Max

I’ve been sitting on it for a month, but this conversation with @nprofile…s5zj is more relevant now than ever!
Check it on:
- @nprofile…cgkr: https://fountain.fm/episode/V2lt2b0MDKgzei4u4Z8I
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIF6kEPL5m8
- Substack: https://hivemindvc.substack.com/p/building-a-decentralized-app-store
As vibe coding enables the creation of orders of magnitude more apps and media, the question becomes: how do I sort through this embarrassment of riches to find what I actually need? One option is to trust centralized entities like companies or governments. Franzap, however, has another idea. Using Nostr’s global identity, data commons, and micropayments, he’s designing a new kind of app store powered by a decentralized web of trust. I hope you enjoy! Here are a few topics we discuss:
- Fran’s vision for an open, permissionless alternative to Apple and Android app stores
- How Zapstore could help fund open source development
- Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) have limited path to adoption
- Is it time to build an App Store for AI agents to use?! An open MCP registry could be a good starting point
- IA (Intelligence Amplification) vs. AI (Artificial Intelligence)
- The future of AI and app development
- Why a decentralized Web of Trust matters in sorting information, apps, accounts and anything else
- How to build and use a decentralized Web of Trust

2025-04-14 18:02:31

https://image.nostr.build/cbffabb06c1b53b7e11ff464d53625aca20a2fbcafcfc07cfce3af89ee95680f.png

2025-04-12 16:43:39

https://image.nostr.build/fa27141131b80f5ba9aee747fda0193aed45d33f829e8bb416dfb51fa846eb9c.png

2025-04-11 01:11:04

[100k SAT BOUNTY]
This is an experiment! I'm going to a hackathon this Saturday and I'd like to showcase to a new community the power of nostr and lightning zaps. I have 2 ideas that I would like to prototype (I'm currently vibe coding them but unlikely I'll have them totally ironed out before then). I will pay a bounty of100,000 sats each via zap (so a total of 200k sats up for grabs) for a live working web version + code/prompts for each of these ideas. I will choose the best project for each category at my discretion (and will only choose one if I think it's complete enough to showcase). I am (of course) also happy to list you on the team and give you credit for building. I just want to sweeten the pot and get this done BEFORE SATURDAY MORNING AT 9AM PT.
Here's what I'd like to build:
1) Memstr
A meme generator with nostr login and zaps. You include 5 or so popular meme templates (guy looking at girl, winnie the pooh, etc) and allow anyone to enter their own text. They're then able to share theire memes via popular nostr relays and other users are able to zap their favorite memes. A leaderboard shows the most popular memes by global zaps and by the zaps of your follows. (I'm also open to using other WoT calcs but I assume that's too complex.) You should be able to login via a browser extension like alby, paste a priv key, or spin up a new nostr identity.
2) Nostr Radio
A clone of https://radio.garden with nostr login, zaps, and a zap leaderboard. Allow anyone to login to the site via browser extension like alby, priv key, or spin up a new identity. Users can zap and share radio stations they like via popular nostr relays. Users can also zap their friends for sharing radio stations they like. There should be a leaderboard tab showing popular stations (global) and from the zaps of your friends. Again, I'm open to other WoT scores as well, but not necessary as that adds complexity.
If you're interested in working on either of these, please feel free to reply to this note with questions (for whatever is not clear) or ideas. Again, I'll only choose at most one project for each bounty and only if it's fully functional and ready before Saturday at 9am PT. If nothing's ready by then or this proves to be too difficult, no sweat! Also, I'm trying to gauge how difficult/how much work this is for someone who knows what they're doing. If the pot is not rich enough, I'd like that feedback too. Thank you!
I'd appreciate any help getting visibility for this experiment 🙏 @nprofile…yr67 @nprofile…7l5w @nprofile…fy4z @nprofile…gc6z @nprofile…g5jd @nprofile…9wx8 @nprofile…qu7d @nprofile…55a2 @nprofile…3a9l @nprofile…97yv @nprofile…u7e3 @nprofile…yu6y @nprofile…ylqx @nprofile…s2s2 @nprofile…478g @nprofile…s5zj @nprofile…h7h8 @nprofile…3qk4 @nprofile…ul8r @nprofile…3cya @nprofile…fvpv @nprofile…x0wy @nprofile…xy6n @nprofile…zkaf @nprofile…yk8r @nprofile…j8dv @nprofile…lf38

2025-04-09 20:35:31

I've been thinking more about it and I really want to help this happen. I want to fund or incubate a vibe coding platform built around open protocols. Like Replit with Amjad’s original vision for enabling millions of kids in India and emerging markets to make bank. Integrating Nostr for identity/data and Bitcoin/ecash for payments. And making it easy for users to remix/mod what others have built. Who is building or wants to build this?
Thanks to @nprofile…yr67 for pushing this idea on X
https://x.com/MaxAWebster/status/1910029627923583034
#nevent1q…5q0p

2025-04-09 00:25:57

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how do I start?

2025-04-09 00:19:15

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more than enough! what are you using? replit agent seems easiest to get from 0 to working prototype

2025-04-08 23:13:44

Vibe coding could be the major catalyst for nostr adoption
"im actually bearish on the 'consumers will all be prompting their own full apps' thing because most good apps require data and there is no such thing as real data portability for consumers."
https://x.com/nearcyan/status/1909730703388115132
A global data commons/backend solves this 𓅦𓅦𓅦

2025-04-02 22:06:22

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awareness without judgement 😃

2025-04-02 21:01:15

The only thing worth fighting for is freedom
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLFSGxj9qVY
#nevent1q…5u05

2025-03-28 19:02:46

bout to go live baby
#nevent1q…5nsd

2025-03-28 01:06:28

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Thanks for tuning and sending great live comments!

