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Nothing guarantees that anything keeps serving files forever. BT at least distributes responsibility and allows anyone to easily keep the files hosted.

• ratsmack 12y ago
  I've often wondered if Freenet, or a similar encrypted network file system would be a viable solution. This, of course, requires a significant number of computers to contribute full time.
  • jsprogrammer 12y ago
    What's wrong with BT? It can operate encrypted and has the DHT to address/discover content.
  • wmf 12y ago
    AFAIK Freenet is basically a cache with no incentive system, so content will expire. There are some cryptocurrency-oriented storage projects but they all seem to be in way over their heads.
    • lmm 12y ago
      I think the fundamental economics for a cryptocurrency approach don't lean towards preserving obscure things that don't interest many people. Storage cost is always going to be proportional to the amount of data being stored, but income is always going to be proportional to the number of people who want the data.
    • pgeorgi 12y ago
      In Freenet content will expire unless it's accessed regularly. If you want to make sure your files are around, just poll them every other week (which may or may not be already supported by the software), which is a simple "proof of work" scheme: As long as you care, the files are reasonably safe to be around. When you (and everyone else) stops caring, they'll slowly disappear in favour of more popular stuff.