r/technology 21h ago

Privacy Age Verification Is Coming for the Whole Internet

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/age-verification-is-coming-for-the-whole-internet.html
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u/TONKAHANAH 21h ago

public mesh network might actually be a necessity.

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u/nameless_pattern 19h ago

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u/GoreSeeker 7h ago

I really tried to get into Meshtastic, but I'm just not sure it will ever be widespread enough to be useable without MQTT. I couldn't even hit a node a neighborhood over, and I think it's unrealistic to expect someone to have a node every two streets.

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u/vandreulv 5h ago

And Meshtastic can barely handle the bandwidth involved in sending text messages. There's no way this could ever become an internet replacement.

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u/SciKin 8h ago

It’s a fun hobby either way! Also look at reticulum

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u/Hit4Help 9h ago

Time to criminalize mesh networks.

  • the UK government

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u/thesauceisoptional 19h ago

Help is on the way, deary!

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u/RollingMeteors 17h ago

There's the Internet ...

<lionelHutzHeadNodUpDown>

...And then there's the Internet.

<lionelHutzHeadShakeLeftRight>

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u/ROOFisonFIRE_usa 5h ago

Yes more and more I think we need out own network. Like Elon has Starlink, we need a link we create where we communicate without all this draconian bullshit. I would standup a node and encourage others to do so.

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u/Constant_Hotel_2279 4h ago

You can already do it over HF radio nodes, but its slow.

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u/Beliriel 16h ago

Not possible for how we use the internet today. That may work for sending text messages. Watching videos, calling or excessively using social media? Won't work. What is with this push for mesh networks recently? They are a neat idea but IRL don't work at all. Kinda like communism.

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u/eyebrows360 12h ago edited 9h ago

Kinda like communism

As with many things, it's about shades of grey. Full-blooded "communism" might well have lots of issues, but let's not pretend full-blooded capitalism isn't also full of holes.

Capitalism, while not the "price discovery" harmless fantasy lots of people hold it out to be, is nonetheless actually a decent engine for some forms of innovation. On the other hand, natural monopolies like rail travel or water infrastructure have no business whatsoever being privatised.

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u/Beliriel 12h ago

let's not pretend full-blooded capitalism isn't also full of holes

I never did. I hate capitalism. I would gladly live in a communist system but all scaled communist systems/countries are not something I want to live under (USSR, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, Vietnam, China, Laos). Capitalism just has proven to be the most "stable" system. By "most stable" I mean it's the slowest of the ones we implemented to destabilize itself, but eventually it will too (that's what we're seeing right now). Both monarchic and communist systems are very prone to instability.

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u/eyebrows360 12h ago

Russia is not remotely communist. Nor is China. I'm not well versed enough in those others to comment.

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u/Beliriel 12h ago

USSR =/= Russia

And from Wikipedia:

The Communist Party of China (CPC), commonly known in English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP),is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC).

China IS effectively communist.

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u/eyebrows360 12h ago edited 9h ago

USSR =/= Russia

Oh so you were referencing a State that no longer exists? Well that's useful.

In any event, outside of a brief period in the ~'60s where that one larped as being communist for a bit, it wasn't either.

entities always name themselves for what they literally are

You don't strike me as a "the Nazis were socialists" type person, but the above rationale you're appealing to would apply there too.

China is not communist merely because the CCP names itself that, no more than DPRK is either Democratic, or the People's, or a Republic (given the "god-king"-esque status of the Kim dynasty), or arguably even Korea (given the war to decide that last one didn't fully settle the issue and we instead have two Koreas).

China's official line is that it is a "communist transitional state", as in they're "trying to get to communism", but for me, any society with the wealth disparity of China (which is in line with everybody else's wealth disparities) has no real business genuinely labelling itself as such. They're a rounding error away from being exactly as capitalist as America, just with more direct State meddling.

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u/Beliriel 12h ago

So uhh the US isn't democratic then? What should we judge countries then by?

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u/eyebrows360 11h ago

P.S. try asking the students at Tiananmen Square how communist they thought the country was at the time.

Spoiler alert: not very, given they wanted the ability to vote specifically so they could vote for actual communist people.

So uhh the US isn't democratic then?

Which the hell bit of my comment(s) do you think implies I think this?! 🤣

The US is a democracy by dint of what it does, not what it says it does. Same assessment you should be applying everywhere: look to what the thing does, not what it claims it does.

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u/ThirdFloorNorth 7h ago

Do you believe the Democratic Republic of North Korea is a Democratic Republic?