2025-03-27 23:05:43

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yv3sZtzJWmc
#nevent1q…56u9

2025-03-27 23:00:05

Nostr News (and other futurism) is back!! Link live in a few
#nevent1q…0cj4

2025-03-20 22:18:38

Autonomous agents on Nostr is my top investing priority rn
A few things I'd love to see:
- nostr auth (login with nostr for agents) (cc @nprofile…fvpv )
- an open inference / gpu marketplace
- an app/tool store for agents to use (perhaps starting as an mcp registry) (cc @nprofile…ul8r @nprofile…rp63 @nprofile…3cya @nprofile…jvw7 )
- agents that run their own ecash mints (cc @nprofile…h36r @nprofile…x0wy @nprofile…xy6n @nprofile…g5a6 )
What else would you like to see?
#nevent1q…402w

2025-03-19 22:08:37

What metrics do you think we should be using to measure Nostr's success/health?
#nevent1q…5lp6

2025-03-19 22:08:10

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Perhaps some measure of time spent on a piece of content x trust/value score of the content (where user or app can apply whatever trust/value score they want)
Daily users sending or receiving zaps is an easier "objective" measure of actual value creation though and applies to other activity I hope to see more of on nostr (e.g commerce)
Perhaps best overall metrics then might be Nostr GDP, GDP / capita, and total users contributing to GDP daily (sending/receiving zaps or payments)

2025-03-19 04:05:01

When you're following lightning development super closely, it can seem frustratingly slow. But if you zoom out, it's phenomenal. I just seamlessly used Muun wallet to top up my @nprofile…fy4z hub and make a bunch of tips (both large and small) to friends and random nyms on nostr via @nprofile…uuxc in @nprofile…mdf3 . We've come a long way!

2025-02-06 21:14:30

Now this is what I'm talking about!! So many applications for this immediately.
@nprofile…n4mu have you seen this yet?
Congrats to @nprofile…rp63 & npub176p7sup477k5738qhxx0hk2n0cty2k5je5uvalzvkvwmw4tltmeqw7vgup!
#nevent1q…vghp

2025-01-29 20:01:03

Money & Markets in a Post AGI World w/ @nprofile…3cya (founder, @nprofile…k0g4 )
YouTube: https://youtube.com/watch?v=QNMGxLD6HyU&t=7s
Fountain: https://fountain.fm/episode/cMfF2cqzslLfD8m1MXlo
Substack: https://substack.com/home/post/p-155970718?source=queue
Jordi is is one of the few people in the world with a deep understanding of the concurrent singularities of AI and Bitcoin. He has particularly novel thoughts on the nature of money and markets post AGI/ASI. This was a fascinating discussion - hope you enjoy!
Topics:
- How Jordi became AGI/ASI pilled (language = code)
- The concurrent singularities of AGI/Bitcoin (almost no-one understands them both)
- Two fundamental types intelligence: 1) desire / will and 2) implementation
- AGI capabilities: all implementation, “will” remains to be seen
- As long as there are still multiple groups who own things, different perspectives, and multiple groups reach AGI/ASI around the same time, we’ll still need markets for coordination
- Markets forming between agents (and humans) should create brand new economic theory untestable heretofore
- Jordi outlines several novel forces for markets in a world with agents in [Beyond the Sum: Unlocking AI Agents Potential Through Market Forces](https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.10388): 1) perfect replication of actors, 2) dynamic instantiation (and deletion) of actors, 3) collective learning with perfect information, and 4) resource fluidity for agents
- The role of Nostr and an emergent web of trust in filtering information in this new Internet
- Gigi’s articles on how a better currency/payment system can lead to better business models: [Attention is a Terrible Currency](https://dergigi.com/threads/attention) and [Value for Value](https://dergigi.com/value/)
- Comparing the early Lightning Network to the early Internet
- Building http://fewsats.com: payment infrastructure for AI agents. Jordi’s new demo: http://sherlockdomains.com - a domain registrar made for AI agents
- Is python now the lingua franca? How do we get more bitcoin and nostr libraries in python?
- The future of Nostr as the open identity/communication standard for humans and agents
- AI / agent predictions for 2025
Full discussion: https://stacker.news/items/869257

2025-01-28 00:18:52

https://m.primal.net/ODck.jpg
#nevent1q…qmt3

2025-01-10 23:52:57

How bout now? Who's building Polymarket on Nostr? I don't yet see nostr login on predyx?
#nevent1q…m0gx

2025-01-10 23:32:23

https://tidal.com/browse/track/47784393?u

2025-01-06 22:01:04

ICYMI my interview with Vlad, founder of @nprofile…qlzx
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcU8T_2VKOw
https://fountain.fm/episode/IVnPTgOWE6xdWpu3yqZV
Paid/premium search is the future because incentives matter. Kagi is now my daily driver search engine. AND Vlad/Kagi are going to be doing a lot to integrate with Nostr in 2025!

