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Comment by Gys | Hacker News Reader

To most people (99% ?) Facebook, Instagram, Google etc offer everything they want. So they do not feel a need for getting the 'power back'.

It all comes down to perceived (!) value. Once people use one thing, they will only switch if something else offers a clear higher value. At that point offering the same value is not enough anymore. This higher value has to be something that makes every day life in a very obvious way a little better. I am afraid something abstract like 'more power' will not do the trick.

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Where the change will come is when we are no longer dependent on paying for network access. That will be the financial incentive.

A fully decentralized web would be delivered peer-to-peer via a mesh network or something similar. Anything else is a farce, because it's not just about who holds the data on the network, it's about the network itself. If any link in the chain of the communication can be controlled by some centralized power- it's not decentralized.

On a fully decentralized network, three things restricting freedom and privacy would be:

* the personal device used to (inter)connect, like malicious code hiding in firmware

* those controlling the power needed for the device

* those that can interfere with communication or alter data on the distributed network, either as a peer on the network, through malware/disruptive communication on the network, or those blocking communication

The problem with the decentralized web, though, is that when the web is fully free- if everyone stores part of the content from everyone else, then they could be storing things that are illegal and that they don't agree with. I personally don't want to participate in any network where I can't control what data is stored locally.

This won't happen anyway, because it's a classic collective choice problem. If all people put some alternative software on their WIFI router at the same time, this fully decentralized mesh web would come into existence at once in most densely populated areas in Europe and the US (all big cities at least), and almost everybody would have an immediate advantage from it. But if only a few people do it first, they'll have tremendous disadvantages from it due to freeriders, abuses, etc. So it won't happen ever.

I remember to have seen a protocol for such ad hoc mesh networks that wasn't even IP-based and could be implemented on most routers. The network can dynamically self-configure, route around failures, and nodes can go in and out of existence whenever they want. It looked pretty cool but unfortunately can't remember where I've seen it. :/

Are you thinking of cjdns?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cjdns

https://github.com/cjdelisle/cjdns

For me the following points come to mind reading something like this, which I think you also partly addressed:

1) Cloud hosting --> might as well use the centralized application because this is still centralized.

2) Peering your own hardware for a direct internet connection is not accessible to most people.

3) even in a p2p context, your PC or mobile device is not under your full control and especially in the US, most broadband goes through one of a small number of service providers (Comcast for example)

So I agree with you: network architecture is a major stumbling block.

On second thought, though, that still doesn't mean we shouldn't strive to create "decentralized" applications that are accessible to most average people somehow. I believe this is possible and without a huge upfront cost (besides time). They could still gain power through traction.

And as far as hosting content for others in a p2p context, I think part of the point of a scheme like that is you should never be able to know what you're hosting. It should be opaque encrypted blocks of data, right?

> Where the change will come is when we are no longer dependent on paying for network access.

When is that going to happen? All those routers, etc. don't run on fairy dust and the people that keep them serviced and running kind of enjoy doing things like being able to afford to eat, etc.

Even if you get rid of that part, you have to provide power to the devices and pay for a place to put them. Don't expect that a local telco's going to let you just slap a box on their pole rent-free. Any halfway savvy businessman is going to say "Good of humanity? That'll be $25/mo to put your box in my shop." unless there's some larger, provable benefit to him or herself.

> When is that going to happen?

It already happens/has happened with AMPRnet, HSMM, CUWiN, Freifunk, FunkFeuer, OpenWireless, Firetide, Guifi.net, Netsukuku, Ninux, Senceive, and others.

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

When higher levels of portable energy become safer and cheaper, then it would be more likely that a small radio could be used to transmit and receive over longer distances.

If a company like Google and Facebook were to provide free adequately high-speed internet access, there'd be less incentive for a free peer-based network wherever they provided free access. Google's free wired plan is lower speed and they didn't plan to expand it; however, I'm not sure about their plans for Wifi. Neither Facebook nor Google have stated they plan to provide access everywhere. So, free access via a peer-based network would remain an incentive over paid plans for the foreseeable future.

