[tor-talk] Possibly Smart, Possibly Stupid, Idea Regarding Tor & Linux Distributions

[grarpamp]

On Wed, Jan 4, 2017 at 6:24 AM, Alec Muffett <alec.muffett at gmail.com> wrote:
> Aside: this was part of why we drunken reprobates were doing this stuff at
> 33c3 -- https://twitter.com/FiloSottile/status/814641733212536832 --

Some dreprobs in the onions have been doing this for years with OnionCat.
Or with plain onions if they use unidirectional channels, or before ocat.
People have posted tests/reports/performance to the list now and then
over the years. Text, audio, video has long been possible subject only
to the weather of your [engineered|random] circuit and the bitrate
selected.

+1 to everyone playing with these things.

> I want people to be able to use stuff like this (piece of crap, but it's
> just a proof of concept) https://github.com/alecmuffett/videonion - using
> onions to communicate directly with one-another.

> I want other people to have an easier time innovating with onions.

> I want everyone to have the opportunity to connect without an intermediary,
> if they choose.  It would be nice to have the option. :-)

> But me, I want to get _everybody_ - teachers, journalists, kids, everyone.

Absolutely. Same for whatever functions other overlay networks are
good at too. Yet at least with tor, how will that happen when it is
restricted to strictly TCP and onion addressing? Is this all the world
is made of? And just how limiting is that to development of varying
apps, particularly P2P and the stacks required for it?

Even if we had AF_*, we could hardly call it a solution for it will
take many years for the appplications and their protocols to
be patched and enhanced to use it.

> Or we can leave everything at the status quo, and just muddle along

In some areas we are, or are regressing (ie: prop224 onioncat / onionvpn).

> But it needs to be easy, not clunky.

Then it seems Tor / overlays will have to build in support for easy.

And app makers will have to give up their centralized services
$IPO dreams for the greater good and new dreams of true p2p.
Not as if they could not have a donate button or other model therein.

And lots more leaders will need to dive into the onion (and *overlay)
space to promote the meatspace and develop the underlying tools as
a whole. Beyond just setting up and announcing another Elgg.onion,
or another new redundant *coin.

Governments will have to relax and let progress beyond the
old legacies.

And let us not forget that the "Internet" was an uneasy
mystery for most users in the 1990's, but by a decade later
they largely taught themselves the necessary details.

If you build it they will come.