2024-12-26 19:42:31

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwzBjBHfDIs

2024-12-18 19:21:02

https://tidal.com/browse/track/185779336?u

2024-12-18 00:20:57

https://youtu.be/ctHqgoxQ2Mo?t=2859
thank you jd

2024-12-14 17:05:41

https://tidal.com/browse/track/36863409?u

2024-12-13 23:01:27

https://tidal.com/browse/track/348383211?u

2024-12-02 19:39:12

[New Pod] Kagi: Hacker News’ favorite search engine is coming to Nostr! with Vlad (Founder, @npub1lmz…jfdp)
Listen on:
- Fountain: https://fountain.fm/episode/IVnPTgOWE6xdWpu3yqZV
- YouTube: https://tinyurl.com/4n4pdn3d
- Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hivemind-ideas-from-the-edge/id1731637285
- Substack: https://hivemindvc.substack.com/p/kagi-hacker-news-favorite-search
Full discussion on @npub1jfu…m0gx: https://stacker.news/items/791927
I got the opportunity to speak with Vlad, the founder of my favorite search engine, Kagi! Kagi is a Hacker News darling with a popular paid search engine (and an interesting philosophy on how to build better search than Google). Vlad and the team recently announced their intention to engage with and build for the Nostr community! We discuss ideas for how they can implement Nostr features as well a ton of other interesting topics, including:
- Andy Weir’s The Egg as a model for reality
- Vlad’s background as a physics student and early web & Wordpress developer
- Was it inevitable for the web to centralize first before now (hopefully) re-wilding?
- Why ads as a business model inevitably leads to low quality service for the user
- Vlad’s manifesto: The Age of PageRank is Over
https://blog.kagi.com/age-pagerank-over
- Kagi’s business philosophy: pay for the product or be the product
- Do Larry and Sergey use ad blockers personally? 800M people do. Vlad would be shocked if they’re not among them
- Will people pay for search? 10s of millions pay for YouTube premium and search is arguably much more important
- DKB’s article that blew up on Hacker News: Google Search is Dying
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30347719
- Workshopping Max’s thesis around building a “value rank” algorithm based on scarce bitcoin and nostr identity
https://hivemind.vc/howtodisruptgoogle/
- Max explains the principles of Nostr and Vlad offers his initial reactions
- Max’s thesis that Nostr becomes the data/identity bridge layer between all kins of publishing clients (e.g. Twitter/X, Bluesky, etc.)
- Ideas for what Kagi could build - e.g. embedded Nostr search in Kagi, a Lightning wallet in Orion, a beefy relay
- Kagi’s collaboration with Stephen Wolfram and Wolfram Alpha
- Vlad’s skepticism around “the singulairty”
- Humanity has a ways to go to become a Type I civilization. This first wave of AI (LLMs) likely only gets us a small relative advancement

2024-11-30 00:30:53

Bitcoin jam with the homies @npub1ug8…d9ry & @npub1kuy…kdj8
https://x.com/i/broadcasts/1OdKrXRWprpJX

2024-11-22 20:08:36

[New Pod] The State of Nostr with @`bob` @`David King` @`Oscar Merry` & @`MoritzK`
@`Fountain`: https://fountain.fm/episode/vH67sscHX8ZvxATFOyi7
YT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlJBttZWius
For context, we recently hosted a Hivemind Ventures LP/Portfolio day, where we showcased a variety of presentations. The Nostr panel was particularly good so I decided to release it publicly.
This was a fantastic discussion about the current state and potential of Nostr! We discuss:
- Why Nostr feels like the early Internet
- How Nostr (Nostr Wallet Connect) serves as the universal messaging layer for Bitcoin/Lightning Network payments
- How Nostr’s open identity and social graph allows apps like Fountain to build new experiences like discovering the podcasts your friends listen to
- Why Nostr is so much more than social media. The real promise of Nostr is a social Internet where data is open and users control their own identity, allowing for a Cambrian explosion of new social apps. Imagine automatically finding your friends’ reviews on goodreads, listens on Spotify, and highlights on Kindle
- How Nostr compares to other projects (e.g. Bluesky and Farcaster) attempting to build open publishing for the web. Why Nostr is the only neutral solution for bringing user-owned identity and open data to any web app today
- What business models might be viable for startups building in and around Nostr
- Will Nostr bring more people to Bitcoin or will Bitcoin bring more people to Nostr?

2024-11-22 07:28:50

Major improvements all around. Feed marketplace will be a game changer
#note1kae…c43m

2024-11-22 01:23:42

Woah! Cashu activity is 🚀
#note1urk…58c2

2024-11-22 01:22:13

Woah! Cashu activity is 🚀
#note1urk…58c2

2024-11-22 00:38:21

My favorite search engine embraces my favorite protocol! Christmas came early :) 🌲 𓅦 ⚡️
If you have ideas around how Kagi can best serve nostr users, let them know here!
#note1376…8qc9

2024-11-13 20:57:11

Nostr crowdfunded sign in 🇧🇷 Badass!
#note1s0e…y7fw

2024-11-12 22:16:17

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@npub13u2…gkaz is it live yet?!

