Vulnerable Podcasting 2.0 — Bitcoin LN Node Monetization Setup (2024)
This article is about the work behind setting up my home podcast called “Bitcoin Security Maps — the Art of Civilian Intelligence”, soon available everywhere, and especially on Fountain.
The work itself is an example of a Bitcoin Security Mapping. At any point in this setup blueprint where a human interacts with a computer for data input, data transmission and data storage, it is a vulnerability by design. Especially since these are reltively new digital computational technologies. The term “vulnerable” simultaneously refers to the state I am in as a creator. It’s precisely this human attribute that I am sharing through my content, a sense of originality, perhaps something new.
At certain higher levels it can be said that a given cyber vulnerability depends on the national security risk, which is the likelihood and impact a breach can have on what is considered valuable to the culture of maintenance of a nation.
A multidimensional blueprint map helps me see the relative placement of a part in the setup sequence. For example, the Lightning Network node address. How important and vulnerable is this as part of the whole?
NOTES ON SECURITY
This is an outline I developed while trying the easiest routes to get the podcast to a stage of working order. In this way I picked up on the quickest routes many people might be taking and so I have been noting security questions for future consideration in the next iterations. For now, the outcome is an unstoppable self-custody podcast outside of the system. However, that makes everything on the following map a security concern. All of these are vulnerabilities because data is being input, computed, transmitted and stored. This is why at certain high levels of security, simplified pre-digital analog systems are used.
PRIMARY
Electricity then Internet in a harmonious environment.
A router.
FOUNDATIONAL:
The computing devices: personal computer, smartphone, Raspberry Pi, and all the devices used in a podcast such as microphones, cameras and RGB LED lights.
1 - Purchase bitcoin.
2 - Download Umbrel.
3 - Install Umbrel.
4 - Run Umbrel.
5 - Install Bitcoin Node and Lightning Node.
6 - Create Lightning Node channel.
7 - Transfer BTC to on-chain LN node address.
8 - Transfer BTC to off-chain LN node address.
9 - Create easy Lightning Network Address.
10 - Create Nostr keypair.
LIGHTNING WALLETS:
11 - Create LN web wallet.
12 - Create mobile LN wallets: custodial, self-custody, private and public.
NOSTR ACCOUNT:
13 - Create Nostr account: input original data and configuration.
14 - Use Nostr account: maintain configuration.
15 - Create Nostr NIP-05 address.
ONLINE PRESENCE:
One’s own economic energy of Lightning Network wallets and one’s own data from Nostr account events makes for a creative online presence which is owned by the individual using the private keys to these accounts.
PODCAST CONTENT:
16 - Record the audio and video, edit and configure the podcast content.
17 - Host the podcast on V4V platforms and publish the RSS feed globally.
18 - Claim podcast on 4V4 podcast subscription applications.
19 - Tune into the podcast2.0 audio and video feeds and play.
With all of the computers that will be used, all require human input, computation, the movement of data and its storage. At any point when any of this is happening, confidentiality, accessability and integrity can be compromised at the following levels: human, hardware, network, operating system, application, API, protocol and so on.
This is an ethical hacker show for a working live mobile setup. The focus is Web Application Security all the way towards a project to audit the knowledge base of electricity. Therefore, understanding money as the economic energy of one’s time and freedom is essential.
When I now tune into any news from the front lines of Bitcoin, Nostr and podcasting theory, I can relate to various kinds of information because I have this map. And also because I have worked on understanding the differences in communication between InfoSec professionals. Read about this in my previous article “A framework of Multidimensional Context for Web App Security.”
The following headlines in 4 parts outline the minimums one can strive to connect in one’s own multidimensional mapping of the placement of these technologies in their life.
Part 1: Theory
Part 2: Setup — Bitcoin Lightning Network and Nostr
Part 3: Podcasting 2.0
Part 4: Conclusions
Why this podcast? Ultimately there is a need for technologically secure solutions which could assist in bridging information between spheres of knowledge. For example, the project to audit the scientific knowledge base of the sources of electricity and its distribution. There are many attack vectors which prevent one from accomplishing this but with the right threat model one can create an unstoppable disclosure.
As long as intelligence is used for covert competition between nations, the amount of malicious entities involved in attempts at monetary power and control will continue to grow with the civilian populations living in dimensions without knowledge of their predicament. It will thus take increasing civilian care and evolution to maintain freedom for those with the right aims beyond competition. I’m starting to see that for this reason, a technocracy might be necessary to control the ignorant blissful masses who do not care, all the way up to self-destruction.