The public zeitgeist is finally catching up with the realisation that being entirely dependent on massive siloed community platforms is not entirely in the users’ best interests

I see zero evidence this happening.

If anything I see the public and businesses going the other way toward the cloud to avoid the hassle of IT. For the average person a PC is a broken piece of time consuming junk that accumulates malware.

Edit: There's another comment in this thread where someone brings up the hassle of IT as a major centralizing force. Best comment so far in this thread.

I see it in some places. For example, my sister now avoids facebook and instagram because she doesn't want pictures of her kids on those services. Unfortunately, none of the decentralized and distributed services are easy enough for her and the rest of the family to use without help.

And just because it's decentralized may not necessarily solve the problem of pictures of kids on those services. That problem could still be solved with a centralized photo sharing platform.

Indeed people have been saying this since AOL. This is a tired argument. Nobody is forced to use anything and you can still buy a domain and run your own Wordpress in like 15 min. Hell you can set up your own social network on Wordpress on your own domain in like 15 min.

Many computer users can do this, but most computer users can't. So most users don't have that choice.

Saying they don't have a choice is sorta disingenuous. Almost everyone was born with the required organs. Most of the tech has free alternatives and instruction exists in numerous freely accessible and easily digestible blog posts and YouTube videos. Saying the users have no choice in this matter is like saying a lot of users can't choose to vote because they're not registered and they don't know where the polls are.

Well, I certainly disagree. Technically you are correct. In a vacuum any person, even my own mother, could endeavor to learn these things and do them.

But when you put a person's life in to context, how do you expect a working mother of three to just learn the tools? What if she has the remotest of computer literacy? That is, she could operate Facebook but no more? Then is it reasonable to expect her to learn how to administer her own server? Can she choose to spend hours a week learning for months while her children need food to be prepared for them, clothes to be washed, and beds to be made? In a practical, not theoretical sense, does she really have that choice?

The example with voting feels disingenuous because voting is specifically designed to be accessible to every person. Learning bash and administering your own web server is absolutely not the same.

> What if she has the remotest of computer literacy? That is, she could operate Facebook but no more? Then is it reasonable to expect her to learn how to administer her own server?

She wouldn't have to, it's all about the money and the wish to be dependent or independent. There are web hosting as well as consulting companies that can setup private social network for one time fee, with automated backups and all.

To me, when I hear that some "computer illiterate" person "learns to use facebok" it kinda sounds reminiscent of hearing that someone learns to make crack from cocaine. Is it useful - maybe, is it good for society - eh I don't think so. I rather see them "learn" how to use sandstorm...

It requires time to even learn about how to search for a web hosting company.

Just the words "web hosting" are not in most peoples' vocabulary.

You are right that it's good to teach people computer literacy. But your belief that people can somehow spontaneously learn about web hosting is unrealistic.

People first need to experience something, then get some language for what it is and how it works, and only then can they begin to seek out education about how to learn how to reconstruct it for themselves.

Providing turnkey decentralized application hosting is a way to allow people to first experience what it's like to deploy an application. By having that experience and doing it over and over they can start to have shared experiences around it, from which they will learn language about what it is. Only at that point can they start to learn how it actually works and what it might be like to do it in a different way.

I also think there is a generational component to this as well. You have an age group who don't know an internet prior to this centralization grab. So there is not much in the way of a standard of comparison for them.

Right. Probably the only way newer generations who've grown up in this context will come to embrace an alternative is if it at least looks like the centralized apps (on the centralized platforms) they're used to.

So you have to create a system that's decentralized and yet has the interface of a centralized application and which is distributed on centralized, mostly monopolized platforms.

So that's certainly an undertaking... but not necessarily impossible.

I completely agree, its definitely not impossible. I think just awareness would build some momentum.

That also explains to libertarians why people like "The State". They don't necessarily feel they need to decentralize everything. But the real reason is, it just hasn't become convenient yet. One day, each community will run its own open-source software that will manage local taxes and services without having to wait for Big Government to do it.

