PK on Nostr: ...

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Thought 1: Content Creation, Discovery & Remixing

Recently I’ve been thinking about ways we could highlight nostr’s unique properties while at the same time attracting creators to the platform.

There’s been a lot of discussion about what might spark nostr’s next wave of growth. I pointed out that people come for either other people, or for content. But, I also failed to realize that people also seek ways to express themselves via new tools that enable easy or unique ways of expressing yourself.

One thing we can say with certainty is that people are not coming to nostr for other people. While generally following influencers is a proven growth strategy - after all, many of us followed Jack, we still have a catch 22 problem of lacking audience and incentives for those creators to come here. Even if we managed to convince some large influencers to try the platform, it is not likely that they would stay. They’d need to be really passionate about nostr’s principles and vision to buckle in for the long term.

Problem: creators and influencers won’t come to nostr unless they can grow their audience, and nostr lacks the audience. We’ve seen this play out with Matt Taibi. He joined nostr but was reluctant to stay because there’s little incentive to share with a small audience when Twitter/X can bring in many more eyeballs.

Possible Solution: Instead of brining creators to the platform, enable some of the current passionate user base to become decent creators themselves. We don’t need influencers with giant audiences, we just need good content that keeps people around. If we apply the ⁸⁰⁄₂₀ rule (Pareto’s principle), it turns out we don’t need that many creators to have a great flow of content. Enabling just a handful of people to create great content might just do the trick.

How to get there: focus on creating tools that enable expression of creativity. One such tool is Pinstr, but its value is largely untapped. On its own, pinstr is nothing interesting, it’s practically a clone of Pinterest. But, given the interoperable nature of nostr, it would be interesting to see pinned boards / content surfaced within kind 1 clients. People could then explore the board or that user’s other boards further by making their way to Pinstr.

How do we encourage more people to curate interesting pins? How about a pin extension that makes it easy to do so?

How do we enable people remixing other pins? Allow them to re-pin the content to their own boards. These are all mechanics that made Pinterest interesting, but lack in pinstr (as far as I’m aware).

Other ways that we might encourage content creation:

1. Multi-account support. Can we make it SUPER easy to switch between identities when posting some curated content? Yes we can. (Select a different identity when posting)

2. Surfacing “Other stuff” with a call to action to do that thing. For example, if someone shares a list, a kind 1 client should be able to render that list in a way that’s easy to browse, share and encourages to create your own list. If someone shares a music playlist (hopefully via native nostr kind), a person should be able to see the playlist and be encouraged to create their own. Watch stream? > prompt to start your own

3. Gif / meme discovery with a call to action to create your own. (Plebhy, Memester)

4. Styling tools (more complex) to style media, add soundtracks etc (perhaps via integration with Wavlake or other nost-native music events).

5. Content scheduling - help existing users become power users. Instead of posting everything at once, allow users to schedule it out for even distribution. Tools like Shipyard enable this already, but having this ability in-client might make it more accessible and useful.

6. Content pinning extensions - bring the outside world to Nostr. How can people 1-click pin content to nostr without having to switch tabs constantly?

7. App discovery - I think this is already in the works, but being able to surface other apps within kind 1 clients would be super interesting.

8. Enable surfacing of highlighted content and paid content - with highlights, nudge people to read more of the content if it comes from within one of the nostr clients. With paid content, indicate that it is premium content and encourage creation of premium content “Become a creator” or “Join creator studio”.

9. Encourage people to write long-form opinion content. When reading a long form article, perhaps have a call to action to start your own nostr publication. “Publish on Nostr and earn”

10. Surface and encourage audio creation - we don’t have a nostr podcast client yet, but if there was one, kind 1 clients could surface that content automatically and encourage people to start their own podcasts, audio diaries, audio chats (nostr nests) or audio stories. Kind 1 clients could surface audio clips with waveforms and subtitles built in, or create a framework by which other developers could create this type of interaction with your kind 1 client. Can users create their own clip playlists from audio content fetched from the nostr podcast app? Why not?

The common objection to all of this might be that “you can already do all of this just by copying links”. Yes, and no. Copying links does share content - albeit in a boring preview way. It does not enable interactivity, nor prompt people to create that type of content. I think this is where nostr could shine.

Thought 2: Interoperability

One of the greatest strengths of nostr is the ability to display events across clients. I think of kind 1 clients as the glue that holds together the “other stuff”. The other stuff apps can be used to create the stuff, and kind 1 can enable discovery of said stuff, while encouraging to visit those tools to create their own.

Traditional social media platforms are encourage to put up walls and discourage leaking of users to other places. The more time a user spends on a website or app, the better for that company. But, with nostr, there’s a virtuous positive loop that does not punish leaking of attention, but instead, rewards it. The more content people create, the more interesting your kind 1 discovery client becomes.

How to get there: It’s going to take a lot of work to integrate the other stuff, but it’s already under way. As a client developer, partner up with other stuff clients to figure out how to best support them. Open up nostrapps.com to see what exists, and how your client can accommodate the surfacing of that stuff with minimal effort (since our resources are so scarce). Tap into product designers to help conceptualize and visualize interactions and growth loops. #nostrdesign is ready to help with this.

Type of content kind 1 clients could surface and create loops for:

1. Playlists
2. Pin boards (pinstr)
3. Audio chats (nost nests, corny chat)
4. Highlights (highlighter)
5. Payments
6. Fundraisers (Heya, Geyser)
7. Communities
8. Events (Flockstr)
9. Streams (zapstream)
10. Long form content
11. Job posts / boards
12. Recipes (zap cooking)
13. Lists
14. Torrents (Stan)
15. News feeds
16. Calling functionality
17. DMVs
18. Podcast clips, playlists
19. Audio clips
20. Marketplace items (Shopstr, Creatstr, Plebeian Market)
21. Paid content (highlighter)

Recap

1. Build tools to aid content creation
2. Surface “other stuff” in kind 1 clients
3. Prompt people to create their own stuff

I’m probably missing a ton, or not thinking of unique experiences that are just under the nose. What am I missing? What other cool interactions could be enabled by nostr’s interoperabilit