Oddbean

You could think of an NPUB as similar to a username on a typical social network or an email address on the Internet. It’s an address which can help you identify a person. It looks a little weird/different because it is created in a different way and can be used in many other ways, but as for the basics: think of it as username/email address on nostr

an NPUB is a cryptographic address Here’s your NPUB: @Markola you also have a more human-readable name which we call a NIP-05: markola@nostrplebs.com === a little more detail since your avatar mentions bitcoin: you know how in bitcoin you can just setup an address to receive bitcoin and you don’t have to rely on any central authority (e.g. JP Morgan/Chase, Bank of America, Coinbase, etc.) to setup a bank account or address or anything? this is kind of what an NPUB is trying to achieve, but for an Internet identity. Setup an identity (for social networking or maybe even another purpose) without having to ask a central authority (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc.) for permission. Obviously the NPUB is kind of ugly and a hassle to explain to someone orally. So a NIP-05 is an identifier you can register to make it easier to explain to someone. But note, when you use a NIP-05 you’re relying on whoever owns the domain (in your case the owner of nostrplebs.com) to agree to let you exist. NPUBs don’t require anyone to issue/agree to your identity. You just do math and have it. NPUB is a public key. NSEC is the private key that corresponds to your NPUB. I found your NPUB and your NIP-05 on your profile. Different nostr clients may emphasize/hide these features depending on their goals.

I wouldn’t say it’s a huge risk particularly, but good to know the tradeoffs. I host a NIP-05 “username” at stacker.news. Just be aware that if you tell people “you can reach me on nostr by looking for markola@nostrplebs.com” that could become a common way people look for you. then some day, for whatever reason, you say something that gets a government upset - they could try to hassle nostrplebs.com to take down your NIP-05 mapping. Anyone you’re connected to on nostr already will continue to be connected since connections happen around the NPUB/cryptography, but new people looking for you might find it hard to find you

Whoops... a lot of nostr clients try to make npubs prettier for users so depending on what client you’re using the npub I showed may not appear very ugly/cryptographic… I will attempt to make it more more raw to show you how it really looks by prefixing it with a - and putting it in quotation marks — no idea if this will work as I’m hoping… -“@Markola”