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> It also bans jailbreaking/rooting your device, and requires GooglePlay Services/IOS equivalent be installed to "prevent tampering". Regulatory capture at its

> It also bans jailbreaking/rooting your device, and requires GooglePlay Services/IOS equivalent be installed to "prevent tampering". Regulatory capture at its finest. Such a ruling gives Apple and Google a duopoly over the market. Maybe worse, it encourages the push of personal computers to be more mobile like (the fact that we treat phones as different from computers is already a silly concept). So when are we going to build a new internet? Anyone playing around with things like Reticulum? LoRA? Mesh networks?

forgetfreeman 8mo ago
A new internet to do what? What is the proposed goal of a new network?
- verisimi 8mo ago
  I would assume it would be not be regulated by government, so without constraints on age, restrictions on what you can do - you know, like reality. And I know that government attempts to regulate reality too, but if you drive at 35 where the limit is 30, or speak to someone dodgy to get some marijuana or whatever, and get away with these and other heinous crimes, you're good! The distinction really is whether you bake regulation into the technology or not. And it seems that technology is actually the new legal system. Or perhaps that should be the 'pre-legal system' as it won't allow you to do those things it determines as 'wrong'. Which is absolutely fine if you think government really does know best, or hell on earth for everyone else.
  - forgetfreeman 8mo ago
    The last 35 years have very vividly demonstrated that there needs to be some adults in the room. Without exception every major tech company has implemented practices so overtly hostile to the userbase that the government has been more or less forced to get involved, mostly in the form of fines that have done very little to disincentivize whatever problematic bullshit the company in question was originally caught at. Suggesting that even less regulation would somehow magically cause tech firms to align goals with their userbase seems baseless to say the least.
    - verisimi 8mo ago
      You seem to think that government and corporations are on opposing sides. I don't think this is the case. Governments want the data corporations collect. Both are encouraging the other. There are no adults in the room. Having (corporate or government) children in control of that every individual's private information won't help.
      - forgetfreeman 8mo ago
        I assure you I think no such thing. I am painfully aware of legislative capture. Proposing an environment where we go from shitty, poorly enforced regulation to none at all solves nothing. It's also worth pointing out that government performing poorly is an indictment of the individuals elected to govern, not the concept of governance.
- godelski 8mo ago
  The internet is a global communication system. So to do what? To do exactly that. The difference though is that it isn't controlled by anyone. It doesn't need to be, so no one needs to have that power, no one should have that power. A global communication system where conversations are private by default, just like they are online. The problem with the current system is that the information was just too free. You could just drop in on anyone's conversation, like it or not. People started hoarding that information and look what we got: surveillance capitalism. The system reinforces itself to watch you, to tell you what to do, what to think, not just what to buy. And the system just wants to keep growing, so it's just going to continue to do that more and more. Sure, there's some nice things we get for the loss of all our privacy, but it comes at the cost of your humanity. They'll be costs to this new system too. It won't be all rainbows and sunshine, but I think it'll be better than this gloomy smog ridden world we have now. We live in a time where it's actually possible to have a functioning world with no kings. Personally, I'm tired of them, aren't you?
  - forgetfreeman 8mo ago
    The infrastructure requirements around routing and switching equipment, transoceanic cables, and satellites mean someone not users has always been in control. Barring some form of anarcho-socialist mass movement around DIY long haul networking infrastructure this seems unavoidable. The problem with the current system is the intersection of human nature and capitalism. Individuals have willingly adopted technology that aggressively surveils them in exchange for notional convenience and by and large are blandly unconcerned with the implications thereof. This also seems unavoidable as long as data collection and brokerage is permitted and profitable, and people value entertainment over critical thinking. This outcome was very accurately predicted by netizens when online advertisements first started popping up and a lot of time was spent wargaming what would happen if mass adoption lead to the net being a viable sales and marketing target. After 35 years of observation I've had about enough of global communications systems and everything that comes from them. At this point there is very little one could say to convince me that the internet hasn't been one of our species largest fuckups.
    - alisadev 8mo ago
freakynit 8mo ago
"Anyone playing around with things like Reticulum? LoRA? Mesh networks?" I'm curious about the 'day after' scenario: what's the move if the state decides to regulate these into "illegality" because they bypass official channels? We have to remember that the devices aren't the problem... the real hurdle is the bureaucratic gatekeeping of communication. The problem are people, not devices.
