I don't wanna brag but this is pretty much the premise behind my soon-to-be-published scifi novel:
A simple web we own
31–40 of 240 posts
Re: A simple web we own
#32The only way we own a web of our own is to develop much more of a culture of leaving smallish machines online all the time. Imagine something like Tor or BitTorrent, but everyone has a very simple way of running their own node for content hosting. That always-on device? To get critical mass, instead of just the nerds, you'd need it to ship with devices which are always-on, like routers/gateways, smart TV's. Then you'…
This is very right. There are two obstacles.
(1) Security. An always-on, externally accessible device will always be a target for breaking in. You want the device to be bulletproof, and to have defense in depth, so that breaking into one service does not affect anything else. Something like Proxmox that works on low-end hardware and is as easy to administer as a mobile phone would do. We are somehow far from this yet. A very limited thing like a static site may be made both easy and bulletproof though.
(2) Connectivity providers should allow that. Most home routers don't get a static IP, or even a globally routable IPv4 at all. Or even a stable IPv6. This complicates the DNS setup, and without DNS such resources are basically invisible.
From the pure resilience POV, it seems more important to keep control of your domain, and have an automated way to deploy your site / app on whatever new host, which is regularly tested. Then use free or cheap DNS and VM hosting of convenience. It takes some technical chops, but can likely be simplified and made relatively error-proof with a concerted effort.
Re: A simple web we own
#33The only way we own a web of our own is to develop much more of a culture of leaving smallish machines online all the time. Imagine something like Tor or BitTorrent, but everyone has a very simple way of running their own node for content hosting. That always-on device? To get critical mass, instead of just the nerds, you'd need it to ship with devices which are always-on, like routers/gateways, smart TV's. Then you'…
if only we all had a little device that was always on and and connected….
If I'm reading the implication right, you're having a pretty terrible idea. Glossing over what running a server would do to your battery, it would never work because of the routing issues you'll run into.
With IPv6 it would theoretically be possible, but currently with ipv4 and NATs everywhere, your website would almost never be reachable, even with fancy workarounds like dynDNS
Re: A simple web we own
#34The real barrier was never technical. It was convenience and discovery. Running a Pi at home is trivial for anyone on HN, but the moment you want people to actually find your stuff, you need DNS, a stable IP, and some way to not get buried under the noise.
Tailscale and similar overlay networks have made the "accessible from anywhere" part way easier than it used to be. The missing piece is still discovery. RSS was the closest we got to decentralized discovery, and we collectively let it rot. Maybe it's time to bring it back properly.
Re: A simple web we own
#35The real barrier was never technical. It was convenience and discovery. Running a Pi at home is trivial for anyone on HN, but the moment you want people to actually find your stuff, you need DNS, a stable IP, and some way to not get buried under the noise. Tailscale and similar overlay networks have made the "accessible from anywhere" part way easier than it used to be. The missing piece is still discovery. RSS was t…
What does “bringing (RSS) back properly” entail in your eyes?
It’s still alive. Many sites still use it. Many people still subscribe to those sites. RSS reader apps are still being created to this day.
Re: A simple web we own
#36I agree with owning the network devices, and lack of control here is a problem that still has solutions.
And self-hosting personal services makes sense and we're able to do that.
BUT, we don't own the connections. There's always going to be shared infrastructure for connecting these devices worldwide, and without an ideal state of Communism or utopian capitalism we're not going to own them or want to be responsible for them. Any kind of service that depends on a central database is not going to be communally owned.
Ownership is an economic problem, the technical aspect is merely interesting. Bitcoin might be a great example of this.
Re: A simple web we own
#37As the author of a content management system I made with the idea to democratize internet content creation, I've had a lot of the same thoughts that the author brings up here. I've always thought that even learning Markdown was a bridge to far when it comes to empowering non-technical users however. In my experience it's best just to supply tooling similar to Word where you have buttons for things like lists and bold…
> supply tooling similar to Word
just fyi, Word still has Save As -> Web Page (.htm). For a blog post or newsletter type thing i bet it works just fine.
Re: A simple web we own
#38> I publish this site via GitHub Pages service for public Internet access A whole post about not needing big corporations to publish things online, and then they use Microsoft to publish this thing online...
There's a whole meme subgenre dedicated to this type of argument. Search for "Yet you participate in society, curious!"
Re: A simple web we own
#39> I publish this site via GitHub Pages service for public Internet access A whole post about not needing big corporations to publish things online, and then they use Microsoft to publish this thing online...
Yes, but that person owns their website, its content, and the address it lives at. They can publish anything they want, in any format they want. Hosting on GitHub is merely a convenience; they can up and leave anytime.
in this case, they're on a github.io subdomain, which they don't own.
Re: A simple web we own
#40We got here iteratively..not all at once. So the path back...it's iterative. I shouldn't even say back. We're not going back. We have to go in a new direction. And again it's evolutionary. So ultimately a lot of these big systems and big tech companies aren't going anywhere and they will be integral to all infrastructure for the foreseeable future whether that be technical, financial or related to public services. But as individuals we can slowly shift some of our efforts elsewhere in ways that it might matter.
Here's my small contribution to that. https://github.com/micro/mu - an app platform without ads, algorithms or tracking.