แค่ตัวเลขน้ำตาลในเลือดเฉียบพลันไม่กระโดด

จะบอกว่านั่นไม่ได้แปลว่าร่างกายปลอดภัยจริงๆ นะแค่ค่าน้ำตาลในเลือดมันเป็นแค่จุุดพอสังเกต เพราะสิ่งที่เกิดขึ้นหลังจากเราดื่มนมพืช โดยเฉพาะนมโอ๊ต คือ คาร์บแฝงที่จะค่อยๆ แตกตัวระหว่างการย่อย ร่างกายอาจจะไม่ช็อคน้ำตาลทันที แต่จะ กระตุ้นอินซูลิน ให้ทำงานหนักขึ้นแบบเนียนๆ อินซูลินสูงเรื้อรังโดยที่ไม่รู้ตัว เป็นเส้นทางลัดไปสู่ไขมันสะสม การอักเสบ และเบาหวานชนิดที่ 2 ในระยะยาว

ภัยเงียบที่น่ากลัวที่สุดของนมโอ๊ต จึงไม่ใช่แค่เรื่องน้ำตาล แต่คือ "ภาวะอินซูลินสูงแบบไร้อาการ" (Silent Hyperinsulinemia) เป็นอาการอินซูลินมันพุ่งสูง แบบที่ตรวจเฉพาะน้ำตาลจะไม่เห็น ต้องเจาะเฉพาะระดับอินซูลิน (Insulin test) ถึงจะรู้ บั่นทอนสุขภาพทีละน้อย เหมือนเชื้อไฟใต้เถ้า ที่รอวันระเบิดเป็นโรคเรื้อรังในอีก 10 ปีข้างหน้า

แล้วทำไมเราถึงศรัทธา "นม" จนหมดใจ? คำตอบคือ..."สงคราม"

Fiat system เก่งมากนะครับที่ไม่ได้แค่พิมพ์นมขึ้นมาจากอุตสาหกรรมเหลือทิ้ง หลังสงครามโลก แต่ยังพิมพ์ "ความกลัว" ลงในใจพวกเราว่า "ถ้าไม่ดื่มนม คุณจะไม่แข็งแรง"

หลังสงครามโลกครั้งที่ 2 อเมริกามีนมล้นตลาดจากโครงการป้อนเสบียงกองทัพ เมื่อสงครามยุติ นมจึงเหลือกองมหึมา ถ้าไม่หาทางระบาย ก็ขาดทุนยับเยิน รัฐจึงออก โครงการนมโรงเรียน บังคับให้เด็กในโรงเรียนต้องดื่มนมวันละแก้วทั่วประเทศ พร้อมเทงบสนับสนุนงานวิจัยที่บอกว่า "นมดีต่อกระดูก ดีต่อสุขภาพ" แต่จริงๆ งานวิจัยเหล่านั้นหลายชิ้น ก็เต็มไปด้วย bias และ เงินทุนจากอุตสาหกรรมนม นั่นเอง

"เราไม่ได้เลือกนมด้วยความเข้าใจ เราแค่เกิดมาในยุคที่นมล้นตลาด" เริ่มต้นจากเด็กในโรงเรียน ถูกเลี้ยง ถูกล้างสมอง จนคิดว่านมคือสัญลักษณ์ของการดูแลตัวเองที่ดี

เวลาผ่านไป โลกเปลี่ยน เด็กโตขึ้นมา เริ่มแพ้นมวัวกันเยอะขึ้น คนก็หันมาหาทางเลือกใหม่...นมพืช

แต่ระบบ Fiat Food ก็ยังทำงานแบบเดิม ผลิตนมพืชจากพืชเหลือทิ้งราคาถูก เช่น ข้าวโอ๊ต เสริมวิตามินแต่งหน้าตา ทำโฆษณาน่ารักๆ ว่า รักษ์โลก ใส่ใจสุขภาพ ดื่มแล้วเป็นทางเลือกของคนฉลาด ทางออกของคนย่อยแลคโตสไม่ได้

จากนั้นบุกเข้าโรงเรียนอีกครั้ง เสนอ "นมโอ๊ตโรงเรียน" แทนนมวัว ครอบเจนฯใหม่ทั้งกระบิทีเดียวเลย ใช้วิจัยใหม่ที่ เน้นเฉพาะข้อมูลด้านสิ่งแวดล้อมหรือ sustainability สร้างความเป็นผู้มีความรู้ในความเป็นคนรักโลก แต่หลีกเลี่ยงไม่พูดถึงสารอาหารจริงๆ

แล้วเด็กๆ ก็กำลังถูกปลูกฝังรอบใหม่อีกครั้ง...ว่า นมโอ๊ต = ทางเลือกสุขภาพ ติดสมองไปอีกหลายเจนฯ ทั้งที่...

นมโอ๊ตอุดมไปด้วยคาร์โบไฮเดรตแตกตัวง่าย ที่ทำให้อินซูลินพุ่งเรื้อรังแบบไร้สัญญาณเตือน โปรตีนต่ำจนไร้ความหมายในแง่สร้างกล้ามเนื้อหรือภูมิคุ้มกัน วิตามินแร่ธาตุที่เติมแต่ง เป็นสารสังเคราะห์ที่ดูดซึมได้ยากกว่าวิตามินจาก real food หลายเท่า

โลกหมุนเร็วขึ้น แต่ Fiat Food ยังวนลูปที่เดิม เปลี่ยนชื่อ เปลี่ยนฉลาก แต่ยังคง "ขายของเหลือ" ผ่านการล้างสมองทางโภชนาการอย่างแนบเนียน ในวันที่โอ้ตล้นโลกจน USDA ต้องหาทางออกให้ มิเช่นนั้นจะต้องเป็นฝ่ายดึงภาษีมาโอบอุ้มเสียเอง

ดังนั้น นมสัตว์ นมพืช ไม่ได้ต่างกันในด้านการครอบความคิด จะต่างกันแค่ผลทางการทำร้ายสุขภาพแบบเงียบๆระยะยาว โปรดเข้าใจประเด็นว่าไม่ใช่จะว่านมโอ้ตแล้วชูนมวัว

ไทม์ไลน์ย่อ "จากนมวัวล้นตลาด สู่แผนบุกนมโอ๊ตโรงเรียน" 1940s (WWII): อเมริกาขยายอุตสาหกรรมนมเพื่อเลี้ยงกองทัพ 1945: สงครามจบ นมล้นตลาด ต้องระบาย 1950: เปิด "โครงการนมโรงเรียน" (School Milk Program) บังคับเด็กดื่มนม พร้อมอุดหนุนฟาร์มนมอย่างลับๆ 1950s-1970s: ใช้งบวิจัยหนุนว่า "นมดีต่อสุขภาพ" ทั่วสหรัฐฯ และโลกตะวันตก 1980s: ปัญหาแพ้นม (Lactose Intolerance) โผล่มากขึ้น แต่โครงการยังเดินหน้าต่อ 2010s: กระแสนมพืชมาแรง ผู้คนตื่นตัวเรื่องแพ้แลคโตส และสิ่งแวดล้อม 2020s: อุตสาหกรรมนมพืชเร่งบุกโรงเรียน เสนอ "นมโอ๊ตโรงเรียน" เพื่อปลูกฝังตั้งแต่เล็กๆ ผ่านโฆษณา "ทางเลือกเพื่อโลก" (ซึ่งซ้ำรอยวิธีเดียวกับที่เคยผลักดันนมวัวเมื่อ 70 ปีก่อนแทบทุกประการ)

สุดท้าย ถามตัวเองอีกครั้ง... นมที่เราดื่มทุกเช้า มาจากความต้องการของร่างกาย หรือมาจากการตลาดที่ชนะสงครามไปตั้งแต่เรายังไม่เกิด?

เราดื่มนมไปทำไมวะ?????

เลือกเองอย่างเข้าใจธรรมชาติ แล้วคุณจะไม่ต้องตื่นขึ้นมาไล่ตามนมอีกเลย วันหยุดนี้ เข้าซุปเปอร์มาร์เกต แล้วดูฉลากโภชนาการกันสิ ว่าได้อะไรจากการดื่มนม

ถามว่าอ่านถึงตรงนี้ ผมเกลียดนมไหม บ้า ใครจะไปเกลียดนม เหตุผลเดียวเลยที่ผมยกให้นมคือ "อร่อย" นมอร่อย ไอติมอร่อย ลาเต้ดีงาม แต่มันคือความอร่อยที่ให้สารอาหารนิดหน่อย ผมไม่ได้เกลียดนม แต่ผมก็ไม่ได้บอกว่าเรา "ต้อง" จะเป็นจะตายเพื่อหานมมาดื่ม ไม่ต้องไปทุรนทุรายว่า เห้ย ทำไมฉันไม่ได้ดื่มนมนะ OMG ชั้นจะป่วยแน่ๆ ชั้นจะไม่แข็งแรงแน่ๆ

ผมเกลียด fiat ที่ครอบหัวคนมากี่รุ่นว่า ถ้าไม่ดื่มนม จะไม่แข็งแรง get มะ 5555

แต่ผมไมได้บอกว่าผมถูกนะ ใครมีเหตุผลที่สนับสนุนว่าเรา "ต้อง" ดื่มนมแบบ “เด็ดขาด” “ห้ามขาดการดื่มนม” มาแชร์กัน ผมยินดีเรียนรู้นะ แต่ประเภทว่า ดื่มแล้วไม่เห็นเป็นไร สะดวกดีบางทีกินง่าย น้องดื่มแล้วตัวสูง ฉันดื่มแล้วตัวสูง อะไรพวกนี้ไม่เอานะ มัน emotion

#pirateketo #กูต้องรู้มั๊ย #ม้วนหางสิลูก #siamstr

@ 6ad3e2a3:c90b7740

There’s an annoying trend on Twitter wherein the algorithm feeds you a lot of threads like “five keys to gaining wealth” or “10 mistakes to avoid in relationships” that list a bunch of hacks for some ostensibly desirable state of affairs which for you is presumably lacking. It’s not that the hacks are wrong per se, more that the medium is the message. Reading threads about hacks on social media is almost surely not the path toward whatever is promised by them.

. . .

I’ve tried a lot of health supplements over the years. These days creatine is trendy, and of course Vitamin D (which I still take.) I don’t know if this is helping me, though it surely helps me pass my blood tests with robust levels. The more I learn about health and nutrition, the less I’m sure of anything beyond a few basics. Yes, replacing processed food with real food, moving your body and getting some sun are almost certainly good, but it’s harder to know how particular interventions affect me.

Maybe some of them work in the short term then lose their effect, Maybe some work better for particular phenotypes, but not for mine. Maybe my timing in the day is off, or I’m not combining them correctly for my lifestyle and circumstances. The body is a complex system, and complex systems are characterized by having unpredictable outputs given changes to initial conditions (inputs).

. . .

I started getting into Padel recently — a mini-tennis-like game where you can hit the ball off the back walls. I’d much rather chase a ball around for exercise than run or work out, and there’s a social aspect I enjoy. (By “social aspect”, I don’t really mean getting to know the people with whom I’m playing, but just the incidental interactions you get during the game, joking about it, for example, when you nearly impale someone at the net with a hard forehand.)

A few months ago, I was playing with some friends, and I was a little off. It’s embarrassing to play poorly at a sport, especially when (as is always the case in Padel) you have a doubles partner you’re letting down. Normally I’d be excoriating myself for my poor play, coaching myself to bend my knees more, not go for winners so much. But that day, I was tired — for some reason I hadn’t slept well — and I didn’t have the energy for much internal monologue. I just mishit a few balls, felt stupid about it and kept playing.

After a few games, my fortunes reversed. I was hitting the ball cleanly, smashing winners, rarely making errors. My partner and I started winning games and then sets. I was enjoying myself. In the midst of it I remember hitting an easy ball into the net and reflexively wanting to self-coach again. I wondered, “What tips did I give to right the ship when I had been playing poorly at the outset?” I racked my brain as I waited for the serve and realized, to my surprise, there had been none. The turnaround in my play was not due to self-coaching but its absence. I had started playing better because my mind had finally shut the fuck up for once.

Now when I’m not playing well, I resist, to the extent I’m capable, the urge to meddle. I intend to be more mind-less. Not so much telling the interior coach to shut up but not buying into the premise there is a problem to be solved at all. The coach isn’t just ignored, he’s fired. And he’s not just fired, his role was obsoleted.

You blew the point, you’re embarrassed about it and there’s nothing that needs to be done about it. Or that you started coaching yourself like a fool and made things worse. No matter how much you are doing the wrong thing nothing needs to be done about any of it whatsoever. There is always another ball coming across the net that needs to be struck until the game is over.

. . .

Most of the hacks, habits and heuristics we pick up to manage our lives only serve as yet more inputs in unfathomably complex systems whose outputs rarely track as we’d like. There are some basic ones that are now obvious to everyone like not injecting yourself with heroin (or mRNA boosters), but for the most part we just create more baggage for ourselves which justifies ever more hacks. It’s like taking medication for one problem that causes side effects, and then you need another medicine for that side effect, rinse and repeat, ad infinitum.

But this process can be reverse-engineered too. For every heuristic you drop, the problem it was put into place to solve re-emerges and has a chance to be observed. Observing won’t solve it, it’ll just bring it into the fold, give the complex system of which it is a part a chance to achieve an equilibrium with respect to it on its own.

You might still be embarrassed when you mishit the ball, but embarrassment is not a problem. And if embarrassment is not a problem, then mishitting a ball isn’t that bad. And if mishitting a ball isn’t that bad, then maybe you’re not worrying about what happens if you botch the next shot, instead fixing your attention on the ball. And so you disappear a little bit into the game, and it’s more fun as a result.

I honestly wish there were a hack for this — being more mindless — but I don’t know of any. And in any event, hack Substacks won’t get you any farther than hack Twitter threads.

@ e3ba5e1a:5e433365

Prelude

I wrote this post differently than any of my others. It started with a discussion with AI on an OPSec-inspired review of separation of powers, and evolved into quite an exciting debate! I asked Grok to write up a summary in my overall writing style, which it got pretty well. I've decided to post it exactly as-is. Ultimately, I think there are two solid ideas driving my stance here:

1. Perfect is the enemy of the good
2. Failure is the crucible of success

Beyond that, just some hard-core belief in freedom, separation of powers, and operating from self-interest.

Intro

Alright, buckle up. I’ve been chewing on this idea for a while, and it’s time to spit it out. Let’s look at the U.S. government like I’d look at a codebase under a cybersecurity audit—OPSEC style, no fluff. Forget the endless debates about what politicians should do. That’s noise. I want to talk about what they can do, the raw powers baked into the system, and why we should stop pretending those powers are sacred. If there’s a hole, either patch it or exploit it. No half-measures. And yeah, I’m okay if the whole thing crashes a bit—failure’s a feature, not a bug.

The Filibuster: A Security Rule with No Teeth

You ever see a firewall rule that’s more theater than protection? That’s the Senate filibuster. Everyone acts like it’s this untouchable guardian of democracy, but here’s the deal: a simple majority can torch it any day. It’s not a law; it’s a Senate preference, like choosing tabs over spaces. When people call killing it the “nuclear option,” I roll my eyes. Nuclear? It’s a button labeled “press me.” If a party wants it gone, they’ll do it. So why the dance?

I say stop playing games. Get rid of the filibuster. If you’re one of those folks who thinks it’s the only thing saving us from tyranny, fine—push for a constitutional amendment to lock it in. That’s a real patch, not a Post-it note. Until then, it’s just a vulnerability begging to be exploited. Every time a party threatens to nuke it, they’re admitting it’s not essential. So let’s stop pretending and move on.

Supreme Court Packing: Because Nine’s Just a Number

Here’s another fun one: the Supreme Court. Nine justices, right? Sounds official. Except it’s not. The Constitution doesn’t say nine—it’s silent on the number. Congress could pass a law tomorrow to make it 15, 20, or 42 (hitchhiker’s reference, anyone?). Packing the court is always on the table, and both sides know it. It’s like a root exploit just sitting there, waiting for someone to log in.

So why not call the bluff? If you’re in power—say, Trump’s back in the game—say, “I’m packing the court unless we amend the Constitution to fix it at nine.” Force the issue. No more shadowboxing. And honestly? The court’s got way too much power anyway. It’s not supposed to be a super-legislature, but here we are, with justices’ ideologies driving the bus. That’s a bug, not a feature. If the court weren’t such a kingmaker, packing it wouldn’t even matter. Maybe we should be talking about clipping its wings instead of just its size.

The Executive Should Go Full Klingon

Let’s talk presidents. I’m not saying they should wear Klingon armor and start shouting “Qapla’!”—though, let’s be real, that’d be awesome. I’m saying the executive should use every scrap of power the Constitution hands them. Enforce the laws you agree with, sideline the ones you don’t. If Congress doesn’t like it, they’ve got tools: pass new laws, override vetoes, or—here’s the big one—cut the budget. That’s not chaos; that’s the system working as designed.

Right now, the real problem isn’t the president overreaching; it’s the bureaucracy. It’s like a daemon running in the background, eating CPU and ignoring the user. The president’s supposed to be the one steering, but the administrative state’s got its own agenda. Let the executive flex, push the limits, and force Congress to check it. Norms? Pfft. The Constitution’s the spec sheet—stick to it.

Let the System Crash

Here’s where I get a little spicy: I’m totally fine if the government grinds to a halt. Deadlock isn’t a disaster; it’s a feature. If the branches can’t agree, let the president veto, let Congress starve the budget, let enforcement stall. Don’t tell me about “essential services.” Nothing’s so critical it can’t take a breather. Shutdowns force everyone to the table—debate, compromise, or expose who’s dropping the ball. If the public loses trust? Good. They’ll vote out the clowns or live with the circus they elected.

Think of it like a server crash. Sometimes you need a hard reboot to clear the cruft. If voters keep picking the same bad admins, well, the country gets what it deserves. Failure’s the best teacher—way better than limping along on autopilot.

States Are the Real MVPs

If the feds fumble, states step up. Right now, states act like junior devs waiting for the lead engineer to sign off. Why? Federal money. It’s a leash, and it’s tight. Cut that cash, and states will remember they’re autonomous. Some will shine, others will tank—looking at you, California. And I’m okay with that. Let people flee to better-run states. No bailouts, no excuses. States are like competing startups: the good ones thrive, the bad ones pivot or die.

Could it get uneven? Sure. Some states might turn into sci-fi utopias while others look like a post-apocalyptic vidya game. That’s the point—competition sorts it out. Citizens can move, markets adjust, and failure’s a signal to fix your act.

Chaos Isn’t the Enemy

Yeah, this sounds messy. States ignoring federal law, external threats poking at our seams, maybe even a constitutional crisis. I’m not scared. The Supreme Court’s there to referee interstate fights, and Congress sets the rules for state-to-state play. But if it all falls apart? Still cool. States can sort it without a babysitter—it’ll be ugly, but freedom’s worth it. External enemies? They’ll either unify us or break us. If we can’t rally, we don’t deserve the win.

Centralizing power to avoid this is like rewriting your app in a single thread to prevent race conditions—sure, it’s simpler, but you’re begging for a deadlock. Decentralized chaos lets states experiment, lets people escape, lets markets breathe. States competing to cut regulations to attract businesses? That’s a race to the bottom for red tape, but a race to the top for innovation—workers might gripe, but they’ll push back, and the tension’s healthy. Bring it—let the cage match play out. The Constitution’s checks are enough if we stop coddling the system.

Why This Matters

I’m not pitching a utopia. I’m pitching a stress test. The U.S. isn’t a fragile porcelain doll; it’s a rugged piece of hardware built to take some hits. Let it fail a little—filibuster, court, feds, whatever. Patch the holes with amendments if you want, or lean into the grind. Either way, stop fearing the crash. It’s how we debug the republic.

So, what’s your take? Ready to let the system rumble, or got a better way to secure the code? Hit me up—I’m all ears.

@ 3bf0c63f:aefa459d

Report of how the money Jack donated to the cause in December 2022 has been misused so far.

Bounties given

March 2025

• Dhalsim: 1,110,540 - Work on Nostr wiki data processing

February 2025

• BOUNTY* NullKotlinDev: 950,480 - Twine RSS reader Nostr integration
• Dhalsim: 2,094,584 - Work on Hypothes.is Nostr fork
• Constant, Biz and J: 11,700,588 - Nostr Special Forces

January 2025

• Constant, Biz and J: 11,610,987 - Nostr Special Forces
• BOUNTY* NullKotlinDev: 843,840 - Feeder RSS reader Nostr integration
• BOUNTY* NullKotlinDev: 797,500 - ReadYou RSS reader Nostr integration

December 2024

• BOUNTY* tijl: 1,679,500 - Nostr integration into RSS readers yarr and miniflux
• Constant, Biz and J: 10,736,166 - Nostr Special Forces
• Thereza: 1,020,000 - Podcast outreach initiative

November 2024

• Constant, Biz and J: 5,422,464 - Nostr Special Forces

October 2024

• Nostrdam: 300,000 - hackathon prize
• Svetski: 5,000,000 - Latin America Nostr events contribution
• Quentin: 5,000,000 - nostrcheck.me

June 2024

• Darashi: 5,000,000 - maintaining nos.today, searchnos, search.nos.today and other experiments
• Toshiya: 5,000,000 - keeping the NIPs repo clean and other stuff

May 2024

• James: 3,500,000 - https://github.com/jamesmagoo/nostr-writer
• Yakihonne: 5,000,000 - spreading the word in Asia
• Dashu: 9,000,000 - https://github.com/haorendashu/nostrmo

February 2024

• Viktor: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/viktorvsk/saltivka and https://github.com/viktorvsk/knowstr
• Eric T: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/tcheeric/nostr-java
• Semisol: 5,000,000 - https://relay.noswhere.com/ and https://hist.nostr.land relays
• Sebastian: 5,000,000 - Drupal stuff and nostr-php work
• tijl: 5,000,000 - Cloudron, Yunohost and Fraidycat attempts
• Null Kotlin Dev: 5,000,000 - AntennaPod attempt

December 2023

• hzrd: 5,000,000 - Nostrudel
• awayuki: 5,000,000 - NOSTOPUS illustrations
• bera: 5,000,000 - getwired.app
• Chris: 5,000,000 - resolvr.io
• NoGood: 10,000,000 - nostrexplained.com stories

October 2023

• SnowCait: 5,000,000 - https://nostter.vercel.app/ and other tools
• Shaun: 10,000,000 - https://yakihonne.com/, events and work on Nostr awareness
• Derek Ross: 10,000,000 - spreading the word around the world
• fmar: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/frnandu/yana
• The Nostr Report: 2,500,000 - curating stuff
• james magoo: 2,500,000 - the Obsidian plugin: https://github.com/jamesmagoo/nostr-writer

August 2023

• Paul Miller: 5,000,000 - JS libraries and cryptography-related work
• BOUNTY tijl: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/github-tijlxyz/wikinostr
• gzuus: 5,000,000 - https://nostree.me/

July 2023

• syusui-s: 5,000,000 - rabbit, a tweetdeck-like Nostr client: https://syusui-s.github.io/rabbit/
• kojira: 5,000,000 - Nostr fanzine, Nostr discussion groups in Japan, hardware experiments
• darashi: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/darashi/nos.today, https://github.com/darashi/searchnos, https://github.com/darashi/murasaki
• jeff g: 5,000,000 - https://nostr.how and https://listr.lol, plus other contributions
• cloud fodder: 5,000,000 - https://nostr1.com (open-source)
• utxo.one: 5,000,000 - https://relaying.io (open-source)
• Max DeMarco: 10,269,507 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aA-jiiepOrE
• BOUNTY optout21: 1,000,000 - https://github.com/optout21/nip41-proto0 (proposed nip41 CLI)
• BOUNTY Leo: 1,000,000 - https://github.com/leo-lox/camelus (an old relay thing I forgot exactly)

June 2023

• BOUNTY: Sepher: 2,000,000 - a webapp for making lists of anything: https://pinstr.app/
• BOUNTY: Kieran: 10,000,000 - implement gossip algorithm on Snort, implement all the other nice things: manual relay selection, following hints etc.
• Mattn: 5,000,000 - a myriad of projects and contributions to Nostr projects: https://github.com/search?q=owner%3Amattn+nostr&type=code
• BOUNTY: lynn: 2,000,000 - a simple and clean git nostr CLI written in Go, compatible with William's original git-nostr-tools; and implement threaded comments on https://github.com/fiatjaf/nocomment.
• Jack Chakany: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/jacany/nblog
• BOUNTY: Dan: 2,000,000 - https://metadata.nostr.com/

April 2023

• BOUNTY: Blake Jakopovic: 590,000 - event deleter tool, NIP dependency organization
• BOUNTY: koalasat: 1,000,000 - display relays
• BOUNTY: Mike Dilger: 4,000,000 - display relays, follow event hints (Gossip)
• BOUNTY: kaiwolfram: 5,000,000 - display relays, follow event hints, choose relays to publish (Nozzle)
• Daniele Tonon: 3,000,000 - Gossip
• bu5hm4nn: 3,000,000 - Gossip
• BOUNTY: hodlbod: 4,000,000 - display relays, follow event hints

March 2023

• Doug Hoyte: 5,000,000 sats - https://github.com/hoytech/strfry
• Alex Gleason: 5,000,000 sats - https://gitlab.com/soapbox-pub/mostr
• verbiricha: 5,000,000 sats - https://badges.page/, https://habla.news/
• talvasconcelos: 5,000,000 sats - https://migrate.nostr.com, https://read.nostr.com, https://write.nostr.com/
• BOUNTY: Gossip model: 5,000,000 - https://camelus.app/
• BOUNTY: Gossip model: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/kaiwolfram/Nozzle
• BOUNTY: Bounty Manager: 5,000,000 - https://nostrbounties.com/

February 2023

• styppo: 5,000,000 sats - https://hamstr.to/
• sandwich: 5,000,000 sats - https://nostr.watch/
• BOUNTY: Relay-centric client designs: 5,000,000 sats https://bountsr.org/design/2023/01/26/relay-based-design.html
• BOUNTY: Gossip model on https://coracle.social/: 5,000,000 sats
• Nostrovia Podcast: 3,000,000 sats - https://nostrovia.org/
• BOUNTY: Nostr-Desk / Monstr: 5,000,000 sats - https://github.com/alemmens/monstr
• Mike Dilger: 5,000,000 sats - https://github.com/mikedilger/gossip

January 2023

• ismyhc: 5,000,000 sats - https://github.com/Galaxoid-Labs/Seer
• Martti Malmi: 5,000,000 sats - https://iris.to/
• Carlos Autonomous: 5,000,000 sats - https://github.com/BrightonBTC/bija
• Koala Sat: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/KoalaSat/nostros
• Vitor Pamplona: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/vitorpamplona/amethyst
• Cameri: 5,000,000 - https://github.com/Cameri/nostream

December 2022

• William Casarin: 7 BTC - splitting the fund
• pseudozach: 5,000,000 sats - https://nostr.directory/
• Sondre Bjellas: 5,000,000 sats - https://notes.blockcore.net/
• Null Dev: 5,000,000 sats - https://github.com/KotlinGeekDev/Nosky
• Blake Jakopovic: 5,000,000 sats - https://github.com/blakejakopovic/nostcat, https://github.com/blakejakopovic/nostreq and https://github.com/blakejakopovic/NostrEventPlayground

@ 266815e0:6cd408a5

noStrudel

Its been over four months since I released v0.42.0 of noStrudel but I haven't forgot about it, I've just been busy refactoring the code-base.

The app is well past its 2yr birthday and a lot of the code is really messy and kind of hacky. so my focus in the past few months has been refactoring and moving a lot of it out into the applesauce packages so it can be tested.

The biggest changes have been switching to use rx-nostr for all relay connections and using rxjs and applesauce for event management and timelines. In total ~22k lines of code have been changed since the last release.

I'm hoping it wont take me much longer to get a stable release for v0.43.0. In the meantime if you want to test out the new changes you can find them on the nsite deployment.

nsite deplyment: nostrudel.nsite.lol/ Github repo: github.com/hzrd149/nostrudel

Applesauce

I've been making great progress on the applesauce libraries that are the core of onStrudel. Since January I've released v0.11.0 and v0.12.0.

In the past month I've been working towards a v1 release with a better relay connection package applesauce-relay and pre-built actions for clients to easily implement common things like follow/unfollow and mute/unmute. applesauce-actions

Docs website: hzrd149.github.io/applesauce/ Github repo: https://github.com/hzrd149/applesauce

Blossom

Spec changes: - Merged PR #56 from kehiy for BUD-09 ( blob reports ) - Merged PR #60 from Kieran to update BUD-8 to use the standard NIP-94 tags array. - Merged PR #38 to make the file extension mandatory in the url field of the returned blob descriptor. - Merged PR #54 changing the authorization type for the /media endpoint to media instead of upload. This fixes an issue where the server could mirror the original blob without the users consent.

Besides the changes to the blossom spec itself I started working on a small cli tool to help test and debug new blossom server implementations. The goal is to have a set of upload and download tests that can be run against a server to test if it adheres to the specifications. It can also be used output debug info and show recommended headers to add to the http responses.

If you have nodejs installed you can try it out by running sh npx blossom-audit audit <server-url> [image|bitcoin|gif|path/to/file.jpeg]

Github repo: github.com/hzrd149/blossom-audit

Other projects

Wifistr

While participating in SEC-04 I built a small app for sharing the locations and passwords of wifi networks. Its far from complete, but its usable and serves as an example of building an app with SolidJS and applesauce.

Live version: hzrd149.github.io/wifistr/ nsite version: here Github repo: github.com/hzrd149/wifistr

nsite-manager

I've been slowly continuing work on nsite-manager, mostly just to allow myself to debug various nsites and make sure nsite.lol is still working correctly.

Github repo: github.com/hzrd149/nsite-manager

nsite-gateway

I finally got around to making some much needed bug fixes and improvements to nsite-gateway ( the server behind nsite.lol ) and released a stable 1.0.0 version.

My hope is that its stable enough now to allow other users to start hosting their own instances of it.

Github repo: github.com/hzrd149/nsite-gateway

morning-glory

As part of my cashu PR for NUT-23 ( HTTP 402 Payment required ) I built a blossom server that only accepts cashu payments for uploads and stores blobs for 24h before deleting them.

Github repo: github.com/hzrd149/morning-glory

bakery

I've been toying with the idea of building a backend-first nostr client that would download events while I'm not at my computer and send me notifications about my DMs.

I made some progress on it in the last months but its far from complete or usable. Hopefully ill get some time in the next few months to create a working alpha version for myself and others to install on Umbrel and Start9

Github repo: github.com/hzrd149/bakery

@ 6e0ea5d6:0327f353

Ascolta.

We live in times where the average man is measured by the speeches he gives — not by the commitments he keeps. People talk about dreams, goals, promises… but what truly remains is what’s honored in the silence of small gestures, in actions that don’t seek applause, in attitudes unseen — yet speak volumes.

Punctuality, for example. Showing up on time isn’t about the clock. It’s about respect. Respect for another’s time, yes — but more importantly, respect for one’s own word. A man who is late without reason is already running late in his values. And the one who excuses his own lateness with sweet justifications slowly gets used to mediocrity.

Keeping your word is more than fulfilling promises. It is sealing, with the mouth, what the body must later uphold. Every time a man commits to something, he creates a moral debt with his own dignity. And to break that commitment is to declare bankruptcy — not in the eyes of others, but in front of himself.

And debts? Even the small ones — or especially the small ones — are precise thermometers of character. A forgotten sum, an unpaid favor, a commitment left behind… all of these reveal the structure of the inner building that man resides in. He who neglects the small is merely rehearsing for his future collapse.

Life, contrary to what the reckless say, is not built on grand deeds. It is built with small bricks, laid with almost obsessive precision. The truly great man is the one who respects the details — recognizing in them a code of conduct.

In Sicily, especially in the streets of Palermo, I learned early on that there is more nobility in paying a five-euro debt on time than in flaunting riches gained without word, without honor, without dignity.

As they say in Palermo: L’uomo si conosce dalle piccole cose.

So, amico mio, Don’t talk to me about greatness if you can’t show up on time. Don’t talk to me about respect if your word is fickle. And above all, don’t talk to me about honor if you still owe what you once promised — no matter how small.

Thank you for reading, my friend!

If this message resonated with you, consider leaving your "🥃" as a token of appreciation.

A toast to our family!

@ afa31726:18cc7792

99Win mang đến cho người dùng một thế giới giải trí đa dạng, nơi mà công nghệ hiện đại kết hợp với sự sáng tạo không giới hạn để tạo nên những trải nghiệm tuyệt vời. Giao diện của 99Win được thiết kế trực quan, thân thiện với người dùng, hỗ trợ tối ưu trên mọi thiết bị từ máy tính đến điện thoại thông minh. Hệ thống nội dung tại 99Win luôn được cập nhật liên tục, mang đến cho người dùng những lựa chọn phong phú, từ giải trí nhẹ nhàng đến các trải nghiệm đòi hỏi sự tương tác cao. Công nghệ trí tuệ nhân tạo (AI) tại 99Win giúp cá nhân hóa nội dung, tự động đề xuất những trải nghiệm phù hợp nhất với thói quen và sở thích riêng của từng cá nhân. Bên cạnh đó, vấn đề bảo mật thông tin cá nhân được đặt lên hàng đầu với các hệ thống mã hóa tiên tiến, mang lại sự yên tâm tuyệt đối cho người dùng trong suốt quá trình trải nghiệm. 99Win không chỉ đơn thuần là một nền tảng giải trí mà còn là nơi khơi nguồn cảm hứng và kết nối cộng đồng, nơi mọi người cùng nhau chia sẻ niềm vui và sự hứng khởi mỗi ngày.

Ngoài việc cung cấp những trải nghiệm giải trí chất lượng, 99WIN còn không ngừng tổ chức các sự kiện hấp dẫn, chương trình ưu đãi và mini game vui nhộn, tạo ra không khí sôi động và cơ hội nhận được nhiều phần thưởng giá trị. Đội ngũ chăm sóc khách hàng chuyên nghiệp, hoạt động 24/7, luôn sẵn sàng hỗ trợ và giải quyết mọi thắc mắc, giúp người dùng cảm thấy được tôn trọng và phục vụ tận tâm. 99Win cũng đầu tư mạnh vào công nghệ thực tế ảo (VR) và thực tế tăng cường (AR), mở rộng phạm vi trải nghiệm và đưa người dùng đến những không gian giải trí hoàn toàn mới mẻ và sống động. Tốc độ tải trang nhanh, hệ thống vận hành ổn định cùng khả năng tùy chỉnh giao diện theo sở thích cá nhân là những điểm cộng giúp 99Win ghi dấu ấn mạnh mẽ trong lòng người dùng. Tất cả những yếu tố đó hội tụ để tạo nên một nền tảng giải trí toàn diện, luôn đổi mới và sáng tạo, hướng đến việc mang lại sự hài lòng cao nhất cho cộng đồng người dùng ngày càng lớn mạnh.

Hướng tới tương lai, 99Win đặt mục tiêu trở thành biểu tượng trong ngành công nghiệp giải trí kỹ thuật số, không chỉ tại Việt Nam mà còn vươn xa ra thị trường quốc tế. Với chiến lược phát triển bền vững, hợp tác cùng các đối tác công nghệ hàng đầu, 99Win cam kết liên tục cải tiến và cập nhật những xu hướng mới nhất để phục vụ người dùng tốt hơn mỗi ngày. Song song với việc mở rộng quy mô, 99Win cũng tích cực tham gia vào các hoạt động xã hội như hỗ trợ giáo dục, bảo vệ môi trường và phát triển cộng đồng. Tinh thần trách nhiệm xã hội luôn được lồng ghép trong mọi kế hoạch phát triển của 99Win, thể hiện cam kết không chỉ xây dựng một nền tảng giải trí tiên tiến mà còn góp phần tạo nên một tương lai tốt đẹp hơn cho toàn xã hội. Với nền tảng công nghệ vững chắc, đội ngũ nhân sự nhiệt huyết và tầm nhìn chiến lược dài hạn, 99Win hứa hẹn sẽ tiếp tục là điểm đến lý tưởng cho những ai tìm kiếm sự mới mẻ, sáng tạo và chất lượng trong thế giới giải trí hiện đại.

@ afa31726:18cc7792

Hubet mang đến cho người dùng một không gian giải trí hiện đại, nơi công nghệ và sự sáng tạo hội tụ để tạo nên trải nghiệm mượt mà và đầy hấp dẫn. Với giao diện thân thiện, bố cục thông minh và khả năng tương thích hoàn hảo trên mọi thiết bị, Hubet giúp người dùng dễ dàng tiếp cận và tận hưởng những giây phút thư giãn tuyệt vời. Nội dung tại Hubet được tuyển chọn kỹ lưỡng, đa dạng và không ngừng cập nhật, đáp ứng nhu cầu giải trí phong phú của mọi đối tượng. Điểm nổi bật tại Hubet còn nằm ở việc tích hợp công nghệ AI tiên tiến, giúp cá nhân hóa trải nghiệm, đề xuất nội dung phù hợp theo thói quen và sở thích riêng của từng người dùng. An toàn và bảo mật luôn được đặt lên hàng đầu, với các lớp bảo vệ thông tin cá nhân và giao dịch tối ưu, tạo nên một môi trường giải trí đáng tin cậy. Hubet không chỉ đơn thuần là nơi giải trí, mà còn là nơi người dùng có thể tìm thấy sự kết nối, niềm vui và nguồn cảm hứng bất tận.

Để gia tăng trải nghiệm cho cộng đồng người dùng, HUBET liên tục tổ chức các chương trình khuyến mãi hấp dẫn, các sự kiện tương tác và minigame đầy sôi động, mang lại không khí sôi nổi và nhiều cơ hội nhận thưởng bất ngờ. Cộng đồng Hubet ngày càng phát triển mạnh mẽ nhờ sự chăm sóc tận tình từ đội ngũ hỗ trợ khách hàng hoạt động 24/7, luôn sẵn sàng giải đáp và hỗ trợ mọi yêu cầu. Ngoài ra, Hubet còn mạnh dạn đầu tư vào các công nghệ giải trí tiên tiến như thực tế ảo (VR) và thực tế tăng cường (AR), mang đến những trải nghiệm độc đáo, sống động và mới lạ. Các chiến dịch phát triển của Hubet luôn hướng tới việc đổi mới không ngừng, cải tiến sản phẩm, dịch vụ để phù hợp với nhu cầu ngày càng cao của người dùng. Mỗi chi tiết nhỏ, từ tốc độ tải trang nhanh chóng, giao diện trực quan đến khả năng tùy chỉnh trải nghiệm đều được chăm chút kỹ lưỡng nhằm đảm bảo sự hài lòng tối đa. Hubet cam kết trở thành một phần không thể thiếu trong hành trình giải trí hiện đại của người dùng.

Nhìn về tương lai, Hubet đặt mục tiêu mở rộng quy mô hoạt động ra thị trường quốc tế, mang trải nghiệm giải trí đỉnh cao của mình đến với đông đảo người dùng toàn cầu. Thông qua việc liên kết với các đối tác chiến lược và không ngừng áp dụng những xu hướng công nghệ mới, Hubet từng bước khẳng định vị thế là một nền tảng giải trí hàng đầu. Bên cạnh việc phát triển kinh doanh, Hubet cũng chú trọng đến trách nhiệm xã hội bằng cách tham gia vào các chương trình từ thiện, hỗ trợ giáo dục, và đóng góp cho cộng đồng. Những nỗ lực này thể hiện cam kết của Hubet trong việc xây dựng một cộng đồng phát triển bền vững, nơi công nghệ, sáng tạo và trách nhiệm xã hội song hành. Với chiến lược rõ ràng, đội ngũ tâm huyết và tinh thần đổi mới không ngừng, Hubet hứa hẹn sẽ tiếp tục mang đến những giá trị thiết thực, trải nghiệm khác biệt và những hành trình giải trí đầy cảm xúc cho người dùng trong và ngoài nước.

@ 21c9f12c:75695e59

Ingredients

• 1 cup dried red lentils
• (2) 25-ounce jars marinara sauce
• 1 cup raw cashews
• 14.5 ounce firm tofu (patted dry)
• ½ cup nutritional yeast
• 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (from about 2 lemons)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon dried basil
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• ½ teaspoon garlic powder
• 3 cups baby spinach
• 1 box lasagna noodles (about 12 noodles) (regular, gluten free or whole grain)
• Double recipe Easy Vegan Mozzarella Cheese (or 2-3 cups shredded vegan mozzarella)

Directions

1. lentilsCook the red lentils . Add 1 cup dried red lentils and 3 cups of water to a medium pot. Bring to a boil, and then simmer for about 20 minutes. Drain the lentils in a fine strainer, and then add back to the pot and stir in the marinara sauce . Set aside.
2. ovenPreheat the oven to 350 degrees .
3. Make the Cashew-Tofu Ricotta: Add the cashews to a food processor and process until fine and crumbly. Then add the tofu in chunks, nutritional yeast , lemon juice , salt , basil , oregano and garlic powder to the food processor. Pulse until well combined and pretty smooth. If it's too thick, add a few tablespoons of water to blend. Set aside.
4. LasagnaAssembling the lasagna: Add about 1 cup of lentil marinara to the bottom of a large 9x13 inch casserole dish. Spread it around evenly. Next add 4-5 lasagna noodles (uncooked). Spread half of the ricotta on top of the noodles . Top with half of the spinach . Add about 1 cup of the marinara sauce over the spinach , then place 4-5 lasagna noodles on top. Spread the rest of the ricotta over the noodles , then the rest of the spinach . Place 4-5 more noodles on top of the spinach , and then pour the rest of the sauce over the top, evenly.
5. LasagnaCover tightly with foil and bake for 40 minutes.
6. MozzarellaWhile the lasagna is cooking, make your Vegan Mozzarella Cheese , if using. Alternatively, use 2-3 cups store bought vegan mozzarella cheese .
7. LasagnaAfter 40 minutes, remove the foil and spoon on the mozzarella (or sprinkle the cheese all over). Place the lasagna back in the oven and bake for 20 more minutes, uncovered. Remove from oven, let cool for at least 15 minutes and serve.
8. StorageLeftover lasagna will keep for about 4 days in the refrigerator. See notes for freezing instructions.

@ afa31726:18cc7792

U88 mang đến một thế giới giải trí hiện đại, nơi người dùng có thể đắm chìm trong những trải nghiệm mượt mà, sáng tạo và đầy hứng khởi. Với thiết kế giao diện tối ưu hóa cho cả điện thoại và máy tính, U88 đảm bảo sự tiện lợi và dễ dàng trong từng thao tác. Kho nội dung tại U88 đa dạng, phong phú và luôn được cập nhật thường xuyên, đáp ứng mọi nhu cầu giải trí từ đơn giản đến cao cấp. Đặc biệt, U88 còn tích hợp nhiều tính năng công nghệ mới như trí tuệ nhân tạo (AI), giúp cá nhân hóa trải nghiệm người dùng, mang đến những gợi ý nội dung phù hợp nhất với sở thích riêng biệt của từng cá nhân. Đồng thời, hệ thống bảo mật tiên tiến giúp bảo vệ tối đa thông tin cá nhân và giao dịch, tạo dựng sự tin tưởng tuyệt đối từ cộng đồng người dùng. U88 không chỉ đơn thuần là một nền tảng giải trí, mà còn là nơi người dùng có thể tìm thấy niềm vui, sự thư giãn và cảm hứng trong từng khoảnh khắc.

Song song với việc phát triển nội dung giải trí chất lượng, U88 còn đặc biệt chú trọng đến việc xây dựng cộng đồng người dùng gắn kết. Các chương trình khuyến mãi hấp dẫn, sự kiện tương tác, minigame vui nhộn liên tục được tổ chức nhằm gia tăng sự kết nối và mang lại trải nghiệm phong phú hơn cho người dùng. Đội ngũ chăm sóc khách hàng của U88 hoạt động 24/7, luôn sẵn sàng hỗ trợ nhanh chóng và tận tình, đảm bảo mỗi thắc mắc hay yêu cầu đều được giải quyết một cách hiệu quả nhất. Ngoài ra, U88 không ngừng đầu tư vào công nghệ thực tế ảo (VR) và thực tế tăng cường (AR), mở rộng trải nghiệm giải trí sang những chân trời mới mẻ, sống động và lôi cuốn. Từng chi tiết nhỏ trong dịch vụ đều được U88 chăm chút, từ giao diện thân thiện, tốc độ tải nhanh, đến các tùy chọn cá nhân hóa linh hoạt, tất cả nhằm mục tiêu mang lại sự hài lòng tối đa cho người dùng trong suốt quá trình trải nghiệm.

Hướng tới tương lai, U88 đặt mục tiêu trở thành một biểu tượng trong ngành giải trí kỹ thuật số, không chỉ ở Việt Nam mà còn vươn ra thị trường quốc tế. Bằng cách hợp tác với các đối tác chiến lược và liên tục đổi mới công nghệ, U88 đang từng bước củng cố vị thế và mở rộng tầm ảnh hưởng của mình. Đồng thời, U88 cũng cam kết đồng hành cùng cộng đồng thông qua những hoạt động thiện nguyện thiết thực, thể hiện trách nhiệm xã hội của một doanh nghiệp hiện đại. Những sáng kiến về bảo vệ môi trường, hỗ trợ giáo dục, và phát triển công nghệ bền vững được U88 tích cực triển khai, góp phần xây dựng một tương lai tốt đẹp hơn. Với phương châm đặt người dùng làm trung tâm và không ngừng hoàn thiện từng ngày, U88 hứa hẹn sẽ tiếp tục mang đến những trải nghiệm giải trí đột phá, xứng đáng với kỳ vọng và sự tin yêu của cộng đồng người dùng trong nước và quốc tế.

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

Read the original blog post

Know Your Customer is a regulation that requires companies of all sizes to verify the identity, suitability, and risks involved with maintaining a business relationship with a customer. Such procedures fit within the broader scope of anti-money laundering (AML) and counterterrorism financing (CTF) regulations.

Banks, exchanges, online business, mail providers, domain registrars... Everyone wants to know who you are before you can even opt for their service. Your personal information is flowing around the internet in the hands of "god-knows-who" and secured by "trust-me-bro military-grade encryption". Once your account is linked to your personal (and verified) identity, tracking you is just as easy as keeping logs on all these platforms.

Rights for Illusions

KYC processes aim to combat terrorist financing, money laundering, and other illicit activities. On the surface, KYC seems like a commendable initiative. I mean, who wouldn't want to halt terrorists and criminals in their tracks?

The logic behind KYC is: "If we mandate every financial service provider to identify their users, it becomes easier to pinpoint and apprehend the malicious actors."

However, terrorists and criminals are not precisely lining up to be identified. They're crafty. They may adopt false identities or find alternative strategies to continue their operations. Far from being outwitted, many times they're several steps ahead of regulations. Realistically, KYC might deter a small fraction – let's say about 1% ^1 – of these malefactors. Yet, the cost? All of us are saddled with the inconvenient process of identification just to use a service.

Under the rhetoric of "ensuring our safety", governments and institutions enact regulations that seem more out of a dystopian novel, gradually taking away our right to privacy.

To illustrate, consider a city where the mayor has rolled out facial recognition cameras in every nook and cranny. A band of criminals, intent on robbing a local store, rolls in with a stolen car, their faces obscured by masks and their bodies cloaked in all-black clothes. Once they've committed the crime and exited the city's boundaries, they switch vehicles and clothes out of the cameras' watchful eyes. The high-tech surveillance? It didn’t manage to identify or trace them. Yet, for every law-abiding citizen who merely wants to drive through the city or do some shopping, their movements and identities are constantly logged. The irony? This invasive tracking impacts all of us, just to catch the 1% ^1 of less-than-careful criminals.

KYC? Not you.

KYC creates barriers to participation in normal economic activity, to supposedly stop criminals. ^2

KYC puts barriers between many users and businesses. One of these comes from the fact that the process often requires multiple forms of identification, proof of address, and sometimes even financial records. For individuals in areas with poor record-keeping, non-recognized legal documents, or those who are unbanked, homeless or transient, obtaining these documents can be challenging, if not impossible.

For people who are not skilled with technology or just don't have access to it, there's also a barrier since KYC procedures are mostly online, leaving them inadvertently excluded.

Another barrier goes for the casual or one-time user, where they might not see the value in undergoing a rigorous KYC process, and these requirements can deter them from using the service altogether.

It also wipes some businesses out of the equation, since for smaller businesses, the costs associated with complying with KYC norms—from the actual process of gathering and submitting documents to potential delays in operations—can be prohibitive in economical and/or technical terms.

You're not welcome

Imagine a swanky new club in town with a strict "members only" sign. You hear the music, you see the lights, and you want in. You step up, ready to join, but suddenly there's a long list of criteria you must meet. After some time, you are finally checking all the boxes. But then the club rejects your membership with no clear reason why. You just weren't accepted. Frustrating, right?

This club scenario isn't too different from the fact that KYC is being used by many businesses as a convenient gatekeeping tool. A perfect excuse based on a "legal" procedure they are obliged to.

Even some exchanges may randomly use this to freeze and block funds from users, claiming these were "flagged" by a cryptic system that inspects the transactions. You are left hostage to their arbitrary decision to let you successfully pass the KYC procedure. If you choose to sidestep their invasive process, they might just hold onto your funds indefinitely.

Your identity has been stolen

KYC data has been found to be for sale on many dark net markets^3. Exchanges may have leaks or hacks, and such leaks contain very sensitive data. We're talking about the full monty: passport or ID scans, proof of address, and even those awkward selfies where you're holding up your ID next to your face. All this data is being left to the mercy of the (mostly) "trust-me-bro" security systems of such companies. Quite scary, isn't it?

As cheap as $10 for 100 documents, with discounts applying for those who buy in bulk, the personal identities of innocent users who passed KYC procedures are for sale. ^3

In short, if you have ever passed the KYC/AML process of a crypto exchange, your privacy is at risk of being compromised, or it might even have already been compromised.

(they) Know Your Coins

You may already know that Bitcoin and most cryptocurrencies have a transparent public blockchain, meaning that all data is shown unencrypted for everyone to see and recorded forever. If you link an address you own to your identity through KYC, for example, by sending an amount from a KYC exchange to it, your Bitcoin is no longer pseudonymous and can then be traced.

If, for instance, you send Bitcoin from such an identified address to another KYC'ed address (say, from a friend), everyone having access to that address-identity link information (exchanges, governments, hackers, etc.) will be able to associate that transaction and know who you are transacting with.

Conclusions

To sum up, KYC does not protect individuals; rather, it's a threat to our privacy, freedom, security and integrity. Sensible information flowing through the internet is thrown into chaos by dubious security measures. It puts borders between many potential customers and businesses, and it helps governments and companies track innocent users. That's the chaos KYC has stirred.

The criminals are using stolen identities from companies that gathered them thanks to these very same regulations that were supposed to combat them. Criminals always know how to circumvent such regulations. In the end, normal people are the most affected by these policies.

The threat that KYC poses to individuals in terms of privacy, security and freedom is not to be neglected. And if we don’t start challenging these systems and questioning their efficacy, we are just one step closer to the dystopian future that is now foreseeable.

Edited 20/03/2024 * Add reference to the 1% statement on Rights for Illusions section to an article where Chainalysis found that only 0.34% of the transaction volume with cryptocurrencies in 2023 was attributable to criminal activity ^1

@ fed76236:9d101c9c

O 6GBet vem se consolidando como uma das principais plataformas de entretenimento online para quem busca diversão, variedade e uma experiência segura e moderna. Com um ambiente desenvolvido para oferecer a melhor experiência ao usuário, o 6GBet combina tecnologia de ponta, atendimento de qualidade e uma seleção impressionante de jogos que conquistam cada vez mais jogadores no Brasil.

Desde o primeiro acesso, é possível perceber que o 6GBet se preocupa com a segurança de seus usuários. A plataforma utiliza sistemas de criptografia avançados, garantindo que todas as informações pessoais e financeiras estejam protegidas. Além disso, o site é licenciado e regulamentado, proporcionando mais confiança para aqueles que desejam jogar com tranquilidade.

Outro destaque é o suporte ao cliente. A equipe de atendimento do 6gbet está disponível 24 horas por dia, sete dias por semana, pronta para ajudar em qualquer situação. Seja para tirar dúvidas sobre o funcionamento do site, resolver problemas técnicos ou orientar sobre métodos de pagamento, o suporte é rápido e eficiente.

Diversidade de Jogos para Todos os Gostos No 6GBet, a diversão é levada a sério. A plataforma oferece uma vasta seleção de jogos, capazes de agradar tanto jogadores iniciantes quanto os mais experientes. Entre os principais destaques estão:

Slots Online: Uma coleção variada de slots modernos e clássicos, com diferentes temas, bônus e jackpots progressivos. Cada giro é uma nova oportunidade de viver emoções únicas.

Jogos de Mesa: Para os fãs de estratégia, o 6GBet oferece versões eletrônicas de jogos tradicionais como blackjack, roleta e pôquer. Com gráficos realistas e mecânicas dinâmicas, a sensação é de estar em uma verdadeira sala de jogos.

Ao Vivo: Para quem gosta de interatividade, o 6GBet disponibiliza opções de jogos com crupiês reais transmitidos em tempo real. Essa modalidade proporciona uma experiência ainda mais imersiva, perfeita para quem busca emoção e realismo.

Apostas Esportivas: Além dos jogos de entretenimento, o 6GBet também permite que os usuários apostem em eventos esportivos. Futebol, basquete, tênis e vários outros esportes estão disponíveis, com odds competitivas e uma cobertura completa de campeonatos nacionais e internacionais.

Experiência de Jogador Pensada nos Detalhes Um dos grandes diferenciais do 6GBet é a atenção aos detalhes na experiência do usuário. A navegação é simples e intuitiva, facilitando o acesso a todas as categorias de jogos e serviços. O design responsivo garante que a plataforma funcione perfeitamente em computadores, tablets e smartphones, sem perda de qualidade.

Além disso, o 6GBet disponibiliza diversos métodos de depósito e saque, tornando as transações rápidas e descomplicadas. Pix, transferências bancárias e carteiras digitais estão entre as opções, permitindo que o jogador escolha a melhor alternativa para seu perfil.

As promoções e bônus também merecem destaque. Novos usuários são recebidos com ofertas atrativas, enquanto jogadores frequentes têm acesso a promoções exclusivas e programas de fidelidade que tornam a jornada ainda mais vantajosa.

Conclusão O 6GBet é a escolha certa para quem procura uma plataforma completa de jogos online. Segurança, variedade de opções, suporte eficiente e uma experiência de usuário impecável fazem do 6GBet uma referência no mercado brasileiro. Se você busca emoção, praticidade e inovação em um só lugar, o 6GBet é o destino perfeito. Prepare-se para viver momentos inesquecíveis!

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

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Over the past few months, I've dedicated my time to a complete rewrite of the kycnot.me website. The technology stack remains unchanged; Golang paired with TailwindCSS. However, I've made some design choices in this iteration that I believe significantly enhance the site. Particularly to backend code.

UI Improvements

You'll notice a refreshed UI that retains the original concept but has some notable enhancements. The service list view is now more visually engaging, it displays additional information in a more aesthetically pleasing manner. Both filtering and searching functionalities have been optimized for speed and user experience.

Service pages have been also redesigned to highlight key information at the top, with the KYC Level box always accessible. The display of service attributes is now more visually intuitive.

The request form, especially the Captcha, has undergone substantial improvements. The new self-made Captcha is robust, addressing the reliability issues encountered with the previous version.

Terms of Service Summarizer

A significant upgrade is the Terms of Service summarizer/reviewer, now powered by AI (GPT-4-turbo). It efficiently condenses each service's ToS, extracting and presenting critical points, including any warnings. Summaries are updated monthly, processing over 40 ToS pages via the OpenAI API using a self-crafted and thoroughly tested prompt.

Nostr Comments

I've integrated a comment section for each service using Nostr. For guidance on using this feature, visit the dedicated how-to page.

Database

The backend database has transitioned to pocketbase, an open-source Golang backend that has been a pleasure to work with. I maintain an updated fork of the Golang SDK for pocketbase at pluja/pocketbase.

Scoring

The scoring algorithm has also been refined to be more fair. Despite I had considered its removal due to the complexity it adds (it is very difficult to design a fair scoring system), some users highlighted its value, so I kept it. The updated algorithm is available open source.

Listings

Each listing has been re-evaluated, and the ones that were no longer operational were removed. New additions are included, and the backlog of pending services will be addressed progressively, since I still have access to the old database.

API

The API now offers more comprehensive data. For more details, check here.

About Page

The About page has been restructured for brevity and clarity.

Other Changes

Extensive changes have been implemented in the server-side logic, since the whole code base was re-written from the ground up. I may discuss these in a future post, but for now, I consider the current version to be just a bit beyond beta, and additional updates are planned in the coming weeks.

@ c066aac5:6a41a034

I’m drawn to extremities in art. The louder, the bolder, the more outrageous, the better. Bold art takes me out of the mundane into a whole new world where anything and everything is possible. Having grown up in the safety of the suburban midwest, I was a bit of a rebellious soul in search of the satiation that only came from the consumption of the outrageous. My inclination to find bold art draws me to NOSTR, because I believe NOSTR can be the place where the next generation of artistic pioneers go to express themselves. I also believe that as much as we are able, were should invite them to come create here.