- godelski 8mo ago
  It could be a difficult battle for them to fight. We'd just have to make it too costly. Make them go hunt down all the relays. Scatter them everywhere. A $5 ESP32 isn't a good relay but they still have to hunt it down and that'll cost a lot more than $5. So the answer is the same as any war: you make it too expensive to keep fighting. It's the same reason a bunch of barely trained people in the desert won a war against a force with far greater military power. It's the same reason a bunch of jungle people defeated the country that just won a world war. It's also the same reason a bunch of rednecks defeated the largest military in the world (at the time) and were able to create an even larger empire. It's not hard to make them give up. It's going to be a cat and mouse game but it already is
  - theodric 8mo ago
    I appreciate what you're trying to say, but here's a counter-example: .22lr ammunition is also extremely inexpensive per unit, but I can't buy that at all in Ireland without extensive, recurring background checks and a demonstrated continuing need for access. If a government decides you don't get to have something, they are well within their power to effectively eliminate it. I can no more make an ESP32 at home than ammunition. I reckon it's harder, in fact. [To the government Cornholio reading this and panicking because I mentioned a gun thing: no, I'm not threatening you.]
    - leoedin 8mo ago
      As long as there's a country willing to build and sell ESP32s, I think it would be fairly easy to get hold of them. How does a customs agent distinguish between an ESP32 and another microcontroller? These things are in every gadget. Is a government really going to ban all electronics? Just look at how ineffective governments are at stopping drugs. If people are motivated to smuggle things, they will. Is there going to be a booming black market in ESP32s? Probably not. But will motivated people manage to import them? Almost certainly.
charcircuit 8mo ago
>regulatory capture It's not other operating systems fault that they failed to invest into security. They should try and catch up instead of blaming people for not trusting their security on "regulatory capture".
- godelski 8mo ago
  Buddy, you're on HN. No one is going to buy that bullshit here. Thanks for the laugh, but seriously, don't insult us like that again. We may be dumb, but not that dumb
  - deleted 8mo ago
    [deleted]
  - charcircuit 8mo ago
    Which is exactly why I have to advocate for it here. There are literally people on this website who think their operating is secure, but in actuality they are one curl | bash or npm install away from having all of their login credentials stolen. No matter how smart they think they are in being able to avoid malware, that strategy does not scale.
    - sfdlkj3jk342a 8mo ago
      Bubblewrap containers to keep all of my environments separate on my laptop works just fine without giving up control to Google.
    - account42 8mo ago
      You are also one lockpick away from having all valuables in your home stolen. So what?
      - charcircuit 8mo ago
        And if competitor locks were unpickable it wouldn't be regulatory capture to require unpickable locks for people to store valuables in a home. Just because people got away with bad locks for many years, that doesn't mean we have to accept that level of security.
ndsipa_pomu 8mo ago
> So when are we going to build a new internet? Finally, the year of IPFS. Government messing too much with the internet will end up pushing people to use more "dangerous" internets that are completely unregulated and that is surely the opposite of the the stated purpose to protect young people.
- Hizonner 8mo ago
  IPFS doesn't even try to do any kind of anonymity or censorship resistance. In a practical sense it's probably worse than BitTorrent, although neither one of them is up to the task. Actually resilient data distribution is hard, and I don't think there are any systems that have all the needed elements. ... and if you create one, they can, and it's starting to look like they will, outlaw using it, regardless of what you use it for.
  - ndsipa_pomu 8mo ago
    I should have said "I2P" instead of "IPFS".
mapt 8mo ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTnYVh7K6xQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTnYVh7K6xQ There are (to make up a number) ten desirable properties of the modern internet, and so far it's "Pick two", but novel combinations of the things you mentioned offer "Pick three" or possibly "Pick four" if adoption picks up. For text, phone, and even image communication in urban and suburban areas, it sounds like there's real promise here. But we're not going to achieve parity with a global fiber + datacenter network by any means. You don't need all ten to, say, organize a revolt.
- godelski 8mo ago
  Hell, I don't know why we don't just start building a guerrilla network around the Bay. Just start gluing repeaters to things. You could do LoRA like in that video but even WiFi has decent range. Maybe not in the km range but it's also a $5 device. And we don't need to limit ourselves to that cheap of stuff. We don't need to replace global fiber, we just need to demonstrate enough to inspire others. I'd be perfectly happy if we got just an old web text only system up. Honestly, would be a lot easier if we could get encryption rules lifted from HAM operations. That's what's needed for long range, even if we won't get the high data rates. We don't need a YouTube to make a difference

forgetfreeman 8mo ago

A new internet to do what? What is the proposed goal of a new network?