2024-11-04 23:29:39

https://tidal.com/track/308238304

2024-11-04 21:49:12

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🙏

2024-11-04 21:44:48

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🙏

2024-11-02 04:04:34

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woah! that would be crazy 👀

2024-11-01 18:20:24

[New Pod] Complexity Rules Everything Around Me with @npub1a2c…w83a
Fountain: https://fountain.fm/episode/DwCEXFLNpWjUBpIpUJSD
Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/complexity-rules-everything-around-me-with-lyn-alden/id1731637285?i=1000675372927
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w78nH7d-N6c
Substack: https://hivemindvc.substack.com/p/complexity-rules-everything-around
This was a fun and fascinating conversation with Lyn Alden! We discuss a number of topics about which she’s not typically asked. One common thread throughout the conversation is how best to understand and invest around complex systems. Please note that while Lyn and I discuss some biohacking/energy boosting stuff, we’re definitely not doctors, so do your own research ;)
Here are a few of the topics we cover:
Energy Hacks
- Lyn’s favorite energy boosting hacks, including: magnesium, sardines, vitamin K2, vitamin A, cold plunges, and sprinting
Complexity and Permaculture
- Lyn’s fascination with permaculture and the application of permaculture principles to our information diets
- How Lyn builds a brand around being open and intellectually honest to avoid group think and audience capture
- Top down vs. bottom up (Communism vs. Capitalism) is the big story of the 20th century that continues today
Nostr
- The promise of Nostr as a new substrate for re-wilding the web and its ultimate TAM
- Evaluating Nostr vs. other systems/protocols attempting to build a decentralized identity/data system
- NOSTR project requests from Lyn and Max
Big Tech and AI
- Lyn’s take that AI is a continuation of the cloud computing wave, which means it’s centralizing in the medium term
- BUT these big companies are snatching defeat from the jaws of victory by restricting and closing off their products, which leaves an opening for tech that’s a year or so behind but actually open and less neutered
- Lyn is less bullish on AGI; the biggest breakthroughs are likely to come out of left field like trillion dollar health care companies
- Lyn is also less bullish on robotics because it’s energy intensive and more complex; software often goes faster than you think and hardware often goes slower than you think
Open Source Software and Companies
- The big winners from open source software are platform aggregators (e.g. AWS) and users
- Lyn analogizes companies built on open source software to ETFs - products with trillions of dollars under management but companies like Black Rock, State Street, and Invesco, which are big but not massive. BlackRock is a $160B company and only half of that is ETFs. Big but not Google or Apple. ETF businesses are worth a couple hundred billion for an industry worth >$10 trillion; the true winners here are the users as margins race to the bottom
MicroStrategy
- Can $MSTR sustain its premium trading 3x to NAV ?
- $MSTR advantages: founder control and growing liquidity network effects (e.g. MSTR options markets); very few ETFs and companies will achieve sufficient liquidity in their options markets
Bitcoin and Energy
- Bitcoin is energy backed money - external entropy is what makes the Bitcoin system not circular logic (like proof of state) and a truly autonomous system
- Both Lyn and Max track energy price/density models for Bitcoin
- Lyn also uses MVRV Z-Score for tracking fair Bitcoin price

2024-10-30 22:54:53

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And also on the funding point, our total funding is still a pittance compared to more centralized networks like Bluesky or Farcaster. I also think we generally lack CEOs (with a few exceptions). I love the hackers (truly I do!). But I'm trying my best to find the entrepreneurs who really want to make money. Most of these types that I'm speaking with are barely aware of nostr's existence. I'm hoping I can help change that at least on the margin ;)

2024-10-30 22:49:15

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These are great points. I hear you on the concern around what happens if Jack's funding dries up. To be clear though, I've also invested in a number of companies who are using nostr as a part of their core infrastructure even if it's not their primary focus. Many of these cos are making money (with paths to profitability) and do run relays (though focused on specific subsets of nostr). Examples include Fountain and Alby (in addition to more obvious ones like Primal).
I'm seeing demand for specialized paid relays for use cases like Nostr Wallet Connect. No one (at least not me) could have predicted that relay infrastructure would be used for something like passing lightning invoices around when nostr got started. Lightspark recently announced that they've built their UMA stack on top of NWC and now have economic incentive to run or pay for relays (although again only storing specific subsets of nostr data).
All that to say, I'm seeing companies with real revenue using and paying for at least some nostr infrastructure. This was not the case even 6 mos ago so seems like we're headed in an at least somewhat promising direction. Some of those experiments are starting to bear fruit. To be fair though, while I really like and appreciate the grant funding, I'm much more bullish on startup investing because startups are trying to become self sustainable.
I agree things could certainly be better though. And I know I need to dive deper into #ditto. You like this model because it incentivizes communities to pay for relays?
What else could we do to make sure relay operators are profitable? Again, pay to post relays make a lot of sense to me. I hope to see experimentation there.

2024-10-30 21:04:41

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I would definitely love to see more growth. And agree that relay incentives are not yet fully baked for lots of people to run relays, though I think businesses will run them with present model. I still see nostr as the only existing system that provides permissionless identity and a sufficiently simple design to scale. When I bring my social graph from primal/damus/amethyst to fountain and discover podcasts that my follows are listening to - it makes me very bullish. It feels a lot like early Facebook social graph days without the inevitable shutdown. That portable social graph / identity will solve cold start problems for so many types of apps that I can’t help but be excited! All that said, I’m certainly open to suggestions on what else we should be funding/supporting to help the network grow. I agree finding a way to incentivize relays like pay per post could make a lot of sense

2024-10-30 20:39:28

This was a fun one! Bullish on nostr and nostr startups
#note1zv7…vywu

2024-10-23 19:04:47

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I'd love to see someone build that! @npub1ste…mul5 code is all open source!