I care and this is why I’m developing a unique line of work as a consultant in Web App Security. For example, anywhere cryptographic keypairs are noted and transmitted is the domain of security. And such keypairs are fundamental for the existance and use of Bitcoin and Nostr, the technological basis of this podcast monetization setup.
From my first uses of the lightning network and from tuning into the pulse of the makers of these projects directly, I have a sense that I come from a land of experience in the much vaster ubiquitous web filled with malicious and nefarious entities, as well as the crypto altcoin community which sees constant attacks on its people, projects and organizations. From this I can tell there is work to be done in the bitcoin community in the Web App Sec perspective and I am glad to be here.
PART 1: Theory
WHY A PODCAST SETUP ARTICLE
I started from scratch and this setup was a lot of work over one month without pay. I do have an unrelated income that I use as support. This article is an attempt to share a feasible home approach for the average person with a computer in order to install one’s own quality podcast that is both outside of the main system yet compatible with it. I care and have a human responsibility to attune holistically inluding with the technologies I use.
I feel very engaged in life and in this field and I am able to work with my neuro-atypicality. I research and I write on paper, then transpose digitally. I often go from chaotic stickies to notes, to articles to podcast content. I have also set up meetups in physical space and live streaming for virtual connections.
The year 2024 is already a few beats into popular generative artificial intelligence and it is possible to have an organized AI produce high quality podcasts for the masses. I’m producing a podcast to display the potential a human has when they are relatively free from the program of the local operating system. One would think that most people are interested in this, and that is the case, but an interest is not the life.
INTRODUCTION
Care and having a need is helpful in this case. That would be the personal attunement aspect of creating a censorship resistant podcast for sovereign monetization. The technical side is simplified in this article example, in order for the average person to access it as a guideline. Any of the headlines or emphasized words and concepts can be researched as needed. These do not take much extra time and effort to recontextualize into one’s own situation for implementation. It is always debugging that may take lots of time, so the problems in following this guideline to completion should all be solveable within one week.
The greatest challenge I found in doing the work is a lack of having a map about how everything relates. Here I attempt to provide both categorized text in a sequence and a general mapping.
For any assistance one can ask a so-called AI such as Chat GPT using the words from the frameworks and technologies one is using, stating aims and any errors in the process.
CREATIVE AUDIO VISUAL
A podcast is the presentation of oneself online to a global audience. Two open-source technologies I use are bitcoin (digital money and its lightning implementation) and Nostr (a censorship resistant communications protocol). All this under a registered umbrella business structure called The Sky Is High.
On the most creative artful aspects of podcasting is perhaps one’s own presence. The content requires research, practice, experience, and various kinds of work such as connecting with others in the world of insights. One has to maintain health and energy in order to present value. Next is one’s choice for the podcast content in audio visual format, podcast series and episode design for various content types, as well as the atmospheric lightning and musical design, website hosting, graphic and text design with photography and audio-video clips. With this, the corresponding setup of Web2.0 social media channels such as Youtube, Facebook and X, each fulfilling their general purpose on popular networks, but also on corresponding decentralized Web3.0 networks and protocols such as Nostr and Fountain.fm.
It is good to have a professional audio and video setup. In my case I use Audio-Technica AT2020 XLR microphones, and the Audio-Technica M50x headphones. The mic is connected to a Behringer Xenyx1002USB mixer (with its particular knob and button settings and cables) which runs to my camera, a Sony A7III (with its selected manual settings and focus on 4K) if not directly to my computer when recording mere audio. I run both audio and video from the camera to my computer when streaming or recording complex episodes in OBS (Open Broadcasting Software). For a second and third camera option I use smartphones with an IP camera app which are received by OBS. For lighting I use a soft box, a key light, and two programmable RGB LED lights with professional grade color temperature settings. All these on stands.
For theme music and sound design, I make my own beats in real-time on an Akai XR-20 beat machine. Sometimes people make careers just from the technical setup of either audio or video and beats. I have worked on film sets as a cinematography technician seasonally for 15 years.
THE CIVILIAN MATRIX
The general global contemporary society is one type of system. The power of mathematics within the deepest layers of computing security, namely cryptography, allow the average person to step outside of the system.
