Тег: Report

Continuing to settle into Nostr: building a pyramid

In my previous post on this topic, I told you how I set up my own personal Nostr relay. I used strfry, which is quite popular for large relays because it is stable and performant. However, I also wanted ease of configuration so that I wouldn’t have to work magic with console commands every time. An attempt to attach a web control panel on top of the existing relay was unsuccessful. The Khatru relay suggested by Grok turned out to be a project abandoned in early 2026. But its developer is @fiatjaf, the author of Nostr itself, and he doesn’t just abandon projects. So I started looking into what he is developing as a replacement and came across Pyramid. This is a specialized relay for community management; meaning, while it can handle basic relay functions, it also helps manage various private and club-like features.

After some tinkering, I uninstalled strfry and installed pyramid. Voila — I have an engine for developing an online community, and half a day later, the first invited client of the new relay appears. We discuss the process on Nostr in the comments of my previous post, and I tag the software creator. Fiatjaf likes this comment and then comes to me on Telegram, congratulates me on installing Pyramid, and starts asking for feedback on both the relay and Nostr in general. We already had a chat history from the time when he created a popular custodial Lightning wallet in the form of a Telegram bot, and I actively promoted it (that project was wound down, and Nostr emerged to replace it).

Anyway, I gave all the feedback I was capable of, given my limited experience and competence:

  • I asked for a more convenient format for adding a new user to the relay: the user clicks to leave a request, I click to approve or deny the request — basically, the familiar Telegram method. I received a promise that this would be done soon.
  • I asked for a monitoring service for relay availability from different corners of the network, suggesting an implementation option that doesn’t require renting servers all over the world. Fiatjaf said the option was doubtful, but he would try to attach one third-party service instead.
  • I asked for a service for local key generation so that new users could be sure that the Nostr client would not have access to their private key. He replied that he had already built a whole set of such utilities — both for offline key generation and for offline event signing, so security advocates can sleep soundly.

That’s where my imagination ran out for now, but I certainly assume that readers have or will soon have their own brilliant ideas.

Anyway, for anyone interested in testing a specialized relay for community management, welcome. Leave requests in the comments, and I will send the invitation link via DM — for now, this is the not-so-convenient connection mechanism in place.

https://stuff.fiatjaf.com — a collection of various things from the author of Nostr

https://github.com/fiatjaf/pyramid — description of the Pyramid relay

https://relay.ancapchan.info — my relay, where you can observe the community participant tree growing and publications appearing from them

I hope you won’t need a special guide on how to set up a Nostr account. Since it is a very decentralized ecosystem, there are already tons of ways to enter it, as well as ways to use it. But anyway, let me recommend that you start exploring via the Nostria client. I also know the developer there, Sondre Bjellos, a participant in the Liberstad and Montelibero projects; he lives three kilometers away from me (when he doesn’t head back to his native Norway, of course) and is very actively developing his client.

Liberland

From April 11 to 13, I was with a group of Montelibero residents at the eleventh birthday of Liberland. The party took place near Apatin, the closest Serbian Danube town to Liberland. There, Liberland had purchased land and built a tourist complex The ARC — a very cozy eco-village.

  • guest houses
  • canoes
  • summer cafe
  • sauna
  • various livestock grazing on the opposite shore of the pond
  • demanding carrots
  • remnants of a water spillway from another pond; Liberland bought the land there too, but hasn’t landscaped it yet
  • the main building, where all the action was
  • a huge fireplace — the centerpiece of the whole house
  • the first floor, with a dining room, bar, and stage
  • first floor
  • second floor — conference hall

By the way, the Liberland website has a list of Diaspora villages, where, in addition to Liberland itself and Arc Village, Montelibero is featured, along with some community in Mexico unknown to me, and several settlements from a single developer, ECI Development. It seems to me that colleagues from Green Zyland should connect with Liberland so that their Georgian and Antiguan Green Zyland settlements eventually appear on their map as well.

