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Groups > comp.misc > #22054 > unrolled thread
| Started by | Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> |
|---|---|
| First post | 2022-07-21 01:41 +0000 |
| Last post | 2023-02-11 19:24 +0000 |
| Articles | 5 on this page of 65 — 15 participants |
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An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-07-21 01:41 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z959" <25B.Z959@nada.net> - 2022-07-20 22:22 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk not@telling.you.invalid (Computer Nerd Kev) - 2022-07-23 09:02 +1000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z959" <25B.Z959@nada.net> - 2022-07-23 00:15 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> - 2022-07-23 09:01 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z959" <25B.Z959@nada.net> - 2022-07-23 14:33 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> - 2022-07-25 19:18 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z959" <25B.Z959@nada.net> - 2022-07-25 23:15 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2022-07-23 11:39 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-02 17:14 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Rich <rich@example.invalid> - 2022-08-02 18:36 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2022-08-02 21:27 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-03 12:44 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2022-08-03 16:26 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Jan van den Broek <balglaas@dds.nl> - 2022-08-03 18:35 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Theo <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2022-08-03 22:26 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-13 14:51 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2022-08-04 09:17 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-14 12:47 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2022-08-14 14:17 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-14 14:01 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-13 14:42 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2022-08-13 21:25 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-14 14:22 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2022-08-14 18:00 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-14 18:13 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z969" <25B.Z969@noda.net> - 2022-08-16 12:14 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-16 18:15 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z969" <25B.Z969@noda.net> - 2022-08-16 20:51 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2022-08-17 08:02 +0100
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2022-08-17 20:12 -0300
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) - 2022-08-18 02:15 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk James Warren <jwwarren987@gmail.com> - 2022-09-05 19:50 -0300
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Rich <rich@example.invalid> - 2022-08-03 15:27 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) - 2022-07-23 13:23 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-02 17:31 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) - 2022-08-03 01:10 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z969" <25B.Z969@noda.net> - 2022-08-02 22:34 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-03 13:04 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z969" <25B.Z969@noda.net> - 2022-08-04 00:05 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-14 09:36 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) - 2022-08-05 23:40 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z969" <25B.Z969@noda.net> - 2022-08-05 22:12 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2022-08-06 02:40 -0300
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) - 2022-08-06 18:09 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-14 13:58 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) - 2022-08-14 17:22 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-16 18:58 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-16 19:10 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) - 2022-08-18 02:12 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) - 2022-08-18 02:11 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-23 08:35 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "voyager55" <voyager55@none.none> - 2022-07-23 17:13 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Bud Spencer <bud@campo.verano.it> - 2022-07-24 00:50 +0300
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "voyager55" <voyager55@none.none> - 2022-07-24 12:14 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Bud Spencer <bud@campo.verano.it> - 2022-07-25 03:18 +0300
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z959" <25B.Z959@nada.net> - 2022-07-24 22:26 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Bud Spencer <bud@campo.verano.it> - 2022-07-25 16:17 +0300
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z959" <25B.Z959@nada.net> - 2022-07-25 09:49 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Bud Spencer <bud@campo.verano.it> - 2022-07-25 17:09 +0300
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk "25B.Z959" <25B.Z959@nada.net> - 2022-07-25 23:01 -0400
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-03 12:02 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2022-08-14 15:09 +0000