In order to be able to pay for my existance, economic energy is what I convert my value into. This is money.
What I am doing now then is setting up my value transmission to work inside and outside of the system with money.
Care and time with freedom to make this possible is essential. The sphere in which this project is created is the contemporary average civilian matrix built around electrical and economic energies.
For the increased security of my shared content I have decided to tune into the latest innovations of the internet and to connect myself with the concept of value for value. This is a home setup, which then acts as a personal financial sovereignty bank. In sequence of primary needs.
Financial Intelligence is the key to civilian matrix. It is a synthesis of personal methodology for thriving with economic energy. Wherever one is, this forms the basis for the lifestyle of society. I align my business to this lifestyle. I need to be participating, creating a network of people who have the same culture, and possibly aims. This is the culture of the treasury of value by today’s artists which include technologists of the internet.
Building a bitcoin Lightning Network node is the wizardry field of financial intelligence of today. It is the cultural connection of the contemporary matrix. Culture is being targeted by attack vectors and abused and business is profiteering from poor culture workers the most.
Part 2: Bitcoin Lightning Network and Nostr
THE PODCAST MONETIZATION SETUP
This is the thermodynamics of decentralization.
The electrical power for the computing operations and an internet connection for synchronization is essential.
Ecological environmental safety is a priority for the physical location of the hardware of the computing device and its data storage. The same for the living human beings taking care of themselves and of this technology.
This is the setup of something that runs bitcoin. This form of money exists because people of a certain culture in contemporary society run it. One does not have to have any bitcoin in order to run bitcoin. On the storage device is the bitcoin blockchain being synced.
The home router must be secured and have port forwarding from the external public Internet to the internal device on the home network.
The device which is running the Bitcoin Node and Lightning is a Raspberry Pi 4B (https://www.raspberrypi.com/), a single-board low cost embedded system computers with essential components.
The aim of all this is to create a node for a personal mesh network topology for Value Network. The tutorial I used as a guideline is from CoinCodeCap because I wanted to test what they mean by “in 5 minutes”.
UMBREL OPERATING SYSTEM
The host Operating System on the Pi is Umbrel (https://umbrel.com/) . After downloading the OS, it is first etched to the Pi’s microSD card with Balena Etcher (https://etcher.balena.io/) on a seperate computer. Umbrel as an operating system then runs automatically when the Pi is turned on and no configurations are needed. It was designed to be accessible on the local network on one’s personal computer through a Web GUI at URL: http://umbrel.local
This operating system can also be accessed directly by command line with a keyboard and monitor connected to the Raspberry Pi.
Various apps can be installed on Umbrel. The installations are through an App Store-like repository which include the software running the Bitcoin Core node and Bitcoin Lightning Network node. One of the first things to do is to download one’s own Bitcoin Lightning node private key using the Umbrel command line interface.
Bitcoin-cli exportprivatekey <address>
The other apps I use are:
Lightning Node management tools: Lightning Terminal, Ride the Lightning, Thunderhub.
Nostr Wallet Connect — connects Lightning wallets to Nostr keys
Nostr Relay — a relay which captures all my posts, called notes, locally
Snort — a Nostr client
Now that I have a basic home bank setup, it is time to start connecting with others in order to use bitcoin as money.
BITCOIN NODE
The Bitcoin node can be accessed at port 2100: http://umbrel.local:2100
“Run your personal node powered by Bitcoin Core”
It has settings allowing various types of connections with the outside world. Its main function is to participate in the decentralization of the bitcoin blockchain, meaning to keep a copy of all the confirmed transactions for others to see.
This node software takes up to a week to download the 650Gb of bitcoin blockchain data through an ethernet cable connection from the Pi (with its external 1T+ hard drive) to the router.
A new block is mined approximately every ten minutes and this has to be synced for the node to maintain live status.
LIGHTNING NODE
The Lightning Node, on port 2101 runs LND, the Lightning Network Daemon.
This is software running on top of the Bitcoin Core software, allowing for a newer feature of bitcoin development, which is an easier and cheaper transaction foundation for the average person.
“By running a Lightning node, you can not only self-custody your Bitcoin on Lightning, but also earn sats by routing payments on the network.
With the Advanced Settings feature, you can take control of your node and customize it to your needs. Personalize it with a name, enable larger channels, limit channel sizes, set your routing fees, optimize your routing strategy, add watchtower services, fine-tune its performance, and much more.”
