nevent1qgszj8r4mym6ghmx5ysflr4xvywlw3yvtxe4yefqcek29nwdxlcml0sqypk3f4v0q726yjn0rvkqpz5ftl49lmr0je4c0c9edfxwgq9texx679vdrul View quoted note →

Pubky... A "sovereignty" platform with a four-jurisdiction corporate maze with El Salvador operations, Mexican entity, English governing law, BVI parent. The structure is optimized for the company's protection, not the user's recourse. John explicitly said in a podcast that they're "based in BVI as a legal entity" for Blocktank and that they deliberately avoided getting VASP licenses because their lawyers are risk-averse. Blocktank is Synonym's Lightning Service Provider product. I have nothing to win here. I'm just a self admitted retarded pleb. I simply wanted to investigate for the fruit of doing so, to answer my own questions and explore. If it helps other potential end users come to their own conclusion, awesome. Open discourse is always a benefit. The more you know, the better. So let's compare this Blocktank to Alby... ---- *Custody and Control* Blocktank: "The Channel shall be a multi-signature address controlled by you and Synonym." Synonym is a co-signer, can refuse your cooperative close, and you may have to force-close and wait two weeks. Alby for its self-custodial Hub: "Alby does not receive or store... any recovery phrase or private keys" and "At no time do we have access to or control over the lightning channel." Alby is explicitly hands-off. Blocktank is explicitly a co-signer. Alby is more self-custodial by design. Blocktank channels being 2-of-2 multisig with the LSP as co-signer is actually how a lot of inbound liquidity channels work so it's not unique to Synonym. The fair distinction is that Alby's Hub is non-custodial and hands-off, while Blocktank's product is structurally a co-signed channel. ---- *In Regards to US Persons* Blocktank flatly bans all US persons. "Prohibited Person" includes any US Person and you must warrant you're not one. Alby is a Delaware US company that serves US users. So Synonym geofenced out the entire United States to avoid regulation; Alby incorporated in the US and deals with it. ---- *Regulatory Posture* Blocktank: "Synonym is not registered as a money services business or money transmitter in the El Salvador or elsewhere." Explicitly unregulated, no insurance, El Salvador courts. Alby: Delaware entity, Polish governing law, Warsaw courts, full EU consumer protections, DSA illegal-content procedures, appeals process. Alby operates inside regulatory frameworks; Blocktank routes around them. ---- *Jurisdiction and Recourse* Blocktank: El Salvador law, El Salvador courts, class action waiver, jury trial waiver. Alby: Polish law, Warsaw courts, EU consumer arbitration options, ODR platform access, district consumer ombudsman. Alby gives users far more accessible recourse ---- Two Lightning companies, same core business. Alby chose to be a US-incorporated, EU-consumer-compliant, explicitly self-custodial, regulated-framework company that doesn't co-sign your channels and gives you real legal recourse. Synonym/Blocktank chose to be an unregulated El Salvador entity that co-signs your channels, bans US users, disclaims all regulatory oversight, and routes disputes through jurisdictions designed to deter claims. Neither approach is inherently evil. There are legitimate arguments for permissionless, unregulated, no-KYC Lightning services, and some users specifically want that. But it punctures the same myth. Synonym's structure is a deliberate choice, not a necessity. A competitor in the identical business made user-friendlier choices across custody, jurisdiction, recourse, and regulatory transparency. The pattern across all three Synonym products (Pubky, Blocktank, and the corporate structure) is consistent: maximum company protection and discretion, minimum user recourse, regulatory avoidance through jurisdiction. Alby is proof that it doesn't have to be built that way.

I have a feeling that these users are more sovereign than 99% of pubky users will ever be. View quoted note →

Do you run a personal nostr relay? Trying to see something. #asknostr

No wayyyy lol View quoted note →

How does this guy treat his actual user base? Lol. Hilarious crash out. And no response to obvious product flaws. View quoted note →

I think I'm the opposite of a nihilist. I believe everything has objective meaning. Yes even suffering, randomness, the stuff we can't explain. Not meaning we invented, but meaning that's actually there, whether we see it or not. We may not understand anything fully. I believe God gave us a purpose. That's not a comfort I talk myself into. It's something I keep coming back to as true. That's enough to keep going.

Pubky checklist. but nostr is dying I guess. 🤷‍♂️ 😂 ✅ ToS content license identical to Meta/Facebook ✅ Retained deleted content clause ✅ Right to edit your posts ✅ Phone number to Prelude third party on signup. ✅ Decentralization used as liability cover ✅ G00gle Cloud backend with zero auditable configuration surface ✅ Hardcoded Synonym relay nodes in default configs ✅ Default admin password "admin" in Docker deployment ✅ Nexus hardcoded moderation key a.k.a censorship resistant with a built-in censor ✅ Cloudflare binary downloaded at runtime with no checksum on Umbrel ✅ Neo4j social graph hardcoded password "12345678" ✅ Session secrets stored unencrypted ✅ cocky CEO with an ego Probably missed a few from this cutting edge 'Freedom Tech'. Also claude did this audit while I pooped. View quoted note →

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