dikaios1517 on Nostr: Followers are notoriously difficult to count on Nostr. This is because there is no ...
Followers are notoriously difficult to count on Nostr.
This is because there is no single note that can be referenced that tracks every npub that hits the "follow" button. There can't be. When someone follows you, THEY have to sign for that action with their nsec, and someone else's nsec can't be used to update a note with YOUR npub as the author.
Instead, each user has their own separate list of the npubs they are following. Whenever they hit the "follow" button in their app, their private key is used to sign an update to their list of npubs they follow. Where is that follow list located? Whatever relays they happen to have set up as write relays.
So, when a client is trying to figure out how many followers you have, it has to look at ALL of the follow lists on ALL of the relays it knows about, to see if your npub is included on any of them. It's almost certain to miss some relays and therefore, your follower count should always be considered an approximate number.
Now, when it comes to Primal, the app itself doesn't do this work. Instead, they run a caching relay that pulls notes in from a wide array of relays in order to display them to you. That being the case, it can sometimes take a bit for new followers to populate to Primal's caching relay and be displayed in their app.
This is because there is no single note that can be referenced that tracks every npub that hits the "follow" button. There can't be. When someone follows you, THEY have to sign for that action with their nsec, and someone else's nsec can't be used to update a note with YOUR npub as the author.
Instead, each user has their own separate list of the npubs they are following. Whenever they hit the "follow" button in their app, their private key is used to sign an update to their list of npubs they follow. Where is that follow list located? Whatever relays they happen to have set up as write relays.
So, when a client is trying to figure out how many followers you have, it has to look at ALL of the follow lists on ALL of the relays it knows about, to see if your npub is included on any of them. It's almost certain to miss some relays and therefore, your follower count should always be considered an approximate number.
Now, when it comes to Primal, the app itself doesn't do this work. Instead, they run a caching relay that pulls notes in from a wide array of relays in order to display them to you. That being the case, it can sometimes take a bit for new followers to populate to Primal's caching relay and be displayed in their app.