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Not a bearish take. Just putting 2 and 2 together: freedom is hard. It requires courage and a willingness to deal with the consequences of your actions. The freedom that Bitcoin and nostr provide is not something everybody wants, in the same way that the freedom of walking in the woods or swimming in the ocean is not something everyone is willing to face.
Some Thoughts on Adoption (and other nonsense).
There's this old Louis C.K. clip—recorded long before he was cancelled—that summarizes our modern conundrum well: "Everything's amazing and nobody's happy."
As I was walking towards the hospital today—after a way too early 5:30 rise—it dawned on me that wide-scale nostr adoption (and "proper" wide-scale bitcoin adoption, for that matter) is probably not going to happen. The good news is that it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. The bad news is that lots of people will suffer.
"Why so bearish?" I hear you ask. If you know me just a little bit you'll know that, even though I do have many faults, being bearish isn't one of them. I'm still incredibly optimistic when it comes to the adoption and proliferation of freedom tech. Otherwise I wouldn't be doing what I do.
Here's what dawned on me, though: People aren't even interested in their own health, why would they be interested in healthy money? Yes, everyone wants to be healthy. But doing what is necessary to live a healthy lifestyle? Not interested. Not in the least. Usually something really really bad has to happen for people to change their ways. And even that doesn't move the needle in some cases, as plenty of drinkers who still drink after their liver gave up, or plenty a smoker who still smokes after being diagnosed with lung cancer can attest to.
Which brings me to bitcoin treasury companies. Are most of them interested in taking the responsibility of holding their own keys? Are they interested in providing real value while staying humble and stacking sats? No, of course not. They are interested in paper gains, not in a full-blown reorientation that leads to a healthier lifestyle. And I mean that literally: if you truly and fully adopt bitcoin, the responsibility that is entailed by that will result in a reorientation, a re-alignment of values, which will—down the line—lead to more long-term thinking, healthier business practices, more honest value generation, and so on.
To me, this is what "capital B" Bitcoin is about. Change. Real change. A ridiculous proposition to the balance sheet brain.
...which brings me to nostr.
A short stroll through the current iteration of the internet should make clear that the platforms that most people spend their time on are incredibly mis-aligned with humanity. The outrage-machine that we've built for ourselves is keeping us like rats in Skinner boxes, hitting the dopamine button with every swipe and every scroll, no matter what. We've built a machine that is parasitic on humanity, instead of synergistic. We are optimizing for engagement, which means that we are maximizing addiction by shoving a mixture of uppers (porn) and downers (rage bait) down our collective throats. The machine is catering to our lowest selves, as opposed to our highest selves. (We could also optimize for the True, the Good, and the Beautiful, you know. Is that too much to ask?)
But who is to blame for all of that? (And is it worth blaming someone in the first place?)
It is clear to me that the whole military-grade industrial advertising complex that profits from running large-scale and nonstop psychological experiments on the whole fucking population of the earth wouldn't be profitable for long if we would all get our act together. But that won't happen, of course. There won't be a magical finger snap that suddenly shakes us awake from our slumber; that stops us from sleepwalking into dystopia. Just like there won't be a magical finger snap that stops us from our bad habits and unhealthy lifestyles.
Adopting a healthy way of living is hard. It means saying no to the constant onslaught of sugary snacks, fast-food around every corner, and social pressures to indulge. It means taking responsibility for your decisions, cultivating discipline, taking care of your body, your psyche, and yes, also your soul.
A wise man once said that "he who has a 'why' can bear almost any 'how'." And that's what most of us are missing: a strong enough "why." Why go through the trouble of living healthy? It's hard! Why hold your own keys, if someone else can do it for you, and there's even the apparent safety of some insurance? Why cultivate a less destructive relationship to the internet, if you can just autoplay & chill, whether it be with Netflix, YouTube, TikTok, PornHub, or something else? Why not write the snarky comment and trigger a whole cohort of people at the click of a button?
Because it's not healthy, that's why.
"Everything's amazing and nobody's happy." That's the state of the world. Always has been. And I'm to blame too, of course. Sitting in the hospital waiting room, writing these lines, bitching and moaning about the internet, this amazing series of tubes that I so love, warts and all.
But yeah, the internet won't heal itself over night. Neither will the economy, nor the rent-seeking zombie companies that don't provide value, nor the underlying fiat system that broke it all in the first place. It will take lots of time, lots of courage, lots of faith, and lots of responsibility.
It will be hard, but it will also be worth it. And it starts with you.
