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My first impressions of web3 (full)
by Giacomo Tesio Jan. 8, 2022

Jan. 8, 2022

[Scusate, la mail partita accidentalmente...] Despite considering myself a cryptographer, I have not found myself particularly drawn to “crypto.” I don’t think I’ve ever actually said the words “get off my lawn,” but I’m much more likely to click on Pepperidge Farm Remembers flavored memes about how “crypto” used to mean “cryptography” than I am the latest NFT drop. Also – cards on the table here – I don’t share the same generational excitement for moving all aspects of life into an instrumented economy. Even strictly on the technological level, though, I haven’t yet managed to become a believer. So given all of the recent attention into what is now being called web3, I decided to explore some of what has been happening in that space more thoroughly to see what I may be missing. [...] It’s probably good to have some clarity on why centralized platforms emerged to begin with, and in my mind the explanation is pretty simple: 1. People don’t want to run their own servers, and never will. [...] 2. A protocol moves much more slowly than a platform. [...] But web3 intends to be different, so let’s take a look. In order to get a quick feeling for the space and a better understanding for what the future may hold, I decided to build a couple of dApps and create an NFT. # Making some distributed apps To get a feeling for the web3 world, I made a dApp called Autonomous Art that lets anyone mint a token for an NFT by making a visual contribution to it. The cost of making a visual contribution increases over time, and the funds a contributor pays to mint are distributed to all previous artists (visualizing this financial structure would resemble something similar to a pyramid shape). At the time of this writing, over $38k USD has gone into creating this collective art piece. I also made a dApp called First Derivative that allows you to create, discover, and exchange NFT derivatives which track an underlying NFT, similar to financial derivatives which track an underlying asset ;-) [...] whether it’s running on mobile or the web, a dApp like Autonomous Art or First Derivative needs to interact with the blockchain somehow [...] That’s not really possible to do from the client, though, since the blockchain can’t live on your mobile device (or in your desktop browser realistically). So the only alternative is to interact with the blockchain via a node that’s running remotely on a server somewhere. A server! But, as we know, people don’t want to run their own servers. As it happens, companies have emerged that sell API access to an ethereum node they run as a service [...] Almost all dApps use either Infura or Alchemy in order to interact with the blockchain. In fact, even when you connect a wallet like MetaMask to a dApp, and the dApp interacts with the blockchain via your wallet, MetaMask is just making calls to Infura! These client APIs are not using anything to verify blockchain state or the authenticity of responses. The results aren’t even signed. An app like Autonomous Art says “hey what’s the output of this view function on this smart contract,” Alchemy or Infura responds with a JSON blob that says “this is the output,” and the app renders it. This was surprising to me. So much work, energy, and time has gone into creating a trustless distributed consensus mechanism, but virtually all clients that wish to access it do so by simply trusting the outputs from these two companies without any further verification. # Making an NFT I also wanted to create a more traditional NFT. Most people think of images and digital art when they think of NFTs, but NFTs generally do not store that data on-chain. For most NFTs of most images, that would be much too expensive. Instead of storing the data on-chain, NFTs instead contain a URL that points to the data. [...] Anyone with access to that machine, anyone who buys that domain name in the future, or anyone who compromises that machine can change the image, title, description, etc for the NFT to whatever they’d like at any time (regardless of whether or not they “own” the token). So as an experiment, I made an NFT that changes based on who is looking at it, since the web server that serves the image can