On the first day, there was an excessively dense speaking program; by the end, my head was swollen from English, and instead of normal networking, I shied away from all English speakers just to get a little break from them, but we had some good chats with all the Russians present. There was no single theme for the presentations; it seems President Edlička simply gathered everyone he could reach, and if someone had something to say, he pulled them onto the stage. So it turned out quite eclectic, and there were relatively few talks about Liberland itself, except for an overview report on what successes it has achieved over 11 years.

On the second day, they organized a trip along the Danube to show us Liberland itself.

  • a small Liberland houseboat
  • a larger rented one
  • and a motorboat, which was towed behind the houseboat and served as a gangway as needed
  • they invited a colorful singer named Branimir, who looks like Milei
  • Edlička shows where an attack on Liberland was being prepared
  • On the left is Gornja Siga island, on the right is Donja Siga; both form the territory of Liberland
  • A settler named Martin has lived on Liberland territory for several weeks now and is preparing to open a summer cafe there. He was cheered on from the boat.
  • signed the Liberland flag
  • signed the sand of a Serbian island

As the excursion approached the shores of Liberland, a Croatian police boat was spotted both above and below it, and a patrol car accompanied us along the Croatian shore. Croatia jealously guards the inviolability of foreign land. The plot of the conflict is described on the wiki, so I won’t retell it. Nevertheless, a settler named Martin waved to us from the shore of the smaller of the two islands that make up Liberland. It was mentioned that he intends to build a beach cafe there, although I don’t rule out that this was said as a joke.

What can be said about Liberland in general? The project is firmly on its feet 11 years after its founding. Despite the fact that quarterly congress elections regularly take place in this pseudo-state, the executive power does not plan to be re-elected until the official establishment of the state, which fully aligns with what Balaji Srinivasan writes in his “The Network State” — namely, that without a single founder figure, nothing will work; only under the leadership of a benevolent dictator are liberty-loving voluntarists capable of moving anywhere. The project is not struggling; it lives and celebrates without excessive luxury, but quite lavishly, and its establishment consists of fairly wealthy entrepreneurs.

A business approach is also evident in the treatment of participants. Tickets for events are paid, including simply purchasing the opportunity to watch a broadcast. Electronic residency is paid. Citizenship costs a quite significant $10k, which is, of course, cheaper than from the “big brothers,” but then again, the power of a Liberland passport is currently near zero. In short, it is a very interesting venture project that can exist in a state of limbo for quite a long time, but as soon as it receives actual diplomatic recognition, the project’s shares will skyrocket, since there is certainly no overabundance of libertarian jurisdictions with open entry in the world right now.

Since I plan to relocate to Serbia within the year, I will inevitably continue to interact with Liberland. We’ll see what the prospects are for attaching one business or another to it.

I continue to perceive Liberland without excessive seriousness, yet with respect.

Anarchist Practice of Pedagogy

A link to a lecture on the anarchist theory of pedagogy appeared in the Ogurism channel, which I found very interesting. It tells the story of the teachings of a very wise Croat who served as a Catholic priest and, as befits a normal Catholic saint, regularly shamed the devil, played by various education officials.

Beyond the banal criticism of the dominant education system, which almost everyone has slammed for the insane ritualization of the process and the disregard for the opinions of those who should formally be the customers of education, our Catholic paid considerable attention to constructive solutions, and the lecturer recounted some of this construct, supplementing it with their own thoughts. In many ways, this construct echoes Friedman’s reasonings on how to prepare children (throw books at them and see which ones stick), although it devotes slightly more attention to the actual teaching technology.

Meanwhile, this weekend we took a private kindergarten, which I help out with small things from time to time, to an educational resort. The owner of the site specializes in inventing puzzles and, for fun, created an inspiring environment around himself. In addition to monetary donations, he took payment from me and my companions in the form of conversations about the meaning of life, libertarianism, Freud and Frankl, neural networks, and evolutionary biology; he was satisfied. The children, in the breaks between the pool and watching peacocks, steadily poked at the puzzles and various cool crafts piled everywhere, thus inevitably exercising their brains.

