The Demus app is powered by Nostr, which uses decentralized relays to deliver end-to-end encrypted messages, and has a powerful proponent in Jack Dorsey.
The so-called “Twitter Killer” Demus, built on a decentralized network, has been approved in the Apple App Store.
The Demus team confirmed the sanction to its 11,500 Twitter followers on Jan. 31, which it claimed were at least three rejections from Big Tech players.
Shortly thereafter, Twitter co-founder and Nostrar contributor Jack Dorsey shared the news with his 6.5 million followers, labeling the entrepreneur a “milestone” moment for the open source protocol
The app calls itself a “social network you control” and is a messaging service built on Nostr — enabling encrypted end-to-end private messaging, among other things
It plans to be a social media platform with uncensored content. It also has built-in payments via Bitcoin
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layer-2 Lightning Network, according to a Jan. 27 post from Protoss.
None of the servers are running the network. Instead, Nostr uses a decentralized relay for message delivery.
Nostr developer Demus is also focused on using bitcoin and the Lightning network to prevent distributed denial-of-service spam attacks in apps.
The Demus user interface displayed on the iPhone. Source: GitHub
According to the team’s GitHub page, there are 44 different software developers contributing code to the Demus web browser.
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Getting Demus on the Apple App Store hasn’t come without issues, however.
Demus’ Twitter page revealed that at least three attempts had failed before it was finally approved.
One of Nostr’s original developers, William Kasarin, also shared some frustration on his personal Twitter account, saying it would be a “shame” if Apple users couldn’t use Nostr natively
Related: An Inside Look at the Ethical and Technical Considerations of Crypto Social Media
While the exact partnership between Dorsey and Nostrar is unknown, the billionaire entrepreneur sent over 14 BTC — worth about $250,000 at the time — in mid-December to help the Nostrar developer team
While the news seems to have increased awareness of the app among the bitcoin community, other high-profile celebrities have also tested the Demus app.
That includes Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, former US National Security Agency (NSA) contractor and whistleblower Edward Snowden, and pro-crypto US Senator Cynthia Lummis
At the time of writing, the Demus web app experienced problems. A warning message on the site’s homepage reads:
“The Demus network is down because someone is trying to exploit browser loopholes and steal private keys. I don’t recommend using a web client at this time. Demus iOS is not affected”.
