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Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

blogs.opera.com

131–140 of 180 posts

Re: Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

#131
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the name of the ethereum JS library: https://github.com/ethereum/web3.js/ The idea is that cryptocurrencies will represent the 3rd wave of the internet after web 2.0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_2.0 Although Tim Berners lee tried to coin web 3.0 as the semantic web but that's not really taken off as a concept.

Yet, the way Web 3.0 works in practice is with a browser extension (which Reborn basically integrated) that does http API calls to a centralized 3rd-party server. So while they market decentralization and trustlessness, they are one server-compromise away from getting fed a completely false view of Ethereum's blockchain state and losing all their funds. If that's an attempt on web 3.0, we might as well just skip stra…

You can use this with your own node without trusting any 3rd party server. Right now this takes some effort but projects like Ethereum 2.0 will enable running a self hosted trusted node on low power devices and even mobile phones via checkpoints. It's not a good idea to use today's capabilities to judge future use cases.

Re: Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

#132
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a small jump from blocking websites to blocking popular VPNs. I know two countries which block websites (Russia and Kazakhstan) and they either block or have plans to block VPNs. I don’t see centralized VPN as effective solution for that problem.

How do you block a VPN though? Do you just constantly chase after their IP addresses? I mean Netflix and similar services do try but with not much luck really.

You use deep packet inspection to detect and block VPN protocols. Ask the Egyptian gov!

Re: Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

#133

Crypto's main issue is not the UX. It's the volatility and costs(i.e merchants pay less for the same crypto). Until these two issues are fixed it makes no sense to use crypto payments unless you are denied access to mainstream payment networks(visa/mastercard). The VPN should be integrated at the OS level not browser level.

These are non-issues in the long-term:

> cost

All currencies have an acquisition cost, usually in the low percents. Bitcoin is actually on the cheaper end these days at around 10-25 bps.

> volatility

Prices of things are reflections of the aggregate opinions of those things by everyone in the market. When prices are volatile, that means people's opinions of those things are volatile. And that's because those things have a lot of unknowns associated with them. As time goes on, and society observes the thing more and how it behaves in different circumstances, the better people will be able to predict the effect of future events, and the lower the volatility will be. In a thousand years, for example, when almost any possible event that could have happened to Bitcoin has happened, volatility could be near 0, and price will probably appreciate predictably with population growth.

Re: Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

#134
post #125

I don't like the term Web3 and I think a lot of people using the it are basically pushing snake oil. However, I really like the idea of eventually having client-side decrypted data, and censorship-resistant "torrent-like" distributed content. Whether cryptocurrencies must play a role in this or not remains to be seen.

Having the ability for users to pay granularly for their use of web infrastructure is a key requirement if we want to transition away from a model where big corporations with dubious motives pay for web infrastructure.

This is an interesting idea. Do you know of any good articles/books about it? I am interested in learning more.

Re: Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

#135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Crypto in this case is also being used as an authentication / password replacement system. Signing with your wallet address proves you are a specific person. So that alone is a great reason to include the wallet.

>> Signing with your wallet address proves you are a specific person. So that alone is a great reason to include the wallet. No, it doesn't. It just proves that you own/hold a private key. You need to build an identity protocol on top of that if you want to prove that you are a specific person/organization. Such protocols have been around for quite some time before crypto currencies. It's just they don't have a good…

I think they meant to say a specific "account" rather than getting into person-hood.

I have been wanting what the op describes for a long time - why do we have to "create" accounts? Why can't we simply tell the site our account with our request. For a dumb example, having "?publicKey=(key)" in the url. That way the site can know who we are and be able to link our profile, provable by our ability to sign using the private key, does away with login forms, does away with password recovery flow, does away with email single-point-of-failure, allows us to switch profiles easily, etc. It's mind-boggling that every site in the world rebuilds login logic.

Re: Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

#138
post #75
post #23

In addition to ad blocking, VPN is becoming a very important feature for modern web browsers. With so many countries blocking websites and websites geoblocking users it becomes necessary to help users circumvent that to access a wide web. This is kind of the whole point of web browsers, give access to world wide web, not local web. Interestingly, Opera trying to compete with other browsers makes it pursue users inter…

That used to be true before it was sold in 2016 to a Chinese conglomerate. As noted above, the Chinese removed VPN apps from the Apple app store, but they left this one. Which means it's compromised.

How does it conclusively mean that?

Re: Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

#139
post #23

In addition to ad blocking, VPN is becoming a very important feature for modern web browsers. With so many countries blocking websites and websites geoblocking users it becomes necessary to help users circumvent that to access a wide web. This is kind of the whole point of web browsers, give access to world wide web, not local web. Interestingly, Opera trying to compete with other browsers makes it pursue users inter…

This had me thinking. Since Cloudflare wants to provide free VPN. May be they should collaborate with Firefox and Offer a Browser with Cloudflare VPN / DNS by default?

Re: Reborn 3: Desktop browser with Web 3, faster VPN and ad blocker

#140
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's free then you are the product

"If it's free then you are the product" BINGO! http://crimeflare.net:83/cfs.html

Well, a free tier loss leader for paid services is much different than what people are generally referring to.
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