choose to serve different images based on the IP or User Agent of the requester. For example, it looked one way on OpenSea, another way on Rarible, but when you buy it and view it from your crypto wallet, it will always display as a large [SMILING-SHIT] emoji. There’s nothing unusual about this NFT, it’s how the NFT specifications are built. Many of the highest priced NFTs could turn into [SMILING-SHIT] emoji at any time; I just made it explicit. After a few days, without warning or explanation, the NFT I made was removed from OpenSea (an NFT marketplace) [...] The takedown suggests that I violated some Term Of Service, but after reading the terms, I don’t see any that prohibit an NFT which changes based on where it is being looked at from, and I was openly describing it that way. What I found most interesting, though, is that after OpenSea removed my NFT, it also no longer appeared in any crypto wallet on my device. This is web3, though, how is that possible? [...] if your NFT is removed from OpenSea, it also disappears from your wallet. It doesn’t functionally matter that my NFT is indelibly on the blockchain somewhere, because the wallet (and increasingly everything else in the ecosystem) is just using the OpenSea API to display NFTs, which began returning 304 No Content for the query of NFTs owned by my address! # It’s early days “It’s early days still” is the most common refrain I see from people in the web3 space when discussing matters like these. In some ways, cryptocurrency’s failure to scale beyond relatively nascent engineering is what makes it possible to consider the days “early,” since objectively it has already been a decade or more. [...] # But you can’t stop a gold rush When you think about it, OpenSea would actually be much “better” in the immediate sense if all the web3 parts were gone. It would be faster, cheaper for everyone, and easier to use. [...] However, if they had built a platform to buy and sell images that wasn’t nominally based on crypto, I don’t think it would have taken off [...] because this is a gold rush. [...] At the end of the stack, NFT artists are excited about this kind of progression because it means more speculation/investment in their art [...] # Creativity might not be enough If we do want to change our relationship to technology, I think we’d have to do it intentionally. My basic thoughts are roughly: We should accept the premise that people will not run their own servers by designing systems that can distribute trust without having to distribute infrastructure. 1. We should accept the premise that people will not run their own servers by designing systems that can distribute trust without having to distribute infrastructure. [...] 2. We should try to reduce the burden of building software. [...] ____ Tratto da https://moxie.org/2022/01/07/web3-first-impressions.html Per i pochi che non lo sapessero, Moxie Marlinspike è il creatore di Signal, piattaforma di comunicazione cifrata end-to-end che io NON consiglio (perché centralizzata, basata sui TPM lato server etc...). Della sua analisi ho riportato qui i punti salienti, pur non condividendo affatto una delle assunzioni (interessata) di Moxie: moltissime persone VOGLIONO il controllo sui propri server e l'evoluzione del software libero così come la LENTISSIMA diffusione di basilari competenze informatiche la stanno rendendo una pratica sempre più diffusa. Moxie d'altronde non può dire che la gente VUOLE il controllo sui server, semplicemente perché contraddirrebbe il proprio business model. Agli altri dovrebbe essere chiaro che non saranno il web3, la blockchain o le AI[1] a liberare la società cibernetica in cui viviamo. E' vero: dobbiamo cambiare la nostra relazione con la tecnologia. Dobbiamo mettere tutti i cittadini in condizione di programmare e debuggare il software che utilizzano. Proprio come hanno imparato a leggere e scrivere. Giacomo [1] sotto l'ombrello AI rientrano molte tecnologie effettivamente molto diverse dalla blockchain perché in effetti... funzionano. Nel caso delle AI a livello implementativo il problema è CHI ne trae vantaggio e CHI ne viene danneggiato. Tuttavia le AI condividono con la blockchain, bitcoin e le altre criptoMENATE un singolo aspetto qui rilevante: la narrazione salvifica che fa leva solo sull'ignoranza informatica diffusa.

