On Thu, 2003-08-28 at 23:00, Adam Hewitt wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> After reading this slashdot article:
>
> http://www.circleid.com/article/215_0_1_0_C/
>
> which discusses the background 'noise' that has been increasing on the
> internet, I began thinking about the possibility of a "sub-net" for lack
> of a better term. Bascially the idea would follow that of
> www.wafreenet.org however instead of providing a free network outside of
> the internet (free as in beer and free as in spam :) it would be created
> inside the internet using tunnels and trusted peers (like PGP).
>
> This would then give us the ability to remove peers from the network if
> they do not comply with the "sub-nets" constitution (ie. they allow spam
> relays, send spam themselves, relay viruses, DoS attacks etc). Obviously
> this subnet would need to either utilize IPv6 or Private Address space
> (which would need to be handed out by a central organisation).
>
> Peers would also have the ability only accept "subnet" traffic or
> internet traffic also, but never relay anything from the outside in and
> vise-versa.
>
> Maybe this is too grand an idea, but it doesn't seem too hard to me and
> although it wouldn't stop the background traffic, if noone was listening
> why would it continue?
>
> Has this been discussed before and I was spring cleaning my cave at the
> time??
>
> Let me know what you think.
Ya' have to sign up for it. We could just sign up for doing the admin
work to keep our nodes from being spam relays, DoS zombies, etc. now.
If you can get everything you want from "inside" the subnet, you'd be
happy, but if some of what you want is from the "outside" you have to
protect against all the threats anyway...
And you'd still be subject to the overall deterioration of service that
comes from the "noise" on the net. The "noise" won't go away as long as
there are many people "outside" to prey on, and once a sizeable number
are "inside" you get similar disputes in different clothing.
If you can identify a small sub-set of people you're happy to confine
all your contact with, then it could be practical, but I don't see how
it could be a solution to the problem overall. And who polices it? Who
resolves disputes about how to police it?
"Yes, you did!" "No, I didn't!"
As a fellow in a SF book was made to say "Shucks, you can't get that
many people to whistle Dixie".
My personal opinion is that isolationism is like standing in traffic
with my eyes closed - the truck is going to hit me whether I see it or
not. I can pretend I'm separate, but that's different from the reality
of things.
Cheers,
Bret
--
bwaldow at alum dot mit dot edu
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