BITCOIN LIGHTNING NODE THEORY
Network value creation. My public node is my public digital economic energy. It is like making friends and business partnerships and communities, liaisons. Similar to connections one may have among people in real life relations.
LIGHTNING CHANNEL
One first thing to do is to open a channel with an existing node on the Lightning Network.
To open a channel with me means to connect economic energy. Open channels early with big players and then remain on their original network when not accessible any more, or after bitcoin valuation has gone up in round. In the LN network built on a market, it is the value of the work behind the node that is the reason to use it. I connect to a store, which is connected to the maker of an item. I pay a bit to this store that routes to the maker. It is good to be a network hub for valuable content. The Wallet of Satoshi is an easy example of a LN node for LN people.
So people should connect to my The Sky Is High node if they are building New Energy sources and they need the value I am giving from being a connector of knowledge. Those with the same missions may benefit from connecting their nodes which then begin to form new financial grid support for new energy work. Setting up a new grids of Lightning Network nodes across planet with same aims is possibly like setting up the first banks centuries ago. Being a node in new city means being the bank for your type of economic energy in your city. Lightning node security — is routing locally. For the vision of your network. At least one node in each country for global decentralization.
One channel should be well connected to the main popular lightning network, keep this private. Nodes which are a part of the paths get a routing fee, so simply by existing, one can receive remuneration.
On the Lightning Terminal web application I opened a channel with another node which was selected from the top of the recommended nodes using a weighted algorithm.
I found the most amazing information on Lightning nodes is in the following documentation:
https://docs.lightning.engineering/lightning-network-tools/lightning-terminal/opening-channels
The details I used are intuited from the above knowledge base and from looking at the selected node’s channels and its details. For my first run I selected: 1025000 sats (about $650USD), Base fee 199sats, local fee rate 499sats, public, onchain 23satv/B for 1hr average completion.
Channel Size is the capacity. This influences the ability to route payments, earn fees to participate in the network liquidity.
Good peers: the number of channels my node has with good peers is more important than total number of channels.
BITCOIN PURCHASE
About $500 to $2000 worth of bitcoin seems to be a reasonable minimum to have for a node which can connect with other nodes.
If you are not able to mine bitcoin, and effective mining is mostly a multimillion dollar business nowadays, for its purchase, use a safe and secure, genuine civilian method, and there are many. The easiest in almost every country is from someone with bitcoin. At this point it is good to understand bitcoin as money by doing a deep dive and reading a book about it.
For the long term hodl storage of bitcoin it is good to have hardware wallets such as Trezor and Ledger. There are others you can even build yourself. These are my safes. But nothing happens to them if these are destroyed, lost or stolen.
TRANSFER BTC TO LN NODE ON-CHAIN
From one of these hardware wallets I transfer to the on-chain part of my Lightning Node which runs on my Umbrel RaspberryPi. It is the private but interconnected treasury of my assets. This is like a bank account. From the on-chain bitcoin I transfer to my off-chain Lightning Node, which is my useable bitcoin on the lightning network. I select an amount I will be using in the channels I create or in the amounts I intend to spend. This is like a stash of bills at home.
A bitcoin address can start with any of these prefixes:
Legacy Addresses (P2PKH): These addresses start with the number “1” and are 34 characters. They are the original and most widely used type of Bitcoin address such as 1BvBMSEYstWetqTFn5Au4m4GFg7xJaNVN2.
Segregated Witness Addresses (P2SH): These addresses start with the number “3” and are 35 characters such as: 3J98t1WpEZ73CNmQviecrnyiWrnqRhWNLy. They are used to store funds in a Segregated Witness (SegWit) compatible format.
Native SegWit Addresses (Bech32): These addresses start with the characters “bc1” and are 42–62 characters such as: bc1qar0srrr7xfkvy5l643lydnw9re59gtzzwf5mdq. They offer improved efficiency and lower transaction fees compared to legacy addresses.
