Oddbean new post about login | logout I'm not sure if they're used anywhere, but private mutes exist. I could see people wanting more privacy forbtheir social graph, that's really some of the most delicate information we have.
There's a tension there, because the social graph is the most game-changing element of Nostr. Nostr as the social layer of the whole Internet is a largely untapped potential, and private follows obviously limit some of that potential. If all social graph data is private, then a large chunk of the Nostr value proposition disappears, IMO. However, allowing users some discretion would be good.
Totally agreed, I'm not sure what the right solution is. Private groups highlight this tension because you might want to follow people you're in a group with, but then you're actually potentially leaking data about your association that would otherwise be private. Something to think about.
How is the “open” social graph nostr’s game changer? This has been part of social networks since the beginning. Granted, there is a tension between having open and private relationships… (and nostr does have potential to be the social “identity management” layer of the internet) but I don’t see this as threatening to Nostr’s value as a protocol for distributed identity management (on the social web). Fact is: Social graphs have been a part of social media since it’s inception. While nostr’s open architecture has potential to revolutionize this, it is hardly itself nostr’s value prop. Also fact: people want privacy. Private groups are a thing. Without private relationships as well, people will just use private anon accounts. Thank god for nostr to support truly anon accounts. Nostr’s value to the internet is in respecting people’s privacy while preserving their data integrity and sovereignty across any app. Private follow lists fall right into this value prop, despite the obvious challenge of keeping social graphs meaningful and accessible.
I think the thing Nostr does is make the social graph an accessible, inherent part of the protocol itself. It used to be the social graph was accessible only through propriety APIs, but since Nostr is an open protocol, that social graph is now available to any application using the protocol. Of course, that is the exact reason why one would want privacy, but fortunately there are a number of possible ways of preserving privacy, not least of which is anonymity.