This is why getting more developers working on knots is imperitive. You need to begin fostering a culture around the implementation that keeps it close to bitcoins roots and nodes at the top of the hierarchy.

It would also be good to move away from centralised platforms like GitHub and Google mailing lists. Maybe a nostr git implementation (where we can zap PRs and releases directly) and a Keet room?

I need to go down the ecash rabbithole

Not yet, that's probably the next thing on my to-do list before setting up lightning payouts

thanks for the tips!

I've seen it go back and forth between online and offline a few times so I guess this is where the miner is not reaching minimum difficulty?

By public do you mean not behind Tor?