4 ms·

As far as I understand it, Freenet is exactly that. Participants offer a part of their harddrive as storage for the network, and content is distributed in an en

As far as I understand it, Freenet is exactly that. Participants offer a part of their harddrive as storage for the network, and content is distributed in an encrypted manner. Websites and other services can be (and are) build on top of this network.

superasn 15y ago
Right now there is not a lot of incentive for the "average" user to install Tor, Freenet or any other de-centralized to make such a network popular commonplace. But if pirated bay or other popular torrent sites started telling people that for direct downloads they can use this ONE particular software and assuming the software is easy to use (as compared to the fake Usenet software scams) a ton of people would download and install such software in a jiffy and when enough people do it (for whatever their reason be - free internet, file sharing, etc) we get a free internet developing side-by-side which the govt. can't seize. The software is free and anonymous (unlike Napster, Limewire which can be shutdown) and is easy to use for the avg. user. So while sharing files like uTorrent could be the main feature, it will also give options to add a local DNS resolver (that does not depend on the root servers), and a custom web server (to host mirrors of sites). I'm sure millions of people are running uTorrent but just imagine if those same people were running this software instead of it!
- pyre 15y ago
  The other question is how well some of those tools would scale if everyone were using them.
  - superasn 15y ago
    If it is a peer to peer network I believe it would get more robust as more people join in. Plus, if a ton of people are using it then it would reduce the bandwidth and load of each node if I understand correctly.
    - gravitronic 15y ago
      That is completely dependent on whether or not each person is consuming more than they are providing.
      - chakalakasp 15y ago
        Unlike with most torrent programs, Tor by default sets up as a client but not as an exit node. I don't know that I'd want to be an exit node for Tor, given some of the things that people use Tor for.
        icebraining 15y ago
        You can be a node without necessarily being an exit node.
- wisty 15y ago
  So, we should be secretly supporting SOPA?
  - superasn 15y ago
    Would you care to elaborate how this would support SOPA?
    - wisty 15y ago
      The more they crack down, the more "darknets" become popular, the pirates win and my newsfeed gets clogged with something else.
- ma2rten 15y ago
  I am in the Netherlands. As it so happens, the pirate bay actually told me a few days ago to install Tor or a private VPN, because my ISP would supposedly block them soon.

superasn 15y ago

Right now there is not a lot of incentive for the "average" user to install Tor, Freenet or any other de-centralized to make such a network popular commonplace. But if pirated bay or other popular torrent sites started telling people that for direct downloads they can use this ONE particular software and assuming the software is easy to use (as compared to the fake Usenet software scams) a ton of people would download and install such software in a jiffy and when enough people do it (for whatever their reason be - free internet, file sharing, etc) we get a free internet developing side-by-side which the govt. can't seize. The software is free and anonymous (unlike Napster, Limewire which can be shutdown) and is easy to use for the avg. user. So while sharing files like uTorrent could be the main feature, it will also give options to add a local DNS resolver (that does not depend on the root servers), and a custom web server (to host mirrors of sites). I'm sure millions of people are running uTorrent but just imagine if those same people were running this software instead of it!

pyre 15y ago
The other question is how well some of those tools would scale if everyone were using them.
- superasn 15y ago
  If it is a peer to peer network I believe it would get more robust as more people join in. Plus, if a ton of people are using it then it would reduce the bandwidth and load of each node if I understand correctly.
  - gravitronic 15y ago
    That is completely dependent on whether or not each person is consuming more than they are providing.
    - chakalakasp 15y ago
      Unlike with most torrent programs, Tor by default sets up as a client but not as an exit node. I don't know that I'd want to be an exit node for Tor, given some of the things that people use Tor for.
      - icebraining 15y ago
        You can be a node without necessarily being an exit node.
wisty 15y ago
So, we should be secretly supporting SOPA?
- superasn 15y ago
  Would you care to elaborate how this would support SOPA?
  - wisty 15y ago
    The more they crack down, the more "darknets" become popular, the pirates win and my newsfeed gets clogged with something else.
ma2rten 15y ago
I am in the Netherlands. As it so happens, the pirate bay actually told me a few days ago to install Tor or a private VPN, because my ISP would supposedly block them soon.