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Y A <y000000000000@ya.ee> - 2023-02-11 08:13 -0800
Re: An open letter to Elon Musk Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> - 2023-02-11 19:24 +0000
Page 4 of 4 — ← Prev page 1 2 3 [4]
| From | "25B.Z959" <25B.Z959@nada.net> |
|---|---|
| Date | 2022-07-25 23:01 -0400 |
| Message-ID | <1PmdnSKjkNJgxUL_nZ2dnUU7-bGdnZ2d@earthlink.com> |
| In reply to | #22069 |
On 7/25/22 10:09 AM, Bud Spencer wrote: > On Mon, 25 Jul 2022, 25B.Z959 wrote: > >> On 7/25/22 9:17 AM, Bud Spencer wrote: >>> On Sun, 24 Jul 2022, 25B.Z959 wrote: >>> >>>> On 7/24/22 8:18 PM, Bud Spencer wrote: >>>>> On Sun, 24 Jul 2022, voyager55 wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> On 7/23/2022 5:50:29 PM, Bud Spencer wrote: >>>>>>> >>>>>>> On Sat, 23 Jul 2022, voyager55 wrote: >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Retroshare, an interesting chatroom/IM/Usenet/E-mail/p2p file >>>>>>>> sharing app, >>>>>>>> has the tech part on lock, but my time in their Usenet-esque >>>>>>>> section >>>>>>>> was rather unnerving. Actual-antisemitism (i.e. calls to 'finish >>>>>>>> the >>>>>>>> job'), bomb-making instructions, unhinged conspiracy theories and >>>>>>>> 'erotica' involving violence were just a handful of the topics >>>>>>>> represented. >>>>>>>> I'm not quite sure where the line is drawn, but "free speech for >>>>>>>> them too" >>>>>>>> meant Retroshare was philosophically consistent at the expense >>>>>>>> of making >>>>>>>> the community somewhere I'd never recommend to anyone else. A >>>>>>>> community >>>>>>>> that *can* become like that *will* become like that eventually. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Not sure you understand how RetroShare works ... It's not >>>>>>> ??community >>>>>>> ?? that >>>>>>> you walk into. RetroShare is just a decentralised secure >>>>>>> communication >>>>>>> thingie you can use with your friends and such. In order you get >>>>>>> that kind >>>>>>> >>>>>>> of content you described, YOU have to go to nodes that are >>>>>>> serving that >>>>>>> kind of content. Nothing to do with the RetroShare, really. >>>>>>> Everyone have >>>>>>> >>>>>>> their own nodes, you did too when you used it. Not sure how and >>>>>>> why you >>>>>>> ended up with such places ... and what is this "usenet-esque" >>>>>>> thing you >>>>>>> are talking about? >>>>>>> >>>>>>> From RetroShare website: >>>>>>> >>>>>>> How does it work? >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Retroshare allows you to create a network of computers (called >>>>>>> nodes). >>>>>>> Every user has it's own node. The exact location (the IP-address) >>>>>>> of nodes >>>>>>> >>>>>>> is only known to neighbor nodes. You invite a person to become a >>>>>>> neighbor >>>>>>> >>>>>>> by exchanging your Retroshare certificates with that person. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Links between nodes are authenticated using strong asymmetric >>>>>>> keys (PGP >>>>>>> format) and encrypted using Perfect Forward Secrecy (OpenSSL >>>>>>> implementation of TLS). >>>>>>> >>>>>>> On top of the network mesh, Retroshare provides services to >>>>>>> securely and >>>>>>> anonymously exchange data with other nodes in the network beyond >>>>>>> your own >>>>>>> >>>>>>> friends. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> --- >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Seems too nice to be true. What's the catch? >>>>>>> >>>>>>> There is no catch. Retroshare is provided free of charge and does >>>>>>> not >>>>>>> generate any kind of money. It is the result of hard work that is >>>>>>> only >>>>>>> driven by the goals of providing a tool to evade censorship. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> The only catch is that you will need to build your own network: >>>>>>> in order >>>>>>> to use Retroshare, you have to recruit friends and exchange >>>>>>> certificates >>>>>>> with them, or join an existing network of friends. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> --- >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Like it's said above "The only catch is that you will need to >>>>>>> build your >>>>>>> own network". >>>>>>> >>>>>>> ??? BUD ??? >>>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> I get how Retroshare works, and from a technical standpoint, I >>>>>> think it's >>>>>> fantastic. In practice, however, the exception you take to my >>>>>> experience does two >>>>>> things: it proves my point and reflects the difference between >>>>>> Retroshare and >>>>>> Twitter. >>>>>> >>>>>> When one starts up Retroshare for the first time and makes the >>>>>> certs and so >>>>>> forth, it's an empty slate. This reveals the problem Retroshare >>>>>> has with the >>>>>> network effect: while everyone uses Twitter because everyone uses >>>>>> Twitter, >>>>>> telling your friends "use Retroshare so we can make our own >>>>>> network" is an >>>>>> incredibly uphill battle that doesn't involve finding new people >>>>>> one doesn't >>>>>> already know. >>>>>> So, the go-to solution for growing one's network in order to >>>>>> engage in a >>>>>> community is to do what I did: do some Google searches and add >>>>>> random users who >>>>>> post their public keys on message boards and start growing the >>>>>> network. This is >>>>>> what I did, which led to the Newcomers Lobby I ended up joining, >>>>>> where people >>>>>> exchanged keys readily. I had nearly 200 people in my network