Bitcoin Lightning Network addresses start with the prefix “ln” and are between 100–150 characters. These payment requests are encoded in a format called BOLT11 and are used to request payments on the Lightning Network. They also contain additional information and look like the following unless they are in QR code format:
lnbc2500n1pw7usl63pp5nvrf0ul6ttxvlgc32at2aqztl9qsp8wd4gqwez5s8jnz9fyhzsdq07v35a9wgsxqr0wssp5kucq9y9qsqsp5lgrcykf7q5pxlwj4yphu8e8hnexqnv9zttt0whh3l2ht36cfrzflntx2jz4t5z55r20m8h5hqgw6xflsdf9ssgl7gjv0rjs7ktmd89qfvugq84rg5q6w9r0qlk9v3qsrrzg2ur53pr4xqqweqf0nws2kmz5fe2qyjx4jmudkcw57rrh3h02spzvg50npqntj96d2hj4p4g3w9s8m8zpylnqvw0jq0qy9qy9qsqz3jz6ydpppqfkmnje95ljx5ycvz84mzj64wujdz2en37fdqz59yd0xc7h8tymtux6hyj3aluxxw5wtdp9nkpafuh0tcrp4gd22e4fss45r64g.
LIGHTNING ADDRESS
Alias@domain.com
Settlement layer addresses are indeed similar to email addresses in format and are used as identifiers for receiving Lightning Network payments.
A settlement layer address typically looks like an email address, consisting of a username followed by an “@” symbol and a domain.
When someone wants to send a Lightning payment to another user, they can use their settlement layer address to specify the recipient. The recipient can then use their Lightning wallet to generate a payment request (a Lightning Network invoice) containing this settlement layer address. Once the payer receives the payment request, they can use their Lightning wallet to initiate the payment to the specified settlement layer address.
Settlement layer addresses are designed to be user-friendly and easy to share, much like email addresses, making them convenient for sending and receiving Lightning payments between users.
Create a bitcoin Lightning Address for this long form using your own domain in order to make a humanly readable and memorable identiy. I later created a Nostr NIP05 address for the same reasons. For this you need to access the data on your Bitcoin Lightning Node configuration settings through two mentioned apps on Umbrel and then enter that data in your domain’s web hosting DNS settings. I used an Orangepill tutorial.
There are also free services to do this but then the address itself is in that organization’s custody.
LIGHTNING WALLETS
While having your own node with an address is a way of maintaining a type of wallet, it’s like having your safe as your wallet. Therefore it’s best to create oneself a plan for the use of Lightning Wallets. These wallets can have their own lightning address for receiving. Various wallets are good to have. Seperate them based on private and public use. They are similar to having a pant pocket with change, an actual wallet taken downtown, a stash of bills at home, a bank account, a safe. For example here is an outline I used:
- Zeus Wallet on mobile for a self-custody connection to my node remotely from anywhere with node management tools. A stash shelf.
- Mutiny Wallet for standalone self-custody. A real digital wallet. No KYC.
- Strike Wallet with KYC.
Alby
This is for web use, an extension for web browsers, mostly on a personal computer such as a desktop or laptop. The same team seems to have made Nostr Wallet Connect and Amethyst for Android. Alby creates a master key for the account. This master key creates an Alby Lightning wallet address. The same master key can create a Nostr keypair (both private and public keys) which can then be attached to the Lightning wallet address. Note then however that these are custodial wallet and address solutions, meaning the keys originated on the organization’s side and one then trusts the security perimeter.
Alternatively one can also connect to one’s own Lightning Node and designate the limits in spending. And one can also import the Nostr private key via QR code or Nostr Wallet Connect.
Wallet of Satoshi — this is a custodial wallet. I load it and I can use it with ease but it is kept in someone else’s wallet.
Breez — this is a self-custody wallet.
Fountain App — This is the fruit, the ultimate example of V4V use of this setup. Enables direct payments for the content I produce on my podcasts.
The Lightning Tips bot on Telegram is a great little wallet for sending and receiving zaps at your name.
My Nostr public address can have a selected Lightning Wallet address associated with it later. This means one address for both functions.
NOSTR
Alias@domain.com. Similar to the Lightning address.
Nostr began in 2019 and it’s a part of Internet technology, an innovative new method of communicating, a protocol. Much of the bitcoin comunity is using Nostr because it is related. The creator of Twitter (X) uses Nostr. It is like ready made code you can use to build new forms of communications. You access this technology by interfacing with it, these interfaces are called clients. When one has new forms of communication and a new form of money that can be transmitted, you can build economies outside of countries.
Nostr itself is just a protocol; an agreed upon procedure for passing messages around on the internet. You will access Nostr (the protocol) via a client. Clients can be web, desktop, or mobile apps. Clients can fetch data from relays and also generate new data and push that to relays so others can read.