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Russian submarines threatening undersea network of internet cables, says UK defence chief Sir Tony Radakin
by don Luca Peyron Jan. 8, 2022

Jan. 8, 2022

Any attempt to damage the underwater cables on which "predominantly all the world's information and traffic travels" could be considered an "act of war", the UK's newly appointed head of the armed forces tells The Times. Gli abissi della guerra. dl https://news.sky.com/story/russian-submarines-threatening-undersea-network-… _________________________ don Luca Peyron Direttore Ufficio per la Pastorale Universitaria Arcidiocesi di Torino www.universitari.to.it via XX settembre 83, Torino tel. 011 5156239

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My first impressions of web3
by Giacomo Tesio Jan. 8, 2022

Jan. 8, 2022

Despite considering myself a cryptographer, I have not found myself particularly drawn to “crypto.” I don’t think I’ve ever actually said the words “get off my lawn,” but I’m much more likely to click on Pepperidge Farm Remembers flavored memes about how “crypto” used to mean “cryptography” than I am the latest NFT drop. Also – cards on the table here – I don’t share the same generational excitement for moving all aspects of life into an instrumented economy. Even strictly on the technological level, though, I haven’t yet managed to become a believer. So given all of the recent attention into what is now being called web3, I decided to explore some of what has been happening in that space more thoroughly to see what I may be missing. [...] It’s probably good to have some clarity on why centralized platforms emerged to begin with, and in my mind the explanation is pretty simple: 1. People don’t want to run their own servers, and never will. [...] 2. A protocol moves much more slowly than a platform. [...] But web3 intends to be different, so let’s take a look. In order to get a quick feeling for the space and a better understanding for what the future may hold, I decided to build a couple of dApps and create an NFT. # Making some distributed apps To get a feeling for the web3 world, I made a dApp called Autonomous Art that lets anyone mint a token for an NFT by making a visual contribution to it. The cost of making a visual contribution increases over time, and the funds a contributor pays to mint are distributed to all previous artists (visualizing this financial structure would resemble something similar to a pyramid shape). At the time of this writing, over $38k USD has gone into creating this collective art piece. I also made a dApp called First Derivative that allows you to create, discover, and exchange NFT derivatives which track an underlying NFT, similar to financial derivatives which track an underlying asset ;-) [...] whether it’s running on mobile or the web, a dApp like Autonomous Art or First Derivative needs to interact with the blockchain somehow [...] That’s not really possible to do from the client, though, since the blockchain can’t live on your mobile device (or in your desktop browser realistically). So the only alternative is to interact with the blockchain via a node that’s running remotely on a server somewhere. A server! But, as we know, people don’t want to run their own servers. As it happens, companies have emerged that sell API access to an ethereum node they run as a service [...] Almost all dApps use either Infura or Alchemy in order to interact with the blockchain. In fact, even when you connect a wallet like MetaMask to a dApp, and the dApp interacts with the blockchain via your wallet, MetaMask is just making calls to Infura! These client APIs are not using anything to verify blockchain state or the authenticity of responses. The results aren’t even signed. An app like Autonomous Art says “hey what’s the output of this view function on this smart contract,” Alchemy or Infura responds with a JSON blob that says “this is the output,” and the app renders it. This was surprising to me. So much work, energy, and time has gone into creating a trustless distributed consensus mechanism, but virtually all clients that wish to access it do so by simply trusting the outputs from these two companies without any further verification. # Making an NFT I also wanted to create a more traditional NFT. Most people think of images and digital art when they think of NFTs, but NFTs generally do not store that data on-chain. For most NFTs of most images, that would be much too expensive. Instead of storing the data on-chain, NFTs instead contain a URL that points to the data. [...] Anyone with access to that machine, anyone who buys that domain name in the future, or anyone who compromises that machine can change the image, title, description, etc for the NFT to whatever they’d like at any time (regardless of whether or not they “own” the token). So as an experiment, I made an NFT that changes based on who is looking at it, since the web server that serves the image can choose to serve different images based on the IP or User Agent of the requester. For example, it looked one way on OpenSea, another way on Rarible, but when you buy it and view it from your crypto wallet, it will always display as a large [SMILING-SHIT] emoji. There’s nothing unusual about this NFT, it’s how the NFT specifications are built. Many of the highest priced NFTs could turn into [SMILING-SHIT] emoji at any time; I just made it explicit. After a few days, without warning or explanation, the NFT I made was removed from OpenSea (an NFT marketplace) [...] The takedown suggests that I violated some Term Of Service, but after reading the terms, I don’t see any that prohibit an NFT which changes based on where it is being looked at from, and I was openly describing it that way. What I found most interesting, though, is that after OpenSea removed my NFT, it also no longer appeared in any crypto wallet on my device. This is web3, though, how is that possible? [...]