2024-10-23 16:42:38

[New Pod] Designing @npub1sg6…f63m's favorite shirt, Creating an open music library, and Growing an indie music empire with @npub1eeq…at9s (Founder, lightning.store and @npub1yfg…v6vg)
Fountain: https://fountain.fm/episode/x3v4yu6AuXsmYvdljKZe
YT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGimjeyTiwY
Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hivemind-ideas-from-the-edge/id1731637285
Substack: https://hivemindvc.substack.com/p/designing-jacks-favorite-shirt-creating
SN: https://stacker.news/items/737103
I sit down with Sam Means, founder of lightning.store and Wavlake for a fascinating conversation about the future of the music industry!
Here are a few topics we discuss:
The genesis of lightning.store
Parallels between Bitcoin and the punk/DIY scenes
Max’s dad - indie artist who made some cool trippy nostr shirts (which Max is wearing during interview)
Sam’s NOFX Nostr shirt (which Max wears frequently)
How Sam decides what shirts to make
Making Jack’s favorite shirt, seeing it on the Super Bowl, and stress testing Sam’s Lightning node + btcpayserver setup
Sam needs a Lightning Shopify app that works (opportunity for listeners!)
Sam got started making a first website and forum for the Weezer fan club
Sam is the consummate entrepreneur: he just does the things that need to be done
Sam’s education was coming up in bands and working venues
Pinkerton - the Weezer album changed the course of Sam’s life
Can a band be big and not suck?
Why the music biz generally sucks for bands
The magic of finding a new band that “flips your lid” (Sam’s new favorite phrase)
The magic of David Bowie and artists who can reinvent themselves
Finding the weirdest 10cc record in Japan
A history of the interplay between music and technology from pre Internet to p2p file sharing to streaming to what’s coming next
Scott Joplin and piano rolls (artists were getting screwed from day 0)
Lars from Metallica will forever be known as the guy who wants to put 12 yo music fans in jail
Music Like Water (2005, Forbes) - early article explaining how to charge for music like a utility
The monthly subscription fee for everything was the first step to a new idea
~97% of artists on Spotify make approximately nothing. If this market can make anything somewhere else they’re likely to try it
Bitcoin is the real occupy Wall Street; Wavlake is the real occupy Spotify
Even though big artists are making money, they’re still leaving a lot on the table with all the middlemen
Wavlake is changing incentives so super fans can give uncapped support for the value they receive
We jumped into the internet super fast. Now Nostr is helping us rearchitect the web by letting people travel through the Internet and bring their social graph with them
Now Wavlake and Value4Value is doing this for Music; the industry was almost completely uprooted in the last wave, but ultimately failed; now we have another shot
The role of the curator in the new more p2p internet world
Wavlake’s grand plan: it’s not a music player with zaps, but rather an open music catalogue that disrupts all of music distribution
Bandcamp and SoundCloud are examples of building a new library from the ground up
Wavlake is following their example with the key difference that their library is not confined to one app but open to anyone (e.g. Fountain)
How does Wavlake compete with Spotify - they don’t
The magic of interoperable networks and instant payments (good clip around 1:10)
Artist still only had to upload track once but the potential for where that track can live and get monetized is unlimited
The negotiations between all parties is transparent unlike current opaque set of deals
We’re making podcasting for music (another good clip around 1:14)
Wavlake’s open music catalogue is inspired by thePodcasting 2.0 spec
Developer splits incentivizes developers to try adding and monetizing music in new ways
Now music can live in all kinds of different experiences (good clip around 1:16)
Interoperability means your social graph and comments follow you to any app you use! A comment in Wavlake shows up in Fountain
LN Beats and RSS Blue also working interoperably
Sam is not afraid of competition, in fact he’s paying to incentivize it
One artist monetizing via bitcoin and value4value will start the tsunami
Check out the Forbes article on Value4Value
Ainsley Costello might already be the first big artist. She had made about $750 over years across Spotify 60+ other services. In one year, she’s made >$12k on Wavlake, Fountain, and other Lightning V4V apps. She was the first artist to earn >1M sats
If 97% of artists can make enough to do music full time in value4value land, it’s game over for traditional music industry. And if they can do well, imagine how well the big artists can eventually do when they cut out the middle men
Superstars like Kanye, Snoop Dogg, and James Blake are just as pissed about the current state of extractive music industry
Average people may not understand exactly how they’re getting fucked, but they know they’re getting fucked with the current monetary and business system - largely because every system lacks transparency
In an open world, companies like Wavlake will need to add valuable services (e.g. licensing) on top of their library to compete and win
ASCAP (what a name lol) fails to live up to their promise to monitor song uage and pay artist royalties
Maxs ideas for nostr business models: #1 remix economy - stemstr for everything and #2 rise of the curator or DJs for everything - getting curators paid for their good taste
Wavlake’s plan to build split marketplaces for music and live radio shows where hosts get paid
Value4Value music podcasts are taking off on Wavlake and Fountain
Sam owns several successful businesses around the music industry (lightning.store, merch, label, venue, zine, wavlake). Each business feeds into this growing indie empire
Wastoids is crazy cool video zine; Sam and his colleagues interview cool indie bands like People Under the Stairs and Red Cross
Check out his pods like Click Vortex, a crazy show called Midnight Music Review in the Attic with an Argentinian dude dressed like a wolf presenting new music in his attic, and a Friday music show inspired by MTV News
Sam starts experiments that could feed into each other and scales them as they work
His buddy works at Aquarium Drunkard and gets major indie darlings to come on show
Goal is for Wavlake to become one of the channels on DistroKid that will catch artists’ attention when they wonder why they made $700 on Wavlake and only 9 cents everywhere else; Wavlake already has simple onboarding for artists, now just needs a simple onboarding for fans
Open library is already 10k+ tracks and growing, that’ll just keep getting better
Sam’s team of 28 pitches in all over his indie music empire
Sam’s secret: he doesn’t know what he’s doing, he just does what needs to be done! His intent was never to run a business, he just wanted to be in a band haha
Sam’s been doing Value4Value at HelloMerch for 17 years. He doesn’t make a penny until something sells; Wavlake will scale in a similar fashion

2024-10-22 19:18:36

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cc @npub1c87…8avm

2024-10-22 19:18:15

That nostr.com NIP-05 though!!
#note1lcl…zwlm

2024-10-16 19:25:06

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hrQ1L_0cEI

2024-10-16 19:14:41

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBwAxmrE194

2024-10-14 18:41:29

NWC the standard!
#note1x59…e0m5

2024-10-14 17:52:11

@npub1unm…d0j2 (founder of @npub1v5u…n0v5) is live with an AMA on @npub1jfu…m0gx now!
https://stacker.news/items/723361
Oscar is one of my favorite builders/thinkers. I'm sure this will be excellent!