Comparing nostr to bitcoin makes no sense to me. Even if you dont care about the possibility of being censored or free speech you probably will be interested in not losing your wealth to inflation. The need of nostr is not comparable to the need of having bitcoin. I like the gigis comparison to health. And he is right. But the most people start a healthier life after health gets worse, not before. If you compare it to bitcoin. The wealthier people still feel good. When they start worrying about money because of inflation, this will be the time for their bitcoin journey.
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @byzantine 9h
yeah these tools will be adopted by people who need them. many will need nostr and far more will need bitcoin. you are absolutely correct in your take.
also since both are protocols they can grow like an organism. slowly reproducing until one day people realize that they are everywhere
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0 sats \ 1 reply \ @ek 8h
The need of nostr is not comparable to the need of having bitcoin.
Thank you!
Aleksandar Svetksi also wrote about this here:
Nostr is a tool, not a revolution
Nostr is full of Bitcoiners, and as much as we like to think we’re immune from shiny object syndrome, we are, somewhere deep down afflicted by it like other humans. That’s normal & fine. But…while Bitcoiners have successfully suppressed this desire when it comes to shitcoins, it lies dormant, yearning for the least shitcoin-like thing to emerge which we can throw our guiltless support behind.
That thing arrived and it’s called Nostr.
As a result, we’ve come to project the same kind of purity and maximalism onto it as we do with Bitcoin, because it shares some attributes and it’s clearly not a grift.
The trouble is, in doing so, we’ve put it in the same class as Bitcoin - which is an error.
Nostr is important and in its own small way, revolutionary, but it pales in comparison to Bitcoin’s importance. Think of it this way: If Bitcoin fails, civilisation is fucked. If Nostr fails, we’ll engineer another rich-identity protocol. There is no need for the kind of immaculate conception and path dependence that was necessary for Bitcoin whose genesis and success has been a once in a civilisation event. Equivocating Nostr and Bitcoin to the degree that it has been, is a significant category error. Nostr may ‘win’ or it may just be an experiment on the path to something better. And that’s ok !
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @anon 2h
Nostr isn’t full of bitcoiners. It’s full of morons.
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What do you think about self custody adoption? Why don't more people/businesses hold their own keys?
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Because they feel safe. They feel no need. Today many exchanges are regulated like banks. So people trust them. They get lazy or trust a bank more then themself. Some people find it too complicated. Many have to learn by losing everything or waiting years to be compensated after a hack. If you ask people on the street if they want to protect themself or being protected. Many want to be taken care of. They want to give up some freedom an independence for safety. Or at least for believing in being safe.
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Yes the lazy buy the etf and “think” they hold btc; while actually holding btc requires more than wanting to “play the market”. Sleepy lazy sheeple
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Bitcoin yes. Lightning yes... Nostr no. What is the appeal of nostr again?
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102 sats \ 3 replies \ @stax 1h
There's a real snobbery between SN & Nostr!
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nostr is cool, and I use it a lot, but I still get frustrated by it (weird feed-loading things, dm's are frustrating). also i feel like most of what I see on there is crappy bitcoin memes. I like that I learn about new things on SN pretty regularly.
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Nostr -> Quantity over Quality SN -> Quality generally over Quantity
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No. There's no competition
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204 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford 4h
Haven't read this yet but I've been thinking about bitcoin adoption lately and it reminds me of what we are seeing in Linux adoption.
I mentioned it here #1029651 in a comment.
I don't think mass adoption is gonna be triggered by insiders but rather from outsiders adopting it. These people will have followings that probably will not share our views or priorities. The problem I see is that bitcoiners aren't really able to see through the eyes of those that don't already see bitcoin for what it is.
I suspect someone with a big following will find bitcoin and start talking about it in ways that we don't talk about it today. To people that probably would ignore us. This person or people will be far more effective. I don't even think its a flaw in the community but rather just human nature. Let me explain.
I've seen this many times with family. I can tell a family member, maybe a parent about something. It bounces off them and they remain unfazed. Then later someone they respect (no a junior to them) will mention this same exact thing and then they tell me about it... This used to bother me but now I just see it for what it is. Its not personal. Its just a defect in most people to discount things people say that haven't gained their deep respect.
If someone sounds crazy to you... you aren't gonna seriously consider what they say. That's it. That's how I see it panning out.
This is a good thing. If everyone jumps into bitcoin all at once it will be even harder for us to stack. I know some of you have a lot more bitcoin than I do. Good for you. But my time preference is pretty low. I honestly don't care if I'm never "rich". I want my great grand kids to have generational wealth. I want them to share my faith. I want them to make a mark on this world.
Sure, I wanna retire on bitcoin and it would be nice to have massive wealth but honestly its not why I am so passionate about bitcoin. To me, it is the solution to deep issues much bigger than my needs. I think many share this view. We just don't talk about it much.
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