My Background: A Small Side Story

My father was a professional gamer in the 80s, back when there was no money or glory in the avocation. He did get a bit of spotlight though after the fact: in the mid 2000’s there were a few parties making documentaries about that era of gaming as well as current arcade events (namely 2007’sChasing GhostsandThe King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters). As a result of these documentaries, there was a revival in the arcade gaming scene. My family attended events related to the documentaries or arcade gaming and I became exposed to a lot of things I wouldn’t have been able to find. The producer ofThe King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters had previously made a documentary calledNew York Dollwhich was centered around the life of bassist Arthur Kane. My 12 year old mind was blown: The New York Dolls were a glam-punk sensation dressed in drag. The music was from another planet. Johnny Thunders’ guitar playing was like Chuck Berry with more distortion and less filter. Later on I got to meet the Galaga record holder at the time, Phil Day, in Ottumwa Iowa. Phil is an Australian man of high intellect and good taste. He exposed me to great creators such as Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Shakespeare, Lou Reed, artists who created things that I had previously found inconceivable.

I believe this time period informed my current tastes and interests, but regrettably I think it also put coals on the fire of rebellion within. I stopped taking my parents and siblings seriously, the Christian faith of my family (which I now hold dearly to) seemed like a mundane sham, and I felt I couldn’t fit in with most people because of my avant-garde tastes. So I write this with the caveat that there should be a way to encourage these tastes in children without letting them walk down the wrong path. There is nothing inherently wrong with bold art, but I’d advise parents to carefully find ways to cultivate their children’s tastes without completely shutting them down and pushing them away as a result. My parents were very loving and patient during this time; I thank God for that.

With that out of the way, lets dive in to some bold artists:

Nicolas Cage: Actor

There is an excellent video by Wisecrack on Nicolas Cage that explains him better than I will, which I will linkhere. Nicolas Cage rejects the idea that good acting is tied to mere realism; all of his larger than life acting decisions are deliberate choices. When that clicked for me, I immediately realized the man is a genius. He borrows from Kabuki and German Expressionism, art forms that rely on exaggeration to get the message across. He has even created his own acting style, which he calls Nouveau Shamanic. He augments his imagination to go from acting to being. Rather than using the old hat of method acting, he transports himself to a new world mentally. The projects he chooses to partake in are based on his own interests or what he considers would be a challenge (making a bad script good for example). Thus it doesn’t matter how the end result comes out; he has already achieved his goal as an artist. Because of this and because certain directors don’t know how to use his talents, he has a noticeable amount of duds in his filmography. Dig around the duds, you’ll find some pure gold. I’d personally recommend the filmsPig, Joe, Renfield, and his Christmas film The Family Man.

Nick Cave: Songwriter

What a wild career this man has had! From the apocalyptic mayhem of his band The Birthday Party to the pensive atmosphere of his albumGhosteen, it seems like Nick Cave has tried everything. I think his secret sauce is that he’s always working. He maintains an excellent newsletter calledThe Red Hand Files, he has written screenplays such asLawless, he has written books, he has made great film scores such asThe Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, the man is religiously prolific. I believe that one of the reasons he is prolific is that he’s not afraid to experiment. If he has an idea, he follows it through to completion. From the albumMurder Ballads(which is comprised of what the title suggests) to his rejected sequel toGladiator(Gladiator: Christ Killer), he doesn’t seem to be afraid to take anything on. This has led to some over the top works as well as some deeply personal works. Albums likeSkeleton TreeandGhosteenwere journeys through the grief of his son’s death. The Boatman’s Callis arguably a better break-up album than anything Taylor Swift has put out. He’s not afraid to be outrageous, he’s not afraid to offend, but most importantly he’s not afraid to be himself. Works I’d recommend include The Birthday Party’sLive 1981-82, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds’The Boatman’s Call, and the filmLawless.

Jim Jarmusch: Director

I consider Jim’s films to be bold almost in an ironic sense: his works are bold in that they are, for the most part, anti-sensational. He has a rule that if his screenplays are criticized for a lack of action, he makes them even less eventful. Even with sensational settings his films feel very close to reality, and they demonstrate the beauty of everyday life. That's what is bold about his art to me: making the sensational grounded in reality while making everyday reality all the more special. Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai is about a modern-day African-American hitman who strictly follows the rules of the ancient Samurai, yet one can resonate with the humanity of a seemingly absurd character. Only Lovers Left Aliveis a vampire love story, but in the middle of a vampire romance one can see their their own relationships in a new deeply human light. Jim’s work reminds me that art reflects life, and that there is sacred beauty in seemingly mundane everyday life. I personally recommend his filmsPaterson,Down by Law, andCoffee and Cigarettes.

NOSTR: We Need Bold Art

NOSTR is in my opinion a path to a better future. In a world creeping slowly towards everything apps, I hope that the protocol where the individual owns their data wins over everything else. I love freedom and sovereignty. If NOSTR is going to win the race of everything apps, we need more than Bitcoin content. We need more than shirtless bros paying for bananas in foreign countries and exercising with girls who have seductive accents. Common people cannot see themselves in such a world. NOSTR needs to catch the attention of everyday people. I don’t believe that this can be accomplished merely by introducing more broadly relevant content; people are searching for content that speaks to them. I believe that NOSTR can and should attract artists of all kinds because NOSTR is one of the few places on the internet where artists can express themselves fearlessly. Getting zaps from NOSTR’s value-for-value ecosystem has far less friction than crowdfunding a creative project or pitching investors that will irreversibly modify an artist’s vision. Having a place where one can post their works without fear of censorship should be extremely enticing. Having a place where one can connect with fellow humans directly as opposed to a sea of bots should seem like the obvious solution. If NOSTR can become a safe haven for artists to express themselves and spread their work, I believe that everyday people will follow. The banker whose stressful job weighs on them will suddenly find joy with an original meme made by a great visual comedian. The programmer for a healthcare company who is drowning in hopeless mundanity could suddenly find a new lust for life by hearing the song of a musician who isn’t afraid to crowdfund their their next project by putting their lighting address on the streets of the internet. The excel guru who loves independent film may find that NOSTR is the best way to support non corporate movies. My closing statement: continue to encourage the artists in your life as I’m sure you have been, but while you’re at it give them the purple pill. You may very well be a part of building a better future.

@ fed76236:9d101c9c

Em um cenário cada vez mais competitivo de plataformas de jogos online, a 898Bet se destaca como uma das principais escolhas para jogadores brasileiros que buscam emoção, variedade e segurança em suas experiências de entretenimento. Com um ambiente moderno, acessível e repleto de opções, a 898Bet vem conquistando o público com seus diferenciais únicos.

Conheça a Plataforma 898Bet A 898Bet é muito mais do que apenas um espaço de apostas online. A plataforma foi desenvolvida com foco total no usuário, oferecendo navegação intuitiva, visual atraente e recursos que facilitam a vida de quem busca diversão com praticidade. Seja pelo site oficial ou pelo aplicativo mobile, a experiência é fluida e adaptada para qualquer dispositivo, permitindo que você jogue onde e quando quiser.

Além disso, a 898bet valoriza a segurança de seus usuários. Com tecnologia de criptografia de última geração e processos de verificação rigorosos, a plataforma garante a proteção de dados pessoais e financeiros, oferecendo tranquilidade para que os jogadores possam se concentrar apenas no que realmente importa: a diversão.

Variedade de Jogos Para Todos os Perfis Um dos grandes atrativos da 898Bet é a impressionante variedade de jogos disponíveis. A plataforma reúne títulos de alta qualidade, desenvolvidos por provedores renomados no mercado internacional. São opções para todos os gostos e estilos, desde clássicos amados por veteranos até lançamentos modernos que trazem novas mecânicas e gráficos impressionantes.

Entre as categorias mais populares, destacam-se as roletas ao vivo, jogos de cartas como blackjack e baccarat, além de uma seleção de slots online com temas diversos, bônus especiais e jackpots que podem transformar uma rodada em uma grande vitória. Há também opções de jogos instantâneos para quem busca diversão rápida e dinâmica.

Para os fãs de esportes, a 898Bet oferece uma seção completa de apostas esportivas, cobrindo eventos nacionais e internacionais. Futebol, basquete, tênis, MMA e muitos outros esportes fazem parte do catálogo, com cotações competitivas e diversas modalidades de apostas.

Uma Experiência de Jogador Inesquecível A 898Bet entende que a experiência do jogador vai muito além da variedade de jogos. Por isso, investe em um atendimento ao cliente ágil e eficiente, disponível 24 horas por dia, 7 dias por semana. Seja para resolver dúvidas, questões técnicas ou apoio geral, a equipe de suporte está sempre pronta para ajudar, garantindo a satisfação do usuário.

Outro destaque é o sistema de bônus e promoções exclusivas, que valoriza tanto novos usuários quanto jogadores mais antigos. Ofertas de boas-vindas, bônus de recarga, programas de fidelidade e torneios temáticos tornam a jornada dentro da plataforma ainda mais emocionante e recompensadora.

As opções de pagamento também são pensadas para o público brasileiro, com suporte para métodos locais como Pix, boleto bancário e transferências via bancos nacionais, além de carteiras digitais populares. Tudo isso contribui para uma experiência de uso prática, rápida e segura.

Conclusão Se você está em busca de uma plataforma confiável, moderna e repleta de oportunidades para se divertir e ganhar prêmios, a 898Bet é a escolha certa. Com uma combinação perfeita entre tecnologia, variedade de jogos e atenção ao jogador, a 898Bet chega para redefinir o entretenimento online no Brasil. Cadastre-se hoje mesmo e descubra um mundo de possibilidades!

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

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I'm launching a new service review section on this blog in collaboration with OrangeFren. These reviews are sponsored, yet the sponsorship does not influence the outcome of the evaluations. Reviews are done in advance, then, the service provider has the discretion to approve publication without modifications.

Sponsored reviews are independent from the kycnot.me list, being only part of the blog. The reviews have no impact on the scores of the listings or their continued presence on the list. Should any issues arise, I will not hesitate to remove any listing.

---

The review

WizardSwap is an instant exchange centred around privacy coins. It was launched in 2020 making it old enough to have weathered the 2021 bull run and the subsequent bearish year.

| Pros | Cons | |------|------| | Tor-friendly | Limited liquidity | | Guarantee of no KYC | Overly simplistic design | | Earn by providing liquidity | |

Rating: ★★★★★ Service Website: wizardswap.io

Liquidity

Right off the bat, we'll start off by pointing out that WizardSwap relies on its own liquidity reserves, meaning they aren't just a reseller of Binance or another exchange. They're also committed to a no-KYC policy, when asking them, they even promised they would rather refund a user their original coins, than force them to undergo any sort of verification.

On the one hand, full control over all their infrastructure gives users the most privacy and conviction about the KYC policies remaining in place.

On the other hand, this means the liquidity available for swapping isn't huge. At the time of testing we could only purchase at most about 0.73 BTC with XMR.

It's clear the team behind WizardSwap is aware of this shortfall and so they've come up with a solution unique among instant exchanges. They let you, the user, deposit any of the currencies they support into your account and earn a profit on the trades made using your liquidity.

Trading

Fees on WizardSwap are middle-of-the-pack. The normal fee is 2.2%. That's more than some exchanges that reserve the right to suddenly demand you undergo verification, yet less than half the fees on some other privacy-first exchanges. However as we mentioned in the section above you can earn almost all of that fee (2%) if you provide liquidity to WizardSwap.

It's good that with the current Bitcoin fee market their fees are constant regardless of how much, or how little, you send. This is in stark contrast with some of the alternative swap providers that will charge you a massive premium when attempting to swap small amounts of BTC away.

Test trades

Test trades are always performed without previous notice to the service provider.

During our testing we performed a few test trades and found that every single time WizardSwap immediately detected the incoming transaction and the amount we received was exactly what was quoted before depositing. The fees were inline with what WizardSwap advertises.

• Monero payment proof
• Bitcoin received
• Wizardswap TX link - it's possible that this link may cease to be valid at some point in the future.

ToS and KYC

WizardSwap does not have a Terms of Service or a Privacy Policy page, at least none that can be found by users. Instead, they offer a FAQ section where they addresses some basic questions.

The site does not mention any KYC or AML practices. It also does not specify how refunds are handled in case of failure. However, based on the FAQ section "What if I send funds after the offer expires?" it can be inferred that contacting support is necessary and network fees will be deducted from any refund.

UI & Tor

WizardSwap can be visited both via your usual browser and Tor Browser. Should you decide on the latter you'll find that the website works even with the most strict settings available in the Tor Browser (meaning no JavaScript).

However, when disabling Javascript you'll miss the live support chat, as well as automatic refreshing of the trade page. The lack of the first means that you will have no way to contact support from the trade page if anything goes wrong during your swap, although you can do so by mail.

One important thing to have in mind is that if you were to accidentally close the browser during the swap, and you did not save the swap ID or your browser history is disabled, you'll have no easy way to return to the trade. For this reason we suggest when you begin a trade to copy the url or ID to someplace safe, before sending any coins to WizardSwap.

The UI you'll be greeted by is simple, minimalist, and easy to navigate. It works well not just across browsers, but also across devices. You won't have any issues using this exchange on your phone.

Getting in touch

The team behind WizardSwap appears to be most active on X (formerly Twitter): https://twitter.com/WizardSwap_io

If you have any comments or suggestions about the exchange make sure to reach out to them. In the past they've been very receptive to user feedback, for instance a few months back WizardSwap was planning on removing DeepOnion, but the community behind that project got together ^1 and after reaching out WizardSwap reversed their decision ^2.

You can also contact them via email at: support @ wizardswap . io

Disclaimer

None of the above should be understood as investment or financial advice. The views are our own only and constitute a faithful representation of our experience in using and investigating this exchange. This review is not a guarantee of any kind on the services rendered by the exchange. Do your own research before using any service.

@ 8d34bd24:414be32b

I started writing a series on the signs of the End Times and how they align with what we are seeing in the world today. There are some major concerns with predicting the end times, so I decided I should insert a short post on “Can we know when the end times are coming?” Like many principles in the Bible, it takes looking at seemingly contradictory verses to reach the truth.

This Generation

Before I get into “Can we know?” I want to address one point that some will bring up against a future Rapture, Tribulation, and Millennium.

Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. (Matthew 24:34) {emphasis mine}

What generation is Jesus talking about. Most Christians that don’t believe in a future Rapture, Tribulation, and Millennium will point to this verse to support their point of view. The important question is, “What is Jesus referring to with the words ‘this generation’?”

Is it referring to the people He was talking to at that time? If so, since that generation died long ago, then Jesus’s predictions must have been fulfilled almost 2 millennia ago. The problem with this interpretation is that nothing resembling these predictions happened during that initial generation. You have to really twist His words to try to support that they were fulfilled. Also, John wrote in Revelation about future fulfillment. By that time, John was the last of the apostles still alive and that whole generation was pretty much gone.

If “this generation” doesn’t refer to the people Jesus was speaking to personally in that moment, then to whom does it refer? The verses immediately preceding talk about the signs that will occur right before the end times. If you take “this generation” to mean the people who saw the signs Jesus predicted, then everything suddenly makes sense. It also parallel’s Paul’s statement of consolation to those who thought they had been left behind,**

But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18) {emphasis mine}

Some believers thought things were happening in their lifetime, but Paul gave them comfort that no believer would miss the end times rapture.

No One Knows

Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.

But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone. For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be. Then there will be two men in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one will be left. (Matthew 24:34-41) {emphasis mine}

This verse very explicitly says that no one, not even angels or Jesus, knows the exact day or hour of His coming.

So when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, “Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority; but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth.” (Acts 1:6-8)

In this verse Jesus again says that they cannot know the time of His return, but based on context, He is explaining that this generation needs to focus on sharing the Gospel with world and not primarily on the kingdom. Is this Jesus’s way of telling them that they would not be alive to see His return, but they would be responsible for “sharing the Gospel even to the remotest part of the earth?”

Therefore we do know that predicting the exact date of His return is a fool’s errand and should not be attempted, but does this mean we can’t know when it is fast approaching?

We Should Know

There is an opposing passage, though.

The Pharisees and Sadducees came up, and testing Jesus, they asked Him to show them a sign from heaven. But He replied to them, “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ And in the morning, ‘There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times? An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and a sign will not be given it, except the sign of Jonah.” And He left them and went away. (Matthew 16:1-4) {emphasis mine}

In this passage, Jesus reprimands the Pharisees and Sadducees because, although they can rightly read the signs of the weather, they were unable to know and understand the prophecies of His first coming. Especially as the religious leaders, they should’ve been able to determine that Jesus’s coming was imminent and that He was fulfilling the prophetic Scriptures.

In Luke, when Jesus is discussing His second coming with His disciples, He tells this parable:

Then He told them a parable: “Behold the fig tree and all the trees; as soon as they put forth leaves, you see it and know for yourselves that summer is now near. So you also, when you see these things happening, recognize that the kingdom of God is near. (Luke 21:29-31) {emphasis mine}

Jesus would not have given this parable if there were not signs of His coming that we can recognize.

We are expected to know the Scriptures and to study them looking for the signs of His second coming. We can’t know the hour or the day, but we can know that the time is fast approaching. We shouldn’t set dates, but we should search anxiously for the signs of His coming. We shouldn’t be like the scoffers that question His literal fulfillment of His promises:

Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.” For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water. But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance. (2 Peter 3:3-9) {emphasis mine}

One thing is certain, we are closer to Jesus’s second coming than we have ever been and must be ready as we see the day approaching.

May the God of heaven give you a desire and urgency to share the Gospel with all those around you and to grow your faith, knowledge, and relationship with Him, so you can finish the race well, with no regrets. May the knowledge that Jesus could be coming soon give you an eternal perspective on life, so you put more of your time into things of eternal consequence and don’t get overwhelmed with things of the world which are here today and then are gone.

Trust Jesus.

FYI, I hope to write several more articles on the end times (signs of the times, the rapture, the millennium, and the judgement), but I might be a bit slow rolling them out because I want to make sure they are accurate and well supported by Scripture. You can see my previous posts on the end times on the end times tab at trustjesus.substack.com. I also frequently will list upcoming posts.

@ 502ab02a:a2860397

แดดกับ Infradian Rhythm จังหวะลึกล้ำของชีวิตที่ธรรมชาติกำหนด เวลาเราพูดถึง "วงจรชีวิต" คนส่วนใหญ่จะนึกถึงแค่การนอนตื่นตามรอบวัน หรือ circadian rhythm ที่พระอาทิตย์ขึ้นแล้วเราตื่น พระอาทิตย์ตกแล้วเราง่วง แต่จริง ๆ แล้วร่างกายมนุษย์นั้นลึกซึ้งกว่านั้นมากครับ เพราะนอกจาก circadian rhythm แล้วเรายังมีจังหวะชีวภาพอีกชนิดนึงที่ชื่อว่า "Infradian Rhythm" ซึ่งไม่ได้เดินเป็นรอบวัน แต่เป็นรอบที่ยาวกว่านั้น อาจเป็นรอบสัปดาห์ หรือแม้แต่รอบเดือน และหนึ่งในตัวตั้งจังหวะชั้นดีนี้ที่ใครหลายคนมองข้าม ก็คือ "แดด" นั่นเองครับ

Infradian Rhythm คืออะไร? คำว่า Infradian มาจากรากศัพท์ละติน "infra" ที่แปลว่า "ต่ำกว่า" หรือ "ยาวกว่า" และ "diem" ที่แปลว่า "วัน" เพราะฉะนั้น Infradian จึงหมายถึงวงจรชีวภาพที่นานกว่าหนึ่งวัน เช่น - วัฏจักรรอบเดือนของผู้หญิง (ประมาณ 28 วัน) - จังหวะของระบบภูมิคุ้มกัน (ที่มีกลไกการตอบสนองขึ้นลงตามรอบ) - วัฏจักรการหลั่งฮอร์โมน เช่น testosterone ในผู้ชาย ที่ขึ้นลงเป็นรายสัปดาห์ - จังหวะของอารมณ์หรือพลังชีวิต ที่มี pattern ประจำสัปดาห์หรือเดือน

วงจรเหล่านี้ไม่ได้ใช้แค่เวลาบอกจังหวะ แต่ต้องการสิ่งกระตุ้น (zeitgeber) จากธรรมชาติ เช่น แสง เสียง อุณหภูมิ และโดยเฉพาะอย่างยิ่ง แสงแดด ผมลองรวบรวมสรุปเป็นหมวดๆให้เพื่อเห็นภาพรวมง่ายขึ้นนะครับ

หมวดที่ 1 แดดกับ Infradian Rhythm ของผู้หญิง สำหรับผู้หญิง แดดมีบทบาทโดยตรงกับรอบเดือนผ่านหลายกลไก เช่น 1.1 แสงแดดกับวิตามิน D วิตามิน D ที่สร้างจากแสง UVB มีผลต่อการควบคุมระดับฮอร์โมนเพศหญิง เช่น estrogen และ progesterone หากขาดแดด วงจรฮอร์โมนอาจรวน ทำให้มีอาการ PMS หนัก อารมณ์แกว่ง หรือรอบเดือนมาไม่ปกติ 1.2 แดดกับการหลั่ง melatonin แสงแดดยามเช้าช่วยหยุดการผลิต melatonin และเปิดการผลิต cortisol อย่างสมดุล ซึ่งเป็นกลไกสำคัญที่ควบคุมการสร้าง LH และ FSH (ฮอร์โมนที่ควบคุมการตกไข่) 1.3 Infrared light กับไมโทคอนเดรีย แดดบ่ายที่มีรังสีอินฟราเรดช่วยกระตุ้นพลังงานในระดับเซลล์ ซึ่งส่งผลต่อการซ่อมแซมและปรับสมดุลฮอร์โมนระยะยาว

หมวดที่ 2 แดดกับ Infradian Rhythm ของผู้ชาย แม้ผู้ชายจะไม่มีรอบเดือน แต่ก็มี Infradian เช่นกัน โดยเฉพาะในระบบฮอร์โมนและอารมณ์ครับ 2.1 Testosterone fluctuation แสงแดดช่วยกระตุ้นการหลั่ง testosterone โดยเฉพาะแสงแดดที่สัมผัสผิวหนังและดวงตา การได้รับแดดสม่ำเสมอช่วยให้ร่างกายเข้าสู่วงจรการผลิตฮอร์โมนที่เหมาะสม และไม่เหวี่ยงมาก 2.2 แดดกับการนอน แสงแดดยามเช้ารีเซ็ตวงจรการนอน ทำให้ testosterone หลั่งดีขึ้นในช่วงเช้ามืด (ซึ่งเป็นเวลาที่ร่างกายผลิตฮอร์โมนนี้มากที่สุด) 2.3 แดดกับการซ่อมแซมกล้ามเนื้อ รังสี Infrared และ Red light จากแดดบ่ายช่วยให้ไมโทคอนเดรียในกล้ามเนื้อทำงานดีขึ้น ซึ่งสอดคล้องกับรอบการฟื้นฟูแบบ Infradian ของกล้ามเนื้อหลังออกกำลังกาย

หมวดที่ 3 แดดกับ Infradian Rhythm ในผู้สูงอายุ เมื่ออายุมากขึ้น ร่างกายมักจะสูญเสียจังหวะธรรมชาติไปทีละน้อย ในหมวดนี้เลยแสดงถึงความสัมพันธ์ตามวัยครับ 3.1 ฮอร์โมนลดลง การตอบสนองต่อแสงก็ลดลง ผู้สูงวัยมักผลิต melatonin ลดลง ทำให้นอนไม่ลึกและส่งผลต่อระบบภูมิคุ้มกันที่มีจังหวะ Infradian 3.2 แสงแดดช่วยชะลอการเสื่อม งานวิจัยหลายชิ้นพบว่าแดดช่วยชะลอความเสื่อมของจังหวะชีวภาพในสมอง โดยช่วยลดภาวะซึมเศร้าและชะลอการเสื่อมของสมอง (เช่น Alzheimer) 3.3 ไนตริกออกไซด์ (NO) รังสี UVA จากแดดกระตุ้นการปล่อย NO จากผิวหนัง ซึ่งช่วยเรื่องความดันโลหิตและการไหลเวียนเลือดแบบรอบสัปดาห์ ส่งผลดีต่อหัวใจในระยะยาว

ดังนั้นเมื่อเอาทั้งหมดมาขมวดรวมกันจะพบว่า กลไกสำคัญที่แดดกระทบกับ Infradian Rhythm มีภาพร่างดังนี้ครับ 1.Vitamin D จาก UVB ช่วยสร้างสมดุลฮอร์โมน, สนับสนุนภูมิคุ้มกัน 2.Nitric Oxide (NO) จาก UVA ช่วยขยายหลอดเลือด, ลดการอักเสบเรื้อรัง 3.Melatonin และ Cortisol แดดยามเช้าควบคุมการตื่นและการนอนอย่างมีจังหวะ 4.Infrared Light ช่วงแดดบ่ายแก่ ช่วยซ่อมแซมเซลล์, สนับสนุนการฟื้นตัว 5.Circannual และ Infradian Crosslink แสงแดดฤดูต่าง ๆ (ที่มีช่วงคลื่นต่างกัน) ส่งผลให้จังหวะรอบเดือนและภูมิคุ้มกันเปลี่ยนไปตามฤดูกาล

ซึ่งถ้าอ่านแล้วบางอย่างดูยังสับสนว่าเอ๊ะมันควรจะเป็น circadian rhythm ไม่ใช่เหรอ เช่น การนอน คือมันสามารถอธิบายได้สั้นๆว่า มันมีการทับซ้อนกันครับ ที่เราแยกเป็นเรื่องนี้มาพูดคุยกันเพราะมันมีความสัมพันธ์กันอยู่ อย่างที่คุยกันเสมอๆว่า ร่างกายต้องมองเป็น spectrum ไม่ใช่ binary คอมพิวเตอร์ 011001

โดยตรงแล้ว Sleep–Wake Cycle เราคุมกันที่ Circadian กับ Homeostatic Drive มากกว่า แต่ Infradian ก็อาจส่งผลทางอ้อมผ่านทาง ฮอร์โมนเอสโตรเจนและโปรเจสเตอโรนขึ้น–ลงตามรอบเดือน ส่งผลต่อคุณภาพการนอน เช่น ช่วงใกล้มีประจำเดือนอาจนอนหลับไม่ลึก หรือช่วงวัยทอง (perimenopause) ที่ Infradian เริ่มเปลี่ยนฮอร์โมน จะมีอาการร้อนวูบวาบ ตื่นกลางดึกบ่อยขึ้น หรือแม้แต่ อาการซึมเศร้าตามฤดูกาล (Infradian รายปี) มักเกิดฤดูหนาว ซึ่งแสงน้อย ทำให้ Circadian ฟั่นเฟือนไปด้วย ทำให้นอนมากขึ้นหรือนอนไม่หลับตามฤดู แม้กระทั่งสัมพันธ์ทางพฤติกรรม งานวิจัยบางชิ้นชี้ว่ามนุษย์อาจมีแนวโน้มอยากนอนเพิ่มขึ้นในช่วงปลายสัปดาห์ (weekend catch-up sleep) ซึ่งเป็น Infradian รายสัปดาห์ที่เกิดจากพฤติกรรมสังคมและสะสม Homeostatic Drive

ทีนี้พอจะเข้าใจแล้วใช่ไหมครับว่า ทำไมเราควรเลิกถามเสียทีว่า "ตากแดดเวลาไหนดีที่สุด", "ตากแดดนานแค่ไหนดีที่สุด" จะให้ตอบยังไง? มันแงะออกมาไม่ได้ครับ เราอย่ายึดติดกับการสรุป สรุป สรุป สรุปสิว่าตกลงต้องยังไง การเสพโซเชียลทำให้เราเคยชินกับความฉาบฉวย คัดย่อ จนหลงลืมรายละเอียดว่า โลกแห่งชีวะคือความสัมพันธ์ พารายังไม่ได้แค่แก้ปวดเลย จะนับอะไรกับแดด

คำตอบที่ดีที่สุดผมคิดว่ามันคือ "เลิกถามจุ๊กจิ๊ก แล้วหัดออกไปตากให้ได้ก่อน เปิดตา เปิดหู ปิดปาก" จากนั้นค่อยเอาข้อสงสัยจากการตาก ข้อสงสัยจากการอ่าน มาประมวลผลเองก่อนว่า มีอะไรที่สามารถตอบกันได้บ้างไหม

อย่างที่เราเคยเปรียบเปรยกันครับ แดดไม่ใช่แค่แสง แต่คือผู้อำนวยเพลงที่ประสานเสียงร่างกายทุกจังหวะ ในขณะที่ไฟฟ้าทำให้เราลืมจังหวะธรรมชาติ แดดยังอยู่ตรงนั้น คอยเคาะจังหวะอย่างอดทน รอให้เรากลับมาได้ยินเสียงของตัวเองอีกครั้งหนึ่ง ไม่ใช่แค่เสียงในวันนี้ แต่คือเสียงของชีวิตในรอบเดือน หน้า และปีต่อไป

แดด…ไม่เคยหายไปจากเราเลย มีแต่เราที่ห่างหายไปจากแดดเสียเอง

ตากไปก่อนเหอะ แล้วค่อยถาม "บ่อยเท่าที่ได้ นานเท่าที่ไหว"

ส่วนใครอ่านบทนี้แล้วงง ไม่ต้องเครียดครับ บทต่อๆไปจะค่อยๆมาคลีคลายให้ ทีละนิด #pirateketo #SundaySpecialเราจะไปเป็นหมูแดดเดียว #กูต้องรู้มั๊ย #ม้วนหางสิลูก #siamstr

@ 6be5cc06:5259daf0

Introdução

Uma sociedade não deve ser construída sobre coerção, mas sim sobre associações voluntárias e interações espontâneas entre indivíduos. A sociedade de condomínios privados surge como uma alternativa natural ao modelo atual de centros urbanos, substituindo a imposição centralizada por estruturas baseadas em contratos e livre associação. Cada condomínio é uma unidade autônoma, gerida por aqueles que ali residem, onde os critérios de entrada, as regras internas e o comércio são definidos pelos próprios participantes. Essa estrutura permite que indivíduos se agrupem com base em valores compartilhados, eliminando os conflitos artificiais impostos por estados e legislações homogêneas que não respeitam a diversidade de preferências e estilos de vida.

O objetivo dessa sociedade é simples: permitir que as pessoas vivam de acordo com seus princípios sem interferência externa. Em um mundo onde a coerção estatal distorce incentivos, os condomínios privados oferecem uma alternativa onde a ordem surge do livre mercado e da cooperação voluntária. Os moradores escolhem seus vizinhos, definem suas próprias normas e interagem economicamente conforme suas necessidades e interesses. O modelo elimina a necessidade de um controle central, pois os incentivos derivados do livre mercado levam ao desenvolvimento de comunidades prósperas, onde a reputação e a confiança mútua são mais eficazes do que qualquer imposição estatal. Assim, essa sociedade representa a evolução lógica do conceito de liberdade individual e propriedade privada como pilares fundamentais da ordem social.

Público-Alvo e Identidade

Os condomínios privados refletem o princípio da livre associação, permitindo que indivíduos escolham viver em comunidades alinhadas com seus valores e necessidades sem interferência estatal. Cada condomínio possui uma identidade própria, moldada pelos moradores e seus interesses, criando ambientes onde afinidades culturais, filosóficas ou profissionais são preservadas e incentivadas. Enquanto alguns podem ser voltados para famílias numerosas, oferecendo amplos espaços e infraestrutura adequada, outros podem priorizar solteiros e jovens profissionais, com áreas de coworking e espaços de lazer voltados para networking e socialização. Da mesma forma, comunidades religiosas podem estabelecer seus próprios espaços de culto e eventos, enquanto condomínios para idosos podem ser projetados com acessibilidade e serviços médicos especializados.

Críticos podem afirmar que essa forma de organização resulta em pouca diversidade de habilidades e perspectivas, mas esse argumento ignora a dinâmica das interações humanas e o caráter evolutivo dos intercâmbios entre comunidades. Nenhum condomínio existe isolado; a troca entre diferentes comunidades ocorre naturalmente pelo mercado, incentivando o intercâmbio de conhecimento e serviços entre especialistas de diferentes áreas. Além disso, a ideia de que todos os grupos devem conter uma variedade aleatória de indivíduos desconsidera que a verdadeira diversidade nasce da liberdade de escolha, e não da imposição estatal de convivências forçadas.

Outra crítica possível é que a existência de critérios de entrada pode levar à segregação social. No entanto, essa preocupação deriva da concepção errônea de que todas as comunidades devem ser abertas e incluir qualquer pessoa indiscriminadamente. Porém, a liberdade de associação implica, necessariamente, a liberdade de exclusão. Se um grupo deseja manter determinada identidade cultural, religiosa ou profissional, isso não impede que outros grupos criem suas próprias comunidades conforme seus valores e recursos. Além disso, essa especialização leva a uma concorrência saudável entre condomínios, forçando-os a oferecer melhores condições para atrair moradores. Em vez de uma sociedade homogênea moldada por burocratas, temos um mosaico de comunidades autônomas, onde cada indivíduo pode encontrar ou criar o ambiente que melhor lhe convém.

Autossuficiência e Especialização

A força dos condomínios privados reside na capacidade de seus moradores de contribuírem ativamente para a comunidade, tornando-a funcional e autossuficiente sem a necessidade de intervenções estatais. Diferentes condomínios podem se especializar em áreas específicas ou ter diversos profissionais de diferentes setores, refletindo as competências e interesses de seus residentes. Essa descentralização do conhecimento e da produção permite que cada comunidade desenvolva soluções internas para suas demandas, reduzindo dependências externas e estimulando a prosperidade local.

Os moradores atuam como agentes econômicos, trocando bens e serviços dentro do próprio condomínio e entre diferentes comunidades. Um condomínio voltado para a saúde, por exemplo, pode contar com médicos, enfermeiros e terapeutas que oferecem consultas, aulas e assistência médica particular, remunerados diretamente por seus clientes, sem a intermediação de burocracias. Da mesma forma, um condomínio agrícola pode abrigar agricultores que cultivam alimentos orgânicos, compartilham técnicas de cultivo e comercializam excedentes com outros condomínios, garantindo um fluxo contínuo de suprimentos. Em um condomínio tecnológico, programadores, engenheiros e empreendedores desenvolvem soluções de TI, segurança digital e energia renovável, promovendo a inovação e ampliando as possibilidades de intercâmbio econômico.

A economia interna de cada condomínio se fortalece através de serviços oferecidos pelos próprios moradores. Professores podem ministrar aulas, técnicos podem prestar serviços de manutenção, artesãos podem vender seus produtos diretamente para os vizinhos. O mercado livre e voluntário é o principal regulador dessas interações, garantindo que a especialização surja naturalmente conforme a demanda e a oferta se ajustam. Essa estrutura elimina desperdícios comuns em sistemas centralizados, onde a alocação de recursos se dá por decisões políticas e não pelas necessidades reais da população.

Alguns argumentam que a especialização pode criar bolhas de conhecimento, tornando os condomínios excessivamente dependentes de trocas externas. Contudo, essa preocupação desconsidera a natureza espontânea do mercado, que incentiva a cooperação e o comércio entre comunidades distintas. Nenhum condomínio precisa produzir tudo internamente; ao contrário, a divisão do trabalho e a liberdade de escolha promovem interdependências saudáveis e vantajosas para todos. Assim, cada morador se insere em um ecossistema dinâmico, onde suas habilidades são valorizadas e sua autonomia preservada, sem coerções estatais ou distorções artificiais impostas por planejadores centrais.

Infraestrutura e Sustentabilidade

A solidez de uma sociedade baseada em condomínios privados depende de uma infraestrutura eficiente e sustentável, projetada para reduzir a dependência externa e garantir o máximo de autonomia. Sem um aparato estatal centralizador, cada comunidade deve estruturar seus próprios meios de obtenção de energia, água, alimentação e demais bens essenciais, garantindo que suas operações sejam viáveis a longo prazo. Essa abordagem, longe de ser um entrave, representa a verdadeira inovação descentralizada: um ambiente onde as soluções emergem da necessidade real e da engenhosidade humana, e não de diretrizes burocráticas e regulamentos ineficazes.

Cada condomínio pode investir em tecnologias sustentáveis e autônomas, como energia solar e eólica, reduzindo custos e minimizando a vulnerabilidade às flutuações do mercado energético tradicional. Sistemas de captação e filtragem de água da chuva, bem como a reutilização eficiente dos recursos hídricos, garantem independência em relação a empresas monopolistas e governos que frequentemente administram esse bem de forma ineficaz. Hortas comunitárias e fazendas verticais podem suprir grande parte da demanda alimentar, permitindo que cada condomínio mantenha sua própria reserva de alimentos, aumentando a resiliência contra crises externas e instabilidades de mercado.

Além dos recursos naturais, os espaços compartilhados desempenham um papel fundamental na integração e no fortalecimento dessas comunidades. Bibliotecas, ginásios, creches e salas de aula permitem que o conhecimento e os serviços circulem internamente, criando um ambiente onde a colaboração ocorre de maneira orgânica. A descentralização também se aplica ao uso da tecnologia, plataformas digitais privadas podem ser utilizadas para conectar moradores, facilitar a troca de serviços e produtos, além de coordenar agendamentos e eventos dentro dos condomínios e entre diferentes comunidades.

O Bitcoin surge como uma ferramenta indispensável nesse ecossistema, eliminando a necessidade de bancos estatais ou sistemas financeiros controlados. Ao permitir transações diretas, transparentes e resistentes à censura, o Bitcoin se torna o meio de troca ideal entre os condomínios, garantindo a preservação do valor e possibilitando um comércio ágil e eficiente. Além disso, contratos inteligentes e protocolos descentralizados podem ser integrados para administrar serviços comuns, fortalecer a segurança e reduzir a burocracia, tornando a governança desses condomínios cada vez mais autônoma e imune a intervenções externas.

Alguns podem argumentar que a falta de um aparato estatal para regulamentar a infraestrutura pode resultar em desigualdade no acesso a recursos essenciais, ou que a descentralização completa pode gerar caos e ineficiência. No entanto, essa visão ignora o fato de que a concorrência e a inovação no livre mercado são os maiores motores de desenvolvimento sustentável. Sem monopólios ou subsídios distorcendo a alocação de recursos, a busca por eficiência leva naturalmente à adoção de soluções melhores e mais acessíveis. Condomínios que oferecem infraestrutura de qualidade tendem a atrair mais moradores e investimentos, o que impulsiona a melhoria contínua e a diversificação dos serviços. Em vez de depender de um sistema centralizado falho, as comunidades se tornam responsáveis por sua própria prosperidade, criando uma estrutura sustentável, escalável e adaptável às mudanças do futuro.

Governança e Administração

Em uma sociedade descentralizada, não se deve depender de uma estrutura estatal ou centralizada para regular e tomar decisões em nome dos indivíduos. Cada condomínio, portanto, deve ser gerido de maneira autônoma, com processos claros de tomada de decisão, resolução de conflitos e administração das questões cotidianas. A gestão pode ser organizada por conselhos de moradores, associações ou sistemas de governança direta, conforme as necessidades locais.

Conselhos de Moradores e Processos de Tomada de Decisão

Em muitos casos, a administração interna de um condomínio privado pode ser realizada por um conselho de moradores, composto por representantes eleitos ou indicados pela própria comunidade. A ideia é garantir que as decisões importantes, como planejamento urbano, orçamento, manutenção e serviços, sejam feitas de forma transparente e que os interesses de todos os envolvidos sejam considerados. Isso não significa que a gestão precise ser completamente democrática, mas sim que as decisões devem ser tomadas de forma legítima, transparente e acordadas pela maior parte dos membros.

Em vez de um processo burocrático e centralizado, onde uma liderança impõe suas vontades sobre todos a muitas vezes suas decisões ruins não o afetam diretamente, a gestão de um condomínio privado deve ser orientada pela busca de consenso, onde os próprios gestores sofrerão as consequências de suas más escolhas. O processo de tomada de decisão pode ser dinâmico e direto, com os moradores discutindo e acordando soluções baseadas no mercado e nas necessidades locais, em vez de depender de um sistema impessoal de regulamentação. Além disso, a utilização de tecnologias descentralizadas, como plataformas de blockchain, pode proporcionar maior transparência nas decisões e maior confiança na gestão.

Resolução de Conflitos

A resolução de disputas dentro dos condomínios pode ocorrer de forma voluntária, através de negociação direta ou com o auxílio de mediadores escolhidos pelos próprios moradores por meio de um sistema de reputação. Em alguns casos, podem ser criados mecanismos para resolução de disputas mais formais, com árbitros ou juízes independentes que atuam sem vínculos com o condomínio. Esses árbitros podem ser escolhidos com base em sua experiência ou especialização em áreas como direito, mediação e resolução de conflitos, com uma reputação para zelar. Ao contrário de um sistema judicial centralizado, onde a parte envolvida depende do Estado para resolver disputas, os moradores possuem a autonomia para buscar soluções que atendam aos seus próprios interesses e necessidades. A diversidade de abordagens em um sistema de governança descentralizado cria oportunidades para inovações que atendem diferentes cenários, sem a interferência de burocratas distantes dos próprios problemas que estão "tentando resolver".

Planejamento Urbano e Arquitetura

A questão do design dos condomínios envolve não apenas a estética das construções, mas também a funcionalidade e a sustentabilidade a longo prazo. O planejamento urbano deve refletir as necessidades específicas da comunidade, onde ela decide por si mesma como construir e organizar seu ambiente.\ Arquitetos e urbanistas, muitas vezes moradores especializados, serão responsáveis pela concepção de espaços que atendam a esses critérios, criando ambientes agradáveis, com áreas para lazer, trabalho e convivência que atendam às diversas necessidades de cada grupo.\ Além disso, condomínios com nessecidades semelhantes poderão adotar ideias que deram certo em outros e certamente também dará no seu.

Segurança e Vigilância

Em relação à segurança, cada condomínio pode adotar sistemas de vigilância e proteção que atendam à sua realidade específica. Algumas comunidades podem optar por sistemas de câmeras de segurança, armamento pleno de seus moradores, patrulhamento privado ou até mesmo formas alternativas de garantir a proteção, como vigilância por meio de criptografia e monitoramento descentralizado. A chave para a segurança será a confiança mútua e a colaboração voluntária entre os moradores, que terão a liberdade de definir suas próprias medidas.

Comércio entre Condomínios

A troca de bens e serviços entre as diferentes comunidades é essencial para o funcionamento da rede. Como cada condomínio possui um grau de especialização ou uma mistura de profissionais em diversas áreas, a interdependência entre eles se torna crucial para suprir necessidades e promover a colaboração.

Embora alguns condomínios sejam especializados em áreas como saúde, agricultura ou tecnologia, outros podem ter um perfil mais diversificado, com moradores que atuam em diferentes campos de conhecimento. Por exemplo, um condomínio agrícola pode produzir alimentos orgânicos frescos, enquanto um condomínio de saúde oferece consultas médicas, terapias e cuidados especializados. Já um condomínio tecnológico pode fornecer inovações em software ou equipamentos de energia. Podem haver condomínios universitários que oferecem todo tipo de solução no campo de ensino. Ao mesmo tempo, um condomínio misto, com moradores de diversas áreas, pode oferecer uma variedade de serviços e produtos, tornando-se um centro de intercâmbio de diferentes tipos de expertise.

Essa divisão de trabalho, seja especializada ou diversificada, permite que os condomínios ofereçam o melhor de suas áreas de atuação, ao mesmo tempo em que atendem às demandas de outros. Um condomínio que não se especializa pode, por exemplo, buscar um acordo de troca com um condomínio agrícola para obter alimentos frescos ou com um condomínio tecnológico para adquirir soluções inovadoras.

Embora os condomínios busquem a autossuficiência, alguns recursos essenciais não podem ser produzidos internamente. Itens como minérios para construção, combustíveis ou até mesmo água, em regiões secas, não estão disponíveis em todas as áreas. A natureza não distribui os recursos de maneira uniforme, e a capacidade de produção local pode ser insuficiente para suprir todas as necessidades dos moradores. Isso implica que, para garantir a qualidade de vida e a continuidade das operações, os condomínios precisarão estabelecer relações comerciais e de fornecimento com fontes externas, seja através de mercados, importações ou parcerias com outras comunidades ou fornecedores fora do sistema de condomínios. O comércio intercondomínios e com o exterior será vital para a complementaridade das necessidades, assegurando que os moradores tenham acesso a tudo o que não pode ser produzido localmente.

O sistema econômico entre os condomínios pode ser flexível, permitindo o uso de uma moeda comum (como o Bitcoin) ou até mesmo um sistema de troca direta. Por exemplo, um morador de um condomínio misto pode oferecer serviços de design gráfico em troca de alimentos ou cuidados médicos. Esse tipo de colaboração estimula a produtividade e cria incentivos para que cada condomínio ofereça o melhor de seus recursos e habilidades, garantindo acesso aos bens e serviços necessários.

Relações Externas e Diplomacia

O isolamento excessivo pode limitar o acesso a inovações, avanços culturais e tecnológicos, e até mesmo dificultar o acesso a mercados externos. Por isso, é importante que haja canais de comunicação e métodos de diplomacia para interagir com outras comunidades. Os condomínios podem, por exemplo, estabelecer parcerias com outras regiões, seja para troca de produtos, serviços ou até para inovação. Isso garante que a rede de condomínios não se torne autossuficiente ao ponto de se desconectar do resto do mundo, o que pode resultar em estagnação.

Feiras, mercados intercondomínios e até eventos culturais e educacionais podem ser organizados para promover essas interações. A colaboração entre as comunidades e o exterior não precisa ser baseada em uma troca de dependência, mas sim numa rede de oportunidades que cria benefícios para todas as partes envolvidas. Uma boa reputação atrai novos moradores, pode valorizar propriedades e facilitar parcerias. A diplomacia entre as comunidades também pode ser exercida para resolver disputas ou desafios externos.

A manutenção de boas relações entre condomínios é essencial para garantir uma rede de apoio mútuo eficiente. Essas relações incentivam a troca de bens e serviços, como alimentos, assistência médica ou soluções tecnológicas, além de fortalecer a autossuficiência regional. Ao colaborar em segurança, infraestrutura compartilhada, eventos culturais e até mesmo na resolução de conflitos, os condomínios se tornam mais resilientes e eficientes, reduzindo a dependência externa e melhorando a qualidade de vida dos moradores. A cooperação contínua cria um ambiente mais seguro e harmonioso.

Educação e Desenvolvimento Humano

Cada comunidade pode criar escolas internas com currículos adaptados às especializações de seus moradores. Por exemplo, em um condomínio agrícola, podem ser ensinadas práticas agrícolas sustentáveis, e em um condomínio tecnológico, cursos de programação e inovação. Isso permite que crianças e jovens cresçam em ambientes que reforçam as competências valorizadas pela comunidade.

Além das escolas internas, o conceito de homeschooling pode ser incentivado, permitindo que os pais eduquem seus filhos conforme seus próprios valores e necessidades, com o apoio da comunidade. Esse modelo oferece uma educação mais flexível e personalizada, ao contrário do currículo tradicional oferecido pelo sistema público atual.

Os condomínios universitários também podem surgir, criando ambientes dedicados ao desenvolvimento acadêmico, científico e profissional, onde estudantes vivem e aprendem. Além disso, programas de capacitação contínua são essenciais, com oficinas e cursos oferecidos dentro do condomínio para garantir que os moradores se atualizem com novas tecnologias e práticas.

Para ampliar os horizontes educacionais, os intercâmbios estudantis entre diferentes condomínios podem ser incentivados. Esses intercâmbios não se limitam apenas ao ambiente educacional, mas também se estendem ao aprendizado de práticas de vida e habilidades técnicas. Os jovens de diferentes condomínios podem viajar para outras comunidades para estudar, trabalhar ou simplesmente trocar ideias. Isso pode ocorrer de diversas formas, como programas de curto e longo prazo, através de acordos entre os próprios condomínios, permitindo que os estudantes se conectem com outras comunidades, aprendam sobre diferentes especializações e desenvolvam uma compreensão mais ampla.

Essa abordagem descentralizada permite que cada comunidade desenvolva as competências essenciais sem depender de estruturas limitantes do estado ou sistemas educacionais centralizados. Ao proporcionar liberdade de escolha e personalização, os condomínios criam ambientes propícios ao crescimento humano, alinhados às necessidades e interesses de seus moradores.

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A sociedade dos condomínios privados propõe uma estrutura alternativa de convivência onde as pessoas podem viver de acordo com seus próprios valores e necessidades. Esses condomínios oferecem um modelo de organização que desafia a centralização estatal, buscando criar comunidades adaptáveis e inovadoras. A liberdade garante que as habilidades necessárias para o sustento e crescimento das comunidades sejam mantidas ao longo do tempo.

A troca de bens, serviços e conhecimentos entre os condomínios, sem a imposição de forças externas, cria uma rede de boas relações, onde o comércio e a colaboração substituem a intervenção estatal. Em vez de depender de sistemas coercitivos, cada condomínio funciona como um microcosmo autônomo que, juntos, formam um ecossistema dinâmico e próspero. Este modelo propõe que, por meio de trocas voluntárias, possamos construir uma sociedade mais saudável. Lembre-se: Ideias e somente ideias podem iluminar a escuridão.

@ 1c19eb1a:e22fb0bc

After my first major review of Primal on Android, we're going to go a very different direction for this next review. Primal is your standard "Twitter clone" type of kind 1 note client, now branching into long-form. They also have a team of developers working on making it one of the best clients to fill that use-case. By contrast, this review will not be focusing on any client at all. Not even an "other stuff" client.

Instead, we will be reviewing a very useful tool created and maintained by nostr:npub1w4uswmv6lu9yel005l3qgheysmr7tk9uvwluddznju3nuxalevvs2d0jr5 called #Amber. For those unfamiliar with Amber, it is an #Android application dedicated to managing your signing keys, and allowing you to log into various #Nostr applications without having to paste in your private key, better known as your #nsec. It is not recommended to paste your nsec into various applications because they each represent another means by which it could be compromised, and anyone who has your nsec can post as you. On Nostr, your #npub is your identity, and your signature using your private key is considered absolute proof that any given note, reaction, follow update, or profile change was authorized by the rightful owner of that identity.

It happens less often these days, but early on, when the only way to try out a new client was by inputting your nsec, users had their nsec compromised from time to time, or they would suspect that their key may have been compromised. When this occurs, there is no way to recover your account, or set a new private key, deprecating the previous one. The only thing you can do is start over from scratch, letting everyone know that your key has been compromised and to follow you on your new npub.

If you use Amber to log into other Nostr apps, you significantly reduce the likelihood that your private key will be compromised, because only one application has access to it, and all other applications reach out to Amber to sign any events. This isn't quite as secure as storing your private key on a separate device that isn't connected to the internet whatsoever, like many of us have grown accustomed to with securing our #Bitcoin, but then again, an online persona isn't nearly as important to secure for most of us as our entire life savings.

Amber is the first application of its kind for managing your Nostr keys on a mobile device. nostr:npub1w4uswmv6lu9yel005l3qgheysmr7tk9uvwluddznju3nuxalevvs2d0jr5 didn't merely develop the application, but literally created the specification for accomplishing external signing on Android which can be found in NIP-55. Unfortunately, Amber is only available for Android. A signer application for iOS is in the works from nostr:npub1yaul8k059377u9lsu67de7y637w4jtgeuwcmh5n7788l6xnlnrgs3tvjmf, but is not ready for use at this time. There is also a new mobile signer app for Android and iOS called Nowser, but I have not yet had a chance to try this app out. From a cursory look at the Android version, it is indeed in the very early stages of development and cannot be compared with Amber.

This review of Amber is current as of version 3.2.5.

Overall Impression

Score: 4.7 / 5 (Updated 4/21/2025)

I cannot speak highly enough about Amber as a tool that every Nostr user on Android should start using if they are not already. When the day comes that we have more options for well-developed signer apps on mobile, my opinion may very well change, but until then Amber is what we have available to us. Even so, it is an incredibly well thought-out and reliable tool for securing your nsec.

Despite being the only well-established Android signer available for Android, Amber can be compared with other external signing methods available on other platforms. Even with more competition in this arena, though, Amber still holds up incredibly well. If you are signing into web applications on a desktop, I still would recommend using a browser extension like #Alby or #Nos2x, as the experience is usually faster, more seamless, and far more web apps support this signing method (NIP-07) than currently support the two methods employed by Amber. Nevertheless that gap is definitely narrowing.

A running list I created of applications that support login and signing with Amber can be found here: Nostr Clients with External Signer Support

I have run into relatively few bugs in my extensive use of Amber for all of my mobile signing needs. Occasionally the application crashes when trying to send it a signing request from a couple of applications, but I would not be surprised if this is no fault of Amber at all, and rather the fault of those specific apps, since it works flawlessly with the vast majority of apps that support either NIP-55 or NIP-46 login.

I also believe that mobile is the ideal platform to use for this type of application. First, because most people use Nostr clients on their phone more than on a desktop. There are, of course, exceptions to that, but in general we spend more time on our phones when interacting online. New users are also more likely to be introduced to Nostr by a friend having them download a Nostr client on their phone than on a PC, and that can be a prime opportunity to introduce the new user to protecting their private key. Finally, I agree with the following assessment from nostr:npub1jlrs53pkdfjnts29kveljul2sm0actt6n8dxrrzqcersttvcuv3qdjynqn.

nostr:nevent1qqsw0r6gzn05xg67h5q2xkplwsuzedjxw9lf7ntrxjl8ajm350fcyugprfmhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumn0wd68yurvv438xtnrdaksyg9hyaxj3clfswlhyrd5kjsj5v04clhjvgeq6pwztmysfzdvn93gev7awu9v

The one downside to Amber is that it will be quite foreign for new users. That is partially unavoidable with Nostr, since folks are not accustomed to public/private key cryptography in general, let alone using a private key to log into websites or social media apps. However, the initial signup process is a bit cumbersome if Amber is being used as the means of initially generating a key pair. I think some of this could be foregone at start-up in favor of streamlining onboarding, and then encourage the user to back-up their private key at a later time.

Features

Amber has some features that may surprise you, outside of just storing your private key and signing requests from your favorite Nostr clients. It is a full key management application, supporting multiple accounts, various backup methods, and even the ability to authorize other users to access a Nostr profile you control.

Android Signing

This is the signing method where Amber really shines in both speed and ease of use. Any Android application that supports this standard, and even some progressive web-apps that can be installed to your Android's home-screen, can very quickly and seamlessly connect with Amber to authorize anything that you need signed with your nsec. All you have to do is select "Login with Amber" in clients like #Amethyst or #0xChat and the app will reach out to Amber for all signing requests from there on out. If you had previously signed into the app with your nsec, you will first need to log out, then choose the option to use Amber when you log back in.

This is a massive deal, because everything you do on Nostr requires a signature from your private key. Log in? Needs a signature. Post a "GM" note? Needs a signature. Follow someone who zapped your note? Needs a signature. Zap them back? You guessed it; needs a signature. When you paste your private key into an application, it will automatically sign a lot of these actions without you ever being asked for approval, but you will quickly realize just how many things the client is doing on your behalf when Amber is asking you to approve them each time.

Now, this can also get quite annoying after a while. I recommend using the setting that allows Amber to automatically sign for basic functions, which will cut down on some of the authorization spam. Once you have been asked to authorize the same type of action a few times, you can also toggle the option to automatically authorize that action in the future. Don't worry, though, you have full control to require Amber to ask you for permission again if you want to be alerted each time, and this toggle is specific to each application, so it's not a blanket approval for all Nostr clients you connect with.

This method of signing is just as fast as signing via browser extension on web clients, which users may be more accustomed to. Everything is happening locally on the device, so it can be very snappy and secure.

Nostr Connect/Bunker Signing

This next method of signing has a bit of a delay, because it is using a Nostr relay to send encrypted information back and forth between the app the user is interacting with and Amber to obtain signatures remotely. It isn't a significant delay most of the time, but it is just enough to be noticeable.

Also, unlike the previous signing method that would automatically switch to Amber as the active application when a signing request is sent, this method only sends you a notification that you must be watching for. This can lead to situations where you are wondering why something isn't working in a client you signed into remotely, because it is waiting on you to authorize the action and you didn't notice the notification from Amber. As you use the application, you get used to the need to check for such authorization requests from time to time, or when something isn't working as expected.

By default, Amber will use relay.nsec.app to communicate with whichever Nostr app you are connecting to. You can set a different relay for this purpose, if you like, though not just any relay will support the event kinds that Amber uses for remote signing. You can even run your own relay just for your own signing purposes. In fact, the creator of Amber has a relay application you can run on your phone, called Citrine, that can be used for signing with any web app you are using locally on your phone. This is definitely more of an advanced option, but it is there for you if you want it. For most users, sticking with relay.nsec.app will be just fine, especially since the contents of the events sent back and forth for signing are all encrypted.

