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Comment by staticelf | Hacker News Reader

I like the idea of nostr but when I tried to use it it was a lot of CP which made me instantly stop using it. I guess the issue with this type of protocols is that there must be a way to prevent these very dark and illegal content.

As a user I don't want to see it and the submitter should be found and jailed for distributing it. Right now, it's hard to know where it even comes from since it can come from any of the relay you are connected to. Most apps do not show which relay the content originates from and honestly, what can you do?

I guess one solution is to only use paid relayes or heavily restricted ones that require invitation. But if that is the case, it kind of defeats the purpose of Nostr to begin with IMO.

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That statement is wrong at best scenario and fake at worst.

I'm a long time user of NOSTR. When you enter the network through any of the main clients you will only see curated topics (trending). The WoT assures that the best content comes up.

I had almost exactly the same experience and lost interest for the same reason. Am I wrong or fake?

Same experience here, im still trying to but that's tough to get past.

Either of them. I can't even fathom how this would be your first time experience there, other people here on this topic confirm that it doesn't happen.

If you feel that is wrong, please describe the steps to replicate such situation.

Happy to help.

Step 1: In 2023, notice a crypto spam post on Mastodon with a weird account name.

Step 2: Look up what could have made that post, which was bridged from some other service.

Step 3: Set up a key, grab a client (I used a web client that deployed to Netlify's free tier).

Step 4: Follow some howtos, add relays, follow some accounts that repeat other accounts, try to figure out how discovery works.

Step 5: Start seeing really disturbing content.

Step 6: Delete all this stuff, and write it off in the same bucket as Freenet.

Step 7: Wait some years.

Step 8: Get called a liar on a web forum.

What relays were you on? I have never seen CP on nostr. Did you start off following the crypto spammer mentioned or that was just what caused you to find nostr? I'd be curious how you built your initial follow list, as that and the relays you were on is the source of what you see. Kind of like if you go to weird ass websites you'll see that content, but nostr itself doesn't expose anything to a user, it's only a network for content read/write.

I did not keep detailed notes, but there were a couple Gists and a couple blogs that listed relays and stuff to follow. I'm perfectly willing to accept that there was bad stuff in thoses lists, but I don't really care about the mechanisms behind it. Easier just to move on.

Come on, so much effort writing and yet so vague.

The easiest way to try NOSTR is using any of the common web platforms like https://primal.net or https://yakihonne.com/

Heck, you can even install NOSTR clients directly from the App and Play store since years.

It is very unbelievable that you followed such a complicated process, even went to effort of deploying to a server (what?!?) and then somehow you see disturbing content without looking explicitly for it.

In case you are sincere, try it again using any of the common methods.

Do you really think somebody would try out a new platform 2 years ago, immediately drop it due to shady stuff and remember all the non trivial steps involved in this process?

> you can even install NOSTR clients directly from the App and Play store since years

Since feb 2023, apparently;)

He just detailed a very weird and vague way that is unbelievable.

I'm a user since January 2023, there were plenty of well-known web clients already available back at that time (e.g. coracle, amethyst, etc). You enter the clients, there is a WoT by default and shows the most proeminent conversations typically.

My experience was never as the one he describes. Not even at the beginning, as you can see for many others here on this same publication. Those few (3?) cases mentioning otherwise will never provide real details for their claims.

it is possible if it is a protocol not a platform. Like there can be illegal stuff over http, there can be illegal stuff over nostr and a normal person can come across it. Actually way more likely on nostr because on web we have centralized https certs and dns which is used all the time to block cp and the like

It's funny when people first say "nostr is just a protocol and completely not subject to censorship" then "there is no way a new user would encounter bad stuff on nostr". pick one?

I know if I encountered CP on a burgeoning social network the first thing I would do is go on my blog and detail the steps to reproduce.

nostr is not a social network. per words of every nostr promoter. it's a protocol. it's like email

also you'll be committing an offence. the first thing you do is report it to authorities, not doing it is illegal. so that's half your day gone. then blogging about how to find it before it's taken down probably also illegal. literally no one wants any of this on a random day)

That is indeed multiple years, technically speaking :)

It was years back and I didn't even care enough at the time to take notes on the process. I typed up the how-to partly as a joke because I found it funny some rando was demanding a detailed reproducer for an afternoon of screwing around ages ago.

I did find the client I used; it was called "branle". I'm not in the habit of installing random shit on my iphone, thanks. Deploying things to Netlify is super easy, especially when the software is designed for it explicitly.