verisimi 8mo ago
I would assume it would be not be regulated by government, so without constraints on age, restrictions on what you can do - you know, like reality. And I know that government attempts to regulate reality too, but if you drive at 35 where the limit is 30, or speak to someone dodgy to get some marijuana or whatever, and get away with these and other heinous crimes, you're good! The distinction really is whether you bake regulation into the technology or not. And it seems that technology is actually the new legal system. Or perhaps that should be the 'pre-legal system' as it won't allow you to do those things it determines as 'wrong'. Which is absolutely fine if you think government really does know best, or hell on earth for everyone else.
- forgetfreeman 8mo ago
  The last 35 years have very vividly demonstrated that there needs to be some adults in the room. Without exception every major tech company has implemented practices so overtly hostile to the userbase that the government has been more or less forced to get involved, mostly in the form of fines that have done very little to disincentivize whatever problematic bullshit the company in question was originally caught at. Suggesting that even less regulation would somehow magically cause tech firms to align goals with their userbase seems baseless to say the least.
  - verisimi 8mo ago
    You seem to think that government and corporations are on opposing sides. I don't think this is the case. Governments want the data corporations collect. Both are encouraging the other. There are no adults in the room. Having (corporate or government) children in control of that every individual's private information won't help.
    - forgetfreeman 8mo ago
      I assure you I think no such thing. I am painfully aware of legislative capture. Proposing an environment where we go from shitty, poorly enforced regulation to none at all solves nothing. It's also worth pointing out that government performing poorly is an indictment of the individuals elected to govern, not the concept of governance.
godelski 8mo ago
The internet is a global communication system. So to do what? To do exactly that. The difference though is that it isn't controlled by anyone. It doesn't need to be, so no one needs to have that power, no one should have that power. A global communication system where conversations are private by default, just like they are online. The problem with the current system is that the information was just too free. You could just drop in on anyone's conversation, like it or not. People started hoarding that information and look what we got: surveillance capitalism. The system reinforces itself to watch you, to tell you what to do, what to think, not just what to buy. And the system just wants to keep growing, so it's just going to continue to do that more and more. Sure, there's some nice things we get for the loss of all our privacy, but it comes at the cost of your humanity. They'll be costs to this new system too. It won't be all rainbows and sunshine, but I think it'll be better than this gloomy smog ridden world we have now. We live in a time where it's actually possible to have a functioning world with no kings. Personally, I'm tired of them, aren't you?
- forgetfreeman 8mo ago
  The infrastructure requirements around routing and switching equipment, transoceanic cables, and satellites mean someone not users has always been in control. Barring some form of anarcho-socialist mass movement around DIY long haul networking infrastructure this seems unavoidable. The problem with the current system is the intersection of human nature and capitalism. Individuals have willingly adopted technology that aggressively surveils them in exchange for notional convenience and by and large are blandly unconcerned with the implications thereof. This also seems unavoidable as long as data collection and brokerage is permitted and profitable, and people value entertainment over critical thinking. This outcome was very accurately predicted by netizens when online advertisements first started popping up and a lot of time was spent wargaming what would happen if mass adoption lead to the net being a viable sales and marketing target. After 35 years of observation I've had about enough of global communications systems and everything that comes from them. At this point there is very little one could say to convince me that the internet hasn't been one of our species largest fuckups.
  - alisadev 8mo ago

freakynit 8mo ago

"Anyone playing around with things like Reticulum? LoRA? Mesh networks?" I'm curious about the 'day after' scenario: what's the move if the state decides to regulate these into "illegality" because they bypass official channels? We have to remember that the devices aren't the problem... the real hurdle is the bureaucratic gatekeeping of communication. The problem are people, not devices.

