[p2p-research] Fwd: Data Roads: P2P network physical topology.

Tue Aug 31 12:36:47 CEST 2010

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Jared Hardy <jaredhardy at dataroads.org>
Date: Tue, Aug 31, 2010 at 1:46 AM
Subject: Re: Data Roads: P2P network physical topology.
To: Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>
Cc: jaromil <jaromil at dyne.org>, Sepp Hasslberger <sepp at lastrega.com>,
olivier auber <olivierauber2 at gmail.com>

Thank you for the input Jaromil and Michel,

   I think the trepidation shown here about the Data Roads project is
indicative of its chicken-vs-egg inception problem status. Which comes
first: hackers or user demand? Aren't hackers really just working out
their own desires as users? Do you get the best hackers by having
existing code to hack on, or by presenting a novel ideas in need of
novel code?
   Also, the code-only view of hackerdom seems (to me) to discount
the necessary phases of design, study, documentation, testing, and
promotion that are inherent to any truly successful project. Projects
in the early design and study phases should never be immediately
discounted, at least not until they adhere to "golden cows" and goals
that are untrustworthy. Data Roads in particular proposes a physical
topology (hence the subject of this thread) more than the "virtual" or
"logical" topologies shown by existing P2P software (TOR, I2P, GNUnet,
FreeNet, etc.). The deployment problem is more about creating a social
understanding of the benefits of peer direct-networking than a
technological one. In this case, the peer is a physical neighbor.
Without that social understanding and demand, there will be no willing
experimenters in the physical deployment stage.

   Even without any new Data Roads router design, I could connect any
willing neighborhoods with existing router hardware, one or more
willing wholesale broadband providers, and a mix of OSPF and OSLR mesh
topologies. That is the intent of my other non-profit project
NELA-ISC.Net. The first problem Data Roads really intends to solve is
creating a wider demand for this type of neighbor-to-neighbor mesh
installation, regardless of the technology used. The next problem I
foresee, and want to deal with early via the router project, is
stitching these meshes together seamlessly once they grow into
adjacency. It may be a grotesque ambition, but I would like the
capability of stitching these meshes globally as well as locally, with
little to no process overhead.

   I really appreciate the exception Michel and others in the P2P
Foundation have made here. I do not claim to have all the best ideas
for Data Roads, P2P networking, or any other concept. P2P Foundation
seems to reach an audience on a much wider scale from philosophy to
technology, and this is the same kind of audience the Data Roads
project needs input from.

   Thank you,
   Jared Hardy

On Mon, Aug 30, 2010 at 9:07 AM, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>
wrote:
> Hi Jaromil,
>
> thanks for the comments,
>
> Hackers would obviously like that everyone would be like them, as
skillful,
> but the majority of people are not,
>
> and more generally, our society has a bias now for doing, against
> intellectual work,
>
> in the case of the p2p foundation, our work is to document the movement,
and
> hopefully, to intermeshwork people and projects for mutual support, it's a
> political and social project, more than a technical one, and to offer an
> integrative perspective, so that people doing seemingly different things,
> but with underlying affinities, can find more reason to work together,
>
> it is true that we have not been very successfull in attracting technical
> people and hackers, and that has probably to do with the kind of
limitations
> jaromil has mentioned,
>
> my hope is of course that other hackers will evolve in the same way, and
see
> some benefit of what we are doing ...
>
> concerning dataroads, we in fact have a policy 'against' projects and you
> will find that 99% of what we talk about are real projects and movements,
>
> in this case, we made an exception in view of the very positive responses
we
> received on it, but as a rule, we try to avoid mere good ideas ...
>
> Michel
>
>
>
> On Mon, Aug 30, 2010 at 3:37 PM, jaromil <jaromil at dyne.org> wrote:
>>
>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>> Hash: SHA256
>>
>>
>>
>> re all,
>>
>> in the hope it helps,
>>
>> here some little criticism from an hacker's perspective
>>
>> On Sat, Aug 28, 2010 at 12:46:53PM +0000, Sepp Hasslberger wrote:
>> > Hi Jared,
>> >
>> > good initiative - congratulations.
>> >
>> > I would certainly be happy to help, where I can. I've been thinking
>> > (and writing) about that concept for some time now, of turning the
>> > internet around and making the user cloud the principal location on
>> > the internet, instead of the central servers.
>> >
>> > Perhaps, as a first thing, I can write a little introductory mention
>> > of the DataRoads Foundation for the P2P Foundation's blog.
>>
>> the P2P foundation is a good thing, conceptually. but when hackers
>> spot it what they think the first time, as i did, is "is this a
>> spoof?! are they actually *developing* something, or supporting
>> development, or just describing other's people efforts? and even with
>> description... what's wrong with them?! why they have no trace of real
>> projects?".
>>
>> in a few words, from an first glance and from an hacker's perspective,
>> the P2P foundation doesn't feels "real" all the way through - and that
>> is a pity! but after such a first negative impression i have
>> interacted with you i've understood you have the right skills and your
>> efforts are worth support, if not for their quality also for the fact
>> you are trying to preserve memory and a certain narrative that is very
>> important and will be so in the future (plz keep ur websites up!!!)
>>
>> but then, all this introduction gets me to the point: i'm not sure you
>> should concentrate your attention on projects that don't really exist:
>> DataRoads as many other blogged narratives are just ideas, eventually
>> with some marketing around, good narratives, but nothing else. IMHO
>> publishing such things instead of real projects running for years and
>> with some serious participations is counter-productive for the
>> credibility of the P2P foundation, at least in my perception.
>>
>>
>> i say this with much admiration for your interests and efforts,
>> including the vision behind DataRoads, hoping no offence is taken. P2P
>> projects are not new to me, as they aren't to hackers in general. DR
>> is indeed a nice photoshop gig to explain policy makers what we dream
>> of, but Jared: maybe instead of branding your own project, you might
>> want to give visibility to some concrete efforts while developing your
>> own narrative for them, pick for instance GNUnet or I2P2 ?
>>
>> ciao
>>
>>
>>
>> - --
>> jaromil, dyne.org developer, http://jaromil.dyne.org
>>
>> GPG: B2D9 9376 BFB2 60B7 601F  5B62 F6D3 FBD9 C2B6 8E39
>>
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>
>
>
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>
>
>
>
>

-- 
P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net

Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
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