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I feel like home NATs were one of the biggest developments that curbed decentralization and led to the dominance of a "producer vs. consumer" internet. STUN/TUR

I feel like home NATs were one of the biggest developments that curbed decentralization and led to the dominance of a "producer vs. consumer" internet. STUN/TURN and IPv6 are big enablers of a move back to the roots of the internet, right?

swizzler 7y ago
Syncthing runs relays to keep the user from knowing/caring: https://docs.syncthing.net/users/relaying.html https://docs.syncthing.net/users/relaying.html
viraptor 7y ago
Not all, but a lot of home routers will block any incoming connections. Even if you have an IPv6 address, you'll need manual configuration or something like upnp to make it work. And with the current systems we have available... it's probably better that way.
- ghthor 7y ago
  STUN and TURN are protocols that help you open connections through a NAT wall
  - viraptor 7y ago
    True. Although those are not great solutions. Stun may simply fail with weird routers, or because there's lots of new connections and ports are not guessed correctly. Turn requires tunneling your traffic through a third party. Both still need you to actively reach outside and advertise your availability via some openly reachable node. It's a massive pita for reliable consumer VoIP.
mindslight 7y ago
NAT isn't the problem. Most NAT punching isn't terribly hard after a lightweight rendezvous. And VPSs with public IPs have been available for $20/mo for the past decade and a half. The problem is the user experience of p2p software, due to less funding to polish it up and market it hard, due to its fundamental goal of eliminating middlemen.
- strbean 7y ago
  > NAT punching isn't terribly hard after a lightweight rendezvous. Has that been true for very long? It seems like nowadays it is trivial, but a decade ago it was extremely common for users to have to do manual port forwarding to receive connections. As for VPSs, that's basically a non-starter in terms of user experience, similar to the issue you raise with p2p software. For the audience of HN, NAT etc. are a non-issue, but for real democratization to occur, the process needs to be as simple as "install app, run app, share link provided by app to friends".
  - mindslight 7y ago
    NAT punching is establishing communication without forwarding a port. Think like making a TCP connection with a connect() at each end (no listen()). The ability has been there the whole time, but I'm sure libraries have gotten better - again because of development effort. The point about VPSs is that extra public IPs have been easily available. If simply being able to receive incoming connections was sufficient, the process of setting up a VPS would have been easily automated. In reality, server-based protocols such as HTTP/DNS are insufficient for decentralization, and developing replacements takes work.
    - oldtail 7y ago
      > In reality, server-based protocols such as HTTP/DNS are insufficient for decentralization That seems to be true but I’m unsure as to why. What’s your take?
      - mindslight 7y ago
        1. A name points to a single authority for a resource. 2. Even worse, the single authority is bound to a single (logical) authoritative server. Using pubkeys for names, like Freenet or IPNS, solves (2) but not (1). Which does allow content to be wholly retrieved from peers (a massive step up!), but still relies on a single authority. So I would think that well-known authorities will still crop up, centralize, and abuse market inefficiency. Although much easier to fork, so more pressure to behave (imagine being able to say hey use my faceboot alternative at http://newsite.com http://newsite.com, and have all the content automatically there, without the hostile software!). I've been thinking about this for quite some time, and ideally (1) would be solved as well. The only system I've seen in the wild that attempts to distribute authority itself is Camlistore's "claims". But the idea being that a "far" link should truly be changeable by the end user, rather than to a singular authority.
ladyattis 7y ago
I think a bigger hurdle is that consumer service ISPs have restrictions on self-hosting. If it wasn't that way then I can see more self-hosting being a norm especially with some consumer routers playing as host at least for some devices attached (external HDDs particularly).

swizzler 7y ago

Syncthing runs relays to keep the user from knowing/caring: https://docs.syncthing.net/users/relaying.html https://docs.syncthing.net/users/relaying.html

viraptor 7y ago

Not all, but a lot of home routers will block any incoming connections. Even if you have an IPv6 address, you'll need manual configuration or something like upnp to make it work. And with the current systems we have available... it's probably better that way.

ghthor 7y ago
STUN and TURN are protocols that help you open connections through a NAT wall
- viraptor 7y ago
  True. Although those are not great solutions. Stun may simply fail with weird routers, or because there's lots of new connections and ports are not guessed correctly. Turn requires tunneling your traffic through a third party. Both still need you to actively reach outside and advertise your availability via some openly reachable node. It's a massive pita for reliable consumer VoIP.

mindslight 7y ago

NAT isn't the problem. Most NAT punching isn't terribly hard after a lightweight rendezvous. And VPSs with public IPs have been available for $20/mo for the past decade and a half. The problem is the user experience of p2p software, due to less funding to polish it up and market it hard, due to its fundamental goal of eliminating middlemen.

strbean 7y ago
> NAT punching isn't terribly hard after a lightweight rendezvous. Has that been true for very long? It seems like nowadays it is trivial, but a decade ago it was extremely common for users to have to do manual port forwarding to receive connections. As for VPSs, that's basically a non-starter in terms of user experience, similar to the issue you raise with p2p software. For the audience of HN, NAT etc. are a non-issue, but for real democratization to occur, the process needs to be as simple as "install app, run app, share link provided by app to friends".
- mindslight 7y ago
  NAT punching is establishing communication without forwarding a port. Think like making a TCP connection with a connect() at each end (no listen()). The ability has been there the whole time, but I'm sure libraries have gotten better - again because of development effort. The point about VPSs is that extra public IPs have been easily available. If simply being able to receive incoming connections was sufficient, the process of setting up a VPS would have been easily automated. In reality, server-based protocols such as HTTP/DNS are insufficient for decentralization, and developing replacements takes work.
  - oldtail 7y ago
    > In reality, server-based protocols such as HTTP/DNS are insufficient for decentralization That seems to be true but I’m unsure as to why. What’s your take?
    - mindslight 7y ago
      1. A name points to a single authority for a resource. 2. Even worse, the single authority is bound to a single (logical) authoritative server. Using pubkeys for names, like Freenet or IPNS, solves (2) but not (1). Which does allow content to be wholly retrieved from peers (a massive step up!), but still relies on a single authority. So I would think that well-known authorities will still crop up, centralize, and abuse market inefficiency. Although much easier to fork, so more pressure to behave (imagine being able to say hey use my faceboot alternative at http://newsite.com http://newsite.com, and have all the content automatically there, without the hostile software!). I've been thinking about this for quite some time, and ideally (1) would be solved as well. The only system I've seen in the wild that attempts to distribute authority itself is Camlistore's "claims". But the idea being that a "far" link should truly be changeable by the end user, rather than to a singular authority.

ladyattis 7y ago

I think a bigger hurdle is that consumer service ISPs have restrictions on self-hosting. If it wasn't that way then I can see more self-hosting being a norm especially with some consumer routers playing as host at least for some devices attached (external HDDs particularly).