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Freenet Version 0.7 Release Candidate 1 Available
apostle5406 writes to mention that the "Freenet" project (a global peer-to-peer publishing network) has unveiled their first release candidate. "Freenet 0.7 is a ground-up rewrite of Freenet. The key user-facing feature in Freenet 0.7 is the ability to operate Freenet in a "darknet" mode, where your Freenet node will only talk to other Freenet users that you trust. This makes it much more difficult for an adversary to discover that you are using Freenet, let alone what you are doing with it. 0.7 also includes significant improvements to both security and performance."
Yes, it's faster. No, it's not fast, but it is usable.
There are some browser setting changes that help a lot; Freenet includes a Firefox profile with the appropriate changes for use when browsing Freenet. It won't ever be as fast as the web, but most freesites are quite usable. Plenty of people report success downloading largish files (isos, etc).
You'll want to leave your node connected for a while; it will get faster over the first few minutes / hours it's installed, and somewhat even after that, especially as your node begins to cache popular data. As always, having a fast network connection helps a lot.
Only the primary design goal of Freenet: make the people uploading and downloading the content anonymous! If you're using bittorrent, it's easy for the Bad People (government, isp, mafiaa) to tell what you're uploading and downloading. Not so with Freenet (it probably can be done, but it would take a *lot* of effort).
It is easy to tell that someone is running Freenet (still harder than bittorrent, though -- with everything encrypted and ports randomized, it requires traffic analysis). But it's hard to tell who's downloading or uploading what.
Browsing the svn (trunk) reveals that the answer is: yes it is still written in Java.
> Seems like the sort of place you'd use it would also be the sort of place where you could trust no one.
It's worse. There ain't no such thing as a 'darknet' to your ISP. If you are in the sort of place that needs Freenet you can be certain your ISP will report you to the government for using freenet. In the sort of places that need Freenet, possession of Freenet will get you shot. In places that having freenet won't get you shot the only people who will bother setting it up is pedophiles and others who are doing things that would get them imprisoned or shot.
These are hard facts. Yes it would be great if a critical mass of non illegal activity could get on Freenet to provide the chaff to provide cover for the occasional whistleblower who really needs it, but getting from here to there is all but impossible. Freenet will, by design, underperform a normal straight connection so there is a strong disincentive for legit content to use it. The only possible hope is if the *IAA goons drive piracy[1] far enough underground that the file traders adopt Freenet. But I really doubt Freenet in it's current form will be able to scale anywhere near large enough to handle the warez scene, especially in the age of full HD ripping we are hurtling towards. The limited size of the local data cache and cable/DSL upload speeds just won't suffer the inefficiencies involved.
[1] Yes, 'pirated' movies are illegal just like kiddieporn but as a practical matter they differ in one vital aspect. 90+% of Internet users currently trade movies, songs, etc. and thus would likely trade them on Freenet if Bittorrent becomes too dangerous, whereas few will currently install a freenet node due to the popular perception is that having one currently is tantamount to admitting being into, or at least a willing faciliator of kiddieporn.
Democrat delenda est
I don't know what index pages you managed to find, but the ones that are preconfigured in Freenet (as of about 6 months ago when I last tried it) were packed with links to government criticisms and a mix of stuff from Wikileaks and Project Gutenberg. The reason you keep getting modded down is that your claim is factually incorrect based on what I've seen.
I'll take your word for it that the nastier stuff is available, even if you have to go digging for it. That doesn't mean that Freenet's not potentially very useful, in exactly the same way the Internet itself is useful even when considering the bad elements.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
If you don't like darknet mode, don't use it. 0.7 has both darknet and opennet available.
There are lots of reasons why darknets are better, but if you'd rather use an opennet instead no one is stopping you. You can get to the network either way.
The first link from the Ultimate Freenet Index (one of the larger index sites) is to images of violence in Tibet.
Is that somehow not good enough for you?
Link (requires freenet to be installed and running.)