Oddbean new post about login | logout I posted last week about how fast the number of users on Nostr was growing and had a bunch of clarifications to the number I pulled from Primal, essential saying the number was too high. Been thinking about this problem/opportunity all week. 1) I understand that it is really hard to get accurate numbers in a protocol like this - similar to how lightning growth is difficult to accurately gauge. (But are we making the problem worse by fighting over the number - that we can’t know?) 2) We all know and take for granted that the other bird app wildly overstates their users because it leads to more users. We know this from the court docs on a) Elon transaction, b) Elon constant drumbeat on “how fast it’s growing” c) our own user experience - ie - engagement per # connections (followers) is much higher here d) All of the bots and scams needed the reply to posts on x. And here’s the thing - it is going to get far worse on X. I still pop in on X to see what’s going on (even though I rarely post) and besides all of the bots and noise, now most of what you see is AI driven clickbait to “win” more followers, drowning out some of the great voices I used to find there. Searching for real content is becoming increasingly difficult. 3) I suspect many of the early users here are early adopters in other areas of their lives. They could see the risks of the other centralized services and/or they wanted to be on the leading edge of something far better. That being said, a core driver for the majority is that they feel comfort in “what everyone else is doing” meaning that a) if they think Nostr is stagnant (because people here are more honest/critical with real #’s) while b) X is growing (because of “marketing” - I wanted to use a different name for it but stopped short) then c) they will stay for longer on X, because they won’t investigate what you already know…….this is a far better experience, that is getting better every day. (While the competitor(s) are getting worse) Users and Developers are much more likely to move their valuable time and content here if they think there is a growing community of engagement (there is) versus a stagnant one. What restaurant are you attracted to? the one with a line of people or the empty one? Our natural biases are hard to break and for all of Elon’s faults, he sure knows how to use these triggers to drive people to do what he wants them to do.
everyone feels closer together here
Agreed
I've found folks here that seem to appreciate some of the more unconventional things I have to say and willing to respond with questions and comments. On X, it's been more like dropping stones into an empty well...😜
Even if half my notes here never get any likes, zaps, or comments, and least the other half do! On X I still don’t get any engagement but I get a slow trickling of bot and scammer followers every day, making my account look to an outside observer as scammy as well 🥴
In my opinion, Nostr is where the likelihood of finding authentic, critical thinking individuals that share my morals and values is greater. If I wanted to be manipulated and told how to think I would spend my time on Xwitter.
Agreed - AND there are a lot of great people (who share your values) still stuck in that ecosystem whose voices would be fantastic here. The point was that they mostly stay because they “falsely” believe that because users are inflated there, there is more opportunity.
I have hope they will eventually see that truth. Similarly to bitcoin you have the early adopters and eventually the network grows from a shift in realizations. I truly believe your presence here notably contributes to Nostr’s growth. You have an ability to see the direction the world, technology and bitcoin is going far earlier than most. The humble, respectful, and peaceful way you have helped others to understand this is pivotal in building a solid foundation for both bitcoin and Nostr.
I agree with this take. Our current user count calculation is very permissive: we count all public keys that have user metadata set. This can be gamed (anyone can create bot key pairs and set metadata for them), so our nostr user numbers are overstated. The alternative is to use a web of trust algorithm to identify real users based on follow connections. The downside of this technique is that we would be underestimating the number of real users because most new users won’t have any real followers initially. Given that other networks generously include bots when stating their user numbers, our approach is probably a decent apples-to-apples comparison. In fact, as you point out, nostr seems to have higher engagement per number of followers. Having said all that, I am not happy with the fact that our numbers don’t reflect real users. We will work on improving these techniques, but I definitely don’t want to err on the side of excluding real users from the count.
check @brugeman ‘s “trusted user” techniques for additional thinking on the topic
"Instead of eliminating bots, let's account for them."
I agree with this too. The more the better, even if the counts are overly generous. We need to show people that it’s growing to attract them. And that becomes a sort of self-fulfilling prophesy. Also - the comments about engagement to follower count ratio being higher here than on X. That’s more nuanced. I’ve seen a marked decrease in engagement, bc I’m no longer consistent there. BUT…if I am consistently posting, the engagement is way higher. That of course points to a much more sophisticated “algo” which IMO is not a bad thing. It’s just a different approach, and works for him. I’ll also say that there are some smaller accounts I follow on X that get major traction with good content. Once again, that’s a mix of consistency and quality. Finally, and related to what I just said, I don’t think it’s all noise or clickbait. I’ve curated my feed quite well, and still get good quality posts on the “following” feed. (The “for you” feed though is way more clickbaity & annoying).
The rear vision mirror is much smaller than the windscreen for a reason. I find the obsession with your followers & the number of active users counterproductive to expressing our authentic self & enabling others to do so. Nostr growth is the best growth, it's completely organic & very similar to Bitcoin's growth. Nostr is a better system. I don't feel the need to sell & market it. Twitter will go the way of Reddit in time. I see Nostr like a lower risk Bitcoin, it moves faster & it's adoption is just as inevitable. As always, let go the fear follow your intuition. Pay little attention to the whining. 🧡
You always cut thru the noice and provide pure signal 👍🏼
🙏
Always choose your own battlefield. Competing on user numbers is not a battle you can win. What battlefields can Nostr win? Largest number of apps in ecosystem. Least risk of being being shadow banned, timeout, or deplatformed. Highest engagement per follower is a good one. What else?
I completely agree with this take. I use X infinitely more before but have began migrating most of my time to Nostr recently. There’s a lot of engagement farming, echo chambers and spam on X. Whilst the early adopters of Nostr are simply real, authentic and have productive discussions. In time, more people will see this and opt to spend their time here.