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I'm interested in the fact that, given all the shadiness about ownership etc with Freenode, there is not a single name of a real person anywhere on the site tha
by SamBam 5y ago
I'm interested in the fact that, given all the shadiness about ownership etc with Freenode, there is not a single name of a real person anywhere on the site that I can find. Indeed, there is only a reference to ownership by "a non-profit association in Sweden."
I don't know enough about Freenode. Is it normal for the staff of such a project to be secret? (Or, at least, secret if you haven't been following the previous history of Freenode?)
- pmlnr 5y agoYep. No names, no contact, no impressum, but "trust us, we're the good ones" - right. Than act like it.
- dannyw 5y agoThat's how the internet worked for decades.
- pmlnr 5y agoYes. Look where it got us: fb, twitter, reddit, etc taking it all over, because people "trust" them - see ominous zuck quote. Why? Because ordinary people need faces and names. So unless libera is aiming for the oldschool nerds, like us, they need to align with 2021.
- politician 5y agoFB requires true names.
- cblconfederate 5y agoFBI can fetch the true names thus nicknames became irrelevant
- pmlnr 5y agoThat's not the point (edit): the only thing I'm missing from libera is an impressum. Mentioning a nameless swedish nonprofit is actually worse in my eyes, than calling it xyz's server in the basement.
- pessimizer 5y agoThat is the point. People don't use Facebook because they like using real names, people use real names on Facebook because they were forced to in order to stay on Facebook. When that Zuck quote happened, Facebook didn't require real names.
- icedchai 5y agoIt actually doesn't. It requires your name look like a true name. I know plenty of folks with fake last names on Facebook.
- qu4z-2 5y agoMy understanding is it requires true names and is unevenly enforced.
- icedchai 5y agoIf it's unevenly enforced, then it's not "required" in any practical sense. Nobody I know has ever been kicked off for a fake but reasonable looking name. Facebook is not a government authority. If you ask for a picture of my ID, I can generate a fake one without consequence.
- qu4z-2 5y agoIt's unevenly enforced, not unenforced. If you're willing to photoshop yourself an ID, then sure, that probably works.
- smhenderson 5y agoSo unless libera is aiming for the oldschool nerds, like us Isn't that exactly who they're aiming for though?
- remram 5y agoFreenode operated this way and failed.
- Macha 5y agoFailed how? Was subjected to a corporate takeover? This happened, but it's hard to see the cause and effect, and the proposed solution is basically to do this out the gate. Didn't become discord? Was that a goal? To be a big VC funded chat service with lots of users and a looming prospect of having to be profitable without losing them. Wasn't a profitable business? It was always intended as a non-profit, and it's not clear they were running out of money to run the network without sponsorship, but rather used it to set up new events like freenode live.
- teachingassist 5y agoYou use and buy things from corporations all the time, without knowing a single name or face behind it. 2021 hasn't changed that.
- GavinMcG 5y agoBut those are isolated transactions, and I can return a product to the store. We're talking about networks and communities here. Those aren't as interchangeable as things we buy.
- dannyw 5y agoThey're pretty interchangeable: "/topic We have moved to irc.alternate.server. Join us in #project".
- munificent 5y ago> without knowing a single name or face behind it. That's because we are ensconced in a framework of corporate and consumer protection laws that makes that generally safe to do and provides legal recourse when it isn't. Even so, fraud and bad experiences with businesses happen all the time.
- FractalHQ 5y agoMeanwhile Discord is one of the most commonly used platforms for young people, where everyone is an anime girl named after their favorite song. I wouldn’t be so sure about your assumption. Facebook is becoming increasingly known as an uncool boomer thing.
- pmlnr 5y agoOK, it looks like nobody understood my point, fascinating. Discord is a company. You can look it up, there are contact points - abuse, legal, etc. People who put their community there trust the entity running Discord. I'd prefer to trust someone I actually know, and with that, I'm fully on board with librachat, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't have a real, visible legal entity behind them. I was never talking about the community on top of a platform, but the platform itself.
- admax88q 5y agoIt's not how it works now. I think many were caught off guard by the legal setup of freenode that allowed it to be sold, including all the staff that resigned and founded Libera Chat. With that in mind, the lesson to take from that is to make sure the legal structure and ownership of the new service is more clearly documented and understood by everyone. At the very least the legal name of this new non-profit they have established should be clearly displayed on the web page somewhere.
- cpach 5y agoI’m not sure I follow. What do you mean by The Internet in this context...? Organizations such as ICANN and IETF are not exactly anonymous.
- politician 5y agoTrust is built over time. The same complaints exist even if they provided all of the information requested. “How do we know these people are really the real people that worked on freenode?” Etc. The solution here is trust neither freenode nor Libera.chat, but use them cautiously. Eventually one will implode and a more complete story will emerge.
- neatze 5y agoTrust is established through interactions (behavior) and not by; real names, titles, certifications, wealth, and location.
- lisper 5y ago> Trust is established ... not by; real names That's not true. The problem with anonymity or pseudonymity is that there is no way to trace bad behavior beyond the persona and back to the person behind it. A single person can even adopt multiple personas, some of which may be trustworthy, others not. The use of real names constrains this kind of gaming of the system and so makes trustworthiness easier and more reliable to establish. This is not to say that the costs of using real names outweighs the benefits. They may very well not. But to say that there are no benefits to using real names in terms of establishing trust is just wrong.
- neatze 5y agoIrrespective of real/fake name, behavior is most critical factor in trust, furthermore behavior changes, so interactions is your only information for degree of trust. Your real name is just label nothing more. Distrust is cognitively taxing, so naturally it is easier to simply trust subject(s) because of real name, title, etc ...