The only form of “data” that exists in Nostr is the event. These events must contain a signature (sig). The signature ensures that it can be proven mathematically that they were created by whoever happens to be their true author. This is done by the keypair. To be able to construct the signature, clients will need your private key.
People with care and need from outside of Big Tech are building this in the open. It is not a product you buy ready to use. The most common appearance of Nostr is through apps that look like X because the easiest things to share are texts and images and audio.
Scroll around and get acquainted with the following sites which I have used as guidelines and selected from my month of research. Get a sense of the time and depth needed to understand enough to make it work. The aim should be to have enough working knowledge to make an account that appears similar to X.
https://nostr.com/
https://njump.me/
https://nostr.how/en/the-protocol
https://nostr.net/
https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nostr
https://github.com/sandwichfarm/nostr-watch
Browse some random content:
https://nostr.band/
Set up an Account:
https://thebitcoinmanual.com/articles/setup-nostr-account/
https://nostr-resources.com/
NOSTR PRIVATE KEY
This is as important as a bitcoin private key except that this is security for your data, which is basically the online value of your life. One should be able to have their own basic needs met when sharing their value with society.
Your public key is your username and your private key is your password, with one major caveat. Unlike a password, your private key cannot be reset if lost. The public key is generally presented as a string with the prefix npub1 and the private key with the prefix nsec1. Make sure you store you private key somewhere safe, like a password manager.
Create a Nostr identity by signing-up, make a presence. One does this by creating a keypair, a secure way of storing one’s identity. With bitcoin one has the private key which makes the bitcoin one’s own. Same with Nostr, your private key makes your account your own. You own your data by connecting everything you do to your private key. It’s as if everything you do online is now your own kind of bitcoin as opposed to belonging to some other company.
I created a Nostr cryptographic identity by using a Kali VM instance on VirtualBox on which I ran some scripts. The Kali operating system is a security researcher’s toolbox which has a Linux terminal and can be installed on almost any computer as a Virtual Machine, using a Hypervisor.
Two keys create a Nostr keypair: private (nsec…) and public (npub…). The second script created a QR code from the private key. This is for scanning into other software in order never to actually share the private key in cleartext nor to trust any other QR code generator. Certainly security measures will be expanded upon in the next iterations.
First run this python script in its folder. Any errors, use an AI prompt. Most likely install the necessary Nostr package and others.
GenerateKeypair.py
from nostr.key import PrivateKey
#Functions generate Nostr keypair output
private_key = PrivateKey()
public_key = private_key.public_key
print(f”32 Byte hex Private key: {private_key.hex()}”)
print(f”32 Byte hex Public key: {public_key.hex()}”)
print(f”Bech32 Private key: {private_key.bech32()}”)
print(f”Bech32 Public key: {public_key.bech32()}”)
Best to just write down your private key on a burning napkin or try to research something better if that doesn’t work. The security of this is of greatest concern and I plan to return to it in other presentations. For now, place your nsec private key (not the hex notation) into a seperate text file called Unimportant.txt in the same folder and run the following script to create the QR.png file:
GenerateQR.py:
import qrcode
# Function generates QR code from text and saves to file
def generate_qr_code(text, filename):
qr = qrcode.QRCode(
version=1,
error_correction=qrcode.constants.ERROR_CORRECT_H,
box_size=10,
border=4,
)
qr.add_data(text)
qr.make(fit=True)
img = qr.make_image(fill_color=”black”, back_color=”white”)
img.save(filename)
# Read from text file
with open(‘Unimportant.txt’, ‘r’) as file:
LessImportant = file.read().strip()
# Generate QR code from the text and save it to a file
generate_qr_code(LessImportant, ‘QR.png’)
print(“QR success.”)
NOSTR CLIENTS
Select the Nostr clients to use, some on personal computer some on mobile device. Clients are the interfaces available to use this new technology. There are many client apps being created, for now consider those which are simple like twitter.
For example,
Primal — for both laptop and mobile
Amethyst — for Android
Damus — for iOS
In most of these I scanned the Nostr QR code to sign-in and prove that the public key I am using belongs to me.
NOSTR ADDRESS
Setup your own address on your own domain a NIP-05 personal identifier which translates your alphanumeric public Nostr key to a human-memorable text that looks like an email. You can do this by hosting a couple of lines of code in two files on a free account at github.io. Then link to these files from your own domain’s DNS settings. I used this Orangepill tutorial.