godelski 8mo ago
It could be a difficult battle for them to fight. We'd just have to make it too costly. Make them go hunt down all the relays. Scatter them everywhere. A $5 ESP32 isn't a good relay but they still have to hunt it down and that'll cost a lot more than $5. So the answer is the same as any war: you make it too expensive to keep fighting. It's the same reason a bunch of barely trained people in the desert won a war against a force with far greater military power. It's the same reason a bunch of jungle people defeated the country that just won a world war. It's also the same reason a bunch of rednecks defeated the largest military in the world (at the time) and were able to create an even larger empire. It's not hard to make them give up. It's going to be a cat and mouse game but it already is
- theodric 8mo ago
  I appreciate what you're trying to say, but here's a counter-example: .22lr ammunition is also extremely inexpensive per unit, but I can't buy that at all in Ireland without extensive, recurring background checks and a demonstrated continuing need for access. If a government decides you don't get to have something, they are well within their power to effectively eliminate it. I can no more make an ESP32 at home than ammunition. I reckon it's harder, in fact. [To the government Cornholio reading this and panicking because I mentioned a gun thing: no, I'm not threatening you.]
  - leoedin 8mo ago
    As long as there's a country willing to build and sell ESP32s, I think it would be fairly easy to get hold of them. How does a customs agent distinguish between an ESP32 and another microcontroller? These things are in every gadget. Is a government really going to ban all electronics? Just look at how ineffective governments are at stopping drugs. If people are motivated to smuggle things, they will. Is there going to be a booming black market in ESP32s? Probably not. But will motivated people manage to import them? Almost certainly.

charcircuit 8mo ago

>regulatory capture It's not other operating systems fault that they failed to invest into security. They should try and catch up instead of blaming people for not trusting their security on "regulatory capture".

godelski 8mo ago
Buddy, you're on HN. No one is going to buy that bullshit here. Thanks for the laugh, but seriously, don't insult us like that again. We may be dumb, but not that dumb
- deleted 8mo ago
  [deleted]
- charcircuit 8mo ago
  Which is exactly why I have to advocate for it here. There are literally people on this website who think their operating is secure, but in actuality they are one curl | bash or npm install away from having all of their login credentials stolen. No matter how smart they think they are in being able to avoid malware, that strategy does not scale.
  - sfdlkj3jk342a 8mo ago
    Bubblewrap containers to keep all of my environments separate on my laptop works just fine without giving up control to Google.
  - account42 8mo ago
    You are also one lockpick away from having all valuables in your home stolen. So what?
    - charcircuit 8mo ago
      And if competitor locks were unpickable it wouldn't be regulatory capture to require unpickable locks for people to store valuables in a home. Just because people got away with bad locks for many years, that doesn't mean we have to accept that level of security.

ndsipa_pomu 8mo ago

> So when are we going to build a new internet? Finally, the year of IPFS. Government messing too much with the internet will end up pushing people to use more "dangerous" internets that are completely unregulated and that is surely the opposite of the the stated purpose to protect young people.

Hizonner 8mo ago
IPFS doesn't even try to do any kind of anonymity or censorship resistance. In a practical sense it's probably worse than BitTorrent, although neither one of them is up to the task. Actually resilient data distribution is hard, and I don't think there are any systems that have all the needed elements. ... and if you create one, they can, and it's starting to look like they will, outlaw using it, regardless of what you use it for.
- ndsipa_pomu 8mo ago
  I should have said "I2P" instead of "IPFS".

mapt 8mo ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTnYVh7K6xQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTnYVh7K6xQ There are (to make up a number) ten desirable properties of the modern internet, and so far it's "Pick two", but novel combinations of the things you mentioned offer "Pick three" or possibly "Pick four" if adoption picks up. For text, phone, and even image communication in urban and suburban areas, it sounds like there's real promise here. But we're not going to achieve parity with a global fiber + datacenter network by any means. You don't need all ten to, say, organize a revolt.

godelski 8mo ago
Hell, I don't know why we don't just start building a guerrilla network around the Bay. Just start gluing repeaters to things. You could do LoRA like in that video but even WiFi has decent range. Maybe not in the km range but it's also a $5 device. And we don't need to limit ourselves to that cheap of stuff. We don't need to replace global fiber, we just need to demonstrate enough to inspire others. I'd be perfectly happy if we got just an old web text only system up. Honestly, would be a lot easier if we could get encryption rules lifted from HAM operations. That's what's needed for long range, even if we won't get the high data rates. We don't need a YouTube to make a difference