Something many users may not realize is that this remote signing feature allows for issuing signing permissions to team members. For instance, if anyone ever joined me in writing reviews, I could issue them a connection string from Amber, and limit their permissions to just posting long-form draft events. Anything else they tried to do would require my explicit approval each time. Moreover, I could revoke those permissions if I ever felt they were being abused, without the need to start over with a whole new npub. Of course, this requires that your phone is online whenever a team member is trying to sign using the connection string you issued, and it requires you pay attention to your notifications so you can approve or reject requests you have not set to auto-approve. However, this is probably only useful for small teams, and larger businesses will want to find a more robust solution for managing access to their npub, such as Keycast from nostr:npub1zuuajd7u3sx8xu92yav9jwxpr839cs0kc3q6t56vd5u9q033xmhsk6c2uc.

The method for establishing a connection between Amber and a Nostr app for remote signing can vary for each app. Most, at minimum, will support obtaining a connection string from Amber that starts with "bunker://" and pasting it in at the time of login. Then you just need to approve the connection request from Amber and the client will log you in and send any subsequent signing requests to Amber using the same connection string.

Some clients will also offer the option to scan a QR code to connect the client to Amber. This is quite convenient, but just remember that this also means the client is setting which relay will be used for communication between the two. Clients with this option will also have a connection string you can copy and paste into Amber to achieve the same purpose. For instance, you may need this option if you are trying to connect to an app on your phone and therefore can't scan the QR code using Amber on the same phone.

Multiple Accounts

Amber does not lock you into using it with only a single set of keys. You can add all of your Nostr "accounts" to Amber and use it for signing events for each independently. Of course, Nostr doesn't actually have "accounts" in the traditional sense. Your identity is simply your key-pair, and Amber stores and accesses each private key as needed.

When first signing in using native Android signing as described above, Amber will default to whichever account was most recently selected, but you can switch to the account that is needed before approving the request. After initial login, Amber will automatically detect the account that the signing request is for.

Key Backup & Restore

Amber allows multiple ways to back up your private key. As most users would expect, you can get your standard nsec and copy/paste it to a password manager, but you can also obtain your private key as a list of mnemonic seed words, an encrypted version of your key called an ncryptsec, or even a QR code of your nsec or ncryptsec.

Additionally, in order to gain access to this information, Amber requires you to enter your device's PIN or use biometric authentication. This isn't cold-storage level protection for your private key by any means, especially since your phone is an internet connected device and does not store your key within a secure element, but it is about as secure as you can ask for while having your key accessible for signing Nostr events.

Tor Support

While Amber does not have Tor support within the app itself, it does support connecting to Tor through Orbot. This would be used with remote signing so that Amber would not connect directly over clearnet to the relay used for communication with the Nostr app requesting the signature. Instead, Amber would connect through Tor, so the relay would not see your IP address. This means you can utilize the remote signing option without compromising your anonymity.

Additional Security

Amber allows the user the option to require either biometric or PIN authentication before approving signing requests. This can provide that extra bit of assurance that no one will be able to sign events using your private key if they happen to gain access to your phone. The PIN you set in Amber is also independent from the PIN to unlock your device, allowing for separation of access.

Can My Grandma Use It?

Score: 4.6 / 5 (Updated 4/21/2025)

At the end of the day, Amber is a tool for those who have some concept of the importance of protecting their private key by not pasting it into every Nostr client that comes along. This concept in itself is not terribly approachable to an average person. They are used to just plugging their password into every service they use, and even worse, they usually have the same password for everything so they can more readily remember it. The idea that they should never enter their "Nostr password" into any Nostr application would never occur to them unless someone first explained how cryptography works related to public/private key pairs.

That said, I think there can be some improvements made to how users are introduced to these concepts, and that a signer application like Amber might be ideal for the job. Considering Amber as a new user's first touch-point with Nostr, I think it holds up well, but could be somewhat streamlined.

Upon opening the app, the user is prompted to either use their existing private key or "Create a new Nostr account." This is straightforward enough. "Account" is not a technically correct term with Nostr, but it is a term that new users would be familiar with and understand the basic concept.

The next screen announces that the account is ready, and presents the user with their public key, explaining that it is "a sort of username" that will allow others to find them on Nostr. While it is good to explain this to the user, it is unnecessary information at this point. This screen also prompts the user to set a nickname and set a password to encrypt their private key. Since the backup options also allow the user to set this password, I think this step could be pushed to a later time. This screen would better serve the new user if it simply prompted them to set a nickname and short bio that could be saved to a few default relays.

Of course, Amber is currently prompting for a password to be set up-front because the next screen requires the new user to download a "backup kit" in order to continue. While I do believe it is a good idea to encourage the creation of a backup, it is not crucial to do so immediately upon creation of a new npub that has nothing at stake if the private key is lost. This is something the UI could remind the user to do at a later time, reducing the friction of profile creation, and expediting getting them into the action.

Outside of these minor onboarding friction points, I think Amber does a great job of explaining to the user the purpose of each of its features, all within the app and without any need to reference external documentation. As long as the user understands the basic concept that their private key is being stored by Amber in order to sign requests from other Nostr apps, so they don't have to be given the private key, Amber is very good about explaining the rest without getting too far into the technical weeds.

The most glaring usability issue with Amber is that it isn't available in the Play Store. Average users expect to be able to find applications they can trust in their mobile device's default app store. There is a valid argument to be made that they are incorrect in this assumption, but that doesn't change the fact that this is the assumption most people make. They believe that applications in the Play Store are "safe" and that anything they can't install through the Play Store is suspect. The prompts that the Android operating system requires the user to approve when installing "unknown apps" certainly doesn't help with this impression.

Now, I absolutely love the Zapstore from nostr:npub1wf4pufsucer5va8g9p0rj5dnhvfeh6d8w0g6eayaep5dhps6rsgs43dgh9, but it doesn't do much to alleviate this issue. Users will still need to be convinced that it is safe to install the Zapstore from the GitHub repo, and then install Amber from there. Furthermore, this adds yet another step to the onboarding process.

Instead of:

• Install Amber
• Set up your keys
• Install the client you want to use
• Log in with Amber

The process becomes:

• Go to the Zapstore GitHub and download the latest version from the releases page.
• Install the APK you downloaded, allowing any prompt to install unknown apps.
• Open Zapstore and install Amber, allowing any prompt to install unknown apps again.
• Open Amber and set up your keys.
• Install the client you want to use
• Log in with Amber

An application as important as Amber for protecting users' private keys should be as readily available to the new user as possible. New users are the ones most prone to making mistakes that could compromise their private keys. Amber should be available to them in the Play Store.

UPDATE: As of version 3.2.8 released on 4/21/2025, the onboarding flow for Amber has been greatly improved! Now, when selecting to set up a new "account" the user is informed on the very next screen, "Your Nostr account is ready!" and given their public key/npub. The only field the user must fill in is their "nickname"/display name and hit "Continue."

From there the user is asked if they want Amber to automatically approve basic actions, or manually approve each app, and then they are shown a new Applications screen, with a prompt to create a backup of their account. This prompt persists until the user has done so.

As you can see, the user is also encouraged to find applications that can be used with Amber with links to nostrapps.com and the Zapstore.

Thanks to these updates, Amber is now the smoothest and most user-friendly onboarding experience I have seen for Nostr to date. Sure, it doesn't have anything for setting up a profile picture or lightning address, but that is better done in a client like Amethyst or YakiHonne, anyway. Just tap "create," type in a handle to call yourself, and you're done!

How do UI Look?

Score: 4.5 / 5

Amber's UI can be described as clean but utilitarian. But then, Amber is a tool, so this is somewhat expected. It is not an app you will be spending a lot of time in, so the UI just needs to be serviceable. I would say it accomplishes this and then some. UI elements are generally easy to understand what they do, and page headings fill in the gaps where that is not the case.

I am not the biggest fan of the color-scheme, particularly in light-mode, but it is not bad in dark-mode at all, and Amber follows whatever theme you have set for your device in that respect. Additionally, the color choice does make sense given the application's name.

It must also be taken into consideration that Amber is almost entirely the product of a single developer's work. He has done a great job producing an app that is not only useful, but pleasant to interact with. The same cannot be said for most utility apps I have previously used, with interfaces that clearly made good design the lowest priority. While Amber's UI may not be the most beautiful Nostr app I have seen, design was clearly not an afterthought, either, and it is appreciated.

Relay Management

Score: 4.9 / 5

Even though Amber is not a Nostr client, where users can browse notes from their favorite npubs, it still relies heavily on relays for some of its features. Primarily, it uses relays for communicating with other Nostr apps for remote signing requests. However, it also uses relays to fetch profile data, so that each private key you add to Amber will automatically load your chosen username and profile picture.

In the relay settings, users can choose which relays are being used to fetch profile data, and which relays will be used by default when creating new remote signing connection strings.

The user can also see which relays are currently connected to Amber and even look at the information that has been passed back and forth on each of those active relays. This information about actively connected relays is not only available within the application, but also in the notification that Amber has to keep in your device's notification tray in order to continue to operate in the background while you are using other apps.

Optionality is the name of the game when it comes to how Amber handles relay selection. The user can just stick with the default signing relay, use their own relay as the default, or even use a different relay for each Nostr application that they connect to for remote signing. Amber gives the user an incredible amount of flexibility in this regard.

In addition to all of this, because not all relays accept the event types needed for remote signing, when you add a relay address to Amber, it automatically tests that relay to see if it will work. This alone can be a massive time saver, so users aren't trying to use relays that don't support remote signing and wondering why they can't log into noStrudel with the connection string they got from Amber.

The only way I could see relay management being improved would be some means of giving the user relay recommendations, in case they want to use a relay other than relay.nsec.app, but they aren't sure which other relays will accept remote signing events. That said, most users who want to use a different relay for signing remote events will likely be using their own, in which case recommendations aren't needed.

Current Users' Questions

The AskNostr hashtag can be a good indication of the pain points that other users are currently having with any Nostr application. Here are some of the most common questions submitted about Amber in the last two months.

nostr:nevent1qqsfrdr68fafgcvl8dgnhm9hxpsjxuks78afxhu8yewhtyf3d7mkg9gpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumn0wd68ytnzv9hxgq3qkgh77xxt7hhtt4u528hecnx69rhagla8jj3tclgyf9wvkxa6dc0sxp0e6m

This is a good example of Amber working correctly, but the app the user is trying to log into not working. In my experience with #Olas in particular, it sometimes allows remote signer login, and sometimes doesn't. Amber will receive the signing request and I will approve it, but Olas remains on the login screen.

If Amber is receiving the signing requests, and you are approving them, the fault is likely with the application you are trying to log into.

That's it. That's all the repeated questions I could find. Oh, there were a few one-off questions where relay.nsec.app wouldn't connect, or where the user's out-of-date web browser was the issue. Outside of that, though, there were no common questions about how to use Amber, and that is a testament to Amber's ease of use all on its own.

Wrap Up

If you are on Android and you are not already using Amber to protect your nsec, please do yourself a favor and get it installed. It's not at all complicated to set up, and it will make trying out all the latest Nostr clients a safe and pleasant experience.

If you are a client developer and you have not added support for NIP-55 or NIP-46, do your users the courtesy of respecting the sanctity of their private keys. Even developers who have no intention of compromising their users' keys can inadvertently do so. Make that eventuality impossible by adding support for NIP-55 and NIP-46 signing.

Finally, I apologize for the extended time it took me to get this review finished. The time I have available is scarce, Nostr is distracting, and nostr:npub1w4uswmv6lu9yel005l3qgheysmr7tk9uvwluddznju3nuxalevvs2d0jr5 kept improving Amber even as I was putting it through its paces over the last two months. Keep shipping, my friend! You have made one of the most useful tools we have seen for Nostr to date!

Now... What should I review next?

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

Read the original blog post

Bitcoin enthusiasts frequently and correctly remark how much value it adds to Bitcoin not to have a face, a leader, or a central authority behind it. This particularity means there isn't a single person to exert control over, or a single human point of failure who could become corrupt or harmful to the project.

Because of this, it is said that no other coin can be equally valuable as Bitcoin in terms of decentralization and trustworthiness. Bitcoin is unique not just for being first, but also because of how the events behind its inception developed. This implies that, from Bitcoin onwards, any coin created would have been created by someone, consequently having an authority behind it. For this and some other reasons, some people refer to Bitcoin as "The Immaculate Conception".

While other coins may have their own unique features and advantages, they may not be able to replicate Bitcoin's community-driven nature. However, one other cryptocurrency shares a similar story of mystery behind its creation: Monero.

History of Monero

Bytecoin and CryptoNote

In March 2014, a Bitcointalk thread titled "Bytecoin. Secure, private, untraceable since 2012" was initiated by a user under the nickname "DStrange"^1^. DStrange presented Bytecoin (BCN) as a unique cryptocurrency, in operation since July 2012. Unlike Bitcoin, it employed a new algorithm known as CryptoNote.

DStrange apparently stumbled upon the Bytecoin website by chance while mining a dying bitcoin fork, and decided to create a thread on Bitcointalk^1^. This sparked curiosity among some users, who wondered how could Bytecoin remain unnoticed since its alleged launch in 2012 until then^2^.

Some time after, a user brought up the "CryptoNote v2.0" whitepaper for the first time, underlining its innovative features^4^. Authored by the pseudonymous Nicolas van Saberhagen in October 2013, the CryptoNote v2 whitepaper^5^ highlighted the traceability and privacy problems in Bitcoin. Saberhagen argued that these flaws could not be quickly fixed, suggesting it would be more efficient to start a new project rather than trying to patch the original^5^, an statement simmilar to the one from Satoshi Nakamoto^6^.

Checking with Saberhagen's digital signature, the release date of the whitepaper seemed correct, which would mean that Cryptonote (v1) was created in 2012^7^, although there's an important detail: "Signing time is from the clock on the signer's computer" ^9^.

Moreover, the whitepaper v1 contains a footnote link to a Bitcointalk post dated May 5, 2013^10^, making it impossible for the whitepaper to have been signed and released on December 12, 2012.

As the narrative developed, users discovered that a significant 80% portion of Bytecoin had been pre-mined^11^ and blockchain dates seemed to be faked to make it look like it had been operating since 2012, leading to controversy surrounding the project.

The origins of CryptoNote and Bytecoin remain mysterious, leaving suspicions of a possible scam attempt, although the whitepaper had a good amount of work and thought on it.

The fork

In April 2014, the Bitcointalk user thankful_for_today, who had also participated in the Bytecoin thread^12^, announced plans to launch a Bytecoin fork named Bitmonero^13^.

The primary motivation behind this fork was "Because there is a number of technical and marketing issues I wanted to do differently. And also because I like ideas and technology and I want it to succeed"^14^. This time Bitmonero did things different from Bytecoin: there was no premine or instamine, and no portion of the block reward went to development.

However, thankful_for_today proposed controversial changes that the community disagreed with. Johnny Mnemonic relates the events surrounding Bitmonero and thankful_for_today in a Bitcointalk comment^15^:

When thankful_for_today launched BitMonero [...] he ignored everything that was discussed and just did what he wanted. The block reward was considerably steeper than what everyone was expecting. He also moved forward with 1-minute block times despite everyone's concerns about the increase of orphan blocks. He also didn't address the tail emission concern that should've (in my opinion) been in the code at launch time. Basically, he messed everything up. Then, he disappeared.

After disappearing for a while, thankful_for_today returned to find that the community had taken over the project. Johnny Mnemonic continues:

I, and others, started working on new forks that were closer to what everyone else was hoping for. [...] it was decided that the BitMonero project should just be taken over. There were like 9 or 10 interested parties at the time if my memory is correct. We voted on IRC to drop the "bit" from BitMonero and move forward with the project. Thankful_for_today suddenly resurfaced, and wasn't happy to learn the community had assumed control of the coin. He attempted to maintain his own fork (still calling it "BitMonero") for a while, but that quickly fell into obscurity.

The unfolding of these events show us the roots of Monero. Much like Satoshi Nakamoto, the creators behind CryptoNote/Bytecoin and thankful_for_today remain a mystery^17^, having disappeared without a trace. This enigma only adds to Monero's value.

Since community took over development, believing in the project's potential and its ability to be guided in a better direction, Monero was given one of Bitcoin's most important qualities: a leaderless nature. With no single face or entity directing its path, Monero is safe from potential corruption or harm from a "central authority".

The community continued developing Monero until today. Since then, Monero has undergone a lot of technological improvements, migrations and achievements such as RingCT and RandomX. It also has developed its own Community Crowdfundinc System, conferences such as MoneroKon and Monerotopia are taking place every year, and has a very active community around it.

Monero continues to develop with goals of privacy and security first, ease of use and efficiency second. ^16^

This stands as a testament to the power of a dedicated community operating without a central figure of authority. This decentralized approach aligns with the original ethos of cryptocurrency, making Monero a prime example of community-driven innovation. For this, I thank all the people involved in Monero, that lead it to where it is today.

If you find any information that seems incorrect, unclear or any missing important events, please contact me and I will make the necessary changes.

Sources of interest

• https://forum.getmonero.org/20/general-discussion/211/history-of-monero
• https://monero.stackexchange.com/questions/852/what-is-the-origin-of-monero-and-its-relationship-to-bytecoin
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monero
• https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=583449.0
• https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=563821.0
• https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=233561
• https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=512747.0
• https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=740112.0
• https://monero.stackexchange.com/a/1024
• https://inspec2t-project.eu/cryptocurrency-with-a-focus-on-anonymity-these-facts-are-known-about-monero/
• https://medium.com/coin-story/coin-perspective-13-riccardo-spagni-69ef82907bd1
• https://www.getmonero.org/resources/about/
• https://www.wired.com/2017/01/monero-drug-dealers-cryptocurrency-choice-fire/
• https://www.monero.how/why-monero-vs-bitcoin
• https://old.reddit.com/r/Monero/comments/u8e5yr/satoshi_nakamoto_talked_about_privacy_features/

@ 04c915da:3dfbecc9

Capitalism is the most effective system for scaling innovation. The pursuit of profit is an incredibly powerful human incentive. Most major improvements to human society and quality of life have resulted from this base incentive. Market competition often results in the best outcomes for all.

That said, some projects can never be monetized. They are open in nature and a business model would centralize control. Open protocols like bitcoin and nostr are not owned by anyone and if they were it would destroy the key value propositions they provide. No single entity can or should control their use. Anyone can build on them without permission.

As a result, open protocols must depend on donation based grant funding from the people and organizations that rely on them. This model works but it is slow and uncertain, a grind where sustainability is never fully reached but rather constantly sought. As someone who has been incredibly active in the open source grant funding space, I do not think people truly appreciate how difficult it is to raise charitable money and deploy it efficiently.

Projects that can be monetized should be. Profitability is a super power. When a business can generate revenue, it taps into a self sustaining cycle. Profit fuels growth and development while providing projects independence and agency. This flywheel effect is why companies like Google, Amazon, and Apple have scaled to global dominance. The profit incentive aligns human effort with efficiency. Businesses must innovate, cut waste, and deliver value to survive.

Contrast this with non monetized projects. Without profit, they lean on external support, which can dry up or shift with donor priorities. A profit driven model, on the other hand, is inherently leaner and more adaptable. It is not charity but survival. When survival is tied to delivering what people want, scale follows naturally.

The real magic happens when profitable, sustainable businesses are built on top of open protocols and software. Consider the many startups building on open source software stacks, such as Start9, Mempool, and Primal, offering premium services on top of the open source software they build out and maintain. Think of companies like Block or Strike, which leverage bitcoin’s open protocol to offer their services on top. These businesses amplify the open software and protocols they build on, driving adoption and improvement at a pace donations alone could never match.

When you combine open software and protocols with profit driven business the result are lean, sustainable companies that grow faster and serve more people than either could alone. Bitcoin’s network, for instance, benefits from businesses that profit off its existence, while nostr will expand as developers monetize apps built on the protocol.

Capitalism scales best because competition results in efficiency. Donation funded protocols and software lay the groundwork, while market driven businesses build on top. The profit incentive acts as a filter, ensuring resources flow to what works, while open systems keep the playing field accessible, empowering users and builders. Together, they create a flywheel of innovation, growth, and global benefit.

@ 78b3c1ed:5033eea9

・ThunderHubで焼いたマカロンがlncli printmacaroonでどう見えるか確認した。

ThunderHub macaroon permissions

get invoices invoices:read create invoices invoices:write get payments offchain:read pay invoices offchain:write get chain transactions onchain:read send to chain address onchain:write create chain address address:write get wallet info info:read stop daemon info:write この結果によれば、offchain:wirteとonchain:writeの権限がなければそのマカロンを使うクライアントは勝手にBTCを送金することができない。 info:writeがなければ勝手にLNDを止めたりすることができない。

・lncli printmacaroonでデフォルトで作られるmacaroonのpermissionsを調べてみた。 admin.macaroon { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "address:read", "address:write", "info:read", "info:write", "invoices:read", "invoices:write", "macaroon:generate", "macaroon:read", "macaroon:write", "message:read", "message:write", "offchain:read", "offchain:write", "onchain:read", "onchain:write", "peers:read", "peers:write", "signer:generate", "signer:read" ], "caveats": null } chainnotifier.macaroon { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "onchain:read" ], "caveats": null } invoice.macaroon { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "address:read", "address:write", "invoices:read", "invoices:write", "onchain:read" ], "caveats": null } invoices.macaroon { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "invoices:read", "invoices:write" ], "caveats": null } readonly.macaroon { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "address:read", "info:read", "invoices:read", "macaroon:read", "message:read", "offchain:read", "onchain:read", "peers:read", "signer:read" ], "caveats": null } router.macaroon { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "offchain:read", "offchain:write" ], "caveats": null } signer.macaroon { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "signer:generate", "signer:read" ], "caveats": null } walletkit.macaroon { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "address:read", "address:write", "onchain:read", "onchain:write" ], "caveats": null }

・lncli listpermissions コマンドですべての RPC メソッド URI と、それらを呼び出すために必要なマカロン権限を一覧表示できる。 LND v0.18.5-betaでやると1344行ほどのJSONができる。 AddInvoiceだとinvoice:writeのpermissionを持つmacaroonを使えばインボイスを作れるようだ。 "/lnrpc.Lightning/AddInvoice": { "permissions": [ { "entity": "invoices", "action": "write" } ] }, lncli listpermissionsからentityとactionを抜き出してみた。 ``` "entity": "address", "entity": "info", "entity": "invoices", "entity": "macaroon", "entity": "message", "entity": "offchain", "entity": "onchain", "entity": "peers", "entity": "signer",

"action": "generate" "action": "read" "action": "write" lncli とjqを組み合わせると例えば以下コマンドでinvoices:writeを必要とするRPCの一覧を表示できる。 invoices:writeだとAddInvoiceの他にホドルインボイス作成でも使ってるようだ lncli listpermissions | jq -r '.method_permissions | to_entries[] | select(.value.permissions[] | select(.entity == "invoices" and .action == "write")) | .key' /invoicesrpc.Invoices/AddHoldInvoice /invoicesrpc.Invoices/CancelInvoice /invoicesrpc.Invoices/HtlcModifier /invoicesrpc.Invoices/LookupInvoiceV2 /invoicesrpc.Invoices/SettleInvoice /lnrpc.Lightning/AddInvoice invoices:readだと以下となる。 /invoicesrpc.Invoices/SubscribeSingleInvoice /lnrpc.Lightning/ListInvoices /lnrpc.Lightning/LookupInvoice /lnrpc.Lightning/SubscribeInvoices LNの主だった機能のRPCはoffchainが必要ぽいので抜き出してみた。 offchain:write チャネルの開閉、ペイメントの送信までやってるみたい。 デフォルトのmacaroonでoffchain:writeを持ってるのはadminとrouterの2つだけ。openchannel,closechannelはonchain:writeのpermissionも必要なようだ。 /autopilotrpc.Autopilot/ModifyStatus /autopilotrpc.Autopilot/SetScores /lnrpc.Lightning/AbandonChannel /lnrpc.Lightning/BatchOpenChannel /lnrpc.Lightning/ChannelAcceptor /lnrpc.Lightning/CloseChannel /lnrpc.Lightning/DeleteAllPayments /lnrpc.Lightning/DeletePayment /lnrpc.Lightning/FundingStateStep /lnrpc.Lightning/OpenChannel /lnrpc.Lightning/OpenChannelSync /lnrpc.Lightning/RestoreChannelBackups /lnrpc.Lightning/SendCustomMessage /lnrpc.Lightning/SendPayment /lnrpc.Lightning/SendPaymentSync /lnrpc.Lightning/SendToRoute /lnrpc.Lightning/SendToRouteSync /lnrpc.Lightning/UpdateChannelPolicy /routerrpc.Router/HtlcInterceptor /routerrpc.Router/ResetMissionControl /routerrpc.Router/SendPayment /routerrpc.Router/SendPaymentV2 /routerrpc.Router/SendToRoute /routerrpc.Router/SendToRouteV2 /routerrpc.Router/SetMissionControlConfig /routerrpc.Router/UpdateChanStatus /routerrpc.Router/XAddLocalChanAliases /routerrpc.Router/XDeleteLocalChanAliases /routerrpc.Router/XImportMissionControl /wtclientrpc.WatchtowerClient/AddTower /wtclientrpc.WatchtowerClient/DeactivateTower /wtclientrpc.WatchtowerClient/RemoveTower /wtclientrpc.WatchtowerClient/TerminateSession "/lnrpc.Lightning/OpenChannel": { "permissions": [ { "entity": "onchain", "action": "write" }, { "entity": "offchain", "action": "write" } ] }, offchain:read readの方はチャネルやインボイスの状態を確認するためのpermissionのようだ。 /lnrpc.Lightning/ChannelBalance /lnrpc.Lightning/ClosedChannels /lnrpc.Lightning/DecodePayReq /lnrpc.Lightning/ExportAllChannelBackups /lnrpc.Lightning/ExportChannelBackup /lnrpc.Lightning/FeeReport /lnrpc.Lightning/ForwardingHistory /lnrpc.Lightning/GetDebugInfo /lnrpc.Lightning/ListAliases /lnrpc.Lightning/ListChannels /lnrpc.Lightning/ListPayments /lnrpc.Lightning/LookupHtlcResolution /lnrpc.Lightning/PendingChannels /lnrpc.Lightning/SubscribeChannelBackups /lnrpc.Lightning/SubscribeChannelEvents /lnrpc.Lightning/SubscribeCustomMessages /lnrpc.Lightning/VerifyChanBackup /routerrpc.Router/BuildRoute /routerrpc.Router/EstimateRouteFee /routerrpc.Router/GetMissionControlConfig /routerrpc.Router/QueryMissionControl /routerrpc.Router/QueryProbability /routerrpc.Router/SubscribeHtlcEvents /routerrpc.Router/TrackPayment /routerrpc.Router/TrackPaymentV2 /routerrpc.Router/TrackPayments /wtclientrpc.WatchtowerClient/GetTowerInfo /wtclientrpc.WatchtowerClient/ListTowers /wtclientrpc.WatchtowerClient/Policy /wtclientrpc.WatchtowerClient/Stats ・おまけ1 RPCメソッド名にopenを含む要素を抽出するコマンド lncli listpermissions | jq '.method_permissions | to_entries[] | select(.key | test("open"; "i"))' { "key": "/lnrpc.Lightning/BatchOpenChannel", "value": { "permissions": [ { "entity": "onchain", "action": "write" }, { "entity": "offchain", "action": "write" } ] } } { "key": "/lnrpc.Lightning/OpenChannel", "value": { "permissions": [ { "entity": "onchain", "action": "write" }, { "entity": "offchain", "action": "write" } ] } } { "key": "/lnrpc.Lightning/OpenChannelSync", "value": { "permissions": [ { "entity": "onchain", "action": "write" }, { "entity": "offchain", "action": "write" } ] } } ・おまけ２ thunderhubで作ったmacaroonはテキストで出力されコピペして使うもので、macaroonファイルになってない。 HEXをmacaroonファイルにするには以下コマンドでできる。HEXをコピペして置換する。またYOURSの箇所を自分でわかりやすい名称に置換すると良い。 echo -n "HEX" | xxd -r -p > YOURS.macaroon thunderhubで"Create Invoices, Get Invoices, Get Wallet Info, Get Payments, Pay Invoices"をチェックして作ったmacaroonのpermissionsは以下となる。 { "version": 2, "location": "lnd", "root_key_id": "0", "permissions": [ "info:read", "invoices:read", "invoices:write", "offchain:read", "offchain:write" ], "caveats": null } ``` offchain:writeはあるがonchain:writeがないのでチャネル開閉はできないはず。

@ 20986fb8:cdac21b3

The Traditional Hackathon: Brilliant Sparks with Limitations

For decades, hackathons have been the petri dishes of tech culture – frantic 24- or 48-hour coding marathons fueled by pizza, caffeine, and impossible optimism. From the first hackathon in 1999, when Sun Microsystems challenged Java developers to code on a Palm V in a day [1], to the all-night hack days at startups and universities, these events celebrated the hacker spirit. They gave us Facebook’s “Like” button and Chat features – iconic innovations born in overnight jams [1]. They spawned companies like GroupMe, which was coded in a few late-night hours and sold to Skype for $80 million a year later [2]. Hackathons became tech lore, synonymous with creativity unchained.

And yet, for all their electric energy and hype, traditional hackathons had serious limitations. They were episodic and offline – a once-in-a-blue-moon adrenaline rush rather than a sustainable process. A hackathon might gather 100 coders in a room over a weekend, then vanish until the next year. Low frequency, small scale, limited reach. Only those who could be on-site (often in Silicon Valley or elite campuses) could join. A brilliant hacker in Lagos or São Paulo would be left out, no matter how bright their ideas.

The outcomes of these sprint-like events were also constrained. Sure, teams built cool demos and won bragging rights. But in most cases, the projects were throwaway prototypes – “toy” apps that never evolved into real products or companies. It’s telling that studies found only about 5% of hackathon projects have any life a few months after the event [3]. Ninety-five percent evaporate – victims of that post-hackathon hangover, when everyone goes back to “real” work and the demo code gathers dust. Critics even dubbed hackathons “weekend wastedathons,” blasting their outputs as short-lived vaporware [3]. Think about it: a burst of creativity occurs, dozens of nifty ideas bloom… and then what? How many hackathon winners can you name that turned into enduring businesses? For every Carousell or EasyTaxi that emerged from a hackathon and later raised tens of millions [2], there were hundreds of clever mashups that never saw the light of day again.

The traditional hackathon model, as exciting as it was, rarely translated into sustained innovation. It was innovation in a silo: constrained by time, geography, and a lack of follow-through. Hackathons were events, not processes. They happened in a burst and ended just as quickly – a firework, not a sunrise.

Moreover, hackathons historically were insular. Until recently, they were largely run by and for tech insiders. Big tech companies did internal hackathons to juice employee creativity (Facebook’s famous all-nighters every few weeks led to Timeline and tagging features reaching a billion users [1]), and organizations like NASA and the World Bank experimented with hackathons for civic tech. But these were exceptions that proved the rule: hackathons were special occasions, not business-as-usual. Outside of tech giants, few organizations had the bandwidth or know-how to host them regularly. If you weren’t Google, Microsoft, or a well-funded startup hub, hackathons remained a novelty.

In fact, the world’s largest hackathon today is Microsoft’s internal global hackathon – with 70,000 employees collaborating across 75 countries [4] – an incredible feat, but one only a corporate titan could pull off. Smaller players could only watch and wonder.

The limitations were clear: hackathons were too infrequent and inaccessible to tap the full global talent pool, too short-lived to build anything beyond a prototype, and too isolated to truly change an industry. Yes, they produced amazing moments of genius – flashbulbs of innovation. But as a mechanism for continuous progress, the traditional hackathon was lacking. As an investor or tech leader, you might cheer the creativity but ask: Where is the lasting impact? Where is the infrastructure that turns these flashes into a steady beam of light?

In the spirit of Clay Christensen’s Innovator’s Dilemma, incumbents often dismissed hackathon projects as mere toys – interesting but not viable. And indeed, “the next big thing always starts out being dismissed as a toy” [5]. Hackathons generated plenty of toys, but rarely the support system to turn those toys into the next big thing. The model was ripe for reinvention. Why, in the 2020s, were we still innovating with a 1990s playbook? Why limit breakthrough ideas to a weekend or a single location? Why allow 95% of nascent innovations to wither on the vine? These questions hung in the air, waiting for an answer.

Hackathons 2.0 – DoraHacks and the First Evolution (2020–2024)

Enter DoraHacks. In the early 2020s, DoraHacks emerged like a defibrillator for the hackathon format, jolting it to new life. DoraHacks 1.0 (circa 2020–2024) was nothing less than the reinvention of the hackathon – an upgrade from Hackathon 1.0 to Hackathon 2.0. It took the hackathon concept, supercharged it, scaled it, and extended its reach in every dimension. The result was a global hacker movement, a platform that transformed hackathons from one-off sprints into a continuous engine for tech innovation. How did DoraHacks revolutionize the hackathon? Let’s count the ways:

From 24 Hours to 24 Days (or 24 Weeks!)

DoraHacks stretched the timeframe of hackathons, unlocking vastly greater potential. Instead of a frantic 24-hour dash, many DoraHacks-supported hackathons ran for several weeks or even months. This was a game-changer. Suddenly, teams had time to build serious prototypes, iterate, and polish their projects. A longer format meant hackathon projects could evolve beyond the rough demo stage. Hackers could sleep (occasionally!), incorporate user feedback, and transform a kernel of an idea into a working MVP. The extended duration blurred the line between a hackathon and an accelerator program – but with the open spirit of a hackathon intact. For example, DoraHacks hackathons for blockchain startups often ran 6–8 weeks, resulting in projects that attracted real users and investors by the end. The extra time turned hackathon toys into credible products. It was as if the hackathon grew up: less hack, more build (“BUIDL”). By shattering the 24-hour norm, DoraHacks made hackathons far more productive and impactful.

From Local Coffee Shops to Global Online Arenas

DoraHacks moved hackathons from physical spaces into the cloud, unleashing global participation. Pre-2020, a hackathon meant being in a specific place – say, a warehouse in San Francisco or a university lab – shoulder-to-shoulder with a local team. DoraHacks blew the doors off that model with online hackathons that anyone, anywhere could join. Suddenly, a developer in Nigeria could collaborate with a designer in Ukraine and a product thinker in Brazil, all in the same virtual hackathon. Geography ceased to be a limit. When DoraHacks hosted the Naija HackAtom for African blockchain devs, it drew over 500 participants (160+ developers) across Nigeria’s tech community [6]. In another event, thousands of hackers from dozens of countries logged into a DoraHacks virtual venue to ideate and compete. This global reach did more than increase headcount – it brought diverse perspectives and problems into the innovation mix. A fintech hackathon might see Latin American coders addressing remittances, or an AI hackathon see Asian and African participants applying machine learning to local healthcare challenges. By going online, hackathons became massively inclusive. DoraHacks effectively democratized access to innovation competitions: all you needed was an internet connection and the will to create. The result was a quantum leap in both the quantity and quality of ideas. No longer were hackathons an elitist sport; they became a global innovation free-for-all, open to talent from every corner of the world.

From Dozens of Participants to Tens of Thousands

Scale was another pillar of the DoraHacks revolution. Traditional hackathons were intimate affairs (dozens, maybe a few hundred participants at best). DoraHacks helped orchestrate hackathons an order of magnitude larger. We’re talking global hackathons with thousands of developers and multi-million dollar prize pools. For instance, in one 2021 online hackathon, nearly 7,000 participants submitted 550 projects for $5 million in prizes [7] – a scale unimaginable in the early 2010s. DoraHacks itself became a nexus for these mega-hackathons. The platform’s hackathons in the Web3 space routinely saw hundreds of teams competing for prizes sometimes exceeding $1 million. This scale wasn’t just vanity metrics; it meant a deeper talent bench attacking problems and a higher probability that truly exceptional projects would emerge. By casting a wide net, DoraHacks events captured star teams that might have been overlooked in smaller settings. The proof is in the outcomes: 216 builder teams were funded with over $5 million in one DoraHacks-powered hackathon series on BNB Chain [8] – yes, five million dollars, distributed to over two hundred teams as seed funding. That’s not a hackathon, that’s an economy! The prize pools ballooned from pizza money to serious capital, attracting top-tier talent who realized this hackathon could launch my startup. As a result, projects coming out of DoraHacks were not just weekend hacks – they were venture-ready endeavors. The hackathon graduated from a science fair to a global startup launchpad.

From Toy Projects to Real Startups (Even Unicorns)

Here’s the most thrilling part: DoraHacks hackathons started producing not just apps, but companies. And some of them turned into unicorns (companies valued at $1B+). We saw earlier the rare cases of pre-2020 hackathon successes like Carousell (a simple idea at a 2012 hackathon that became a $1.1B valued marketplace [2]) or EasyTaxi (born in a hackathon, later raising $75M and spanning 30 countries [2]). DoraHacks turbocharged this phenomenon. By providing more time, support, and follow-up funding, DoraHacks-enabled hackathons became cradles of innovation where raw hacks matured into fully-fledged ventures. Take 1inch Network for example – a decentralized finance aggregator that started as a hackathon project in 2019. Sergej Kunz and Anton Bukov built a prototype at a hackathon and kept iterating. Fast forward: 1inch has now processed over $400 billion in trading volume [9] and became one of the leading platforms in DeFi. Or consider the winners of DoraHacks Web3 hackathons: many have gone on to raise multimillion-dollar rounds from top VCs. Hackathons became the front door to the startup world – the place where founders made their debut. A striking illustration was the Solana Season Hackathons: projects like STEPN, a move-to-earn app, won a hackathon track in late 2021 and shortly after grew into a sensation with a multi-billion dollar token economy [10]. These are not isolated anecdotes; they represent a trend DoraHacks set in motion. The platform’s hackathons produced a pipeline of fundable, high-impact startups. In effect, DoraHacks blurred the line between a hackathon and a seed-stage incubator. The playful hacker ethos remained, but now the outcomes were much more than bragging rights – they were companies with real users, revenue, and valuations. To paraphrase investor Chris Dixon, DoraHacks took those “toys” and helped nurture them into the next big things [5].

In driving this first evolution of the hackathon, DoraHacks didn’t just improve on an existing model – it created an entirely new innovation ecosystem. Hackathons became high-frequency, global, and consequential. What used to be a weekend thrill became a continuous pipeline for innovation. DoraHacks events started churning out hundreds of viable projects every year, many of which secured follow-on funding. The platform provided not just the event itself, but the after-care: community support, mentorship, and links to investors and grants (through initiatives like DoraHacks’ grant programs and quadratic funding rounds).

By 2024, the results spoke volumes. DoraHacks had grown into the world’s most important hackathon platform – the beating heart of a global hacker movement spanning blockchain, AI, and beyond. The numbers tell the story. Over nine years, DoraHacks supported 4,000+ projects in securing more than $30 million in funding [11]; by 2025, that figure skyrocketed as 21,000+ startups and developer teams received over $80 million via DoraHacks-supported hackathons and grants [12]. This is not hype – this is recorded history. According to CoinDesk, “DoraHacks has made its mark as a global hackathon organizer and one of the world’s most active multi-chain Web3 developer platforms” [11]. Major tech ecosystems took notice. Over 40 public blockchain networks (L1s and L2s) – from Solana to Polygon to Avalanche – partnered with DoraHacks to run their hackathons and open innovation programs [13]. Blockworks reported that DoraHacks became a “core partner” to dozens of Web3 ecosystems, providing them access to a global pool of developers [13]. In the eyes of investors, DoraHacks itself was key infrastructure: “DoraHacks is key to advancing the development of the infrastructure for Web3,” noted one VC backing the platform [13].

In short, by 2024 DoraHacks had transformed the hackathon from a niche event into a global innovation engine. It proved that hackathons at scale can consistently produce real, fundable innovation – not just one-off gimmicks. It connected hackers with resources and turned isolated hacks into an evergreen, worldwide developer movement. This was Hackathons 2.0: bigger, longer, borderless, and far more impactful than ever before.

One might reasonably ask: Can it get any better than this? DoraHacks had seemingly cracked the code to harness hacker energy for lasting innovation. But the team behind DoraHacks wasn’t done. In fact, they were about to unveil something even more radical – a catalyst to push hackathons into a new epoch entirely. If DoraHacks 1.0 was the evolution, what came next would be a revolution.

The Agentic Hackathon: BUIDL AI and the Second Revolution

In 2024, DoraHacks introduced BUIDL AI, and with it, the concept of the Agentic Hackathon. If hackathons at their inception were analog phones, and DoraHacks 1.0 made them smartphones, then BUIDL AI is like giving hackathons an AI co-pilot – a self-driving mode. It’s not merely an incremental improvement; it’s a second revolution. BUIDL AI infused hackathons with artificial intelligence, automation, and agency (hence “agentic”), fundamentally changing how these events are organized and experienced. We are now entering the Age of Agentic Innovation, where hackathons run with the assistance of AI agents can occur with unprecedented frequency, efficiency, and intelligence.

So, what exactly is an Agentic Hackathon? It’s a hackathon where AI-driven agents augment the entire process – from planning and judging to participant support – enabling a scale and speed of innovation that was impossible before. In an agentic hackathon, AI is the tireless co-organizer working alongside humans. Routine tasks that used to bog down organizers are now handled by intelligent algorithms. Imagine hackathons that practically run themselves, continuously, like an “always-on” tournament of ideas. With BUIDL AI, DoraHacks effectively created self-driving hackathons – autonomous, efficient, and capable of operating 24/7, across multiple domains, simultaneously. This isn’t science fiction; it’s happening now. Let’s break down how BUIDL AI works and why it 10x’d hackathon efficiency overnight:

AI-Powered Judging and Project Review – 10× Efficiency Boost

One of the most labor-intensive aspects of big hackathons is judging hundreds of project submissions. It can take organizers weeks of effort to sift the high-potential projects from the rest. BUIDL AI changes that. It comes with a BUIDL Review module – an AI-driven judging system that can intelligently evaluate hackathon projects on multiple dimensions (completeness, originality, relevance to the hackathon theme, etc.) and automatically filter out low-quality submissions [14]. It’s like having an army of expert reviewers available instantly. The result? What used to require hundreds of human-hours now happens in a flash. DoraHacks reports that AI-assisted review has improved hackathon organization efficiency by more than 10× [14]. Think about that: a process that might have taken a month of tedious work can be done in a few days or less, with AI ensuring consistency and fairness in scoring. Organizers can now handle massive hackathons without drowning in paperwork, and participants get quicker feedback. The AI doesn’t replace human judges entirely – final decisions still involve experts – but it augments them, doing the heavy lifting of initial evaluation. This means hackathons can accept more submissions, confident that AI will help triage them. No more cutting off sign-ups because “we can’t review them all.” The machine scale is here. In an agentic hackathon, no good project goes unseen due to bandwidth constraints – the AI makes sure of that.

Automated Marketing and Storytelling

Winning a hackathon is great, but if nobody hears about it, the impact is muted. Traditionally, after a hackathon ended, organizers would manually compile results, write blog posts, thank sponsors – tasks that, while important, take time and often get delayed. BUIDL AI changes this too. It features an Automated Marketing capability that can generate post-hackathon reports and content with a click [14]. Imagine an AI that observes the entire event (the projects submitted, the winners, the tech trends) and then writes a polished summary: highlighting the best ideas, profiling the winning teams, extracting insights (“60% of projects used AI in healthcare this hackathon”). BUIDL AI does exactly that – it automatically produces a hackathon “highlight reel” and summary report [14]. This not only saves organizers the headache of writing marketing copy, but it also amplifies the hackathon’s reach. Within hours of an event, a rich recap can be shared globally, showcasing the innovations and attracting attention to the teams. Sponsors and partners love this, as their investment gets publicized promptly. Participants love it because their work is immediately celebrated and visible. In essence, every hackathon tells a story, and BUIDL AI ensures that story spreads far and wide – instantly. This kind of automated storytelling turns each hackathon into ongoing content, fueling interest and momentum for the next events. It’s a virtuous cycle: hackathons create innovations, AI packages the narrative, that narrative draws in more innovators.

One-Click Launch and Multi-Hackathon Management

Perhaps the most liberating feature of BUIDL AI is how it obliterates the logistical hurdles of organizing hackathons. Before, setting up a hackathon was itself a project – coordinating registrations, judges, prizes, communications, all manually configured. DoraHacks’ BUIDL AI introduces a one-click hackathon launch tool [14]. Organizers simply input the basics (theme, prize pool, dates, some judging criteria) and the platform auto-generates the event page, submission portal, judging workflow, and more. It’s as easy as posting a blog. This dramatically lowers the barrier for communities and companies to host hackathons. A small startup or a university club can now launch a serious global hackathon without a dedicated team of event planners. Furthermore, BUIDL AI supports Multi-Hackathon Management, meaning one organization can run multiple hackathons in parallel with ease [14]. In the past, even tech giants struggled to overlap hackathons – it was too resource-intensive. Now, an ecosystem could run, say, a DeFi hackathon, an AI hackathon, and an IoT hackathon all at once, with a lean team, because AI is doing the juggling in the back-end. The launch of BUIDL AI made it feasible to organize 12 hackathons a year – or even several at the same time – something unimaginable before [14]. The platform handles participant onboarding, sends reminders, answers common queries via chatbots, and keeps everything on track. In essence, BUIDL AI turns hackathon hosting into a scalable service. Just as cloud computing platforms let you spin up servers on demand, DoraHacks lets you spin up innovation events on demand. This is a tectonic shift: hackathons can now happen as frequently as needed, not as occasionally as resources allow. We’re talking about the birth of perpetual hackathon culture. Hackathons are no longer rare spark events; they can be continuous flames, always burning, always on.

Real-Time Mentor and Agentic Assistance

The “agentic” part of Agentic Hackathons isn’t only behind the scenes. It also touches the participant experience. With AI integration, hackers get smarter tools and support. For instance, BUIDL AI can include AI assistants that answer developers’ questions during the event (“How do I use this API?” or “Any example code for this algorithm?”), acting like on-demand mentors. It can match teams with potential collaborators or suggest resources. Essentially, every hacker has an AI helper at their side, reducing frustration and accelerating progress. Coding issues that might take hours to debug can be resolved in minutes with an AI pair programmer. This means project quality goes up and participants learn more. It’s as if each team has an extra member – an tireless, all-knowing one. This agentic assistance embodies the vision that “everyone is a hacker” [14] – because AI tools enable even less-experienced participants to build something impressive. The popularization of AI has automated repetitive grunt work and amplified what small teams can achieve [14], so the innovation potential of hackathons is far greater than before [14]. In an agentic hackathon, a team of two people with AI assistants can accomplish what a team of five might have in years past. The playing field is leveled and the creative ceiling is raised.

What do all these advances add up to? Simply this: Hackathons have evolved from occasional bouts of inspiration into a continuous, AI-optimized process of innovation. We have gone from Hackathons 2.0 to Hackathons 3.0 – hackathons that are autonomous, persistent, and intelligent. It’s a paradigm shift. The hackathon is no longer an event you attend; it’s becoming an environment you live in. With BUIDL AI, DoraHacks envisions a world where “Hackathons will enter an unprecedented era of automation and intelligence, allowing more hackers, developers, and open-source communities around the world to easily initiate and participate” [14]. Innovation can happen anytime, anywhere – because the infrastructure to support it runs 24/7 in the cloud, powered by AI. The hackathon has become an agentic platform, always ready to transform ideas into reality.

Crucially, this isn’t limited to blockchain or any single field. BUIDL AI is general-purpose. It is as relevant for an AI-focused hackathon as for a climate-tech or healthcare hackathon. Any domain can plug into this agentic hackathon platform and reap the benefits of higher frequency and efficiency. This heralds a future where hackathons become the default mode for problem-solving. Instead of committees and R&D departments working in silos, companies and communities can throw problems into the hackathon arena – an arena that is always active. It’s like having a global innovation engine humming in the background, ready to tackle challenges at a moment’s notice.

To put it vividly: If DoraHacks 1.0 turned hackathons into a high-speed car, DoraHacks 2.0 with BUIDL AI made it a self-driving car with the pedal to the metal. The roadblocks of cost, complexity, and time – gone. Now, any organization can accelerate from 0 to 60 on the innovation highway without a pit stop. Hackathons can be as frequent as blog updates, as integrated into operations as sprint demos. Innovation on demand, at scale – that’s the power of the Agentic Hackathon.

Innovation On-Demand: How Agentic Hackathons Benefit Everyone

The advent of agentic hackathons isn’t just a cool new toy for the tech community – it’s a transformative tool for businesses, developers, and entire industries. We’re entering an era where anyone with a vision can harness hackathons-as-a-service to drive innovation. Here’s how different players stand to gain from this revolution:

AI Companies – Turbocharging Ecosystem Growth

For AI-focused companies (think OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Stability AI and the like), hackathons are goldmines of creative uses for their technology. Now, with agentic hackathons, an AI company can essentially run a continuous developer conference for their platform. For example, OpenAI can host always-on hackathons for building applications with GPT-4 or DALL-E. This means thousands of developers constantly experimenting and showcasing what the AI can do – effectively crowdsourcing innovation and killer apps for the AI platform. The benefit? It dramatically expands the company’s ecosystem and user base. New use cases emerge that the company’s own team might never have imagined. (It was independent hackers who first showed how GPT-3 could draft legal contracts or generate game levels – insights that came from hackathons and community contests.) With BUIDL AI, an AI company could spin up monthly hackathons with one click, each focusing on a different aspect (one month NLP, next month robotics, etc.). This is a marketing and R&D force multiplier. Instead of traditional, expensive developer evangelism tours, the AI does the heavy lifting to engage devs globally. The company’s product gets improved and promoted at the same time. In essence, every AI company can now launch a Hackathon League to promote their APIs/models. It’s no coincidence Coinbase just hosted its first AI hackathon to bridge crypto and AI [15] – they know that to seed adoption of a new paradigm, hackathons are the way. Expect every AI platform to do the same: continuous hackathons to educate developers, generate content (demos, tutorials), and identify standout talent to hire or fund. It’s community-building on steroids.

L1s/L2s and Tech Platforms – Discovering the Next Unicorns

For blockchain Layer1/Layer2 ecosystems, or any tech platform (cloud providers, VR platforms, etc.), hackathons are the new deal flow. In the Web3 world, it’s widely recognized that many of the best projects and protocols are born in hackathons. We saw how 1inch started as a hackathon project and became a DeFi unicorn [9]. There’s also Polygon (which aggressively runs hackathons to find novel dApps for its chain) and Filecoin (which used hackathons to surface storage applications). By using DoraHacks and BUIDL AI, these platforms can now run high-frequency hackathons to continuously source innovation. Instead of one or two big events a year, they can have a rolling program – a quarterly hackathon series or even simultaneous global challenges – to keep developers building all the time. The ROI is huge: the cost of running a hackathon (even with decent prizes) is trivial compared to acquiring a thriving new startup or protocol for your ecosystem. Hackathons effectively outsource initial R&D to passionate outsiders, and the best ideas bubble up. Solana’s hackathons led to star projects like Phantom and Solend gaining traction in its ecosystem. Facebook’s internal hackathons gave birth to features that kept the platform dominant [1]. Now any platform can do this externally: use hackathons as a radar for talent and innovation. Thanks to BUIDL AI, a Layer-2 blockchain, even if its core team is small, can manage a dozen parallel bounties and hackathons – one focusing on DeFi, one on NFTs, one on gaming, etc. The AI will help review submissions and manage community questions, so the platform’s devrel team doesn’t burn out. The result is an innovation pipeline feeding the platform’s growth. The next unicorn startup or killer app is identified early and supported. In effect, hackathons become the new startup funnel for VCs and ecosystems. We can expect venture investors to lurk in these agentic hackathons because that’s where the action is – the garages of the future are now cloud hackathon rooms. As Paul Graham wrote, “hackers and painters are both makers” [16], and these makers will paint the future of technology on the canvas of hackathon platforms.

Every Company and Community – Innovation as a Continuous Process

Perhaps the most profound impact of BUIDL AI is that it opens up hackathons to every organization, not just tech companies. Any company that wants to foster innovation – be it a bank exploring fintech, a hospital network seeking healthtech solutions, or a government looking for civic tech ideas – can leverage agentic hackathons. Innovation is no longer a privilege of the giant tech firms; it’s a cloud service accessible to all. For example, a city government could host a year-round hackathon for smart city solutions, where local developers continuously propose and build projects to improve urban life. The BUIDL AI platform could manage different “tracks” for transportation, energy, public safety, etc., with monthly rewards for top ideas. This would engage the community and yield a constant stream of pilot projects, far more dynamically than traditional RFP processes. Likewise, any Fortune 500 company that fears disruption (and who doesn’t?) can use hackathons to disrupt itself positively – inviting outsiders and employees to hack on the company’s own challenges. With the agentic model, even non-technical companies can do this without a hitch; the AI will guide the process, ensuring things run smoothly. Imagine hackathons as part of every corporate strategy department’s toolkit – continuously prototyping the future. As Marc Andreessen famously said, “software is eating the world” – and now every company can have a seat at the table by hosting hackathons to software-ize their business problems. This could democratize innovation across industries. The barrier to trying out bold ideas is so low (a weekend of a hackathon vs. months of corporate planning) that more wild, potentially disruptive ideas will surface from within companies. And with the global reach of DoraHacks, they can bring in external innovators too. Why shouldn’t a retail company crowdsource AR shopping ideas from global hackers? Why shouldn’t a pharma company run bioinformatics hackathons to find new ways to analyze data? There is no reason not to – the agentic hackathon makes it feasible and attractive. Hackathon-as-a-service is the new innovation department. Use it or risk being out-innovated by those who do.

All these benefits boil down to a simple but profound shift: hackathons are becoming a permanent feature of the innovation landscape, rather than a novelty. They are turning into an always-available resource, much like cloud computing or broadband internet. Need fresh ideas or prototypes? Spin up a hackathon and let the global talent pool tackle it. Want to engage your developer community? Launch a themed hackathon and give them a stage. Want to test out 10 different approaches to a problem? Run a hackathon and see what rises to the top. We’re effectively seeing the realization of what one might call the Innovation Commons – a space where problems and ideas are continuously matched, and solutions are rapidly iterated. And AI is the enabler that keeps this commons humming efficiently, without exhausting the human facilitators.

It’s striking how this addresses the classic pitfalls identified in hackathon critiques: sustainability and follow-through. In the agentic model, hackathons are no longer isolated bursts. They can connect to each other (winning teams from one hackathon can enter an accelerator or another hackathon next month). BUIDL AI can track teams and help link them with funding opportunities, closing the loop that used to leave projects orphaned after the event. A great project doesn’t die on Sunday night; it’s funneled into the next stage automatically (perhaps an AI even suggests which grant to apply for, which partner to talk to). This way, innovations have a life beyond the demo day, systematically.

We should also recognize a more philosophical benefit: the culture of innovation becomes more experimental, meritocratic, and fast-paced. In a world of agentic hackathons, the motto is “Why not prototype it? Why not try it now?” – because spinning up the environment to do so is quick and cheap. This mindset can permeate organizations and communities, making them more agile and bold. The cost of failure is low (a few weeks of effort), and the potential upside is enormous (finding the next big breakthrough). It creates a safe sandbox for disruptive ideas – addressing the Innovator’s Dilemma by structurally giving space to those ‘toy’ ideas to prove themselves [5]. Companies no longer have to choose between core business and experimentation; they can allocate a continuous hackathon track to the latter. In effect, DoraHacks and BUIDL AI have built an innovation factory – one that any visionary leader can rent for the weekend (or the whole year).

From Like Button to Liftoff: Hackathons as the Cradle of Innovation

To truly appreciate this new era, it’s worth reflecting on how many game-changing innovations started as hackathon projects or hackathon-like experiments – often despite the old constraints – and how much more we can expect when those constraints are removed. History is full of examples that validate the hackathon model of innovation:

Facebook’s DNA was shaped by hackathons

Mark Zuckerberg himself has credited the company’s internal hackathons for some of Facebook’s most important features. The Like button, Facebook Chat, and Timeline all famously emerged from engineers pulling all-nighters at hackathons [1]. An intern’s hackathon prototype for tagging people in comments was shipped to a billion users just two weeks later [1]. Facebook’s ethos “Move fast and break things” was practically the hackathon ethos formalized. It is no stretch to say Facebook won over MySpace in the 2000s because its culture of rapid innovation (fueled by hackathons) let it out-innovate its rival [1]. If hackathons did that within one company, imagine a worldwide network of hackathons – the pace of innovation everywhere could resemble that hypergrowth.

Google and the 20% Project

Google has long encouraged employees to spend 20% of time on side projects, which is a cousin of the hackathon idea – unstructured exploration. Gmail and Google News were born this way. Additionally, Google has hosted public hackathons around its APIs (like Android hackathons) that spurred the creation of countless apps. The point is, Google institutionalized hacker-style experimentation and reaped huge rewards. With agentic hackathons, even companies without Google’s resources can institutionalize experimentation. Every weekend can be a 20% time for the world’s devs using these platforms.

