Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Creating a Backboneless Internet?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the tricky-part-is-finding-the-right-medium dept.

Peter Trepan asks: "The Internet is the best thing to happen to the free exchange of ideas since... well... maybe ever. But it can also be used as a tool for media control and universal surveillance, perhaps turning that benefit into a liability. Imagine, for instance, if Senator McCarthy had been able to steam open every letter in the United States. In the age of ubiquitous e-mail and filtering software, budding McCarthys are able and willing to do so. I Am Not A Network Professional, but it seems like all this potential for abuse depends upon bottlenecks at the level of ISPs and backbone providers. Is it possible to create an internet that relies instead on peer-to-peer connectivity? How would the hardware work? How would the information be passed? What would be the incentive for average people to buy into it if it meant they'd have to host someone else's packets on their hard drive? In short, what would have to be done to ensure that at least one internet remains completely free, anonymous, and democratized?"

2 of 370 comments (clear)

  1. How did this make it to the front page? by ltwally · · Score: 0, Flamebait
    Seriously, how did this make it to the front page. Not only does the poster obviously know very little about networking or computers in general (come on... "hosting someone else's packets on my hard drive ... eh.. that's retarded. hard drives are SLOW), but this idea is patently stupid. The originall gnutella was a great example of what would happen -- it would work just fine in small environments, but as the users scaled, the speed would actually decrease due to no centralised DNs et all.

    I most ignore the trolls about slashdot going to hell ... but this technologically infeasiable and outright rediculous idea should never have made it past the editors. Come'on guys, what is the deal?

    --



    /dev/random
  2. Re:You're on it baby.. by NoMoreNicksLeft · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    They aren't websites, for fuck's sake. Can you put up a slashdot on freenet, or anything else that requires two way communication? It's not HTTP, it's pretty much file-trading for html files. BIG DIFFERENCE.

    Oh, and they have this little usenet-like thing. Nice.