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Yes, in practice you always have to rely on someone. Even before the internet you'd have to rely on the USPS to carry your letters. Unless you are physically s
by thekyle 6y ago
Yes, in practice you always have to rely on someone. Even before the internet you'd have to rely on the USPS to carry your letters.
Unless you are physically speaking to someone in person, then there is always a middleman.
- umvi 6y agoWell you can always just create your own courier. If you want true free speech these days you need to build your own stack from the ground up anyway.
- arbitrage 6y agoOh? Is the government interfering in your ability to say what you would like to say in an online space?
- BitwiseFool 6y agoI really detest this kind of attitude. Yes, the government is NOT restricting what you can say in an online space. But at the same time, there is no government platform I can speak from. They're not stopping me from saying what I want but they're also not giving me a platform. Why are we giving corporate entities a pass on tyranny? It's not like restricting people's liberties is only something the government can do.
- arbitrage 6y agoOooh, you detest my attitude. I'll watch out and be more careful with my word choice next time! Right, so I agree with all of that. But maybe you should use the proper words to describe what's going on, instead of using alarmist word choices that purposely obscure what the point of the conversation is about. This isn't a "free speech" issue. It's a wealth equality issue. It's a captalism-gone-amok issue. But it specifically isn't the government out to get you.
- biohacker85 6y agoMy onboard, state of the art, military grade AI suite is detecting infantile sarcasm, irritability unrelated to the current topic, and a tone unbecoming of a hacker news commenter.
- emeraldd 6y agoThis is well outside of the practical capabilities of anyone but a nation state or large commercial entity. Even then, it's hard. It's more practical for a physical letter than for digital stuff. For a digital service, you'd have to go down to cabling infrastructure or take something like the SpaceX route and launch satellites. If you need something between a few nearby buildings, it's more practical to come up with a solution, but anything further out ... you're kind of stuck. (Your ISP classifies as a middle man as well...)
- yunesj 6y ago> you can always create your own courier It is illegal to compete with USPS to deliver letters.
- high_density 6y ago...but you can delivery boxes...? so put mail in boxes? I mean, there's DHL, Fedex, and others...
- gumby 6y agoI don't believe the law has ever been revoked that requires anyone sending documents through a non-USPS service* to include the appropriate USPS postage cancelled with a pen along with their shipment * excepting a point-to-point courier service for some reason
- yunesj 6y agoThe USPS carved out a few exceptions, like delivering urgent mail. Gaming the system will get you raided by armed agents of the enforcement arm of the USPS.
- gruez 6y agoAFAIK there are exceptions for express couriers, which is why you can still use fedex/ups to delivery documents.
- Lammy 6y agoWe Await Silent Tristero's Empire
- xhkkffbf 6y agoBeat me to it. Paranoia is not new.
- mippenhappen 6y agoYou start by creating the universe...
- httpsterio 6y agothe difference here though is that physically you can at least own the address, but even your digital address isn't actually yours. Phone, email, ip and whatnot are all provided by someone else and can be taken away. Domains can be stolen, deprecated or simply restricted from your use.
- jcranmer 6y agoWell, the USPS has renamed towns before. Ask Waimea, Hawaii Island, Hawaii.
- foolmeonce 6y ago> physically you can at least own the address No, a town owns an address and rents it to you. If something goes wrong with the billing you get evicted, if they want a mall they forcibly "buy" it from you. There's no resource you can count on in this way. Resources get reallocated at some point.