The Internet runs on free and open source software and so does the DNS
icann.org
Report: The Domain Name System Runs on Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) [pdf] https://itp.cdn.icann.org/en/files/security-and-stability-ad...
icann.org
That did exist with the likes of Tymnet and the various Online Services (AOL, CompuServe, etc). The Internet won out over those because it was open, as you alluded to. Internet adoption really exploded with unlimited services rather than ISPs that billed hourly.
It was truly a time to be alive, the 1980s and 1990s, if you were into technology. The change was interesting and quite rapid, lot of variety and experiments
> The CYCLADES network was the first to make the hosts responsible for the reliable delivery of data, rather than this being a centralized service of the network itself. Datagrams were exchanged on the network using transport protocols that do not guarantee reliable delivery, but only attempt best-effort [..] The experience with these concepts led to the design of key features of the Internet Protocol in the ARPANET project
Keeping with the theme of the thread, CYCLADES was destroyed because of greed:
> Data transmission was a state monopoly in France at the time, and IRIA needed a special dispensation to run the CYCLADES network. The PTT did not agree to funding by the government of a competitor to their Transpac network, and insisted that the permission and funding be rescinded. By 1981, Cyclades was forced to shut down.
> Rumors had persisted for years that the ARPANET had been built to protect national security in the face of a nuclear attack. It was a myth that had gone unchallenged long enough to become widely accepted as fact.
No, the Internet (inclusive of ARPANET, NSFNet, and so on) was not designed to survive a nuclear war. It's the worst kind of myth: One you can cite legitimate sources for, because it's been repeated long enough even semi-experts believe it.
The ARPANET was made to help researchers and to justify the cost of a mainframe computer:
> It's understandable how it could spread. Military communications during Nuclear War makes a more memorable story than designing a way to remote access what would become the first massively parallel computer, the ILLIAC IV. The funding and motivation for building ARPANET was partially to get this computer, once built, to be "online" in order to justify the cost of building it. This way more scientists could use the expensive machine.
> Later, in the 1970s, ARPA did emphasize the goal of "command and control". According to Stephen J. Lukasik, who was deputy director (1967–1970) and Director of DARPA (1970–1975):
> "The goal was to exploit new computer technologies to meet the needs of military command and control against nuclear threats, achieve survivable control of US nuclear forces, and improve military tactical and management decision making."
And in that same Wikipedia section there are 3-4 other people, including Herzfeld, who was the guy/director who authorized the actual starting of the project, who say otherwise:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET#Creation
Meanwhile you cherrypick 1-2 paragraphs at the end, while there are over a dozen that say the opposite. Note that Kukasik was later the director of DARPA, which had a completely different mandate that (no-D) ARPA.
Without IP protocols we probably would not even be born as a company. BBSes on analog modems or GSM data would be all we had.
France Telecom was privatised during the 1990s with the aquisition of the Orange Group, its current (commercial) branding.
The only Internet the common man interacted with is the one that began to flourish as the government relinquished control. The Internet since the mid-90s is and has been a purely commercial achievement.
Because it was new there weren't really thought out mechanism for people connecting early on, but some did.
There isn't a single person living on the planet that isn't touched and benefitted by this in some way, even remote island tribes we consider untouched, there is hardly a single ounce of space payload that doesn't have open source in it's causal chain.
There is no more pragmatically altruistic culture that has ever existed or impacted more people.
In the U.S. no culture has helped lift the impoverished out of poverty into the upper middle class through empowerment (ask any of us adults who were once kids going to bed hungry.)
People have their pet beliefs and metaphysics and ideological communities but "information deserves to be free" is the goat.
That seems a bit over the top. I'd love to see your causal chain for that claim.
My mother did remote tribal work in the brasilian interior, she grew up on the Amazon, I personally know well off Ruby devs who grew up unable to even read.
Whether you are against intervention or pro intervention, all across that spectrum, whatever your luxury belief may be, everyone is impacted by open-source.
Open source is an insane force multiplier, not just for production but for the entire training and r&d pipeline as well.
Apply this to the internet and essentials are FOSS. Linux, DNS and maybe RISCV someday will mean you can build computers and internet on essentials that are free to learn and use.
Learning to self-host and get off cloud services might be one of the most personally freeing feelings I've had in a long time.
Rent-seeking is obviously growing out of control and one of the most powerful ways to combat it is personal ownership (if possible).
You are living in imaginary land, nothing is free in todays society!
(I do realise you used euro, I just don't think we need to adjust our standards down, when our locality sucks.)
Nothing against Bind9, but it is almost exclusively maintained by the ISC, so the DNS's future used to depend heavily on the ISC getting the funding needed to continue operating.
When I was in Holland many years ago there was a university initiative to connect the whole town with it's own hobby network. I bought some directed antennae to connect, and it worked, but I seem to recall it was line-of-sight WiFi stuff and thus very limited range.
I also worked for an airline that had line-of-sight laser communications, but again it was only short distances.
Are there any modern alternatives that would make such a people sponsored/focused hobby network possible?
The first thought I had was long-wave radio, but I cant imagine there is much bandwidth there, but might be okay for a text only protocols?
This is surprising. I would have expected them to have custom needs with so many customers that using an off the shelf service would be sufficient.
Cloudflare also delivers a rather large portion of said public infrastructure free of charge. They also released a few of their own projects as FOSS, and regularly contribute.
Granted, the centralisation part worries me too, but it feels like a bit of a cheap shot against CF just because they are a large player.
You can go make your entire own alternative DNS system, with your own governance and policy. Free as you like. You just have to convince people to resolve against you.
Also, I really don't think controlling a domain name NFT in a system that's mostly computers you neither own nor control constitutes "more ownership" than the IRL law and contract bound rental world we currently live in. Especially if all the requirements and outcomes (payments for control resulting in land grabs of valuable names) are the same as our current system.
The throughput problem that poisons cryptocurrency becomes irrelevant when we're talking about something that's as naturally long-lived as domain names. Every domain blockchain can have its own gatekeeping process; one can sell names for thousands of $ each, and another can give away thousands for a $. They can require that domain owners have a camera pointed at them personally for 24-hours a day or be revoked, or they can hand out infinite names through a onion-routed API.