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Covid-19’s impact on Tor

blog.torproject.org

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Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#51

Post by anigbrowl »

EamonnMR wrote: post #9
anigbrowl wrote: post #2

Why isn't there a public open-source fund to finance open projects (ie one to which the donors have no clue or control where the funds will eventually go; they're disbursed on the basis of how widely something is used)?

https://my.fsf.org/donate/ https://sfconservancy.org/donate/ https://www.apache.org/foundation/contributing.html https://opensource.org/donate https://www.linuxfoundation.org/about/donate/

The FSF's total assets are less than $2m. Apache's under $5m. I mean something with billion $ capitalization instead of peanuts.

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#52

Post by thaeli »

justnotworthit wrote: post #37
Renaud wrote: post #19

They are too dependent on government sponsorship. 80% of their funding comes from the US government in some shape. I would imagine that a project of that importance deserves to be able to be self-sufficient. A US$2M budget/year is not that much, (m|b)illionaires making their money from the Internet could easily sponsor the project. Better yet, having grass-root sponsorship is even more important. Maybe they need mark…

I work on a project depended upon and repeatedly promoted by Snowden (tweets) and less-than-public-figures-who-lives-depend-on-it (pastebins). We gave up writing grant proposals. After repeatedly pouring hours into crafting proposals exactly as specified, the big one (no plural) OTF (.gov funding) has never responded. The smaller, more informal ones aren't interested as well (no clue why). What little OTF money there…

What is the project? (I understand if you don't want to name it in this context, but I am curious.)

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#53

Post by anigbrowl »

jzb wrote: post #5
anigbrowl wrote: post #2

Why isn't there a public open-source fund to finance open projects (ie one to which the donors have no clue or control where the funds will eventually go; they're disbursed on the basis of how widely something is used)?

How many people or organizations are likely to donate to a random project they’ve no idea if it’s something they use or care about?

Promoting free software in general means giving up that kind of micromanagement/ control maximization.

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#54

Post by dillondoyle »

geofft wrote: post #44
dillondoyle wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's nowhere near that small. That's like a 4-6 person 501cX. Their 2019 revenue was 309 Million https://www.aclu.org/other/aclu-annual-report-2019

Did you mean this for the thread about the ACLU? The comment you're replying to is about Tor, which is much smaller.

oh yes i did! sorry... i had multiple tabs open. Now I'm actually surprised at the reverse that TOR had that many people on that small fo a budget

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#55

Post by mikeg8 »

Renaud wrote: post #32
mhuffman wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no tech company that is going to sponsor a browser that makes it harder for them to track customers.

Craigslist is a sponsor, so not all tech companies think that way.

Craigslist isn’t a tech company. It’s a website. Not trying to disrespect them as I’m sure they do some impressive stuff behind the scenes to handle scale, I just don't feel they’re innovating in a way to be called “tech”.

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#56

Post by roenxi »

duckMuppet wrote: post #46
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their current efforts are focused on getting lots of people released from jails and prisons, since they might catch COVID-19 if they're in jail.

Well it's far more important to have the ACLU working on advocacy and rights for LGBTQ+ where there are demonstrable acts of violence and systemic oppression rather than waste time hand holding individuals who think they should be able purchase an Arsenal of firearms and spread Covid by not obeying and respecting their fellow citizens through their non compliance. I'd say they are definitely where they need to be.. I…

So just quickly glancing at Wikipedia [0] it looks like most of the major line items for the LGBTQ+ agenda have been part of US Federal law for about 5+ years.

The LGBTQ+ community are basically ordinary people from all walks of life, including prominent names like Tim Cook and Pete Buttigieg. The community has I believe explicit public support from culture generating machines like Hollywood and political entities like the Democrat party. These aren't exactly wilting lilies in terms of power and influence.

It isn't obvious that supporting their liberties should take precedence over supporting anyone else's.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_in_the_United_Stat...

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#57

Post by anigbrowl »

burrows wrote: post #3
anigbrowl wrote: post #2

Why isn't there a public open-source fund to finance open projects (ie one to which the donors have no clue or control where the funds will eventually go; they're disbursed on the basis of how widely something is used)?

What does “public” mean in this context? And if you want this thing, why don’t you make it?

Public means non-profit and wholly transparent, explicitly dedicated to the creation and expansion of a software commons. It infuriates me that people who work on important projects like numpy or Tor which are very widely used have trouble paying the bills and keeping a roof over their head.

I don't make it because I don't work in the software industry and don't have access to large social or financial capital networks. That sounds a bit like asking why someone who proposes a public policy idea doesn't just run for President.

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#58

Post by mikeg8 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #51
EamonnMR wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://my.fsf.org/donate/ https://sfconservancy.org/donate/ https://www.apache.org/foundation/contributing.html https://opensource.org/donate https://www.linuxfoundation.org/about/donate/

The FSF's total assets are less than $2m. Apache's under $5m. I mean something with billion $ capitalization instead of peanuts.

Probably because the players who can amass a billion $ fund would rather put their money somewhere else. You're basically asking why is capitalism capitalism?

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#59

Post by geofft »

dmix wrote: post #50
geofft wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again - I disagree with the view that they "gave up" their values, and I don't want to live in a world where every political ideology needs its own non-profit, either. I think the ACLU can and should be an organization that defends the right to freedom of speech of everyone regardless of political affiliation. I'm arguing that their lawsuit in Charlottesville didn't actually serve the goals of protecting civil rights…

> Unite the Right wasn't primarily about speech, it was about violence This is easy to say with retrospect. How many other major protests in history would you have compromised had you known there would be violence? Any embedded provocateur could easily kill any protest. Any extremist portion of any political group, no matter how small, could kill the mainstream purpose of the wider legitimate group. I'd much rather w…

I think it was clear in advance of Unite the Right that many of the groups actively invited by the organizer were interested in violence. This wasn't embedded provocateurs or out-of-control extremists. Furthermore, Charlottesville didn't deny Unite the Right a permit - they just offered them a permit at a different location than what they wanted.

Obviously the organizer didn't go to court and say, "I would like the right to commit violence, can you please give me that right because free speech." But he did go to court and say "Me and my militia buddies who are hoping for a civil war and are bringing their guns would like to hold a rally at this crowded location where police can't keep things under control, and the city said that we can hold a rally at this less-crowded location instead, can we have our original location please?" and the ACLU defended that.

I think we're too far off-topic to argue about whether my view of Unite the Right is true or not - but I think I've set out a coherent position about principles (and, in particular, if my view is wrong on the facts, then I am in favor of the ACLU's support on principle.) I think you'll find that I am, in fact, opposed to most riots and do not believe there is an unalienable civil right to riot. I do believe in the right of people to protest even if there's a violent faction you can't do anything about. (And, in particular, I don't believe that information in retrospect about the violence of a given protest is relevant. I would still hold the same position if nobody had died or even been injured at Charlottesville, because of the information we knew beforehand. That is, my position rests on it the ACLU having been wrong at the time they filed the suit, not after the fact, which is a good part of why I don't think they've learned anything from it.)

Re: Covid-19’s impact on Tor

#60

Post by burrows »

samatman wrote: post #45
burrows wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does “public” mean in this context? And if you want this thing, why don’t you make it?

Everyone knows that there's a huge gap between wanting something to exist, and wanting something to exist, while having the expertise, time, resources, and will, to bring it into existence. Since you know this as well as I do, I want to ask: what is your motive in asking this question?

First, I dig your meditation on Forth and the Dao that won’t be named.

> what is your motive in asking this question?

To provoke OP into debugging me.

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