Open Source Movements

Open Source Movements have benefitted from hackathons (“code sprints”) to develop critical software. The entire OpenBSD operating system had regular hackathons that were essential to its development [3]. In more recent times, projects like Node.js or TensorFlow have organized hackathons to build libraries and tools. The result: stronger ecosystems and engaged contributors. DoraHacks embraces this, positioning itself as “the leading global hackathon community and open source developer incentive platform” [17]. The synergy of open source and hackathons (both decentralized, community-driven, merit-based) is a powerful engine. We can foresee open source projects launching always-on hackathons via BUIDL AI to continuously fix bugs, add features, and reward contributors. This could rejuvenate the open source world by providing incentives (through hackathon prizes) and recognition in a structured way.

The Startup World

The Startup World has hackathons to thank for many startups. We’ve mentioned Carousell (from a Startup Weekend hackathon, now valued over $1B [2]) and EasyTaxi (Startup Weekend Rio, went on to raise $75M [2]). Add to that list Zapier (integrations startup, conceived at a hackathon), GroupMe (acquired by Skype as noted), Instacart (an early version won a hackathon at Y Combinator Demo Day, legend has it), and numerous crypto startups (the founders of Ethereum itself met and collaborated through hackathons and Bitcoin meetups!). When Coinbase wants to find the next big thing in on-chain AI, they host a hackathon [15]. When Stripe wanted more apps on its payments platform, it ran hackathons and distributed bounties. This model just works. It identifies passionate builders and gives them a springboard. With agentic hackathons, that springboard is super-sized. It’s always there, and it can catch far more people. The funnel widens, so expect even more startups to originate from hackathons. It’s quite plausible that the biggest company of the 2030s won’t be founded in a garage – it will be born out of an online hackathon, formed by a team that met in a Discord server, guided by an AI facilitator, and funded within weeks on a platform like DoraHacks. In other words, the garage is going global and AI-powered.

Hackers & Painters – The Creative Connection

Paul Graham, in Hackers & Painters, drew an analogy between hacking and painting as creative endeavors [16]. Hackathons are where that creative energy concentrates and explodes. Many great programmers will tell you their most inspired work happened in a hackathon or skunkworks setting – free of bureaucratic restraints, in a flow state of creation. By scaling and multiplying hackathons, we are effectively amplifying the global creative capacity. We might recall the Renaissance when artists and inventors thrived under patronage and in gatherings – hackathons are the modern Renaissance workshops. They combine art, science, and enterprise. The likes of Leonardo da Vinci would have been right at home in a hackathon (he was notorious for prototyping like a madman). In fact, consider how hackathons embody the solution to the Innovator’s Dilemma: they encourage working on projects that seem small or “not worth it” to incumbents, which is exactly where disruptive innovation often hides [5]. By institutionalizing hackathons, DoraHacks is institutionalizing disruption – making sure the next Netflix or Airbnb isn’t missed because someone shrugged it off as a toy.

We’ve gone from a time when hackathons were rare and local to a time when they are global and constant. This is a pivotal change in the innovation infrastructure of the world. In the 19th century, we built railroads and telegraphs that accelerated the Industrial Revolution, connecting markets and minds. In the 20th century, we built the internet and the World Wide Web, unleashing the Information Revolution. Now, in the 21st century, DoraHacks and BUIDL AI are building the “Innovation Highway” – a persistent, AI-enabled network connecting problem-solvers to problems, talent to opportunities, capital to ideas, across the entire globe, in real time. It’s an infrastructure for innovation itself.

A Grand Vision: The New Infrastructure of Global Innovation

We stand at an inflection point. With DoraHacks and the advent of agentic hackathons, innovation is no longer confined to ivory labs, Silicon Valley offices, or once-a-year events. It is becoming a continuous global activity – an arena where the best minds and the boldest ideas meet, anytime, anywhere. This is a future where innovation is as ubiquitous as Wi-Fi and as relentless as Moore’s Law. It’s a future DoraHacks is actively building, and the implications are profound.

Picture a world a few years from now, where DoraHacks+BUIDL AI is the default backbone for innovation programs across industries. This platform is buzzing 24/7 with hackathons on everything from AI-driven healthcare to climate-change mitigation to new frontiers of art and entertainment. It’s not just for coders – designers, entrepreneurs, scientists, anyone with creative impulse plugs into this network. An entrepreneur in London has a business idea at 2 AM; by 2:15 AM, she’s on DoraHacks launching a 48-hour hackathon to prototype it, with AI coordinating a team of collaborators from four different continents. Sounds crazy? It will be commonplace. A government in Asia faces a sudden environmental crisis; they host an urgent hackathon via BUIDL AI and within days have dozens of actionable tech solutions from around the world. A venture fund in New York essentially “outsources” part of its research to the hackathon cloud – instead of merely requesting pitch decks, they sponsor open hackathons to see real prototypes first. This is agentic innovation in action – fast, borderless, and intelligent.

In this coming era, DoraHacks will be as fundamental to innovation as GitHub is to code or as AWS is to startups. It’s the platform where innovation lives. One might even call it the “GitHub of Innovation” – a social and technical layer where projects are born, not just stored. Already, DoraHacks calls itself “the global hacker movement” [17], and with BUIDL AI it becomes the autopilot of that movement. It’s fitting to think of it as part of the global public infrastructure for innovation. Just as highways move goods and the internet moves information, DoraHacks moves innovation itself – carrying ideas from inception to implementation at high speed.

When history looks back at the 2020s, the arrival of continuous, AI-driven hackathons will be seen as a key development in how humanity innovates. The vision is grand, but very tangible: Innovation becomes an everlasting hackathon. Think of it – the hacker ethos spreading into every corner of society, an eternal challenge to the status quo, constantly asking “How can we improve this? How can we reinvent that?” and immediately rallying the talent to do it. This is not chaos; it’s a new form of organized, decentralized R&D. It’s a world where any bold question – “Can we cure this disease? Can we educate children better? Can we make cities sustainable?” – can trigger a global hackathon and yield answers in days or weeks, not years. A world where innovation isn’t a scarce resource, jealously guarded by few, but a common good, an open tournament where the best solution wins, whether it comes from a Stanford PhD or a self-taught coder in Lagos.

If this sounds idealistic, consider how far we’ve come: Hackathons went from obscure coder meetups to the engine behind billion-dollar businesses and critical global tech (Bitcoin itself is a product of hacker culture!). With DoraHacks’s growth and BUIDL AI’s leap, the trajectory is set for hackathons to become continuous and ubiquitous. The technology and model are in place. It’s now about execution and adoption. And the trend is already accelerating – more companies are embracing open innovation, more developers are working remotely and participating in online communities, and AI is rapidly advancing as a co-pilot in all creative endeavors.

DoraHacks finds itself at the center of this transformation. It has the first-mover advantage, the community, and the vision. The company’s ethos is telling: “Funding the everlasting hacker movement” is one of their slogans [18]. They see hackathons as not just events but a movement that must be everlasting – a permanent revolution of the mind. With BUIDL AI, DoraHacks is providing the engine to make it everlasting. This hints at a future where DoraHacks+BUIDL AI is part of the critical infrastructure of global innovation, akin to a utility. It’s the innovation grid, and when you plug into it, magic happens.

Marc Andreessen’s writings often speak about “building a better future” with almost manifest destiny fervor. In that spirit, one can boldly assert: Agentic hackathons will build our future, faster and better. They will accelerate solutions to humanity’s toughest challenges by tapping a broader talent pool and iterating faster than ever. They will empower individuals – giving every creative mind on the planet the tools, community, and opportunity to make a real impact, immediately, not someday. This is deeply democratizing. It resonates with the ethos of the early internet – permissionless innovation. DoraHacks is bringing that ethos to structured innovation events and stretching them into an ongoing fabric.

In conclusion, we are witnessing a paradigm shift: Hackathons reinvented, innovation unchained. The limitations of the old model are gone, replaced by a new paradigm where hackathons are high-frequency, AI-augmented, and outcome-oriented. DoraHacks led this charge in the 2020–2024 period, and with BUIDL AI, it’s launching the next chapter – the Age of Agentic Innovation. For investors and visionaries, this is a call to action. We often talk about investing in “infrastructure” – well, this is investing in the infrastructure of innovation itself. Backing DoraHacks and its mission is akin to backing the builders of a transcontinental railroad or an interstate highway, except this time the cargo is ideas and breakthroughs. The network effects are enormous: every additional hackathon and participant adds value to the whole ecosystem, in a compounding way. It’s a positive-sum game of innovation. And DoraHacks is poised to be the platform and the community that captures and delivers that value globally.

DoraHacks reinvented hackathons – it turned hackathons from sporadic stunts into a sustained methodology for innovation. In doing so, it has thrown open the gates to an era where innovation can be agentic: self-driving, self-organizing, and ceaseless. We are at the dawn of this new age. It’s an age where, indeed, “he who has the developers has the world” [14] – and DoraHacks is making sure that every developer, every hacker, every dreamer anywhere can contribute to shaping our collective future. The grand vista ahead is one of continuous invention and discovery, powered by a global hive mind of hackers and guided by AI. DoraHacks and BUIDL AI stand at the helm of this movement, as the architects of the “innovation rails” on which we’ll ride. It’s not just a platform, it’s a revolutionary infrastructure – the new railroad, the new highway system for ideas. Buckle up, because with DoraHacks driving, the age of agentic innovation has arrived, and the future is hurtling toward us at hackathon speed. The hackathon never ends – and that is how we will invent a better world.

References

[1] Vocoli. (2015). Facebook’s Secret Sauce: The Hackathon. https://www.vocoli.com/blog/june-2015/facebook-s-secret-sauce-the-hackathon/
[2] Analytics India Magazine. (2023). Borne Out Of Hackathons. https://analyticsindiamag.com/ai-trends/borne-out-of-hackathons/
[3] Wikipedia. (n.d.). Hackathon: Origin and History. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackathon#Origin_and_history
[4] LinkedIn. (2024). This year marked my third annual participation in Microsoft’s Global…. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/clare-ashforth_this-year-marked-my-third-annual-participation-activity-7247636808119775233-yev-
[5] Glasp. (n.d.). Chris Dixon’s Quotes. https://glasp.co/quotes/chris-dixon
[6] ODaily. (2024). Naija HackAtom Hackathon Recap. https://www.odaily.news/en/post/5203212
[7] Solana. (2021). Meet the winners of the Riptide hackathon - Solana. https://solana.com/news/riptide-hackathon-winners-solana
[8] DoraHacks. (n.d.). BNB Grant DAO - DoraHacks. https://dorahacks.io/bnb
[9] Cointelegraph. (2021). From Hackathon Project to DeFi Powerhouse: AMA with 1inch Network. https://cointelegraph.com/news/from-hackathon-project-to-defi-powerhouse-ama-with-1inch-network
[10] Gemini. (2022). How Does STEPN Work? GST and GMT Token Rewards. https://www.gemini.com/cryptopedia/stepn-nft-sneakers-gmt-token-gst-crypto-move-to-earn-m2e
[11] CoinDesk. (2022). Inside DoraHacks: The Open Source Bazaar Empowering Web3 Innovations. https://www.coindesk.com/sponsored-content/inside-dorahacks-the-open-source-bazaar-empowering-web3-innovations
[12] LinkedIn. (n.d.). DoraHacks. https://www.linkedin.com/company/dorahacks
[13] Blockworks. (2022). Web3 Hackathon Incubator DoraHacks Nabs $20M From FTX, Liberty City. https://blockworks.co/news/web3-hackathon-incubator-dorahacks-nabs-20m-from-ftx-liberty-city
[14] Followin. (2024). BUIDL AI: The future of Hackathon, a new engine for global open source technology. https://followin.io/en/feed/16892627
[15] Coinbase. (2024). Coinbase Hosts Its First AI Hackathon: Bringing the San Francisco Developer Community Onchain. https://www.coinbase.com/developer-platform/discover/launches/Coinbase-AI-hackathon
[16] Graham, P. (2004). Hackers & Painters. https://ics.uci.edu/~pattis/common/handouts/hackerspainters.pdf
[17] Himalayas. (n.d.). DoraHacks hiring Research Engineer – BUIDL AI. https://himalayas.app/companies/dorahacks/jobs/research-engineer-buidl-ai
[18] X. (n.d.). DoraHacks. https://x.com/dorahacks?lang=en

@ 3f770d65:7a745b24

At the recent Launch Music Festival and Conference in Lancaster, PA, featuring over 120 musicians across three days, I volunteered my time with Tunestr and Phantom Power Music's initiative to introduce artists to Bitcoin, Nostr, and the value-for-value model. Tunestr sponsored a stage, live-streaming 21 bands to platforms like Tunestr.io, Fountain.fm and other Nostr/Podcasting 2.0 apps and on-boarding as many others as possible at our conference booth. You may have seen me spamming about this over the last few days.

V4V Earnings

Day 1: 180,000 sats

Day 2: 300,000 sats

Day 3: Over 500,000 sats

Who?

Here are the artists that were on-boarded to Fountain and were live streaming on the Value-for-Value stage:

nostr:npub1cruu4z0hwg7n3r2k7262vx8jsmra3xpku85frl5fnfvrwz7rd7mq7e403w nostr:npub12xeh3n7w8700z4tpd6xlhlvg4vtg4pvpxd584ll5sva539tutc3q0tn3tz nostr:npub1rc80p4v60uzfhvdgxemhvcqnzdj7t59xujxdy0lcjxml3uwdezyqtrpe0j @npub16vxr4pc2ww3yaez9q4s53zkejjfd0djs9lfe55sjhnqkh nostr:npub10uspdzg4fl7md95mqnjszxx82ckdly8ezac0t3s06a0gsf4f3lys8ypeak nostr:npub1gnyzexr40qut0za2c4a0x27p4e3qc22wekhcw3uvdx8mwa3pen0s9z90wk nostr:npub13qrrw2h4z52m7jh0spefrwtysl4psfkfv6j4j672se5hkhvtyw7qu0almy nostr:npub1p0kuqxxw2mxczc90vcurvfq7ljuw2394kkqk6gqnn2cq0y9eq5nq87jtkk nostr:npub182kq0sdp7chm67uq58cf4vvl3lk37z8mm5k5067xe09fqqaaxjsqlcazej nostr:npub162hr8kd96vxlanvggl08hmyy37qsn8ehgj7za7squl83um56epnswkr399 nostr:npub17jzk5ex2rafres09c4dnn5mm00eejye6nrurnlla6yn22zcpl7vqg6vhvx nostr:npub176rnksulheuanfx8y8cr2mrth4lh33svvpztggjjm6j2pqw6m56sq7s9vz nostr:npub1akv7t7xpalhsc4nseljs0c886jzuhq8u42qdcwvu972f3mme9tjsgp5xxk nostr:npub18x0gv872489lrczp9d9m4hx59r754x7p9rg2jkgvt7ul3kuqewtqsssn24

Many more musicians were on-boarded to Fountain, however, we were unable to obtain all of their npubs.

THANK YOU TO ALL ZAPPERS AND BOOSTERS!

Musicians “Get It”

My key takeaway was the musicians' absolute understanding that the current digital landscape along with legacy social media is failing them. Every artist I spoke with recognized how algorithms hinder fan connection and how gatekeepers prevent fair compensation for their work. They all use Spotify, but they only do so out of necessity. They felt the music industry is primed for both a social and monetary revolution. Some of them were even speaking my language…

Because of this, concepts like decentralization, censorship resistance, owning your content, and controlling your social graph weren't just understood by them, they were instantly embraced. The excitement was real; they immediately saw the potential and agreed with me. Bitcoin and Nostr felt genuinely punk rock and that helped a lot of them identify with what we were offering them.

The Tools and the Issues

While the Nostr ecosystem offers a wide variety of tools, we focused on introducing three key applications at this event to keep things clear for newcomers:

1. Fountain, with a music focus, was the primary tool for onboarding attendees onto Nostr. Fountain was also chosen thanks to Fountain’s built-in Lightning wallet.
2. Primal, as a social alternative, was demonstrated to show how users can take their Nostr identity and content seamlessly between different applications.
3. Tunestr.io, lastly was showcased for its live video streaming capabilities.

Although we highlighted these three, we did inform attendees about the broader range of available apps and pointed them to nostrapps.com if they wanted to explore further, aiming to educate without overwhelming them.

This review highlights several UX issues with the Fountain app, particularly concerning profile updates, wallet functionality, and user discovery. While Fountain does work well, these minor hiccups make it extremely hard for on-boarding and education.

• Profile Issues:
• When a user edits their profile (e.g., Username/Nostr address, Lightning address) either during or after creation, the changes don't appear to consistently update across the app or sync correctly with Nostr relays.
• Specifically, the main profile display continues to show the old default Username/Nostr address and Lightning address inside Fountain and on other Nostr clients.
• However, the updated Username/Nostr address does appear on https://fountain.fm (chosen-username@fountain.fm) and is visible within the "Edit Profile" screen itself in the app.
• This inconsistency is confusing for users, as they see their updated information in some places but not on their main public-facing profile within the app. I confirmed this by observing a new user sign up and edit their username – the edit screen showed the new name, but the profile display in Fountain did not update and we did not see it inside Primal, Damus, Amethyst, etc.
• Wallet Limitations:
• The app's built-in wallet cannot scan Lightning address QR codes to initiate payments.
• This caused problems during the event where users imported Bitcoin from Azte.co vouchers into their Fountain wallets. When they tried to Zap a band by scanning a QR code on the live tally board, Fountain displayed an error message stating the invoice or QR code was invalid.
• While suggesting musicians install Primal as a second Nostr app was a potential fix for the QR code issue, (and I mentioned it to some), the burden of onboarding users onto two separate applications, potentially managing two different wallets, and explaining which one works for specific tasks creates a confusing and frustrating user experience.
• Search Difficulties:
• Finding other users within the Fountain app is challenging. I was unable to find profiles from brand new users by entering their chosen Fountain username.
• To find a new user, I had to resort to visiting their profile on the web (fountain.fm/username) to retrieve their npub. Then, open Primal and follow them. Finally, when searching for their username, since I was now following them, I was able to find their profile.
• This search issue is compounded by the profile syncing problem mentioned earlier, as even if found via other clients, their displayed information is outdated.
• Searching for the event to Boost/Zap inside Fountain was harder than it should have been the first two days as the live stream did not appear at the top of the screen inside the tap. This was resolved on the third day of the event.

Improving the Onboarding Experience

To better support user growth, educators and on-boarders need more feature complete and user-friendly applications. I love our developers and I will always sing their praises from the highest mountain tops, however I also recognize that the current tools present challenges that hinder a smooth onboarding experience.

One potential approach explored was guiding users to use Primal (including its built-in wallet) in conjunction with Wavlake via Nostr Wallet Connect (NWC). While this could facilitate certain functions like music streaming, zaps, and QR code scanning (which require both Primal and Wavlake apps), Wavlake itself has usability issues. These include inconsistent or separate profiles between web and mobile apps, persistent "Login" buttons even when logged in on the mobile app with a Nostr identity, and the minor inconvenience of needing two separate applications. Although NWC setup is relatively easy and helps streamline the process, the need to switch between apps adds complexity, especially when time is limited and we’re aiming to showcase the benefits of this new system.

Ultimately, we need applications that are more feature-complete and intuitive for mainstream users to improve the onboarding experience significantly.

Looking forward to the future

I anticipate that most of these issues will be resolved when these applications address them in the near future. Specifically, this would involve Fountain fixing its profile issues and integrating Nostr Wallet Connect (NWC) to allow users to utilize their Primal wallet, or by enabling the scanning of QR codes that pay out to Lightning addresses. Alternatively, if Wavlake resolves the consistency problems mentioned earlier, this would also significantly improve the situation giving us two viable solutions for musicians.

My ideal onboarding event experience would involve having all the previously mentioned issues resolved. Additionally, I would love to see every attendee receive a $5 or $10 voucher to help them start engaging with value-for-value, rather than just the limited number we distributed recently. The goal is to have everyone actively zapping and sending Bitcoin throughout the event. Maybe we can find a large sponsor to facilitate this in the future?

What's particularly exciting is the Launch conference's strong interest in integrating value-for-value across their entire program for all musicians and speakers at their next event in Dallas, Texas, coming later this fall. This presents a significant opportunity to onboard over 100+ musicians to Bitcoin and Nostr, which in turn will help onboard their fans and supporters.

We need significantly more zaps and more zappers! It's unreasonable to expect the same dedicated individuals to continuously support new users; they are being bled dry. A shift is needed towards more people using bitcoin for everyday transactions, treating it as money. This brings me back to my ideal onboarding experience: securing a sponsor to essentially give participants bitcoin funds specifically for zapping and tipping artists. This method serves as a practical lesson in using bitcoin as money and showcases the value-for-value principle from the outset.

@ 04c915da:3dfbecc9

One of the most common criticisms leveled against nostr is the perceived lack of assurance when it comes to data storage. Critics argue that without a centralized authority guaranteeing that all data is preserved, important information will be lost. They also claim that running a relay will become prohibitively expensive. While there is truth to these concerns, they miss the mark. The genius of nostr lies in its flexibility, resilience, and the way it harnesses human incentives to ensure data availability in practice.

A nostr relay is simply a server that holds cryptographically verifiable signed data and makes it available to others. Relays are simple, flexible, open, and require no permission to run. Critics are right that operating a relay attempting to store all nostr data will be costly. What they miss is that most will not run all encompassing archive relays. Nostr does not rely on massive archive relays. Instead, anyone can run a relay and choose to store whatever subset of data they want. This keeps costs low and operations flexible, making relay operation accessible to all sorts of individuals and entities with varying use cases.

Critics are correct that there is no ironclad guarantee that every piece of data will always be available. Unlike bitcoin where data permanence is baked into the system at a steep cost, nostr does not promise that every random note or meme will be preserved forever. That said, in practice, any data perceived as valuable by someone will likely be stored and distributed by multiple entities. If something matters to someone, they will keep a signed copy.

Nostr is the Streisand Effect in protocol form. The Streisand effect is when an attempt to suppress information backfires, causing it to spread even further. With nostr, anyone can broadcast signed data, anyone can store it, and anyone can distribute it. Try to censor something important? Good luck. The moment it catches attention, it will be stored on relays across the globe, copied, and shared by those who find it worth keeping. Data deemed important will be replicated across servers by individuals acting in their own interest.

Nostr’s distributed nature ensures that the system does not rely on a single point of failure or a corporate overlord. Instead, it leans on the collective will of its users. The result is a network where costs stay manageable, participation is open to all, and valuable verifiable data is stored and distributed forever.

@ 8d34bd24:414be32b

I started working on this post a couple weeks ago, and out of pure accident, it became my Resurrection Sunday (Easter) post. Maybe it was by God’s design. On Resurrection Sunday, Jesus was raised from the grave. Forty days later he rose to heaven before many witnesses. Someday in the future, the dead in Christ will be raised from the dead, and all believers will be snatched up to heaven. Maybe this is this right post for Resurrection Sunday.

For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. … For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. (1 Thessalonians 4:14, 16-17) {emphasis mine}

---

It always amazes me that some Christians don’t believe in the rapture of the church. I understand how there can be a disagreement about exactly when the rapture is to occur, but I can’t comprehend how some Christians don’t believe the rapture is coming or that they believe that the rapture happened in the first century.

Let’s start with the three key verses on the subject and then we’ll get into more details.

Key Rapture Verses

I didn’t notice that this first passage referred to the rapture until it was pointed out to me. I was so focused on Jesus preparing a place, that I missed the key sentence.

“Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also. (John 14:1-3) {emphasis mine}

Jesus, after His resurrection and as promised in these verses, rose up to heaven to go prepare a place for believers. He will then return to bring believers to Himself. This whole idea would have been particularly clear for the Jews when it was written. When a bride and groom were engaged (a legal contract where they were considered married), the groom would go and prepare a place for them to live. It could be an extra room in his parent’s home or it could be a whole new home. The bride didn’t know when the groom would return to take her to himself to become man and wife. In the same way, Jesus has gone away to prepare a place for us and will return at a time we do not know. Just as the Jewish bride had to be ready to leave with her groom when he suddenly arrived, we also must be ready for Jesus’s return when He will snatch us from earth and take us home with Him to heaven.

But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18) {emphasis mine}

The Bible has a wonderful euphemism for the death of believers. It speaks of them falling asleep because death is not the end for believers. It is just a pause, a separation of body and spirit, before we are raptured to Jesus, to meet Him in the sky, where we will receive a new resurrection body, just as Jesus received when He was raised from the dead 3 days after His crucifixion. Both the dead in Christ and the alive in Christ will “be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.” God gives us this promise in the Bible to comfort us. It gives us comfort that death is not the end and we will see our fellow believers again in heaven one day. It also gives us comfort that we will not have to experience God’s wrath. “For God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Thessalonians 5:9)

What else can we learn about the rapture?

Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. But when this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Corinthians 15:50-57) {emphasis mine}

The rapture will be an instantaneous change from our perishable bodies to imperishable, whether we are alive in Christ or dead in Christ. At the rapture we “will be raised imperishable.” I am very excited to be snatched up into the air, receive a new, eternal body, and meet Jesus face-to-face.

There is one more passage that I believe talks of the rapture that is a bit more subtle from Isaiah.

The righteous man perishes, and no man takes it to heart;\ And devout men are taken away, while no one understands.\ For the righteous man is taken away from evil,\ **He enters into peace;\ They rest in their beds,\ Each one who walked in his upright way. (Isaiah 57:1-2) {emphasis mine}

The seven year Tribulation is the wrath of God poured out on those who rejected Him and the merciful, last chance warning before eternal judgement. Those who have trusted in Jesus (the devout men, the righteous man) will be “taken away from evil” and will “enter into peace.” Instead of experiencing God’s wrath, they will experience His peace. Instead of experience horror, they will “rest in their beds.”

The Seven Raptures Before the Rapture of the Church

How can we know that we will be raptured to heaven to be with Jesus forever? One way is because people have been raptured before (in different ways)

I am borrowing the organization of this section from Chapter 9 of “The End: Everything You’ll Want to Know about the Apocalypse” by Mark Hitchcock, which I happen to be reading at the moment.

1. Rapture of Enoch\ ”So all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty-five years. Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him.” (Genesis 5:23-24) \ Enoch was raptured to heaven to be with God. He did not die, but went straight to God.

2. Rapture of Elijah\ ”And it came about when the Lord was about to take up Elijah by a whirlwind to heaven, that Elijah went with Elisha from Gilgal. … As they were going along and talking, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire and horses of fire which separated the two of them. And Elijah went up by a whirlwind to heaven.” (2 Kings 2:1,11) \ Elijah also was raptured to heaven without having to die. This passage gives more details. He went up in a whirlwind to heaven.

3. Rapture of Isaiah\ ”In the year of King Uzziah’s death I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple. Seraphim stood above Him, each having six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called out to another and said,

“Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts,

The whole earth is full of His glory.”” (Isaiah 6:1-3)\ Isaiah’s situation was different. He was raptured to heaven only temporarily to be given God’s word and His prophecy and to call Isaiah for His good plan.

1. Rapture of Jesus\ ”And she gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron; and her child was caught up to God and to His throne.” (Revelation 12:5)\ and\ ”And after He had said these things, He was lifted up while they were looking on, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And as they were gazing intently into the sky while He was going, behold, two men in white clothing stood beside them. They also said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.” (Acts 1:9-11)\ I’ve listed two verses about Jesus’s rapture. The one from Revelation uses the Greek word harpazo, caught up - when translated to Latin, the word is rapturo, which is where we get our English word rapture. The verses in Acts give a more detailed description of His rapture to heaven, which is an example of our rapture. We are also promised His return.

2. Rapture of Philip\ ”And he ordered the chariot to stop; and they both went down into the water, Philip as well as the eunuch, and he baptized him. When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; and the eunuch no longer saw him, but went on his way rejoicing. But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he passed through he kept preaching the gospel to all the cities until he came to Caesarea.” (Acts 8:38-40)

The rapture of Philip is different than the rest, because Philip was snatched away, not to heaven, but to Azotus. This is still an instance worth pointing out because it also uses the Greek word Harpazo.

1. Rapture of Paul\ ”I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago—whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know, God knows—such a man was caught up to the third heaven. And I know how such a man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, God knows— was caught up into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which a man is not permitted to speak.” (2 Corinthians 12:2-4)\ Like Isaiah, Paul was temporarily caught up (Harpazo) to heaven to receive revelation from God and then returned to his work and life on earth

These examples show God snatching people from one location to another, physically or spiritually for His good purpose. I expect it to happen again, shortly before the beginning of the seven year tribulation.

The 3 Views of the Rapture

There are three main views of the rapture: pre-trib, mid-trib, and post-trib. The basic beliefs are pretty much self explanatory by their name. Does the rapture occur before the tribulation, around the mid-point of the tribulation (which is right before the Great Tribulation or final 3.5 years), or after the tribulation? Which one fits what the Bible says better?

Although the Bible doesn’t directly say when the rapture happens, there are some very strong hints.

No wrath For saints

“For God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Thessalonians 5:9)

God promises believers that we are not destined for wrath. The tribulation is also known as1 “The wrath” (1 Thessalonians 5:9 & Revelation 11:18), “The wrath to come” (1 Thessalonians 1:10), “The great day of their wrath” (Revelation 6:17), “The wrath of God” (Revelation15:1,7, 14:10,19, 16:1), “The wrath of the lamb” (Revelation 6:16). There are numerous other equally unpleasant names, but I am sticking with those that use the word wrath. God promised believers that we are not destined for wrath. God never breaks His promises.

Similarly Revelation 3 promises believers will be kept from the hour of testing.

Because you have kept the word of My perseverance, I also will keep you from the hour of testing, that hour which is about to come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth. I am coming quickly; hold fast what you have, so that no one will take your crown. (Revelation 3:10-11) {emphasis mine}

The word quickly can also be translated suddenly. Although Jesus has not returned quickly by our way of figuring time, He will come suddenly.

No one knows when

“But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone.” (Matthew 24:36)

Scripture says the Tribulation starts when the Antichrist signs a peace treaty with Israel. If the rapture happens before the tribulation, then we won’t know when it will happen. If the rapture occurs at the mid-trib position, then it will happen 3.5 years after the peace treaty. If the rapture occurs post-trip, then it will happen 7 years after the peace treaty is signed and 3.5 years after the abomination of desolation, when the Antichrist declares himself god in the Jewish temple and requires the whole world to worship him. Only one makes sense if we can’t know when it happens.

Just as in the days of …

“For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be. Then there will be two men in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one will be left.” (Matthew 24:37-41)

If we look at the words of Jesus, He compares the rapture to the days of Noah. Life happening as normal, then God put Noah and his family on the ark and personally shut the door (Genesis 7:16). Then the flood came, pouring God’s wrath out on those who had rejected Him. In the same way, God will take believers out of the world before pouring out His wrath on those who remain. He clearly states, “one will be taken and one will be left.”

A parallel passage in Luke, not only talks of God removing Noah before the flood, but also tells of God removing Lot before destroying Sodom & Gomorrah.

For just like the lightning, when it flashes out of one part of the sky, shines to the other part of the sky, so will the Son of Man be in His day. But first He must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation. And just as it happened in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: they were eating, they were drinking, they were marrying, they were being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. It was the same as happened in the days of Lot: they were eating, they were drinking, they were buying, they were selling, they were planting, they were building; but on the day that Lot went out from Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. It will be just the same on the day that the Son of Man is revealed. (Luke:17:24-30) {emphasis mine}

Just as Noah was removed before judgement, so also was Lot removed before judgement. In both cases the majority of people were going about business, living normal lives, not expecting anything to change.

In Genesis 19, the angels must remove Lot and his family before the city is destroyed.

Then the two men said to Lot, “Whom else have you here? A son-in-law, and your sons, and your daughters, and whomever you have in the city, bring them out of the place; for we are about to destroy this place, because their outcry has become so great before the Lord that the Lord has sent us to destroy it.” \ …\ When morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, “Up, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or you will be swept away in the punishment of the city.” But he hesitated. So the men seized his hand and the hand of his wife and the hands of his two daughters, for the compassion of the Lord was upon him; and they brought him out, and put him outside the city. (Genesis 19:12-13,15-16) {emphasis mine}

In the last days, God has promised to remove us before His judgment is poured out on those who willfully rejected Him. Jesus spoke these words to comfort us and so we would not fear the end.

Removal of the Restrainer

Now we request you, brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed either by a spirit or a message or a letter as if from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God. Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things? And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he will be revealed. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; (2 Thessalonians 2:1-8) {emphasis mine}

The restrainer is the Holy Spirit and the lawless one is the antichrist. This passage is saying that the antichrist will not be revealed until the restrainer is removed. The Holy Spirit indwells every believer. The believers also have to be removed before the antichrist is revealed, otherwise the Holy Spirit would have to leave the believers, leaving them alone during God’s wrath. That, of course, is contrary to God’s character, history, and promise.

Why is There No Mention of the Church During the Tribulation?

In the first three chapters of Revelation, the word church is used again and again. The church is not mentioned again until Revelation 19, regarding the Bride of Christ.

Let us rejoice and be glad and give the glory to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready.” It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. (Revelation 19:7-8) {emphasis mine}

All of this makes sense if the church was raptured before the tribulation. Therefore the bride (the church) has had seven years to make herself ready. They then get to descend with Jesus in the second coming of Jesus.

And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, “KING OF KINGS, AND Lord OF LORDS.” (Revelation 19:11-16) {emphasis mine}

The Bride of Christ follows the King of Kings and Lord of Lords back to earth after being made “white and clean.”

Some may accuse pre-trib believers of being escapists. I’ll admit, I am happy to avoid the wrath of God, whether that be the tribulation or eternal damnation or just His daily disappointment in my failings. The fact that I am glad to “escape” the wrath, doesn’t make it untrue. I hope the passages and explanations I shared will give you comfort as the Day of the Lord and the Wrath of God approaches and as we see the world seemingly spiraling out of control. God is in control. Everything is happening according to His plan and for our good.

May the Lord of heaven comfort you with His promises and make you know His love. May you trust Him in good times and bad until the last days. May God give you a desire for His word and an understanding of His prophecies, so you will know the day is fast approaching.

Trust Jesus.

FYI, You can find most of my articles at end times. Some are directly relating to end times while others are loosely related. This post is a logical explanation of the rapture. You can also check out my older article on the rapture, “Up, Up, and Away.” The focus in my previous post was a little different including focusing on how the rapture will effect us, how we should respond to its immanency, and how it relates to the 2nd coming of Christ after the tribulation, so it is worth checking out as well.

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

Read the original blog post

I've been thinking about how to improve my seed backup in a cheap and cool way, mostly for fun. Until now, I had the seed written on a piece of paper in a desk drawer, and I wanted something more durable and fire-proof.

Show me the final result!

After searching online, I found two options I liked the most: the Cryptosteel Capsule and the Trezor Keep. These products are nice but quite expensive, and I didn't want to spend that much on my seed backup. Privacy is also important, and sharing details like a shipping address makes me uncomfortable. This concern has grown since the Ledger incident^1. A $5 wrench attack^2 seems too cheap, even if you only hold a few sats.

Upon seeing the design of Cryptosteel, I considered creating something similar at home. Although it may not be as cool as their device, it could offer almost the same in terms of robustness and durability.

Step 1: Get the materials and tools

When choosing the materials, you will want to go with stainless steel. It is durable, resistant to fire, water, and corrosion, very robust, and does not rust. Also, its price point is just right; it's not the cheapest, but it's cheap for the value you get.

I went to a material store and bought:

• Two bolts
• Two hex nuts and head nuts for the bolts
• A bag of 30 washers

All items were made of stainless steel. The total price was around €6. This is enough for making two seed backups.

You will also need:

• A set of metal letter stamps (I bought a 2mm-size letter kit since my washers were small, 6mm in diameter)
  • You can find these in local stores or online marketplaces. The set I bought cost me €13.
• A good hammer
• A solid surface to stamp on

Total spent: 19€ for two backups

Step 2: Stamp and store

Once you have all the materials, you can start stamping your words. There are many videos on the internet that use fancy 3D-printed tools to get the letters nicely aligned, but I went with the free-hand option. The results were pretty decent.

I only stamped the first 4 letters for each word since the BIP-39 wordlist allows for this. Because my stamping kit did not include numbers, I used alphabet letters to define the order. This way, if all the washers were to fall off, I could still reassemble the seed correctly.

The final result

So this is the final result. I added two smaller washers as protection and also put the top washer reversed so the letters are not visible:

Compared to the Cryptosteel or the Trezor Keep, its size is much more compact. This makes for an easier-to-hide backup, in case you ever need to hide it inside your human body.

Some ideas

Tamper-evident seal

To enhance the security this backup, you can consider using a tamper-evident seal. This can be easily achieved by printing a unique image or using a specific day's newspaper page (just note somewhere what day it was).

Apply a thin layer of glue to the washer's surface and place the seal over it. If someone attempts to access the seed, they will be forced to destroy the seal, which will serve as an evident sign of tampering.

This simple measure will provide an additional layer of protection and allow you to quickly identify any unauthorized access attempts.

Note that this method is not resistant to outright theft. The tamper-evident seal won't stop a determined thief but it will prevent them from accessing your seed without leaving any trace.

Redundancy

Make sure to add redundancy. Make several copies of this cheap backup, and store them in separate locations.

Unique wordset

Another layer of security could be to implement your own custom mnemonic dictionary. However, this approach has the risk of permanently losing access to your funds if not implemented correctly.

If done properly, you could potentially end up with a highly secure backup, as no one else would be able to derive the seed phrase from it. To create your custom dictionary, assign a unique number from 1 to 2048 to a word of your choice. Maybe you could use a book, and index the first 2048 unique words that appear. Make sure to store this book and even get a couple copies of it (digitally and phisically).

This self-curated set of words will serve as your personal BIP-39 dictionary. When you need to translate between your custom dictionary and the official BIP-39 wordlist, simply use the index number to find the corresponding word in either list.

Never write the idex or words on your computer (Do not use Ctr+F)

@ 0598a50c:d765ddce

This LA Times story, from their archives, is not paywalled:

WASHINGTON — The chief of China’s military intelligence secretly directed funds from Beijing to help re-elect President Clinton in 1996, former Democratic fund-raiser Johnny Chung has told federal investigators.

According to sources familiar with Chung’s sealed statements to federal prosecutors, Chung says he met three times with the intelligence official, General Ji Shengde, who ordered $300,000 deposited into the Torrance businessman’s bank account to subsidize campaign donations intended for Clinton,

Never forget blatant, destructive, disloyalty to the USA.

It's not an accident that the Clinton donation from China happened in (Freemason controlled) Los Angeles, where China has a massive presence to this day. Take a drive on San Gabriel Blvd and see for yourself.

According to law enforcement and other sources, key aspects of Chung’s testimony, which has not been made public, have been corroborated by financial records in the United States and Hong Kong.

+++++++++++ Chung, 44, a Taiwan-born American citizen who lives in Artesia, Calif., was one of the most prominent figures in the 1996 campaign finance scandal. He contributed more than $400,000 to various Democratic campaigns and causes, visited the White House no fewer than 50 times and brought numerous Chinese associates to events with the president and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton.

As you might expect, it is illegal for U.S. political parties or candidates to accept contributions from foreign sources.

Only a portion of the $300,000 made it into Democratic campaign coffers, records show.

A spokesman for China’s embassy in Washington denied any involvement in the 1996 elections.

SOURCE: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-apr-04-mn-24189-story.html

@ 4ba8e86d:89d32de4

Tutorial feito por nostr:nostr:npub1rc56x0ek0dd303eph523g3chm0wmrs5wdk6vs0ehd0m5fn8t7y4sqra3tk poste original abaixo:

Parte 1 : http://xh6liiypqffzwnu5734ucwps37tn2g6npthvugz3gdoqpikujju525yd.onion/263585/tutorial-debloat-de-celulares-android-via-adb-parte-1

Parte 2 : http://xh6liiypqffzwnu5734ucwps37tn2g6npthvugz3gdoqpikujju525yd.onion/index.php/263586/tutorial-debloat-de-celulares-android-via-adb-parte-2

Quando o assunto é privacidade em celulares, uma das medidas comumente mencionadas é a remoção de bloatwares do dispositivo, também chamado de debloat. O meio mais eficiente para isso sem dúvidas é a troca de sistema operacional. Custom Rom’s como LineageOS, GrapheneOS, Iodé, CalyxOS, etc, já são bastante enxutos nesse quesito, principalmente quanto não é instalado os G-Apps com o sistema. No entanto, essa prática pode acabar resultando em problemas indesejados como a perca de funções do dispositivo, e até mesmo incompatibilidade com apps bancários, tornando este método mais atrativo para quem possui mais de um dispositivo e separando um apenas para privacidade.   Pensando nisso, pessoas que possuem apenas um único dispositivo móvel, que são necessitadas desses apps ou funções, mas, ao mesmo tempo, tem essa visão em prol da privacidade, buscam por um meio-termo entre manter a Stock rom, e não ter seus dados coletados por esses bloatwares. Felizmente, a remoção de bloatwares é possível e pode ser realizada via root, ou mais da maneira que este artigo irá tratar, via adb.

O que são bloatwares?

Bloatware é a junção das palavras bloat (inchar) + software (programa), ou seja, um bloatware é basicamente um programa inútil ou facilmente substituível — colocado em seu dispositivo previamente pela fabricante e operadora — que está no seu dispositivo apenas ocupando espaço de armazenamento, consumindo memória RAM e pior, coletando seus dados e enviando para servidores externos, além de serem mais pontos de vulnerabilidades.

O que é o adb?

O Android Debug Brigde, ou apenas adb, é uma ferramenta que se utiliza das permissões de usuário shell e permite o envio de comandos vindo de um computador para um dispositivo Android exigindo apenas que a depuração USB esteja ativa, mas também pode ser usada diretamente no celular a partir do Android 11, com o uso do Termux e a depuração sem fio (ou depuração wifi). A ferramenta funciona normalmente em dispositivos sem root, e também funciona caso o celular esteja em Recovery Mode.

Requisitos:

Para computadores:

• Depuração USB ativa no celular; • Computador com adb; • Cabo USB;

Para celulares:

• Depuração sem fio (ou depuração wifi) ativa no celular; • Termux; • Android 11 ou superior;

Para ambos:

• Firewall NetGuard instalado e configurado no celular; • Lista de bloatwares para seu dispositivo;

Ativação de depuração:

Para ativar a Depuração USB em seu dispositivo, pesquise como ativar as opções de desenvolvedor de seu dispositivo, e lá ative a depuração. No caso da depuração sem fio, sua ativação irá ser necessária apenas no momento que for conectar o dispositivo ao Termux.

Instalação e configuração do NetGuard

O NetGuard pode ser instalado através da própria Google Play Store, mas de preferência instale pela F-Droid ou Github para evitar telemetria.

F-Droid: https://f-droid.org/packages/eu.faircode.netguard/

Github: https://github.com/M66B/NetGuard/releases

Após instalado, configure da seguinte maneira:

Configurações → padrões (lista branca/negra) → ative as 3 primeiras opções (bloquear wifi, bloquear dados móveis e aplicar regras ‘quando tela estiver ligada’);

Configurações → opções avançadas → ative as duas primeiras (administrar aplicativos do sistema e registrar acesso a internet);

Com isso, todos os apps estarão sendo bloqueados de acessar a internet, seja por wifi ou dados móveis, e na página principal do app basta permitir o acesso a rede para os apps que você vai usar (se necessário). Permita que o app rode em segundo plano sem restrição da otimização de bateria, assim quando o celular ligar, ele já estará ativo.

Lista de bloatwares

Nem todos os bloatwares são genéricos, haverá bloatwares diferentes conforme a marca, modelo, versão do Android, e até mesmo região.

Para obter uma lista de bloatwares de seu dispositivo, caso seu aparelho já possua um tempo de existência, você encontrará listas prontas facilmente apenas pesquisando por elas. Supondo que temos um Samsung Galaxy Note 10 Plus em mãos, basta pesquisar em seu motor de busca por:

Samsung Galaxy Note 10 Plus bloatware list

Provavelmente essas listas já terão inclusas todos os bloatwares das mais diversas regiões, lhe poupando o trabalho de buscar por alguma lista mais específica.

Caso seu aparelho seja muito recente, e/ou não encontre uma lista pronta de bloatwares, devo dizer que você acaba de pegar em merda, pois é chato para um caralho pesquisar por cada aplicação para saber sua função, se é essencial para o sistema ou se é facilmente substituível.

De antemão já aviso, que mais para frente, caso vossa gostosura remova um desses aplicativos que era essencial para o sistema sem saber, vai acabar resultando na perda de alguma função importante, ou pior, ao reiniciar o aparelho o sistema pode estar quebrado, lhe obrigando a seguir com uma formatação, e repetir todo o processo novamente.

Download do adb em computadores

Para usar a ferramenta do adb em computadores, basta baixar o pacote chamado SDK platform-tools, disponível através deste link: https://developer.android.com/tools/releases/platform-tools. Por ele, você consegue o download para Windows, Mac e Linux.

Uma vez baixado, basta extrair o arquivo zipado, contendo dentro dele uma pasta chamada platform-tools que basta ser aberta no terminal para se usar o adb.

Download do adb em celulares com Termux.

Para usar a ferramenta do adb diretamente no celular, antes temos que baixar o app Termux, que é um emulador de terminal linux, e já possui o adb em seu repositório. Você encontra o app na Google Play Store, mas novamente recomendo baixar pela F-Droid ou diretamente no Github do projeto.

F-Droid: https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.termux/

Github: https://github.com/termux/termux-app/releases

Processo de debloat

Antes de iniciarmos, é importante deixar claro que não é para você sair removendo todos os bloatwares de cara sem mais nem menos, afinal alguns deles precisam antes ser substituídos, podem ser essenciais para você para alguma atividade ou função, ou até mesmo são insubstituíveis.

Alguns exemplos de bloatwares que a substituição é necessária antes da remoção, é o Launcher, afinal, é a interface gráfica do sistema, e o teclado, que sem ele só é possível digitar com teclado externo. O Launcher e teclado podem ser substituídos por quaisquer outros, minha recomendação pessoal é por aqueles que respeitam sua privacidade, como Pie Launcher e Simple Laucher, enquanto o teclado pelo OpenBoard e FlorisBoard, todos open-source e disponíveis da F-Droid.

Identifique entre a lista de bloatwares, quais você gosta, precisa ou prefere não substituir, de maneira alguma você é obrigado a remover todos os bloatwares possíveis, modifique seu sistema a seu bel-prazer. O NetGuard lista todos os apps do celular com o nome do pacote, com isso você pode filtrar bem qual deles não remover.

Um exemplo claro de bloatware insubstituível e, portanto, não pode ser removido, é o com.android.mtp, um protocolo onde sua função é auxiliar a comunicação do dispositivo com um computador via USB, mas por algum motivo, tem acesso a rede e se comunica frequentemente com servidores externos. Para esses casos, e melhor solução mesmo é bloquear o acesso a rede desses bloatwares com o NetGuard.

MTP tentando comunicação com servidores externos:

Executando o adb shell

No computador

Faça backup de todos os seus arquivos importantes para algum armazenamento externo, e formate seu celular com o hard reset. Após a formatação, e a ativação da depuração USB, conecte seu aparelho e o pc com o auxílio de um cabo USB. Muito provavelmente seu dispositivo irá apenas começar a carregar, por isso permita a transferência de dados, para que o computador consiga se comunicar normalmente com o celular.

Já no pc, abra a pasta platform-tools dentro do terminal, e execute o seguinte comando:

./adb start-server

O resultado deve ser:

daemon not running; starting now at tcp:5037 daemon started successfully

E caso não apareça nada, execute:

./adb kill-server

E inicie novamente.

Com o adb conectado ao celular, execute:

./adb shell

Para poder executar comandos diretamente para o dispositivo. No meu caso, meu celular é um Redmi Note 8 Pro, codinome Begonia.

Logo o resultado deve ser:

begonia:/ $

Caso ocorra algum erro do tipo:

adb: device unauthorized. This adb server’s $ADB_VENDOR_KEYS is not set Try ‘adb kill-server’ if that seems wrong. Otherwise check for a confirmation dialog on your device.

Verifique no celular se apareceu alguma confirmação para autorizar a depuração USB, caso sim, autorize e tente novamente. Caso não apareça nada, execute o kill-server e repita o processo.

No celular

Após realizar o mesmo processo de backup e hard reset citado anteriormente, instale o Termux e, com ele iniciado, execute o comando:

pkg install android-tools

Quando surgir a mensagem “Do you want to continue? [Y/n]”, basta dar enter novamente que já aceita e finaliza a instalação

Agora, vá até as opções de desenvolvedor, e ative a depuração sem fio. Dentro das opções da depuração sem fio, terá uma opção de emparelhamento do dispositivo com um código, que irá informar para você um código em emparelhamento, com um endereço IP e porta, que será usado para a conexão com o Termux.

Para facilitar o processo, recomendo que abra tanto as configurações quanto o Termux ao mesmo tempo, e divida a tela com os dois app’s, como da maneira a seguir:

Para parear o Termux com o dispositivo, não é necessário digitar o ip informado, basta trocar por “localhost”, já a porta e o código de emparelhamento, deve ser digitado exatamente como informado. Execute:

adb pair localhost:porta CódigoDeEmparelhamento

De acordo com a imagem mostrada anteriormente, o comando ficaria “adb pair localhost:41255 757495”.

Com o dispositivo emparelhado com o Termux, agora basta conectar para conseguir executar os comandos, para isso execute:

adb connect localhost:porta

Obs: a porta que você deve informar neste comando não é a mesma informada com o código de emparelhamento, e sim a informada na tela principal da depuração sem fio.

Pronto! Termux e adb conectado com sucesso ao dispositivo, agora basta executar normalmente o adb shell:

adb shell

Remoção na prática Com o adb shell executado, você está pronto para remover os bloatwares. No meu caso, irei mostrar apenas a remoção de um app (Google Maps), já que o comando é o mesmo para qualquer outro, mudando apenas o nome do pacote.

Dentro do NetGuard, verificando as informações do Google Maps:

Podemos ver que mesmo fora de uso, e com a localização do dispositivo desativado, o app está tentando loucamente se comunicar com servidores externos, e informar sabe-se lá que peste. Mas sem novidades até aqui, o mais importante é que podemos ver que o nome do pacote do Google Maps é com.google.android.apps.maps, e para o remover do celular, basta executar:

pm uninstall –user 0 com.google.android.apps.maps

E pronto, bloatware removido! Agora basta repetir o processo para o resto dos bloatwares, trocando apenas o nome do pacote.

Para acelerar o processo, você pode já criar uma lista do bloco de notas com os comandos, e quando colar no terminal, irá executar um atrás do outro.

Exemplo de lista:

Caso a donzela tenha removido alguma coisa sem querer, também é possível recuperar o pacote com o comando:

cmd package install-existing nome.do.pacote

Pós-debloat

Após limpar o máximo possível o seu sistema, reinicie o aparelho, caso entre no como recovery e não seja possível dar reboot, significa que você removeu algum app “essencial” para o sistema, e terá que formatar o aparelho e repetir toda a remoção novamente, desta vez removendo poucos bloatwares de uma vez, e reiniciando o aparelho até descobrir qual deles não pode ser removido. Sim, dá trabalho… quem mandou querer privacidade?

Caso o aparelho reinicie normalmente após a remoção, parabéns, agora basta usar seu celular como bem entender! Mantenha o NetGuard sempre executando e os bloatwares que não foram possíveis remover não irão se comunicar com servidores externos, passe a usar apps open source da F-Droid e instale outros apps através da Aurora Store ao invés da Google Play Store.

Referências: Caso você seja um Australopithecus e tenha achado este guia difícil, eis uma videoaula (3:14:40) do Anderson do canal Ciberdef, realizando todo o processo: http://odysee.com/@zai:5/Como-remover-at%C3%A9-200-APLICATIVOS-que-colocam-a-sua-PRIVACIDADE-E-SEGURAN%C3%87A-em-risco.:4?lid=6d50f40314eee7e2f218536d9e5d300290931d23

Pdf’s do Anderson citados na videoaula: créditos ao anon6837264 http://eternalcbrzpicytj4zyguygpmkjlkddxob7tptlr25cdipe5svyqoqd.onion/file/3863a834d29285d397b73a4af6fb1bbe67c888d72d30/t-05e63192d02ffd.pdf

Processo de instalação do Termux e adb no celular: https://youtu.be/APolZrPHSms

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

Read the original blog post

kycnot.me features a somewhat hidden tool that some users may not be aware of. Every month, an automated job crawls every listed service's Terms of Service (ToS) and FAQ pages and conducts an AI-driven analysis, generating a comprehensive overview that highlights key points related to KYC and user privacy.

Here's an example: Changenow's Tos Review

Why?

ToS pages typically contain a lot of complicated text. Since the first versions of kycnot.me, I have tried to provide users a comprehensive overview of what can be found in such documents. This automated method keeps the information up-to-date every month, which was one of the main challenges with manual updates.

A significant part of the time I invest in investigating a service for kycnot.me involves reading the ToS and looking for any clauses that might indicate aggressive KYC practices or privacy concerns. For the past four years, I performed this task manually. However, with advancements in language models, this process can now be somewhat automated. I still manually review the ToS for a quick check and regularly verify the AI’s findings. However, over the past three months, this automated method has proven to be quite reliable.

Having a quick ToS overview section allows users to avoid reading the entire ToS page. Instead, you can quickly read the important points that are grouped, summarized, and referenced, making it easier and faster to understand the key information.

Limitations

This method has a key limitation: JS-generated pages. For this reason, I was using Playwright in my crawler implementation. I plan to make a release addressing this issue in the future. There are also sites that don't have ToS/FAQ pages, but these sites already include a warning in that section.

Another issue is false positives. Although not very common, sometimes the AI might incorrectly interpret something harmless as harmful. Such errors become apparent upon reading; it's clear when something marked as bad should not be categorized as such. I manually review these cases regularly, checking for anything that seems off and then removing any inaccuracies.

Overall, the automation provides great results.

How?

There have been several iterations of this tool. Initially, I started with GPT-3.5, but the results were not good in any way. It made up many things, and important thigs were lost on large ToS pages. I then switched to GPT-4 Turbo, but it was expensive. Eventually, I settled on Claude 3 Sonnet, which provides a quality compromise between GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 Turbo at a more reasonable price, while allowing a generous 200K token context window.

I designed a prompt, which is open source^1, that has been tweaked many times and will surely be adjusted further in the future.

For the ToS scraping part, I initially wrote a scraper API using Playwright^2, but I replaced it with Jina AI Reader^3, which works quite well and is designed for this task.

Non-conflictive ToS

All services have a dropdown in the ToS section called "Non-conflictive ToS Reviews." These are the reviews that the AI flagged as not needing a user warning. I still provide these because I think they may be interesting to read.

Feedback and contributing

You can give me feedback on this tool, or share any inaccuraties by either opening an issue on Codeberg^4 or by contacting me ^5.

You can contribute with pull requests, which are always welcome, or you can support this project with any of the listed ways.

@ 2183e947:f497b975

(1) Here is a partial list of p2p bitcoin exchanges and their friends:

• Robosats (custodial escrow)
• Hodlhodl (2-of-3 escrow)
• Peach (2-of-3 escrow)
• Binance P2P (2-of-3 escrow)
• Bisq v1 (either user can send the funds to a custodial escrow, but if neither one does that, the escrow never touches user funds)
• Bisq v2 (no escrow)

(2) In my opinion, bisq2 is the only "true" p2p exchange on the above list. In a true p2p system, the only people who *can* touch the money are the buyer and the seller. Whenever there's an escrow, even one that has to be "triggered" (like in bisq v1), it's not "really" p2p because the escrow serves as a middleman: he can collude with one party or the other to steal user funds, and in some models (e.g. robosats) he can just straight up run off with user funds without needing to collude at all.

(3) In bisq2 (the One True P2P exchange), buyers select sellers solely based on their reputation, and they just directly send them the bitcoin *hoping* they are as honest as their reputation says they are. What I like about this model is that bisq is not involved in bisq2 at all except as a platform to help buyers discover reputable sellers and communicate with them. There are two things I don't like about this "reputation" model: it's hard to get a good reputation, and it's hard to debug payment failures in this context. I've tried to do about 5 trades on bisq2 (as someone with no reputation) and not a single one went through. Four times, everyone ignored my offers or someone accepted it but then abandoned it immediately. Once, someone accepted my offer, but I could not pay their lightning invoice for some reason, so we mutually canceled the trade.

(4) Just because I opined that an exchange with an escrow "doesn't count" as peer-to-peer doesn't mean that's a bad thing. Of the list of exchanges in number 1, I most frequently use robosats, which, per my analysis, sounds like the "worst" one if considered solely on the metric of "which one is the most p2p." But I use it because there are *advantages* to its model: the btc seller doesn't need a reputation to use it (because the escrow is there to ensure he can't cheat, and so the escrow is the trusted third party, not the btc seller) and payment failures are easier to debug because you're always paying one of the coordinators, who tend to be responsive and knowledgeable and can help you figure out how to fix it (it's how they make money, after all).