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"Operation Tulip: Inside Facebook’s Secretive Push To Build Holland’s Biggest Data Center"
by J.C. DE MARTIN Jan. 8, 2022

Jan. 8, 2022

*Operation Tulip: Inside Facebook’s Secretive Push To Build Holland’s Biggest Data Center* /In a wild twist, Facebook demanded that its data center be designated a project of “national importance.”// / Aman Sethi BuzzFeed Staff Posted on January 7, 2022, at 12:50 p.m. ET [...] continua qui: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/amansethi/operation-tulip-inside-faceb…

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The WWWorst App Store
by Giacomo Tesio Jan. 8, 2022

Jan. 8, 2022

Picture the most abusive app store. Programs in it are meant to run on your own computer. However, you have to be online to run them. Every time you start them, they contact the app store. If there is an updated version, it's installed automatically, no questions asked. You'd rather run the earlier version? Tough. If the app store decides you're no longer welcome, the program won't start any more. If the app store servers are offline, or if you are, it won't start either. > Programs in this app store must also hold your data in the app store's > servers. > > If the program won't start, you can't get to the data on the servers > any more. > > You may have downloaded backups of your data, but you'd have to figure > out how to decode them without the program. Sounds like a nightmare? It is. But it's also very real. Well-known app stores are approaching this level of nastiness. But they are just catching up with the real thing. The most abusive app store is the business-driven perversion of the old user-empowering distributed hypertext system called “the Web.” Users have been encouraged to adopt “web apps” for much of their computing, paving the way for other app stores to follow suit. > “Web apps” are most often distributed as JavaScript (though Java and > Flash have served similar purposes), automatically installed and > executed on your browser. > > But the problem is not that they're in JavaScript, or that it's your > browser that runs them. It's that: > > - you don't have control over what the program does; > - you don't have control over when you can run it; > - you don't have control over your own data. > > The app store owner takes all that control away from you, thereby > gaining control over you. > > You lose when the JavaScript code is nonfree software. > https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html > > But you also lose when it is (nominally) free software! When the app / web site has so much control over what runs on your computer, the effect “is equivalent to using a nonfree program with surveillance features and a universal back door.” https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/network-services-arent-free-or-nonfree.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/who-does-that-server-really-serve.html The owner gets all the freedom, and you, the user, get none. That's not a self-respectful way to do your computing. It invades your privacy, it keeps you and your data hostage, it takes away your agency and your freedom when it comes to your digital life. The web used to be a wonderful way to share information. Web apps and mandatory JavaScript have turned it into the worst app store. It is time to separate the WWWonderful from the WWWorst practices. Here are some ways to help: - request web sites that require JavaScript execution to offer either: - alternate means of access to information they publish, or - alternate means of delivery for their apps; - promote free browser extensions that control JavaScript execution; https://www.gnu.org/software/librejs/ - beware of apps that are mere front ends for SaaSS; https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/who-does-that-server-really-serve.html - demand software you use to be delivered in freedom-respecting ways; - promote hypertext systems that do not grant servers control over users. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gemini_(protocol) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_(protocol) More generally: - as a self-respecting user, reject the abusive practices whenever you can; https://gnu.org/philosophy/saying-no-even-once.html - discourage automatic execution of downloaded code; https://www.fsfla.org/blogs/lxo/pub/who-is-afraid-of-spectre-and-meltdown.e… - as a network service operator, set a user-respecting example; https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/network-services-arent-free-or-nonfree.html - spread awareness of the problem, and advice on solving and avoiding it. https://www.gnu.org/help/help-javascript.html Now, if you wish your site to give its users a taste of how the WWWorst app store feels to us, add to web pages you control the following JavaScriptlet: > document.body.textContent = 'Please disable JavaScript to view this > site.' If you wish, make “disable JavaScript” a link to this article. Thanks to Richard Stallman for the inspiration to write about this issue, and for the encouragement to publish it. 2021-04-01 update: thanks to KE0VVT for letting me know that textContent can't have links; you need innerHTML for that. ______ Tratto da https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/wwworst-app-store.en.html Attenzione che in questo testo si nasconde un primo passo verso una nuova consapevolezza nel mondo del software libero: > You lose when the JavaScript code is nonfree software. > https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html > > But you also lose when it is (nominally) free software! Finalmente! Non basta la licenza a rendere un software libero! Giacomo