at >>>>>> this point; many >>>>>> of them were unconnectable (one of Retroshare's issues is that >>>>>> it's extremely >>>>>> limited when users have CGNAT)...but I did have a pretty decent >>>>>> number of >>>>>> 'friends of friends' that yielded some actual chatrooms and some >>>>>> posts on the >>>>>> asynchronous one-to-many message boards (the "usenet-esque" >>>>>> function I >>>>>> described). It was at this point where I started encountering the >>>>>> content I >>>>>> described. >>>>>> >>>>>> Retroshare works when the goal is for an insular community to >>>>>> connect, but that's >>>>>> not creating new connections. Moreover, even when a set of users >>>>>> do what I did, >>>>>> communication isn't necessarily effective - message board replies >>>>>> may not >>>>>> replicate all the way back to the person to whom one replies. >>>>>> Usenet solves this >>>>>> with NNTP peering, but Retroshare has no similar mechanism beyond >>>>>> nodes that are >>>>>> functionally centralized. >>>>>> >>>>>> All of that being said, the point I was making about Retroshare is >>>>>> that the >>>>>> community that I stumbled into was the sort of community that most >>>>>> people would >>>>>> consider 'unwelcoming' at the very least. "Just disconnect from >>>>>> those nodes" >>>>>> becomes extremely difficult to implement on any kind of scale, >>>>>> especially due to >>>>>> how Retroshare handles replication through 2nd-order nodes. >>>>> >>>>> All the tings you describet above haven't anything but ones own >>>>> doing. Yet, you still kinda blame the means for your actions ... >>>>> peculiar might some say. I'm not one of those. I just say, meh. >>>>> >>>> >>>> ?The "tings you describet" he went into are quite relevant. >>>> >>>> ?Building Twitter/FB/IG replacements is a FORMIDIBLE task. >>>> ?As said, people sign up for these things because everybody >>>> ?else did so - they KNOW there will be a big 'community' >>>> ?to make things interesting - to see and be seen. >>>> >>>> ?Sorry, but at this juncture, if you value Free Speech/Ideas >>>> ?you CAN'T really build a new service - you have to seize >>>> ?control of the existing services. >>>> >>>> ?It does not require force of arms or a revolution - it >>>> ?requires MONEY, lots and lots of MONEY, and the WILL to >>>> ?change things. As much as 'conservatives' (rightfully) >>>> ?bitch I haven't seen them just BUYING these services >>>> ?even though the money IS out there. I think this is quite >>>> ?deliberate - in order to preserve a useful enemy. >>>> >>>> ?Machiavelli said that there is just no substitute for >>>> ?an Enemy Of The People ... and if there aren't any then >>>> ?you must INVENT/CULTIVATE such Enemies. THEN you can >>>> ?crusade against them, get vast public support and the >>>> ?power that goes with that AND the liberty to employ >>>> ?'emergency authority'. >>>> >>>> ?The politics of power hasn't changed in thousands >>>> ?of years. Machiavelli was mostly referencing Roman >>>> ?political wisdom - which was still employed in >>>> ?his day AND still in OUR day. Modern communications >>>> ?tech has slightly changed the look and feel of >>>> ?The Big Game, but the fundamentals do NOT change. >>>> ?Humans still have the same "buttons" to press and >>>> ?NEVER seem to catch on that they're being played. >>> >>> Sorry ... but your incoherent rambling doesn't make any sense ... WTF >>> you mean with "Humans still have the same "buttons" to press" >>> >>> Please elaborate, or am I just too fucking dumb? >> >> >> When (if) you went to school - did you ride in the >> big bus, or the short bus ? Study Machiavelli yourself. >> I'd recommend 'Discourses' over 'Prince' because the >> previous supplies the WHY for the latter. >> >> As for "buttons", try "The Technological Society" >> by Jaques Ellul, old but good. > > Yes. Yes. Done. Done. > > Try better. Yes ... you must Try Better. Then get back to us.
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| From | Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> |
|---|---|
| Date | 2022-08-03 12:02 +0000 |
| Message-ID | <OJaTIXdLfMEvK3Oc3@bongo-ra.co> |
| In reply to | #22062 |
On Sat, 23 Jul 2022 17:13:50 -0400
"voyager55" <voyager55@none.none> wrote:
> On 7/20/2022 9:41:45 PM, Spiros Bousbouras wrote:
[...]
> > An absolute concept of free speech is that if persons A and B want to
> > exchange views or information about whatever issue , no entity C (where
> > "entity" means individual or corporation or government) should be able to
> > prevent it. In other words , the decision should be entirely up to A and B
> > and noone else.
>
> I submit that this still exists, for the most part. E-mail is still mostly
> unaffected by this, and while both Microsoft and Google are likely to hand over a
> user's inbox to law enforcement whenever asked, they're unlikely to censor
> contents. The protocol itself has all the functionality you describe; it's
> decentralized and federated, and anyone can spin up a mail server if they so
> choose. There are also a number of chat applications that handle synchronous
> communication in a similar manner. Signal and Telegram have so far managed to
> hold up to some scrutiny, while Rocketchat and Mattermost and Matrix allow users
> to spin up their own chat servers and federate them as well.
>
> The statement above assumes one-to-one communication, while Twitter's claim to
> fame is one-to-many communication...and that's why the question arises with
> Twitter in a way that it doesn't with E-mail.