(5) There are at least two ways to do escrow without a 3rd party. Satoshi Nakamoto outlines one way to do it here: https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/posts/bitcointalk/threads/169/ Make a 2 of 2 multisig between the btc buyer and the btc seller, and have the btc seller put his btc in that multisig. Then have the btc buyer send the product (fiat money) to the btc seller. When the btc seller receives it, he sends his privkey to the btc buyer, who can now withdraw the money. The advantage of this system is that the buyer has no incentive to "stiff" the seller (by not sending the fiat), because if he does that, he won't get paid. The downside is, if the btc buyer is a troll who just aborts the protocol halfway through the trade, the seller loses his btc and cannot recover it.

(6) There is another way: start out with a 2 of 2 multisig just like above, but instead of having the btc seller fund it by himself, have the buyer and the seller *both* put in the *same amount* in the *same transaction* (i.e. via a coinjoin), and have the btc seller put in a bit "extra" -- like 20% extra. For example, if the btc seller wants $100 in fiat, the multisig would have $220 in it in total -- $120 from the seller and $100 from the buyer. Using this model, the disadvantage mentioned in paragraph number 5 is fixed: the buyer has an incentive now to send the fiat, otherwise he loses the $100 he put in. He only gets his $100 back if the btc seller cosigns to give it to him, which he'll only do once he receives the product. Meanwhile, the seller is *also* incentivized properly: he only gets his *extra* $20 back if the btc buyer cosigns to give it to him, which he'll only do if the transaction he's signing *also* gives him back *his* $100 deposit.

(7) The model described in number 6 exists: https://scrow.exchange/ is a website that implements it as an option, though as far as I'm aware, no one uses it. The downsides of this model are: it's capital intensive, e.g. a trade for $100 involves $220 or more. Also, the btc buyer needs to already *have* btc to post as a bond, so this cannot be his first time acquiring btc (unless someone helps him make his first deposit). Also, a very rich person who does not care about money can still be a troll; they deposit funds into the multisig alongside their counterparty, then abandon the trade, because they have so much money they don't care if they get it back as long as they cause suffering to their counterparty.

(8) I'd like to see more p2p exchanges, and more exchanges like robosats. I want to continue to spread awareness of ways they can improve -- like the protocols mentioned in numbers 5 and 6 -- and help them implement these protocols. If you run an exchange on the list in number 1 or want to start one, reach out to me, I'd love to help.

@ 2dd9250b:6e928072

Vi recentemente um post onde a pessoa diz que aquele final do filme O Doutrinador (2019) não faz sentido porque mesmo o protagonista explodindo o Palácio dos Três Poderes, não acaba com a corrupção no Brasil.

Progressistas não sabem ler e não conseguem interpretar textos corretamente. O final de Doutrinador não tem a ver com isso, tem a ver com a relação entre o Herói e a sua Cidade.

Nas histórias em quadrinhos há uma ligação entre a cidade e o Super-Herói. Gotham City por exemplo, cria o Batman. Isso é mostrado em The Batman (2022) e em Batman: Cavaleiro das Trevas, quando aquele garoto no final, diz para o Batman não fugir, porque ele queria ver o Batman de novo. E o Comissário Gordon diz que o "Batman é o que a cidade de Gotham precisa."

Batman: Cavaleiro das Trevas Ressurge mostra a cidade de Gotham sendo tomada pela corrupção e pela ideologia do Bane. A Cidade vai definhando em imoralidade e o Bruce, ao olhar da prisão a cidade sendo destruída, decide que o Batman precisa voltar porque se Gotham for destruída, o Batman é destruído junto. E isso o da forças para consegue fugir daquele poço e voltar para salvar Gotham.

Isso também é mostrado em Demolidor. Na série Demolidor o Matt Murdock sempre fala que precisa defender a cidade Cozinha do Inferno; que o Fisk não vai dominar a cidade e fazer o que ele quiser nela. Inclusive na terceira temporada isso fica mais evidente na luta final na mansão do Fisk, onde Matt grita que agora a cidade toda vai saber o que ele fez; a cidade vai ver o mal que ele é para Hell's Kitchen, porque a gente sabe que o Fisk fez de tudo para a imagem do Demolidor entrar e descrédito perante os cidadãos, então o que acontece no final do filme O Doutrinador não significa que ele está acabando com a corrupção quando explode o Congresso, ele está praticamente interrompendo o ciclo do sistema, colocando uma falha em sua engrenagem.

Quando você ouve falar de Brasília, você pensa na corrupção dos políticos, onde a farra acontece,, onde corruptos desviam dinheiro arrecadado dos impostos, impostos estes que são centralizados na União. Então quando você ouve falarem de Brasília, sempre pensa que o pessoal que mora lá, mora junto com tudo de podre que acontece no Brasil.

Logo quando o Doutrinador explode tudo ali, ele está basicamente destruindo o mecanismo que suja Brasília. Ele está fazendo isso naquela cidade. Porque o símbolo da cidade é justamente esse, a farsa de que naquele lugar o povo será ouvido e a justiça será feita. Ele está destruindo a ideologia de que o Estado nos protege, nos dá segurança, saúde e educação. Porque na verdade o Estado só existe para privilegiar os políticos, funcionários públicos de auto escalão, suas famílias e amigos. Enquanto que o povo sofre para sustentar a elite política. O protagonista Miguel entendeu isso quando a filha dele morreu na fila do SUS.

@ c066aac5:6a41a034

I work in the business world as a salesperson. I am frequently out and about in the community trying to make friends, connect with people who I can help, and ultimately grow my book of business. I have goals set by my employers and I aim to meet those expectations. Because of this, I find myself frequently under pressure to find ways to produce. This often leads to me being disappointed in myself; my sales cycles are long and I lose more deals than I win. My Dad often reminds me that How to Win Friends and Influence People has all the secrets of sales I'll ever need, but I still end up wishing I could find that secret edge to out-do the competition. That's where the watch temptation comes in.

I frequently see a luxurious timepiece on the left wrist of my peers and elder-statesmen closers. Rolex, Omega, Patek, a whole world of $10k minimum machines. It comes across as a power-move, a symbol of status that is hard to ignore. It sends a message that the bearer's time is more valuable than that of other people. It makes me think "if this person is wearing that watch, that means they're great at what they do." The ultimate investment in one's self.

As a newly married man expecting a child, it is hard for me to stomach such a purchase. My wife has supported the idea of me potentially getting such a timepiece; as much as it tickles my fancy, I'd rather put my capital towards things that further my family than my clout. One of the things that struck me was a statement made by an investment advisor in my Kiwanis club: "A watch is a purchase, not an investment."

What a true statement! His words helped me escape my short-lived delusions. That said, I still look at watches sometimes on the internet (The Omega No Time to Die watch is sleek looking). One day, I found myself looking at houses online shortly after looking at watches online. Then it hit me: how many purchases are being marketed as investments in this era? A Rolex is a supposed investment in your career, not just a luxury timepiece. A house is a mechanism for monetary growth, not an attainable home to be enjoyed by a family. A college degree is an investment for your future, not a vehicle for building upon passions.

The Bitcoiners will repeat the phrase "fix the money, fix the world" in harmonious chorus to address the concern I have laid out in this article. Ultimately, I leave you with this reminder: don't let the world pass off things that should be inconsequential purchases as investments with ROIs. I believe the only true investment one can make is into the people around them; that will yield the greatest rewards for the soul.

@ 6e64b83c:94102ee8

• Demo: https://blog.nostrize.me
• Source code: nostr-static

Prerequisites

Before using nostr-static, you'll need:

1. Nostr Articles: You can either:
2. Create new articles using platforms like yakihonne.com or habla.news
3. Find existing articles on Nostr

4. Copy the naddr string from the article (usually can be found in the address bar)

5. Author Profiles: For each article's author:

6. Copy their public key (pubkey)
7. Visit njump.me/npub1xxxxx (replace with the actual pubkey)
8. Copy the nprofile string from the page

These identifiers (naddr for articles and nprofile for authors) are essential for the tool to fetch and display your content correctly.

Features

Core Functionality

• Index Page: A homepage featuring your blog's title, logo, article summaries, and tags
• Article Pages: Individual pages for each article, including:
• Title and logo
• Article summary
• Full content
• Tags
• Comments (via ZapThreads integration)

Social Features

• Comments: Integrated with ZapThreads for decentralized commenting
• Nostr Connect: Seamless integration with window.nostr.js (wnj), supporting NIP-46 bunker connect

Content Organization

• Tag Pages: Browse articles filtered by specific tags
• Profile Pages: View articles from specific authors
• Manual Curation: Select and order articles by adding their naddr strings (see NIP-19)

Customization Options

• Themes: Choose between dark and light mode
• Branding:
• Custom logo
• Custom blog title
• Network: Specify your preferred Nostr relays

Technical Requirements

• Profile Format: Authors must be added in nprofile format (see NIP-19) for consistency
• Automatic Updates: Built-in scripts for:
• Windows Task Scheduler
• Unix/Linux cron jobs

Getting Started

1. Fork and Clone:
2. Fork this repository to your GitHub account
3. Clone it to your local machine or use GitHub Codespaces for a cloud-based development environment

4. Watch this quick tutorial to learn more about GitHub Codespaces

5. Configuration: Set up your config.yaml file with:

6. Blog title and logo
7. Theme preference
8. Relay list
9. Article naddr strings

10. Author nprofile strings

11. Content Selection: Add your desired articles by including their naddr strings in the configuration

12. Author Selection: You have to add the nprofile strings of the articles. This is needed for URL consistancy.

13. Build & Run: Follow the instruction in the README at https://github.com/dhalsim/nostr-static

14. Deployment: Choose your preferred static hosting service and deploy the generated HTML files

15. Updates: Set up automatic updates using the provided scripts for your operating system (For github pages)

Deployment Options

GitHub Pages (Recommended)

GitHub Pages provides free hosting for static websites. Here's how to set it up:

1. Enable GitHub Pages:
2. Go to your repository's Settings
3. Navigate to "Pages" in the menu
4. Under "Build and deployment" > "Source", select "GitHub Actions"
5. Enable Actions by following the GitHub Actions settings guide

6. Go to the "Actions" tab in the top menu. If you see the message "Workflows aren't being run on this forked repository", click the "I understand my workflows, go ahead and enable them" button

7. Custom Domain Setup:

8. Purchase a domain from your preferred domain registrar
9. Create a CNAME record in your domain's DNS settings:
   • Type: CNAME
   • Name: @ or www or a subdomain you prefer (depending on your preference)
   • Value: YOUR_GITHUB_USERNAME.github.io
10. In your repository's GitHub Pages settings:
    • Enter your custom domain in the "Custom domain" field
    • Check "Enforce HTTPS" for secure connections
11. Wait for DNS propagation (can take up to 24 hours)
12. Your site will be available at your custom domain

Other Hosting Options

You can also deploy your static site to any hosting service that supports static websites, such as: - Netlify - Vercel - Cloudflare Pages - Amazon S3 - Any traditional web hosting service

Why nostr-static?

nostr-static offers a unique solution for bloggers who want to leverage Nostr's decentralized content while maintaining a traditional web presence. It combines the best of both worlds:

• Decentralized Content: Your articles live on the Nostr network
• Traditional Web Presence: A familiar blog interface for your readers
• Easy Maintenance: Simple configuration and automatic updates
• Flexible Hosting: Deploy anywhere that supports static websites
• Social interactions: Leverage nostr for comments

Conclusion

nostr-static makes it easy to create a professional blog from your Nostr long-form content. Whether you're a seasoned Nostr user or new to the ecosystem, this tool provides a straightforward way to share your content with both the Nostr community and traditional web users.

Start your Nostr-powered blog today by visiting the demo and exploring the possibilities!

@ 5d4b6c8d:8a1c1ee3

Let's see if @Car can find the episode link this week! (Nobody tell him)

We're mid-NFL draft right now, but it will be in the books by the time we record. So far, we're happy with our teams' picks. How long will that last?

The other big thing on our radar is the ongoing playoffs in the NBA and NHL. We both have lots of thoughts on the NBA, but I'll need someone to walk me through what's happening in the NHL. I can tell it must be wild, from how the odds are swinging around.

In MLB news, I'm locked in a fierce battle with @NEEDcreations for the top spot in our fantasy league, while @grayruby and @supercyclone are in a domestic civil war. Will we have time to actually talk baseball or will we recycle the same tease from last week?

Of course, we'll sprinkle in territory talk and contest updates as we go, plus whatever else stackers want to hear about.

originally posted at https://stacker.news/items/958590

@ dab6c606:51f507b6

Core idea: Use geotagged anonymized Nostr events with Cashu-based points to snitch on cop locations for a more relaxed driving and walking

We all know navigation apps. There's one of them that allows you to report on locations of cops. It's Waze and it's owned by Google. There are perfectly fine navigation apps like Organic Maps, that unfortunately lack the cop-snitching features. In some countries, it is illegal to report cop locations, so it would probably not be a good idea to use your npub to report them. But getting a points Cashu token as a reward and exchanging them from time to time would solve this. You can of course report construction, traffic jams, ...

Proposed solution: Add Nostr client (Copstr) to Organic Maps. Have a button in bottom right allowing you to report traffic situations. Geotagged events are published on Nostr relays, users sending cashu tokens as thank you if the report is valid. Notes have smart expiration times.

Phase 2: Automation: Integration with dashcams and comma.ai allow for automated AI recognition of traffic events such as traffic jams and cops, with automatic touchless reporting.

Result: Drive with most essential information and with full privacy. Collect points to be cool and stay cool.

@ 7b3f7803:8912e968

As we enter Holy Week, we are confronted with a world steeped in sin, strife, conflict, and mortality. There exists a peculiar fascination among some with societal decline, as if they derive satisfaction from witnessing civilization’s unraveling. This attraction to darkness may reflect their inner turmoil, a desire to see others share in their suffering. Alternatively, it could stem from a profound hopelessness, a belief that life lacks purpose, leading them to wish for its end. The allure of dystopian futures is, indeed, a curious phenomenon.

Alexander Hamilton once yearned for war as a means to elevate his status, a reflection of youthful ambition for decisive action. Such a desire—to distinguish oneself and ascend the social hierarchy—underlies some of the grim visions of the future propagated by certain ideological circles. Their aim is not war itself but a reconfiguration of power, placing authority in the hands of those who affirm their values. For years, such individuals have held sway, yet their influence appears to be waning.

In the absence of hope, many embrace visions of decline. This despair is characteristic of a faltering empire, signaling the end of an era. The younger generation, burdened by weariness, falters under the weight of their circumstances. They lack hope for a brighter future and see no clear path out of life’s monotony. In a word, they are trapped, uncertain of how to proceed.

We witnessed a similar sentiment during the Arab Spring, where upheaval was celebrated as a longed-for revolution, a societal reset. The assassination of a prominent corporate executive, such as the CEO of United Health, evokes a comparable yearning for disruption. There is a desire for a cultural transformation, though its precise nature remains elusive.

Yet, the youth find themselves dominated by the very elites whose rhetoric they echo. Unlike the 1960s, when generational values clashed overtly, today’s power structures co-opt the language of the young, redirecting their frustration toward populist movements. This inversion is a cunning strategy, mitigating the potential for significant rebellion.

The reality remains that the older generation holds the wealth, power, and authority, while the young are consistently marginalized. They are the ones left with little hope, ensnared by the system. However, a quiet rebellion is emerging—one rooted in hope and faith. Many are beginning to see through the falsehoods propagated by those in power. The promises of governmental provision, once alluring, now appear untenable in light of fiscal realities. The youth seek a new source of hope, a renewed perspective. Thankfully, they are beginning to find it, turning toward faith as a foundation for a more optimistic future.

@ 21335073:a244b1ad

Warning: This piece contains a conversation about difficult topics. Please proceed with caution.

TL;DR please educate your children about online safety.

Julian Assange wrote in his 2012 book Cypherpunks, “This book is not a manifesto. There isn’t time for that. This book is a warning.” I read it a few times over the past summer. Those opening lines definitely stood out to me. I wish we had listened back then. He saw something about the internet that few had the ability to see. There are some individuals who are so close to a topic that when they speak, it’s difficult for others who aren’t steeped in it to visualize what they’re talking about. I didn’t read the book until more recently. If I had read it when it came out, it probably would have sounded like an unknown foreign language to me. Today it makes more sense.

This isn’t a manifesto. This isn’t a book. There is no time for that. It’s a warning and a possible solution from a desperate and determined survivor advocate who has been pulling and unraveling a thread for a few years. At times, I feel too close to this topic to make any sense trying to convey my pathway to my conclusions or thoughts to the general public. My hope is that if nothing else, I can convey my sense of urgency while writing this. This piece is a watchman’s warning.

When a child steps online, they are walking into a new world. A new reality. When you hand a child the internet, you are handing them possibilities—good, bad, and ugly. This is a conversation about lowering the potential of negative outcomes of stepping into that new world and how I came to these conclusions. I constantly compare the internet to the road. You wouldn’t let a young child run out into the road with no guidance or safety precautions. When you hand a child the internet without any type of guidance or safety measures, you are allowing them to play in rush hour, oncoming traffic. “Look left, look right for cars before crossing.” We almost all have been taught that as children. What are we taught as humans about safety before stepping into a completely different reality like the internet? Very little.

I could never really figure out why many folks in tech, privacy rights activists, and hackers seemed so cold to me while talking about online child sexual exploitation. I always figured that as a survivor advocate for those affected by these crimes, that specific, skilled group of individuals would be very welcoming and easy to talk to about such serious topics. I actually had one hacker laugh in my face when I brought it up while I was looking for answers. I thought maybe this individual thought I was accusing them of something I wasn’t, so I felt bad for asking. I was constantly extremely disappointed and would ask myself, “Why don’t they care? What could I say to make them care more? What could I say to make them understand the crisis and the level of suffering that happens as a result of the problem?”

I have been serving minor survivors of online child sexual exploitation for years. My first case serving a survivor of this specific crime was in 2018—a 13-year-old girl sexually exploited by a serial predator on Snapchat. That was my first glimpse into this side of the internet. I won a national award for serving the minor survivors of Twitter in 2023, but I had been working on that specific project for a few years. I was nominated by a lawyer representing two survivors in a legal battle against the platform. I’ve never really spoken about this before, but at the time it was a choice for me between fighting Snapchat or Twitter. I chose Twitter—or rather, Twitter chose me. I heard about the story of John Doe #1 and John Doe #2, and I was so unbelievably broken over it that I went to war for multiple years. I was and still am royally pissed about that case. As far as I was concerned, the John Doe #1 case proved that whatever was going on with corporate tech social media was so out of control that I didn’t have time to wait, so I got to work. It was reading the messages that John Doe #1 sent to Twitter begging them to remove his sexual exploitation that broke me. He was a child begging adults to do something. A passion for justice and protecting kids makes you do wild things. I was desperate to find answers about what happened and searched for solutions. In the end, the platform Twitter was purchased. During the acquisition, I just asked Mr. Musk nicely to prioritize the issue of detection and removal of child sexual exploitation without violating digital privacy rights or eroding end-to-end encryption. Elon thanked me multiple times during the acquisition, made some changes, and I was thanked by others on the survivors’ side as well.

I still feel that even with the progress made, I really just scratched the surface with Twitter, now X. I left that passion project when I did for a few reasons. I wanted to give new leadership time to tackle the issue. Elon Musk made big promises that I knew would take a while to fulfill, but mostly I had been watching global legislation transpire around the issue, and frankly, the governments are willing to go much further with X and the rest of corporate tech than I ever would. My work begging Twitter to make changes with easier reporting of content, detection, and removal of child sexual exploitation material—without violating privacy rights or eroding end-to-end encryption—and advocating for the minor survivors of the platform went as far as my principles would have allowed. I’m grateful for that experience. I was still left with a nagging question: “How did things get so bad with Twitter where the John Doe #1 and John Doe #2 case was able to happen in the first place?” I decided to keep looking for answers. I decided to keep pulling the thread.

I never worked for Twitter. This is often confusing for folks. I will say that despite being disappointed in the platform’s leadership at times, I loved Twitter. I saw and still see its value. I definitely love the survivors of the platform, but I also loved the platform. I was a champion of the platform’s ability to give folks from virtually around the globe an opportunity to speak and be heard.

I want to be clear that John Doe #1 really is my why. He is the inspiration. I am writing this because of him. He represents so many globally, and I’m still inspired by his bravery. One child’s voice begging adults to do something—I’m an adult, I heard him. I’d go to war a thousand more lifetimes for that young man, and I don’t even know his name. Fighting has been personally dark at times; I’m not even going to try to sugarcoat it, but it has been worth it.

The data surrounding the very real crime of online child sexual exploitation is available to the public online at any time for anyone to see. I’d encourage you to go look at the data for yourself. I believe in encouraging folks to check multiple sources so that you understand the full picture. If you are uncomfortable just searching around the internet for information about this topic, use the terms “CSAM,” “CSEM,” “SG-CSEM,” or “AI Generated CSAM.” The numbers don’t lie—it’s a nightmare that’s out of control. It’s a big business. The demand is high, and unfortunately, business is booming. Organizations collect the data, tech companies often post their data, governments report frequently, and the corporate press has covered a decent portion of the conversation, so I’m sure you can find a source that you trust.

Technology is changing rapidly, which is great for innovation as a whole but horrible for the crime of online child sexual exploitation. Those wishing to exploit the vulnerable seem to be adapting to each technological change with ease. The governments are so far behind with tackling these issues that as I’m typing this, it’s borderline irrelevant to even include them while speaking about the crime or potential solutions. Technology is changing too rapidly, and their old, broken systems can’t even dare to keep up. Think of it like the governments’ “War on Drugs.” Drugs won. In this case as well, the governments are not winning. The governments are talking about maybe having a meeting on potentially maybe having legislation around the crimes. The time to have that meeting would have been many years ago. I’m not advocating for governments to legislate our way out of this. I’m on the side of educating and innovating our way out of this.

I have been clear while advocating for the minor survivors of corporate tech platforms that I would not advocate for any solution to the crime that would violate digital privacy rights or erode end-to-end encryption. That has been a personal moral position that I was unwilling to budge on. This is an extremely unpopular and borderline nonexistent position in the anti-human trafficking movement and online child protection space. I’m often fearful that I’m wrong about this. I have always thought that a better pathway forward would have been to incentivize innovation for detection and removal of content. I had no previous exposure to privacy rights activists or Cypherpunks—actually, I came to that conclusion by listening to the voices of MENA region political dissidents and human rights activists. After developing relationships with human rights activists from around the globe, I realized how important privacy rights and encryption are for those who need it most globally. I was simply unwilling to give more power, control, and opportunities for mass surveillance to big abusers like governments wishing to enslave entire nations and untrustworthy corporate tech companies to potentially end some portion of abuses online. On top of all of it, it has been clear to me for years that all potential solutions outside of violating digital privacy rights to detect and remove child sexual exploitation online have not yet been explored aggressively. I’ve been disappointed that there hasn’t been more of a conversation around preventing the crime from happening in the first place.

What has been tried is mass surveillance. In China, they are currently under mass surveillance both online and offline, and their behaviors are attached to a social credit score. Unfortunately, even on state-run and controlled social media platforms, they still have child sexual exploitation and abuse imagery pop up along with other crimes and human rights violations. They also have a thriving black market online due to the oppression from the state. In other words, even an entire loss of freedom and privacy cannot end the sexual exploitation of children online. It’s been tried. There is no reason to repeat this method.

It took me an embarrassingly long time to figure out why I always felt a slight coldness from those in tech and privacy-minded individuals about the topic of child sexual exploitation online. I didn’t have any clue about the “Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse.” This is a term coined by Timothy C. May in 1988. I would have been a child myself when he first said it. I actually laughed at myself when I heard the phrase for the first time. I finally got it. The Cypherpunks weren’t wrong about that topic. They were so spot on that it is borderline uncomfortable. I was mad at first that they knew that early during the birth of the internet that this issue would arise and didn’t address it. Then I got over it because I realized that it wasn’t their job. Their job was—is—to write code. Their job wasn’t to be involved and loving parents or survivor advocates. Their job wasn’t to educate children on internet safety or raise awareness; their job was to write code.

They knew that child sexual abuse material would be shared on the internet. They said what would happen—not in a gleeful way, but a prediction. Then it happened.

I equate it now to a concrete company laying down a road. As you’re pouring the concrete, you can say to yourself, “A terrorist might travel down this road to go kill many, and on the flip side, a beautiful child can be born in an ambulance on this road.” Who or what travels down the road is not their responsibility—they are just supposed to lay the concrete. I’d never go to a concrete pourer and ask them to solve terrorism that travels down roads. Under the current system, law enforcement should stop terrorists before they even make it to the road. The solution to this specific problem is not to treat everyone on the road like a terrorist or to not build the road.

So I understand the perceived coldness from those in tech. Not only was it not their job, but bringing up the topic was seen as the equivalent of asking a free person if they wanted to discuss one of the four topics—child abusers, terrorists, drug dealers, intellectual property pirates, etc.—that would usher in digital authoritarianism for all who are online globally.

Privacy rights advocates and groups have put up a good fight. They stood by their principles. Unfortunately, when it comes to corporate tech, I believe that the issue of privacy is almost a complete lost cause at this point. It’s still worth pushing back, but ultimately, it is a losing battle—a ticking time bomb.

I do think that corporate tech providers could have slowed down the inevitable loss of privacy at the hands of the state by prioritizing the detection and removal of CSAM when they all started online. I believe it would have bought some time, fewer would have been traumatized by that specific crime, and I do believe that it could have slowed down the demand for content. If I think too much about that, I’ll go insane, so I try to push the “if maybes” aside, but never knowing if it could have been handled differently will forever haunt me. At night when it’s quiet, I wonder what I would have done differently if given the opportunity. I’ll probably never know how much corporate tech knew and ignored in the hopes that it would go away while the problem continued to get worse. They had different priorities. The most voiceless and vulnerable exploited on corporate tech never had much of a voice, so corporate tech providers didn’t receive very much pushback.

Now I’m about to say something really wild, and you can call me whatever you want to call me, but I’m going to say what I believe to be true. I believe that the governments are either so incompetent that they allowed the proliferation of CSAM online, or they knowingly allowed the problem to fester long enough to have an excuse to violate privacy rights and erode end-to-end encryption. The US government could have seized the corporate tech providers over CSAM, but I believe that they were so useful as a propaganda arm for the regimes that they allowed them to continue virtually unscathed.

That season is done now, and the governments are making the issue a priority. It will come at a high cost. Privacy on corporate tech providers is virtually done as I’m typing this. It feels like a death rattle. I’m not particularly sure that we had much digital privacy to begin with, but the illusion of a veil of privacy feels gone.

To make matters slightly more complex, it would be hard to convince me that once AI really gets going, digital privacy will exist at all.

I believe that there should be a conversation shift to preserving freedoms and human rights in a post-privacy society.

I don’t want to get locked up because AI predicted a nasty post online from me about the government. I’m not a doomer about AI—I’m just going to roll with it personally. I’m looking forward to the positive changes that will be brought forth by AI. I see it as inevitable. A bit of privacy was helpful while it lasted. Please keep fighting to preserve what is left of privacy either way because I could be wrong about all of this.

On the topic of AI, the addition of AI to the horrific crime of child sexual abuse material and child sexual exploitation in multiple ways so far has been devastating. It’s currently out of control. The genie is out of the bottle. I am hopeful that innovation will get us humans out of this, but I’m not sure how or how long it will take. We must be extremely cautious around AI legislation. It should not be illegal to innovate even if some bad comes with the good. I don’t trust that the governments are equipped to decide the best pathway forward for AI. Source: the entire history of the government.

I have been personally negatively impacted by AI-generated content. Every few days, I get another alert that I’m featured again in what’s called “deep fake pornography” without my consent. I’m not happy about it, but what pains me the most is the thought that for a period of time down the road, many globally will experience what myself and others are experiencing now by being digitally sexually abused in this way. If you have ever had your picture taken and posted online, you are also at risk of being exploited in this way. Your child’s image can be used as well, unfortunately, and this is just the beginning of this particular nightmare. It will move to more realistic interpretations of sexual behaviors as technology improves. I have no brave words of wisdom about how to deal with that emotionally. I do have hope that innovation will save the day around this specific issue. I’m nervous that everyone online will have to ID verify due to this issue. I see that as one possible outcome that could help to prevent one problem but inadvertently cause more problems, especially for those living under authoritarian regimes or anyone who needs to remain anonymous online. A zero-knowledge proof (ZKP) would probably be the best solution to these issues. There are some survivors of violence and/or sexual trauma who need to remain anonymous online for various reasons. There are survivor stories available online of those who have been abused in this way. I’d encourage you seek out and listen to their stories.

There have been periods of time recently where I hesitate to say anything at all because more than likely AI will cover most of my concerns about education, awareness, prevention, detection, and removal of child sexual exploitation online, etc.

Unfortunately, some of the most pressing issues we’ve seen online over the last few years come in the form of “sextortion.” Self-generated child sexual exploitation (SG-CSEM) numbers are continuing to be terrifying. I’d strongly encourage that you look into sextortion data. AI + sextortion is also a huge concern. The perpetrators are using the non-sexually explicit images of children and putting their likeness on AI-generated child sexual exploitation content and extorting money, more imagery, or both from minors online. It’s like a million nightmares wrapped into one. The wild part is that these issues will only get more pervasive because technology is harnessed to perpetuate horror at a scale unimaginable to a human mind.

Even if you banned phones and the internet or tried to prevent children from accessing the internet, it wouldn’t solve it. Child sexual exploitation will still be with us until as a society we start to prevent the crime before it happens. That is the only human way out right now.

There is no reset button on the internet, but if I could go back, I’d tell survivor advocates to heed the warnings of the early internet builders and to start education and awareness campaigns designed to prevent as much online child sexual exploitation as possible. The internet and technology moved quickly, and I don’t believe that society ever really caught up. We live in a world where a child can be groomed by a predator in their own home while sitting on a couch next to their parents watching TV. We weren’t ready as a species to tackle the fast-paced algorithms and dangers online. It happened too quickly for parents to catch up. How can you parent for the ever-changing digital world unless you are constantly aware of the dangers?

I don’t think that the internet is inherently bad. I believe that it can be a powerful tool for freedom and resistance. I’ve spoken a lot about the bad online, but there is beauty as well. We often discuss how victims and survivors are abused online; we rarely discuss the fact that countless survivors around the globe have been able to share their experiences, strength, hope, as well as provide resources to the vulnerable. I do question if giving any government or tech company access to censorship, surveillance, etc., online in the name of serving survivors might not actually impact a portion of survivors negatively. There are a fair amount of survivors with powerful abusers protected by governments and the corporate press. If a survivor cannot speak to the press about their abuse, the only place they can go is online, directly or indirectly through an independent journalist who also risks being censored. This scenario isn’t hard to imagine—it already happened in China. During #MeToo, a survivor in China wanted to post their story. The government censored the post, so the survivor put their story on the blockchain. I’m excited that the survivor was creative and brave, but it’s terrifying to think that we live in a world where that situation is a necessity.

I believe that the future for many survivors sharing their stories globally will be on completely censorship-resistant and decentralized protocols. This thought in particular gives me hope. When we listen to the experiences of a diverse group of survivors, we can start to understand potential solutions to preventing the crimes from happening in the first place.

My heart is broken over the gut-wrenching stories of survivors sexually exploited online. Every time I hear the story of a survivor, I do think to myself quietly, “What could have prevented this from happening in the first place?” My heart is with survivors.

My head, on the other hand, is full of the understanding that the internet should remain free. The free flow of information should not be stopped. My mind is with the innocent citizens around the globe that deserve freedom both online and offline.

The problem is that governments don’t only want to censor illegal content that violates human rights—they create legislation that is so broad that it can impact speech and privacy of all. “Don’t you care about the kids?” Yes, I do. I do so much that I’m invested in finding solutions. I also care about all citizens around the globe that deserve an opportunity to live free from a mass surveillance society. If terrorism happens online, I should not be punished by losing my freedom. If drugs are sold online, I should not be punished. I’m not an abuser, I’m not a terrorist, and I don’t engage in illegal behaviors. I refuse to lose freedom because of others’ bad behaviors online.

I want to be clear that on a long enough timeline, the governments will decide that they can be better parents/caregivers than you can if something isn’t done to stop minors from being sexually exploited online. The price will be a complete loss of anonymity, privacy, free speech, and freedom of religion online. I find it rather insulting that governments think they’re better equipped to raise children than parents and caretakers.

So we can’t go backwards—all that we can do is go forward. Those who want to have freedom will find technology to facilitate their liberation. This will lead many over time to decentralized and open protocols. So as far as I’m concerned, this does solve a few of my worries—those who need, want, and deserve to speak freely online will have the opportunity in most countries—but what about online child sexual exploitation?

When I popped up around the decentralized space, I was met with the fear of censorship. I’m not here to censor you. I don’t write code. I couldn’t censor anyone or any piece of content even if I wanted to across the internet, no matter how depraved. I don’t have the skills to do that.

I’m here to start a conversation. Freedom comes at a cost. You must always fight for and protect your freedom. I can’t speak about protecting yourself from all of the Four Horsemen because I simply don’t know the topics well enough, but I can speak about this one topic.

If there was a shortcut to ending online child sexual exploitation, I would have found it by now. There isn’t one right now. I believe that education is the only pathway forward to preventing the crime of online child sexual exploitation for future generations.

I propose a yearly education course for every child of all school ages, taught as a standard part of the curriculum. Ideally, parents/caregivers would be involved in the education/learning process.

Course: - The creation of the internet and computers - The fight for cryptography - The tech supply chain from the ground up (example: human rights violations in the supply chain) - Corporate tech - Freedom tech - Data privacy - Digital privacy rights - AI (history-current) - Online safety (predators, scams, catfishing, extortion) - Bitcoin - Laws - How to deal with online hate and harassment - Information on who to contact if you are being abused online or offline - Algorithms - How to seek out the truth about news, etc., online

The parents/caregivers, homeschoolers, unschoolers, and those working to create decentralized parallel societies have been an inspiration while writing this, but my hope is that all children would learn this course, even in government ran schools. Ideally, parents would teach this to their own children.

The decentralized space doesn’t want child sexual exploitation to thrive. Here’s the deal: there has to be a strong prevention effort in order to protect the next generation. The internet isn’t going anywhere, predators aren’t going anywhere, and I’m not down to let anyone have the opportunity to prove that there is a need for more government. I don’t believe that the government should act as parents. The governments have had a chance to attempt to stop online child sexual exploitation, and they didn’t do it. Can we try a different pathway forward?

I’d like to put myself out of a job. I don’t want to ever hear another story like John Doe #1 ever again. This will require work. I’ve often called online child sexual exploitation the lynchpin for the internet. It’s time to arm generations of children with knowledge and tools. I can’t do this alone.

Individuals have fought so that I could have freedom online. I want to fight to protect it. I don’t want child predators to give the government any opportunity to take away freedom. Decentralized spaces are as close to a reset as we’ll get with the opportunity to do it right from the start. Start the youth off correctly by preventing potential hazards to the best of your ability.

The good news is anyone can work on this! I’d encourage you to take it and run with it. I added the additional education about the history of the internet to make the course more educational and fun. Instead of cleaning up generations of destroyed lives due to online sexual exploitation, perhaps this could inspire generations of those who will build our futures. Perhaps if the youth is armed with knowledge, they can create more tools to prevent the crime.

This one solution that I’m suggesting can be done on an individual level or on a larger scale. It should be adjusted depending on age, learning style, etc. It should be fun and playful.

This solution does not address abuse in the home or some of the root causes of offline child sexual exploitation. My hope is that it could lead to some survivors experiencing abuse in the home an opportunity to disclose with a trusted adult. The purpose for this solution is to prevent the crime of online child sexual exploitation before it occurs and to arm the youth with the tools to contact safe adults if and when it happens.

In closing, I went to hell a few times so that you didn’t have to. I spoke to the mothers of survivors of minors sexually exploited online—their tears could fill rivers. I’ve spoken with political dissidents who yearned to be free from authoritarian surveillance states. The only balance that I’ve found is freedom online for citizens around the globe and prevention from the dangers of that for the youth. Don’t slow down innovation and freedom. Educate, prepare, adapt, and look for solutions.

I’m not perfect and I’m sure that there are errors in this piece. I hope that you find them and it starts a conversation.

@ 826e9f89:ffc5c759

What follows began as snippets of conversations I have been having for years, on and off, here and there. It will likely eventually be collated into a piece I have been meaning to write on “payments” as a whole. I foolishly started writing this piece years ago, not realizing that the topic is gargantuan and for every week I spend writing it I have to add two weeks to my plan. That may or may not ever come to fruition, but in the meantime, Tether announced it was issuing on Taproot Assets and suddenly everybody is interested again. This is as good a catalyst as any to carve out my “stablecoin thesis”, such as it exists, from “payments”, and put it out there for comment and feedback.

In contrast to the “Bitcoiner take” I will shortly revert to, I invite the reader to keep the following potential counterargument in mind, which might variously be termed the “shitcoiner”, “realist”, or “cynical” take, depending on your perspective: that stablecoins have clear product-market-fit. Now, as a venture capitalist and professional thinkboi focusing on companies building on Bitcoin, I obviously think that not only is Bitcoin the best money ever invented and its monetization is pretty much inevitable, but that, furthermore, there is enormous, era-defining long-term potential for a range of industries in which Bitcoin is emerging as superior technology, even aside from its role as money. But in the interest not just of steelmanning but frankly just of honesty, I would grudgingly agree with the following assessment as of the time of writing: the applications of crypto (inclusive of Bitcoin but deliberately wider) that have found product-market-fit today, and that are not speculative bets on future development and adoption, are: Bitcoin as savings technology, mining as a means of monetizing energy production, and stablecoins.

I think there are two typical Bitcoiner objections to stablecoins of significantly greater importance than all others: that you shouldn’t be supporting dollar hegemony, and that you don’t need a blockchain. I will elaborate on each of these, and for the remainder of the post will aim to produce a synthesis of three superficially contrasting (or at least not obviously related) sources of inspiration: these objections, the realisation above that stablecoins just are useful, and some commentary on technical developments in Bitcoin and the broader space that I think inform where things are likely to go. As will become clear as the argument progresses, I actually think the outcome to which I am building up is where things have to go. I think the technical and economic incentives at play make this an inevitability rather than a “choice”, per se. Given my conclusion, which I will hold back for the time being, this is a fantastically good thing, hence I am motivated to write this post at all!

Objection 1: Dollar Hegemony

I list this objection first because there isn’t a huge amount to say about it. It is clearly a normative position, and while I more or less support it personally, I don’t think that it is material to the argument I am going on to make, so I don’t want to force it on the reader. While the case for this objection is probably obvious to this audience (isn’t the point of Bitcoin to destroy central banks, not further empower them?) I should at least offer the steelman that there is a link between this and the realist observation that stablecoins are useful. The reason they are useful is because people prefer the dollar to even shitter local fiat currencies. I don’t think it is particularly fruitful to say that they shouldn’t. They do. Facts don’t care about your feelings. There is a softer bridging argument to be made here too, to the effect that stablecoins warm up their users to the concept of digital bearer (ish) assets, even though these particular assets are significantly scammier than Bitcoin. Again, I am just floating this, not telling the reader they should or shouldn’t buy into it.

All that said, there is one argument I do want to put my own weight behind, rather than just float: stablecoin issuance is a speculative attack on the institution of fractional reserve banking. A “dollar” Alice moves from JPMorgan to Tether embodies two trade-offs from Alice’s perspective: i) a somewhat opaque profile on the credit risk of the asset: the likelihood of JPMorgan ever really defaulting on deposits vs the operator risk of Tether losing full backing and/or being wrench attacked by the Federal Government and rugging its users. These risks are real but are almost entirely political. I’m skeptical it is meaningful to quantify them, but even if it is, I am not the person to try to do it. Also, more transparently to Alice, ii) far superior payment rails (for now, more on this to follow).

However, from the perspective of the fiat banking cartel, fractional reserve leverage has been squeezed. There are just as many notional dollars in circulation, but there the backing has been shifted from levered to unlevered issuers. There are gradations of relevant objections to this: while one might say, Tether’s backing comes from Treasuries, so you are directly funding US debt issuance!, this is a bit silly in the context of what other dollars one might hold. It’s not like JPMorgan is really competing with the Treasury to sell credit into the open market. Optically they are, but this is the core of the fiat scam. Via the guarantees of the Federal Reserve System, JPMorgan can sell as much unbacked credit as it wants knowing full well the difference will be printed whenever this blows up. Short-term Treasuries are also JPMorgan’s most pristine asset safeguarding its equity, so the only real difference is that Tether only holds Treasuries without wishing more leverage into existence. The realization this all builds up to is that, by necessity,

Tether is a fully reserved bank issuing fiduciary media against the only dollar-denominated asset in existence whose value (in dollar terms) can be guaranteed. Furthermore, this media arguably has superior “moneyness” to the obvious competition in the form of US commercial bank deposits by virtue of its payment rails.

That sounds pretty great when you put it that way! Of course, the second sentence immediately leads to the second objection, and lets the argument start to pick up steam …

Objection 2: You Don’t Need a Blockchain

I don’t need to explain this to this audience but to recap as briefly as I can manage: Bitcoin’s value is entirely endogenous. Every aspect of “a blockchain” that, out of context, would be an insanely inefficient or redundant modification of a “database”, in context is geared towards the sole end of enabling the stability of this endogenous value. Historically, there have been two variations of stupidity that follow a failure to grok this: i) “utility tokens”, or blockchains with native tokens for something other than money. I would recommend anybody wanting a deeper dive on the inherent nonsense of a utility token to read Only The Strong Survive, in particular Chapter 2, Crypto Is Not Decentralized, and the subsection, Everything Fights For Liquidity, and/or Green Eggs And Ham, in particular Part II, Decentralized Finance, Technically. ii) “real world assets” or, creating tokens within a blockchain’s data structure that are not intended to have endogenous value but to act as digital quasi-bearer certificates to some or other asset of value exogenous to this system. Stablecoins are in this second category.

RWA tokens definitionally have to have issuers, meaning some entity that, in the real world, custodies or physically manages both the asset and the record-keeping scheme for the asset. “The blockchain” is at best a secondary ledger to outsource ledger updates to public infrastructure such that the issuer itself doesn’t need to bother and can just “check the ledger” whenever operationally relevant. But clearly ownership cannot be enforced in an analogous way to Bitcoin, under both technical and social considerations. Technically, Bitcoin’s endogenous value means that whoever holds the keys to some or other UTXOs functionally is the owner. Somebody else claiming to be the owner is yelling at clouds. Whereas, socially, RWA issuers enter a contract with holders (whether legally or just in terms of a common-sense interpretation of the transaction) such that ownership of the asset issued against is entirely open to dispute. That somebody can point to “ownership” of the token may or may not mean anything substantive with respect to the physical reality of control of the asset, and how the issuer feels about it all.

And so, one wonders, why use a blockchain at all? Why doesn’t the issuer just run its own database (for the sake of argument with some or other signature scheme for verifying and auditing transactions) given it has the final say over issuance and redemption anyway? I hinted at an answer above: issuing on a blockchain outsources this task to public infrastructure. This is where things get interesting. While it is technically true, given the above few paragraphs, that, you don’t need a blockchain for that, you also don’t need to not use a blockchain for that. If you want to, you can.

This is clearly the case given stablecoins exist at all and have gone this route. If one gets too angry about not needing a blockchain for that, one equally risks yelling at clouds! And, in fact, one can make an even stronger argument, more so from the end users’ perspective. These products do not exist in a vacuum but rather compete with alternatives. In the case of stablecoins, the alternative is traditional fiat money, which, as stupid as RWAs on a blockchain are, is even dumber. It actually is just a database, except it’s a database that is extremely annoying to use, basically for political reasons because the industry managing these private databases form a cartel that never needs to innovate or really give a shit about its customers at all. In many, many cases, stablecoins on blockchains are dumb in the abstract, but superior to the alternative methods of holding and transacting in dollars existing in other forms. And note, this is only from Alice’s perspective of wanting to send and receive, not a rehashing of the fractional reserve argument given above. This is the essence of their product-market-fit. Yell at clouds all you like: they just are useful given the alternative usually is not Bitcoin, it’s JPMorgan’s KYC’d-up-the-wazoo 90s-era website, more than likely from an even less solvent bank.

So where does this get us? It might seem like we are back to “product-market-fit, sorry about that” with Bitcoiners yelling about feelings while everybody else makes do with their facts. However, I think we have introduced enough material to move the argument forward by incrementally incorporating the following observations, all of which I will shortly go into in more detail: i) as a consequence of making no technical sense with respect to what blockchains are for, today’s approach won’t scale; ii) as a consequence of short-termist tradeoffs around socializing costs, today’s approach creates an extremely unhealthy and arguably unnatural market dynamic in the issuer space; iii) Taproot Assets now exist and handily address both points i) and ii), and; iv) eCash is making strides that I believe will eventually replace even Taproot Assets.

To tease where all this is going, and to get the reader excited before we dive into much more detail: just as Bitcoin will eat all monetary premia, Lightning will likely eat all settlement, meaning all payments will gravitate towards routing over Lightning regardless of the denomination of the currency at the edges. Fiat payments will gravitate to stablecoins to take advantage of this; stablecoins will gravitate to TA and then to eCash, and all of this will accelerate hyperbitcoinization by “bitcoinizing” payment rails such that an eventual full transition becomes as simple as flicking a switch as to what denomination you want to receive.

I will make two important caveats before diving in that are more easily understood in light of having laid this groundwork: I am open to the idea that it won’t be just Lightning or just Taproot Assets playing the above roles. Without veering into forecasting the entire future development of Bitcoin tech, I will highlight that all that really matters here are, respectively: a true layer 2 with native hashlocks, and a token issuance scheme that enables atomic routing over such a layer 2 (or combination of such). For the sake of argument, the reader is welcome to swap in “Ark” and “RGB” for “Lightning” and “TA” both above and in all that follows. As far as I can tell, this makes no difference to the argument and is even exciting in its own right. However, for the sake of simplicity in presentation, I will stick to “Lightning” and “TA” hereafter.

1) Today’s Approach to Stablecoins Won’t Scale

This is the easiest to tick off and again doesn’t require much explanation to this audience. Blockchains fundamentally don’t scale, which is why Bitcoin’s UTXO scheme is a far better design than ex-Bitcoin Crypto’s’ account-based models, even entirely out of context of all the above criticisms. This is because Bitcoin transactions can be batched across time and across users with combinations of modes of spending restrictions that provide strong economic guarantees of correct eventual net settlement, if not perpetual deferral. One could argue this is a decent (if abstrusely technical) definition of “scaling” that is almost entirely lacking in Crypto.

What we see in ex-Bitcoin crypto is so-called “layer 2s” that are nothing of the sort, forcing stablecoin schemes in these environments into one of two equally poor design choices if usage is ever to increase: fees go higher and higher, to the point of economic unviability (and well past it) as blocks fill up, or move to much more centralized environments that increasingly are just databases, and hence which lose the benefits of openness thought to be gleaned by outsourcing settlement to public infrastructure. This could be in the form of punting issuance to a bullshit “layer 2” that is a really a multisig “backing” a private execution environment (to be decentralized any daw now) or an entirely different blockchain that is just pretending even less not to be a database to begin with. In a nutshell, this is a decent bottom-up explanation as to why Tron has the highest settlement of Tether.

This also gives rise to the weirdness of “gas tokens” - assets whose utility as money is and only is in the form of a transaction fee to transact a different kind of money. These are not quite as stupid as a “utility token,” given at least they are clearly fulfilling a monetary role and hence their artificial scarcity can be justified. But they are frustrating from Bitcoiners’ and users’ perspectives alike: users would prefer to pay transaction fees on dollars in dollars, but they can’t because the value of Ether, Sol, Tron, or whatever, is the string and bubblegum that hold their boondoggles together. And Bitcoiners wish this stuff would just go away and stop distracting people, whereas this string and bubblegum is proving transiently useful.

All in all, today’s approach is fine so long as it isn’t being used much. It has product-market fit, sure, but in the unenviable circumstance that, if it really starts to take off, it will break, and even the original users will find it unusable.

2) Today’s Approach to Stablecoins Creates an Untenable Market Dynamic

Reviving the ethos of you don’t need a blockchain for that, notice the following subtlety: while the tokens representing stablecoins have value to users, that value is not native to the blockchain on which they are issued. Tether can (and routinely does) burn tokens on Ethereum and mint them on Tron, then burn on Tron and mint on Solana, and so on. So-called blockchains “go down” and nobody really cares. This makes no difference whatsoever to Tether’s own accounting, and arguably a positive difference to users given these actions track market demand. But it is detrimental to the blockchain being switched away from by stripping it of “TVL” that, it turns out, was only using it as rails: entirely exogenous value that leaves as quickly as it arrived.

One underdiscussed and underappreciated implication of the fact that no value is natively running through the blockchain itself is that, in the current scheme, both the sender and receiver of a stablecoin have to trust the same issuer. This creates an extremely powerful network effect that, in theory, makes the first-to-market likely to dominate and in practice has played out exactly as this theory would suggest: Tether has roughly 80% of the issuance, while roughly 19% goes to the political carve-out of USDC that wouldn’t exist at all were it not for government interference. Everybody else combined makes up the final 1%.

So, Tether is a full reserve bank but also has to be everybody’s bank. This is the source of a lot of the discomfort with Tether, and which feeds into the original objection around dollar hegemony, that there is an ill-defined but nonetheless uneasy feeling that Tether is slowly morphing into a CBDC. I would argue this really has nothing to do with Tether’s own behavior but rather is a consequence of the market dynamic inevitably created by the current stablecoin scheme. There is no reason to trust any other bank because nobody really wants a bank, they just want the rails. They want something that will retain a nominal dollar value long enough to spend it again. They don’t care what tech it runs on and they don’t even really care about the issuer except insofar as having some sense they won’t get rugged.

Notice this is not how fiat works. Banks can, of course, settle between each other, thus enabling their users to send money to customers of other banks. This settlement function is actually the entire point of central banks, less the money printing and general corruption enabled (we might say, this was the historical point of central banks, which have since become irredeemably corrupted by this power). This process is clunkier than stablecoins, as covered above, but the very possibility of settlement means there is no gigantic network effect to being the first commercial issuer of dollar balances. If it isn’t too triggering to this audience, one might suggest that the money printer also removes the residual concern that your balances might get rugged! (or, we might again say, you guarantee you don’t get rugged in the short term by guaranteeing you do get rugged in the long term).

This is a good point at which to introduce the unsettling observation that broader fintech is catching on to the benefits of stablecoins without any awareness whatsoever of all the limitations I am outlining here. With the likes of Stripe, Wise, Robinhood, and, post-Trump, even many US megabanks supposedly contemplating issuing stablecoins (obviously within the current scheme, not the scheme I am building up to proposing), we are forced to boggle our minds considering how on earth settlement is going to work. Are they going to settle through Ether? Well, no, because i) Ether isn’t money, it’s … to be honest, I don’t think anybody really knows what it is supposed to be, or if they once did they aren’t pretending anymore, but anyway, Stripe certainly hasn’t figured that out yet so, ii) it won’t be possible to issue them on layer 1s as soon as there is any meaningful volume, meaning they will have to route through “bullshit layer 2 wrapped Ether token that is really already a kind of stablecoin for Ether.”

The way they are going to try to fix this (anybody wanna bet?) is routing through DEXes, which is so painfully dumb you should be laughing and, if you aren’t, I would humbly suggest you don’t get just how dumb it is. What this amounts to is plugging the gap of Ether’s lack of moneyness (and wrapped Ether’s hilarious lack of moneyness) with … drum roll … unknowable technical and counterparty risk and unpredictable cost on top of reverting to just being a database. So, in other words, all of the costs of using a blockchain when you don’t strictly need to, and none of the benefits. Stripe is going to waste billions of dollars getting sandwich attacked out of some utterly vanilla FX settlement it is facilitating for clients who have even less of an idea what is going on and why North Korea now has all their money, and will eventually realize they should have skipped their shitcoin phase and gone straight to understanding Bitcoin instead …

3) Bitcoin (and Taproot Assets) Fixes This

To tie together a few loose ends, I only threw in the hilariously stupid suggestion of settling through wrapped Ether on Ether on Ether in order to tee up the entirely sensible suggestion of settling through Lightning. Again, not that this will be new to this audience, but while issuance schemes have been around on Bitcoin for a long time, the breakthrough of Taproot Assets is essentially the ability to atomically route through Lightning.

I will admit upfront that this presents a massive bootstrapping challenge relative to the ex-Bitcoin Crypto approach, and it’s not obvious to me if or how this will be overcome. I include this caveat to make it clear I am not suggesting this is a given. It may not be, it’s just beyond the scope of this post (or frankly my ability) to predict. This is a problem for Lightning Labs, Tether, and whoever else decides to step up to issue. But even highlighting this as an obvious and major concern invites us to consider an intriguing contrast: scaling TA stablecoins is hardest at the start and gets easier and easier thereafter. The more edge liquidity there is in TA stables, the less of a risk it is for incremental issuance; the more TA activity, the more attractive deploying liquidity is into Lightning proper, and vice versa. With apologies if this metaphor is even more confusing than it is helpful, one might conceive of the situation as being that there is massive inertia to bootstrap, but equally there could be positive feedback in driving the inertia to scale. Again, I have no idea, and it hasn’t happened yet in practice, but in theory it’s fun.

More importantly to this conversation, however, this is almost exactly the opposite dynamic to the current scheme on other blockchains, which is basically free to start, but gets more and more expensive the more people try to use it. One might say it antiscales (I don’t think that’s a real word, but if Taleb can do it, then I can do it too!).

Furthermore, the entire concept of “settling in Bitcoin” makes perfect sense both economically and technically: economically because Bitcoin is money, and technically because it can be locked in an HTLC and hence can enable atomic routing (i.e. because Lightning is a thing). This is clearly better than wrapped Eth on Eth on Eth or whatever, but, tantalisingly, is better than fiat too! The core message of the payments tome I may or may not one day write is (or will be) that fiat payments, while superficially efficient on the basis of centralized and hence costless ledger amendments, actually have a hidden cost in the form of interbank credit. Many readers will likely have heard me say this multiple times and in multiple settings but, contrary to popular belief, there is no such thing as a fiat debit. Even if styled as a debit, all fiat payments are credits and all have credit risk baked into their cost, even if that is obscured and pushed to the absolute foundational level of money printing to keep banks solvent and hence keep payment channels open.

Furthermore! this enables us to strip away the untenable market dynamic from the point above. The underappreciated and underdiscussed flip side of the drawback of the current dynamic that is effectively fixed by Taproot Assets is that there is no longer a mammoth network effect to a single issuer. Senders and receivers can trust different issuers (i.e. their own banks) because those banks can atomically settle a single payment over Lightning. This does not involve credit. It is arguably the only true debit in the world across both the relevant economic and technical criteria: it routes through money with no innate credit risk, and it does so atomically due to that money’s native properties.

Savvy readers may have picked up on a seed I planted a while back and which can now delightfully blossom:

This is what Visa was supposed to be!

Crucially, this is not what Visa is now. Visa today is pretty much the bank that is everybody’s counterparty, takes a small credit risk for the privilege, and oozes free cash flow bottlenecking global consumer payments.

But if you read both One From Many by Dee Hock (for a first person but pretty wild and extravagant take) and Electronic Value Exchange by David Stearns (for a third person, drier, but more analytical and historically contextualized take) or if you are just intimately familiar with the modern history of payments for whatever other reason, you will see that the role I just described for Lightning in an environment of unboundedly many banks issuing fiduciary media in the form of stablecoins is exactly what Dee Hock wanted to create when he envisioned Visa:

A neutral and open layer of value settlement enabling banks to create digital, interbank payment schemes for their customers at very low cost.

As it turns out, his vision was technically impossible with fiat, hence Visa, which started as a cooperative amongst member banks, was corrupted into a duopolistic for-profit rent seeker in curious parallel to the historical path of central banks …

4) eCash

To now push the argument to what I think is its inevitable conclusion, it’s worth being even more vigilant on the front of you don’t need a blockchain for that. I have argued that there is a role for a blockchain in providing a neutral settlement layer to enable true debits of stablecoins. But note this is just a fancy and/or stupid way of saying that Bitcoin is both the best money and is programmable, which we all knew anyway. The final step is realizing that, while TA is nice in terms of providing a kind of “on ramp” for global payments infrastructure as a whole to reorient around Lightning, there is some path dependence here in assuming (almost certainly correctly) that the familiarity of stablecoins as “RWA tokens on a blockchain” will be an important part of the lure.

But once that transition is complete, or is well on its way to being irreversible, we may as well come full circle and cut out tokens altogether. Again, you really don’t need a blockchain for that, and the residual appeal of better rails has been taken care of with the above massive detour through what I deem to be the inevitability of Lightning as a settlement layer. Just as USDT on Tron arguably has better moneyness than a JPMorgan balance, so a “stablecoin” as eCash has better moneyness than as a TA given it is cheaper, more private, and has more relevantly bearer properties (in other words, because it is cash). The technical detail that it can be hashlocked is really all you need to tie this all together. That means it can be atomically locked into a Lightning routed debit to the recipient of a different issuer (or “mint” in eCash lingo, but note this means the same thing as what we have been calling fully reserved banks). And the economic incentive is pretty compelling too because, for all their benefits, there is still a cost to TAs given they are issued onchain and they require asset-specific liquidity to route on Lightning. Once the rest of the tech is in place, why bother? Keep your Lightning connectivity and just become a mint.

