On Sun, 2010-03-28 at 14:30 -0700, Jason Self wrote: > Ted Smith <[email protected]> wrote .. > > In all these discussions about what the optimal structure of GNU Social > > would be, my foremost care has been freedom. I don't yet know what a > > fully free network service would look like, but I think that it would > > have to have the following properties: > > > > * Based on only free software (obviously) > > * Federated, so that any user can run their own node if they wish > > * NOT requiring or encouraging software as a service, or SaaS. > > * Users totally control who can see their data. > > Social networking isn't SaaS. [1] > Publication and communication isn't SaaS, and Stallman calls that social networking. But in this case there is more - namely, managing your social network (who can see what, etc.). Additionally, more could be done with the social network than that.
> The model that Matt Lee presented already meets your criteria, and can be done > with existing (and ubiquitous) tools. > Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe Matt Lee is proposing a monolithic PHP program. In my model, there is a distinction between the core, transport modules, and the UI. > It can be operated in a cheap web hosting environment, as Matt suggested, or > on > one of those cheap wall wart servers like Eben Moglen mentioned [2]. Either > way > the user is in control of their data. > On a web hosting environment the user is not in control of their data - the operator of the hosting service is. It certainly isn't safe to do encryption on those machines. Additionally, using only PHP means that every time a user wants to have their own node, they need to install, configure, secure, and maintain an entire GLAMP stack + GNU Social + the interface (the browser, in this case). That is an unnecessary and very burdensome level of complexity. > One thing that I like about Matt's model is that it avoids the issue of what > to > do one one of the nodes is offline: If my friend has unplugged their wall wart > server and are transporting it to another location, I'll be able to get their > updates once they come back online again, and their RSS/Atom/whatever feed > becomes available again. The same could be said of thing that I publish. > So if one of the nodes is offline, there's just no possibility to get data? Active migration (as I'll call it) isn't exclusive to my structural model; GNU Social could implement it in a monolithic program (that operates in a federated p2p network).
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