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Comment by endisneigh | Hacker News Reader

Does there exist a de-platform proof way of hosting something on the internet?

Even if you host your own server on your own premises they could forbid you from using the location, shut off your electricity, etc.

Is it possible to host a website entirely on bittorrent? I suppose there's also IPFS but I'm not entirely familiar.

Maybe once solar is cheap enough you could launch some sort of array of powered drones into the sky that follow the sun that send files to people via P2P - solar mesh network if you will.

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"They" in that case would typically be the government (assuming you own your property), which at least in the US would have to (at least nominally) follow more regulations and protocols for restricting your speech, while a private business doesn't really have those same obligations.

I'm not sure how ISPs fit into this though, and to what extent they can say "we don't like the content you're serving" and cut your net. Obviously if the content is outright illegal that's one thing, but I wonder if they can "pull an Amazon".

Even if you had a data center other peers could refuse to peer with you, remove you from DNS etc...

Yeah, it kinda ties back to the question of under what circumstance can an ISP cut you off.

You could at least get around DNS level stuff with a P2P application layer. But if you're cut off at the routing level by everyone then yeah, no go...

I wonder, if the electric company gets thousands of requests to disconnect someone's power, will they comply?

Probably not. In many places, shutting off utilities to an occupied residence is very hard to do legally without meeting a huge number of requirements.

I once lived in an apartment tower that didn’t pay the water bill for 3 years (because of an incompetent transfer of management responsibilities). They didn’t shut off the water. They didn’t threaten to shut off the water. After 3 years, they threatened to charge interest on the unpaid amount if it wasn’t paid within 30 days!

Make a dark web[1] site? Basically make it impossible to link what you're doing to who your infra providers/internet connections are.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_web

I bet there won't be many data centres happy if you're doing tons of traffic to the tor network. Many even disallow simple things like IRC.

Tor is secure, but not absolutely anonymous. If the entry relay and exit node are controlled by the same party then they know where you came from and where you're going.

Given anyone can do such nodes and it's relatively inexpensive to get gigabit lines nowadays - it's no doubt a good number of the nodes are owned by various three letter agencies.

Bandwidth isn't expensive on taxpayer dollars, but it is expensive for individuals.

Also because a lot of relays go outside the U.S. the metadata can be collected and stored at will.

Yes, there are.

IPFS, I believe, has a solution. The one I am most familiar with is Dat Browser.

4chan has survived the wannabe-stasi deplatform mob all these years simply by hosting the servers in the admin's basement.

Like 4chan, Gab also survived the de-platforming witch hunt and are self-hosting almost everything.

To Downvoters: So the above statement is somehow 'false' and 4chan and Gab are NOT self-hosting and are in the same situation like Parler which is still down?

Does anyone have concrete evidence that contradicts the parent AND the grandparent statements? Or is it just the emotional reaction to two websites that one just felt the need to downvote a fact without reason or counter evidence?

Let's not get any form of irrationalities in the way of the actual facts and the truth.

Explanation? (With evidence of course)

I think people are responding to language like “wannabe-stasi deplatform mob” and “de-platforming witch hunt” more than the actual facts or websites involved.

That language is not neutral, so the response isn’t surprising.

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