<<O>> Difference Topic Philosophy (r1.3 - 12 Jan 2002 - MarcoCalamari) |
Changed: | |
< < | Perchè questo testo abbia un significato, si dovrebbe già sapere che cos'è Freenet. Una buona presentazione generale si trova nella pagina Cos'è Freenet?. |
> > | Perchè questo testo abbia un significato, si dovrebbe già sapere che cos'è Freenet. Una buona presentazione generale si trova nella pagina Cos'è Freenet?. |
<<O>> Difference Topic Philosophy (r1.2 - 10 Jan 2002 - MarcoCalamari) |
Changed: | |
< < |
The Philosophy behind FreenetBy Ian Clarke |
> > |
La filosofia di Freenetdi Ian Clarke |
Changed: | |
< < |
1. A DisclaimerThere are many reasons why people get involved in the Freenet Project. Some share the views outlined in this document; some share variations of these views, which are also served by what we are trying to achieve; and some just enjoy the technical challenge. These are the ideas which motivated me to architect the system in the first place, but not necessarily the views that everyone involved in the Freenet project holds. |
> > |
1. Una nota di riservaSono molti i motivi per decidere di partecipare al progetto Freenet. Qualcuno degli interessati condivide le opinioni espresse nel presente testo; altri propendono per varianti di queste opinioni, che trovano rispondenza anch'esse in quello che stiamo cercando di realizzare; altri ancora, semplicemente, apprezzano la sfida sotto il profilo tecnico. Espongo qui le idee che mi hanno maggiormente motivato ad elaborare il sistema, le quali non coincidono necessariamente con le opinioni di tutti i partecipanti al progetto Freenet. |
Changed: | |
< < |
2. Suggested prior readingFor this document to make sense, you should probably know what Freenet is. You can get a good overview on the What is Freenet? page. |
> > |
2. Letture preliminari suggeritePerchè questo testo abbia un significato, si dovrebbe già sapere che cos'è Freenet. Una buona presentazione generale si trova nella pagina Cos'è Freenet?. |
Changed: | |
< < |
3. The importance of the Free flow of informationFreedom of speech, in most western cultures, is generally considered to be one of the most important rights any individual might have. Why is the freedom to share ideas and opinions so important? There are several ways to answer this question. |
> > |
3. L'importanza del libero flusso dell'informazioneNella massima parte delle culture occidentali, la libertà di parola è considerata in genere uno dei più importanti diritti che si possano avere. Perchè è così importante la libertà di scambiarsi idee e opinioni? Sono molte le risposte a questa domanda. |
Changed: | |
< < |
3.1 Communication is what makes us humanOne of the most obvious differences between mankind and the rest of the animal kingdom is our ability to communicate sophisticated and abstract concepts. While we constantly discover that animal's communication ability is more sophisticated than previously assumed, it is unlikely that any other animal approaches our own level of ability in this area. |
> > |
3.1 è la comunicazione che ci rende umaniUna delle differenze più evidenti tra il genere umano e il resto del regno animale è la nostra capacità di comunicare concetti astratti e sofisticati. Anche se scopriamo di continuo che la capacità di comunicazione degli animali è più sofisticata di quanto si pensasse in passato, è improbabile che qualsiasi altro animale si avvicini al nostro livello di capacità in questo campo. |
Changed: | |
< < |
3.2 Knowledge is goodMost people, given the option of knowing something and not knowing something, will choose to have more information rather than less. Wars have been won and lost over who was better-informed. This is because being better-informed allows us to make better decisions, and generally improve our ability to survive and be successful. |
> > |
3.2 è bene sapereLa maggior parte della gente, potendo decidere se sapere o non sapere qualcosa, sceglierà di essere più, e non meno, informata. Si sono vinte e perse guerre a seconda di chi era meglio informato. Questo perchè essere meglio informati ci consente di prendere decisioni migliori, e in generale migliora la nostra capacità di sopravvivere e di avere successo. |
Changed: | |
< < |
