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Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

cabal.chat

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Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#171

Post by blast »

jv22222 wrote: post #125

For clarification: The 1st amendment ensures that the government may not stop you from saying what you want. This is a separate issue from private companies removing/banning you. Each company has their own right and freedom to be as dickish as they want with regard to deleting your account etc - but that is not related to the 1st.

Free speech and censorship are issues that go far beyond just the First Amendment. This has always been the case, and recent efforts to narrow the scope of the term are actually part of the battle to reduce free speech (and increase censorship) that's going on right in the culture now.

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#172

Post by fabianhjr »

revnode wrote: post #163
tonymet wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d like to address this, since it’s a common retort meant to shutdown discussion on censorship. It’s disingenuous , because “First amendment” is so essential to American culture, that it means both the literal First Amendment to the constitution AND more importantly, the American principle of free expression. Ether you are aware that people are appealing to free expression as a principle, or you are unaware that fre…

This. The companies are behaving in an un-American manner. What they are doing is deeply selfish and cynical. They should be criticized for their behavior and shamed for it. We should not excommunicate members of our society even if the things they say are reprehensible. And yes, the companies have a right to do it, but there are plenty of things you can do, but should nevertheless be shamed for doing.

> The companies are behaving in an un-American manner.

Those are transnational private companies. What is stopping others from claiming they have been behaving in an un-Chinese manner or an un-European manner or an un-Russian manner so far? How is a naive notion of nationalism of capital an argument of how such entities should behave when they operate in most recognized nations with different ideological and regulatory frameworks?

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#173

Post by eznzt »

ReactiveJelly wrote: post #128

Checked the FAQ. Downside: It doesn't support Tor and they don't seem to have any plan for that. So it's trusted-friends-only, IPs are always visible. Which is pointless for me, as a person trying to build healthy online friendships from behind Tor. Upside: I was afraid it's a reaction to Parler being deplatformed. And then I thought maybe it was a side-project of Urbit. But looking at the Values page: "No nazis, no…

> as a person trying to build healthy online friendships from behind Tor.

As someone who's spent a lot of time on Tor-related IRC channels and other communities, gl lol

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#174

Post by dang »

antris wrote: post #100
WClayFerguson wrote: post #96

I've developed a great social media system that's basically a centralized system, although I added Fediverse capability to it recently. It's here: https://quanta.wiki . I'm looking for a way to leverage Quanta's power on top of some kind of true peer-to-peer architecture to make it censorship resistant, because BigTech has just now gone nuclear in their censorship efforts. So I'm currently trying to find the right pe…

>BigTech has just now gone nuclear in their censorship efforts Who's being censored? Twitter, Facebook etc. are private platforms and they've been banning users who break their TOS throughout their histories.

This has been and is being discussed in so many HN threads right now that this is not a great place to re-rehearse the same flamewars. Let's not let the generic drown out the specific—that's the main thing that reduces intellectual curiosity on the site.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

(Yes, the GP comment started it by including flamebait, but it's not necessary to take the bait, and the guidelines ask everyone to resist that.)

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#175

Post by WClayFerguson »

antris wrote: post #133
dmerks wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I know, AWS is not an ISP-- it's a business, a bit like the one not selling cakes to homosexual individuals.

It's more akin to "no shirt no service". Parler can continue using Amazon if they moderate their platform, you can put on a shirt to get a cake. You cannot change your sexuality or skin color.

You can't moderate a platform if there's millions of people posting and only a handful of moderators.

Remember, AT&T is also incapable of stopping criminals from conspiring using text/telephone messages...and based on your logic the Feds could just shut down AT&T and blame AT&T for being "complicit". No obviously that's moronic. Wake up and stop giving our rights away. Eventually you're going to loose your own.

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#176

Post by antris »

dang wrote: post #174
antris wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>BigTech has just now gone nuclear in their censorship efforts Who's being censored? Twitter, Facebook etc. are private platforms and they've been banning users who break their TOS throughout their histories.

This has been and is being discussed in so many HN threads right now that this is not a great place to re-rehearse the same flamewars. Let's not let the generic drown out the specific—that's the main thing that reduces intellectual curiosity on the site. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html (Yes, the GP comment started it by including flameba…

Yeah, fair enough. I'm just worried about these kinds of statements going unchallenged.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_truth_effect

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#177

Post by astura »

jb775 wrote: post #127
antris wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having your message broadcasted through Twitter is not a human right or essential to your survival. Also, what kind of TOS would a water company have that you can break? This example is ridiculous.

Sorry, but since the water company is privately owned they can do whatever they please. If you don't like it, you can build your own water company. Thanks! ...now you know how it feels for anyone on the opposite side of your argument.

What? I have municipal water.

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#178

Post by londons_explore »

Network connections are getting faster... Peoples typing/reading speeds are not...

One day it will be feasible for someone's phone to receive all messages sent by every other person on earth. They can then try to decode every message till they find one that their private key can decode.

You've now made the perfect privacy messaging system - by sending all messages to all users, no quantity of network packet sniffing/timing analysis/evil nodes can figure out who is talking to who.

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#179

Post by revnode »

fabianhjr wrote: post #172
revnode wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. The companies are behaving in an un-American manner. What they are doing is deeply selfish and cynical. They should be criticized for their behavior and shamed for it. We should not excommunicate members of our society even if the things they say are reprehensible. And yes, the companies have a right to do it, but there are plenty of things you can do, but should nevertheless be shamed for doing.

> The companies are behaving in an un-American manner. Those are transnational private companies. What is stopping others from claiming they have been behaving in an un-Chinese manner or an un-European manner or an un-Russian manner so far? How is a naive notion of nationalism of capital an argument of how such entities should behave when they operate in most recognized nations with different ideological and regulato…

> Those are transnational private companies.

If you're going to sell your services and goods here, you need to comport to the cultural norms HERE.

> What is stopping others from claiming they have been behaving in an un-Chinese manner or an un-European manner or an un-Russian manner so far?

Nothing.

> How is a naive notion of nationalism of capital an argument of how such entities should behave when they operate in most recognized nations with different ideological and regulatory frameworks?

They can and do change business practices to fit the region.

Re: Cabal: A peer-to-peer, off-grid, community-first, hackable chat platform

#180

Post by londons_explore »

londons_explore wrote: post #178

Network connections are getting faster... Peoples typing/reading speeds are not... One day it will be feasible for someone's phone to receive all messages sent by every other person on earth. They can then try to decode every message till they find one that their private key can decode. You've now made the perfect privacy messaging system - by sending all messages to all users, no quantity of network packet sniffing/…

Thought experiment: There are 7e9 people on earth. Say they send 10, 100 byte messages per day, but that compresses 10x (modern text compression using big neural networks is amazing).

That works out to 7e11 bytes per day, or 8 Megabytes per second. That is nearly feasible today...

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