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ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

zeronet.io

51–60 of 79 posts

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#51
post #3

Curious about using Tor for anonymity. Tor explicitly asks users not to use it for bittorrent for many reasons. So if I have a ZeroNet site serving a nice big video over bittorrent, does my visitors' using Tor for anonymity go against their best practices?

ZeroNet doesn't use bittorrent for file transfers. The bittorrent network is only used for the DHT to map site addresses to IP addresses (or TOR hidden service names).

File transfer is done over a service that ZeroNet runs on a particular port with its own protocol.

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#52

How do you account for content unavailability when a node shuts down/ runs slow?

All sites that viewed an existing site contain a copy of it and share the data. There is a "thundering herd" problem of multiple requesters for the site initially being distributed but once that's done then multiple nodes will have it and can seed it. The original site shutting down is no problem at that point.

IPFS shares the same problem and knowing when it's safe to shut down a node in both IPFS and ZeroNet is difficult.

Freenet solves this by having an insert of data sent directly to peers immediately. The site isn't stored on the inserting node. Once the insert is done it's safe to close the node and the content is still available.

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#53
post #7

Last time I used that project I was trying to migrate my wordpress to zeroNet and I failed because my wp-content/images is over 3Gb and ZeroNet website is (was?) limited to 100Mb. Has this changed, are they tools that migrate images to separate addresses and link them correctly in html files?

ZeroNet is better at dealing with such sites now but it's still problematic when a site grows past a threshold where requestors need to be prompted to increase the size. Nodes that are just seeding don't automatically seed the changed site since they don't respond to the size change request.

One way of dealing with it is to make the images "Optional content". This means they are not sent to requestors of the site immediately - they are requested only when specifically wanted. Users can choose to seed optional files - in which case they'll mirror them all - or they only seed the ones they've looked at. Optional files don't count towards site size limits.

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#54
post #13
post #7

Last time I used that project I was trying to migrate my wordpress to zeroNet and I failed because my wp-content/images is over 3Gb and ZeroNet website is (was?) limited to 100Mb. Has this changed, are they tools that migrate images to separate addresses and link them correctly in html files?

Shouldn't they combine it with IPFS for static content storage then? Or does IPFS have the same limitation?

I think IPFS would make a good backing store for ZeroNet. Rather than storing files on the filesystem of the user they could be stored in IPFS.

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#55
post #47

This is very similar to maidsafe. Except maidsafe pays you for hosting. Does this?

ZeroNet does not pay you for hosting. Maidsafe is more file storage, ZeroNet is more about distributed site sharing. ZeroNet could be implemented on top of Maidsafe but not vice versa. There's also the fact that ZeroNet works today, has been working for a year or two, whereas Maidsafe is still in test stages.

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#57

I can bet my 0.1000 bitcoins that news headlines will pop up soon as follows: "China bans ZeroNet" :) Wait & see...

There are other solutions being pushed in Hong Kong, called BlockStack. It looks very similar to ZeroNet

http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/economy/article/2113521/n...

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#58

How is this different than FreeNet?

FreeNet is a distributed key/value store. It can be used to store files by storing the contents of the file under a key that is the hash of the file content. Generally you operate on Freenet at the level of keys and values.

ZeroNet operates at the level of sites. Sites contain multiple files. Seeding of data happens at the site level.

You could implement ZeroNet on top of Freenet but implementing Freenet on top of ZeroNet wouldn't make much sense.

When inserting new data, Freenet pushes data out to nodes. ZeroNet pulls data from requestors. With Zeronet you can't disconnect your node until other nodes have a complete copy if you want the data to remain available. It is difficult to tell when it is safe to do this. With Freenet the data isn't stored on your own node, it is pushed out to other nodes when first inserting. When the insert completes you know you can safely turn off your node. The data remains available.

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#59
post #29

Interest in decentralized web solutions seem to be on the rise. I wonder why and if they have any real world benefits for me as a publisher? All the stated benefits are non-issues for me: * Uncensored I never been censored. * No hosting costs I serve hundreds of thousands of users per month for something like $20. * Always accessible Just like hosting costs, my downtime is negligible.

> I never been censored Have you never self-censored?

That would be a benefit to him as a publisher you are proposing he give up, in that context.

Re: ZeroNet: Decentralized websites using Bitcoin crypto and the BitTorrent network

#60
All these blockchain/decentralized projects remind me of my childhood. Everytime there was a new technology I built cool things just for the sake of doing something with this shiny new tech without actually having any real-world use case.
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