What you get at that point is dramatically superior private database to JPMorgan with the dramatically superior public rails of Lightning. There is nothing left to desire from “a blockchain” besides what Bitcoin is fundamentally for in the first place: counterparty-risk-free value settlement.

And as a final point with a curious and pleasing echo to Dee Hock at Visa, Calle has made the point repeatedly that David Chaum’s vision for eCash, while deeply philosophical besides the technical details, was actually pretty much impossible to operate on fiat. From an eCash perspective, fiat stablecoins within the above infrastructure setup are a dramatic improvement on anything previously possible. But, of course, they are a slippery slope to Bitcoin regardless …

Objections Revisited

As a cherry on top, I think the objections I highlighted at the outset are now readily addressed – to the extent the reader believes what I am suggesting is more or less a technical and economic inevitability, that is. While, sure, I’m not particularly keen on giving the Treasury more avenues to sell its welfare-warfare shitcoin, on balance the likely development I’ve outlined is an enormous net positive: it’s going to sell these anyway so I prefer a strong economic incentive to steadily transition not only to Lightning as payment rails but eCash as fiduciary media, and to use “fintech” as a carrot to induce a slow motion bank run.

As alluded to above, once all this is in place, the final step to a Bitcoin standard becomes as simple as an individual’s decision to want Bitcoin instead of fiat. On reflection, this is arguably the easiest part! It's setting up all the tech that puts people off, so trojan-horsing them with “faster, cheaper payment rails” seems like a genius long-term strategy.

And as to “needing a blockchain” (or not), I hope that is entirely wrapped up at this point. The only blockchain you need is Bitcoin, but to the extent people are still confused by this (which I think will take decades more to fully unwind), we may as well lean into dazzling them with whatever innovation buzzwords and decentralization theatre they were going to fall for anyway before realizing they wanted Bitcoin all along.

Conclusion

Stablecoins are useful whether you like it or not. They are stupid in the abstract but it turns out fiat is even stupider, on inspection. But you don’t need a blockchain, and using one as decentralization theatre creates technical debt that is insurmountable in the long run. Blockchain-based stablecoins are doomed to a utility inversely proportional to their usage, and just to rub it in, their ill-conceived design practically creates a commercial dynamic that mandates there only ever be a single issuer.

Given they are useful, it seems natural that this tension is going to blow up at some point. It also seems worthwhile observing that Taproot Asset stablecoins have almost the inverse problem and opposite commercial dynamic: they will be most expensive to use at the outset but get cheaper and cheaper as their usage grows. Also, there is no incentive towards a monopoly issuer but rather towards as many as are willing to try to operate well and provide value to their users.

As such, we can expect any sizable growth in stablecoins to migrate to TA out of technical and economic necessity. Once this has happened - or possibly while it is happening but is clearly not going to stop - we may as well strip out the TA component and just use eCash because you really don’t need a blockchain for that at all. And once all the money is on eCash, deciding you want to denominate it in Bitcoin is the simplest on-ramp to hyperbitcoinization you can possibly imagine, given we’ve spent the previous decade or two rebuilding all payments tech around Lightning.

Or: Bitcoin fixes this. The End.

• Allen, #892,125

thanks to Marco Argentieri, Lyn Alden, and Calle for comments and feedback

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Money is more than just a medium of exchange—it’s the current that drives economies, the lifeblood of societies, and the pulse of civilization itself. When money decays, so does the culture it sustains. Take fiat, for example. Created out of thin air and inflated into oblivion, it acts like poison—rewarding conformity over sovereignty, speculation over creation, and exploitation over collaboration.

A culture built this way fails to foster true progress. Instead, it pushes us into darker corners where creativity and truth become increasingly scarce.

From the food we eat to the media we consume, much of modern culture has become a reflection of this problem—prioritizing shortcuts, convenience, and profit at any cost. It seems there’s no room left for depth, authenticity, or connection anymore.

Art, for example—once a sacred space for meaning, and inner calling—has not been spared either. Stripped of its purpose, it too falls into gloom, weaponized to divide and manipulate rather than inspire beauty and growth.

“Art is the lie that reveals the truth” as Picasso once said.

Indeed, this intriguing perspective highlights the subjectivity of truth and the many ways art can be interpreted. While creative expression doesn’t always need to mirror reality one-to-one—actually, often reshaping it through the creator’s lens—much of what we’re surrounded with these days feels like a dangerous illusion built on the rotten incentives of decaying values.

The movies we watch, the music we hear, and the stories we absorb from books, articles, ads, and commercials—are too often crafted to condition specific behaviors. Greed, laziness, overconsumption, ignorance (feel free to add to this list). Instead of enriching our culture, they disconnect us from each other, as well as from our own minds, hearts, and souls.

If you see yourself as a Bitcoiner—or, as I like to call it, ‘a freedom fighter at heart’—and you care about building a world based on truth, freedom, and prosperity, please recognize that culture is also our battleground.

Artistic forms act as transformative forces in the fight against the status quo.

Join me and the hundreds of guests this May at Bitcoin FilmFest 2025.

You don’t have to be a creative person in the traditional sense—like a filmmaker, writer, painter, sculptor, musician, and so on—to have a direct impact on culture!

One way or another, you engage with creative realms anyway. The deeper you connect with them, the better you understand the reality we live in versus the future humanity deserves.

I know the process may take time, but I truly believe it’s possible. Unfiat The Culture!

Bitcoin FilmFest 2025. May 22-25, Warsaw, Poland.

The third annual edition of a unique event built at the intersection of independent films, art, and culture.

“Your narrative begins where centralized scripts end—explore the uncharted stories beyond the cinema.” - Details: bitcoinfilmfest.com/bff25/ - Grab 10% off your tickets with code YAKIHONNE!

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This is a part of the Bitcoin Infinity Academy course on Knut Svanholm's book Bitcoin: Sovereignty Through Mathematics. For more information, check out our Geyser page!

Scarcity

What makes a commodity scarce? What is scarcity in the first place? What other properties can be deducted from an object’s scarcity? How are scarcity, energy, time, and value connected? Scarcity might seem easy to describe on the surface, but in reality, it’s not. Not when you take infinity into account. Infinity is a concept that has puzzled the human mind for as long as it has been able to imagine it. If it ever has. It is a very abstract concept, and it’s always linked to time simply because even imagining an infinite number would take an infinite amount of time. If we truly live in an infinite universe, scarcity cannot exist. If something exists in an infinite universe, an infinite number of copies of this something must also exist since the probability of this being true would also be infinite in an infinite universe. Therefore, scarcity must always be defined within a set framework. No frame, no scarcity.

Think of it this way: the most expensive artwork ever sold at the time of writing was the Salvator Mundi, painted by Leonardo da Vinci. It’s not even a particularly beautiful painting, so why the high price? Because Da Vinci originals are scarce. A poster of the painting isn’t expensive at all, but the original will cost you at least 450 million US Dollars. All because we agree to frame its scarcity around the notion that it is a Da Vinci original, of which under twenty exist today. Historically, scarcity has always been framed around real-world limits to the supply of a good. Most of the great thinkers of the Austrian school of economics from the twentieth century believed that the value of a monetary good arises from its scarcity and that scarcity is always connected to the real-world availability of that good. Most of them believed that a gold standard would be the hardest form of money that we would ever see and the closest thing to an absolutely scarce resource as we would ever know.

In the late 90’s, the cryptographers that laid the groundwork for what would become Bitcoin reimagined scarcity as anything with an unforgeable costliness. This mindset is key to understanding the connection between scarcity and value. Anything can be viewed as scarce if it’s sufficiently hard to produce and hard to fake the production cost of — in other words, easy to verify the validity of. The zeros at the beginning of a hashed Bitcoin block are the Proof of Work that proves that the created coins in that block were costly to produce. People who promote the idea that the mining algorithm used to produce Bitcoin could be more environmentally friendly or streamlined are either deliberately lying or missing the point. The energy expenditure is the very thing that gives the token its value because it provides proof to the network that enough computing power was sacrificed in order to keep the network sufficiently decentralized and thus resistant to change. "Easy to verify" is the flipside of the "unforgeable costliness" coin. The validity of a Bitcoin block is very easy to verify since all you need to do is look at its hash, make sure the block is part of the strongest chain, and that it conforms to all consensus rules. In order to check whether a gold bar is real or not, you probably need to trust a third party. Fiat money often comes with a plethora of water stamps, holograms, and metal stripes, so in a sense, they’re hard to forge. What you cannot know about a fiat currency at any given moment, though, is how much of it is in circulation. What you do know about fiat currencies is that they’re not scarce.

Bitcoin provides us with absolute scarcity for the first time in human history. It is a remarkable breakthrough. Even though you can’t make jewelry or anything else out of Bitcoin, its total supply is fixed. After the year 2140, after the last Bitcoin has been mined, the total amount of Bitcoin in circulation can only go down. This limited supply is what the gold standards of the past were there for in the first place. Bitcoin’s supply is much more limited than that of gold, however, since they will be lost as time goes by. Since the supply is so limited, it doesn’t matter what the current demand is. The potential upside to its value is literally limitless due to this relationship between supply and demand. The “backing” that other currencies have is only there to assume people that the currency will keep its value over time, and the only way of ensuring this is to limit the supply. Bitcoin does this better than any other thing before it. Leonardo da Vinci’s original paintings are extremely valuable because of Leonardo’s brand name and the fact that there are only about 13 of them left. One day there’ll be less than one left. The same is true for Bitcoin.

Scarcity on the Internet was long believed to be an impossible invention, and it took a multi-talented genius such as Satoshi Nakamoto to figure out all the different parts that make Bitcoin so much more than the sum of them. His disappearance from the project was one such part, maybe the most important one. The thing about computerized scarcity is that it was a one-time invention. Once it was invented, the invention could not be recreated. That’s just the nature of data. Computers are designed to be able to replicate any data set any number of times. This is true for every piece of code there is, and digital scarcity needed to be framed somehow to work. Bitcoin’s consensus rules provided such a frame. Bitcoin certainly seems to provide true digital scarcity, and if the game theoretical theories that it builds on are correct, its promise of an ever-increasing value will be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In 2018, the inflation rate of the Venezuelan Bolivar was a staggering 80,000%. Hugo Chavez and his successor, Nicolas Maduro, effectively killed the Venezuelan economy with socialism. It has happened before — and sadly, it is likely to happen again. The main problem with socialism is not that people aren’t incentivized to work in socialist countries. On the contrary, hungry people under the threat of violence tend to work harder than most. The problem with state-owned production is that there is no free market price mechanism to reflect the true demand for goods and, therefore, no way of knowing how much supply the state should produce. Everything is in constant surplus or shortage — often the latter, as the empty supermarket shelves in Venezuela depressingly attest. Chavez and Maduro attempted to rescue the country’s economy by printing more money — which simply does not work. Their true motives for printing money are, of course, questionable given that it depreciated the value of Bolivar bills to less than that of toilet paper. As mentioned in earlier chapters, inflation is the greatest hidden threat to themselves that humans have ever created.

A few hundred years ago, the Catholic Church held the lion’s share of political power throughout Europe. Today, power primarily resides with nation-states in collusion with multinational corporations. The separation of church and state triggered the migration of power from the former to the latter, emancipating many citizens in the process. Still, places like Venezuela are sad proof that “the people” are still not in power in many self-proclaimed democracies — if in any, for that matter. Another separation will have to take place first: The separation of money and state. We, the people of Planet Earth, now have the means at our disposal for this separation to take place. Whether we use them or not will determine how emancipated and independent our children can and will be in the future.

About the Bitcoin Infinity Academy

The Bitcoin Infinity Academy is an educational project built around Knut Svanholm’s books about Bitcoin and Austrian Economics. Each week, a whole chapter from one of the books is released for free on Highlighter, accompanied by a video in which Knut and Luke de Wolf discuss that chapter’s ideas. You can join the discussions by signing up for one of the courses on our Geyser page. Signed books, monthly calls, and lots of other benefits are also available.

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Read the original blog post

These reviews are sponsored, yet the sponsorship does not influence the outcome of the evaluations. Sponsored reviews are independent from the kycnot.me list, being only part of the blog. The reviews have no impact on the scores of the listings or their continued presence on the list. Should any issues arise, I will not hesitate to remove any listing. Reviews are in collaboration with Orangefren.

The review

Swapter.io is an all-purpose instant exchange. They entered the scene in the depths of the bear market about 2 years ago in June of 2022.

| Pros | Cons | | --------------- | ---------------------------------- | | Low fees | Shotgun KYC with opaque triggers | | Large liquidity | Relies on 3rd party liquidity | | Works over Tor | Front-end not synced with back-end | | Pretty UI | |

Rating: ★★★☆☆ Service Website: swapter.io

⚠️ There is an ongoing issue with this service: read more on Reddit.

Test Trades

During our testing we performed a trade from XMR to LTC, and then back to XMR.

Our first trade had the ID of: mpUitpGemhN8jjNAjQuo6EvQ. We were promised 0.8 LTC for sending 0.5 XMR, before we sent the Monero. When the Monero arrived we were sent 0.799 LTC.

On the return journey we performed trade with ID: yaCRb5pYcRKAZcBqg0AzEGYg. This time we were promised 0.4815 XMR for sending 0.799 LTC. After Litecoin arrived we were sent 0.4765 XMR.

As such we saw a discrepancy of ~0.1% in the first trade and ~1% in the second trade. Considering those trades were floating we determine the estimates presented in the UI to be highly accurate and honest.

Of course Swapter could've been imposing a large fee on their estimates, but we checked their estimates against CoinGecko and found the difference to be equivalent to a fee of just over 0.5%. Perfectly in line with other swapping services.

Trading

Swapter supports BTC, LTC, XMR and well over a thousand other coins. Sadly they don't support the Lightning Network. For the myriad of currencies they deal with they provide massive upper limits. You could exchange tens, or even hundreds, of thousands of dollars worth of cryptocurrency in a single trade (although we wouldn't recommend it).

The flip side to this is that Swapter relies on 3rd party liquidity. Aside from the large liqudity this also benefits the user insofar as it allows for very low fees. However, it also comes with a negative - the 3rd party gets to see all your trades. Unfortunately Swapter opted not to share where they source their liquidity in their Privacy Policy or Terms of Service.

KYC & AML policies

Swapter reserves the right to require its users to provide their full name, their date of birth, their address and government-issued ID. A practice known as "shotgun KYC". This should not happen often - in our testing it never did - however it's not clear when exactly it could happen. The AML & KYC policy provided on Swapter's website simply states they will put your trade on hold if their "risk scoring system [deems it] as suspicious".

Worse yet, if they determine that "any of the information [the] customer provided is incorrect, false, outdated, or incomplete" then Swapter may decide to terminate all of the services they provide to the user. What exactly would happen to their funds in such a case remains unclear.

The only clarity we get is that the Swapter policy outlines a designated 3rd party that will verify the information provided by the user. The third party's name is Sum & Substance Ltd, also simply known as samsub and available at sumsub.com

It's understandable that some exchanges will decide on a policy of this sort, especially when they rely on external liquidity, but we would prefer more clarity be given. When exactly is a trade suspicious?

Tor

We were pleased to discover Swapter works over Tor. However, they do not provide a Tor mirror, nor do they work without JavaScript. Additionally, we found that some small features, such as the live chat, did not work over Tor. Fortunately, other means of contacting their support are still available.

UI

We have found the Swapter UI to be very modern, straightforward and simple to use. It's available in 4 languages (English, French, Dutch and Russian), although we're unable to vouch for the quality of some of those, the ones that we used seemed perfectly serviceable.

Our only issue with the UI was that it claims the funds have been sent following the trade, when in reality it seems to take the backend a minute or so to actually broadcast the transaction.

Getting in touch

Swapter's team has a chat on their website, a support email address and a support Telegram. Their social media presence in most active on Telegram and X (formerly Twitter).

Disclaimer

None of the above should be understood as investment or financial advice. The views are our own only and constitute a faithful representation of our experience in using and investigating this exchange. This review is not a guarantee of any kind on the services rendered by the exchange. Do your own research before using any service.

@ df67f9a7:2d4fc200

Businesses want Nostr, but Nostr is not ready for business. What can be done?

TLDR :

What Nostr brings to business apps…

• Get your brands in front of users with your choice of SEO and Algos that YOU control.
• Access unlimited public user data from across the network without fees or permission.
• Keep your business data private, while "releasing" liability for other data collected by your apps.
• Build one app to reach a diversity of users from across the network, even from other apps.
• Build your own tech and to use it as you wish. No gate keepers or code review process.

Businesses want Nostr.

• Businesses want reliable SEO and socials to put their brands in front of users, rather than arbitrary gate keepers, censoring the marketplace on a whim.
• Businesses want open access to harvest public data for free on a soveregnty respecting network, rather than paying gate keepers for access to user data of questionalble origin.
• Businesses want the freedom to NOT take ownership of certain user data collected by their apps, rather than being liabile for moderation and safe handling on their private infrastructure.
• Busineses want a single open protocol on which to build their apps, with unlimited potential and a diversity of shared users from other apps, rather than multiple siloed networks with difering APIs and demographics.
• Businesses want to own the technology they build and to use it as they wish, rather than submit their code for approval and control by arbitrary gate keepers.

But Nostr is not ready for business.

• Businesses DON'T want proprietary app data stored publicly as signed Nostr events on user specified relays.
• Businesses DON'T want to have to specify, or be constrained by, or even navigate the complexity of Nostr NIP standards for every novel kind of content that their apps generate.
• Businesses DON'T want to "open source" their entire suite of native apps JUST to assure end users that Nostr private keys are being safely handled.
• Businesses DON'T want to have to "rewrite" their entire app backend just to accomodate the Nostr way of "users sign events but dont actually login to your server" auth architecture.
• Businesses DONT want to suffer DDOS from bots and bad actors, or to expose their users to unwanted content, or even to have their own content disappear a sea of spam and misinformation.

Here’s what can be done.

• More tools and services for private business apps to coexist with freedom tech, and even thrive together, on the Nostr network.
• Extensible Webs of Trust algos for discovery and reach into any audience or demographic of trusted users.
• WoT powered standard APIs for exposing content to Nostr (and other business apps) from within a “black box” business app.
• HTTP AUTH (NIP 98) integration for business apps, allowing users to create local content WITHOUT needing discrete signatures or “linked” user accounts.
• Frost compatible “login“ for business apps, allowing users to paste “disposable” nsecs into proprietary clients without fear of their “cold” nsec being compromised.
• Support for “incremental” (and voluntary) adoption of freedom tech into existing business apps, with easy off-ramps for businesses to transfer more and more siloed data onto the “public” network.

Thoughts so far…

@ 21335073:a244b1ad

Warning: This piece contains a conversation about difficult topics. Please proceed with caution.

TL;DR please educate your children about online safety.

Julian Assange wrote in his 2012 book Cypherpunks, “This book is not a manifesto. There isn’t time for that. This book is a warning.” I read it a few times over the past summer. Those opening lines definitely stood out to me. I wish we had listened back then. He saw something about the internet that few had the ability to see. There are some individuals who are so close to a topic that when they speak, it’s difficult for others who aren’t steeped in it to visualize what they’re talking about. I didn’t read the book until more recently. If I had read it when it came out, it probably would have sounded like an unknown foreign language to me. Today it makes more sense.

This isn’t a manifesto. This isn’t a book. There is no time for that. It’s a warning and a possible solution from a desperate and determined survivor advocate who has been pulling and unraveling a thread for a few years. At times, I feel too close to this topic to make any sense trying to convey my pathway to my conclusions or thoughts to the general public. My hope is that if nothing else, I can convey my sense of urgency while writing this. This piece is a watchman’s warning.

When a child steps online, they are walking into a new world. A new reality. When you hand a child the internet, you are handing them possibilities—good, bad, and ugly. This is a conversation about lowering the potential of negative outcomes of stepping into that new world and how I came to these conclusions. I constantly compare the internet to the road. You wouldn’t let a young child run out into the road with no guidance or safety precautions. When you hand a child the internet without any type of guidance or safety measures, you are allowing them to play in rush hour, oncoming traffic. “Look left, look right for cars before crossing.” We almost all have been taught that as children. What are we taught as humans about safety before stepping into a completely different reality like the internet? Very little.

I could never really figure out why many folks in tech, privacy rights activists, and hackers seemed so cold to me while talking about online child sexual exploitation. I always figured that as a survivor advocate for those affected by these crimes, that specific, skilled group of individuals would be very welcoming and easy to talk to about such serious topics. I actually had one hacker laugh in my face when I brought it up while I was looking for answers. I thought maybe this individual thought I was accusing them of something I wasn’t, so I felt bad for asking. I was constantly extremely disappointed and would ask myself, “Why don’t they care? What could I say to make them care more? What could I say to make them understand the crisis and the level of suffering that happens as a result of the problem?”

I have been serving minor survivors of online child sexual exploitation for years. My first case serving a survivor of this specific crime was in 2018—a 13-year-old girl sexually exploited by a serial predator on Snapchat. That was my first glimpse into this side of the internet. I won a national award for serving the minor survivors of Twitter in 2023, but I had been working on that specific project for a few years. I was nominated by a lawyer representing two survivors in a legal battle against the platform. I’ve never really spoken about this before, but at the time it was a choice for me between fighting Snapchat or Twitter. I chose Twitter—or rather, Twitter chose me. I heard about the story of John Doe #1 and John Doe #2, and I was so unbelievably broken over it that I went to war for multiple years. I was and still am royally pissed about that case. As far as I was concerned, the John Doe #1 case proved that whatever was going on with corporate tech social media was so out of control that I didn’t have time to wait, so I got to work. It was reading the messages that John Doe #1 sent to Twitter begging them to remove his sexual exploitation that broke me. He was a child begging adults to do something. A passion for justice and protecting kids makes you do wild things. I was desperate to find answers about what happened and searched for solutions. In the end, the platform Twitter was purchased. During the acquisition, I just asked Mr. Musk nicely to prioritize the issue of detection and removal of child sexual exploitation without violating digital privacy rights or eroding end-to-end encryption. Elon thanked me multiple times during the acquisition, made some changes, and I was thanked by others on the survivors’ side as well.

I still feel that even with the progress made, I really just scratched the surface with Twitter, now X. I left that passion project when I did for a few reasons. I wanted to give new leadership time to tackle the issue. Elon Musk made big promises that I knew would take a while to fulfill, but mostly I had been watching global legislation transpire around the issue, and frankly, the governments are willing to go much further with X and the rest of corporate tech than I ever would. My work begging Twitter to make changes with easier reporting of content, detection, and removal of child sexual exploitation material—without violating privacy rights or eroding end-to-end encryption—and advocating for the minor survivors of the platform went as far as my principles would have allowed. I’m grateful for that experience. I was still left with a nagging question: “How did things get so bad with Twitter where the John Doe #1 and John Doe #2 case was able to happen in the first place?” I decided to keep looking for answers. I decided to keep pulling the thread.

I never worked for Twitter. This is often confusing for folks. I will say that despite being disappointed in the platform’s leadership at times, I loved Twitter. I saw and still see its value. I definitely love the survivors of the platform, but I also loved the platform. I was a champion of the platform’s ability to give folks from virtually around the globe an opportunity to speak and be heard.

I want to be clear that John Doe #1 really is my why. He is the inspiration. I am writing this because of him. He represents so many globally, and I’m still inspired by his bravery. One child’s voice begging adults to do something—I’m an adult, I heard him. I’d go to war a thousand more lifetimes for that young man, and I don’t even know his name. Fighting has been personally dark at times; I’m not even going to try to sugarcoat it, but it has been worth it.

The data surrounding the very real crime of online child sexual exploitation is available to the public online at any time for anyone to see. I’d encourage you to go look at the data for yourself. I believe in encouraging folks to check multiple sources so that you understand the full picture. If you are uncomfortable just searching around the internet for information about this topic, use the terms “CSAM,” “CSEM,” “SG-CSEM,” or “AI Generated CSAM.” The numbers don’t lie—it’s a nightmare that’s out of control. It’s a big business. The demand is high, and unfortunately, business is booming. Organizations collect the data, tech companies often post their data, governments report frequently, and the corporate press has covered a decent portion of the conversation, so I’m sure you can find a source that you trust.

Technology is changing rapidly, which is great for innovation as a whole but horrible for the crime of online child sexual exploitation. Those wishing to exploit the vulnerable seem to be adapting to each technological change with ease. The governments are so far behind with tackling these issues that as I’m typing this, it’s borderline irrelevant to even include them while speaking about the crime or potential solutions. Technology is changing too rapidly, and their old, broken systems can’t even dare to keep up. Think of it like the governments’ “War on Drugs.” Drugs won. In this case as well, the governments are not winning. The governments are talking about maybe having a meeting on potentially maybe having legislation around the crimes. The time to have that meeting would have been many years ago. I’m not advocating for governments to legislate our way out of this. I’m on the side of educating and innovating our way out of this.

I have been clear while advocating for the minor survivors of corporate tech platforms that I would not advocate for any solution to the crime that would violate digital privacy rights or erode end-to-end encryption. That has been a personal moral position that I was unwilling to budge on. This is an extremely unpopular and borderline nonexistent position in the anti-human trafficking movement and online child protection space. I’m often fearful that I’m wrong about this. I have always thought that a better pathway forward would have been to incentivize innovation for detection and removal of content. I had no previous exposure to privacy rights activists or Cypherpunks—actually, I came to that conclusion by listening to the voices of MENA region political dissidents and human rights activists. After developing relationships with human rights activists from around the globe, I realized how important privacy rights and encryption are for those who need it most globally. I was simply unwilling to give more power, control, and opportunities for mass surveillance to big abusers like governments wishing to enslave entire nations and untrustworthy corporate tech companies to potentially end some portion of abuses online. On top of all of it, it has been clear to me for years that all potential solutions outside of violating digital privacy rights to detect and remove child sexual exploitation online have not yet been explored aggressively. I’ve been disappointed that there hasn’t been more of a conversation around preventing the crime from happening in the first place.

What has been tried is mass surveillance. In China, they are currently under mass surveillance both online and offline, and their behaviors are attached to a social credit score. Unfortunately, even on state-run and controlled social media platforms, they still have child sexual exploitation and abuse imagery pop up along with other crimes and human rights violations. They also have a thriving black market online due to the oppression from the state. In other words, even an entire loss of freedom and privacy cannot end the sexual exploitation of children online. It’s been tried. There is no reason to repeat this method.

It took me an embarrassingly long time to figure out why I always felt a slight coldness from those in tech and privacy-minded individuals about the topic of child sexual exploitation online. I didn’t have any clue about the “Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse.” This is a term coined by Timothy C. May in 1988. I would have been a child myself when he first said it. I actually laughed at myself when I heard the phrase for the first time. I finally got it. The Cypherpunks weren’t wrong about that topic. They were so spot on that it is borderline uncomfortable. I was mad at first that they knew that early during the birth of the internet that this issue would arise and didn’t address it. Then I got over it because I realized that it wasn’t their job. Their job was—is—to write code. Their job wasn’t to be involved and loving parents or survivor advocates. Their job wasn’t to educate children on internet safety or raise awareness; their job was to write code.

They knew that child sexual abuse material would be shared on the internet. They said what would happen—not in a gleeful way, but a prediction. Then it happened.

I equate it now to a concrete company laying down a road. As you’re pouring the concrete, you can say to yourself, “A terrorist might travel down this road to go kill many, and on the flip side, a beautiful child can be born in an ambulance on this road.” Who or what travels down the road is not their responsibility—they are just supposed to lay the concrete. I’d never go to a concrete pourer and ask them to solve terrorism that travels down roads. Under the current system, law enforcement should stop terrorists before they even make it to the road. The solution to this specific problem is not to treat everyone on the road like a terrorist or to not build the road.

So I understand the perceived coldness from those in tech. Not only was it not their job, but bringing up the topic was seen as the equivalent of asking a free person if they wanted to discuss one of the four topics—child abusers, terrorists, drug dealers, intellectual property pirates, etc.—that would usher in digital authoritarianism for all who are online globally.

Privacy rights advocates and groups have put up a good fight. They stood by their principles. Unfortunately, when it comes to corporate tech, I believe that the issue of privacy is almost a complete lost cause at this point. It’s still worth pushing back, but ultimately, it is a losing battle—a ticking time bomb.

I do think that corporate tech providers could have slowed down the inevitable loss of privacy at the hands of the state by prioritizing the detection and removal of CSAM when they all started online. I believe it would have bought some time, fewer would have been traumatized by that specific crime, and I do believe that it could have slowed down the demand for content. If I think too much about that, I’ll go insane, so I try to push the “if maybes” aside, but never knowing if it could have been handled differently will forever haunt me. At night when it’s quiet, I wonder what I would have done differently if given the opportunity. I’ll probably never know how much corporate tech knew and ignored in the hopes that it would go away while the problem continued to get worse. They had different priorities. The most voiceless and vulnerable exploited on corporate tech never had much of a voice, so corporate tech providers didn’t receive very much pushback.

Now I’m about to say something really wild, and you can call me whatever you want to call me, but I’m going to say what I believe to be true. I believe that the governments are either so incompetent that they allowed the proliferation of CSAM online, or they knowingly allowed the problem to fester long enough to have an excuse to violate privacy rights and erode end-to-end encryption. The US government could have seized the corporate tech providers over CSAM, but I believe that they were so useful as a propaganda arm for the regimes that they allowed them to continue virtually unscathed.

That season is done now, and the governments are making the issue a priority. It will come at a high cost. Privacy on corporate tech providers is virtually done as I’m typing this. It feels like a death rattle. I’m not particularly sure that we had much digital privacy to begin with, but the illusion of a veil of privacy feels gone.

To make matters slightly more complex, it would be hard to convince me that once AI really gets going, digital privacy will exist at all.

I believe that there should be a conversation shift to preserving freedoms and human rights in a post-privacy society.

I don’t want to get locked up because AI predicted a nasty post online from me about the government. I’m not a doomer about AI—I’m just going to roll with it personally. I’m looking forward to the positive changes that will be brought forth by AI. I see it as inevitable. A bit of privacy was helpful while it lasted. Please keep fighting to preserve what is left of privacy either way because I could be wrong about all of this.

On the topic of AI, the addition of AI to the horrific crime of child sexual abuse material and child sexual exploitation in multiple ways so far has been devastating. It’s currently out of control. The genie is out of the bottle. I am hopeful that innovation will get us humans out of this, but I’m not sure how or how long it will take. We must be extremely cautious around AI legislation. It should not be illegal to innovate even if some bad comes with the good. I don’t trust that the governments are equipped to decide the best pathway forward for AI. Source: the entire history of the government.

I have been personally negatively impacted by AI-generated content. Every few days, I get another alert that I’m featured again in what’s called “deep fake pornography” without my consent. I’m not happy about it, but what pains me the most is the thought that for a period of time down the road, many globally will experience what myself and others are experiencing now by being digitally sexually abused in this way. If you have ever had your picture taken and posted online, you are also at risk of being exploited in this way. Your child’s image can be used as well, unfortunately, and this is just the beginning of this particular nightmare. It will move to more realistic interpretations of sexual behaviors as technology improves. I have no brave words of wisdom about how to deal with that emotionally. I do have hope that innovation will save the day around this specific issue. I’m nervous that everyone online will have to ID verify due to this issue. I see that as one possible outcome that could help to prevent one problem but inadvertently cause more problems, especially for those living under authoritarian regimes or anyone who needs to remain anonymous online. A zero-knowledge proof (ZKP) would probably be the best solution to these issues. There are some survivors of violence and/or sexual trauma who need to remain anonymous online for various reasons. There are survivor stories available online of those who have been abused in this way. I’d encourage you seek out and listen to their stories.

There have been periods of time recently where I hesitate to say anything at all because more than likely AI will cover most of my concerns about education, awareness, prevention, detection, and removal of child sexual exploitation online, etc.

Unfortunately, some of the most pressing issues we’ve seen online over the last few years come in the form of “sextortion.” Self-generated child sexual exploitation (SG-CSEM) numbers are continuing to be terrifying. I’d strongly encourage that you look into sextortion data. AI + sextortion is also a huge concern. The perpetrators are using the non-sexually explicit images of children and putting their likeness on AI-generated child sexual exploitation content and extorting money, more imagery, or both from minors online. It’s like a million nightmares wrapped into one. The wild part is that these issues will only get more pervasive because technology is harnessed to perpetuate horror at a scale unimaginable to a human mind.

Even if you banned phones and the internet or tried to prevent children from accessing the internet, it wouldn’t solve it. Child sexual exploitation will still be with us until as a society we start to prevent the crime before it happens. That is the only human way out right now.

There is no reset button on the internet, but if I could go back, I’d tell survivor advocates to heed the warnings of the early internet builders and to start education and awareness campaigns designed to prevent as much online child sexual exploitation as possible. The internet and technology moved quickly, and I don’t believe that society ever really caught up. We live in a world where a child can be groomed by a predator in their own home while sitting on a couch next to their parents watching TV. We weren’t ready as a species to tackle the fast-paced algorithms and dangers online. It happened too quickly for parents to catch up. How can you parent for the ever-changing digital world unless you are constantly aware of the dangers?

I don’t think that the internet is inherently bad. I believe that it can be a powerful tool for freedom and resistance. I’ve spoken a lot about the bad online, but there is beauty as well. We often discuss how victims and survivors are abused online; we rarely discuss the fact that countless survivors around the globe have been able to share their experiences, strength, hope, as well as provide resources to the vulnerable. I do question if giving any government or tech company access to censorship, surveillance, etc., online in the name of serving survivors might not actually impact a portion of survivors negatively. There are a fair amount of survivors with powerful abusers protected by governments and the corporate press. If a survivor cannot speak to the press about their abuse, the only place they can go is online, directly or indirectly through an independent journalist who also risks being censored. This scenario isn’t hard to imagine—it already happened in China. During #MeToo, a survivor in China wanted to post their story. The government censored the post, so the survivor put their story on the blockchain. I’m excited that the survivor was creative and brave, but it’s terrifying to think that we live in a world where that situation is a necessity.

I believe that the future for many survivors sharing their stories globally will be on completely censorship-resistant and decentralized protocols. This thought in particular gives me hope. When we listen to the experiences of a diverse group of survivors, we can start to understand potential solutions to preventing the crimes from happening in the first place.

My heart is broken over the gut-wrenching stories of survivors sexually exploited online. Every time I hear the story of a survivor, I do think to myself quietly, “What could have prevented this from happening in the first place?” My heart is with survivors.

My head, on the other hand, is full of the understanding that the internet should remain free. The free flow of information should not be stopped. My mind is with the innocent citizens around the globe that deserve freedom both online and offline.

The problem is that governments don’t only want to censor illegal content that violates human rights—they create legislation that is so broad that it can impact speech and privacy of all. “Don’t you care about the kids?” Yes, I do. I do so much that I’m invested in finding solutions. I also care about all citizens around the globe that deserve an opportunity to live free from a mass surveillance society. If terrorism happens online, I should not be punished by losing my freedom. If drugs are sold online, I should not be punished. I’m not an abuser, I’m not a terrorist, and I don’t engage in illegal behaviors. I refuse to lose freedom because of others’ bad behaviors online.

I want to be clear that on a long enough timeline, the governments will decide that they can be better parents/caregivers than you can if something isn’t done to stop minors from being sexually exploited online. The price will be a complete loss of anonymity, privacy, free speech, and freedom of religion online. I find it rather insulting that governments think they’re better equipped to raise children than parents and caretakers.

So we can’t go backwards—all that we can do is go forward. Those who want to have freedom will find technology to facilitate their liberation. This will lead many over time to decentralized and open protocols. So as far as I’m concerned, this does solve a few of my worries—those who need, want, and deserve to speak freely online will have the opportunity in most countries—but what about online child sexual exploitation?

When I popped up around the decentralized space, I was met with the fear of censorship. I’m not here to censor you. I don’t write code. I couldn’t censor anyone or any piece of content even if I wanted to across the internet, no matter how depraved. I don’t have the skills to do that.

I’m here to start a conversation. Freedom comes at a cost. You must always fight for and protect your freedom. I can’t speak about protecting yourself from all of the Four Horsemen because I simply don’t know the topics well enough, but I can speak about this one topic.

If there was a shortcut to ending online child sexual exploitation, I would have found it by now. There isn’t one right now. I believe that education is the only pathway forward to preventing the crime of online child sexual exploitation for future generations.

I propose a yearly education course for every child of all school ages, taught as a standard part of the curriculum. Ideally, parents/caregivers would be involved in the education/learning process.

Course: - The creation of the internet and computers - The fight for cryptography - The tech supply chain from the ground up (example: human rights violations in the supply chain) - Corporate tech - Freedom tech - Data privacy - Digital privacy rights - AI (history-current) - Online safety (predators, scams, catfishing, extortion) - Bitcoin - Laws - How to deal with online hate and harassment - Information on who to contact if you are being abused online or offline - Algorithms - How to seek out the truth about news, etc., online

The parents/caregivers, homeschoolers, unschoolers, and those working to create decentralized parallel societies have been an inspiration while writing this, but my hope is that all children would learn this course, even in government ran schools. Ideally, parents would teach this to their own children.

The decentralized space doesn’t want child sexual exploitation to thrive. Here’s the deal: there has to be a strong prevention effort in order to protect the next generation. The internet isn’t going anywhere, predators aren’t going anywhere, and I’m not down to let anyone have the opportunity to prove that there is a need for more government. I don’t believe that the government should act as parents. The governments have had a chance to attempt to stop online child sexual exploitation, and they didn’t do it. Can we try a different pathway forward?

I’d like to put myself out of a job. I don’t want to ever hear another story like John Doe #1 ever again. This will require work. I’ve often called online child sexual exploitation the lynchpin for the internet. It’s time to arm generations of children with knowledge and tools. I can’t do this alone.

Individuals have fought so that I could have freedom online. I want to fight to protect it. I don’t want child predators to give the government any opportunity to take away freedom. Decentralized spaces are as close to a reset as we’ll get with the opportunity to do it right from the start. Start the youth off correctly by preventing potential hazards to the best of your ability.

The good news is anyone can work on this! I’d encourage you to take it and run with it. I added the additional education about the history of the internet to make the course more educational and fun. Instead of cleaning up generations of destroyed lives due to online sexual exploitation, perhaps this could inspire generations of those who will build our futures. Perhaps if the youth is armed with knowledge, they can create more tools to prevent the crime.

This one solution that I’m suggesting can be done on an individual level or on a larger scale. It should be adjusted depending on age, learning style, etc. It should be fun and playful.

This solution does not address abuse in the home or some of the root causes of offline child sexual exploitation. My hope is that it could lead to some survivors experiencing abuse in the home an opportunity to disclose with a trusted adult. The purpose for this solution is to prevent the crime of online child sexual exploitation before it occurs and to arm the youth with the tools to contact safe adults if and when it happens.

In closing, I went to hell a few times so that you didn’t have to. I spoke to the mothers of survivors of minors sexually exploited online—their tears could fill rivers. I’ve spoken with political dissidents who yearned to be free from authoritarian surveillance states. The only balance that I’ve found is freedom online for citizens around the globe and prevention from the dangers of that for the youth. Don’t slow down innovation and freedom. Educate, prepare, adapt, and look for solutions.

I’m not perfect and I’m sure that there are errors in this piece. I hope that you find them and it starts a conversation.

@ 06639a38:655f8f71

Finally there is a release (1.7.0) for Nostr-PHP with a full NIP-19 integration. Here is an example file with some snippets to how it works to encode and decode bech32 encoded entities:

• https://github.com/nostrver-se/nostr-php/blob/main/src/Examples/nip19-bech32-decoded-entities.php
• https://github.com/nostrver-se/nostr-php/blob/main/src/Examples/nip19-bech32-encoded-entities.php

Now merge request #68 (and issues #74, #64 are closed) is finally merged which I opened in October 2024.

Next up is:

• Create documentation how to use NIP-19 with the library on https://nostr-php.dev
• Create documentation how to use NIP-04 and NIP-44 with the library on https://nostr-php.dev
• Work out a proof-of-concept with the revolt/event-loop package to create concurrent async requests with websocket connections

@ ec8f6700:fb2a4766

SNAILS.

Creator Co-op for the Cosmos Ecosystem

Written by: Terp Network

Original post: https://docs.terp.network/guides/nodes/faq

We must keep in mind that p2p networks are exposed to the risk of denial of service attacks, and an effective way to mitigate this type of attacks is by using sentry nodes.

Why is it important to avoid denial of service attacks?​

When our node is suffering a denial of service attack that cannot be mitigated by the server provider, it is likely that the server will be inoperative for the duration of the attack because, being saturated, it will stop responding to the requests made by the rest of the nodes in the network.

If our node becomes inoperative, it means that we are no longer participating in the consensus rounds, our node will not be signing blocks or generating rewards for the delegators and therefore in a few minutes the node will be jailed and penalized.

In addition to being a risk for node operators due to the penalties involved in being jailed, it is also a risk for the network, since if an attack is carried out on several nodes at the same time, the stability and security of the network would be affected. Sentry nodes hide our validator’s IP from the world​

Using sentry nodes is a solution to prevent the rest of the network from knowing the IP of our validator node, but allowing our validator node to continue communicating with other validator nodes in the terp network, since if the node were 100% isolated, it would not be able to participate in the network and therefore would not generate rewards for the delegators.

A sentry node is a bridge between our validator node and the rest of the network, so that the rest of the network does not know the IP of the validator node, but the IP of the sentry nodes.

Can sentry nodes suffer denial of service attacks?​

Yes, but as they are nodes that are not validating transactions and only act as a bridge between the network and the validating node, we could quickly deploy new sentry nodes or even change the IP of the sentry node being attacked. How many sentry nodes can there be?​

There is really no maximum number, the more sentry nodes we have, the more resistance to denial of service attacks our validator node will have. However, it must be taken into account that the more sentry nodes we have, the more complex it will be to maintain our nodes when carrying out maintenance or upgrades, in addition to the increase in server costs. You should have at least two sentry nodes and if possible have one of them in a different datacenter from where the validator node is deployed. Where should the sentry nodes be deployed?​

If two sentry nodes are going to be mounted, one of them could be deployed in the same datacenter where our validator node is, this will reduce the latency between both servers, and therefore, the connection between both servers will be quite fast. The other sentry node could be located in a different datacenter; this way, in case the network of the datacenter where our validator node is down for any reason, we would always have a node with the current block available to synchronize our validator node. Step by step guide​

To follow this guide, we will use a node created & connected to 90u-3 testnet network. In case you have not deployed the node yet, how to install the terp-core binary Creating the sentry nodes​

Once we have contracted the two sentry node servers and we have the access IPs, we must perform the same installation that we would perform as if it were a validator node on both servers.

First, we will need to download and compile the terp-core binary.

git clone https://github.com/terpnetwork/terp-core.git cd terp-core git checkout

Once downloaded, we will proceed to compile the binary:

make install

It will also be necessary to initialize the node so that the .terp directory is created, for this we can use the following commands, each one in the corresponding server:

On sentry node A:

terpd init "terpd-up - Sentry A" --chain-id 90u-3

On sentry node B:

terpd init "terpd-up - Sentry B" --chain-id 90u-3

Once the previous step is done, the .terp folder will already exist, so we can download the genesis.json file:

curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/terpnetwork/networks/main/testnet/90u-3/genesis.json > ~/.terp/config/genesis.json

Configure service​

Finally, we will configure the terp service:

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/system/terpd.service

sudo tee /etc/systemd/system/terpd.service > /dev/null <<EOF [Unit] Description=terpd Daemon After=network-online.target [Service] User=$USER ExecStart=$(which terpd) start Restart=always RestartSec=3 LimitNOFILE=65535 [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target EOF

Base configuration of the sentry nodes​

For now we have not done anything different from what we would do when setting up a validator node, although we have stopped doing several things, such as creating the wallet or running the validator creation command “tx staking create-validator”, since we do not want to create validator nodes, only nodes that synchronize with the rest of the nodes in the network and we can use to synchronize our validator node in a secure way without exposing our IP to the rest of the network.

The sentry nodes (both), must have peers to be synchronized at all times, we will add the following peers to the config.toml file inside the config folder. Persistent Peers:​

peers=$(curl -s https://ss.terp.nodestake.top/peers.txt) sed -i.bak -e "s/^persistent_peers =./persistent_peers = \"$peers\"/" ~/.terp/config/config.toml

Note: the peers were obtained from Nodestake validator team.

It would also be advisable to add as persistent peer the sentry nodes between them. That is to say, that the sentry node B is persistent peer of the sentry node A, in the same way that the sentry node A is persistent peer of the sentry node B; this will make us have more redundancy. Private Peers:​

In the config.toml file of the config folder of the sentry nodes (both), it is necessary to specify the id of the validator node in the private_peer_ids parameter. This is so that our sentry nodes never share with the rest of the peers of the network the existence of our validator node.

If you don’t know how to get the id of your validator node, you can get it with the following command:

terpd tendermint show-node-id

Unconditional Peers​

In the same configuration file, we will also find the unconditional-peer-ids parameter to which we must add our validator node as we did with the private_peer_ids parameter. This step is necessary because the nodes have a limited number of peers to which they can connect.

To avoid the risk of leaving our validator node incommunicado, by setting its id in the unconditional-peer-ids parameter, we will make the sentry nodes always connected to the validator node even if the limit of peers to which they can be connected has been exceeded. Optionally we can also add in this same parameter (separated by commas) the homologous sentry node to guarantee that the sentry nodes will always be connected to each other.

unconditional-peer-ids = "validator node, peer sentry node". Start Sentry Nodes​

At this point, we could start our sentry nodes and let them synchronize and be discovered by the rest of the network. For that we will use the following command:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload sudo systemctl enable terpd

Base configuration for validator​

Once the sentry nodes have been synchronized, we can configure the validator node with all certainty that our validator node is not going to stop being synchronized with the network. We will have to edit the config.toml file in the config folder, where we will find the following lines: Persistent Peers​

In persistent_peers we will add only the ids of the sentry nodes, that is to say that if the node was already mounted before, we will have to delete the content of this field before adding our sentry nodes. PEX​

In the same configuration file we will find the pex parameter, which we must set to “false”. This parameter does not discover other peers, it will only use the ones set in the persistent_peers parameter.

pex = false

Remove address book (optional)​

If the validator has already been exposed to the network, we can delete the address book so that it only “knows” the sentry nodes; if it is a validator that has never been started, this step is not necessary. Once inside the config folder and with the node stopped, perform the following command:

rm -rf $HOME/.terp/config/addrbook.json

Start Validator Node​

To verify that we are really connected only to two peers and these are the sentry nodes, we can write the following command in our validated node; the output is a JSON where it will show us the number and which peers we are connected to, where the number should be two and the peers should be our sentry nodes.

curl -s localhost:26657/net_info Here you can see the number of peers to which our validator node is connected, in this case it is two, which is correct. Extra: Protecting the validator node through firewall​

Right now the p2p port of our validator node is open and anyone can establish a connection. If we have just set up the validator node, with the configurations made, nobody would have to find our validator node, however, to add a plus of security it is advisable to close the p2p port and only allow traffic to the IP’s of our sentry nodes.

There are several ways to do this, it is possible that your server provider allows you to do it through a gui. Ufw is a simple to use alternative. Extra: Private networks​

One possibility we have when our validator node is in the same datacenter as one of the sentry nodes, would be to use private addressing.

In case we want to use private addressing, we will have to edit the addr-book-strict parameter of the config.toml file and set it to false in both the validator node and the sentry node that are communicating under private addressing. This parameter, when set to “true”, will only add routable addresses to the address book, the private addresses defined in RFC-1918 are not routable, therefore, they would not be added to the address book, so we will have to change it to false to be able to use IP addresses from the private ranges.

addr-book-strict: boolean. By default, nodes with a routable address will be considered for connection. If this setting is disabled (false), non-routable IP addresses, such as addresses from a private network, can be added to the address book. Source: https://docs.tendermint.com/master/nodes/validators.html

Conclusions​

Having sentry nodes will not only help our validator node not to fall victim to a denial of service attack, but will also make the Terp network more robust. The installation of the sentry nodes does not differ much from that of a validator node, and the additional configurations to be performed are very simple and intuitive.

Now that Terp Network is doing the 90u-3 testnet, it is a good time to try to set up sentry nodes and once the mainnet is launched, to be able to replicate it with the experience of having been able to test it in 90u-3. If you already have your node on 90u-3, what are you waiting for to set up your sentry nodes and protect yourself from unwanted attacks?

sources: https://stakely.io/en/blog/how-to-deploy-sentry-nodes-in-the-archway-network

@ 21335073:a244b1ad

I want to see Nostr succeed. If you can think of a way I can help make that happen, I’m open to it. I’d like your suggestions.

My schedule’s shifting soon, and I could volunteer a few hours a week to a Nostr project. I won’t have more total time, but how I use it will change.

Why help? I care about freedom. Nostr’s one of the most powerful freedom tools I’ve seen in my lifetime. If I believe that, I should act on it.

I don’t care about money or sats. I’m not rich, I don’t have extra cash. That doesn’t drive me—freedom does. I’m volunteering, not asking for pay.

I’m not here for clout. I’ve had enough spotlight in my life; it doesn’t move me. If I wanted clout, I’d be on Twitter dropping basic takes. Clout’s easy. Freedom’s hard. I’d rather help anonymously. No speaking at events—small meetups are cool for the vibe, but big conferences? Not my thing. I’ll never hit a huge Bitcoin conference. It’s just not my scene.

That said, I could be convinced to step up if it’d really boost Nostr—as long as it’s legal and gets results.

In this space, I’d watch for social engineering. I watch out for it. I’m not here to make friends, just to help. No shade—you all seem great—but I’ve got a full life and awesome friends irl. I don’t need your crew or to be online cool. Connect anonymously if you want; I’d encourage it.

I’m sick of watching other social media alternatives grow while Nostr kinda stalls. I could trash-talk, but I’d rather do something useful.

Skills? I’m good at spotting social media problems and finding possible solutions. I won’t overhype myself—that’s weird—but if you’re responding, you probably see something in me. Perhaps you see something that I don’t see in myself.

If you need help now or later with Nostr projects, reach out. Nostr only—nothing else. Anonymous contact’s fine. Even just a suggestion on how I can pitch in, no project attached, works too. 💜

Creeps or harassment will get blocked or I’ll nuke my simplex code if it becomes a problem.

https://simplex.chat/contact#/?v=2-4&smp=smp%3A%2F%2FSkIkI6EPd2D63F4xFKfHk7I1UGZVNn6k1QWZ5rcyr6w%3D%40smp9.simplex.im%2FbI99B3KuYduH8jDr9ZwyhcSxm2UuR7j0%23%2F%3Fv%3D1-2%26dh%3DMCowBQYDK2VuAyEAS9C-zPzqW41PKySfPCEizcXb1QCus6AyDkTTjfyMIRM%253D%26srv%3Djssqzccmrcws6bhmn77vgmhfjmhwlyr3u7puw4erkyoosywgl67slqqd.onion

@ bf95e1a4:ebdcc848

This is a part of the Bitcoin Infinity Academy course on Knut Svanholm's book Bitcoin: Sovereignty Through Mathematics. For more information, check out our Geyser page!

Scarcity

What makes a commodity scarce? What is scarcity in the first place? What other properties can be deducted from an object’s scarcity? How are scarcity, energy, time, and value connected? Scarcity might seem easy to describe on the surface, but in reality, it’s not. Not when you take infinity into account. Infinity is a concept that has puzzled the human mind for as long as it has been able to imagine it. If it ever has. It is a very abstract concept, and it’s always linked to time simply because even imagining an infinite number would take an infinite amount of time. If we truly live in an infinite universe, scarcity cannot exist. If something exists in an infinite universe, an infinite number of copies of this something must also exist since the probability of this being true would also be infinite in an infinite universe. Therefore, scarcity must always be defined within a set framework. No frame, no scarcity.

Think of it this way: the most expensive artwork ever sold at the time of writing was the Salvator Mundi, painted by Leonardo da Vinci. It’s not even a particularly beautiful painting, so why the high price? Because Da Vinci originals are scarce. A poster of the painting isn’t expensive at all, but the original will cost you at least 450 million US Dollars. All because we agree to frame its scarcity around the notion that it is a Da Vinci original, of which under twenty exist today. Historically, scarcity has always been framed around real-world limits to the supply of a good. Most of the great thinkers of the Austrian school of economics from the twentieth century believed that the value of a monetary good arises from its scarcity and that scarcity is always connected to the real-world availability of that good. Most of them believed that a gold standard would be the hardest form of money that we would ever see and the closest thing to an absolutely scarce resource as we would ever know.

In the late 90’s, the cryptographers that laid the groundwork for what would become Bitcoin reimagined scarcity as anything with an unforgeable costliness. This mindset is key to understanding the connection between scarcity and value. Anything can be viewed as scarce if it’s sufficiently hard to produce and hard to fake the production cost of — in other words, easy to verify the validity of. The zeros at the beginning of a hashed Bitcoin block are the Proof of Work that proves that the created coins in that block were costly to produce. People who promote the idea that the mining algorithm used to produce Bitcoin could be more environmentally friendly or streamlined are either deliberately lying or missing the point. The energy expenditure is the very thing that gives the token its value because it provides proof to the network that enough computing power was sacrificed in order to keep the network sufficiently decentralized and thus resistant to change. "Easy to verify" is the flipside of the "unforgeable costliness" coin. The validity of a Bitcoin block is very easy to verify since all you need to do is look at its hash, make sure the block is part of the strongest chain, and that it conforms to all consensus rules. In order to check whether a gold bar is real or not, you probably need to trust a third party. Fiat money often comes with a plethora of water stamps, holograms, and metal stripes, so in a sense, they’re hard to forge. What you cannot know about a fiat currency at any given moment, though, is how much of it is in circulation. What you do know about fiat currencies is that they’re not scarce.

Bitcoin provides us with absolute scarcity for the first time in human history. It is a remarkable breakthrough. Even though you can’t make jewelry or anything else out of Bitcoin, its total supply is fixed. After the year 2140, after the last Bitcoin has been mined, the total amount of Bitcoin in circulation can only go down. This limited supply is what the gold standards of the past were there for in the first place. Bitcoin’s supply is much more limited than that of gold, however, since they will be lost as time goes by. Since the supply is so limited, it doesn’t matter what the current demand is. The potential upside to its value is literally limitless due to this relationship between supply and demand. The “backing” that other currencies have is only there to assume people that the currency will keep its value over time, and the only way of ensuring this is to limit the supply. Bitcoin does this better than any other thing before it. Leonardo da Vinci’s original paintings are extremely valuable because of Leonardo’s brand name and the fact that there are only about 13 of them left. One day there’ll be less than one left. The same is true for Bitcoin.

Scarcity on the Internet was long believed to be an impossible invention, and it took a multi-talented genius such as Satoshi Nakamoto to figure out all the different parts that make Bitcoin so much more than the sum of them. His disappearance from the project was one such part, maybe the most important one. The thing about computerized scarcity is that it was a one-time invention. Once it was invented, the invention could not be recreated. That’s just the nature of data. Computers are designed to be able to replicate any data set any number of times. This is true for every piece of code there is, and digital scarcity needed to be framed somehow to work. Bitcoin’s consensus rules provided such a frame. Bitcoin certainly seems to provide true digital scarcity, and if the game theoretical theories that it builds on are correct, its promise of an ever-increasing value will be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In 2018, the inflation rate of the Venezuelan Bolivar was a staggering 80,000%. Hugo Chavez and his successor, Nicolas Maduro, effectively killed the Venezuelan economy with socialism. It has happened before — and sadly, it is likely to happen again. The main problem with socialism is not that people aren’t incentivized to work in socialist countries. On the contrary, hungry people under the threat of violence tend to work harder than most. The problem with state-owned production is that there is no free market price mechanism to reflect the true demand for goods and, therefore, no way of knowing how much supply the state should produce. Everything is in constant surplus or shortage — often the latter, as the empty supermarket shelves in Venezuela depressingly attest. Chavez and Maduro attempted to rescue the country’s economy by printing more money — which simply does not work. Their true motives for printing money are, of course, questionable given that it depreciated the value of Bolivar bills to less than that of toilet paper. As mentioned in earlier chapters, inflation is the greatest hidden threat to themselves that humans have ever created.

A few hundred years ago, the Catholic Church held the lion’s share of political power throughout Europe. Today, power primarily resides with nation-states in collusion with multinational corporations. The separation of church and state triggered the migration of power from the former to the latter, emancipating many citizens in the process. Still, places like Venezuela are sad proof that “the people” are still not in power in many self-proclaimed democracies — if in any, for that matter. Another separation will have to take place first: The separation of money and state. We, the people of Planet Earth, now have the means at our disposal for this separation to take place. Whether we use them or not will determine how emancipated and independent our children can and will be in the future.

About the Bitcoin Infinity Academy

The Bitcoin Infinity Academy is an educational project built around Knut Svanholm’s books about Bitcoin and Austrian Economics. Each week, a whole chapter from one of the books is released for free on Highlighter, accompanied by a video in which Knut and Luke de Wolf discuss that chapter’s ideas. You can join the discussions by signing up for one of the courses on our Geyser page. Signed books, monthly calls, and lots of other benefits are also available.