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Il digitale [legato alle criptovalue] innesca la crisi kazaka
by Antonio Iacono Jan. 7, 2022

Jan. 7, 2022

https://www.sergiobellucci.it/wordpress/2022/01/07/il-digitale-innesca-la-c… Conclude con: "Questo non toglie che la condizione sociale sia critica e che il paese necessiti di riforme e di un nuovo livello di equità ma occorre comprendere che la crisi kazaka si sia innescata per le dinamiche legate allo sviluppo del mondo digitale e rappresenta, probabilmente, la prima rivolta sociale che poggia le sue motivazioni sulle necessità di sviluppo del nuovo mondo delle criptovalute." Per avere un quadro più completo ed una cronologia degli eventi rimando ad articoli di qualche settimana fa [1][2][3]. 90000 grossi "minatori" si sono spostati dalla Cina al Kazakhstan negli scorsi mesi, dove andranno adesso? A. [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-09/bitcoin-btc-miners-who-f… [2] https://www.businessinsider.in/cryptocurrency/news/cryptocurrency-mining-ca… [3] https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Cryptocurrencies/Kazakhstan-s-crypto-mini…

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Pentagon creates new digital and artificial intelligence office
by don Luca Peyron Jan. 6, 2022

Jan. 6, 2022

Accadono cose, a ritmi serrati dl https://www.c4isrnet.com/artificial-intelligence/2021/12/08/pentagon-create… _________________________ don Luca Peyron Direttore Ufficio per la Pastorale Universitaria Arcidiocesi di Torino www.universitari.to.it via XX settembre 83, Torino tel. 011 5156239

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Italian mafia fugitive arrested in Spain after Google Street View sighting | Mafia | The Guardian
by Alberto Cammozzo Jan. 6, 2022

Jan. 6, 2022

<https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/05/italian-mafia-fugitive-arrest…> An Italian mafia boss on the run for 20 years was tracked down to a Spanish town after being spotted on Google Street View. Gioacchino Gammino, a convicted murderer listed among Italy’s most wanted gangsters, was arrested in Galapagar, a town near Madrid, where over the years he had married, changed his name to Manuel, worked as a chef and owned a fruit and vegetable shop. Sicilian police carried out several investigations in their search for Gammino, 61, and a European arrest warrant was issued in 2014. The fugitive was traced to Spain, but it was Google Street View that helped to pinpoint his precise location. The navigation tool, accessible through Google Maps, had captured an image of two men chatting outside a fruit and vegetable shop called El Huerto de Manu, or Manu’s Garden, in Galapagar. Police believed one of the men closely resembled Gammino, but his identity was only confirmed when they came across a listing for a nearby restaurant called La Cocina de Manu or Manu’s Kitchen. The shop and the restaurant are now closed, but the police found a photo of Gammino, dressed in his chef’s garb, on a still-existing Facebook page for La Cocina de Manu. He was recognisable by the scar on the left side of his chin. The restaurant’s menu included a dish called Cena Siciliana or Sicilian dinner. Gammino was arrested on 17 December but the details surrounding his capture did not come to light until they were reported by La Repubblica on Wednesday. The details were confirmed by the Palermo prosecutor Francesco Lo Voi, who led the latest investigation. “It’s not as if we spend our days wading through Google Maps to find fugitives,” he told the Guardian. “There were many previous and long investigations, which led us to Spain. We were on a good path, with Google Maps helping to confirm our investigations.” After 20 years in hiding, Gammino thought he had managed to sever all his ties with Sicily. Upon his arrest, he reportedly told police: “How did you find me? I haven’t even called my family for 10 years!” Gammino belonged to a mafia clan in Agrigento, Sicily, which was caught up in a bloody feud with Cosa Nostra, Sicily’s main mafia network, in the 1990s. He was first arrested in 1984, when he was investigated by the anti-mafia judge Giovanni Falcone, who was assassinated by the mafia in a car bomb in 1992. Gammino was wanted for murder and various other mafia-related crimes. He was arrested for a second time in Barcelona in 1998. He had been serving a life sentence at Rebibbia prison in Rome when, in 2002, he managed to escape during the commotion of the making of a film at the prison. It is not the first time a mafia fugitive has been caught with the help of the web. In March last year, Mark Feren Claude Biart was captured in the Caribbean after appearing in YouTube cooking videos. Biart had been on the run since 2014, when Italian prosecutors ordered his arrest for trafficking cocaine in the Netherlands on behalf of the Cacciola clan of the ’Ndrangheta mafia. Until his arrest, Biart had been leading a quiet life among the Italian expat community in Boca Chica in the Dominican Republic. Although the YouTube videos of him flaunting his cooking skills never showed his face, police said he was betrayed by the distinctive tattoos on his body. In 2019, police arrested a mobster with the Camorra mafia organisation while he was eating pasta with his two cats sitting beside him in an apartment in the outskirts of Naples.