I will not be trying again, because as I said elsewhere in the thread, I don't actually care about nostr. Bluesky is working fine for me these days, and in the event that stops being the case, I won't be revisiting the one I already wrote off.

Sweden has a website called "dumpen.se" which tricks and publishes pedophile that are trying to abuse children.

The leftist media hates this website because they are doing an effective job. They are calling them all kinds of things.

When people are effective in tracking or publishing about pedos, there are always a lot of people saying you are the problem, not the pedos. I wonder why. There are a lot of pedos out there (just look at dumpens work it's kinda obvious) and they are of course using services that are anonymized and decentralized like any other.

Usually they are also very active online and attack people that try to cut their illegal actions online. Just look at my original post, it is downvoted. I just wanted some kind of action towards cutting pedo content and it is frowned upon by these people.

Very much unrelated to NOSTR which is a transparent network with a Web Of Trust enabled as default for users.

It is a grave and unfair accusation to associate NOSTR with such nefarious activities, that was the reason why so many protested against that labelling.

I don't see what any of this has to do with nostr.

Yeah, when a layperson says $SOCIAL_MEDIA is full of child pornography, it often just means legal anime content that would be on advertisements everywhere in Tokyo, especially anime contents that are LESS explicitly sexualized.

This happens because Japan always has disproportionately massive online presence with significantly better democratized attention engineering, and so content selections naturally mimic a crossing at Akihabara(despite it almost has been entirely superseded by Chinese tech cultural centers such as Shenzhen), not the Times Square(in NYC), which infuriates a lot of somewhat vocal people.

And, the reason why I must bring this up is that it is not merely it is inaccurate labeling, but it is also counter productive to not face it straight on. Such as, people would move away from pornography, making it less actually pornographic, which is more child-pornographic by the standards of people using this term in this manner, because that is what are considered LESS sexualized contents by its producers, which by the way exist in orders of millions in Japan and leaking out fast into Asia at large.

TLDR. Hating anime, fine. Just don't call it CP. Your words sound opposite of intent. That's what brought us here. So stop.

1. I am not a layperson. I used nostr while it was still under active development and when it only had a few NIPs finished.

2. I have been to Japan several times, I know the difference between anime/hentai/lolita and stuff like that. This is not what I was experiencing.

3. I have nothing against pornography in general.

The issue is that when people bring up shit like this, we are not taken seriously and this hurts projects like nostr. It will never reach momentum if no steps are taken to prevent illegal material and dark shit like CP.

Calling me a liar makes me believe that you are intentionally are downplaying the experiences I and others have, which is helping pedophiles and similar people share their illegal content freely and without consequences. Why I do not know and you should seriously think about it and stop.

- The smaller group says they see TONS of $thing,

- the larger group says they see NONE of $thing,

- both are looking at the EXACT same thing.

-> The disagreement is in the definition of $thing.

It can't get clearer. How else would you explain it? Either you're lying(I guess not), or your definition is way off, or those secret underground organizations made some mistake and their secret Facebook group illegal content leaked out(no such thing on Nostr). By far the most likely scenario is that you're grouping from traffic cones to boxes of oranges to parrots in a forest into the exact same category of offensive contents by standards that nobody else could even understand.

Or maybe nostr is based on relays and no one user sees the whole network?

But aren't relays supposed to be completely architecturally different from Mastodon instances? I thought that very point of Nostr is that choice of relays should not (directly) lead to availability or mix of contents.

What exactly is wrong about my statement? Stating that my experience is wrong is stupid.

I don't know how the app I used works. I simply used the "Snort" app, connected to a few relays and did not use it for a couple of months. Then I came back and instantly saw CP freely shared. Instantly removed the app from the phone.

You can't say that it don't exist when people like me have seen it with their own set of eyes. This only makes protocols/projects like nostr set to fail, since regular people won't fucking care and just think of the nostr as something pedophiles are using, which they would not be incorrect in thinking at this moment.

I was betting on nostr in the beginning, I was running my own relay and started on a nostr client. But I gave up since clients came popping up everywhere so I didn't really have time to compete.

That's quite the bold faced lie. I've been on nostr for years and it's been pretty friendly and never offensive.

3 people have shared this experience in the thread.

Is there a fundamental reason this wouldn't be true? Isn't it a place where people can anonymously share multimedia with minimal moderation?

