When I first heard of Nostr, I heard some pretty special people were already on it. Jack Dorsey, Edward Snowden, Efrat Fenigson. When I opened it up, I saw mostly jumbled text notes that seemed “un-decrypted,” and a very unfriendly user interface. I wasn’t impressed, and I didn’t bother creating an account.

I continued to hear about Nostr on podcasts. I saw the informative graphics on nostr.com, and continued to find the concept of this decentralized net very appealing. So a few months later, I decided to give it another shot.

Just to preface: I’m nobody special. I’m someone who’s been working as a regular developer, as a freelancer, who’s tried their hand at solo game development without luck, as well as co-founding start-ups. I never “won big”, but I consider myself pretty lucky to have a very open mind, always eager to learn, and to try new things.

Which is what brought me here.

Once I took that deeper dive, I found and installed some pretty nice-looking clients. I saw Primal, Ditto, and ended up installing 0xChat for private messaging and zapping, even convincing two friends of mine to install it as well. I started looking at global feeds, and although they were not always pretty, they spiked my interest. They showed me something new.

I was never huge on social media, but always found it valuable. Back in my teenage years, social media was where my friends and I were posting without a thought, having fun and enjoying the platforms purely for the social and enjoyment aspect of it. That’s basically how my dad uses it today. However, what concerns me is the algorithms pushing divisive news articles, clearly influencing people politically, preventing true progress from happening at a social and societal scale.

I had previously leaned into open-source for this reason. Bringing freedom of communication without corporate or political goals, there was already Mastodon and later, Bluesky. As somebody who’s understood the value of a politically and financially agnostic technology, I’m told that I have an unusually large amount of contacts on Signal (around 10). These are all steps in the right direction, in my eyes.

Nostr, in its own way, brings it all together. Not only by being client agnostic, but by being application-agnostic as well. Whether you’re creating long-form content, live-streaming, participating in P2P markets, or launching your vibe-coded app, everything is interopable and you can like, re-post, share, or zap anything. All of that, without the need for any central server. That, for me, is unheard of.

Maybe too many people here talk about Bitcoin. I’m looking for like-minded people who want sovereignty, but who recognize that the way to make it happen is one person, one farm, one self-hoster, one yogi, one shaman, one local, political, social or religious community at a time. Bitcoin certainly ties it all together, and is a strong foundation for economic freedom internationally, but it’s not the only solution at the local level – just one aspect of it. But what I see behind all the love for Bitcoin is the values themselves. I respect the Bitcoiners for how they were in this game far longer than I have. I respect them for how self-authoritative they are. I respect them for how they search for ultimate sovereignty, not only on their money but on all aspects of life, which is surely what generated the adoption and creation of Nostr.

In my eyes, Nostr is going places. People here experiment like crazy, and I’ve seen how they can generate usable results in pretty short timeframes. Having tried to launch a “next-generation” social media app myself, I see the people here adding features every week that I was dreaming about. The addition of an integrated payment layer, as well as the value-exchange mindset, means monetization is reachable for any commonly used application. There’s a true sharing of purpose and of value here, which again, is difficult to find elsewhere in the world.

I’m seeing areas that have yet to develop. More in-world discovery and services. Games – which were the original reason I signed up for facebook when I was 12 – are likely to have a postive impact on adoption as well. Peer-to-peer marketplaces, community relays… I’m far from the best person to try and envision what will come. But I feel it. It’s new, fresh, maybe a bit chaotic and in need of better product design, but it’s here.

My last message today to my fellow Nostriches is this:

From permissionless payment systems, to integration with everything, I believe we have a real chance at changing the world for the better. The way to do that is not by isolating ourselves, but accepting those of us who are further behind on the adoption curve, and helping us step on board. A lot of people out there don’t necessarily align with all our values, but certainly align on a few. Where we can make connections, we can create adoption. And where we can build bridges, we can go more places.

The protocol is made for this. Let’s embrace the diversity, let’s build more, and let’s enjoy the chaos. ✌️