7 ms·

We're so close. ^_^ We need to make sure the internet and this magical way of archiving and sharing information can't be taken from away from us unless the whol

by ghthor 9y ago

We're so close. ^_^ We need to make sure the internet and this magical way of archiving and sharing information can't be taken from away from us unless the whole civilization is crippled or destroyed.

erikpukinskis 9y ago
Well, I don't share your fear because I think the whole of mandatory centralized civilization should and will be destroyed, and replaced with equivalent voluntary microcivilizations. I also think anyone trying to control the flow of information is fighting a losing battle, so I don't lose sleep over that one either. Censoring the internet is already difficult and economically costly. Once we have Ethereum on a mesh network of $5 handheld computers, the difficulty goes up probably two orders of magnitude. And we're what, 10 years away from that? I also think corporations are trying to lure you into thinking they control things, when in fact they don't have any real power any more, we (people with a little credit and a computer) have it all. We are just brainwashed into thinking we need them, so we're not exercising most of our power. What if Comcast et al stopped offering you service entirely? Would you be lost? Would you be able to find the internet again?
- ghthor 9y ago
  That's actually a scary scenario. I'd be stuck relying on my neighbors for "pirate" wifi which would be unreliable unless I was able to run some QoS and setup their router. If that failed I'd be SoL because I don't know how use HAM radio and access the packet network. What other options or ideas am I missing? Excluding the cell carrier network.
  - erikpukinskis 9y ago
    You'd need to rely on your friends, I guess.
  - mtreis86 9y ago
    There are a couple companies attempting to solve this, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gotenna/gotenna-mesh-off-grid-people-powered-connectivity https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gotenna/gotenna-mesh-of... and https://www.beartooth.com/ https://www.beartooth.com/
- wruza 9y ago
  I feel that Ethereum is not yet another coin, or maybe coins are not simply currencies from the beginning, but ethereum's site did not make that clear except mentioning "scripts". This seems to open a whole new perspective, but I fail to get it myself. Where can I read more on this?
  - erikpukinskis 9y ago
    I would start you off with this: Bitcoin is an autonomous software program. It waits for help, and relies on the help of humans, but it can't be pushed around. It either works or it waits. What Bitcoin does, specifically, is maintain a ledger. That's all. Very useful, but quite limited. It tracks accounts, and which accounts transfer where. No more, no less. That simplicity made it somewhat tractable to implement, in a world where no one had ever heard of an autonomous software application before. It was the "Hello World" of autonomous software. Computer scientists were mostly blindsided by this. At least I was. But Bitcoin's success, even in its earliest forms, suggested that there would be a whole wealth of autonomous software coming. We were excited. A whole new way of thinking about software, where you don't write procedures, you write contracts. It was easy enough to see that you could store arbitrary information in the Bitcoin ledger... a few kilobytes, maybe a GIF. But performance was awful. So an autonomous data hosting service was certainly on the menu, for whoever could figure out a set of contracts that would scale. But it also seemed like an autonomous application hosting service was also possible. And whoever built it would be holding the keys to another Bitcoin-style explosion of value. Think of it like this: someone had invented autonomous Visa, the race was on to invent the autonomous Heroku. MaidSafe was one attempt. Ethereum was another. I don't have any reading materials for you. This is a brand new area of inquiry. Academia doesn't seem to have taken notice yet, and the AltCoin scene is just a bunch of finance people gathering around cargo cults. I guess what I would suggest: read up on MaidSafe and Ethereum. The Ethereum blog is fascinating. Start at the beginning. Try to understand what's happening and then ask questions. Don't rely on other peoples' characterizations of these systems, try to understand how and why they work. Or, if you want to trust someone, trust me: Ethereum is currently the best contender we have. Just learn how to make dapps and start looking for good business opportunities within that ecosystem.

by ghthor 9y ago

erikpukinskis 9y ago

Well, I don't share your fear because I think the whole of mandatory centralized civilization should and will be destroyed, and replaced with equivalent voluntary microcivilizations. I also think anyone trying to control the flow of information is fighting a losing battle, so I don't lose sleep over that one either. Censoring the internet is already difficult and economically costly. Once we have Ethereum on a mesh network of $5 handheld computers, the difficulty goes up probably two orders of magnitude. And we're what, 10 years away from that? I also think corporations are trying to lure you into thinking they control things, when in fact they don't have any real power any more, we (people with a little credit and a computer) have it all. We are just brainwashed into thinking we need them, so we're not exercising most of our power. What if Comcast et al stopped offering you service entirely? Would you be lost? Would you be able to find the internet again?

ghthor 9y ago
That's actually a scary scenario. I'd be stuck relying on my neighbors for "pirate" wifi which would be unreliable unless I was able to run some QoS and setup their router. If that failed I'd be SoL because I don't know how use HAM radio and access the packet network. What other options or ideas am I missing? Excluding the cell carrier network.
- erikpukinskis 9y ago
  You'd need to rely on your friends, I guess.
- mtreis86 9y ago
  There are a couple companies attempting to solve this, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gotenna/gotenna-mesh-off-grid-people-powered-connectivity https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gotenna/gotenna-mesh-of... and https://www.beartooth.com/ https://www.beartooth.com/
wruza 9y ago
I feel that Ethereum is not yet another coin, or maybe coins are not simply currencies from the beginning, but ethereum's site did not make that clear except mentioning "scripts". This seems to open a whole new perspective, but I fail to get it myself. Where can I read more on this?
- erikpukinskis 9y ago
  I would start you off with this: Bitcoin is an autonomous software program. It waits for help, and relies on the help of humans, but it can't be pushed around. It either works or it waits. What Bitcoin does, specifically, is maintain a ledger. That's all. Very useful, but quite limited. It tracks accounts, and which accounts transfer where. No more, no less. That simplicity made it somewhat tractable to implement, in a world where no one had ever heard of an autonomous software application before. It was the "Hello World" of autonomous software. Computer scientists were mostly blindsided by this. At least I was. But Bitcoin's success, even in its earliest forms, suggested that there would be a whole wealth of autonomous software coming. We were excited. A whole new way of thinking about software, where you don't write procedures, you write contracts. It was easy enough to see that you could store arbitrary information in the Bitcoin ledger... a few kilobytes, maybe a GIF. But performance was awful. So an autonomous data hosting service was certainly on the menu, for whoever could figure out a set of contracts that would scale. But it also seemed like an autonomous application hosting service was also possible. And whoever built it would be holding the keys to another Bitcoin-style explosion of value. Think of it like this: someone had invented autonomous Visa, the race was on to invent the autonomous Heroku. MaidSafe was one attempt. Ethereum was another. I don't have any reading materials for you. This is a brand new area of inquiry. Academia doesn't seem to have taken notice yet, and the AltCoin scene is just a bunch of finance people gathering around cargo cults. I guess what I would suggest: read up on MaidSafe and Ethereum. The Ethereum blog is fascinating. Start at the beginning. Try to understand what's happening and then ask questions. Don't rely on other peoples' characterizations of these systems, try to understand how and why they work. Or, if you want to trust someone, trust me: Ethereum is currently the best contender we have. Just learn how to make dapps and start looking for good business opportunities within that ecosystem.