Another decentralized social networking app that challenges Twitter has landed on the App Store. Last year, Twitter co-founder Jack donated about $245,000 in Bitcoin (about 14 BTC at the time) to fund the development of an open decentralized social networking protocol called Nostr, which is based on cryptographic key pairs. Now, the first mobile app to utilize the protocol, Damus, has been released on the App Store, allowing anyone to try out this new technology.

The new app is the latest in a long line of Twitter competitors that have emerged since Elon Musk took over the social network, prompting longtime Twitter users to return to old apps like Tumblr and try new ones, as well as other decentralized social networking services like Mastodon. Some startups are also creating their own Twitter competitors, such as T2 and Spill, which have already raised seed rounds.

But Damus isn’t a venture-backed startup. Instead, it’s another experiment in decentralized social networking. The app’s promise is an open social network with no central authority like Facebook or Twitter deciding the network’s content or who is allowed to participate. Instead, the app’s homepage explains, “You’re in control… No platform can ban or censor you. You control your data,” it reads.

The site also touts end-to-end encrypted messaging — something Twitter doesn’t have and that has raised concerns among users following Musk’s takeover. Because of the way Nostr works, there’s also no need to sign up using a phone number, email, or name. This is a big difference from Mastodon, where users’ accounts are attached to specific servers and administrators have some control over who registers with their servers. It also means that problems with the Mastodon server you’re using, such as an outage, could affect your ability to use the network. If the shutdown is sudden or permanent, you could be at risk of losing your data.

On Damus, messages are distributed via decentralized relays — in fact, the name Nostr is an acronym for “Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays.” There are no federated servers involved, but some Nostr relays are said to be better at filtering out spam.

Tweet from Nostr developer @fiatjaf

Bitcoin integration is also part of the Damus experience, allowing users to tip their friends’ posts, for example. This is made possible through Bitcoin’s Lightning Network. Also, unlike Twitter, posts can be longer than 280 characters.

As Cointelegraph reported, Nostr’s early testers included Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, whistleblower Edward Snowden, and pro-crypto U.S. Senator Cynthia Lummis.

The decentralized nature of Damus initially posed problems getting through App Review, as Apple has been requiring the app to follow the same rules as any other social network — like providing a way for users to flag objectionable content and having a clear policy that abuse is not allowed. The Damus Twitter account had earlier tweeted that the app had been repeatedly rejected despite claiming to have addressed the issues raised by Apple.

Damus announced on Twitter that this changed yesterday, as the app was finally approved. As of this writing, the account has 17,700 followers — so even if all of Damus’ potential users leave Twitter, it won’t have a significant impact on Twitter’s user base. However, according to Nostr’s website, Damus is just one of several Nostr projects in development.

Dorsey also celebrated the release of the Damus app on Twitter, calling it a “milestone for open protocols.”

However, the former Twitter executive has been busy building Bluesky, another decentralized social network powered by the new AT protocol, ready to go live in client applications that will also resemble Twitter. Meanwhile, Mastodon, which has grown in popularity since Musk's acquisition, is using an older protocol called ActivityPub. Tumblr may also add support for ActivityPub, its owner said. Bluesky and Mastodon will not be able to interact unless one chooses to integrate with the other's protocol or design other systems. Damus adds another open protocol to the mix, making the new battle between Twitter competitors not necessarily about Silicon Valley startups, but the technological foundations of social networks.

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