And usenet also allows one-to-many communication. I didn't say this in my
opening post but it is an important factor. One puts a message out there and
anyone can decide to read it or not , to propagate it or not. If a group of
people have already prearranged to communicate amongst themselves then yes ,
they can use email and they can also use encryption which makes censorship
harder.
> > There are physical limitations which make such absolute free speech
> > impossible and it may not even be desirable. But it is also very far from
> > a desirable level of free speech if a single entity , like Twitter , can
> > restrict people's ability to communicate with each other. Obviously
> > Twitter isn't the only form of online communication but my overall point
> > is that online discussion is too centralised at present , that this
> > centralisation negatively affects freedom of speech and plurality of
> > opinions therefore the right way forward is to give emphasis to more
> > decentralised methods of online discussion.
>
> Centralization also has its benefits, if we're going to be real about it. If it
> didn't, Gmail wouldn't be the default it is today. Ever try to solve an e-mail
> flow issue? User->Server->Filter->Internet- >Filter->Server->User, any one of
> those links can go wrong. They're worth having for the very reasons you specify,
> but we can't truly solve an issue if we're not honest about why it is chosen.
I don't see what this has to do with freedom of speech.
> Yes, Twitter brings censorship with it, but it also brings message amplification
> to it. Reddit does this as well. Though Reddit is admittedly susceptible to
> groupthink, lets users upvote/downvote and sort by those votes, allowing
> generally-more-desirable content to be sifted from the generally-less-desirable
> content, without actually censoring anyone (in principle, anyway). As much as I
> appreciate the true egalitarianism of Usenet, it is disingenuous to paint the
> algorithms at Twitter (and the more human one at Reddit) as completely without
> merit.
Reddit most definitely allows censorship including shadow banning which is a
very noxious form of censorship. I have read claims that while the "gamergate"
issue was "hot" , several people on reddit were shadow banned over their views.
With anything having to do with gamergate one gets great many contradictory
claims so I cannot vouch for that but reddit certainly allows for shadow banning.
I'm not sure who you think was being disingenuous since no one mentioned the
algorithms of twitter or reddit. The problem is that these algorithms are
controlled by a small group of people. Freedom of speech includes the right
for one to read what they deem important even if their assessment of what's
important disagrees with the assessments of the majority. Say you have an
online discussion community with 1,000,000 people and 999,999 of them think
that person A is a sage and person B is an idiot but there is one person C
who thinks that B says more worthwhile stuff than A ; C should still have the
ability to read B's messages. If the 999,999 people can use their preferences
to prevent C from reading B's posts (or make it very hard) , it goes against
freedom of speech regardless of what algorithms these 999,999 people use to
achieve that.
By the way , usenet is egalitarian only in certain respects. Among the
regulars in a group , there are certainly going to be people whose posts
carry a lot more weight (according to the opinions of other regulars) than
other people's posts. But the point is that on usenet everyone can make up
their own mind and cannot force it on other people.
> Your post and some random cryptocurrency spam have two different values.
> The relatively low user count of Usenet at the moment is pretty much the primary
> reason why your post wasn't bordered by a thousand crypto bot spam messages and
> the protocol makes it extremely difficult to solve this problem.
Why do you think that crypto bots would use the groups I posted in ?
> Retroshare, an interesting chatroom/IM/Usenet/E-mail/p2p file sharing app, has
> the tech part on lock, but my time in their Usenet-esque section was rather
> unnerving. Actual-antisemitism (i.e. calls to 'finish the job'), bomb-making
> instructions, unhinged conspiracy theories and 'erotica' involving violence were
> just a handful of the topics represented. I'm not quite sure where the line is
> drawn, but "free speech for them too" meant Retroshare was philosophically
> consistent at the expense of making the community somewhere I'd never recommend
> to anyone else. A community that *can* become like that *will* become like that
> eventually.
I don't see what point you're trying to make. You found some online discussion
which you found unnerving ? Well yes , for the vast majority of people there
will be plenty of dicussions they will find unnerving and also plenty of books ,
movies , etc. So ?
> > And as it turns out , there is such a method. Not only that but it is one
> > of the oldest forms of online dicussion : usenet !
> >
> > I will guess that you have already encountered usenet although perhaps not
> > recently. It is a lot less popular than what it was some decades ago but
> > it is still going strong. From the point of view of freedom of speech it
> > has many advantages over Twitter : it is decentralised , meaning a large
> > number of servers controlled by different entities instead of servers
> > ultimately controlled by a single entity which can command that this or
> > that should be censored. Usenet is based on open standards for which there
> > exist already a large number of implementations both of servers and
> > clients and also programming libraries for many programming languages. So
> > whether one wants to use a preexisting client or server or implement their
> > own , possibly one with a fancier interface , the possibilities are
> > limitless.
