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Internet supervilains...
#1
@Li3n
@Li3n
As per the rules™, they're actually the good guys: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8163190.stm
Crack teams of volunteers keep the net online and functioning, according to leading internet lawyer Jonathan Zittrain of Harvard University.
The way data is divided up and sent around the internet in many jumps makes it \"delicate and vulnerable\" to attacks or mistakes, he said.
However, he added, the \"random acts of kindness\" of these unsung heroes quietly keep the net in working order.
Professor Zittrain's comments came at the TED Global conference in Oxford.
Incidents such as when the Pakistan government took YouTube offline in 2008 exposed the web's underlying fragility, he explained.
But a team of volunteers - unpaid, unauthorised and largely unknown to most people - rolled into action and restored the service within hours.
\"It's like when the Bat signal goes up and Batman answers the call,\" Professor Zittrain told BBC News.
Blind faith
The fragility of the internet's architecture was largely due to its origins, said Professor Zittrain.
He said it had been conceived with \"one great limitation and with one great freedom\".
\"Their limitation was that they didn't have any money,\" he told the TED audience in Oxford.
\"But they had an amazing freedom, which was that they didn't have to make any money from it.
\"The internet has no business plan - never did - no CEO, no single firm responsible for building it. Instead it's folks getting together to do something for fun, rather than because they were told to or because they were expecting to make money from it,\" he said.
That ethos, he suggested, had led to a network architecture that was completely unique.
\"As late as 1992, IBM was known to say that you couldn't build a corporate network using internet protocol.\"
Internet protocol (IP), the method used to send data around the internet, was first described by Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn in 1974. Data is broken into chunks - or packets - and sent around different parts of the network, often owned by different corporations and entities.
Professor Zittrain likened it to how a drink may be passed along a row of people at a sporting event.
\"Your neighbourly duty is to pass the beer along - at risk to your own trousers - to get it to its destination.\"
\"That's precisely how packets move around the internet, sometimes in a many as 25 or 30 hops with the intervening entities passing the data around having no contractual or legal obligation to the original sender or to the receiver.\"
The route the data takes depends on the net's addressing system, he said.
\"It turns out there is no overall map of the internet. It is as if we are all sat together in a theatre but we can only see in the fog the people around us.
\"So what do we do to figure out what is around us. We turn to the person on our right and tell them what we can see to the left and vice versa.
This method, he said, gives network operators a general sense of \"what is where\".
\"This is a system that relies on kindness and trust, which also makes it very delicate and vulnerable,\" he said.
\"In rare but striking instances, a lie told by a single entity within this honeycomb can lead to real trouble.\"
Bucket brigade
One example, he said, was an incident in 2008 when Pakistan Telecom accidentally took YouTube offline.
At the time, the Pakistan government asked Pakistan's ISPs to block the site, reportedly because of a \"blasphemous\" video clip.
However, a network error caused a worldwide blackout of the site.
\"This one ISP in Pakistan decided to [institute] the block for its subscribers in a highly unusual way,\" said Professor Zittrain.
\"It advertised that … it had suddenly awakened to find it was YouTube.\"
Because of the way that the network spreads messages between neighbours, the announcement quickly reverberated around the world.
Volunteers quench fire (AP)
Passing a drink, firefighting, and saving the net - driven by similar motivations
Within two minutes, YouTube was completely blocked.
\"One of the most popular websites in the world, run by the most powerful company in the world, and there was nothing that YouTube or Google were particularly privileged to do about it,\" said Professor Zittrain.
However, he said, the problem was fixed within about two hours.
This was down to a largely unknown group known as the North American Network Operators Group (NANOG), he said.
NANOG is a forum for distributing technical information among computer and network engineers.
\"They came together to help find a problem and fix it,\" he said.
Despite being unpaid volunteers they were able to put YouTube back on line, he said.
\"It's kind of like when your house catches on fire,\" he said.
\"The bad news is there is no fire brigade. The good news is that random people appear from nowhere, put out the fire and leave without expecting payment or praise.\"
The same social structures - and in particular kindness and trust - are also responsible for websites such as Wikipedia, he said.
\"It's like dark matter in the universe. There's a lot of it, you don't see it but it has a huge impact on the physics of the place,\" he earlier told the BBC.
This year's TED Global conference runs from 21 to 24 July.
#2
redapples
redapples
Hmmm so much like Anarchy then, you must trust that more people intend to do good than intend to do bad and that things will get done because it benefits an individual but the knock on effect is benefit for a much wider group of people. You've convinced me. Free market capitalism is dead long live the Internet saviour!
#3
@Li3n
@Li3n
Actually i think it's the other ay around, more people do bad, but the ones that do good are better at it... to each according to his needs, from each according to his ability... and no leaders = anarcho-communism.
#5
Shegokigo
Shegokigo
What happens if more of the "good" die off and the "bad" continue to grow in number?@Li3n said:Actually i think it's the other ay around, more people do bad, but the ones that do good are better at it... to each according to his needs, from each according to his ability... and no leaders = anarcho-communism.
