> Except without the ability to give and receive real value via zaps, and at the risk of being censored, and losing your entire audience at the whim of the network operators
Every large relay has the same problem
Every large relay has the same problem
Read about the outbox model, or Bitchat.
The large relays are not required. They are a public service but not essential. There are plenty of community relays charging for access too, and the outbox model means you're not even depending on them. Nostr can and does successfully operate via even Bluetooth Mesh Networks. Search up Bitchat and see how it has been used in Nepal, Indonesia, and elsewhere.
Your followers fetch the note from your relays. You tell the network where they can find your notes (self hosted relay) and their client will take the effort to find your content
Compare this with Mastodon, where your favourite server can decide to exclude other servers, so if A decides that X is toxic, you will never see X as long as you use A.