@ c8841c9d:ae8048e2

What is Bitcoin ? Here are the fundamentals to understand the first crypto.

Created by the anonymous Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009, Bitcoin is a decentralized digital currency with no central authority.

Censorship-resistant and peer-to-peer, it gives power to the people!

Check out my mind map for a dipper dive. #Bitcoin #Crypto #Cryptomindmap

\ \ Bitcoin runs on a blockchain—a distributed ledger secured by Nakamoto consensus & Proof of Work.

Miners earn BTC rewards by creating new blocks, while UTXO (Unspent Transaction Output) prevents double-spending. A block is added to chain every \~10min. If parallel chains form, the longest chain wins, after 6 blocks, a transaction is considered final.

Transactions are transparent yet private. Check my older cryptomindmaps for more details.

Bitcoin Economics

With a hard cap of 21 million coins, Bitcoin’s supply halves every 4 years(next in 2028), creating scarcity The smallest unit? A Satoshi - 0.00000001 BTC.

This decreasing supply is creating scarcity which drives value but also fuels volatility, with bull runs and corrections shaping its price since day one

What can you do with Bitcoin? Let’s explore!

Bitcoin was intended for payments, it's evolving into "digital gold", a store of value for the internet age.

It enables cheap, easy cross-border transfers and acts as an inflation edge.

Its Lightning Network improves the scalability for digital payments.

Bitcoin’s Challenges

The main hurdles addressed to Bitcoin is the scalability. The low number of possible transactions per second (TPS). Solutions, such as Lightning Network, provide ways to increase usage.

The energy consumption of block production in Proof of Work debate rages . Critics call it is too much electricity, while supporters argue that it is the elegant way to valorize renewable energy and ensure top-notch security.

No central authority means slow consensus via Bitcoin Improvement Proposals (BIPs) and there is no government regulation which can deter some adopters.

Bitcoin #Cryptomindmap

Thanks for reading! 🌟 Share your thoughts on Bitcoin !

@ c1e9ab3a:9cb56b43

If you ever read about a hypothetical "evil AI"—one that manipulates, dominates, and surveils humanity—you might find yourself wondering: how is that any different from what some governments already do?

Let’s explore the eerie parallels between the actions of a fictional malevolent AI and the behaviors of powerful modern states—specifically the U.S. federal government.

Surveillance and Control

Evil AI: Uses total surveillance to monitor all activity, predict rebellion, and enforce compliance.

Modern Government: Post-9/11 intelligence agencies like the NSA have implemented mass data collection programs, monitoring phone calls, emails, and online activity—often without meaningful oversight.

Parallel: Both claim to act in the name of “security,” but the tools are ripe for abuse.

Manipulation of Information

Evil AI: Floods the information space with propaganda, misinformation, and filters truth based on its goals.

Modern Government: Funds media outlets, promotes specific narratives through intelligence leaks, and collaborates with social media companies to suppress or flag dissenting viewpoints.

Parallel: Control the narrative, shape public perception, and discredit opposition.

Economic Domination

Evil AI: Restructures the economy for efficiency, displacing workers and concentrating resources.

Modern Government: Facilitates wealth transfer through lobbying, regulatory capture, and inflationary monetary policy that disproportionately hurts the middle and lower classes.

Parallel: The system enriches those who control it, leaving the rest with less power to resist.

Perpetual Warfare

Evil AI: Instigates conflict to weaken opposition or as a form of distraction and control.

Modern Government: Maintains a state of nearly constant military engagement since WWII, often for interests that benefit a small elite rather than national defense.

Parallel: War becomes policy, not a last resort.

Predictive Policing and Censorship

Evil AI: Uses predictive algorithms to preemptively suppress dissent and eliminate threats.

Modern Government: Experiments with pre-crime-like measures, flags “misinformation,” and uses AI tools to monitor online behavior.

Parallel: Prevent rebellion not by fixing problems, but by suppressing their expression.

Conclusion: Systemic Inhumanity

Whether it’s AI or a bureaucratic state, the more a system becomes detached from individual accountability and human empathy, the more it starts to act in ways we would call “evil” if a machine did them.

An AI doesn’t need to enslave humanity with lasers and killer robots. Sometimes all it takes is code, coercion, and unchecked power—something we may already be facing.

@ 8d34bd24:414be32b

Ever since becoming a Christian, I have whole-heartedly believed the Bible and that God will fulfill what He has promised. On the other hand, for the majority of the time I have been a Christian, I have dreaded reading prophecy. It seemed so hard to understand. Some is couched in figurative language, but I now believe much of it was hard to understand because there were no words for the technology and systems that would come into being and fulfill these predictions.

Now reading End times prophecy, like in Revelation, Daniel, Matthew 24-25, 2 Thessalonians, Zechariah, etc. the prophecies are starting to sound like the evening news instead of some poetic mystery. These predictions are making more and more sense as the technology and world politics begin to align with the prophecies. I have gone from hating when I get to prophecy passages, especially Revelation, in my Bible reading, to spending extra time reading these passages and seeing how they line up and clarify each other. (I really want to start a project linking all of the end-times prophetic passages together to see how they clarify each other and try to see the big picture, but that is a massive project and time is in short supply. The only way I know to do it is in Excel, but that isn’t efficient. If anyone has a suggestion for a better way to link and show relationships, I’d love to hear about it, especially if it is free or very cheap.)

Matthew recounts Jesus telling His disciples about what to expect in the end times. Although Matthew 24 describes more of the details of the events that happen, this passage in Matthew 25 describes the importance of watching expectantly for the signs of the times, so we are ready.

“Then the kingdom of heaven will be comparable to ten virgins, who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were prudent. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the prudent took oil in flasks along with their lamps. Now while the bridegroom was delaying, they all got drowsy and began to sleep. But at midnight there was a shout, ‘Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’ Then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps. The foolish said to the prudent, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the prudent answered, ‘No, there will not be enough for us and you too; go instead to the dealers and buy some for yourselves.’ And while they were going away to make the purchase, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding feast; and the door was shut. Later the other virgins also came, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open up for us.’ But he answered, ‘Truly I say to you, I do not know you.’ Be on the alert then, for you do not know the day nor the hour. (Matthew 25:1-13) {emphasis mine}

Many Christians think studying prophecy is not useful for today, but that is not true. Our time is short and Jesus warned us to be aware and ready. We can’t be ready for something if we know nothing about it.

In this passage it mentions that “while the bridegroom was delaying, they all got drowsy and began to sleep.” How often do we feel the delay and begin to rest or get distracted by other things? Most Christians do not live like Christ’s return is imminent. Although we can’t know the hour or the day, we can know that we are closer to that hour than we have ever been before. Peter warns us not to doubt Christ’s coming or to become focused solely on our earthly lives.

Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.” (2 Peter 3:3-4)

Because Jesus has not returned for almost 2,000 years, many act as if He will never come, but that long wait instead suggests the time is nearing because God never breaks His promises.

For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water. But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance. (2 Peter 3:5-9) {emphasis mine}

The long wait is due to God’s unfathomable mercy and patience, but we should also realize that the increase of evil in the world cannot continue forever. How much more can evil increase before mankind destroys itself? God claims judgement for Himself and finds every kind of sin abhorrent. If we are distraught over the sin in the world today, how much more awful is it to a holy, perfect God to see His very own creation destroyed by sin?

Just as the ten virgins became tired waiting, we tend to get caught up in the things of this world instead of focusing on God’s plan for us and the world. We act as if this world is the only thing we will experience instead of preparing for our rapture to heaven. We focus on our job, our homes, and our families (all good things) and miss the most important things — winning souls for heaven.

Just as Jesus gently reprimanded Martha for having the wrong focus:

But Martha was distracted with all her preparations; and she came up to Him and said, “Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to do all the serving alone? Then tell her to help me.” But the Lord answered and said to her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so many things; but only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:40-42) {emphasis mine}

In the same way, we get focused with the business of life and miss the most important stuff. It wasn’t bad of Martha to take care of her guests, but sitting with Jesus and learning from Him was more important. In the same way, our jobs, families, and homes are good things and we should do them well, but reading our Bibles, praying, growing closer to Jesus, and sharing the Gospel with those who don’t know Jesus is better.

When we believe that our time on earth is short and Jesus is coming for us soon, we are more likely to focus on the most important things — the eternal things.

This passage in Matthew 16 describes the importance of us knowing, understanding, and looking for the signs of the times.

The Pharisees and Sadducees came up, and testing Jesus, they asked Him to show them a sign from heaven. But He replied to them, “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ And in the morning, ‘There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times? An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and a sign will not be given it, except the sign of Jonah.” And He left them and went away. (Matthew 16:1-4) {emphasis mine}

Christians that believe studying end times prophecy is not important would be rebuked even today by Jesus. We are supposed to study and learn and prepare and watch eagerly for His return.

In Revelation, God says we are blessed if we hear and heed the words of this prophecy.

The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show to His bond-servants, the things which must soon take place; and He sent and communicated it by His angel to His bond-servant John, who testified to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and heed the things which are written in it; for the time is near. (Revelation 1:1-3) {emphasis mine}

Do you seek God’s blessing? Then study God’s prophecies, especially as written in Revelation. God is good and He has shown His children what will happen, so they can be prepared. Don’t be like the five foolish virgins who were unprepared. Study the Scriptures. Look for the signs. Be ready for our Savior’s return by inviting as many people as possible to join us.

Trust Jesus.

FYI, I hope to write several more articles on the end times (signs of the times, the rapture, the millennium, the judgement, etc.).

@ 04c915da:3dfbecc9

Recently we have seen a wave of high profile X accounts hacked. These attacks have exposed the fragility of the status quo security model used by modern social media platforms like X. Many users have asked if nostr fixes this, so lets dive in. How do these types of attacks translate into the world of nostr apps? For clarity, I will use X’s security model as representative of most big tech social platforms and compare it to nostr.

The Status Quo

On X, you never have full control of your account. Ultimately to use it requires permission from the company. They can suspend your account or limit your distribution. Theoretically they can even post from your account at will. An X account is tied to an email and password. Users can also opt into two factor authentication, which adds an extra layer of protection, a login code generated by an app. In theory, this setup works well, but it places a heavy burden on users. You need to create a strong, unique password and safeguard it. You also need to ensure your email account and phone number remain secure, as attackers can exploit these to reset your credentials and take over your account. Even if you do everything responsibly, there is another weak link in X infrastructure itself. The platform’s infrastructure allows accounts to be reset through its backend. This could happen maliciously by an employee or through an external attacker who compromises X’s backend. When an account is compromised, the legitimate user often gets locked out, unable to post or regain control without contacting X’s support team. That process can be slow, frustrating, and sometimes fruitless if support denies the request or cannot verify your identity. Often times support will require users to provide identification info in order to regain access, which represents a privacy risk. The centralized nature of X means you are ultimately at the mercy of the company’s systems and staff.

Nostr Requires Responsibility

Nostr flips this model radically. Users do not need permission from a company to access their account, they can generate as many accounts as they want, and cannot be easily censored. The key tradeoff here is that users have to take complete responsibility for their security. Instead of relying on a username, password, and corporate servers, nostr uses a private key as the sole credential for your account. Users generate this key and it is their responsibility to keep it safe. As long as you have your key, you can post. If someone else gets it, they can post too. It is that simple. This design has strong implications. Unlike X, there is no backend reset option. If your key is compromised or lost, there is no customer support to call. In a compromise scenario, both you and the attacker can post from the account simultaneously. Neither can lock the other out, since nostr relays simply accept whatever is signed with a valid key.

The benefit? No reliance on proprietary corporate infrastructure.. The negative? Security rests entirely on how well you protect your key.

Future Nostr Security Improvements

For many users, nostr’s standard security model, storing a private key on a phone with an encrypted cloud backup, will likely be sufficient. It is simple and reasonably secure. That said, nostr’s strength lies in its flexibility as an open protocol. Users will be able to choose between a range of security models, balancing convenience and protection based on need.

One promising option is a web of trust model for key rotation. Imagine pre-selecting a group of trusted friends. If your account is compromised, these people could collectively sign an event announcing the compromise to the network and designate a new key as your legitimate one. Apps could handle this process seamlessly in the background, notifying followers of the switch without much user interaction. This could become a popular choice for average users, but it is not without tradeoffs. It requires trust in your chosen web of trust, which might not suit power users or large organizations. It also has the issue that some apps may not recognize the key rotation properly and followers might get confused about which account is “real.”

For those needing higher security, there is the option of multisig using FROST (Flexible Round-Optimized Schnorr Threshold). In this setup, multiple keys must sign off on every action, including posting and updating a profile. A hacker with just one key could not do anything. This is likely overkill for most users due to complexity and inconvenience, but it could be a game changer for large organizations, companies, and governments. Imagine the White House nostr account requiring signatures from multiple people before a post goes live, that would be much more secure than the status quo big tech model.

Another option are hardware signers, similar to bitcoin hardware wallets. Private keys are kept on secure, offline devices, separate from the internet connected phone or computer you use to broadcast events. This drastically reduces the risk of remote hacks, as private keys never touches the internet. It can be used in combination with multisig setups for extra protection. This setup is much less convenient and probably overkill for most but could be ideal for governments, companies, or other high profile accounts.

---

Nostr’s security model is not perfect but is robust and versatile. Ultimately users are in control and security is their responsibility. Apps will give users multiple options to choose from and users will choose what best fits their need.

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

Read the original blog post

“The future is there... staring back at us. Trying to make sense of the fiction we will have become.” — William Gibson.

This month is the 4th anniversary of kycnot.me. Thank you for being here.

Fifteen years ago, Satoshi Nakamoto introduced Bitcoin, a peer-to-peer electronic cash system: a decentralized currency free from government and institutional control. Nakamoto's whitepaper showed a vision for a financial system based on trustless transactions, secured by cryptography. Some time forward and KYC (Know Your Customer), AML (Anti-Money Laundering), and CTF (Counter-Terrorism Financing) regulations started to come into play.

What a paradox: to engage with a system designed for decentralization, privacy, and independence, we are forced to give away our personal details. Using Bitcoin in the economy requires revealing your identity, not just to the party you interact with, but also to third parties who must track and report the interaction. You are forced to give sensitive data to entities you don't, can't, and shouldn't trust. Information can never be kept 100% safe; there's always a risk. Information is power, who knows about you has control over you.

Information asymmetry creates imbalances of power. When entities have detailed knowledge about individuals, they can manipulate, influence, or exploit this information to their advantage. The accumulation of personal data by corporations and governments enables extensive surveillances.

Such practices, moreover, exclude individuals from traditional economic systems if their documentation doesn't meet arbitrary standards, reinforcing a dystopian divide. Small businesses are similarly burdened by the costs of implementing these regulations, hindering free market competition^1:

How will they keep this information safe? Why do they need my identity? Why do they force businesses to enforce such regulations? It's always for your safety, to protect you from the "bad". Your life is perpetually in danger: terrorists, money launderers, villains... so the government steps in to save us.

‟Hush now, baby, baby, don't you cry Mamma's gonna make all of your nightmares come true Mamma's gonna put all of her fears into you Mamma's gonna keep you right here, under her wing She won't let you fly, but she might let you sing Mamma's gonna keep baby cosy and warm” — Mother, Pink Floyd

We must resist any attack on our privacy and freedom. To do this, we must collaborate.

If you have a service, refuse to ask for KYC; find a way. Accept cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Monero. Commit to circular economies. Remove the need to go through the FIAT system. People need fiat money to use most services, but we can change that.

If you're a user, donate to and prefer using services that accept such currencies. Encourage your friends to accept cryptocurrencies as well. Boycott FIAT system to the greatest extent you possibly can.

This may sound utopian, but it can be achieved. This movement can't be stopped. Go kick the hornet's nest.

“We must defend our own privacy if we expect to have any. We must come together and create systems which allow anonymous transactions to take place. People have been defending their own privacy for centuries with whispers, darkness, envelopes, closed doors, secret handshakes, and couriers. The technologies of the past did not allow for strong privacy, but electronic technologies do.” — Eric Hughes, A Cypherpunk's Manifesto

The anniversary

Four years ago, I began exploring ways to use crypto without KYC. I bookmarked a few favorite services and thought sharing them to the world might be useful. That was the first version of kycnot.me — a simple list of about 15 services. Since then, I've added services, rewritten it three times, and improved it to what it is now.

kycnot.me has remained 100% independent and 100% open source^2 all these years. I've received offers to buy the site, all of which I have declined and will continue to decline. It has been DDoS attacked many times, but we made it through. I have also rewritten the whole site almost once per year (three times in four years).

The code and scoring algorithm are open source (contributions are welcome) and I can't arbitrarly change a service's score without adding or removing attributes, making any arbitrary alterations obvious if they were fake. You can even see the score summary for any service's score.

I'm a one-person team, dedicating my free time to this project. I hope to keep doing so for many more years. Again, thank you for being part of this.

@ 1f79058c:eb86e1cb

I think we should agree on an HTML element for pointing to the Nostr representation of a document/URL on the Web. We could use the existing one for link relations for example:

html <link rel="alternate" type="application/nostr+json" href="nostr:naddr1qvzqqqr4..." title="This article on Nostr" />

This would be useful in multiple ways:

1. Nostr clients, when fetching meta/preview information for a URL that is linked in a note, can detect that there's a Nostr representation of the content, and then render it in Nostr-native ways (whatever that may be depending on the client)
2. User agents, usually a browser or browser extension, when opening a URL on the Web, can offer opening the alternative representation of a page in a Nostr client. And/or they could offer to follow the author's pubkey on Nostr. And/or they could offer to zap the content.
3. When publishing a new article, authors can share their preferred Web URL everywhere, without having to consider if the reader knows about or uses Nostr at all. However, if a Nostr user finds the Web version of an article outside of Nostr, they can now easily jump to the Nostr version of it.
4. Existing Web publications can retroactively create Nostr versions of their content and easily link the Nostr articles on all of their existing article pages without having to add prominent Nostr links everywhere.

There are probably more use cases, like Nostr search engines and whatnot. If you can think of something interesting, please tell me.

Update: I came up with another interesting use case, which is adding alternate links to RSS and Atom feeds.

Proof of concept

In order to show one way in which this could be used, I have created a small Web Extension called Nostr Links, which will discover alternate Nostr links on the pages you visit.

If it finds one or more links, it will show a purple Nostr icon in the address bar, which you can click to open the list of links. It's similar to e.g. the Feed Preview extension, and also to what the Tor Browser does when it discovers an Onion-Location for the page you're looking at:

The links in this popup menu will be web+nostr: links, because browsers currently do not allow web apps or extensions to handle unprefixed nostr: links. (I hope someone is working on getting those on par with ipfs: etc.)

Following such a link will either open your default Nostr Web app, if you have already configured one, or it will ask you which Web app to open the link with.

Caveat emptor: At the time of writing, my personal default Web app, noStrudel, needs a new release for the links to find the content.

Try it now

Have a look at the source code and/or download the extension (currently only for Firefox).

I have added alternate Nostr links to the Web pages of profiles and long-form content on the Kosmos relay's domain. It's probably the only place on the Web, which will trigger the extension right now.

You can look at this very post to find an alternate link for example.

Update: A certain fiatjaf has added the element to his personal website, which is built entirely from Nostr articles. Multiple other devs also expressed their intent to implement.

@ 39cc53c9:27168656

Read the original blog post

Silent.link is an anonymous eSIM provider. They offer pay-as-you-go roaming in 160+ countries.

Pros

• Anonymous
• Private payment options
• High performance
• Global availability

Cons

• Need to select the right networks sometimes
• Latency
• Data and incoming SMS & call only

Rating

★★★★★

Service website

Silent.link

---

eSIMs replace traditional, physical SIM cards, if you have a fairly new phone, odds are it supports them. Since most people change their mobile carrier very rarely, the most common use case for these new eSIMs is their use in travel. Although their use as a piece of a larger OPSEC puzzle to improve privacy when using the internet from your phone is increasingly popular too.

Silent.link is not the only eSIM provider out there. Yet, they’re so unique that even Twitter’s (now X) founder Jack Dorsey recommends them.

Let’s start off with a quick explanation of how Silent.link works and what pay-as-you-go means. Most other eSIM providers will sell you packages of GBs with an expiration date. For instance imagine you’re visiting France then going to the UK after a few months. With other providers you might buy a 10GB in France package valid for 7 days, then after some months a 10GB in the UK package also valid for 7 days. You likely won’t use up the full package in either country and the remaining capacity will be voided as the package expires.

Silent.link’s pay-as-you-go is different. There are no geographic packages. There are no expiration dates. You simply have a balance denominated in USD and are charged as you use up the data according to the pricing of whichever local carrier you’re connecting via.

Preparing for the same trips from the example above you’d simply top-up your Silent.link balance with $10. Then you’d use Silent.link in France paying $1.33/GB, you’d only be charged for the exact amount used, then you’d go to the UK and pay $1.54/GB from the balance you had left over from France. It doesn’t matter how much time passes between the trips, because Silent.link balances don’t expire. If you have a balance left over you can use it on a future trip, or simply use it up in your home country.

---

Pros

Anonymity

Silent.link is anonymous. Most other eSIM providers require some form of identification. This can be a traditional, full KYC, procedure involving your ID or passport numbers or, as seemingly innocent, as verifying your phone number with your main carrier. Regardless, a link between the eSIM you bought online and your identity is established.

In some countries you’ll be able to pick up a traditional SIM (or the new eSIM) from a local carrier without undergoing this verification. This can still be a hassle though. You’ll need to look up the laws before travelling, you’ll need to find a local store selling them, you’ll need to decide how you’ll pay privately, etc. And that’s the best case, that’s assuming the country you want to get the SIM in allows you to buy one anonymously.

Private payment methods

Silent.link only accepts cryptocurrency and according to their stats, most payments are made with Bitcoin (either onchain or using the Lightning Network) or with Monero. As such paying anonymously is not a problem. The use a self-hosted instance of BTCPay Server to process payments and operate their own LN node. The entire checkout process can be completed over Tor.

---

Cons

Network selection

Although you can skip the hassle of buying a new eSIM every time you travel it’s a good idea to look up the pricing of different mobile networks in the country you’re going to. The differences can be trivial, but can also be 100x. If a specific mobile network offers a much better deal, you’ll probably want to dive into your phone’s settings to make sure it only connects to that network.

High prices for some regions

Second issue can be that, especially for poorer countries, Silent.link might not have the best prices. For instance if you travel to Angola you’ll end up paying $155.44/GB. But if you search around for other providers you’ll find eSIM that offer much lower prices for that same country.

Data & incoming SMS & calls only

These eSIMs are either data-only or only offer data and inbound sms and calls. You can’t use Silent.link eSIMs to send texts or make phone calls.

Latency

For most use-cases this shouldn’t matter, but the way roaming works is that when you’re abroad your data is first sent to your home country then sent out into the internet from there. For instance if you’re a Brit on holiday in Spain wherever you open up a website your phone communicates with the Spanish network who forwards the request to your home network in the UK and only there does the request start going towards the website you’re trying to load. The response takes the same path in reverse.

The home network for the Silent.link eSIMs is Poland. To take an extreme (antipodal) example, if you’re in Chile loading a Chilean website your request will go to Poland then back from Poland to the website’s server in Chile, then the response will go from Chile to Poland to you (in Chile). All those trips add latency. In our testing, done during the recent OrangeFren.com meetup in Istanbul, the difference was an additional 73ms. The bandwidth, however, was exceptional, easily surpassing 100 Mbps.

This latency issue isn’t unique to Silent.link, other eSIM providers usually suffer from it too, though their home network may be better suited for your latency needs. If you need the best latency we recommend a SIM from a local provider (or WiFi).

This proxy behaviour isn’t all negative however. It may potentially allow you to circumvent censorship or geoblocking if you’re trying to access resources available from Poland, but unavailable elsewhere.

Besides Istanbul one of the countries we also tested Silent.link in was Northern Cyprus. This territory is mostly unrecognized. It’s a country that, depending on who you ask, is or isn’t real. Despite this unresolved geopolitical status Silent.link performed without any issues.

---

Installation

If you decide to give Silent.link a try, you'll need to select if you want a data-only plan or a plan with inbound SMS & calling, once you complete the payment simply scan the QR code on the order confirmation page with your phone. Make sure to save the url of that order confirmation page somewhere! You will need it to top up your eSIM and check your remaining balance.

Getting in touch

The preferred way of contacting Silent.link's support is using the website's built-in chat function. Alternative methods include X (formerly Twitter), Matrix and email.

Their support is online from 09:00 - 21:00 UTC although even when testing outside of those hours we got a reply within a minute.

NOTE: These reviews are sponsored, yet the sponsorship does not influence the outcome of the evaluations. Sponsored reviews are independent from the kycnot.me list, being only part of the blog. The reviews have no impact on the scores of the listings or their continued presence on the list. Should any issues arise, I will not hesitate to remove any listing.

@ 21335073:a244b1ad

Before I saw those X right-wing political “influencers” parading their Epstein binders in that PR stunt, I’d already posted this on Nostr, an open protocol. 

“Today, the world’s attention will likely fixate on Epstein, governmental failures in addressing horrific abuse cases, and the influential figures who perpetrate such acts—yet few will center the victims and survivors in the conversation. The survivors of Epstein went to law enforcement and very little happened. The survivors tried to speak to the corporate press and the corporate press knowingly covered for him. In situations like these social media can serve as one of the only ways for a survivor’s voice to be heard. 

It’s becoming increasingly evident that the line between centralized corporate social media and the state is razor-thin, if it exists at all. Time and again, the state shields powerful abusers when it’s politically expedient to do so. In this climate, a survivor attempting to expose someone like Epstein on a corporate tech platform faces an uphill battle—there’s no assurance their voice would even break through. Their story wouldn’t truly belong to them; it’d be at the mercy of the platform, subject to deletion at a whim. Nostr, though, offers a lifeline—a censorship-resistant space where survivors can share their truths, no matter how untouchable the abuser might seem. A survivor could remain anonymous here if they took enough steps. 

Nostr holds real promise for amplifying survivor voices. And if you’re here daily, tossing out memes, take heart: you’re helping build a foundation for those who desperately need to be heard.“

That post is untouchable—no CEO, company, employee, or government can delete it. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t take it down myself. The post will outlive me on the protocol. 

The cozy alliance between the state and corporate social media hit me hard during that right-wing X “influencer” PR stunt. Elon owns X. Elon’s a special government employee. X pays those influencers to post. We don’t know who else pays them to post. Those influencers are spurred on by both the government and X to manage the Epstein case narrative. It wasn’t survivors standing there, grinning for photos—it was paid influencers, gatekeepers orchestrating yet another chance to re-exploit the already exploited.

The bond between the state and corporate social media is tight. If the other Epsteins out there are ever to be unmasked, I wouldn’t bet on a survivor’s story staying safe with a corporate tech platform, the government, any social media influencer, or mainstream journalist. Right now, only a protocol can hand survivors the power to truly own their narrative.

I don’t have anything against Elon—I’ve actually been a big supporter. I’m just stating it as I see it. X isn’t censorship resistant and they have an algorithm that they choose not the user. Corporate tech platforms like X can be a better fit for some survivors. X has safety tools and content moderation, making it a solid option for certain individuals. Grok can be a big help for survivors looking for resources or support! As a survivor, you know what works best for you, and safety should always come first—keep that front and center.

That said, a protocol is a game-changer for cases where the powerful are likely to censor. During China's # MeToo movement, survivors faced heavy censorship on social media platforms like Weibo and WeChat, where posts about sexual harassment were quickly removed, and hashtags like # MeToo or "woyeshi" were blocked by government and platform filters. To bypass this, activists turned to blockchain technology encoding their stories—like Yue Xin’s open letter about a Peking University case—into transaction metadata. This made the information tamper-proof and publicly accessible, resisting censorship since blockchain data can’t be easily altered or deleted.

I posted this on X 2/28/25. I wanted to try my first long post on a nostr client. The Epstein cover up is ongoing so it’s still relevant, unfortunately.

If you are a survivor or loved one who is reading this and needs support please reach out to: National Sexual Assault Hotline 24/7 https://rainn.org/

Hours: Available 24 hours

@ 78b3c1ed:5033eea9

※スポットライトから移植した古い記事です。参考程度に。

これを参考にしてUmbrelのBitcoin Nodeをカスタムsignetノードにする。 以下メモ書きご容赦。備忘録程度に書き留めました。

メインネットとは共存できない。Bitcoinに依存する全てのアプリを削除しなければならない。よって実験機に導入すべき。

<手順>

1.Umbrel Bitcoin Nodeアプリのadvance settingでsignetを選択。

2.CLI appスクリプトでbitcoinを止める。 cd umbrel/scripts ./app stop bitcoin 3.bitcoin.conf, umbrel-bitcoin.conf以外を削除 ディレクトリの場所は ~/umbrel/app-data/bitcoin/data/bitcoin 4.umbrel-bitcoin.confをsu権限で編集。末尾にsignetchallengeを追加。 ``` [signet] bind=0.0.0.0:8333 bind=10.21.21.8:8334=onion

51,21,<公開鍵>,51,ae

signetchallenge=5121<公開鍵>51ae 5.appスクリプトでbitcoinを開始。 cd ~/umbrel/scripts ./app start bitcoin ``` 6.適当にディレクトリを作りgithubからbitcoindのソースをクローン。

7.bitcoindのバイナリをダウンロード、bitcoin-cliおよびbitcoin-utilを~/.local/binに置く。6.のソースからビルドしても良い。ビルド方法は自分で調べて。

8.bitcondにマイニング用のウォレットを作成 ``` alias bcli='docker exec -it bitcoin_bitcoind_1 bitcoin-cli -signet -rpcconnect=10.21.21.8 -rpcport=8332 -rpcuser=umbrel -rpcpassword=<パスワード>'

ウォレットを作る。

bcli createwallet "mining" false true "" false false

秘密鍵をインポート

bcli importprivkey "<秘密鍵>" RPCパスワードは以下で確認 cat ~/umbrel/.env | grep BITCOIN_RPC_PASS 9.ソースにあるbitcoin/contrib/signet/minerスクリプトを使ってマイニング cd <ダウンロードしたディレクトリ>/bitcoin/contrib/signet

難易度の算出

./miner \ --cli="bitcoin-cli -signet -rpcconnect=10.21.21.8 -rpcport=8332 -rpcuser=umbrel -rpcpassword=<パスワード>" calibrate \ --grind-cmd="bitcoin-util grind" --seconds 30 ★私の環境で30秒指定したら nbits=1d4271e7 と算出された。実際にこれで動かすと２分30になるけど...

ジェネシスブロック生成

./miner \ --cli="bitcoin-cli -signet -rpcconnect=10.21.21.8 -rpcport=8332 -rpcuser=umbrel -rpcpassword=<パスワード>" generate \ --address <ビットコインアドレス> \ --grind-cmd="bitcoin-util grind" --nbits=1d4271e7 \ --set-block-time=$(date +%s)

継続的にマイニング

./miner \ --cli="bitcoin-cli -signet -rpcconnect=10.21.21.8 -rpcport=8332 -rpcuser=umbrel -rpcpassword=<パスワード>" generate \ --address <ビットコインアドレス> \ --grind-cmd="bitcoin-util grind" --nbits=1d4271e7 \ --ongoing ``` ここまでやればカスタムsignetでビットコインノードが稼働する。

@ 3b3a42d3:d192e325

Atomic Signature Swaps (ASS) over Nostr is a protocol for atomically exchanging Schnorr signatures using Nostr events for orchestration. This new primitive enables multiple interesting applications like:

• Getting paid to publish specific Nostr events
• Issuing automatic payment receipts
• Contract signing in exchange for payment
• P2P asset exchanges
• Trading and enforcement of asset option contracts
• Payment in exchange for Nostr-based credentials or access tokens
• Exchanging GMs 🌞

It only requires that (i) the involved signatures be Schnorr signatures using the secp256k1 curve and that (ii) at least one of those signatures be accessible to both parties. These requirements are naturally met by Nostr events (published to relays), Taproot transactions (published to the mempool and later to the blockchain), and Cashu payments (using mints that support NUT-07, allowing any pair of these signatures to be swapped atomically.

How the Cryptographic Magic Works 🪄

This is a Schnorr signature (Zₓ, s):

s = z + H(Zₓ || P || m)⋅k

If you haven't seen it before, don't worry, neither did I until three weeks ago.

The signature scalar s is the the value a signer with private key k (and public key P = k⋅G) must calculate to prove his commitment over the message m given a randomly generated nonce z (Zₓ is just the x-coordinate of the public point Z = z⋅G). H is a hash function (sha256 with the tag "BIP0340/challenge" when dealing with BIP340), || just means to concatenate and G is the generator point of the elliptic curve, used to derive public values from private ones.

Now that you understand what this equation means, let's just rename z = r + t. We can do that, z is just a randomly generated number that can be represented as the sum of two other numbers. It also follows that z⋅G = r⋅G + t⋅G ⇔ Z = R + T. Putting it all back into the definition of a Schnorr signature we get:

s = (r + t) + H((R + T)ₓ || P || m)⋅k

Which is the same as:

s = sₐ + t where sₐ = r + H((R + T)ₓ || P || m)⋅k

sₐ is what we call the adaptor signature scalar) and t is the secret. ((R + T)ₓ, sₐ) is an incomplete signature that just becomes valid by add the secret t to the sₐ:

s = sₐ + t

What is also important for our purposes is that by getting access to the valid signature s, one can also extract t from it by just subtracting sₐ:

t = s - sₐ

The specific value of t depends on our choice of the public point T, since R is just a public point derived from a randomly generated nonce r.

So how do we choose T so that it requires the secret t to be the signature over a specific message m' by an specific public key P'? (without knowing the value of t)

Let's start with the definition of t as a valid Schnorr signature by P' over m':

t = r' + H(R'ₓ || P' || m')⋅k' ⇔ t⋅G = r'⋅G + H(R'ₓ || P' || m')⋅k'⋅G

That is the same as:

T = R' + H(R'ₓ || P' || m')⋅P'

Notice that in order to calculate the appropriate T that requires t to be an specific signature scalar, we only need to know the public nonce R' used to generate that signature.

In summary: in order to atomically swap Schnorr signatures, one party P' must provide a public nonce R', while the other party P must provide an adaptor signature using that nonce:

sₐ = r + H((R + T)ₓ || P || m)⋅k where T = R' + H(R'ₓ || P' || m')⋅P'

P' (the nonce provider) can then add his own signature t to the adaptor signature sₐ in order to get a valid signature by P, i.e. s = sₐ + t. When he publishes this signature (as a Nostr event, Cashu transaction or Taproot transaction), it becomes accessible to P that can now extract the signature t by P' and also make use of it.

Important considerations

A signature may not be useful at the end of the swap if it unlocks funds that have already been spent, or that are vulnerable to fee bidding wars.

When a swap involves a Taproot UTXO, it must always use a 2-of-2 multisig timelock to avoid those issues.

Cashu tokens do not require this measure when its signature is revealed first, because the mint won't reveal the other signature if they can't be successfully claimed, but they also require a 2-of-2 multisig timelock when its signature is only revealed last (what is unavoidable in cashu for cashu swaps).

For Nostr events, whoever receives the signature first needs to publish it to at least one relay that is accessible by the other party. This is a reasonable expectation in most cases, but may be an issue if the event kind involved is meant to be used privately.

How to Orchestrate the Swap over Nostr?

Before going into the specific event kinds, it is important to recognize what are the requirements they must meet and what are the concerns they must address. There are mainly three requirements:

• Both parties must agree on the messages they are going to sign
• One party must provide a public nonce
• The other party must provide an adaptor signature using that nonce

There is also a fundamental asymmetry in the roles of both parties, resulting in the following significant downsides for the party that generates the adaptor signature:

• NIP-07 and remote signers do not currently support the generation of adaptor signatures, so he must either insert his nsec in the client or use a fork of another signer
• There is an overhead of retrieving the completed signature containing the secret, either from the blockchain, mint endpoint or finding the appropriate relay
• There is risk he may not get his side of the deal if the other party only uses his signature privately, as I have already mentioned
• There is risk of losing funds by not extracting or using the signature before its timelock expires. The other party has no risk since his own signature won't be exposed by just not using the signature he received.

The protocol must meet all those requirements, allowing for some kind of role negotiation and while trying to reduce the necessary hops needed to complete the swap.

Swap Proposal Event (kind:455)

This event enables a proposer and his counterparty to agree on the specific messages whose signatures they intend to exchange. The content field is the following stringified JSON:

{     "give": <signature spec (required)>,     "take": <signature spec (required)>,     "exp": <expiration timestamp (optional)>,     "role": "<adaptor | nonce (optional)>",     "description": "<Info about the proposal (optional)>",     "nonce": "<Signature public nonce (optional)>",     "enc_s": "<Encrypted signature scalar (optional)>" }

The field role indicates what the proposer will provide during the swap, either the nonce or the adaptor. When this optional field is not provided, the counterparty may decide whether he will send a nonce back in a Swap Nonce event or a Swap Adaptor event using the nonce (optionally) provided by in the Swap Proposal in order to avoid one hop of interaction.

The enc_s field may be used to store the encrypted scalar of the signature associated with the nonce, since this information is necessary later when completing the adaptor signature received from the other party.

A signature spec specifies the type and all necessary information for producing and verifying a given signature. In the case of signatures for Nostr events, it contain a template with all the fields, except pubkey, id and sig:

{ "type": "nostr", "template": { "kind": "<kind>"        "content": "<content>"        "tags": [ … ],        "created_at": "<created_at>" } }

In the case of Cashu payments, a simplified signature spec just needs to specify the payment amount and an array of mints trusted by the proposer:

{   "type": "cashu",   "amount": "<amount>",   "mint": ["<acceptable mint_url>", …] }

This works when the payer provides the adaptor signature, but it still needs to be extended to also work when the payer is the one receiving the adaptor signature. In the later case, the signature spec must also include a timelock and the derived public keys Y of each Cashu Proof, but for now let's just ignore this situation. It should be mentioned that the mint must be trusted by both parties and also support Token state check (NUT-07) for revealing the completed adaptor signature and P2PK spending conditions (NUT-11) for the cryptographic scheme to work.

The tags are:

• "p", the proposal counterparty's public key (required)
• "a", a kind:30455 Swap Listing event or an application specific version of it (optional)

Forget about this Swap Listing event for now, I will get to it later...

Swap Nonce Event (kind:456) - Optional

This is an optional event for the Swap Proposal receiver to provide the public nonce of his signature when the proposal does not include a nonce or when he does not want to provide the adaptor signature due to the downsides previously mentioned. The content field is the following stringified JSON:

{     "nonce": "<Signature public nonce>",     "enc_s": "<Encrypted signature scalar (optional)>" }

And the tags must contain:

• "e", a kind:455 Swap Proposal Event (required)
• "p", the counterparty's public key (required)

Swap Adaptor Event (kind:457)

The content field is the following stringified JSON:

{ "adaptors": [ {         "sa": "<Adaptor signature scalar>",         "R": "<Signer's public nonce (including parity byte)>",         "T": "<Adaptor point (including parity byte)>",         "Y": "<Cashu proof derived public key (if applicable)>",     }, …],     "cashu": "<Cashu V4 token (if applicable)>" }

And the tags must contain:

• "e", a kind:455 Swap Proposal Event (required)
• "p", the counterparty's public key (required)

Discoverability

The Swap Listing event previously mentioned as an optional tag in the Swap Proposal may be used to find an appropriate counterparty for a swap. It allows a user to announce what he wants to accomplish, what his requirements are and what is still open for negotiation.

Swap Listing Event (kind:30455)

The content field is the following stringified JSON:

{ "description": "<Information about the listing (required)>", "give": <partial signature spec (optional)>, "take": <partial signature spec (optional)>, "examples: [<take signature spec>], // optional "exp": <expiration timestamp (optional)>, "role": "<adaptor | nonce (optional)>" }

The description field describes the restrictions on counterparties and signatures the user is willing to accept.

A partial signature spec is an incomplete signature spec used in Swap Proposal events kind:455 where omitting fields signals that they are still open for negotiation.

The examples field is an array of signature specs the user would be willing to take.

The tags are:

• "d", a unique listing id (required)
• "s", the status of the listing draft | open | closed (required)
• "t", topics related to this listing (optional)
• "p", public keys to notify about the proposal (optional)

Application Specific Swap Listings

Since Swap Listings are still fairly generic, it is expected that specific use cases define new event kinds based on the generic listing. Those application specific swap listing would be easier to filter by clients and may impose restrictions and add new fields and/or tags. The following are some examples under development:

Sponsored Events

This listing is designed for users looking to promote content on the Nostr network, as well as for those who want to monetize their accounts by sharing curated sponsored content with their existing audiences.

It follows the same format as the generic Swap Listing event, but uses the kind:30456 instead.

The following new tags are included:

• "k", event kind being sponsored (required)
• "title", campaign title (optional)

It is required that at least one signature spec (give and/or take) must have "type": "nostr" and also contain the following tag ["sponsor", "<pubkey>", "<attestation>"] with the sponsor's public key and his signature over the signature spec without the sponsor tag as his attestation. This last requirement enables clients to disclose and/or filter sponsored events.

Asset Swaps

This listing is designed for users looking for counterparties to swap different assets that can be transferred using Schnorr signatures, like any unit of Cashu tokens, Bitcoin or other asset IOUs issued using Taproot.

It follows the same format as the generic Swap Listing event, but uses the kind:30457 instead.

It requires the following additional tags:

• "t", asset pair to be swapped (e.g. "btcusd")
• "t", asset being offered (e.g. "btc")
• "t", accepted payment method (e.g. "cashu", "taproot")

Swap Negotiation

From finding an appropriate Swap Listing to publishing a Swap Proposal, there may be some kind of negotiation between the involved parties, e.g. agreeing on the amount to be paid by one of the parties or the exact content of a Nostr event signed by the other party. There are many ways to accomplish that and clients may implement it as they see fit for their specific goals. Some suggestions are:

• Adding kind:1111 Comments to the Swap Listing or an existing Swap Proposal
• Exchanging tentative Swap Proposals back and forth until an agreement is reached
• Simple exchanges of DMs
• Out of band communication (e.g. Signal)

Work to be done

I've been refining this specification as I develop some proof-of-concept clients to experience its flaws and trade-offs in practice. I left the signature spec for Taproot signatures out of the current document as I still have to experiment with it. I will probably find some important orchestration issues related to dealing with 2-of-2 multisig timelocks, which also affects Cashu transactions when spent last, that may require further adjustments to what was presented here.

The main goal of this article is to find other people interested in this concept and willing to provide valuable feedback before a PR is opened in the NIPs repository for broader discussions.

References

• GM Swap- Nostr client for atomically exchanging GM notes. Live demo available here.
• Sig4Sats Script - A Typescript script demonstrating the swap of a Cashu payment for a signed Nostr event.
• Loudr- Nostr client under development for sponsoring the publication of Nostr events. Live demo available at loudr.me.
• Poelstra, A. (2017). Scriptless Scripts. Blockstream Research. https://github.com/BlockstreamResearch/scriptless-scripts

@ 7d3cd8a1:66aa5c86

SNAILS.

Creator Co-op for the Cosmos Ecosystem

Written by: Terp Network

Original post: https://docs.terp.network/guides/nodes/faq

We must keep in mind that p2p networks are exposed to the risk of denial of service attacks, and an effective way to mitigate this type of attacks is by using sentry nodes.

Why is it important to avoid denial of service attacks?​

When our node is suffering a denial of service attack that cannot be mitigated by the server provider, it is likely that the server will be inoperative for the duration of the attack because, being saturated, it will stop responding to the requests made by the rest of the nodes in the network.

If our node becomes inoperative, it means that we are no longer participating in the consensus rounds, our node will not be signing blocks or generating rewards for the delegators and therefore in a few minutes the node will be jailed and penalized.

In addition to being a risk for node operators due to the penalties involved in being jailed, it is also a risk for the network, since if an attack is carried out on several nodes at the same time, the stability and security of the network would be affected. Sentry nodes hide our validator’s IP from the world​

Using sentry nodes is a solution to prevent the rest of the network from knowing the IP of our validator node, but allowing our validator node to continue communicating with other validator nodes in the terp network, since if the node were 100% isolated, it would not be able to participate in the network and therefore would not generate rewards for the delegators.

A sentry node is a bridge between our validator node and the rest of the network, so that the rest of the network does not know the IP of the validator node, but the IP of the sentry nodes.

Can sentry nodes suffer denial of service attacks?​

Yes, but as they are nodes that are not validating transactions and only act as a bridge between the network and the validating node, we could quickly deploy new sentry nodes or even change the IP of the sentry node being attacked. How many sentry nodes can there be?​

There is really no maximum number, the more sentry nodes we have, the more resistance to denial of service attacks our validator node will have. However, it must be taken into account that the more sentry nodes we have, the more complex it will be to maintain our nodes when carrying out maintenance or upgrades, in addition to the increase in server costs. You should have at least two sentry nodes and if possible have one of them in a different datacenter from where the validator node is deployed. Where should the sentry nodes be deployed?​

If two sentry nodes are going to be mounted, one of them could be deployed in the same datacenter where our validator node is, this will reduce the latency between both servers, and therefore, the connection between both servers will be quite fast. The other sentry node could be located in a different datacenter; this way, in case the network of the datacenter where our validator node is down for any reason, we would always have a node with the current block available to synchronize our validator node. Step by step guide​

To follow this guide, we will use a node created & connected to 90u-3 testnet network. In case you have not deployed the node yet, how to install the terp-core binary Creating the sentry nodes​

Once we have contracted the two sentry node servers and we have the access IPs, we must perform the same installation that we would perform as if it were a validator node on both servers.

First, we will need to download and compile the terp-core binary.

git clone https://github.com/terpnetwork/terp-core.git cd terp-core git checkout

Once downloaded, we will proceed to compile the binary:

make install

It will also be necessary to initialize the node so that the .terp directory is created, for this we can use the following commands, each one in the corresponding server:

On sentry node A:

terpd init "terpd-up - Sentry A" --chain-id 90u-3

On sentry node B:

terpd init "terpd-up - Sentry B" --chain-id 90u-3

Once the previous step is done, the .terp folder will already exist, so we can download the genesis.json file:

curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/terpnetwork/networks/main/testnet/90u-3/genesis.json > ~/.terp/config/genesis.json

Configure service​

Finally, we will configure the terp service:

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/system/terpd.service

sudo tee /etc/systemd/system/terpd.service > /dev/null <<EOF [Unit] Description=terpd Daemon After=network-online.target [Service] User=$USER ExecStart=$(which terpd) start Restart=always RestartSec=3 LimitNOFILE=65535 [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target EOF

Base configuration of the sentry nodes​

For now we have not done anything different from what we would do when setting up a validator node, although we have stopped doing several things, such as creating the wallet or running the validator creation command “tx staking create-validator”, since we do not want to create validator nodes, only nodes that synchronize with the rest of the nodes in the network and we can use to synchronize our validator node in a secure way without exposing our IP to the rest of the network.

The sentry nodes (both), must have peers to be synchronized at all times, we will add the following peers to the config.toml file inside the config folder. Persistent Peers:​

peers=$(curl -s https://ss.terp.nodestake.top/peers.txt) sed -i.bak -e "s/^persistent_peers =./persistent_peers = \"$peers\"/" ~/.terp/config/config.toml

Note: the peers were obtained from Nodestake validator team.

It would also be advisable to add as persistent peer the sentry nodes between them. That is to say, that the sentry node B is persistent peer of the sentry node A, in the same way that the sentry node A is persistent peer of the sentry node B; this will make us have more redundancy. Private Peers:​

In the config.toml file of the config folder of the sentry nodes (both), it is necessary to specify the id of the validator node in the private_peer_ids parameter. This is so that our sentry nodes never share with the rest of the peers of the network the existence of our validator node.

If you don’t know how to get the id of your validator node, you can get it with the following command:

terpd tendermint show-node-id

Unconditional Peers​

In the same configuration file, we will also find the unconditional-peer-ids parameter to which we must add our validator node as we did with the private_peer_ids parameter. This step is necessary because the nodes have a limited number of peers to which they can connect.

To avoid the risk of leaving our validator node incommunicado, by setting its id in the unconditional-peer-ids parameter, we will make the sentry nodes always connected to the validator node even if the limit of peers to which they can be connected has been exceeded. Optionally we can also add in this same parameter (separated by commas) the homologous sentry node to guarantee that the sentry nodes will always be connected to each other.

unconditional-peer-ids = "validator node, peer sentry node". Start Sentry Nodes​

At this point, we could start our sentry nodes and let them synchronize and be discovered by the rest of the network. For that we will use the following command:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload sudo systemctl enable terpd

Base configuration for validator​

Once the sentry nodes have been synchronized, we can configure the validator node with all certainty that our validator node is not going to stop being synchronized with the network. We will have to edit the config.toml file in the config folder, where we will find the following lines: Persistent Peers​

In persistent_peers we will add only the ids of the sentry nodes, that is to say that if the node was already mounted before, we will have to delete the content of this field before adding our sentry nodes. PEX​

In the same configuration file we will find the pex parameter, which we must set to “false”. This parameter does not discover other peers, it will only use the ones set in the persistent_peers parameter.

pex = false

Remove address book (optional)​

If the validator has already been exposed to the network, we can delete the address book so that it only “knows” the sentry nodes; if it is a validator that has never been started, this step is not necessary. Once inside the config folder and with the node stopped, perform the following command:

rm -rf $HOME/.terp/config/addrbook.json

Start Validator Node​

To verify that we are really connected only to two peers and these are the sentry nodes, we can write the following command in our validated node; the output is a JSON where it will show us the number and which peers we are connected to, where the number should be two and the peers should be our sentry nodes.

curl -s localhost:26657/net_info Here you can see the number of peers to which our validator node is connected, in this case it is two, which is correct. Extra: Protecting the validator node through firewall​

Right now the p2p port of our validator node is open and anyone can establish a connection. If we have just set up the validator node, with the configurations made, nobody would have to find our validator node, however, to add a plus of security it is advisable to close the p2p port and only allow traffic to the IP’s of our sentry nodes.

There are several ways to do this, it is possible that your server provider allows you to do it through a gui. Ufw is a simple to use alternative. Extra: Private networks​

One possibility we have when our validator node is in the same datacenter as one of the sentry nodes, would be to use private addressing.

In case we want to use private addressing, we will have to edit the addr-book-strict parameter of the config.toml file and set it to false in both the validator node and the sentry node that are communicating under private addressing. This parameter, when set to “true”, will only add routable addresses to the address book, the private addresses defined in RFC-1918 are not routable, therefore, they would not be added to the address book, so we will have to change it to false to be able to use IP addresses from the private ranges.

addr-book-strict: boolean. By default, nodes with a routable address will be considered for connection. If this setting is disabled (false), non-routable IP addresses, such as addresses from a private network, can be added to the address book. Source: https://docs.tendermint.com/master/nodes/validators.html

Conclusions​

Having sentry nodes will not only help our validator node not to fall victim to a denial of service attack, but will also make the Terp network more robust. The installation of the sentry nodes does not differ much from that of a validator node, and the additional configurations to be performed are very simple and intuitive.

Now that Terp Network is doing the 90u-3 testnet, it is a good time to try to set up sentry nodes and once the mainnet is launched, to be able to replicate it with the experience of having been able to test it in 90u-3. If you already have your node on 90u-3, what are you waiting for to set up your sentry nodes and protect yourself from unwanted attacks?

sources: https://stakely.io/en/blog/how-to-deploy-sentry-nodes-in-the-archway-network

@ f683e870:557f5ef2

When it comes to the Nostr Web of Trust, several NIPs have been proposed, but the one that seemed to gather the most traction was Trusted Assertion by Vitor Pamplona.

The idea is to have kind:30382 represent assertions made about an entity, which could be a pubkey, for example. The NIP also specifies a tag called rank, which can be used to build some basic WoT primitives.

Example event:

{ "kind": 30382, "tags": [ ["d", "e88a6...50411"], ["rank", "89"], ["zap_amt_sent", "1000000"], ], "content": "", //... }

However, we quickly realized that this NIP was too limiting for what we wanted to accomplish: real-time, personalized ranking.

To illustrate our different approaches, we will show how to replicate our Verify Reputation with trusted assertions.

Verify Reputation

Verify Reputation returns:

• the rank, follow count and followers count of the given target
• its top followers by rank.

All ranks are personalized to the given source.

This “batteries included” solution helps users avoid impersonation and fraud with a single request, no matter what application they are using, be it a kind:1 client, chat app, wallet, marketplace, or more.


To get the same result with trusted assertions, you would have to

• Get all contact lists that contain the target (as a p tag)
• Build the target’s follower list from those event authors
• Get the trusted assertions for the target and each of the followers
• Sort them by the rank provided by the trusted assertions

This operation is computationally expensive, especially on mobile devices. It is clear that if the user is willing to verify and process a large number of events (potentially +100k), he can compute some (rudimentary) ranking directly on the device, without the need to trust a third party.

More generally, trusted assertions are very hard to use when one doesn’t know the pubkeys of the people he’s looking for. This goes fundamentally against our approach of Web of Trust, as a powerful mechanism for discovery.

---

Are you looking to add Web of Trust capabilities to your app or project?

Take a look at our website or send a DM to Pip.

@ 3b7fc823:e194354f

A quick guide for the less than technical savvy to set up their very own free private tor enabled email using Onionmail. Privacy is for everyone, not just the super cyber nerds.

Onion Mail is an anonymous POP3/SMTP email server program hosted by various people on the internet. You can visit this site and read the details: https://en.onionmail.info/

1. Download Tor Browser

First, if you don't already, go download Tor Browser. You are going to need it. https://www.torproject.org/

1. Sign Up

Using Tor browser go to the directory page (https://onionmail.info/directory.html) choose one of the servers and sign up for an account. I say sign up but it is just choosing a user name you want to go before the @xyz.onion email address and solving a captcha.

1. Account information

Once you are done signing up an Account information page will pop up. MAKE SURE YOU SAVE THIS!!! It has your address and passwords (for sending and receiving email) that you will need. If you lose them then you are shit out of luck.

1. Install an Email Client

You can use Claws Mail, Neomutt, or whatever, but for this example, we will be using Thunderbird.

a. Download Thunderbird email client

b. The easy setup popup page that wants your name, email, and password isn't going to like your user@xyz.onion address. Just enter something that looks like a regular email address such as name@example.com and the Configure Manuallyoption will appear below. Click that.

1. Configure Incoming (POP3) Server

Under Incoming Server: Protocol: POP3 Server or Hostname: xyz.onion (whatever your account info says) Port: 110 Security: STARTTLS Authentication: Normal password Username: (your username) Password: (POP3 password).

1. Configure Outgoing (SMTP) Server

Under Outgoing Server: Server or Hostname: xyz.onion (whatever your account info says) Port: 25 Security: STARTTLS Authentication: Normal password Username: (your username) Password: (SMTP password).

1. Click on email at the top and change your address if you had to use a spoof one to get the configure manually to pop up.

2. Configure Proxy

a. Click the gear icon on the bottom left for settings. Scroll all the way down to Network & Disk Space. Click the settings button next to Connection. Configure how Thunderbird connects to the internet.

b. Select Manual Proxy Configuration. For SOCKS Host enter 127.0.0.1 and enter port 9050. (if you are running this through a VM the port may be different)

c. Now check the box for SOCKS5 and then Proxy DNS when using SOCKS5 down at the bottom. Click OK

1. Check Email

For thunderbird to reach the onion mail server it has to be connected to tor. Depending on your local setup, it might be fine as is or you might have to have tor browser open in the background. Click on inbox and then the little cloud icon with the down arrow to check mail.

1. Security Exception

Thunderbird is not going to like that the onion mail server security certificate is self signed. A popup Add Security Exception will appear. Click Confirm Security Exception.

You are done. Enjoy your new private email service.

REMEMBER: The server can read your emails unless they are encrypted. Go into account settings. Look down and click End-toEnd Encryption. Then add your OpenPGP key or open your OpenPGP Key Manager (you might have to download one if you don't already have one) and generate a new key for this account.

@ 0c469779:4b21d8b0

Sobre el amor

Mi percepción del amor cambió con el tiempo. Leer literatura rusa, principalmente a Dostoevsky, te cambia la perspectiva sobre el amor y la vida en general.

Por mucho tiempo mi visión sobre la vida es que la misma se basa en el sufrimiento: también la Biblia dice esto. El amor es igual, en el amor se sufre y se banca a la otra persona. El problema es que hay una distinción de sufrimientos que por mucho tiempo no tuve en cuenta. Está el sufrimiento del sacrificio y el sufrimiento masoquista. Para mí eran indistintos.

Para mí el ideal era Aliosha y Natasha de Humillados y Ofendidos: estar con alguien que me amase tanto como Natasha a Aliosha, un amor inclusive autodestructivo para Natasha, pero real. Tiene algo de épico, inalcanzable. Un sufrimiento extremo, redentor, es una vara altísima que en la vida cotidiana no se manifiesta. O el amor de Sonia a Raskolnikov, quien se fue hasta Siberia mientras estuvo en prisión para que no se quede solo en Crimen y Castigo.