>
> Ironically, due to the aforementioned spam issue, something tells me that a
> successful Usenet renaissance would yield one of two related solutions.
I don't think anyone can predict how something as complicated as the online
discussion of millions of people will play out. Perhaps the majority will
gravitate towards some centralised solutions but it is still important for
the possibility to exist to do otherwise.
> The first variant would be something like Mimecast or Mailprotector - users would
> pay a company to implement spam filtering and 'good stuff prioritization'. This
> has some advantages, in that services could compete on the efficacy of their
> filtering solution, and also that users would have greater control over the
> algorithm while being able to say "show me everything" in a verifiable way.
Why couldn't users decide for themselves what they consider good stuff and
possibly rely on word of mouth ?
> The second variant would be something like Gmail: "Usenet access, complete with
> antispam and good stuff prioritization!" Which, Google Groups essentially is.
> This sort of solution would end up being Twitter with extra steps. If Google were
> to implement their Gmail filtering to their Usenet service, you're right next to
> censorship.
Only for people who rely exlusively on googlegroups.
> The last variant is what you talk about below: having a myriad of servers users
> can choose to subscribe to, and leave it up to the server ops to pick things to
> remove. I'll address this below the section...
>
>
> > You are a visionary so let me a suggest the following vision : every city
> > block in every city in every technologically advanced country will have at
> > least 1 usenet server operating. Note that the servers do not need any
> > special facilities , it could just as well be a server operating from
> > one's own home. It doesn't have to be a recent or powerful computer either
> > , an old computer which one has lying somewhere and remains unused , would
> > do the job just fine. The important thing is that all of these servers
> > would be operated by different people. So lets say someone does not want a
> > certain usenet group or messages on their server because they consider
> > them as too right wing or too left wing or too whatever wing or they feel
> > it's "hate speech" , etc. Not a problem. With so many servers the messages
> > would still get transmitted between the people who are interested in them
> > because there would be billions of different paths (passing through
> > servers) between clients a message could follow. Now *that's* freedom of
> > speech.
>
> I don't think the lack of NNTP services is truly a problem:
> https://www.reddit.com/r/usenet/wiki/providers/ For good or for ill, they don't
> censor much of anything. As many of the existing Usenet services cater primarily
> to binary downloads, the closest thing the existing companies seem to come to is
> to handle DMCA takedowns. A handful of individual newsgroups are moderated, but
> post removals on those aren't performed by server owners.
I don't know how much they censor but they still have the ability to do so. These
are too few companies which have too much power. As things are at present it
doesn't matter much because not many people use usenet anyway. But in a hypothetical
situation where usenet became a lot more popular , do you really consider it
acceptable for so few companies (or individuals or whatever) to be able to censor
so many people ?
> The sort of solution you're describing is either obscenely time consuming for
> humans to perform (there are over 110,000 existing newsgroups), or those server
> ops are stuck running a spam/content filter of their own and not letting end
> users weigh in.
There's no reason for a server to carry all those groups. In my idea of every
city block having at least one usenet server , I was thinking around the lines
that each server would carry a few hundred groups whose content the operator
of the server would be somewhat interested in.
> Philosophically, is the solution to censorship "lots of different
> censors to choose from"?
Philosophically it is "An absolute concept of free speech..." which I wrote
above and you quote. But practically there are physical limitations. A
government can decide to shut down the internet altogether. Or perhaps
someone manages to piss off enough people to a sufficient extent that they
break down his door and lynch him. Obviously there are many other possible
scenarios apart from such extremes. So practically one has to choose between
potential censors who operate independently from each other.
> Practically, can users on two federated servers have a
> meaningful discourse if either one of them has a server op who deletes one half
> of the conversation? We're back to the shadowbans of Twitter, but with two
> potential chokepoints.
And that's why we need as many servers as possible.
> > So where do you come in ? No , I'm not suggesting that you pay for all
> > those servers out of your own pocket. What you can do is express publicly
> > your interest and support for usenet. Coming from someone as well known as
> > you , this already will have a large positive impact. It may be that this
> > is all that is needed. The infrastructure already exists : there is news
> > client and news server software for the usual desktop operating systems ,
> > there exist both free and commercial servers running and more can be
> > created whether one is primarily motivated by profit or the desire to
> > offer a public service.
>
> I submit that there is plenty more that is needed. As you correctly point out,
> all of this is in place already. This very discourse proves that. Tweaknews has
> basically solved this. Their first party Usenetwire client is almost as simple to
> use as Facebook (though some folks lament its terrible formatting), and €2 gets a
> 10GB block, i.e. more data than one could ever use for text-based discourse in a
> lifetime. And yet, people aren't flocking to it.
