Hackers the salvation for net neutrality?

Mize

3dfx Fan
Legend
Let's face it, Congress and the White House are bought and paid for on the issue of net neutrality. They go the way the corporations want. They've even been clever enough to couch neutrality as some leftist, communist plot to stifle free speech.

In such an environment it is entirely plausible that talented hackers are the saviors of the future of information exchange and net neutrality. With corporate oversight the internet becomes cable TV with 255 carefully selected web sites to choose from.

Good hackers, on the other hand, could thwart this future.

Something to think about.
 
Time to call Zero Cool!

What exactly do you think hackers can do? I don't it's so much a matter of hackers doing stuff but people creating large VPNs to places were those restrictions do not exist.
 
Massive crippling of hardware used to scan and prioritize packets?
Crippling of the 255 eventually-for-subscription websites that Google will offer in it's "Internet Premium" package?
Hacking of prioritization hardware so that VPNs (to less restrictive areas like the EU and China) can work?
 
Somehow I get the feeling that someone's been around RPSC forum too long and replaced sleeping with repeated reading of William Gibson's work.

Could hackers be the final defenders of our freedom?
If 'hackers' means the likes of Linus Torvalds, FSF, GNU project etc - yes.
If 'hackers' means the likes of Neo, or Case from Neuromancer - Iiiiii don't think so...
 
Lol. Well one must try to find a hopeful outlook for the future and google is making that very difficult right now wrt the Internet.
 
Somehow I get the feeling that someone's been around RPSC forum too long and replaced sleeping with repeated reading of William Gibson's work.

Could hackers be the final defenders of our freedom?
If 'hackers' means the likes of Linus Torvalds, FSF, GNU project etc - yes.
If 'hackers' means the likes of Neo, or Case from Neuromancer - Iiiiii don't think so...

You make a good point here though.
What if FSF, GNU, etc. modified their license to prohibit their code from being used in any systems that implement or benefit from biased packet control?
 
If 'hackers' means the likes of Neo, or Case from Neuromancer - Iiiiii don't think so...
:LOL:

Yeah, I think you're right. Seriously, when was the last time anyone heard about a "hacker" actually doing anything constructive, or useful?
 
Apache2 alone would be great for this.

Wouldn't that just mean a commercial company, or different OS group, creating a (sub-par) solution that could be used with packet control?

I mean, most companies could happily use OSS, but if it starts to dictate how they operate their business, they'd probably switch to another solution without such limitations, even if it meant a sub-optimal solution.
Judging from companies I know, they'd much prefer to have the opportunity to make stupid business decisions then using superior software solutions, simply because they want to choose what their company does and not be dictated by someone else....
 
:LOL:

Yeah, I think you're right. Seriously, when was the last time anyone heard about a "hacker" actually doing anything constructive, or useful?
Happens all the time. We'd all be at the mercy of criminal hackers if it weren't for the ones who engage their time to discover and report security flaws, for instance. Google just recently paid out a total of $10,000 dollars to a few different people who uncovered security flaws in the Google Chrome browser, for instance.

Security on the internet depends upon independent people taking their time to find clever ways to break software.

Anyway, I rather like this John Gilmore quote:
"The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it."
 
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