RE: The Worth Of STEEM
I don't know. You can only get off the grid so far. Until they have an up and running decentralized way to get on the internet, you can do everything but that, as far as I know. And then you'd need some kind of encrypted software so they couldn't track you as you surf. Unless you flat out decide not to use the internet, which I can't see most of us doing, even if we're running solar panels and eating off the land.
My problem is, I love technology that works. I've been dreaming of home automation in since at least the late 80s when I found out Tony Stark's home existed (aka Bill Gates's home). So, I have an Echo or two running lights, TV, playing music, answering trivia questions, etc. I also have a couple of motion detecting garbage cans and various other things because I find them to be cool, useful and convenient. Just like a remote, or a radio or electricity before all of it.
Unfortunately, there's the privacy issue with all of the new things whereas there wasn't much of a problem with the previous iterations of advancement. It really frustrates me. Things that are meant to be useful should not usher in Big Brother.
ISPs are the chokepoint for decentralized internet but with Tor and VPNs you can manage to browse anonymously. Tor is free software developed by DARPA that uses encryption and relays to conceal your information while online (the dark web is only accessible via Tor or similar software) but its not up to streaming video (as of the last I heard, which was a year or two ago) and apparently attracts the NSA's attention.
I'm a sci fi junkie so I have a similar fondness for technology (I'm still waiting on a kitchen that will cook a meal when I tell it to) but between the Big Brother stuff it does and people's dependence upon it, I'm also wary of it. You should spend your time wondering what all you can get technology to do for you, not worrying about what else it might be doing, dammit!
So is the internet to blame? Practically all of what we've been lamenting has been things linked to and reliant upon the internet. Subtract the internet and most of the privacy concerns dissipate (the tech don't work either though). Can we create technology that can accomplish the same things without the internet and/or the privacy concerns?
Maybe it's the love of sci-fi that makes us love the tech, because we've read what it's like beyond what we currently have, and in most cases, while the world might be falling apart, except in realistic dystopian worlds where everything is used against you, tech is your friend. It does what you tell it to do without any repercussions whatsoever. How is that even possible?
Well, if you think about it, the internet isn't entirely centralized—you have millions of computers all over the world going through different portals to get onto it to go to someplace else, like a freeway system—but with the right software, you can pretty much track anyone's movements across the web from anywhere you are.
So, while it's not entirely centralized, it's interconnected, and so I would say yes, absolutely, it's precisely the problem, as it is currently made up.
The internet and the cloud provides a very neat and convenient place to send and store data. As long as there is a connection, it's great. However, as long as all of that exists, it becomes a target for anyone, from wannabe hackers, to rogue nations, to our own governments, that either want to see that data and go after it through legal channels, or just plain go in and get it.
I'm sure the technology already exists, or could easily be created to do all of what we want, within a closed environment, just like you would on a LAN, but generally the expense and the knowledge required to make something completely autonomous is more than what most people want to mess with, or can truly afford.
But that is what we're looking at with the blockchain. So, somehow, we need to bypass the ISPs. We need a whole new internet, or, several internets. I've seen some peer to peer things happening, but they're low range and in one case line of site, so it would take awhile to get that up and running.
We still hold to some level of trust, or lacking that, there's just so much to sift through, and more bad guys doing worst things than we've ever done, that they probably won't ever get to our stuff. And even if they did, we tell ourselves, "I've got nothing to hide."
Well, that might be today's world where all we do is acceptable. That doesn't mean tomorrow's world is going to look the same. History has a way of repeating itself eventually. I'm pretty sure I read that in a book somewhere. :)
We must have read the same book :) Sci fi might have given us unrealistic expectations of technology as well. The nice thing about technology is that as it gets older and more refined, it tends to gets cheaper as well, so I'm hopeful that the closed environment type stuff won't be prohibitively expensive for very much longer.
While I'm quite hopeful about blockchain in general, I don't see how something so public could help ensure privacy (not saying it couldn't, I just don't understand it well enough to see a way to do so). Peer to peer internet will be a major step in the right direction, but as you pointed out its still got a ways to go. Until then we'll just have to try and remember to keep a low profile.
I don't know enough about the blockchain either, but I think the main thing is there's not one single server to go and try to take down or hack. That means others can continue to run, which makes it's less vulnerable to corruption. How that helps with privacy, other than anonymity, I'm not sure. Steemit just updated Terms of Service statements that we're all supposed to acknowledge and agree to where information that could be requested by governments or because it's the law can be handed over. From the comments about the update on the steemitblog, it doesn't sound like very many people are happy about. We do have folks who aren't happy about any kind of policing, and I can understand it since there's people here from all over the world and who knows how many laws could be violated due to a lack of free speech law or what have you in those countries—at the same time, unless the blockchains are going to set up their own police and prosecutors (which sounds scary) I don't know how you get rid of scammers. They're competing illegal acts on the blockchain through their phishing schemes and other activities.
So, far the ideas have been to make it impossible for them financially. Unfortunately, that would make it nearly impossible for those of us who are new to earn here, too. :)