#14: Building Browsers w/ Justin

"I want Nostr to be the perfect thing just for me."

Justin & Gigi drive to the airport. Recorded October 2025.

Projects & tech mentioned:

• Blitz (Rust HTML/CSS renderer)
• QuickJS (lightweight JavaScript engine)
• Dioxus (Rust UI framework)
• Iroh (peer-to-peer networking)
• MOQ (Media Over QUIC)
• White Noise (MLS-based private messaging on Nostr)
• Ladybird (independent browser by Andreas Kling)
• VRChat

In this dialogue:

• Driving to the airport
• "Don't say anything that could be used against you"
• The low quality of this podcast focuses the mind of the listener
• You need proper headphones
• Walking focuses you, and stops you after 90 minutes
• Justin's adoption curve: hater first, builder later
• "I'm the ascending left curve"
• Bitcoin hating, Lightning hating, Nostr hating
• Audio calling with npubs: Nostr as signaling & identity layer
• First version: Iroh for peer-to-peer, Nostr for lookup
• Calling Paul Miller's npub from a CLI
• innpub: a 2D pixel art level with rooms you can hang out in
• The killer feature of positional audio
• VRChat Bitcoin meetups during COVID, thanks to Udi
• Twitter Spaces, Clubhouse, and why one big room encourages attention seeking
• Positional audio lets you hide in a corner
• WebRTC is Google Meet shipped as a "web standard"
• Safari and Firefox just shipped Google's code
• MOQ (Media Over QUIC) as the simple alternative
• CDN-style mesh relays for binary data
• What if MOQ relays were Nostr-style, and you'd pay to relay?
• E2E encrypted group audio in the browser using White Noise / MLS compiled to WASM
• "Let's make Nostr fast"
• The web is dying: Chrome blocked ad blockers and Justin just stopped visiting websites
• No SQLite in the browser, no TypeScript in the browser
• Why do I need a domain name? Why certificate authorities?
• Building a browser in 3 days
• Blitz + QuickJS = a browser that runs a React counter app
• "This would have taken me months"
• Andreas Kling: built a browser as part of a 12-step program
• Ladybird proving that you can build a browser from scratch
• Vibe coding: 20-30 projects in six weeks
• Nerd-sniped into implementing Mosaic in Zig, then dropping it in two days
• What Nostr got right: "good enough"
• Binary transport for Nostr relays
• Getting rid of DNS: a theme every week at SovEng (noDNS)
• Claiming names via Nostr events, no .com needed
• Web of trust for conflict resolution
• Self-signed TLS certs trusted through Nostr identity
• Social handles already replaced URLs in practice
• "Build for the nerds, not the mass market"
• "I want Nostr to be the perfect thing just for me"
• Building blocks crystallizing: mesh networking, noDNS, better relays, search
• Relays in the browser
• The synergistic ecosystem
• "You're gonna miss your flight"