Joe on Nostr: I very much doubt this latest round has to do with a paid relay op. We’re in a ...

I very much doubt this latest round has to do with a paid relay op. We’re in a pretty early and altruistic phase for Nostr all around these days.

But it does showcase the incentive misalignment. Paid relays are certainly are being offered a short-term incentive to make unpaid relays less viable. So just the fact that the network has created that particular temptation to resist is an issue. (I'd imagine this has been a pretty good week for paid-relay sign ups across the board.)

And even on the passive side, you can argue paid relays are short-term incentivised to sit back, not lend their expertise to help stop the spam, and also use situations like this in their marketing. It's just just how you'd want network incentives to be aligned.

What you'd want is a situation where paid relays are directly financially incentivised to participate in the guardianship of the network overall, including that of unpaid relays. (Of course everyone benefits from good network health in the end, but I mean in a direct way, at the protocol level, so short term counter-incentives don't get in the way.)

You’re bang on about the Catch 22 though, curious what your ideas are.