Bonum Certa Men Certa

Alternatives to the World Wide Web, to HTML, to HTTP/S, and to the Internet

It would be nice to embrace GNUnet one day, but it's not production-ready yet

GNUnet logo, large



Summary: Looking around the Web (yes, the Web) for alternatives to the Web (and the stack underneath the Web), we're finding that IPFS is mature and robust enough for our needs

RECENTLY we've been researching a number of networking and rendering protocols; some replace the format, some transmission protocols, some the nature of data distribution. In essence, the Internet is a mechanism for exchanging streams and files. They're sent around in the form of packets (UDP and TCP/IP). UDP is still used a lot in DNS. Some systems seek to replace DNS. Due to the nature of routers, replacing the Internet itself (rather than build a layer on top of it) would be challenging; it would require worldwide, large-scale cooperation from countless ISPs.



"Accountability or improved behaviour comes about when there's increased transparency."With Gopher, Gemini, BBS (over Telnet), (S)FTP and various other protocols (GNUnet insists it's still in alpha) there are many options at our disposal, but for the time being we use IPFS, which seems solid, stable, and widely used (approaching a million nodes worldwide).

So what about GNU? "GNUnet is a software framework for decentralized, peer-to-peer networking and an official GNU package," Wikipedia says. "The framework offers link encryption, peer discovery, resource allocation, communication over many transports and various basic peer-to-peer algorithms for routing, multicast and network size estimation."

That's quite similar to IPFS, but IPFS seems to be production-ready and we encourage our readers to participate.

A couple of months ago, foreseeing more EPO leaks (Benoît Battistelli sent lawyers to threaten us with legal action; António Campinos has not yet done that), we started making and then improving plain text versions of everything, ranging from blog posts to IRC logs. Pretty much every protocol and piece of software supports plain text, even BBS.

IPFS large logoWithout getting dirty and going deep into all the pertinent details (we spent much time reading about and experimenting with the above), one thing that's safe to say is that on the Web there are almost no plain text sites. Sites which claim to be "text-only" are basically simplified HTML and some contain malicious JavaScript, including spyware. When we speak of plain text we mean no hyperlinks or images. Nothing of that sort. At one point we tested GNU/Linux utilities that convert images to ASCII or Unicode, but those are pretty useless when one has only 79 characters across and no colours (it's binary).

Last night we made our last modifications (for the time being) and tested extensively the latest code which turns this site into plain text (Unicode, albeit nothing that's lacking widespread support, e.g. emojis) and then feeds everything into a peer-to-peer network, namely IPFS. For the time being we rest better, knowing that copies of everything we publish are not just downloaded by many peers but also served by many peers. This means that stuff we publish cannot be taken down; and even if we're being forced to take something down we're unable to also take down copies, served by other nodes. In that regard, we're not just censorship-resistant but a deterrent to censors (those who understand how it works would deem it an exercise in futility if they sent takedowns or nastygrams/SLAPP).

So on we go, writing articles and publishing suppressed material, including some internal documents of interest to the wider public. Accountability or improved behaviour comes about when there's increased transparency. People in positions of great power don't like transparency because it threatens that power.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Open Source Initiative (OSI) Resists Software Freedom, Even by Attacking Its Own
The OSI is compromised
 
A Much-Needed Wake-up Call to Users of Wordpress.com, Blogspot, Substack and All Those Other Outsourced (and Centralised) Platforms
There are several lessons in there
The UEFI 9/11 - Part II - Campaign of Censorship and Defamation Against Critics
In dictatorships, humour serves an important role. It's tragic.
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, August 27, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, August 27, 2025
Slopwatch: linuxsecurity.com, Slopfarms in Google News, and More
Some readers of ours end up sending us links that are from slopfarms, not realising those are slopfarms
Gemini Links 27/08/2025: Katrina Memories and Google Versus Software Freedom
Links for the day
Links 27/08/2025: Police Against Media Freedom in the UK, Energy-Hungry Countries Targeted by China
Links for the day
Microsoft Windows Fell to All-Time Lows in Egypt This Summer, Vista 11 Adoption Decreases While GNU/Linux Increases
Vista 11 is going down rather than up
Links 27/08/2025: Microsoft Demoralises Staff With Slop Demands, Leaving Mastodon Explained
Links for the day
12 Hours Ago The Register MS Published a Fake (Paid-for) Article, But This One for a Change Did Not Promote a Ponzi Scheme
There are also Free software alternatives, but they don't pay The Register MS for "synthetic" so-called 'journalism'
More People Need to Call Out and Put a Stop to Serial Sloppers
Unless slopfarms are stopped, people will read and share Microsoft propaganda made by chatbots
Gemini Links 27/08/2025: Headphones and Tartarus
Links for the day
Morale at Microsoft is Terrible (Proprietary Plagiarism Machines Have No Future, LLM Slop is a Bubble)
The slop sceptics/critics are going to have lots of "told you so" moments
GNOME "governance issues, staff reduction, etc." amidst Albanian whistleblowing and women trafficking
Notice the connection to Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC) and GNOME
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, August 26, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, August 26, 2025
Richard Stallman (RMS) Was Right About "Sideloading" in 1996
We now have computers that treat booting GNU/Linux like an act of "Sideloading"
Panama: Windows Down From 97% "Market Share" to Less Than 30%
In 2009, Windows was measured at 97.24% (compared to 62.32% right now or less than 30% if one also counts Android)
The UEFI 9/11 - Part I - Introduction to Impending Catastrophe (Microsoft Preventing People From Booting Non-Windows Systems)
eight-part series
Why Techrights is Slow Today (Bot Floods)
We don't know if those bots are connected to LLMs (we have not checked), but that is a possibility
Slopwatch: DDoS Slop, LinuxBSDos.com Spam, and Slopfarms in Google News, Including webpronews.com
Among the news we also found fakes, albeit not so much today
Links 26/08/2025: "Ballooning Debt" in France and "Transnational Repression in the UK"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/08/2025: Listening to Alcest and Google Doing Evil (Users Installing Software is "Sideloading" and Prohibited)
Links for the day
Links 26/08/2025: DNS Tampering and TikTok Layoffs
Links for the day
Microsoft's Windows "Market Share" Overestimated
Microsoft's income sources are shrinking
We Shall See...
My wife and I are hardly the first victims of Brett Wilson LLP
This New Determination on a Case Echoes the Modus Operandi of Microsoft's Serial Strangler vs Techrights (Its Online Decision/Judgment Says Truth and Public Interest Defend the Publisher)
Noel Anthony Clarke hopefully has enough money left to pay his victims, which include the publishers
Going Offline
There was life before the Net
The Register MS Has Apparently Shut Down Its Office
It is basically a fake address on the face of it
There Are Also Expectations of IBM Layoffs Very Soon With "Narrative Control."
Some of them mention Red Hat and how IBM failed to achieve anything substantial with that acquisition
After at Least Two Rounds of Mass Layoffs in August Microsoft Said to Have "September Layoff Confirmed - Performance Based"
Those "M5 level meetings" sound plausible
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, August 25, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, August 25, 2025