The trend in private (as in commercial, non profit etc) internet is exactly opposite. Why do you expect the public (as in state) to be different?

Because as I said, trends are largely a function of available technology. There is a reason we put up with long DMV lines and mailed everything with USPS, until the web eventually moves all that stuff online.

You mention Google which is a search machine to gazillions of websites. Surely people actually want to be able to visit those sites!

Google has been much more than "a search machine" for a long time now. I assume they were referring to Google Docs, Google+, etc.

It seems reasonable to me that indexing and search could be decentralized just as well as the documents themselves.

> they will only switch if something else offers a clear higher value

No, that's not how it works. Sure, perceived value is important, but that's not where it starts. For people to switch to something else they need to find out about it first, and to find out about it somebody has to promote it to them. And how do you get people to promote it? You need an incentive, you need to find some way to make it worth for people to promote the software and of course it has to have a value for users to use it too.

Torrent sites, for example, benefited from promoting torrent technology.

> For people to switch to something else they need to find out about it first, and to find out about it somebody has to promote it to them

The perceived higher value itself is the incentive that will make people tell other people about it. People like to share things they really like or dislike. It gives them something to talk about ;-)

No, not really. To tell each other they first need to find out about it too and not just find out, but also try to use it. You can benefit from this, of course, but it cannot be a force moving product until it reaches some critical mass.

I was talking more in general.

You seem to talk about building a platform to replace Facebook, Snapchat, Google and others like them ? Good luck ;-)

Snapchat made it by offering easier photo options before Facebook did. Whatsapp did the same with messaging. Maybe some startup will make it with VR before the others do. But 'more power' and 'decentralized' will simply not do.

> To most people (99% ?) Facebook, Instagram, Google etc offer everything they want.

This is the classic "If I asked people what they wanted, they would've asked for a faster horse" thinking.

There are lots of things people want that Google, Instagram, etc don't offer them. Most people just don't think they're allowed to ask. I know many people who want a better job, people who want to be able to stop living on the street, people who want to eat better, people who want political representation they believe in.

Health, career mobility, and an end to poverty, and good reprentation are maybe acceptable outcomes for specific businesses. But overall the world of business owners is hurt by those things. Sick people spend more money to treat their symptoms, people without job mobility work harder for less pay, poverty forces people to spend the same money over and over again, and corrupt officials can be controlled with bribes. These things are all great for the great core of businesses from Wal-Mart to Coca-Cola to the donut shops, strip clubs, and restaurants on your street.

The way that incentive plays out is complicated, and this is just a theory. I can't prove that there's any kind of permanent system there. But that's how it seems to me.

Decentralized systems don't have that incentive. Ethereum doesn't care how easy it is for employees to quit. Email servers don't care how sick people are.

That doesn't mean those system will necessarily be empowering... "Empowering to disempowered people" is a political aim, and if you want tools to support a political aim, they have to be designed and tested for that outcome. Unfortunately, even though the decentralized tools don't care about the cultural incentives, those of us who build tools on those decentralized platforms do, and we often recapitulate the same incentive systems that Google, Facebook, etc do.

BUT, the light in the end of this whole tunnel for me is that IF you can take "empowering disempowered" as a design goal, and IF you can find some space outside of the commercial incentives to design a tool on decentralized platforms that moves that dial, THEN that tool will actually embody those values, and because it is decentralized it will not be beholden to the standard cultural pressures, and that might actually make a difference.

To some extent this happens every day in in little corners of every product and service in the world. Employees do find ways to enact their values in the work, when they have a little bit of free energy after doing what their boss likes. In theory a decentralized toolset can replace the corporate structure that makes that employee beholden to the boss, making them beholden to algorithms of their choice instead. In theory one of those algorithms would be responsible for keeping them solvent. In theory that could free them up to spend a larger percentage of their time enacting their values. In theory that could create more economic value than doing what an (largely arbitrarily selected) supervisor thinks is right.

But that's a lot of theories.

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