Oddbean

Imagine Webs of Trust (WOT) with me: This is how Nostr will fend off bots and bad actors. Your “trusted” follows (and possibly their trusted follows) will comprise your personal trust network. It will be your WALL from which undesired content can be avoided and new friends can be included. #followed < #trustworthy < #trusted - “Trusted” accounts will be relative to your account, and always chosen by you. Any account can be marked as “trusted”. - “Trustworthy” will be suggested by your “WOT filters” which will be configureable on your profile. (And extended by NIPs) - “Followed” will be your baseline (as it currently is) for accounts “of interest”chosen by you. - “Recommended” accounts (that you do not follow) MAY be available for you to consider for following or trusting, based on your WOT settings. In the end your WOT filters will keep YOU in charge of your own web of trust. This will determine the accounts that you interact with AND the accounts that YOUR followers see as “trustworthy” or “recommended”. QUESTION FOR YOU: #asknostr What “filters” would YOU like to have for “trustworthy” or “recommended” accounts to be suggested?

Just a reality check. Nostr has no central moderation, with data and protocol wide open for bad actors to take advantage of. They will come in droves as nostr becomes more popular. Webs of trust (people trusting people) will make all the difference. Nostr is not quite ready for mainstream.

@Karnage as a UX professional, of all people, I’d expect you to understand this first. What’s your take on the vulnerability of nostr for bots and bad actors? Is it inevitable they will come? Does it matter?

Bots don’t matter imo. Bad actors of course matter but there are ways to mitigate their harm. I’ve talked about it many times already and wrote in the design guide is well. It’s not bulletproof but I’m confident as the protocol requires it, we will come up with sensible solutions.

So we’re talking the same language? >”The simple way to minimize spam is to not visit Global. Once you’ve found some people to follow, browse through their following lists and discover new people through conversations to expand your network. Some nostr clients also utilize Web of Trust (WoT) scoring to minimize spam.” https://nostrdesign.org/docs/faq/ The only difference is that I’m saying to pull the trigger NOW on making nostr bulletproof for bots and bad actors. Nostr webs of trust is currently an ad-hoc afterthought. (As implied in your faq) Friends helping friends keep better feeds IS how nostr will sustain. The time is now to build the tools to support this, cause human behavior takes even more longer.