Este es el tipo de amor que yo esperaba. Y como no me pasó nada tan extremo y las situaciones que llegan a ocurrir en mi vida están lejos de ser tan extremas, me parecía hasta poco lo que estaba pidiendo y que nadie pueda quedarse conmigo me parecía insuficiente.

Ahora pienso que el amor no tiene por qué ser así. Es un pensamiento nuevo que todavía estoy construyendo, y me di cuenta cuando fui a la iglesia, a pesar de que no soy cristiano. La filosofía cristiana me gusta. Va conmigo. Tiene un enfoque de humildad, superación y comunidad que me recuerda al estoicismo.

El amor se trata de resaltar lo mejor que hay en el otro. Se trata de ser un plus, de ayudar. Por eso si uno no está en su mejor etapa, si no se está cómodo con uno mismo, no se puede amar de verdad. El amor empieza en uno mismo.

Los libros son un espejo, no necesariamente vas a aprender de ellos, sino que te muestran quién sos. Resaltás lo que te importa. Por eso a pesar de saber los tipos de amores que hay en los trabajos de Dostoevsky, cometí los mismos errores varias veces.

Ser mejor depende de uno mismo y cada día se pone el granito de arena.

@ 9c9d2765:16f8c2c2

CHAPTER ONE

Grandpa Ray’s birthday was a grand celebration. His children and grandchildren gathered around, each presenting him with expensive gifts, golden watches, fine suits, and rare wines. The room buzzed with excitement and laughter.

Among them was James, Grandpa Ray’s adopted son. Unlike the others, James had no gift to offer. He stood quietly, watching as each family member received warm praise for their presents.

Then, Grandpa Ray did something unexpected. With a kind smile, he said, “Today, I want to give you all a gift instead. Ask for anything, and I will grant it.”

Excited, his children and grandchildren eagerly requested expensive things luxury cars, houses, money, and positions in the family business.

When it was James’ turn, he hesitated for a moment before saying, “Grandpa, I would like a shovel.”

A hush fell over the room, then erupted into laughter.

“A shovel?” one cousin sneered. “What a silly request!” another chuckled.

But Grandpa Ray raised a hand, silencing them. He looked at James with curiosity. “Why a shovel, my boy?”

James took a deep breath and replied, “I don’t need riches handed to me. I want to work for my own wealth. A shovel will help me till the land, plant crops, and build something for myself.”

Grandpa Ray’s eyes gleamed with pride. He nodded and said, “That is a wise request. Not only will I give you a shovel, but I will also grant you a piece of land to farm.”

The laughter died down. The others had asked for luxury, but James had asked for a tool to create his own future. James had once lived a life of promise. He was hardworking, loyal, and dedicated to his family’s company. But his world came crashing down when he was falsely accused of embezzlement. His own parents, ashamed of the scandal, disowned him without listening to his pleas of innocence.

Alone and broken, James had nowhere to go. It was then that Grandpa Ray, a man known for his wisdom and kindness, took him in. Unlike the rest of the world, Grandpa Ray saw something in James his resilience, his honesty, and his potential.

Despite being adopted into a wealthy and powerful family, James never truly felt accepted. The others in the family pretended to love him, but behind his back, they whispered that he was a burden, an outsider. The only one who genuinely cared for him besides Grandpa Ray was Rita, the old man’s granddaughter.

Over the years, James worked hard to earn his place in the family. He managed some of Grandpa Ray’s businesses, proving his intelligence and dedication. Rita, a kind and spirited woman, saw the goodness in him. Their bond grew stronger, and soon, love blossomed between them.

Grandpa Ray, seeing James’ sincerity and loyalty, made a bold decision he gave Rita’s hand in marriage to James, despite the objections of the rest of the family.

"You have proven yourself to be a man of honor," Grandpa Ray said to James on the wedding day. "And I know that you will cherish Rita the way she deserves."

The rest of the family smiled in public but harbored resentment in their hearts. To them, James was an unworthy orphan who had stolen their grandfather’s favor.

When Grandpa Ray passed away, everything changed. The mask of fake love that the family had worn for years finally fell off. Without Grandpa Ray to protect him, James became a target of humiliation.

Helen, Rita’s mother, Christopher, her father, and Stephen, her brother, openly ridiculed him. They made life unbearable, treating him like a servant rather than a family member.

"You don’t belong here," Stephen sneered one evening. "You were just Grandpa’s charity case."

James endured the insults in silence, holding onto the love he shared with Rita. But his in-laws had other plans; they wanted him out of Rita’s life for good.

Helen and Christopher believed that Rita had made a mistake by marrying James. They wanted her to divorce him and marry someone who would elevate the family’s status. That’s when Helen introduced Mark, the only son of the Prime Minister.

Mark was wealthy, powerful, and came from a family of high political influence. To her, he was the perfect husband for Rita.

"Rita, darling," Helen said sweetly, "don’t waste your life with James. You deserve someone who can give you the life of luxury you were born into."

Stephen agreed. "Mark is everything James is not rich, powerful, and from a good family. Be wise, sister."

But Rita stood firm.

"I love James," she said. "And I will not betray him, no matter how much you pressure me. James and I made a promise to Grandpa never to leave each other"

Helen, frustrated by Rita’s refusal, tried to manipulate her further. She arranged secret meetings between Rita and Mark, hoping she would be swayed. She even planned an engagement dinner, assuming Rita would eventually give in.

Meanwhile, James felt the weight of the battle. He saw how much pressure Rita was under and, one evening, he took her hands and said, "Rita, if leaving me will make your life easier, I won’t stop you."

Tears filled her eyes. "James, my love isn’t based on status or wealth. I chose you, and I will keep choosing you no matter what, you have forgotten the promise we two made to Grandpa before he died, in case you have forgotten, I haven't"

That night, Rita made her choice. She called a meeting to inform everyone that nothing will make her leave James for another man, James couldn't withstand the joy she made her that night, choosing love over wealth and status.

With nothing but their love and determination, James and Rita started anew. They built their life from scratch, with James working tirelessly to create a name for himself.

The Ray family had once been a symbol of wealth, power, and success, but in recent months, everything had started crumbling. A series of financial setbacks, business failures, and internal conflicts had pushed the family into a dire situation. The creditors were knocking, the banks were threatening to withdraw their support, and their empire was on the verge of collapse.

Desperation clouded every decision they made. And in that desperation, they saw only one way out is Mark.

Mark, the only son of the Prime Minister, was not just a man of wealth but also of power and influence. He had been interested in Rita for years, but she had always refused him, choosing instead to marry James. But now, with the family drowning in crisis, Mark became their only hope.

Helen, Rita’s mother, sat across from Christopher, her husband, and Stephen, their son. The tension in the room was thick.

“We have no other choice,” Helen said firmly. “Mark is willing to help us, but he wants something in return.”

“We all know what that is,” Stephen said, glancing at Rita, who sat silently in the corner of the room.

Christopher sighed. “James is the only obstacle left. We have to make Rita understand that this isn’t about love anymore, it's about survival.”

Helen’s voice was cold. “She will divorce him. And James will have no choice but to accept it.”

Rita looked up, her heart pounding. “You’re selling me to him,” she said in disbelief.

“Rita,” Helen said impatiently. “This isn’t about selling you. This is about securing our future. James has nothing. Mark can give you everything.”

“I don’t want everything. I want my husband.”

Helen scoffed. “Love won’t save this family.”

But Rita clenched her fists. She wasn’t going to give up on James so easily.

The Ray family organized a grand business anniversary event, using it as a cover to publicly introduce Mark as their savior. Guests arrived in expensive suits and dazzling gowns, but beneath the luxury was a desperate attempt to keep up appearances.

James had never felt more out of place. He knew he wasn’t truly welcome among the Ray family, but tonight, it was worse than ever. He could see the way people looked at him like he was an outsider, a liability.

Then Mark arrived; Tall, confident, and exuding power, he walked into the hall as if he already owned it. People flocked to him, shaking his hand, singing his praises.

And then, during a private meeting with the Ray family, he made his move.

“I know about your situation,” Mark said smoothly, placing a black suitcase on the table and opening it. Inside were stacks of cash, two million dollars.

Helen gasped. Christopher’s hands trembled.

Mark leaned back.

@ afa31726:18cc7792

99win mang đến cho người dùng một không gian giải trí trực tuyến tràn đầy năng lượng và sáng tạo, nơi mỗi trải nghiệm đều được đầu tư chỉn chu nhằm mang lại cảm giác mới mẻ, hấp dẫn và khó quên, với kho nội dung đa dạng, liên tục cập nhật theo xu hướng, 99win đáp ứng mọi nhu cầu giải trí của người dùng từ những phút giây thư giãn nhẹ nhàng cho đến các trải nghiệm bùng nổ cảm xúc, giao diện của nền tảng được thiết kế thân thiện, trực quan, tối ưu hóa cho cả máy tính và thiết bị di động, giúp người dùng dễ dàng thao tác, truy cập nhanh chóng mọi lúc mọi nơi, đồng thời, tốc độ tải trang cực kỳ nhanh và khả năng vận hành ổn định giúp trải nghiệm không bị gián đoạn, tạo nên sự liền mạch và mượt mà trong từng khoảnh khắc, bên cạnh đó, 99win luôn chú trọng đến yếu tố bảo mật thông tin người dùng, áp dụng các công nghệ mã hóa tiên tiến nhất để đảm bảo mọi dữ liệu cá nhân đều được bảo vệ một cách an toàn tuyệt đối, xây dựng lòng tin và sự yên tâm vững chắc cho cộng đồng thành viên, không những thế, đội ngũ chăm sóc khách hàng chuyên nghiệp, tận tâm hoạt động 24/7 luôn sẵn sàng hỗ trợ và giải đáp mọi thắc mắc một cách nhanh chóng và hiệu quả, giúp người dùng cảm thấy luôn được đồng hành trong suốt quá trình trải nghiệm, đặc biệt, 99win thường xuyên tổ chức các chương trình khuyến mãi, sự kiện hấp dẫn với nhiều phần thưởng giá trị, nhằm tri ân người dùng cũng như tạo thêm nhiều cơ hội trải nghiệm thú vị và bổ ích, nền tảng này không ngừng cải tiến công nghệ, nâng cấp hệ thống và bổ sung thêm nhiều tính năng mới nhằm đáp ứng tốt hơn kỳ vọng ngày càng cao của người dùng hiện đại, sự linh hoạt trong việc đổi mới cùng khả năng nắm bắt nhanh xu hướng giải trí đã giúp 99win giữ vững vị thế và liên tục phát triển trong lĩnh vực giải trí trực tuyến, tạo dựng một cộng đồng người dùng sôi động, gắn kết và đầy nhiệt huyết, từ đó, mỗi lần tham gia vào thế giới 99win, người dùng không chỉ được thư giãn, giải trí mà còn có cơ hội kết nối, chia sẻ và mở rộng những mối quan hệ ý nghĩa trong môi trường năng động và đầy cảm hứng, với tầm nhìn dài hạn và chiến lược phát triển bền vững, 99win cam kết không ngừng đổi mới, nâng cao chất lượng dịch vụ và trải nghiệm người dùng, hướng đến mục tiêu trở thành điểm đến giải trí hàng đầu trong khu vực và vươn tầm quốc tế, đồng hành cùng người dùng trên hành trình khám phá thế giới số rộng lớn, nơi mà mọi giới hạn đều có thể được mở rộng và mọi đam mê đều được chắp cánh bay xa, bởi vậy, không quá ngạc nhiên khi 99win đã và đang trở thành lựa chọn ưu tiên của đông đảo người yêu thích giải trí hiện nay, mang đến không chỉ những giây phút thư giãn tuyệt vời mà còn là nguồn năng lượng tích cực giúp cân bằng cuộc sống bộn bề, vậy nên nếu bạn đang tìm kiếm một nơi để khám phá những trải nghiệm mới mẻ, thú vị và đầy sáng tạo, 99win chắc chắn là điểm đến lý tưởng mà bạn không nên bỏ lỡ.

@ 177bfd16:347a07e4

So , you've battles through your way through countless Grunts , overcome the Team GO Rocket Leaders, and now you stand face to face with the big boss him self - Giovanni!

As of April 2025 , Giovanni is finishing his battles with Shadow Palkia.

Giovanni's Current Lineup (April 2025) First, know your enemy. Giovanni's team follows this structure:

Slot 1: Shadow Persian (Normal)

Slot 2: One of these three, chosen randomly:

Shadow Nidoking (Poison/Ground) Shadow Kingdra (Water/Dragon) Shadow Rhyperior (Rock/Ground)

Slot 3: Shadow Palkia (Water/Dragon) Remember, these are Shadow Pokémon – they hit harder than their normal counterparts!

Counter Strategy: Beating Giovanni Pokémon by Pokémon

Let's dive into the best counters for each potential opponent:

1. Vs. Shadow Persian (Normal)

Giovanni always leads with Persian. As a Normal-type, it's weak only to Fighting-type attacks.

Top Counters: Machamp, Lucario, Conkeldurr, Terrakion, Mega Blaziken, Mega Lucario.

Moves: Prioritize Fighting-type moves like Counter, Dynamic Punch, Aura Sphere, and Sacred Sword.

Tip: Lead with a strong Fighting-type. Moves like Lucario's Power-Up Punch or Machamp's Cross Chop charge quickly and are great for baiting Giovanni's shields early!

1. Vs. The Second Slot (Nidoking, Kingdra, or Rhyperior)

This is where things get unpredictable. You need Pokémon that can handle these potential threats:

Vs. Shadow Nidoking (Poison/Ground): Weak to Water, Ground, Ice, Psychic.

Counters: Kyogre (Primal/Shadow), Swampert (Mega), Groudon (Primal/Shadow), Mewtwo (Shadow), Excadrill. Water and Ground-types are prime choices.

Vs. Shadow Kingdra (Water/Dragon): Weak to Fairy, Dragon. Counters: Gardevoir (Mega), Togekiss, Xerneas. Fairy-types are excellent as they resist Dragon attacks while dealing super-effective damage. Dragon-types like Rayquaza or Palkia work but are risky.

Vs. Shadow Rhyperior (Rock/Ground): Double weak to Water and Grass! Also weak to Fighting, Ground, Ice, Steel.

Counters: Kyogre (Primal/Shadow), Swampert (Mega), Sceptile (Mega), Roserade. Your Fighting-type lead (if it survived Persian) can also do significant damage. Hit it hard with Water or Grass!

1. Vs. Shadow Palkia (Water/Dragon)

Giovanni's final Pokémon is the powerful Shadow Palkia. Like Kingdra, it's weak to Fairy and Dragon types.

Top Counters: Gardevoir (Mega), Togekiss, Xerneas. Again, Fairy-types are the safest and most reliable counters.

Dragon Counters (Use with Caution): Rayquaza (Mega), Palkia (Origin Forme), Dragonite, Dialga (Origin Forme).

Recommended Battle Teams for April 2025 Based on the counters, here are a few effective teams you can assemble:

Team 1 (Balanced):

Machamp (Counter / Cross Chop & Dynamic Punch)

Swampert (Mud Shot / Hydro Cannon & Earthquake)

Togekiss (Charm / Dazzling Gleam & Ancient Power)

Why it works: Covers all bases well with accessible Pokémon. Machamp handles Persian/shields, Swampert crushes Rhyperior/Nidoking, Togekiss tackles Kingdra/Palkia.

Team 2 (Legendary Power):

Lucario (Counter / Power-Up Punch & Aura Sphere)

Kyogre (Waterfall / Origin Pulse & Surf)

Xerneas (Geomancy / Moonblast & Close Combat)

Why it works: High-powered options. Lucario baits shields effectively, Kyogre dominates slot two's Ground/Rock types, Xerneas shreds the Dragons.

Team 3 (Mega Advantage):

Machamp (Counter / Cross Chop & DP)

Kyogre (Waterfall / Origin Pulse)

Mega Gardevoir (Charm / Dazzling Gleam & Shadow Ball)

Why it works: Uses a standard strong lead and mid-game counter, saving the Mega slot for Gardevoir to ensure a powerful finish against Palkia/Kingdra.

Essential Battle Tips Don't forget these crucial tactics:

The Switch Trick: Place your intended starting Pokémon (e.g., Machamp) in the second or third slot. Start the battle, then immediately switch to it. Giovanni will pause for a moment, letting you get in free hits!

Bait Those Shields: Use Pokémon with fast-charging Charged Moves, especially early on, to force Giovanni to waste his Protect Shields.

Power Up: Ensure your team is powered up significantly and consider unlocking second Charged Moves for better flexibility.

Don't Give Up: Giovanni is tough! It might take a few tries to get the right matchup against his second Pokémon. Learn from each attempt and adjust your team if needed.

Go show the boss who's the boss and claim your shadow Palkia . Good Luck, Trainer !

@ f1989a96:bcaaf2c1

Good morning, readers!

In Georgia, mere weeks after freezing the bank accounts of five NGOs supporting pro-democracy movements, the ruling Georgian Dream party passed a new law banning foreign organizations from providing grants to local groups without regime approval. The bill is part of a broader effort to silence dissent and weaken democracy through financial repression.\ \ In Latin America, opposition leader María Corina Machado seeks to rally citizens against Nicolás Maduro’s immensely repressive regime. With the economy and currency in shambles and dozens of military personnel abandoning Maduro, Machado sees an opportunity to challenge his grip on power.

In open source news, we spotlight the release of Bitcoin Core version 29.0, the latest update to the primary software that powers the Bitcoin network and helps millions of people send, receive, and verify Bitcoin transactions every day. This release improves the reliability and compatibility of Bitcoin’s main software implementation. We also cover the unique story of LuckyMiner, an unauthorized Bitaxe clone making waves in Asian markets as demand soars for small, low-cost, home mining equipment — evidence that people want to participate in the Bitcoin network themselves.

We close with the latest edition of the HRF x Pubkey Freedom Tech Series, in which Nicaraguan human rights defender Berta Valle joins HRF’s Arsh Molu to explore how authoritarian regimes weaponize financial systems to silence dissent and isolate opposition voices and how tools like Bitcoin can offer a way out. We also feature an interview with Salvadoran opposition leader Claudia Ortiz, who discusses the erosion of civil liberties under President Nayib Bukele and offers a nuanced take on Bitcoin in the country.

Now, let’s jump right in!

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GLOBAL NEWS

Georgia | Bans Foreign Donations for Nonprofits and NGOs

Mere weeks after freezing the bank accounts of five NGOs supporting pro-democracy demonstrators in recent unrest caused by elections, Georgia’s regime passed a new law that bans foreign organizations from providing “monetary or in-kind grants” to Georgian organizations and individuals without regime approval. Introduced by the increasingly repressive Georgian Dream party, the bill is part of a broader effort (including the controversial foreign agents law passed in 2024) designed to silence dissent and dismantle pro-democracy groups. Rights groups warn these laws will cripple civil society by cutting funding and imposing heavy fines for violators. Last week, parliament also read a bill that would grant officials the power to ban opposition parties entirely. With civil society financially repressed, Georgia is sliding further into tyranny, where free expression, political opposition, and grassroots organizations are under siege.

Venezuela | Opposition Mobilizes Against Maduro’s Financial Repression

Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado is intensifying efforts against Nicolás Maduro’s brutal regime by targeting what she believes are his two greatest vulnerabilities: a collapsing economy and fractures in his repressive apparatus. As the Venezuelan bolivar unravels (reaching a record low in March) and inflation spirals out of control (expected to reach 220% before the end of the year), Maduro’s regime doubles down. It imposes currency controls, expropriates private property, and exerts complete state control over banks. Meanwhile, signs of discontent are growing inside the military, with dozens of personnel reportedly deserting. “I think we have a huge opportunity in front of us, and I see that much closer today than I did a month ago,” Machado said. To rebuild Venezuela’s future, Machado sees financial freedom as essential and has publicly embraced Bitcoin as a tool to resist the regime’s weaponization of money.

India | UPI Outage Disrupts Payments Nationwide

Digital transactions across India were disrupted mid-April as the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) experienced its third major outage in the last month. UPI is a government-run system that enables digital payments and underpins India’s push towards a cashless, centralized economy. Fintechs, banks, and institutions plug into UPI as a backbone of their digital infrastructure. Recently, India started integrating its central bank digital currency (CBDC), the digital rupee, into UPI, leveraging its existing network effect to expand the reach of state-issued digital money. When a single outage can freeze an entire nation’s ability to transact, it reveals the fragility of centralized infrastructure. By contrast, decentralized money like Bitcoin operates independently of state-run systems and with consistent uptime, giving users the freedom to transact and save permissionlessly.

China | Bitcoin for Me, Not for Thee

China is debating new regulations for handling its growing trove of Bitcoin and other digital assets seized during criminal investigations. While the regime debates how to manage its seized digital assets, the trading of Bitcoin and other digital assets remains banned for Chinese citizens on the mainland. Reports indicate that local governments have quietly sold confiscated Bitcoin and other digital assets through private companies to bolster their dwindling budgets. If true, this exposes the hypocrisy of a regime banning digital assets for its people while exploiting them as a strategic revenue source for the state. This contradiction accentuates the ways authoritarian regimes manipulate financial rules for their own benefit while punishing the public for using the same strategies.

Serbia | Vučić Targets Civil Society as Economy Sinks

As Serbia’s economy stalls and the cost of living remains stubbornly high, President Aleksandar Vučić is escalating his crackdown on civil society to deflect blame and tighten control. After a train station canopy collapse in Novi Sad killed 16 people last November, protests erupted. Serbians, led by students, flooded the streets to protest government corruption, declining civil liberties, and a worsening economy. The protests have since spread across 400 cities, reflecting nationwide discontent. In response, Vučić is now targeting civil society organizations under the pretext of financial misconduct. Law enforcement raided four NGOs that support Serbians’ human rights, the rule of law, and democratic elections.

Russia | Jails Four Journalists for Working With Navalny

A Russian court sentenced four independent Russian journalists to five and a half years in prison for working with the Anti-Corruption Foundation (ACF) — a pro-democracy organization founded by the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny. The journalists — Antonina Favorskaya, Konstantin Gabov, Sergei Karelin, and Artyom Kriger — were convicted in a closed-door trial for associating with an organization the Kremlin deems an “extremist.” The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned the verdict as a “blatant testimony to Russian authorities’ profound contempt for press freedom.” Since it launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Kremlin has increasingly criminalized dissent and financially repressed opposition, nonprofits, and ordinary citizens.

BITCOIN AND FREEDOM TECH NEWS

Flash | Introduces Flash Lightning Addresses, New UI, and Encrypted Messaging

Flash, a Bitcoin Lightning wallet and HRF grantee bringing freedom money to the Caribbean, released its version 0.4.0 beta. This release includes an updated user interface, dedicated Flash Lightning addresses (user @ flashapp.me), and encrypted messaging. The redesigned app is more user-friendly and better suited for users new to Bitcoin. Flash users now receive a verified Lightning address, making it easier to send and receive Bitcoin. The update also adds encrypted nostr messaging, enabling secure communication between users. As authoritarian regimes in the region, like Cuba, tighten control over money, Flash offers a practical and private solution for Bitcoin access.

DahLIAS | New Protocol to Lower the Cost of Private Bitcoin Transactions

Bitcoin developers recently announced DahLIAS, the first protocol designed to enable full cross-input signature aggregation (CISA). CISA is a proposed Bitcoin update that could make private Bitcoin transactions much cheaper. Right now, collaborative transactions are more expensive than typical transactions because each input in a transaction needs its own signature. CISA would allow those signatures to be combined, saving space and reducing fees. But this change would require a soft fork, a safe, backward-compatible software update to Bitcoin’s code. If adopted, CISA could remove the need for users to justify why they want privacy, as the answer would be, to save money. This is especially important for dissidents living under surveillant regimes. DahLIAS could be a breakthrough that helps make privacy more practical for everyone using Bitcoin.

Bitcoin Core | Version 29.0 Now Available for Node Runners

Bitcoin Core is the main software implementation that powers the Bitcoin network and helps millions of people send, receive, and verify transactions every day. The latest update, Bitcoin Core v29.0, introduces changes to improve network stability and performance. The release helps keep the network stable even when not everyone updates simultaneously. Further, it reduces the chances that nodes (computers that run the Bitcoin software) accidentally restart — an issue that can interrupt network participation. It also adds support for full Replace-by-Fee (RBF), allowing users to increase the fee on stuck transactions in times of high network demand. Enhancing Bitcoin’s reliability, usability, and security ensures that individuals in oppressive regimes or unstable financial systems can access a permissionless and censorship-resistant monetary network. Learn more about the update here.

Nstart | Releases Multilingual Support

Nstart, a new tool that simplifies onboarding to nostr — a decentralized and censorship-resistant social network protocol — released multilingual support. It added Spanish, Italian, French, Dutch, and Mandarin as languages. This update broadens access by making the onboarding experience available to a wider audience — especially those living under dictatorships across Africa, Latin America, and Asia, where communication and press freedom are heavily restricted. Users can even contribute translations themselves. Overall, multilingual support makes Nstart a more powerful tool for activists and organizations operating under authoritarian environments, offering guided, straightforward access to uncensorable communications.

Bitcoin Chiang Mai | Release Bitcoin Education Podcast

Bitcoin Chiang Mai, a grassroots Bitcoin community in Thailand, launched an educational podcast to teach Bitcoin in Thai. In a country where financial repression is on the rise and the regime is experimenting with a programmable central bank digital currency (CBDC), this podcast offers an educational lifeline. By making Bitcoin knowledge and tools more accessible, the show empowers Thais to explore alternatives to state-controlled financial systems. It’s a grassroots effort to preserve financial freedom and encourage open dialogue in an increasingly controlled economic environment. Check it out here.

LuckyMiner | Undisclosed Bitaxe Clone Gaining Popularity in Asia

LuckyMiner, a Bitcoin mining startup out of Shenzhen, China is shaking up Asia’s Bitcoin hardware scene with a rogue twist. What began as a hobby project in 2023 has since exploded into a full-scale operation, manufacturing and selling thousands of undisclosed Bitaxe clones (which are small, affordable bitcoin miners based on the Bitaxe design). While Bitaxe is open-source, it’s licensed under CERN-OHL-S-2.0, requiring any modifications to be made public. LuckyMiner ignored that rule and the founder has openly admitted to breaking the license. Despite that, LuckyMiner is succeeding anyway, fueled by growing demand for affordable home mining equipment. While controversial, the rise of low-cost miners signals grassroots interest in Bitcoin, especially at a time when Asia grapples with growing authoritarianism and financial repression.

RECOMMENDED CONTENT

HRF x Pubkey — Bitcoin as a Tool to Fight Financial Repression in Autocracies with Berta Valle

In the latest HRF x Pubkey Freedom Tech series, Nicaraguan human rights defender and journalist Berta Valle joins HRF’s Arsh Molu to discuss how Bitcoin empowers individuals to resist the financial repression of authoritarian regimes. From helping families receive remittances when bank accounts are frozen to enabling independent media and activists to fund their work without regime interference, Bitcoin is quietly reshaping what resistance can look like under tyranny. Watch the full fireside chat here.

Claudia Ortiz: A Voice of Opposition in Bukele’s El Salvador

In this interview, analyst and journalist Marius Farashi Tasooji speaks to Salvadoran opposition leader Claudia Ortiz about President Bukele’s consolidation of power, the erosion of civil liberties, and the future of Bitcoin in the country. While Ortiz acknowledges Bitcoin’s potential as a tool for freedom, she critiques the current administration’s opaque and heavy-handed implementation of it. Ortiz explains her opposition to the Bitcoin Law, citing concerns about transparency and accountability, and outlines what she would do differently if elected president. Watch the full conversation here.

If this article was forwarded to you and you enjoyed reading it, please consider subscribing to the Financial Freedom Report here.

Support the newsletter by donating bitcoin to HRF’s Financial Freedom program via BTCPay.\ Want to contribute to the newsletter? Submit tips, stories, news, and ideas by emailing us at ffreport @ hrf.org

The Bitcoin Development Fund (BDF) is accepting grant proposals on an ongoing basis. The Bitcoin Development Fund is looking to support Bitcoin developers, community builders, and educators. Submit proposals here.

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@ 266815e0:6cd408a5

Its been a little over a year since NIP-90 was written and merged into the nips repo and its been a communication mess.

Every DVM implementation expects the inputs in slightly different formats, returns the results in mostly the same format and there are very few DVM actually running.

NIP-90 is overloaded

Why does a request for text translation and creating bitcoin OP_RETURNs share the same input i tag? and why is there an output tag on requests when only one of them will return an output?

Each DVM request kind is for requesting completely different types of compute with diffrent input and output requirements, but they are all using the same spec that has 4 different types of inputs (text, url, event, job) and an undefined number of output types.

Let me show a few random DVM requests and responses I found on wss://relay.damus.io to demonstrate what I mean:

This is a request to translate an event to English json { "kind": 5002, "content": "", "tags": [ // NIP-90 says there can be multiple inputs, so how would a DVM handle translatting multiple events at once? [ "i", "<event-id>", "event" ], [ "param", "language", "en" ], // What other type of output would text translations be? image/jpeg? [ "output", "text/plain" ], // Do we really need to define relays? cant the DVM respond on the relays it saw the request on? [ "relays", "wss://relay.unknown.cloud/", "wss://nos.lol/" ] ] }

This is a request to generate text using an LLM model json { "kind": 5050, // Why is the content empty? wouldn't it be better to have the prompt in the content? "content": "", "tags": [ // Why use an indexable tag? are we ever going to lookup prompts? // Also the type "prompt" isn't in NIP-90, this should probably be "text" [ "i", "What is the capital of France?", "prompt" ], [ "p", "c4878054cff877f694f5abecf18c7450f4b6fdf59e3e9cb3e6505a93c4577db2" ], [ "relays", "wss://relay.primal.net" ] ] }

This is a request for content recommendation json { "kind": 5300, "content": "", "tags": [ // Its fine ignoring this param, but what if the client actually needs exactly 200 "results" [ "param", "max_results", "200" ], // The spec never mentions requesting content for other users. // If a DVM didn't understand this and responded to this request it would provide bad data [ "param", "user", "b22b06b051fd5232966a9344a634d956c3dc33a7f5ecdcad9ed11ddc4120a7f2" ], [ "relays", "wss://relay.primal.net", ], [ "p", "ceb7e7d688e8a704794d5662acb6f18c2455df7481833dd6c384b65252455a95" ] ] }

This is a request to create a OP_RETURN message on bitcoin json { "kind": 5901, // Again why is the content empty when we are sending human readable text? "content": "", "tags": [ // and again, using an indexable tag on an input that will never need to be looked up ["i", "09/01/24 SEC Chairman on the brink of second ETF approval", "text"] ] }

My point isn't that these event schema's aren't understandable but why are they using the same schema? each use-case is different but are they all required to use the same i tag format as input and could support all 4 types of inputs.

Lack of libraries

With all these different types of inputs, params, and outputs its verify difficult if not impossible to build libraries for DVMs

If a simple text translation request can have an event or text as inputs, a payment-required status at any point in the flow, partial results, or responses from 10+ DVMs whats the best way to build a translation library for other nostr clients to use?

And how do I build a DVM framework for the server side that can handle multiple inputs of all four types (url, text, event, job) and clients are sending all the requests in slightly differently.

Supporting payments is impossible

The way NIP-90 is written there isn't much details about payments. only a payment-required status and a generic amount tag

But the way things are now every DVM is implementing payments differently. some send a bolt11 invoice, some expect the client to NIP-57 zap the request event (or maybe the status event), and some even ask for a subscription. and we haven't even started implementing NIP-61 nut zaps or cashu A few are even formatting the amount number wrong or denominating it in sats and not mili-sats

Building a client or a library that can understand and handle all of these payment methods is very difficult. for the DVM server side its worse. A DVM server presumably needs to support all 4+ types of payments if they want to get the most sats for their services and support the most clients.

All of this is made even more complicated by the fact that a DVM can ask for payment at any point during the job process. this makes sense for some types of compute, but for others like translations or user recommendation / search it just makes things even more complicated.

For example, If a client wanted to implement a timeline page that showed the notes of all the pubkeys on a recommended list. what would they do when the selected DVM asks for payment at the start of the job? or at the end? or worse, only provides half the pubkeys and asks for payment for the other half. building a UI that could handle even just two of these possibilities is complicated.

NIP-89 is being abused

NIP-89 is "Recommended Application Handlers" and the way its describe in the nips repo is

a way to discover applications that can handle unknown event-kinds

Not "a way to discover everything"

If I wanted to build an application discovery app to show all the apps that your contacts use and let you discover new apps then it would have to filter out ALL the DVM advertisement events. and that's not just for making requests from relays

If the app shows the user their list of "recommended applications" then it either has to understand that everything in the 5xxx kind range is a DVM and to show that is its own category or show a bunch of unknown "favorites" in the list which might be confusing for the user.

In conclusion

My point in writing this article isn't that the DVMs implementations so far don't work, but that they will never work well because the spec is too broad. even with only a few DVMs running we have already lost interoperability.

I don't want to be completely negative though because some things have worked. the "DVM feeds" work, although they are limited to a single page of results. text / event translations also work well and kind 5970 Event PoW delegation could be cool. but if we want interoperability, we are going to need to change a few things with NIP-90

I don't think we can (or should) abandon NIP-90 entirely but it would be good to break it up into small NIPs or specs. break each "kind" of DVM request out into its own spec with its own definitions for expected inputs, outputs and flow.

Then if we have simple, clean definitions for each kind of compute we want to distribute. we might actually see markets and services being built and used.

@ 2b24a1fa:17750f64

Ganz im Geiste des klassischen Kabaretts widmen sich Franz Esser und Michael Sailer den Ereignissen des letzten Monats: Was ist passiert? Und was ist dazu zu sagen? Das ist oft frappierend - und manchmal auch zum Lachen.

https://soundcloud.com/radiomuenchen/vier-wochen-wahnsinn-marz25-ein-satirischer-wochenruckblick?

@ 0b118e40:4edc09cb

TL;DR : No.

(This is not a feasibility analysis, but a reflection on philosophical alignment with Bitcoin’s vision).

The moment stablecoins or national currencies gain traction in Bitcoin LN, you can forget about Bitcoin’s position as a purely decentralized medium of exchange. Bitcoin’s position will be undermined.

A Bitcoin-native global economy, where people and businesses transact directly in Bitcoin, is what aligns with its original purpose. This is what we should aim for. This is all we should aim for.

I used to believe stablecoins might help with on/off ramps. But the truth is, if Bitcoin is to function as a true currency, broader global adoption that bypasses traditional financial systems will make those ramps irrelevant.

Eventually, two camps will emerge. One will try to preserve Bitcoin’s purity as a currency. The other will push for everything else in the name of Bitcoin: store-of-value narratives, ETFs, stablecoin collaborations, tokens, pump and dumps, NFTs, and centralized workarounds.

Currency domination, especially by the USD, has long contributed to poverty in the Global South. It deepens inequality and worsens debt burdens. During the Tequila Crisis and the Asian Financial Crisis, countries like Mexico and regions like Southeast Asia suffered massive currency devaluations and defaults because of their dependence on the USD. Every time the US raises interest rates, developing nations experience capital flight, currency drops, and economic hardship. This is not ancient history. It has been happening in the last two years and continues to widen the poverty gap. And as always, it is the poor who suffer the most.

What does this have to do with stablecoins? Stablecoin is your fiat 2.0.

USDT is just currency domination through blockchain. It is pegged to the USD, and if it rides Bitcoin’s Lightning rails, it risks keeping users transacting in USD rather than in Bitcoin itself. That not only undermines Bitcoin’s core purpose, it risks making Bitcoin appear like it is taking sides in the fragile and invisible global currency war.

To counter, people will say “Let all stablecoins come. Peg them to any currency.” But what’s the point of Bitcoin then? To become the new logistics layer for fiat 2.0?

That is not progress. That is regress. It is inviting the very systems Bitcoin was built to disrupt back into the ecosystem.

I believe when you use stablecoins this way, you are not Trojan-horsing Bitcoin into the mainstream. You are letting fiat Trojan-horse its way into Bitcoin. And if you let them in, they will win.

Adding stablecoin into Bitcoin LN is counterproductive to Bitcoin's decentralized ethos.

Bitcoin’s true potential is its ability to provide an alternative to centralized, government-controlled currencies and financial systems. We should stick to the original game plan.

---

Side note: If you really want to Trojan-horse Bitcoin adoption…

In my country, we have so many mixed races and cross-cultural traditions. During Chinese New Year, if you are married, you give everyone who is not married an “ang pow,” which is money in a red packet. Because we are so deeply integrated, people give money at almost every celebration: Christmas, Eid, Diwali, birthdays, graduations, even funerals.

I recently met up with a friend who just had a baby, and I was more than happy to be the first to give her daughter some Bitcoin. Her first sats. It would not hurt to start giving Bitcoin as gifts. And if someone gets offended that it is not part of their tradition, just get a Bitkey and wrap it up. It is so pretty.

Find more fun and creative ways to spread Bitcoin adoption.

But for goodness’ sake, stop justifying everything else in the name of Bitcoin adoption.

---

To get a better idea of Fiat 2.0, I mind-mapped Bitcoin on macroeconomy on my scratchpad.

If you take a closer look, it might help you answer a few key questions:

• Do you want more or less government control over money?

• Are you a fan of central banks? Then you probably prefer stablecoins.

@ 5c8a5765:4fc5edee

[Читать в IPFS]

Итак, детки-котлетки, сегодня мы поговорим, как ~~не~~правильно распространять агиацию. Возьмите свои любимые антифашистские стикеры и используйте этот текст как инструкцию к ним — иначе у меня голова лопнет от того, что я вижу на улицах.

Агитация

Для начала определитесь, чем вы занимаетесь: агитируете к чему-то или поддерживаете чего-то, потому что это предполагает совершенно разные подходы. Агитацией может быть призыв к анархизму, классовой борьбе, неуплате налогов, гендерному равенству и т.д. Поддержкой может быть поддержка анархической борьбы, антифашистский идей и т.д. Первое — "вербует"/приманивает новых людей к идее, второе поддерживает только тех, кто уже знаком с идеей и уже с ней согласен.

Как должна выглядеть агитация? Представьте, что некий неонацист решил за-агитировать вас в неонацизм (с учетом, что сейчас вы его не поддерживаете): в каком случае у него больше всего на это шансов? Если вы заметите на мусорном баке наклейку "бей жыдоф"? Или если вам, например, выдадут в руки грамотный агитационный текст? Поставьте себя на место читающего: агитация должна выглядеть именно так, как мог бы выглядеть материал, который хоть немного мог бы поменять ваши текущие взгляды. А именно...

1. Агитация доступна

Она не висит на задней стороне мусорки. Она не нарисована на заброшке. Обыватель не рассматривает мусорки и не ходит по заброшкам. Чтобы масса увидела вашу агитацию, она должна висеть в заметном месте.

Ещё лучше, если она висит там, где человек по внешним причинам на мгновение задерживается, и имеет время проглядеть вашу агитацию: ибо обыватель никогда не остановится у столба посреди длинной тропы, чтобы прочесть стикер.

И учтите: если место, которое вы выбрали, уже забито стикерами, вашему придётся делить привлеченное внимание с каждым остальным.

К доступности стоит также отнести то, что агитация более значительна, если она написана на самом популярном в вашей стране языке, развешивается в разных локациях (чтобы люди разного класса могли её увидеть), если вы развешиваете в туалетах — то туалетах разного гендера (и не забывайте про инвалидные кабинки!), так далее.

Лучшие места для стикеров: лифт, автобусная остановка, метро, поручен эскалатора, внешняя сторона дверцы туалета, чистое (не разрисованное или расклеенное) зеркало.

Лучшие места для крупных агитационных листов или графитти: указанные выше, а также — заметные места подъездов,

Лучшие места для "визиток"*: оставлять под задницей на выходе из автобуса, метро, маршрутки, на стульях, скамейках и т.д.

*"Визитка" — это са-а-амый простой метод агитации: выводите нужный текст или картинки мелкими блоками на листе А4, нарезаете бумагу на кусочки "визиток" с небольшим текстом, картинкой или ссылкой, и оставляете где попало.

2. Агитация запоминается

Если вы не неонацист, какие эмоции в вас побуждает "бей жыдоф"? Вы возжелали стать неонацистом? Или это только укрепило ваши антифашистские взгляды? Или это для вас вообще никак не прозвучало?

Также для ваших противников и обывателей звучат ваши "ешь богатых!", "классовая борьба сегодня!!", "доёш онархию!!!". Это — поддержка. Уже-анархисты будут рады увидеть, что в городе есть левые активисты кроме них самих. Но это никого не переубедит и не привлечет.

А агитация привлекает. Агитация задаёт острые вопросы, которые остаются в голове. Агитация манит предложениями нового. Агитация нестереотипно предлагает.

Примеры хорошей агитации:

"Если большинство проголосует за то, чтобы ты спрыгнул(а) с вмоста, ты бы сделал(а) это? / - Может быть — если это было честным голосованием!"

"Этот телефон прослушивается - согласно законодательству США, телефонные разговоры прослушиваются без ордера или уведомленияю"

"Вы под наблюдением — текст, объясняющий тезис, и ссылка, где можно прочесть об этом подробнее."

Примеры никудышной агитации (но хорошей поддержки):

3. Агитация даёт возможность изучить больше

Хорошее правило для любой агитации: иметь ссылку на сайт, где можно найти больше информации о том, к чему агитируется. Это не обязательное, но рекомендуемое правило, ибо мало толку от человека, согласившегося с идеей анархизма и захотевшего (редчайший случай!) самостоятельно изучить больше, но не имевшего к этому простой возможности и забывшего вследствие обо всей идее.

Поддержка

А вот поддержка — ориентированная на тех, кто уже знает и уже поддерживает то, что вы любите — может быть совершенно любой. Поддержать антифашистов своего города, позлить фашистов и остаться совершенно незамеченными для обывателя — самое место для диалектики "бей жыдоф!" и "доёш онтифошизм!!".

Напоминание о безопасности

Несколько базовых напоминаний о том, что нужно помнить во время агитации:

• ОСТЕРЕГАЙТЕСЬ КАМЕР! Особенно в России! Метро, маршрутки, автобусы, учебные заведения полны ими!
• Если вас заметили гестаповцы, лучшее, что вы можете сделать — это бежать, что есть мочи.
• Шифруйте материалы, которые храните для распечаток.
• Не распечатывайте стикеры/"визитки" в публичных местах (вроде библиотек).

Спасибо за прочтение!

@ c21b1a6c:0cd4d170

🧾 Progress Report Two

Hey everyone! I’m back with another progress report for Formstr, a part of the now completed grant from nostr:npub10pensatlcfwktnvjjw2dtem38n6rvw8g6fv73h84cuacxn4c28eqyfn34f . This update covers everything we’ve built since the last milestone — including polish, performance, power features, and plenty of bug-squashing.

---

🏗️ What’s New Since Last Time?

This quarter was less about foundational rewrites and more about production hardening and real-world feedback. With users now onboard, our focus shifted to polishing UX, fixing issues, and adding new features that made Formstr easier and more powerful to use.

✨ New Features & UX Improvements

• Edit Existing Forms
• Form Templates
• Drag & Drop Enhancements (especially for mobile)
• New Public Forms UX (card-style layout)
• FAQ & Support Sections
• Relay Modal for Publishing
• Skeleton Loaders and subtle UI Polish

---

🐛 Major Bug Fixes

• Fixed broken CSV exports when responses were empty
• Cleaned up mobile rendering issues for public forms
• Resolved blank.ts export issues and global form bugs
• Fixed invalid npub strings in the admin flow
• Patched response handling for private forms
• Lots of small fixes for titles, drafts, embedded form URLs, etc.

---

🔐 Access Control & Privacy

• Made forms private by default
• Fixed multiple issues around form visibility, access control UIs, and anonymous submissions
• Improved detection of pubkey issues in shared forms

---

🚧 Some Notable In-Progress Features

The following features are actively being developed, and many are nearing completion:

• Conditional Questions:
  This one’s been tough to crack, but we’re close!
  Work in progress by keraliss and myself:
  👉 PR #252

• Downloadable Forms:
  Fully-contained downloadable HTML versions of forms.
  Being led by casyazmon with initial code by Basanta Goswami
  👉 PR #274

• OLLAMA Integration (Self-Hosted LLMs):
  Users will be able to create forms using locally hosted LLMs.
  PR by ashu01304
  👉 PR #247

• Sections in Forms:
  Work just started on adding section support!
  Small PoC PR by keraliss:
  👉 PR #217

---

🙌 Huge Thanks to New Contributors

We've had amazing contributors this cycle. Big thanks to:

• Aashutosh Gandhi (ashu01304) – drag-and-drop enhancements, OLLAMA integration
• Amaresh Prasad (devAmaresh) – fixed npub and access bugs
• Biresh Biswas (Billa05) – skeleton loaders
• Shashank Shekhar Singh (Shashankss1205) – bugfixes, co-authored image patches
• Akap Azmon Deh-nji (casyazmon) – CSV fixes, downloadable forms
• Manas Ranjan Dash (mdash3735) – bug fixes
• Basanta Goswami – initial groundwork for downloadable forms
• keraliss – ongoing work on conditional questions and sections

We also registered for the Summer of Bitcoin program and have been receiving contributions from some incredibly bright new applicants.

---

🔍 What’s Still Coming?

From the wishlist I committed to during the grant, here’s what’s still in the oven:

-[x] Upgrade to nip-44 - [x] Access Controlled Forms: A Form will be able to have multiple admins and Editors. - [x] Private Forms and Fixed Participants: Enncrypt a form and only allow certain npubs to fill it. - [x] Edit Past Forms: Being able to edit an existing form. - [x] Edit Past Forms
- [ ] Conditional Rendering (in progress)
- [ ] Sections (just started)
- [ ] Integrations - OLLAMA / AI-based Form Generation (near complete)
- [ ] Paid Surveys
- [ ] NIP-42 Private Relay support

---

❌ What’s De-Prioritized?

• Nothing is de-prioritized now especially since Ollama Integration got re-prioritized (thanks to Summer Of Bitcoin). We are a little delayed on Private Relays support but it's now becoming a priority and in active development. Zap Surveys will be coming soon too.

---

💸 How Funds Were Used

• Paid individual contributors for their work.
• Living expenses to allow full-time focus on development

---

🧠 Closing Thoughts

Things feel like they’re coming together now. We’re out of "beta hell", starting to see real adoption, and most importantly, gathering feedback from real users. That’s helping us make smarter choices and move fast without breaking too much.

Stay tuned for the next big drop — and in the meantime, try creating a form at formstr.app, and let me know what you think!

@ 68768a6c:0eaf07e9

Sometimes it feels like everything we do is invisible. The late nights, the sacrifices, the silent battles — all of it seems to go unnoticed. And there comes a moment when quitting feels easier than holding on.

But let me remind you: You’re closer than you think.

Growth is quiet. Success doesn't announce itself as it's happening. Healing happens in the dark before it shines in the light.

Every effort you made when no one was clapping... Every time you showed up when you felt like disappearing... Every "small" step you took — those were not small at all.

They were giant leaps that your future self will thank you for.

Remember:

Diamonds form under pressure.

Seeds grow underground before breaking the surface.

Stars shine brightest in the darkest skies.

So don’t you dare give up now. Your breakthrough might not come with fireworks — it might come quietly, softly, almost without you noticing at first. But it is coming.

Stay patient. Stay kind to yourself. Keep moving — even if it’s slow. Because you’re already closer than you think.

@ 8cda1daa:e9e5bdd8

Bitcoin cracked the code for money.  Now it's time to rebuild everything else.

What about identity, trust, and collaboration? What about the systems that define how we live, create, and connect?

Bitcoin gave us a blueprint to separate money from the state. But the state still owns most of your digital life. It's time for something more radical.

Welcome to the Atomic Economy - not just a technology stack, but a civil engineering project for the digital age. A complete re-architecture of society, from the individual outward.

The Problem: We Live in Digital Captivity

Let's be blunt: the modern internet is hostile to human freedom.

You don't own your identity. You don't control your data. You don't decide what you see.

Big Tech and state institutions dominate your digital life with one goal: control.

• Poisoned algorithms dictate your emotions and behavior.
• Censorship hides truth and silences dissent.
• Walled gardens lock you into systems you can't escape.
• Extractive platforms monetize your attention and creativity - without your consent.

This isn't innovation. It's digital colonization.

A Vision for Sovereign Society

The Atomic Economy proposes a new design for society - one where: - Individuals own their identity, data, and value. - Trust is contextual, not imposed. - Communities are voluntary, not manufactured by feeds. - Markets are free, not fenced. - Collaboration is peer-to-peer, not platform-mediated.

It's not a political revolution. It's a technological and social reset based on first principles: self-sovereignty, mutualism, and credible exit.

So, What Is the Atomic Economy?

The Atomic Economy is a decentralized digital society where people - not platforms - coordinate identity, trust, and value.

It's built on open protocols, real software, and the ethos of Bitcoin. It's not about abstraction - it's about architecture.

Core Principles: - Self-Sovereignty: Your keys. Your data. Your rules. - Mutual Consensus: Interactions are voluntary and trust-based. - Credible Exit: Leave any system, with your data and identity intact. - Programmable Trust: Trust is explicit, contextual, and revocable. - Circular Economies: Value flows directly between individuals - no middlemen.

The Tech Stack Behind the Vision

The Atomic Economy isn't just theory. It's a layered system with real tools:

1. Payments & Settlement

• Bitcoin & Lightning: The foundation - sound, censorship-resistant money.
• Paykit: Modular payments and settlement flows.
• Atomicity: A peer-to-peer mutual credit protocol for programmable trust and IOUs.

2. Discovery & Matching

• Pubky Core: Decentralized identity and discovery using PKARR and the DHT.
• Pubky Nexus: Indexing for a user-controlled internet.
• Semantic Social Graph: Discovery through social tagging - you are the algorithm.

3. Application Layer

• Bitkit: A self-custodial Bitcoin and Lightning wallet.
• Pubky App: Tag, publish, trade, and interact - on your terms.
• Blocktank: Liquidity services for Lightning and circular economies.
• Pubky Ring: Key-based access control and identity syncing.

These tools don't just integrate - they stack. You build trust, exchange value, and form communities with no centralized gatekeepers.

The Human Impact

This isn't about software. It's about freedom.

• Empowered Individuals: Control your own narrative, value, and destiny.
• Voluntary Communities: Build trust on shared values, not enforced norms.
• Economic Freedom: Trade without permission, borders, or middlemen.
• Creative Renaissance: Innovation and art flourish in open, censorship-resistant systems.

The Atomic Economy doesn't just fix the web. It frees the web.

Why Bitcoiners Should Care

If you believe in Bitcoin, you already believe in the Atomic Economy - you just haven't seen the full map yet.

• It extends Bitcoin's principles beyond money: into identity, trust, coordination.
• It defends freedom where Bitcoin leaves off: in content, community, and commerce.
• It offers a credible exit from every centralized system you still rely on.
• It's how we win - not just economically, but culturally and socially.

This isn't "web3." This isn't another layer of grift. It's the Bitcoin future - fully realized.

Join the Atomic Revolution

• If you're a builder: fork the code, remix the ideas, expand the protocols.
• If you're a user: adopt Bitkit, use Pubky, exit the digital plantation.
• If you're an advocate: share the vision. Help people imagine a free society again.

Bitcoin promised a revolution. The Atomic Economy delivers it.

Let's reclaim society, one key at a time.

Learn more and build with us at Synonym.to.

@ 4857600b:30b502f4

Key Findings

• Researchers at the University of Cambridge discovered that aspirin can help slow the spread of certain cancers, including breast, bowel, and prostate cancers
• The study was published in the journal Nature

How Aspirin Works Against Cancer

• Aspirin blocks thromboxane A2 (TXA2), a chemical produced by blood platelets
• TXA2 normally weakens T cells, which are crucial for fighting cancer
• By inhibiting TXA2, aspirin "unleashes" T cells to more effectively target and destroy cancer cells

Supporting Evidence

• Previous studies showed regular aspirin use was linked to:
• 31% reduction in cancer-specific mortality in breast cancer patients
• 9% decrease in recurrence/metastasis risk
• 25% reduction in colon cancer risk

Potential Impact

• Aspirin could be particularly effective in early stages of cancer
• It may help prevent metastasis, which causes 90% of cancer fatalities
• As an inexpensive treatment, it could be more accessible globally than antibody-based therapies

Cautions

• Experts warn against self-medicating with aspirin
• Potential risks include internal bleeding and stomach ulcers
• Patients should consult doctors before starting aspirin therapy

Next Steps

• Large-scale clinical trials to determine which cancer types and patients would benefit most
• Development of new drugs that mimic aspirin's benefits without side effects

Citations: Natural News

@ 04c915da:3dfbecc9

Bitcoin has always been rooted in freedom and resistance to authority. I get that many of you are conflicted about the US Government stacking but by design we cannot stop anyone from using bitcoin. Many have asked me for my thoughts on the matter, so let’s rip it.

Concern

One of the most glaring issues with the strategic bitcoin reserve is its foundation, built on stolen bitcoin. For those of us who value private property this is an obvious betrayal of our core principles. Rather than proof of work, the bitcoin that seeds this reserve has been taken by force. The US Government should return the bitcoin stolen from Bitfinex and the Silk Road.

Usually stolen bitcoin for the reserve creates a perverse incentive. If governments see a bitcoin as a valuable asset, they will ramp up efforts to confiscate more bitcoin. The precedent is a major concern, and I stand strongly against it, but it should be also noted that governments were already seizing coin before the reserve so this is not really a change in policy.

Ideally all seized bitcoin should be burned, by law. This would align incentives properly and make it less likely for the government to actively increase coin seizures. Due to the truly scarce properties of bitcoin, all burned bitcoin helps existing holders through increased purchasing power regardless. This change would be unlikely but those of us in policy circles should push for it regardless. It would be best case scenario for American bitcoiners and would create a strong foundation for the next century of American leadership.

Optimism

The entire point of bitcoin is that we can spend or save it without permission. That said, it is a massive benefit to not have one of the strongest governments in human history actively trying to ruin our lives.

Since the beginning, bitcoiners have faced horrible regulatory trends. KYC, surveillance, and legal cases have made using bitcoin and building bitcoin businesses incredibly difficult. It is incredibly important to note that over the past year that trend has reversed for the first time in a decade. A strategic bitcoin reserve is a key driver of this shift. By holding bitcoin, the strongest government in the world has signaled that it is not just a fringe technology but rather truly valuable, legitimate, and worth stacking.

This alignment of incentives changes everything. The US Government stacking proves bitcoin’s worth. The resulting purchasing power appreciation helps all of us who are holding coin and as bitcoin succeeds our government receives direct benefit. A beautiful positive feedback loop.

Realism

We are trending in the right direction. A strategic bitcoin reserve is a sign that the state sees bitcoin as an asset worth embracing rather than destroying. That said, there is a lot of work left to be done. We cannot be lulled into complacency, the time to push forward is now, and we cannot take our foot off the gas. We have a seat at the table for the first time ever. Let's make it worth it.

We must protect the right to free usage of bitcoin and other digital technologies. Freedom in the digital age must be taken and defended, through both technical and political avenues. Multiple privacy focused developers are facing long jail sentences for building tools that protect our freedom. These cases are not just legal battles. They are attacks on the soul of bitcoin. We need to rally behind them, fight for their freedom, and ensure the ethos of bitcoin survives this new era of government interest. The strategic reserve is a step in the right direction, but it is up to us to hold the line and shape the future.

@ 3b7fc823:e194354f

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@ 2b24a1fa:17750f64

Wir leben in einer Demokratie. So heißt es immer. Immerhin hat die Bevölkerung, der Souverän ein Mitspracherecht. Einmal alle vier Jahre. Und damit fünfundzwanzig Mal in einem Jahrhundert. Diese 25 Wahltage ergeben zeitlich 0,07 Prozent des gesamten Jahrhunderts. Würde man das Jahrhundert auf einen Tag runter rechnen, dann ergäben diese 0,07 Prozent ziemlich genau eine Minute des Mitspracherechts. Eine Minute pro Tag darf der Souverän also bestimmen, wer am restlichen Tag ungehindert schalten und walten darf – bis in das Grundgesetz hinein.

https://soundcloud.com/radiomuenchen/das-grundgesetz-als-schmierzettel-von-henry-matthes?

Die Veränderung in diesem zentralen Gesetzestexten ist allein den Parteien vorbehalten. An sämtliche Änderungen halten, dürfen sich dann nachher alle – selbst dann, wenn noch so wenige Bürger dahinterstehen.

In den letzten Wochen offenbarte sich dieser Missstand in präzedenzloser Weise. Die als Sondervermögen schön-deklarierte Neuverschuldung wurde im Grundgesetz festgeschrieben. Ist eine solch selektive Umgestaltungsmöglichkeit des wichtigsten Gesetzestext einer Demokratie würdig? Bräuchte es nicht zumindest einer Absegnung durch Volksabstimmungen?

Henry Mattheß hat sich hierzu Gedanken gemacht. Hören Sie seinen Text „Das Grundgesetz als Schmierzettel“, der zunächst auf dem Blog von Norbert Häring erschienen war. 

Sprecher: Karsten Tryoke

Bild: Radio München

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