We’ve watched them come and go: social networking attempts like Mastodon (Activity Pub), Blue Sky, and recently, Threads. They’ve begun to follow what feels very much like a pattern. First basic functionality is built out, then there’s a crisis of some sort on mainstream social media, then there’s a population explosion on the new social network, people quickly become disillusioned, then a population collapse.
It can be very tempting, while watching these networks explode their user bases into the millions overnight, to wish for that for ourselves on Nostr. I do not. In fact, I believe this sudden explosive growth is partially responsible for the inevitable decline and collapse of these attempted “replacements” for any of the big corporately owned networks. Social networks don’t fail due to technology issues - they fail because of social issues.
Culture Matters
When people exodus a media platform en masse, they bring their culture with them. Their expectations of the types of content they want to interact with, the ways they intend to behave, and the ways they engage with others. These patterns are influenced by two factors in mainstream social: moderation, and tradition.
- Moderation forms the culture in a top-down way, by establishing the limits of what kind of content will be acceptable on the platform. Platforms with relatively loose moderation policies will tend to attract people that diverge from established norms of behavior, more than those who typically conform.
- Tradition also informs culture in unique ways for each platform - the things that are easiest to find, provoke an emotional response, and are easy to share tend to dominate.
- Functionality also plays a role, albeit a lesser one, but one that tends to form the unique humor of a platform. Reddit is a fine example of this with its long threads of puns, each one building on the previous post. Hell threads on other platforms are another example.
The problem arises because new platforms rarely meet the expectations of another culture formed on another platform. Functionality will be different in subtle but important ways, and the early adopters of the new platform will be interested in different topics. This is very true on Nostr, where posts are rewarded specifically for quality - a metric that is very difficult to quantify, but any long-time user can identify - and an overabundant quantity of posts is more likely to get you muted than followed.
Assimilation Matters
When users slowly trickle their way into a new platform, they are more inclined to ask questions, and attempt to understand the existing culture. They are the “new kid on the block” and will be more apt to seek feedback if they truly desire to achieve any sort of success. They then add the unique qualities of their personality to this information, and contribute something new to the culture, while still being a part of it.
When a large group of users joins all at once, they bring their own connections with them. When the group joining dwarfs the existing user base, they have less motivation to seek advice on how to best utilize the platform to its fullest potential, expecting that they will be able to continue connecting and communicating with their existing contacts in the same way they always have. This will inevitably lead to frustration when the new platform does not provide them with the same success that they had on the former platform - leading to the inevitable conclusion that the “new Twitter (or Facebook, Instagram, et al.)” is not as good as the old one.
And so we watch the tides of users go in and out, leaving old platforms in frustration for new ones, only to become equally frustrated with their inability to communicate and reach an audience as effectively as they used to, and returning to the old platform, or seeking yet greener pastures.
Stability Matters
Sudden growth causes sudden problems. Both Mastodon and Blue Sky encountered major issues that they were not prepared to handle, and handled badly. Mastodon operators found themselves facing enormous hosting bills, and Blue Sky faces serious obstacles in keeping their promises to provide a “safe” environment with the influx of new users.
A slow, steady growth model allows the operators of services to face problems in a more measured way, and to build out both infrastructure and content tools to allow users to have a pleasant experience. It is less likely to take an otherwise major contributor to a project, and make them “tap out” due to rising costs, frustrated users, and a constant crisis mindset.
Nostr is a distributed network, and has amazing potential for horizontal scaling. Even if one in ten-thousand users who onboards onto Nostr decides to run a relay, the network will be in good shape. Content distribution can be handled in a large number of ways - it isn’t tied fundamentally to the protocol itself - which allows many different providers to be used, and new ways of handling content to be built.
But creating those relay operators and content hosts out of newbies takes time. A truly educated relay admin capable of handling the job of maintaining a secure and reliable relay takes weeks or days at best, assuming they are already familiar with similar tasks. Adding 10 million users overnight - the way Threads did - is likely to swamp existing providers before new providers have time to step in a fill the gap. Which would also have the effect of chilling user experience.
There is a lot of new terminology and capability to take in when joining Nostr. For the mainstream person, they are going to have to learn about: cryptographic keys, Nostr Addresses (NIP-05), Lightning Wallets, Zaps and by proxy Bitcoin, and eventually Lists, Relay Management, Paid Relays, how to find content, moderate their own feed, and more. Right now, Nostr is doing an excellent job of answering those questions and educating users on the new terminology and techniques because the flow is small and steady with a few bursts.
The Tortoise and The Hare
I truly believe that the success of Nostr will be in no small part because it is growing steadily instead of all at once. Every user onboarded correctly adds to the army of people ready to help welcome the next little wave of people who learn about the decentralized and censorship resistant qualities of Nostr. These individuals are also given the time to become part of a kinder social group than is typically found on social media, and learn to truly become productive and successful as true Nostriches rather than just transplants from another place.
And that is truly the magic isn’t it? People don’t just move to Nostr, they become Nostriches. They become part of a real community, and they belong with us. We take refugees from other social media sites, and don’t leave them refugees. I think that’s beautiful and worth slowing down to do.
I don’t look to the short term for Nostr - I’m bullish for Nostr in the long haul. We are building to still be here after the others have already burnt themselves away. It reminds me of my home country:
“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