#6
Chibibar
Chibibar
The bad also tend to be vocal and more of themShegokigo said:What happens if more of the "good" die off and the "bad" continue to grow in number?@Li3n said:Actually i think it's the other ay around, more people do bad, but the ones that do good are better at it... to each according to his needs, from each according to his ability... and no leaders = anarcho-communism.
#7
H
Han-Sagan
H
Han-Sagan
I would disagree...if we're using those terms, I would say silent good and vocal evil are still vastly outnumbered by mind-their-own-business neutral
#8
redapples
redapples
I cant agree. I admit, my political leanings are to the left and perhaps a tad anarchistic, however - discounting this - it is my experience that the bulk of society abide by a social contract that does not do harm to others. In the main we do not steal, attack and murder, rape or intentionally remove liberty and freedom from others. It can be argued that this is a result of punitive measures should we be caught but I'm not sure that this is the over arching reason for the widespread compliance.
Neutrality is an interesting idea and I find that those who consider themselves neutral can be given the right motivation very active (post office closure in the UK a good example) say if there is a problem with the school board or their neighbours grass is too long. I use that last example not to demean it but to illustrate that people tend to be more active about local issues that directly affect them and their community - but c'mon its grass.
That said the general populace is quite capable of jumping on the bandwagon when a perceived (often politically motivated or fictitious) enemy is presented. Catholics in the UK for several centuries, 'Commies' and 'Leftists' in America for (at least) a decade, Jews/Blacks/Arabs/Gays... German 1930s & 40s. Its not a big leap to compare African genocides in the past decades with these events. That said these are often coupled with a regime of government that populates and persists these bias. It is argued (flame on) that Anarchism would remove the power behind these governments to divide the masses.
Lastly the term Anarcho-Communism is an interesting one to me as there is a clear rift in the two ideologies when it comes to the need to have an interim 'benign' ruler. They are separate in my mind at least. Any way an interesting piece and food for thought.
Neutrality is an interesting idea and I find that those who consider themselves neutral can be given the right motivation very active (post office closure in the UK a good example) say if there is a problem with the school board or their neighbours grass is too long. I use that last example not to demean it but to illustrate that people tend to be more active about local issues that directly affect them and their community - but c'mon its grass.
That said the general populace is quite capable of jumping on the bandwagon when a perceived (often politically motivated or fictitious) enemy is presented. Catholics in the UK for several centuries, 'Commies' and 'Leftists' in America for (at least) a decade, Jews/Blacks/Arabs/Gays... German 1930s & 40s. Its not a big leap to compare African genocides in the past decades with these events. That said these are often coupled with a regime of government that populates and persists these bias. It is argued (flame on) that Anarchism would remove the power behind these governments to divide the masses.
Lastly the term Anarcho-Communism is an interesting one to me as there is a clear rift in the two ideologies when it comes to the need to have an interim 'benign' ruler. They are separate in my mind at least. Any way an interesting piece and food for thought.
#9
Lally
Lally
I find it hilarious the Buckley section refers to a non-existent Halfpixel link.Gusto said:
#10
LittleSin
LittleSin
Aw. I thought this was going to be about Doctor Insano and other internet villians.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AA8OnP4__Og&feature=related:3dot9cxu][/youtube:3dot9cxu]
SCIENCE!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AA8OnP4__Og&feature=related:3dot9cxu][/youtube:3dot9cxu]
SCIENCE!
#11
figmentPez
figmentPez
LOL! I just finished watching the last part of Spoony's review of Final Fantasy VIII yesterday. Doctor Insano is one of the best parts.LittleSin said:Aw. I thought this was going to be about Doctor Insano and other internet villians.
SCIENCE!
#12
@Li3n
Also, putting anarcho- in front of something implies taking that concept and removing the need for leaders/hierarchy... so it always works (the word i mean).
@Li3n
The it's no longer the internet, it's 4chan. But at least we'll be rid of Scientology...Shegokigo said:What happens if more of the "good" die off and the "bad" continue to grow in number?@Li3n said:Actually i think it's the other ay around, more people do bad, but the ones that do good are better at it... to each according to his needs, from each according to his ability... and no leaders = anarcho-communism.
They way to communism isn't the same as communism itself... and Marx even got called out on the whole dictatorship of the proletariat thing by a russian anarchist, who correctly pointed out that a dictatorship would not be inclined to let go of power after obtaining it. But the whole thing was about forcing the issue, as communism is supposed to be the final step in natural social evolution...redapples said:Lastly the term Anarcho-Communism is an interesting one to me as there is a clear rift in the two ideologies when it comes to the need to have an interim 'benign' ruler. They are separate in my mind at least. Any way an interesting piece and food for thought.
Also, putting anarcho- in front of something implies taking that concept and removing the need for leaders/hierarchy... so it always works (the word i mean).