[tor-relays] Call for discussion: turning funding into more exit relays

[Zac Lym]

This seems (to me) like an obvious suggestion, so my apologies if it's
already been thought up.

Why not establish a team/scoreboard system, like those used for distributed
computing and BitCoin mining?  This elegantly solves a few problems while
with minimal resource commitment from the Tor organization.

Most importantly, it's a way to pump money into the system without ruining
the current atmosphere.   Sponsors could easily buy some bandwidth or
people can also just donate their own connections and join a particular
team.  The scoreboard is based on goodwill, not dollars spent.

It also eliminates the hassle of setting prices, as teams can compete for
dollars and bandwidth provided, essentially setting their own prices.  The
org could also setup a payment system, like we-pay, that the team admins
can configure to deposit funds.  It could be set as a proof of work system,
paying after the bandwidth has been provided.

This also allows a degree of control to prevent abuse from admins trying to
juice stats by abusing some network infrastructure, like dummy trial
accounts on hosting sites.  A group admin could block specific hosts or the
Tor project could remove an entire group.

Finally, this could allow for the Tor project to create metrics based on
things other than speed, akin to how Folding at home scores GPU and CPU
contributions differently.  Then the project can set anonymity goals for
the network (such as location, ISP, backbone provider, etc) and the
volunteers will adjust their patterns accordingly.

Finally, I would like to strongly suggest taking a cut of all donations to
pay for the new infrastructure and Tor research and development.  I
wouldn't want development to slow on Tor because donations are going to
bandwidth instead. Indeed, I would prefer we spend a ton of money on the
stenography efforts and usability.

Anyway, thanks for the hard work!
-Zach Lym
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