Or you can get a free custodial NIP-05 or pay for one. Both the LN address and Nostr address goes on Nostr profile.
NOSTR RELAYS
Select some Nostr relays to join. Use your client settings. I like those on Amethyst because they give the ability to activate relays for select parts of the app. It is possible to select which relays to read from and which to upload to. It is good to have at least one paid relay in order to eliminate spam. Relays run on web sockets (“secure”) so their addresses look like this:
wss://relay.nostr.wine
DEVELOP A NOSTR ACCOUNT
Then I created an account by filling in the details over time and posting the most significant texts about myself. Use care. This is like tatooing the internet with your words.
PART 3: PODCASTING 2.0
NEW RSS VALUES
A solution to support easier monetization of of content. Flow of economic energy for creating and collaborating without censorship. “2.0” is the latest iteration term used to describe the applied changes to the standards of technical podcasting methods. Specifically there are additions to the RSS format which is a technical specification.
“RSS is officially an acronym for Rich Site Summary, but many sources (including the United States government) accept the more telltale definition of “Really Simple Syndication”. Either way, RSS is a form of online publication that pulls information from various sources in real time.”
So the addition is something being called Value-forValue (V4V). As many original podcasters of the last 30 years have been those seeking autonomy from the world by casting thier own voices over the internet, this new feature are based on the bitcoin lightning network protocol foundations.
If you come and find the content useful then you may choose to return the value through perr-to-peer transactions in satoshis (sats — or bitcoin denominations). The podcaster simply has to adjust the RSS feed (often done automatically by newer podcasting hosts such as Podhome) to include their bitcoin lightning wallet for receiving payments. For listeners this means loading their bitcoin lightning wallets with satoshis on newer podcasting listening apps such as fountain.fm. Their wallet may be custodial such as the one fountain.fm offers or one may connect another wallet for this use, such as Alby.
Having wallets organized previously is the reason for understanding which one to use at this point.
PODHOME — PODCAST HOSTING PROVIDER
This is what I use for audio hosting. The wallets and hosting providers may take percentage fees from the payments. Therefore it is also possible to host one’s own podcast given resources, and to provide one’s own RSS feed, which is an XML text file using one’s own domain and hosting plan.
FOUNTAIN.FM — PODCAST V4V LISTENING APP
Also connects with Nostr. The listening consumers send value to the podcaster in the form of instant remuneration of satoshis. These can be sent as a one time support or per streaming time measures such as per minute (“streaming”), or at certain time in the podcast (“boost”) or with a message (“boostagram”).
The host of the show may split the payments automatically between collaborators, guests and other stakeholders in real-time.
PART 4: CONCLUSIONS
FUTURE PODCAST CHANNELS
For my video content I am starting with youtube but I expect it not to be easy to continue there for long. I am also using other popular social media networks like facebook and twitter. I have been following the developments in Web3 and Crypto for almost a decade soon, so I do know of the upcoming exciting changes. My focus is on bitcoin now, and I am excited about hte following:
Bitcoin Specific Videos
Since we are dealing with a financial technology with global impact on the macro economy, there will be times when we will be best hosted on community platforms such as:
Orangepill App
Bitcoin TV
Zap.stream
New Energy Specific Videos
Some presentations will have a threat model of attack vectors which require front-line innovation on internet publication. At that time the consideration will be towards:
Opensource transnational livestreaming.
OnionShare
IFPS
Unstoppable front-ends
etc…
CONCLUSION
If one understands all of this in general and has this as a working setup then one is able to participate in civilization and the system and function economically to produce continuous energy for the maintenance of basic needs — which includes a holistic ecological treasury of one’s life.
KEYS
My Nostr public key:
npub1esawtrr4d8vm4cewfqtmaptv32fky6vx5jch3tlpe3fdqg9qmjjq0a6e9d
My Nostr Profile:
https://njump.me/npub1esawtrr4d8vm4cewfqtmaptv32fky6vx5jch3tlpe3fdqg9qmjjq0a6e9d
My podcast on Fountain.fm:
https://www.fountain.fm/show/Qe7TPBbzNXjhdD3s7QQc
This is under much development over 2024 and much is unpublished, so you might see temporary working drafts in places.
