I am not sure I entirely agree with that, but I see your point. Not everything needs to be motivated by profit to survive. A lot of devs are scratching their own itch with the things they build on Nostr, so they are happy to plug away at it in their spare time, because they get value out of what they build just as much as we do as users.
Also, profits can easily corrupt products, depending on the business model, because they can create bad incentives. I think Primal is an example of this. They clearly want to be profitable, and it has led them to make some choices in how their product works that are distinctly antithetical to the Nostr ethos.
That said, I think the clients and relay implementations that are most polished and user-friendly will likely be built by those highly motivated to be profitable. They just need to be very intentional about finding ways to make a profit that don't skew their incentives. What exactly will properly compensate devs for their work without creating bad incentives around how they iterate on what they are building? That's a really tough nut to crack.
I would love to hear your suggestions in that area, particularly around how client devs ought to monetize, and how relay implementation devs should monetize. Those who run relays can obviously charge for write and/or read access to their relay. Those who host media can do the same for their Blossom server. Heck, utxo the webmaster 🧑💻 (npub1utx…50e8) built Aegis specifically for that purpose. But how client and relay devs get paid for their work is a much harder problem to solve.
Dikaios1517
npub1ku…v3lhe
2025-04-01 19:59:59
in reply to nevent1q…vmdr
Author Public Key
npub1kun5628raxpm7usdkj62z2337hr77f3ryrg9cf0vjpyf4jvk9r9smv3lheSeen on
wss://relay.utxo.one/inboxwss://relay.nostrplebs.comwss://nostr.winewss://relay.brightbolt.netwss://relay.damus.ioPublished at
2025-04-01 19:59:59Event JSON
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"pubkey": "b7274d28e3e983bf720db4b4a12a31f5c7ef262320d05c25ec90489ac99628cb",
"created_at": 1743537599,
"kind": 1,
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"content": "I am not sure I entirely agree with that, but I see your point. Not everything needs to be motivated by profit to survive. A lot of devs are scratching their own itch with the things they build on Nostr, so they are happy to plug away at it in their spare time, because they get value out of what they build just as much as we do as users.\n\nAlso, profits can easily corrupt products, depending on the business model, because they can create bad incentives. I think Primal is an example of this. They clearly want to be profitable, and it has led them to make some choices in how their product works that are distinctly antithetical to the Nostr ethos.\n\nThat said, I think the clients and relay implementations that are most polished and user-friendly will likely be built by those highly motivated to be profitable. They just need to be very intentional about finding ways to make a profit that don't skew their incentives. What exactly will properly compensate devs for their work without creating bad incentives around how they iterate on what they are building? That's a really tough nut to crack.\n\nI would love to hear your suggestions in that area, particularly around how client devs ought to monetize, and how relay implementation devs should monetize. Those who run relays can obviously charge for write and/or read access to their relay. Those who host media can do the same for their Blossom server. Heck, nostr:npub1utx00neqgqln72j22kej3ux7803c2k986henvvha4thuwfkper4s7r50e8 built Aegis specifically for that purpose. But how client and relay devs get paid for their work is a much harder problem to solve.",
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