Let’s consider this somewhat disjointed story to be a toast, and drink to the hope that theory does not diverge from practice!

MTL fest 2023, impressions

Yesterday I had the chance to attend MTL-fest. The festival was held in MTL-City literally on a construction site, and the preparation for it was completely decentralized, based on the principle of “whoever wants it most, takes a piece of the work and does it.” So, naturally, there were some glitches, but as a result of this approach, the festival certainly gained its own eclectic charm.

I ran into Svetov in person; we chatted, although I didn’t manage to hand him the book yet, as everyone was too busy. Usanov, however, did not go empty-handed. We are still thinking about recording a separate video with him. Unfortunately, my level of spoken English didn’t allow me to give enough attention to the English-speaking speakers.

Surprisingly, I managed not to fuck up my own presentation; thanks to Dan Lesnov for forcing me to do two preliminary dry runs. To be honest, speaking immediately after Svetov is a questionable pleasure, because about twenty people immediately swarm him and start throwing questions; he continues to speak, moves further away, and the audience suddenly shrinks.

If you look at which parts of the festival were more crowded and which were less, it’s clear that libertarians have well-honed the skill of organizing conferences and all sorts of small-scale trade: people mostly hung out in the lecture hall, at the food court, and at the fair. However, as it turned out, this theme blends poorly with a music festival. Firstly, the loud music interfered with the lecture hall, and secondly, almost no one came specifically for the DJ program; everyone preferred either to listen to the speakers or to sit further away and chat—to dance in front of the stage, apparently, requires a completely different audience.

As expected, there was a severe lack of shade: a whole day outdoors is not for Montenegro. There was a moment when I felt a heatstroke coming on, so I had to lay out the foam mat I brought with me and lie in the shade for a while. Also, at the food court, there was a certain bias toward alcoholic beverages: beer, cider, and various strong liqueurs were offered, while coffee and mors were only available at one spot, which had the longest queue. The mineral water I brought with me saved the day.

However, all these small rough edges do not negate the main point: the festival went very energetically, about 270 people attended, and the lineup of speakers for a first time was beyond expectations—and at several venues, the fest was described as annual and far from the first. In other words, there was no feeling of a modest debut in the air; the fest was immediately perceived as part of an unshakable tradition, which is cool!

Various pictures and short videos from the fest can be seen in a separate channel. I hope that text reports will also start appearing there soon.

Chapters about ancap finally appear in the book about ancap. The reader will be disappointed.

I have started writing the final, fourth section of the first and most important part of the book about ancap. As usual, I produced two chapters: The first — the concept of ancap, where I simply formulate the banality that anarcho-capitalism is, believe it or not, anarchy plus capitalism. The second — the expansion and contraction of ancap — concerns the dynamics of how the corresponding relations penetrate society.

Essentially, my theory regarding libertarianism and ancap ends here: I tried very hard to be extremely concise, so I don’t even intend to push the fourth section to the traditional four chapters. Instead, I want to write a fairly detailed conclusion summarizing the first part, after which it could well be set sail as a standalone book, serving as a convenient (hopefully) entry point into libertarianism.

The second and third parts are intended to be the application of the previously outlined theory to various practical issues — regarding how different aspects of life may be organized under ancap, and what practical steps are envisioned for the transition to ancap. These parts, unlike the first theoretical one, should lose relevance much faster, whereas the first was written for eternity, to take a small spot on the pedestal, where it is already quite crowded with the greats.

Book about ancap – finished the section on the marketlet

I’ve unexpectedly ended up hanging out in Albania, so my posting pace has slipped a bit. On the other hand, dropping out of the usual flow is very conducive to slow-paced creativity, so I relatively quickly finished the two remaining chapters of the market section in my future book: specifically on the market and on capitalism. In the next section, I will finally begin describing ancap—assuming, of course, that I don’t get swept away somewhere again.

