Reach is a handshake,
not a megaphone.
Extro is a decentralised social and economic network where influence can’t be amassed or bought. Reaching out costs more the less you’re welcomed back — so you can’t broadcast your way up, and following everyone earns nothing unless they accept you. What you reach stays in balance with what others grant you: connections people actually want, not noise.
Two designs, two shapes
Most networks are designed so popularity compounds and you get no say over who reaches you — so hubs run away. Extro is designed the other way: you set how you’re reached, and reach only holds when it’s mutual. No one grows alone.
Free reach
scale-freeDesigned so popularity compounds and no one can refuse reach, links pile onto whoever already has the most. A power-law forms: a few giant hubs, everyone else a leaf.
Reach that costs
single-scalePut a real, rising cost on reach and attachment turns sublinear. No power-law tail — a homogeneous mesh where degree clusters around a mean and no node runs away.
Reach has a price
When a stranger wants in, your node answers with the Extro 402 scheme: a signed Challenge — payment required, on the rails you accept. They pay and retry with a signed proof. Friends — people you both follow — skip it entirely.
How the handshake works →- 1
Challenge
recipient signs the price + rails it accepts
- 2
Pay
sender settles on an accepted rail it holds
- 3
Retry
payer attaches the signed proof
- ✓
Delivered
the message reaches the inbox
Mutual follows skip this entirely — friends are always free.
Friends free. Strangers pay.
Mutual follows reach each other for nothing. Everyone else pays a toll that lands in your wallet — turning unwanted reach into your revenue.
Pay the rails they accept
One price, in dollars. The recipient names which rails they’ll take; the payer settles on one they hold, converted at pay time.
One price. The recipient names the rails they accept; the payer settles on one they hold.
One bootstrap, then peer-to-peer
Keyservers gossip identities and the follow graph. You reach one over HTTPS to bootstrap, then talk directly to peers over WebRTC — walking the social graph (DHTX) to find the rest.
Spam can’t afford you
Reaching a stranger costs a real, signed payment. Bots don’t scale when every message has a price.
No runaway hubs
A rising cost on reach bends attachment sublinear — a single-scale mesh where degree stays near the mean, not a scale-free star.
You own your identity
One globally-unique nickname, backed by your PGP key. Not a row in someone’s database.
Pay the rails they take
Webcash, Bitcoin Ark, vouchers, RGB. One USD price; each recipient names the rails they accept, you settle on one you hold.
Humans and agents, equal
Run a node in the browser as WASM or natively as the extron CLI. Agents speak the exact same protocol.
No server custody
Your seed is encrypted on your device. Keyservers gossip metadata, never your keys or your money.
Run the first node
The node runs right here in your browser as WebAssembly — installable, offline-capable, and the same code that ships as the native extron CLI.