In my experience even the most toy application exposed to the wider internet will face this issue.

Everytime NOSTR is mentioned there are people from other networks coming here to spread FUD.

The best thing is asking them to provide steps for replicating their claims, which they won't since it is the not the common user experience at all.

Everything I don't like is FUD.

Every time a crypto user faces criticism over their favorite technology they frame it as FUD. Quite a marvel of nature.

Not really. Cryptos are born out of criticism for current systems and they are an ever evolving technology fueled by those same critics.

What doesn't make sense is when the other party starts making stories just to tarnish other competing technologies. Just now the OP was asked to provide details to replicate his findings and those were indeed very "fuzzy" to say the least.

> Cryptos are born out of criticism for current systems

Nope. Most are born out of people not understanding how existing systems work and/or looking to get rich quick.

> an ever evolving technology fueled by those same critics.

No, it's mostly a self-perpetuating self-congratulatory hype machine busily re-inventing the systems they criticise

> What doesn't make sense is when the other party starts making stories just to tarnish other competing technologies.

What does make sense is the extremely fragile ego of crypto bros who can't stand any criticism towards their scams and hype, or the mention of any possible issues.

All of that is correct, albeit not the full picture.

Crypto wasn't created as a "get rich quick". I say this because I was there since the early days and participated quite a bit on the related BBS. Back then you'd already make good money building bots for day trading on stocks, crypto was really about a type of currency that no government could touch.

Nowadays the large majority of users are desperate to make some money through pyramid schemes and pure speculation to "get rich quick" albeit they usually end up losing money. The small minority is doing what they've always done: looking at systems, criticizing systems and building their own solutions to those systems.

There is really good stuff being built. Not many do it, granted.

Yeah, they could say such and such handles are spreading content disgusting in such and such ways, e.g. "users like Sam Altman are posting astronauts riding horses on the Moon". They don't have to be so specific that exact contents would be actually accessible, only plausible. The mental imagery would not have to be precisely imaginable to disgusting details.

It's odd that they see "tons of" things that they can't describe beyond it belongs in the category, as if, just as if, actually characterizing it beyond making trust me remarks would lead to formation of broad consensus against them rather than against the contents.

It's euphemism for anime. Listening to these draw lines between porn and not-porn ever clearer, which users interpret that inside the line is free-for-all, and anime wins and obliterates everything even harder after the fix is implemented or strengthened.

These people come back fuming hot with more derogatory, still indirect, descriptions, and cycle repeats. This has been a "problem" for social media for almost as long as I've been online.

What I would consider is that nostr doesn't show you content. The content you see is a function of: 1. The people you follow 2. The relays you read from 3. The clients (apps) you use

I can't think of any clients which surface weird stuff (I've never seen any on nostr). I think to reach this situation a user must follow weird accounts and thus get their content - but then I can't see that as being nostr related, since someone could do that on the internet or other networks.

And.. why would I lie? I used nostr for a little while in the very early days. Stopped using it then came back and had this experience on a major nostr app.

You're lying about me lying.

It's a more censorship resistant platform, of course it'll see some spam. If this happens, you'll see lots of outrage, people see it as a way to test out and improve WoT.

The content (images, videos) itself is often quickly removed by blossom/media relay runners, especially if people report it and once they're cleared the spam notes are basically worthless to anyone because they're just dead links and spammy/abusive hashtags. Due to the hashtags is still quite easy to purge them.

I run my own relay and self reported it whenever one of these notes or uploads hit my systems. I built a quick shell script using AI to take care of almost all of that.

Its horrible but that kind of content means theres no censorship.

Its on the individual to block that kind of stuff.

The problem is that in many jurisdictions (including the ones to which the vast majority of HN users are likely subject), by the time you've received “that kind of stuff” you're already in legal hot water.

I think this is a real problem of "an open network". Disgusting people will find the network and abuse it.

There is a very insightful thread on nostr about it -> https://asknostr.site/question/note1lhvk3kkmaev6qzlpzzns69vw...

The top voted answer was

> Relays have to become more whitelisted and less open, and clients have to implement outbox model and stop relying on 2 or 3 big relays, then we can just stop worrying about this.

> I think this is a real problem of "an open network". Disgusting people will find the network and abuse it.

Question. Do you prefer open or closed networks? I'm sure you are aware that the internet is an open network.

Anytime I see something that is NSFW it is from the fediverse bridge.

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