[p2p-research] "Many of us will not send mail to gmail.com"

[marc fawzi]

I don't mean it as a 'radical' but as an engineer with a social conscience.

There is nothing wrong with centralization as an abstract concept
except it also involves concentration of power and loss of resiliency.

Sometimes you have to have centralization because of performance
issues or some philosophically deep design issue (like why we have one
brain instead of 10,000 brainlets throughout our body sort of like the
starfish)

But when we are able to have decentralization then we should since no
one benefits from the concentration of power (e.g. in the hands of
Google) and we can't afford to see our rights erode in the future (ans
present) as we get more and more used to the convenience that the
centralized power structures (like Google) and become willing to trade
our civil rights (e.g, privacy) to keep that convenience.

Marc

On Sat, May 9, 2009 at 6:23 PM, marc fawzi <marc.fawzi at gmail.com> wrote:
> Just because you haven't seen a black swan (major google crash) it
> doesn't meant there won't be one.
>
> Beliving so much in the resiliency of centralized systems is not what
> P2P is about.
>
> Marc
>
> On 5/9/09, Ryan Lanham <rlanham1963 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Kris, I agree.  For that matter, I've never had more than an hour or two
>> that I've known I'm down in the several years years I've used it.  I've
>> used
>> it in many countries and at all times of day.  I only wish the government
>> systems I use were 1/2 as reliable.
>>
>> Ryan Lanham
>> rlanham1963 at gmail.com
>> Facebook: Ryan_Lanham
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sat, May 9, 2009 at 4:45 PM, Kris ROOSE <kroose at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Ryan and Marc,
>>>
>>> I don/t understand you: all my thousands of Gmails are immediately sorted
>>> by date... and by much more than that
>>>
>>> Kris
>>>
>>> 2009/5/9 marc fawzi <marc.fawzi at gmail.com>
>>>
>>> Ryan,
>>>>
>>>> It's not that Gmail is expensive to society in terms of money. It's
>>>> expensive in terms of dependency and its ability to take down a huge
>>>> portion of social interaction with it when it crashes, which it does
>>>> often.
>>>>
>>>> The issue is resiliency. Lack of resiliency in centralized systems is
>>>> the real expense to society.
>>>>
>>>> Marc
>>>>
>>>> On Sat, May 9, 2009 at 10:39 AM, M. Fioretti <mfioretti at nexaima.net>
>>>> wrote:
>>>> > On Sat, May 09, 2009 11:57:49 AM -0500, Ryan Lanham wrote:
>>>> >> Marco,
>>>> >>
>>>> >> Gmail is a function rich
>>>> >
>>>> > I would never call "function rich" something that doesn't even have a
>>>> > "sort by date" and similar basic functions, but that is really, really
>>>> > a matter of personal preference, and you're also right that Gmail is,
>>>> > in spite of its name, actually a combination of email and _other_
>>>> > services, so never mind.
>>>> >
>>>> >> I disagree with Marc that these services are inherently expensive to
>>>> >> society. Corporations can be quite efficient
>>>> >
>>>> > substitute "corporations" with "centralized infrastructures" and I
>>>> > agree without problems, have you read this, especially Case 2:
>>>> >
>>>> >
>>>> http://p2pfoundation.net/Thoughts_on_P2P_production_and_deployment_of_physical_objects
>>>> >
>>>> > Nor have I problems with you or anybody else using non-FOSS
>>>> > applications, for that matter.
>>>> >
>>>> >> I've long ago given up on strong expectations of privacy.  What do I
>>>> >> have to hide that isn't inherently coded and defended by other
>>>> >> service providers (e.g. banks) anyway?
>>>> >
>>>> > Private correspondence? Do your bank, government offices, credit card
>>>> > companies, marketers etc... still have complete, easy access all in
>>>> > one place to every single private message you've sent or received, if
>>>> > you don't use Gmail or any other traditional provider, web-centric or
>>>> > not?
>>>> >
>>>> >> As I have said, I'm not a political zealot for P2P.  It isn't an
>>>> >> idealism--it is, to me, a ethos.  I recognize it as a valuable set
>>>> >> of ideas whose time has come.  If its time passes, I'll shed no
>>>> >> tears
>>>> >
>>>> > same here, absolutely. But my original question/curiosity was a bit
>>>> > different and not even centered on privacy, ie "**why** is the
>>>> > percentage of Gmail users much higher **on a P2P list** than on any
>>>> > other list I follow, including non "geeky" ones?"
>>>> >
>>>> > Marco
>>>> > --
>>>> > Your own civil rights and the quality of your life heavily depend on
>>>> > how
>>>> > software is used *around* you:
>>>> http://digifreedom.net/node/84
>>>> >
>>>> > _______________________________________________
>>>> > p2presearch mailing list
>>>> > p2presearch at listcultures.org
>>>> > http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>>> >
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>>
>>>> Marc Fawzi
>>>> Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/people/Marc-Fawzi/605919256
>>>> LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/marcfawzi
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> p2presearch mailing list
>>>> p2presearch at listcultures.org
>>>> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> p2presearch mailing list
>>> p2presearch at listcultures.org
>>> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>>
>>>
>>
>
>
> --
>
> Marc Fawzi
> Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/people/Marc-Fawzi/605919256
> LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/marcfawzi
>



-- 

Marc Fawzi
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/people/Marc-Fawzi/605919256
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/marcfawzi