3.3 Democracy assumes a well informed populationMany people today live under democratic governments, and those who don't, probably want to. Democracy is an answer to the question of how to create leaders, while preventing them from abusing that power. It achieves this by giving the population the power to regulate their government through voting, yet the ability to vote does not necessarily mean that you live in a democratic country. For a population to regulate their government effectively it must know what their government is doing, they must be well informed. It is a feedback loop, but this loop can be broken if the government has the power to control the information the population has access to. |
> > |
3.3 La democrazia presuppone un popolo bene informatoMolte persone vivono oggi in un ordinamento democratico, e dove non c'è un governo democratico se ne sente probabilmente l'esigenza. La democrazia è una risposta alla domanda di come creare dei leaders impedendo loro, al tempo stesso, di abusare del potere di cui dispongono. Si ottiene questo dando al popolo il potere di dettare regole al proprio governo mediante il voto, ma la possibilità di votare non significa necessariamente vivere in un paese democratico. Per dettare davvero regole al proprio governo, il popolo deve sapere che cosa il governo sta facendo: deve essere bene informato. è un'interrelazione a circolo, ma questo circolo si può interrompere se il governo ha il potere di controllare l'informazione alla quale il popolo ha accesso. |
Changed: | |
< < |
4. Censorship and freedomEveryone values their freedom, in fact, many consider it so important that they will die for it. People like to think that they are free to form and hold whatever opinions they like, particularly in western countries. Consider now that someone had the ability to control the information you have access to. This would give them the ability to manipulate your opinions by hiding some facts from you, by presenting you with lies and censoring anything that contradicted those lies. This is not some Orwellian fiction, it is standard practice for most western governments to lie to their populations, so much so, that people now take it for granted, despite the fact that this undermines the very democratic principals which justify the government's existence in the first place. |
> > |
4. Censura e libertàLa libertà è preziosa per tutti: anzi, molti la considerano tanto importante da essere pronti a morire per essa. Soprattutto nei paesi occidentali, piace pensare di essere liberi di formarsi l'opinione che si vuole e di tenersela. Supponiamo ora che qualcuno abbia la facoltà di controllare l'informazione alla quale si ha accesso. Questo qualcuno avrebbe così la possibilità di manipolare le opinioni degli altri nascondendo certi dati di fatto, diffondendo menzogne e censurando qualsiasi cosa contraddica le sue menzogne. Non è una fantasticheria alla Orwell, è pratica standard della maggior parte dei governi occidentali mentire al popolo, al punto che oggi tutti lo danno per scontato, sebbene questo leda proprio quei principi democratici che costituiscono la giustificazione primaria dell'esistenza del governo. |
Changed: | |
< < |
5. The solutionThe only way to ensure that a democracy will remain effective is to ensure that the government cannot control its population's ability to share information, to communicate. So long as everything we see and hear is filtered, we are not truly free. Freenet's aim is to allow two or more people who wish to share information, to do so. |
> > |
5. La soluzioneL'unico modo per preservare la democrazia è provvedere perchè il governo non abbia la possibilità di controllare la facoltà del popolo di scambiarsi informazioni, di comunicare. Se ogni cosa che vediamo e sentiamo è passata per un filtro, non siamo veramente liberi. L'intento di Freenet è di consentire a due o più persone di scambiarsi informazioni, se lo vogliono. |
Changed: | |
< < |
6. Isn't censorship sometimes necessary?Of course no issue is black and white, and there are many who feel that censorship is a good thing in some circumstances. For example, in some European countries propagating information deemed to be racist is illegal. Governments seek to prevent people from advocating ideas which are deemed damaging to society. There are two answers to this however. The first is that you can't allow those in power to impose "good" censorship, without also enabling them to impose "bad" censorship. To impose any form of censorship a government must have the ability to monitor and thus restrict communication. There are already criticisms that the anti-racism censorship in many European countries is hampering legitimate historical analysis of events such as the second world war. |