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"Le religioni delle nuove tecnologie: un’analisi del rapporto tra religione e modernità" | 14 gennaio 2022, ore 18:00
by Nexa Media Jan. 5, 2022

Jan. 5, 2022

Gentilissimi, vi invitiamo a partecipare all'incontro /*"Le religioni delle nuove tecnologie: un’analisi del rapporto tra religione e modernità"*/ che si terrà *venerdì 14 gennaio 2022*, dalle ore 18:00 alle ore 20:00. Ospite: *Giovanni Leghissa* (Università di Torino e Faculty Fellow Centro Nexa). Maggiori informazioni sull'incontro sono disponibili alla pagina: https://nexa.polito.it/religione-e-tecnologie Sarà possibile partecipare al seminario connettendosi al seguente indirizzo: https://didattica.polito.it/VClass/NexaEvent Cordiali saluti, -- Anita Botta Communication Manager Nexa Center for Internet & Society Politecnico di Torino – DAUIN Corso Duca degli Abruzzi, 24 - 10129 Torino _web:_ https://nexa.polito.it/ _mail:_anita.botta@polito.it <mailto:anita.botta@polito.it> tel: 011 090 7219

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Climate & Crypto
by Antonio Iacono Jan. 5, 2022

Jan. 5, 2022

Interessante conversazione tra Evgeny Morozov e Sanneke Kloppenburg [1] La parte che "mi piace" di più è comunque la fine: There is, of course, a third, even more radical possibility: the boycott of anything related to blockchains and cryptocurrencies, not least because they have a huge environmental impact. Some scholars, like Pete Howson, for example, have called for global bans (or least limitations) on crypto-mining due to their disastrous impact on emissions (which we probably still underestimate). So, there’s always the option of moving from “blowing up a pipeline” in the colorful formulation of Andreas Malm to “blowing up a blockchain.” What are you thoughts on this more radical option? Blockchain, like many other digital technologies, does have a huge environmental footprint. There is now an increasing effort to develop guidelines and regulations for the responsible use of digital technologies, for example by the EU and by standard setting organisations. The goal of such guidelines and regulations is to mitigate the societal implications of digital technology. The harmful environmental impacts of digital technologies, however, do not get the same amount of attention yet. Often the energy consumption of technologies, but also the more systemic environmental risks of using digital technologies, is an externality, which remains invisible and hard to quantify. This is a serious problem, which goes beyond the case of the blockchain, as it also applies to Artificial Intelligence, for example. It is crucial to better integrate sustainability in these efforts to regulate the societal impact of digital technology. The sustainability aspects of technologies should not be an afterthought, but taken into account already when a technology is proposed or designed. A. [1] https://the-crypto-syllabus.com/sanneke-kloppenburg-on-climate-cryptogovern…

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