2024-10-09 21:53:49

Yes! @npub1ste…mul5 for everything
(Eg see https://pkgzap.albylabs.com from @npub1get…0nfm)
I’m looking to support projects that make it easy to create, discover, remix, and share all forms of media (software, agents, music, art). I’m especially interested in hooking these systems up with open source agents and DVMs as well (ideally with python tooling). Hmu if you’re working on anything in this realm
#note1vtt…m7xw

2024-10-09 20:36:03

💯
#note1qqq…uuvv

2024-10-09 20:30:48

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haha get ready dude ;)

2024-10-09 20:15:54

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And I started taking daily magnesium supplements about 2 years ago and that's changed my life. I sleep much much better.

2024-10-09 20:15:11

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Almost nothing processed. But probably not enough veggies. General diet is lots of eggs, salmon, sardines, brown rice, and popcorn on stove. Cooked green beans, onions, bell peppers, and broccoli a few times as week as well. Occasional salads and (no added sugar) acai bowls. Lots of olive oil. Japanese green teas in the morning. Buckwheat tea at night. And that's about it haha

2024-10-09 20:09:31

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yea electrolytes make a lot of sense especially given how hot (dehydrating) it's been lately

2024-10-09 20:05:18

I've been experimenting with fresh green juices the last couple days (spinach, celery, cucumber, lemon, ginger). Holy shit do I feel energized!! Like I feel amped beyond belief.
I'm wondering if I've been missing some crucial micronutrient before these juices. Has anyone else had a similar experience? Any best guess at which nutrient might be doing the trick?

2024-10-09 19:43:46

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Full discussion on Stacker News: https://stacker.news/items/716343

2024-10-09 19:43:14

[New Podcast] Ideas From the Edge: High Strangeness, Memetics, & the Open Source Insurgency w/ Jack Heart
https://fountain.fm/episode/Yq7TAbg6t2BLvdCqGLyM
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/high-strangeness-memetics-and-the-open-source-insurgency/id1731637285?i=1000672400114
https://hivemindvc.substack.com/p/high-strangeness-gnosticism-memetics
This was a fun one! In most recent episodes, I’ve had conversations with builders from the Nostr/Bitcoin community about other rabbit holes they’re interested in. In today’s episode, I sat down with Jack Heart, a longtime blogger and veteran of high strangeness and esoteric rabbit holes galore.
Although we focus primarily on themes from Jack’s blog and recent book, we do spend some time discussing the principles of Nostr and how they align with Jack’s view of building an open source insurgency. I’m hoping to do more conversations with thinkers like Jack from communities philosophically adjacent to Nostr.
You can learn more about Jack’s work on his blog, Tekgnostics, and in his new book, Brave Noo World: A Guerrilla Ethnography of High Strangeness.
Here are some of the other topics we cover:
- High strangeness and the acceleration of technology, society, and novelty
- Tekgnostics - a balance of artifact and epiphany
- J. Allen Hynek - coined the term high strangeness
- The origin of "Foo Fighters" - UFOs
- Cosmic triggers - the atomic bomb - UFO craze after the war - term - UFO coined after lights over Mt. Ranier
- 2012 as omega point for Terence McKenna and the Mayans
- High strangeness going mainstream as dominant paradigm: politicians calling each other weird
- Synchronicity as meaningful coincidence
- Vernor Vinge’s singularity and the end of the human era
- Humor as the highest and most human form of intelligence and the great weapon against bureaucracy
- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and the Noosphere as the omega point of human thought and the next layer of biosphere
- Humans will ultimately be all right because of our creativity
- Humans are tool and model builders
- Early internet was the first model of the hivemind
- Nostr and gnostic — a happy synchronicity ;)
- Digital evolution and DNA
- Philip K Dick’s view of DNA as a binary system of memory coils which gnosis allows us to read
- The workaround - humans’ core ability to adapt to whatever circumstances
- Jung and the ability to catch ideas from the noosphere
- The Buddha is in the Park
- Discordianism: seriousness vs humor - don’t take the world too seriously
- Humor is the highest form of intelligence; perhaps AI will struggle to mimic or understand humor
- “When I dress like a clown, the cops won’t hit me”
- The clown and jester archetype; the fool and the trickster (Prometheus , Krishna?)
- Meme magic and memetics as mind virus
- Memes are a big reason Trump won in 2016 (Pepe the frog)
- The open source / decentralized insurgency
- The ebb and flow of everything
- Robert Anton Wilson, Timothy Leary, chakras, and the 8 brain model of psychology
- Crowdfunding a billboard for Brazil all over nostr
- Nostr as the open source / decentralized insurgency against bureaucracy
- PKD and blows against the empire
- Bureaucracy lacks a sense of humor
- Gnosticism as the mystic arm of Christianity
- The great Yin/Yang, masculine/feminine, binary dichotomy of the universe
- Why something instead of nothing (manifest vs. unmanifest)?
- The mythology of Ancient Civilizations - civilizations rise and fall all the time
- Creating substrates for data redundancy and preventing human amnesia (Nostr/Project Alexandria)