> > |
6. Ma qualche volta la censura non è necessaria?Ovviamente, niente è tutto positivo o tutto negativo. Sono molti a pensare che in determinate circostanze la censura sia una buona cosa. Per esempio, in certi paesi europei è illecito diffondere informazioni che sono ritenute razziste. I governi cercano d'impedire alla gente di difendere idee considerate nefaste per la società. Le risposte a questo dilemma sono due. La prima è che non si può permettere ai governanti d'imporre una censura "buona" senza lasciarli liberi d'imporre anche una censura "cattiva". Per imporre una qualsiasi forma di censura, un governo deve essere in grado di controllare, e quindi di ridurre, la comunicazione. Alcuni già sostengono criticamente che in molti Stati europei la censura antirazzismo è un ostacolo per una legittima analisi storica di fatti quali la seconda guerra mondiale. |
Changed: | |
< < | The second argument is that this "good" censorship is counter-productive even when it does not leak into other areas. For example, it is generally more effective when trying to persuade someone of something to present them with the arguments against it, and then answer those arguments. Unfortunately, preventing people from being aware of the often sophisticated arguments used by racists, makes them vulnerable to those arguments when they do eventually encounter them. |
> > | La seconda argomentazione è che la censura "buona" è controproducente anche quando non si insinua in altri campi. Per esempio, se si vuole persuadere qualcuno di qualcosa, in genere è più efficace presentare le obiezioni al riguardo e fornire le risposte a queste obiezioni. Purtroppo, impedendo alle persone di conoscere le tesi, spesso sofisticate, sostenute dai razzisti, le si rendono vulnerabili a quelle stesse tesi quando alla fine ci vengono a contatto. |
Changed: | |
< < | Of course the first argument is the stronger one, and would still hold-true even if you didn't accept the second. Basically, you either have censorship, or you don't. There is no middle-ground. |
> > | Beninteso, la prima argomentazione è quella più valida, e resterebbe vera anche rifiutando la seconda. In ultima analisi, o c'è censura o non c'è: non vi è una via di mezzo. |
Changed: | |
< < |
7. But why is anonymity necessary?You cannot have freedom of speech without the option to remain anonymous. Most censorship is retrospective, it is generally much easier to curtail free speech by punishing those who exercise it afterward, rather than preventing them from doing it in the first place. The only way to prevent this is to remain anonymous. It is a common misconception that you cannot trust anonymous information. This is not necessarily true, using digital signatures people can create a secure anonymous pseudonym which, in time, people can learn to trust. Freenet incorporates a mechanism called "subspaces" to facilitate this. |
> > |
7. Ma perchè è necessario l'anonimato?Non si può avere libertà di parola senza la possibilità di conservare l'anonimato. La censura è perlopiù retrospettiva: in genere, è molto più facile privare della libertà di parola sanzionando a posteriori chi la esercita, piuttosto che impedire in anticipo di esercitarla. Il solo modo di opporsi a questa tattica è rimanere anonimi. è diffusa, ma errata, l'idea che non ci si possa fidare d'informazioni anonime: non è necessariamente vero. Si possono utilizzare firme digitali per crearsi uno pseudonimo sicuro, che con il tempo può riscuotere fiducia. A tale scopo, Freenet comprende un dispositivo denominato "subspaces". |
Changed: | |
< < |
8. And what of copyright?Of course much of Freenet's publicity has centered around the issue of copyright, and thus I will speak to it briefly. The core problem with copyright is that enforcement of it requires monitoring of communications, and you cannot be guaranteed free speech if someone is monitoring everything you say. This is important, most people fail to see or address this point when debating the issue of copyright, so let me make it clear: |
> > |