Tweaknews is a usenet provider , right ? Do they do anything which many other
usenet providers do not do ? I mean I'm not sure why you mention this
particular provider. Anyway , perhaps people are not flocking to it because
they haven't heard of usenet or do not want to pay money.
> Usenet has different sets of issues than Twitter. Creating a new newsgroup seems
> more complicated than it needs to be, but paradoxically, there are many
> newsgroups that are redundant and likely could be consolidated. Similarly, there
> are swaths of abandoned newsgroups that haven't had a non-spam post since 2006,
> and there's the awkward discussion about what to do with newsgroups that have
> served their purpose (alt.windows95, anyone?).
Creating a new group in certain hierarchies (like the "big 8") has to follow
certain procedures but everyone with some technical knowledge , a fixed IP
and access to computer hardware which doesn't have to be particularly new or
powerful can run a NNTP server and create whatever groups they like. They
want to have a group on their server called my.cool.newsgroup ? I assume all
they have to do is edit an appropriate configuration file of their server
software. Now of course this doesn't mean that anyone else would be
interested in carrying my.cool.newsgroup but the choice would be there.
That's the key issue for freedom of speech : one has a choice what to write ,
what to read and what to propagate and neither the majority nor a few popular
or powerful players would be able to force their preferences on the rest.
> The ability to avoid censorship by changing one's username and e-mail is
> laudable, but it also means that genuinely bad behavior can't really be
> regulated.
Different people will generally have different ideas on what's "genuinely bad
behavior".
> Head over to alt.windows95 and look at the post from June 25,
> 2020...and let's try and figure out a solution for it. Deleting the post is
> censorship, banning the author is basically impossible, and leaving it up there
> validates the "why am I here" and "is this the upside to the absence of
> censorship" questions that a whole lot of people would have. You and I can 'just
> ignore it', but that's not a benefit to most people who would come by to look
> around.
I use free servers which do not have messages going that far back. If you give
me an ID for the message in question , I can look it up on al.howardknight.net .
Or perhaps you can reproduce a ROT13 version of (part of) the message.
> Twitter allows for pictures and GIFs to be part of posts, for good and for ill.
So does usenet , as attachments. I don't know how many newsreaders support it
but the standards certainly allow it. Creating usenet software which offers more
bells and whistles is one way usenet can be used for profit.
> Usenet is still inconsistent with Unicode.
In what way ?
> Usenet's asynchronous nature is helpful in that one needn't worry about missing a
> post from last week. However, imagine the Twitter Users who already have a
> tendency to mob and bandwagon getting infinite retention. It would make a flame
> war last longer than it needed to, only for someone new to scroll up a bit and
> restart the fire all over again. However, the paradox I find myself in as I write
> this is the functional gatekeeping that the implicit alternative ("don't let them
> on Usenet") recommends. I don't want to do that, but Usenet + Twitter Mob strikes
> me as the worst of both worlds.
For anything involving lots of people , one can imagine a million ways it can go
wrong. I can't really comment further on such theoretical possibilities. Anyone
can read or participate in a flame war as they please , the rest can filter it.
> The presence of different Usenet clients has its benefits, but is also a
> liability. Looking at Wikipedia's list of desktop Usenet clients, how many see a
> meaningful amount of active development?
Perhaps these clients already behave as their users want so no further
enhancements are needed ?
[ Stuff about the user interface of newsreaders. ]
The more popular usenet is , the more likely it is that newsreaders will
get the features you prefer. Again , that's an opportunity for making
money.
> Culturally, the handful of remaining Usenet post creators are of a particular
> breed. We're generally tech savvy and generally can have a discussion that runs
> its course and lets it sit. We can have a discussion over the course of days or
> weeks, and it's fine. We can handle the technical issues and slower pace. Modern
> social media and its users are unlikely to fit into such a culture, becoming a
> bit of a chicken-and-egg problem.
It's not as if all social media users are the same. Thoughtful discussions on
complicated issues generally benefit from a lower pace. Some will appreciate
this , some won't. The point is that even those who would appreciate it , may
not have heard of usenet at all. And the same person can post on social media
quick throwaway remarks and use usenet for more prolonged discussion.
[...]
> I addressed a lot of this already, but I submit that a grassroots return to
> Usenet is going to be difficult to execute. Even if a few sexy newsreaders and
> some additional servers were to be spun up, the differentiator you're proposing
> over just being another Highwinds node is the huge number of different
> moderators. That's what needs to be incentivized, which paradoxically, means
> providing a financial incentive to censorship...which Twitter already has. I'm
> all about giving Giganews some competition, but it's unclear how Usenet's
> problems are solved by the presence of more servers, and even if moderation was
> tied to servers, the problem has more to do with getting people dedicated to
> performing the moderation on a continuing basis. Bandwidth and server maintenance
> also play into the underlying question about how dedicated the grassroots sysops
> would be. Some would be a 'labor of love' for a retired person, sure, but if they
> get popular, it's a lot of work, and if they don't, it's work done in vain.