2024-10-09 17:29:34

https://tidal.com/browse/track/213999136?uhttps://m.primal.net/LQHs.png

2024-10-09 17:29:20

https://tidal.com/browse/track/213999136?u

2024-10-08 18:46:31

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Every jam session is better with the bay + sauna!
We just need to get mics in there that can handle the heat haha

2024-10-08 18:40:48

O shit! @npub1az9…m8y8 Now THIS is the content I want on Nostr!
#saunamaximalist
#note1y84…89ua

2024-10-07 19:37:57

This is awesome!
I'd love to see more python tooling for DVMs. And for Nostr in general. Huge opportunity to integrate with the modern AI community. Who else is working on nostr or dvm python libraries?
cc @npub1hlr…sjwf @npub1tlv…7fdm @npub1c87…8avm
#note1x7u…d9d5

2024-10-07 19:33:57

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d06Tv3wUkwg

2024-10-07 19:09:28

Actually this model will be huge for all kinds of creative development. @npub1ste…mul5 for everything 😉
#note12uv…c7lj

2024-10-07 19:08:17

Zapping repos with split payments will be a game changer for software development. I'd love to see someone run with this incredible concept from @npub1get…0nfm 🐝 ⚡
#note1gmr…2jw5

2024-10-07 19:03:22

This is great! I would love to see more AI, energy, and art/music content on Nostr
#note18qq…5wt8
Glad to see that @npub18na…5evl is spreading the good word on Reddit as well!
https://www.reddit.com/r/nostr/comments/1fxg9yo/interesting_accounts_that_are_not_posting_about/

2024-10-07 05:03:36

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Makes sense! Python DVM library seems like a game changer

2024-10-06 21:52:40

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aww that makes more sense

2024-10-06 21:07:12

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See this discussion on @npub1jfu…m0gx as well: https://stacker.news/items/712731

2024-10-06 21:04:58

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Based on feedback from @npub1mel…5c24, perhaps this chart is more interesting:
https://m.primal.net/LNLv.png
(note I ran out of free lines so activitypub/mastodon is missing, but it surprisingly only had 1.2k stars)

2024-10-06 20:52:57

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Cool! I'll play with it.
I'm with you on agents communicating over nostr. openagents.com and fewsats.com are the best examples of this vision I've seen so far. cc @npub1tlv…7fdm
I guess DVMs as well, though I've yet to find a user friendly way to interact with these - what's the best DVM client right now? cc @npub1mgv…pdjc @npub1l2v…ajft

2024-10-06 19:59:16

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I’m definitely excited to see @npub1q9p…vcqf and @npub1cas…dg5l up the ante for sure. And I’m impressed by what the next version of @npub12vk…pugg is looking like. I’m also really excited by the music/podcast discovery on @npub1v5u…n0v5 with their new nostr integration. And I assume next tweetdeck style drop from @npub1xts…kk5s will be 🔥
I haven’t played with @npub10qd…arpj yet. What excites you about it? And what sort of AI app do you think would be most interesting on nostr?

2024-10-06 19:22:23

Nostr vs. Bitcoin Github star history
https://m.primal.net/LNIj.png
Is this a fair comparison? What causes the next vertical phase? BTC bull market? Current apps get better? New apps/use cases emerge?
cc @npub16c0…6nvr @npub1l2v…ajft @npub1kuy…kdj8 @npub1xdt…ntxy @npub1unm…d0j2 @npub1mel…5c24 @npub1xts…kk5s @npub1xv8…lk3x @npub1c87…8avm @npub1g53…drvk @npub1gcx…nj5z @npub1lun…27lj @npub1myg…sn5p

2024-10-06 19:14:44

Still one of the best explanations of nostr's potential h/t @npub1xdt…ntxy
#note1gv4…t02s

2024-10-05 22:11:32

The nostr powered music and podcast feeds on @npub1v5u…n0v5 are the coolest things on nostr right now!
And it's only getting better as people share more tracks from @npub1q9p…vcqf & @npub1yfg…v6vg
Can't wait til I can set up a dj/radio station and stream for sats (with splits to the artsits). I see @npub1q9p…vcqf already has "artist radio" - just one step away ;)
cc @npub1uzp…k3xk @npub1ds3…hzcn @npub1eeq…at9s @npub1unm…d0j2
#note1nac…2qlr

2024-10-05 22:03:41

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Right!?

2024-10-05 22:02:54

Who's cookin up beats like this???
https://x.com/scubaryan_/status/1841214469008949656

2024-10-05 21:20:37

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Check it on @npub1v5u…n0v5! They have a tab just for music shares via @npub1q9p…vcqf or @npub1yfg…v6vg

2024-10-05 20:52:03

https://tidal.com/browse/track/365311013?u

2024-10-05 20:47:52

https://tidal.com/browse/track/369298417?u

2024-10-04 21:03:18

https://tidal.com/track/195420807?u

2024-10-04 21:01:01

https://tidal.com/track/304779370?u

2024-10-04 20:48:57

https://tidal.com/track/308238304?u

2024-10-04 02:37:02

https://tidal.com/track/80420116?u

2024-09-25 17:00:23

Notes from my conversation w/ @npub1c87…8avm (founder, @npub10ef…aeh3)
https://m.primal.net/LByQ.jpg
Listen on @npub1v5u…n0v5: https://fountain.fm/episode/GwkMHQvCQCFjmLdqbCeT
Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/anarchism-the-origins-of-nostr-the-future-of/id1731637285?i=1000670559595
Substack w/ video: https://hivemindvc.substack.com/p/anarchism-the-origins-of-nostr-and
#note1w8z…s8yz

