Altough it's very practical for calculating networks LinkedIn style when all follow lists are public, it also keeps the social graph of users out in the open.
Not that it have to matter, but it can matter. It certainly is a privacy concern to some degree.
I think we ought to consider integrating private follower lists into our nostr clients. Maybe one would like to keep real life friends on a private contact list, rather than exposing all that data to datamining and similar uses.
If people remember the OxfordAnalytica scandal that facebook got their hands in. That's something that's doable on nostr without even having to ask nostr-hq for premision.
Maybe the more people use nostr, the more it would be a good thing if we had tools concealed the social graph as much as people would like to do so. Today, that's hardly an option on most clients.
Part of the brilliance of nostr:nprofile1qqsvnx99ww0sfall7gpv2jtz4ftc9v6wevgdd7g4hh7awkpfvwlezugppemhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mp0jwtjpy is how it also conceals the social graph. It's basically a black box void where people can connect without any third parties even knowing it has happened.
nostr:nevent1qqsz4z6e3y7w536gp4pqjqyhxhp57qrkh3qd992vjn5kg3ezmsx84aqpz4mhxue69uhkummnw3ezummcw3ezuer9wchsyg86q9j6puvjlv8fr37cwy89w4c26fanw9w22gvp7mznexeqxwtswvpsgqqqqqqs58xh2f
private block lists let's gooooo
nostr:nevent1qqsz4z6e3y7w536gp4pqjqyhxhp57qrkh3qd992vjn5kg3ezmsx84aqppemhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mp0qgs05qt95rce97cwj8rasugw2ats45nmxu2u55scrak98jdjqvuhqucrqsqqqqqpkng3pc
Selectively reveal the parts of yourself you want to
I would very much appreciate if public follows would remain as it is a very valuable heuristic to go by when judging which content might be relevant and real.
I want to limit my client's view to follows of my follows' follows. Anybody beyond that is probably bots, scams and other first-time posters. These should only enter my view if a relevant account interacts with them.
Yes it is a very valuable metric, when public. Especially for such functionality you describe :)
A proposal worth debating!
nostr:nevent1qqsz4z6e3y7w536gp4pqjqyhxhp57qrkh3qd992vjn5kg3ezmsx84aqpzamhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgtczyraqzedq7xf0kr53clv8zrjh2u9dy7ehzh99yxqld3funvsr89c8xqcyqqqqqqg4svwm5
Would this require those that want to reveal themselves publicly to do so with their npub in another public domain? For those that wish to stay anonymous, what’s to stop someone from duplicating a profile, wouldn’t follower count be the social consensus method of verifying authenticity?
Follower count is not a reliable number on nostr, it fluctuate depending on what relays are running or have downtime. Sharing npub in a trusted and using NIP-05 domain verification is way more reliable. (NIP-05 is however in most cases KYCd, so not anonymous.)
What I'm thinking of is similar to private lists on Twitter. Letting people subscribe to content without publicly sharing their connection to it.
As a complement to the legacy follow system. But a privacy focused client might consider using private lists as default. To counter social graph analysis by malicious actors*.
*Say maybe a paranoid government that want to track down the social connections among those who have been talking sh%t about the dear status quo.
Oddbean new post about login | logout