I don't see why it would be that much work or that it would need moderation on
"a continuing basis". I also don't see what the financial incentive to censorship
would be.
> > You could create a charity which runs news servers. Again , the main
> > advantage of such a thing would be the publicity caused by the association
> > with your name rather than having a few extra servers.
>
> Would the charities then be responsible for moderation the way grassroots servers
> are? It's unclear how that's helpful.
I said a charity (singular) created by Musk and it would be helpful because
"the main advantage of such a thing would be the publicity caused by the
association with your name rather than having a few extra servers."
> > None of the above suggestions would cost more than thousands of USD. A lot
> > cheaper than Twitter and they would do a lot more for freedom of speech. I
> > will admit though that if your main goal in the endeavour is to make
> > profit rather than enhance freedom of speech then a centralised medium
> > offers more opportunity.
>
> Although I agree with the statement expressly stated here, this goes all the way
> back to Musk being able to accomplish 99% of what you're talking about with a
> Mastodon fork, possibly with some volunteer moderators, and having a better
> experience for everyone in the process.
I doubt that when it comes to computer software there is anything which *everyone*
will find more pleasant. Beyond that , a detailed comparison between Mastodon
and usenet would be too much of a digression.
[...]
> I'm obviously not Elon Musk, and I do appreciate the fact that the problem is
> being considered by someone besides me. I like the idea of more servers, more
> grassroots servers, and even if there are occasional out-of-control flamewars, a
> renaissance of Usenet would be worthwhile. As IRC got extensions and successors
> in the form of Slack and Discord, so too could Usenet evolve in some way that
> brings the best aspects of Usenet (client/server, organized discussion threads,
> moderated/free-for-all choices, low bandwidth, asynchronous discussions with
> splinters, etc.) while mitigating the worst (spam, total absence of even
> light-touch moderation, no communities, no upvote/downvote system).
Some people would prefer total absence of moderation. But with millions of
servers , some servers (perhaps the majority) would have some moderation. The
point is for the users to have a lot of choice.
I don't know what you mean "no communities" .In the groups I frequent I get
a very strong sense of community. There are people who have been posting for
decades , sometimes daily if the group is busy enough. And what especially
warms my heart is that the community is formed totally voluntarily , there
is no one to enforce standards of behaviour but such standards still exist.
As for upvoting posts or threads , I don't see what benefit it has. Voting is
useful when a common course of action has to be chosen and it is very
unlikely that any amount of discussion will achieve consensus. But with
online discussions everyone can choose their own actions or at least they can
in the absence of centralised moderation. Someone thinks that thread A is
more interesting than thread B ? Fine , let them read thread A and ignore
thread B. Someone thinks that poster X is wise and poster Y is an idiot ?
Fine , let them read posts by X and filter those by Y. Someone else who
thinks otherwise can make different choices. I consider it especially bad if
the results of voting change the order posts in a single thread get presented
because it messes up the logical order of arguments and counterarguments or
of claims and corrections. I have come across at least one thread on
stackoverflow which became unreadable (to me) because of this. Online voting
also promotes a knee-jerk reaction , namely for someone to click a "like" or
"dislike" button instead of presenting to the world an argument or explanation.
In any case , upvoting can easily be incorporated in usenet thanks to its
open standards.
> I love the
> handful of folks like you and me who still check in, but I think that bringing
> the masses back here would ultimately be as much a fool's errand as buying
> Twitter.
--
Unfortunately this film has aged very well.
https://www.imdb.com/review/rw7324855/
Review of "They live"
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| From | Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> |
|---|---|
| Date | 2022-08-14 15:09 +0000 |
| Message-ID | <vJSDJfWxULAsN2KdB@bongo-ra.co> |
| In reply to | #22081 |
On Wed, 3 Aug 2022 12:02:28 -0000 (UTC) Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> wrote: > On Sat, 23 Jul 2022 17:13:50 -0400 > "voyager55" <voyager55@none.none> wrote: > > The sort of solution you're describing is either obscenely time consuming for > > humans to perform (there are over 110,000 existing newsgroups), or those server > > ops are stuck running a spam/content filter of their own and not letting end > > users weigh in. > > There's no reason for a server to carry all those groups. In my idea of every > city block having at least one usenet server , I was thinking around the lines > that each server would carry a few hundred groups whose content the operator > of the server would be somewhat interested in. With just a few hundred groups a server could also have unlimited retention. So I imagine an individual running a server like this throughout their lives and even passing it on to their children and grandchildren (with appropriate updates in hardware). Every post which isn't spam or illegal would be on the server indefinitely.