2024-09-24 18:36:05

In case link wasn't showing properly, here's the pod with @npub1c87…8avm on @npub1v5u…n0v5
https://fountain.fm/episode/GwkMHQvCQCFjmLdqbCeT
#note1w8z…s8yz

2024-09-24 18:35:30

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It's the fountain link! https://fountain.fm/episode/GwkMHQvCQCFjmLdqbCeT

2024-09-24 18:07:31

[New Podcast] Anarchism, The Origins of #Nostr, & The Future of FOSS w/ @npub1c87…8avm
https://m.primal.net/LAmF.png
https://fountain.fm/episode/GwkMHQvCQCFjmLdqbCeT
I sit down with LNbits founder Ben Arc for a wide ranging and fascinating conversation about political philosophy, Nostr, and the future of FOSS/AI. This was a treat to record and I hope you enjoy! Here's a full sample of what we discussed:
- Ben’s left libertarian / anarchist lens on Bitcoin - the ultimate goal is liberty
- Stateless socialism, Marx, and Adam Smith
- Open protocols like Bitcoin / Nostr and public key cryptography replacing functions of the state
- Pierre-Joseph Proudhon: “Property is theft, property is liberty”
- Soulful vs. soul-less capital
- “The Adam Smith Invisible Bitch Slap” - Ben’s synthesis of left anarchism and Austrian/ancap thought. Open protocols, public key cryptography, FOSS create new more efficient commons in which private capital can participate. But if capital tries to co-opt the commons, it gets the Adam Smith invisible hand bitch slap (see the big blockers from Segwit2x). This creates the playing field for an actual free market
- Collaboration vs extraction - key is aligning incentives so both parties win and grow the pie
- “Value waterfalls and the remix economy”- Max’s idea of how BTC and open source protocols will evolve - similar to Stemstr. Both parties win when they collaborate are incentivized to share the same stream of files which get remixed and create thicker value waterfalls or a bigger pie for all
- Peter Kropotkin and Mutual Aid - rereading Darwin for mutual aid as a driving factor in evolution
- Karma and evolution: 1) nothing is permanent; everything is in flow; everything is relative - one order lower of complexity sees only itself + information 2) karma may be the ultimate driver/law of evolution - a system evolves in its totality toward more mutual aid and complexity
- Hegel and the Master-Slave Dialectic - exploitation requires dehumanization making both parties less in touch with reality and happy; in order for them to both be free they need to become peers. The ultimate goal is more liberation/liberty
- P2P peer relationships are the best healthiest relationships: what we see in Bitcoin and open networks
- John Nash: non oppressive mind space is healthiest - Mind on Strike: giving more people mind space allows their minds to explore and explode open; libertarianism comes from liberation and the need for some equality for this to happen.
- Is John Nash Satoshi?
- Ben’s entry to bitcoin: dorky Uk news correspondents, his students using dark markets, a hatred of banks, and Wikileaks
- The mindseed for Nostr: Ben’s Diagon Alley
- Pirate Bay and p2p markets
- Building the first twitter clone on nostr; apologies for NIP-04
- Reverting a fiatjaf hard commit led to Branle
- Securing http://nostr.com for 1 BTC
- First talk on Nostr at Paralelni Polis
- Finding the alpha with the productive nyms; spear fishing for projects; hanging out on edge of internet; if you’re sending a deck it’s generally too late for me
- Nostr and free / open / non Orwellian / non evil IoT - what all can we build with relays, web sockets, and public key crypto
- Building a new web with Nostr (e.g. see Nostr Wallet Connect and early IoT)- the old web is compromised and drowning in AI spam; dead internet theory is here; Nostr (public key crypto) for signing notes is our best defense
- http://Nostr.com is selling dope NIP-05 verifiers
- LNbits released a Nostr signing device for identity management
- Nostr is best of both worlds online - create smaller forum like communities while still riding on a global network effect
- “A better Internet is possible” - we’re not at the end of history
- FOSS, nostr, and bitcoin are viruses which infect the system: Just like the major financial institutions with Bitcoin, eventually Twitter will plug into Nostr
- Monopoly of the commons is the future; FOSS eventually swallows all (see Switzerland recently requiring the government to use FOSS)
- AI brings the age of disposable software at least at the level of building extensions
- The need for more Bitcoin and Nostr tooling in Python for the AI community so they can easily bring identity and payments / value transfer to the agents
- Max’s thesis: evolution of digital life forms : open source models will evolve into swarms of agents with value - see http://hivemind.vc/ai
- The importance of reputation in Nostr: Web of Trust as a theoretical solution; open timestamps with payment to go higher up a merkle tree; AI agent as dvm for calculating trust
- Ben is more wary of AI long term and thinks it will be more monolithic than swarm-like; perhaps it becomes a benign dictator that could kill us or just give us what we need to be happy; could be capitalism as we know it eating itself and requiring a new system?
- How the Light Gets In: philosophy festival (part of haybook festival): open AI guy calling the god AI Super Gaia
- Max’s idea on AI: there will be always trade-offs resulting in different forms of intelligence

2024-09-23 22:42:08

🐐
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hL0yfxDe6jE&si=FLJYbgDQVu0EIJh4

2024-09-23 22:40:10

h/t @npub1lun…27lj
#note1kgt…9rw9

2024-09-15 20:51:57

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haha I actually meant a different sort of winning today ;) ⚜️

2024-09-15 20:39:13

WHO DAT?!