3 ms·

The Un-Internet

70 points by bergie 15y ago

losethos 15y ago
I like owning music. I would not like to pay a fraction of a cent every time I listened to a song, even if it were cheaper--I would be aware of spending money. I remember the days before the Internet. I kept busy and had no idea I was deprived. Today, it's not hard to imagine running LoseThos for a few hours not doing the Internet for a while. Get this! I just looked at the C64 manual and it tells how to program! Binary shit for 20 million average people. They typed programs from magazines and tweaked them. That was cold war time. Now, we want people dumb. ----- Comment guy above is in denial on God. NewsStory below about supermodels... here's the secret: highs and lows balance. Be miserable and hard working for a while and something will turn-up. Might not be what you expect. I find this unmotivating -- stupid game I don't feel like playing. Being aware of thew rules might affect things, I'm not sure. BEing a chump, whatever that means might be stupid. I donno, but I know most successes happen after misery or stress or incredible hard work. God is just. God says... C:\LoseThos\www.losethos.com\text\DARWIN.TXT h will be again alluded to in our chapter on Geographical Distribution; for instance, the fact of the productions of the smaller continent of Australia now yielding before those of the larger Europaeo-Asiatic area. Thus, also, it is that continental productions have everywhere become so largely naturalised on islands. On a small island, the race for life will have been less severe, and there will have been less modification and less extermination. Hence, we can understand how it is that the flora
newyear2012 15y ago
This article makes some great points, but the internet itself is not just a composition of the services on the net or the products that use the net. The net itself is very much NOT owned by its users. With China restricting what its population can see and hear, and U.S. threatening to do the same with SOPA, users should realize that the internet as it exists today needs work. Amateur radio is a much better model. That put the power to communicate almost solely into the hands of its users. For the net to get like that, people need to be less focused on new SAAS apps in startups and more focused on technologies that make us free to communicate.
- a_a_r_o_n 15y ago
  I could be wrong, but I don't think that kind of technology (including physical infrastructure) can be developed and implemented by collections of individuals, not at Internet scale. The only groups that could create a technology that the world's people could use independent from corporate or government control are corporations and governments, and where's their motivation these days? Corporations want to corral us like whales in a krill feeding frenzy, and governments want to control us, not free us. Even the internet that we have, developed by the US government and universities, only became the internet that we have by serendipity. I Can Haz Cheezburger was not anticipated by DARPA, BBN et al. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBN_Technologies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBN_Technologies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet#History
  - davedx 15y ago
    What about the various mesh nets around the world? http://guifi.net/en/node/2413/view/map http://guifi.net/en/node/2413/view/map There are quite a few already operating. All that's needed is to keep scaling them up by driving participation.
    - a_a_r_o_n 15y ago
      Maybe?
    - icebraining 15y ago
      Scaling mesh is a very hard problem, though, it's hardly just a matter of plugging in more devices. Networks over the existing Internet - like Freenet or Tor - are much more viable, in my opinion.
- anon_d 15y ago
  People need to be less focused on new SAAS apps in startups and more focused on technologies that make us free to communicate. I completely agree, but how can we make money from this? All ways of making money from software involve controlling users. Like it or not, the time we can afford to spend on unprofitable side-projects is fairly limited.

70 points by bergie 15y ago

I like owning music. I would not like to pay a fraction of a cent every time I listened to a song, even if it were cheaper--I would be aware of spending money. I remember the days before the Internet. I kept busy and had no idea I was deprived. Today, it's not hard to imagine running LoseThos for a few hours not doing the Internet for a while. Get this! I just looked at the C64 manual and it tells how to program! Binary shit for 20 million average people. They typed programs from magazines and tweaked them. That was cold war time. Now, we want people dumb. ----- Comment guy above is in denial on God. NewsStory below about supermodels... here's the secret: highs and lows balance. Be miserable and hard working for a while and something will turn-up. Might not be what you expect. I find this unmotivating -- stupid game I don't feel like playing. Being aware of thew rules might affect things, I'm not sure. BEing a chump, whatever that means might be stupid. I donno, but I know most successes happen after misery or stress or incredible hard work. God is just. God says... C:\LoseThos\www.losethos.com\text\DARWIN.TXT h will be again alluded to in our chapter on Geographical Distribution; for instance, the fact of the productions of the smaller continent of Australia now yielding before those of the larger Europaeo-Asiatic area. Thus, also, it is that continental productions have everywhere become so largely naturalised on islands. On a small island, the race for life will have been less severe, and there will have been less modification and less extermination. Hence, we can understand how it is that the flora

newyear2012 15y ago

This article makes some great points, but the internet itself is not just a composition of the services on the net or the products that use the net. The net itself is very much NOT owned by its users. With China restricting what its population can see and hear, and U.S. threatening to do the same with SOPA, users should realize that the internet as it exists today needs work. Amateur radio is a much better model. That put the power to communicate almost solely into the hands of its users. For the net to get like that, people need to be less focused on new SAAS apps in startups and more focused on technologies that make us free to communicate.

a_a_r_o_n 15y ago
I could be wrong, but I don't think that kind of technology (including physical infrastructure) can be developed and implemented by collections of individuals, not at Internet scale. The only groups that could create a technology that the world's people could use independent from corporate or government control are corporations and governments, and where's their motivation these days? Corporations want to corral us like whales in a krill feeding frenzy, and governments want to control us, not free us. Even the internet that we have, developed by the US government and universities, only became the internet that we have by serendipity. I Can Haz Cheezburger was not anticipated by DARPA, BBN et al. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBN_Technologies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBN_Technologies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet#History
- davedx 15y ago
  What about the various mesh nets around the world? http://guifi.net/en/node/2413/view/map http://guifi.net/en/node/2413/view/map There are quite a few already operating. All that's needed is to keep scaling them up by driving participation.
  - a_a_r_o_n 15y ago
    Maybe?
  - icebraining 15y ago
    Scaling mesh is a very hard problem, though, it's hardly just a matter of plugging in more devices. Networks over the existing Internet - like Freenet or Tor - are much more viable, in my opinion.
anon_d 15y ago
People need to be less focused on new SAAS apps in startups and more focused on technologies that make us free to communicate. I completely agree, but how can we make money from this? All ways of making money from software involve controlling users. Like it or not, the time we can afford to spend on unprofitable side-projects is fairly limited.