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@ Spatia Nostra
2025-05-30 18:52:13The subject of continuity, or the lack thereof, is probably one of the most confusing topics for anyone new to the concept of Nostr. It can be a bit of a mind-bender. Just when you start understanding the difference between relays and traditional servers, you are almost certain to stumble into the scenerio of "the missing note". Maybe its your own missing note or maybe its something from another user that you clearly recall but cannot find. Whichever it is, you may temporarily question your sanity until the full picture of what is happening starts to become clear.
As you know by now, every user chooses the relays to which they will publish their notes and other stuff. Relays are like small, simple servers. Even the most widely open, public relays are minor in size compared to the servers that traditional data-silo systems utilize. By using publishing and storing data to theses small servers, we are also agreeing to have our content hosted for what could be an indeterminable length of time, or more ideally, by a length of time clearly defined in a relay's policies. Some relays may store any and all posts from all of their users for any length of time, so long as the user is paying to use the service. Others, particularly larger public relays, may only hold data for a few months to a year, when all data is erased at the relay operator's discretion. Others yet will attempt to host any and all events for as long as possible, regardless of who generated the data or where it was published to begin with. There are even relays that will delete everything at a specific hour everyday. Understanding relay policy is the first piece to learning Nostr long term data management. Of course, nothing is guaranteed, as with anything on the internet, but to best achieve your desired result, its a good place to start.
If you consider anything that you publish as important enough to keep it around, you will want to look into publishing to relays that enable some sort of long-term storage. The reasons could be many. Perhaps you are a content creator looking to earn sustained income off of your creations, or maybe, like me, you're simply fond of looking back on memories. Whatever the case, publishing events to relays that will offer longer storage times is where you would want to start. Many subscription relays will keep your data for as long as you remain a subscriber. Simply check their policy page before subscribing to see if what they offer works for your needs. Another alternative is archival relays. These relays offer a paid service to do nothing BUT store your data. Some are readily available to receive publications as they are created, while others will search, pull in, and store all of your data in one command. These relays are not typically publicly readable without a user specifically choosing to do so. Other options for more resilience of your data include broadcasting your notes, and most obviously SETTING UP YOUR OWN RELAY. :)
On the other side, you may want to create as minimal of a footprint as possible and still participate. You can again, look into relay policies and choose ones that will delete your data on a defined schedule, honor all of your delete requests, and require certain criteria for serving your data to others. One of the best ways to minimize your presence and keep control of your exposure is by SETTING UP YOUR OWN RELAY. :)
This is only a basic framework for understanding Nostr data management, and the one that I am able to explain. There are probably many other, possibly smarter or more or less complicate ways of doing so, but if this resonates with you so far, then please read on. Managing your data does not necessarily provide full understanding into the case of the missing note (sometimes nothing may). For that, we need to broaden our view and consider what a decentralized system really looks like and how its pieces fit together, even if sometimes imperfectly.
When a centralized service goes down, every user knows it. No one is able to send or receive anything. When a a relay goes down, only a small number of users are affected. If you are writing to more than one relay, it may not even be obvious to you when that happens. If you read from multiple relays, you may not notice either, due to the way that notes propagate throughout the network. It's part of the beauty behind what makes Nostr work for everyone. Many clients accessing many relays creating a web of notes and other stuff, flowing and duplicating across a wide network that may or may not be tied to other parts of the ecosystem as a whole.
Every now and then, though, you might notice something missing. If a note you are looking for is only located on one relay that you are accessing, and that relay experiences some downtime, that data may be temporarily unavailable. Maybe even permanently, in the case of unexpected or impulsive data wipes. This can happen with your own notes just as easily as with anyone else's. Such is one scenario of the missing note. You do have the option of utilizing search tools that will scan other relays either by the Nostr schema (nevent, naddr, etc) or by a user's public key. You can choose to read directly from some other relay that is likely to host whatever it is that went missing. There is also the likelihood that previously seen events will be available again, once whatever has happened subsides, so patience is an option, too, but who has time for that these days?
There are also some network connectivity mechanisms at play. Some relays may not be available over all connections. It is not uncommon to see a slightly different feed while using wifi vs your cellular data signal, or even on different data signal locations. The best way I have found to mitigate that is to disconnect reading from relays that become unavailable at a given location while spending time in that area. There is a bit of attention to be paid in order to achieve this, but if you are looking for continuity across wherever you may access your Nostr feed, it is worth the mental energy of remembering who you don't see where and what relays they use for publication. Then, its as simple as flipping a switch when you arrive at your sketchy location.
Latency sometimes plays a part in this, as well. Geographic location, access point, hardware, software, and complexity of a relay can all effect how quickly data is returned to your client for you to see. If you notice a note that was NOT in your feed before, but you are connected in the same fashion as before, it might be most easily solved by disconnecting from the bigger, faster relays so that notes that are hosted on smaller or more complex relays can reach your feed before the connections expire.
So, no... you're not losing your mind when you know that you've seen a post but you can't find it again. It's just part of learning how to navigate a truly decentralized system. This may seem like a lot, and it kind of is, but only because we have spent so many years seeing only what the big server algorithms wanted us to see. Speaking of that, it's impossible to find some posts in those places. You actually have a better chance of tracking things down on Nostr than you ever would in big tech land.