Monday, 28 January 2008

Holding Pattern

Please Bear With Me..

I'll be getting round to populating this, mainly as a testbed for some stupid ideas, just as soon as I've sorted out a few technical details.

Thinking out loud here (as a note to myself about this blog's purpose)
problem: how to distribute material in an open manner that can't be taken be blocked.
  • p2p networks: are fine for mass distribution, its hard to take down the information once its out there, but have a couple of problems regarding speed of downloads, seeding etc.
  • ftp servers and hidden web links: Again, ok, great for limited distribution, allows for fast downloads, data can be on public/private servers, but can be removed by people/organisations who object to the content.
  • newsgroups/email: ok for smaller files.
  • Tor type networks: great fun, but a bit too 'esoteric' at present for the average user.
The main problem is that the best way, ftp/http transfers, which work transparently for most people irrespective of Operating System or browser/ftp client choice, means that you have to make the links visible, which means that the 'enemy' can track them down and do something about them.

Needed:
  • way of publicly pointing to the links in a manner which cannot be interfered with, or a means of obfuscating the links in a manner that hides them from prying eyes.
  • Identifying link harvesting mechanisms, and then 'poisoning' the data they return. (should be easy, at least the 'poisoning' part is easy)
  • more tea, in which case I'll be off...

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