I've got a problem where I want to shore up the "human web," but my brain can't settle on a shape for a solution. I start out thinking "web of trust, but better somehow," then "could this just be a network of TLS-signed blogrolls?" And then "what about secure communication away from crawlers and AI bros? Should there be a private network/walled garden attached to this somehow?"

I probably don't know exactly the problem I'm trying to solve. Seems to be several overlapping ones.

@vidak I worry also that maybe I'm over-inclined toward technical solutions where they may not be appropriate because that's where my skillset lies. Maybe I'm approaching the problem all wrong because I'm positioned wrong?

I dunno.

Can't really get anywhere without struggling with this in one way or another, anyway.

Ah, this is getting a lot of attention pretty quickly, at least by my standards. Maybe I should write a post expanding on my thoughts. They will be half-baked and a bit unfocused, I promise, but maybe you will find them interesting.

Edit: All I could write in 10 minutes: http://lyk.so/human-web.html

@lykso @vidak it feels like anyone that's technically inclined and can see past the wall of trash put in front of us in the world of ad driven networks are all experiencing the same thing.

@lykso @vidak I was contemplating this idea for a while too. A GPG style peer signed certificates to prove humanity with rules to govern bad and good actors. i am just too busy to sit down and look if there is an easy way to implement this without creating something new altogether.

In this case a strict only human policy can kick anything out with ease combined with some traffic rules.

@lykso @vidak @jlamothe
I talked to @aral here:
https://communitymedia.video/w/kTjUgHSYCZsJwucUPVoLgx
Aral's Kitten uses a nodejs server and websockets to provide live access to clientside html and html slots.

I'm going to be talking to @thegibson around HOPE about Veilid. Veilid is our local onion routed ad hoc social media cum content addressed storage (that's live.).
Solves a different problem to Kitten, where people basically run local websites, and the occasional public website is effectively a communication gateway.

@stunder

I kinda think the activation energy cost for managing-to-use-the-internet-well *is* a problem. I think people who do contribute very well to liberating technologies end up on mass market internet products because they use their time and care on technical things.

For example, 20 years ago it was a mark of new academics to have a simple LaTeX webpage that said your name and academic details. However now those people are instructed to use M$ linkedin by their university

@vidak @lykso

@vidak
The thing is, I think my two examples ^ are years of work that aren't easy to reproduce. I don't think gemini per se addressed the problems described. The fact that you could build a tls based other system that incidentally also conforms to gemini, gemini is incidental to (many apologies gemloggers). Kitten is better than gemini.
@stunder @lykso

@vidak
Evenings of intermittent work
-> Setting up and having your own veilid node
-> Setting up and having your own kitten
Months of constant work
-> A kitten site other kittens who aren't public web facing can play with each other in
-> A veilid log | content addressed storage oriented application
Years of dedicated work
-> Kitten https://kitten.small-web.org/
-> Veilid https://veilid.org/
@stunder @lykso

@vidak
I guess so! Though by dint I am making suggestions of what I have found to do (in our somewhat local community). Gemini came out of the discussions on whether to use gopher with stunnel with magic compatibility to gopher:classic, or write a new protocol (gemini). And Solderpunk /did/ walk the walk, I guess.
@stunder @lykso

@vidak @screwlisp @stunder Yeah, most likely some of the anxiety is from that. I don't have much of an academic background. I also think that the solution to these problems might more properly be political, rather than technical. It feels like there may be a sort of ineffective, individualist/libertarian tendency to approaching these problems as if writing the right bit of software might solve them, and I guess I worry about falling into that tendency a lot these days.