Eric Mack. Libertarianism. Translation of the chapter on Hayek’s views on social justice

I have processed another large donation and finished translating the fourth part of Eric Mack’s book “Libertarianism.” The chapter being posted is interesting because it is the first time Mack polemicizes with the discussed views of a particular author rather than simply transmitting them. Previously, there was nothing like “Locke is wrong here” or “Spencer is wrong there,” but he makes such assertions about Hayek. Apparently, this means he considers Hayek sufficiently his contemporary for it to make sense to argue with him.

Mack classifies Hayek’s argumentation against social justice, highlighting five arguments against it, and notes at the end that in his further reasoning, Hayek still departs from his own principles and argues that society does have the right to provide its members with a basic income, and that this is fair. In short, Nozick, in Mack’s presentation, appears far more consistent.

Strangely enough, this concludes the main positive exposition of the principles of libertarianism by Eric Mack. One more part will be devoted to the critique of libertarianism, and one bonus part contains a set of surnames completely unknown to me, who tweaked the ideology in their own key—I suspect, somewhere toward the left. I will deal with them starting from the next donation.

A couple more chapters for the book about ancap

I have put together the first two chapters of the third section of the book about ancap. The section is called “The Market” and, of course, the first chapters are dedicated to anything but the market. In the first one, I ramble on about labor productivity, and then suddenly switch to inequality, and I’m currently pondering whether to remove the final passages. The second chapter is dedicated to planning, and this is the first place in the book where I appeal to specific named authorities, Mises and Hayek, which also creates a certain dissonance, as it might overcomplicate the text.

Overall, I am dissatisfied with the writing pace; I thought I would announce three chapters at once, but the chapter about the market isn’t coming along yet, so I have to report on only two.

Stefan Molinieu. Practical Anarchy. Chapter 7

After an indecently long break, I am returning to the translation of Practical Anarchy by Stephan Molinari. I have already begun to miss his style, so I decided to ignore the lack of donations and translated another chapter just because; you’ll have plenty of time to chip in later.

Chapter Seven continues the first part of the book dedicated to methodology — the author approaches the explanation of his subject quite thoroughly, yet quite vividly. In particular, here he shows where the main strength of the existing world order, in which everything is divided among states, lies — in the fact that we cannot imagine it being any other way, although if we were to start designing the best possible world order from scratch right now, it wouldn’t occur to anyone to voluntarily build all this crap. On the contrary, the solution we devised would likely resemble something anarchic — simply because these recipes work perfectly in private life. In short, give it a read; it is presented quite well and convincingly.

Next, I am switching back to the translation of Libertarianism by Eric Mack, because a donation of sufficient size has arrived for the translation of another chapter, from which we will learn what Hayek thought about economic justice.

Eric Mack. Libertarianism. Translation of the chapter on Nozick’s views on property rights.

I have started on the fourth section of Eric Mackay’s book Libertarianism, dedicated to economic justice and property rights. Like the third, it consists of a short introduction and two chapters showing the views of Nozick and Hayek on the subject—apparently, for Mackay, there are no other libertarians worthy of attention on this issue (though this is likely because Mackay is writing a book on philosophy, not on history, economics, or law, which explains the selection of authors).

The chapter on Nozick examines how he tore into supporters of distributive justice, showing that to achieve some ideal end-state, they would have to launch a mechanism of permanent revolution, and to apply some single distributive model, they would have to reduce everyone to partial slavery. Nozick opposes this redistributive ecstasy with the libertarian approach well known to us, according to which the justice of a particular property right depends on the procedures by which it was acquired, rather than on the size of the property or, for example, the degree of the beneficiary’s loyalty to the party line.

I express my deep gratitude to everyone who sent in donations for the translation of this chapter; now we can start collecting for the next one. And while the money for Mackay (or for Molynneux, you love Molynneux, don’t you?) is being collected, I will return to Friedman; a chapter on the laws of the Chinese Empire awaits us.