- GavinMcG 5y agoIt's also established by pointing to one's past behavior to demonstrate a track record of trustworthiness, of certain values, etc. If it turns out that Mark Zuckerberg is leading the charge, here, you'd be unhappy.
- neatze 5y agoIf new product/service is not lead by Mark Zuckerberg you should not trust it ether, since you have no track record, furthermore past performance is not guarantee of future results.
- sdevonoes 5y agoTrust has nothing to do with names, contact page or impressum. The other way around also works (e.g., Facebook has all the impressum and contact pages you want, but it's the least trustful tech company out there).
- piokoch 5y agoThe Old Internet way, you knew people by their nicks. The only thing that mattered was what they are bringing to the table in terms of valuable input. Sex, race, nationality, education, believes, age, etc. were irrelevant. Asking someone for a "true name" was consider to be impolite if not offensive.
- owlbynight 5y agoYeah, I miss it a lot.
- cblconfederate 5y agoAnd species (nobody knows i m a dog)
- emptyparadise 5y agoI'd trust a dog (or any other furry community member) on the internet over an international corporation any day of the week.
- andai 5y agotfw my dog is a member of the furry community
- bwindels 5y agoHackles [1], is that you? 1: http://www.hackles.org/ http://www.hackles.org/
- cblconfederate 5y agoWe are Legion
- TrispusAttucks 5y agoThe golden era. When the only identity that mattered was your username and behavior.
- CaptArmchair 5y agofwiw: the privacy page states that it's a non-profit under Swedish Law, mentions the GDPR, sets terms regarding your personal data which ought to be aligned with the GDPR and refers to the Swedish Authority for Private Protection if you want to file a formal complaint. It's odd to only get a mail address - policy at libera dot chat - and no further formal contact information of the non-profit as a legal entity in Sweden. I suppose you could try an inquiry via the Swedish tax office asking them for a formal statement from the public record. I don't know any Swedish but I suppose there might be a search engine which lists public information about non-profits? Even so, there are other hints: the footer features a link to a Github organization where you can easily track development in the open. Of course, that still doesn't give the project a clear, identifiable "face" or formal point of contact. Other commenters argue "anonymity is how Freenode got big, and how the Internet used to work and that's perfectly fine since it fosters trust." I think this only holds so much water today. It's not about a relationship between users of a service which provides the affordances to hide behind an anonymous handle. This is about the relationship between users and the operators of a service. You trust that an operator "won't do harm" when you log onto their service. Such trust is tenuous at best if the decade has demonstrated. Legal frameworks such as the GDPR and privacy laws exist for the exact purpose of protecting users, and creating a legal liability on the part of all too zealous operators of services. Moreover, the GDPR framework actively tries to de-incentivize gathering and storing any personal data which can be tracked to identifiable individuals without due cause. Testing Libera Chat's trustworthiness would be, theoretically, as easy as sending a formal subject access request under the GDPR rules to the listed mail address. Now, I'm aware that all of this are round about ways of figuring out whether this service is legit. It would help if their website just listed formal contact and legal details that identify the legal entity which can be held liable. Then there's Freenode Ltd which is a UK company. Since Brexit, the GDPR doesn't apply. Given the latest publicly published updates, I don't feel similarly confident about the credibility of any statements regarding the safeguarding of personal data, nor backed by a similarly strong legal framework as far as my own rights go (I'm not acquainted with British privacy laws).
- freeone3000 5y agoWhat personal data are you actually sending to the IRC server? They can associate your IP with your Nick, and that's... It. I suppose chat logs are also your data? And the results of the port scans, if those are saved? But this seems honestly less than what the average website visit sends out
- blibble 5y agoafter the disgusting harassment their staff received a few years back I can understand not wanting their realnames anywhere ("freenodegate")
- sdevonoes 5y agoIf I were the author of this project I wouldn't like to share my name just like that. I don't know, perhaps it's just me, but what's wrong with this?
- smarx007 5y agoHow do you expect me to accept a privacy policy of your website if two parties are not identified? Every legal(-looking) document begins by identifying the parties (not necessarily names, though a quick lookup on https://www.allabolag.se https://www.allabolag.se will get you the names of the directors). Also, https://gdpr-info.eu/art-37-gdpr/ https://gdpr-info.eu/art-37-gdpr/, p. 7 requires DPO to be identified.
- boomboomsubban 5y agoP 7 says they need to publish the contact details, which presumably "You may also exercise your rights by contacting policy@libera.chat" fufills. Also, their privacy policy does begin by listing one of the parties as the Swedish nonprofit organization Libera Chat.
- smarx007 5y ago> which presumably "You may also exercise your rights by contacting policy@libera.chat" fufills. I guess you are right. > Swedish nonprofit organization Libera Chat Which could not be found in the national registry. Compare to https://www.kth.se/en/om/kontakt/kontakt-kth-1.1947 https://www.kth.se/en/om/kontakt/kontakt-kth-1.1947 which promptly resolves to https://www.allabolag.se/2021003054/kungliga-tekniska-hogskolan https://www.allabolag.se/2021003054/kungliga-tekniska-hogsko...
- boomboomsubban 5y agoThe registry is likely just standard bureaucracy, I think most of this has happened over the past week or so.
- rwmj 5y agoA year or two ago the Freenode admins were subjected to an intense and somewhat bizarre campaign against them where unsubstantiated and false claims about them were spammed into Freenode channels (also incredibly annoying for those of us trying to run free software through Freenode channels at the time). So I can kind of understand that they might want to remain anonymous.
- caf 5y agoPseudonymous, really. I mean, "Fuchs" for example means far more to me than whatever the name on their drivers license is. Typically the only time I find out someone's real name on IRC is when their obituary gets posted!
- fennecfoxen 5y agoRIP lilo