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| From | Y A <y000000000000@ya.ee> |
|---|---|
| Date | 2023-02-11 08:13 -0800 |
| Message-ID | <0beb0d54-9b61-43ee-955b-de998b56b4e1n@googlegroups.com> |
| In reply to | #22054 |
You don't know his e-mail address ? On Thursday, July 21, 2022 at 4:41:44 AM UTC+3, Spiros Bousbouras wrote: > Dear Mr. Musk, > > I have read in the news that you are (or were) interested in buying > Twitter in order to promote free speech. I applaud your goals , I care a > lot about free speech myself. But let me suggest that the operational > model of Twitter and free speech do not fit well together. > > An absolute concept of free speech is that if persons A and B want to > exchange views or information about whatever issue , no entity C (where > "entity" means individual or corporation or government) should be able to > prevent it. In other words , the decision should be entirely up to A and B > and noone else. > > There are physical limitations which make such absolute free speech > impossible and it may not even be desirable. But it is also very far from > a desirable level of free speech if a single entity , like Twitter , can > restrict people's ability to communicate with each other. Obviously > Twitter isn't the only form of online communication but my overall point > is that online discussion is too centralised at present , that this > centralisation negatively affects freedom of speech and plurality of > opinions therefore the right way forward is to give emphasis to more > decentralised methods of online discussion. > > And as it turns out , there is such a method. Not only that but it is one > of the oldest forms of online dicussion : usenet ! > > I will guess that you have already encountered usenet although perhaps not > recently. It is a lot less popular than what it was some decades ago but > it is still going strong. From the point of view of freedom of speech it > has many advantages over Twitter : it is decentralised , meaning a large > number of servers controlled by different entities instead of servers > ultimately controlled by a single entity which can command that this or > that should be censored. Usenet is based on open standards for which there > exist already a large number of implementations both of servers and > clients and also programming libraries for many programming languages. So > whether one wants to use a preexisting client or server or implement their > own , possibly one with a fancier interface , the possibilities are > limitless. > > You are a visionary so let me a suggest the following vision : every city > block in every city in every technologically advanced country will have at > least 1 usenet server operating. Note that the servers do not need any > special facilities , it could just as well be a server operating from > one's own home. It doesn't have to be a recent or powerful computer either > , an old computer which one has lying somewhere and remains unused , would > do the job just fine. The important thing is that all of these servers > would be operated by different people. So lets say someone does not want a > certain usenet group or messages on their server because they consider > them as too right wing or too left wing or too whatever wing or they feel > it's "hate speech" , etc. Not a problem. With so many servers the messages > would still get transmitted between the people who are interested in them > because there would be billions of different paths (passing through > servers) between clients a message could follow. Now *that's* freedom of > speech. > > So where do you come in ? No , I'm not suggesting that you pay for all > those servers out of your own pocket. What you can do is express publicly > your interest and support for usenet. Coming from someone as well known as > you , this already will have a large positive impact. It may be that this > is all that is needed. The infrastructure already exists : there is news > client and news server software for the usual desktop operating systems , > there exist both free and commercial servers running and more can be > created whether one is primarily motivated by profit or the desire to > offer a public service. > > If you want to go further than that , you can announce a public competition > for a new news client or a new news server with a prize for each of say > 20,000 USD. That's not to say that there is anything wrong with already > existing software but people get attracted to the new sexy thing and such > new software , with the attendant publicity , would be the new sexy thing. > I won't go into details of how such a competition could be run or what > criteria should be used to rank the entries because it would make this too > long and it would be a digression. The publicity would be more important > than the precise rules of the competition anyway. > > You could create a charity which runs news servers. Again , the main > advantage of such a thing would be the publicity caused by the association > with your name rather than having a few extra servers. > > None of the above suggestions would cost more than thousands of USD. A lot > cheaper than Twitter and they would do a lot more for freedom of speech. I > will admit though that if your main goal in the endeavour is to make > profit rather than enhance freedom of speech then a centralised medium > offers more opportunity. > > So these are my suggestions , I hope you will get to read them and give > them some thought. > > Finally , for your convenience here is a list of some usenet servers : > news.aioe.org , news.cyber23.de , news.eternal-september.org (requires > registration) , news2.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (read only). > > Best regards > Spiros Bousbouras
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| From | Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> |
|---|---|
| Date | 2023-02-11 19:24 +0000 |
| Message-ID | <fDjN2mxMjGrZibp6m@bongo-ra.co> |
| In reply to | #22665 |
On Sat, 11 Feb 2023 08:13:42 -0800 (PST) Y A <y000000000000@ya.ee> wrote: > You don't know his e-mail address ? No , I don't know his email address and it's besides the point anyway because my main motivation for starting the thread was to have public discussion on usenet.
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