8. E che succede per il copyright?Naturalmente, in molto di quello che si è pubblicato riguardo a Freenet, il problema del copyright ha assunto importanza centrale. è quindi necessario parlarne un po'. Il nucleo della questione del copyright è che per farlo rispettare occorre controllare le comunicazioni, ma la libertà di parola non è garantita se qualcuno controlla quello che si dice. è un punto importante, che perlopiù non viene sollevato e affrontato quando si discute sul problema del copyright. Permettetemi di dirlo chiaramente: |
Changed: | |
< < |
|
> > |
|
Changed: | |
< < | It is for this reason that Freenet, a system designed to protect Freedom of Speech, must prevent enforcement of copyright. |
> > | è per questo che Freenet, un sistema inteso a salvaguardare la libertà di parola, deve opporsi all'applicazione del copyright. |
Changed: | |
< < |
9. But how will artists be rewarded for their work without copyright? |
> > |
9. Ma, senza copyright, quale remunerazione avranno gli artisti per le loro opere? |
Changed: | |
< < | Firstly, even if copyright were the only way that artists could be rewarded for their work, then I would contend that freedom is more important than having professional artists (those who claim that we would have no art do not understand creativity: people will always create, it is a compulsion, the only question is whether they can do it for a living). |
> > | Anzitutto, anche se il copyright costituisse l'unico modo di remunerare gli artisti per le loro opere, vorrei far valere che la libertà è più importante del fatto che ci siano artisti di professione (quelli che sostengono che allora non ci sarebbe arte non capiscono la creatività: si creerà sempre, è un impulso irresistibile. L'unico problema è se si possa vivere delle proprie creazioni). |
Changed: | |
< < | Secondly, it could be questioned whether copyright is effective even now. The music industry is one of the most vocally opposed to enhancements in communication technology, yet according to many of the artists who should be rewarded by copyright, it is failing to do so. Rather it has allowed middle-men to gain control over the mechanisms of distribution, to the detriment of both artists and the public. |
> > | Inoltre, si può mettere in dubbio l'efficacia del copyright, già adesso. Il mondo della musica, che è il più esplicitamente contrario ai progressi della tecnologia delle comunicazioni, non riesce ad agire al riguardo, secondo molti degli artisti la cui remunerazione consiste nel copyright, e anzi ha permesso ad intermediari di acquisire il controllo sui meccanismi della distribuzione, a scapito al tempo stesso degli artisti e del pubblico. |
Changed: | |
< < |
10. Alternatives to CopyrightFortunately it won't come to this. There are many alternative ways to reward artists. The simplest is voluntary payment. This is an extension of the patronage system which was frequently used to reward artists prior to copyright, where a wealthy person would fund an artist to allow them to create full-time. The Internet permits an interesting extension of this idea, where rather than having just one wealthy patron, you could have hundreds of thousands, contributing small amounts of money over the Internet. |
> > |
10. Le alternative al copyrightPer fortuna non è qualcosa di ineluttabile. Vi sono molte modalità alternative per remunerare gli artisti. La più semplice è il pagamento su base volontaria: è un'estensione del sistema del mecenatismo, che era frequente prima dell'avvento del copyright, quando i ricchi finanziavano gli artisti per consentire loro di darsi alla creazione a tempo pieno. Internet permette un ampliamento interessante di questa idea, perchè invece di avere un solo ricco mecenate se ne possono avere centinaia di migliaia, che versano piccole somme di denaro via Internet. E anche a questo riguardo noi mettiamo in pratica quello che proclamiamo: il 15 marzo 2001 il progetto Freenet ha iniziato a ricevere donativi, e in una settimana abbiamo raccolto oltre mille dollari. |
Deleted: | |
< < | We actually practice what we preach in this regard too, on the 15th of March 2001 the Freenet Project started taking donations, and within a week we had collected over $1000. |
Changed: | |
< < |
11. More sophisticated approaches: FairshareOf course some people ridicule this idea on the basis (I assume) that nobody would ever pay for something unless forced to do so (despite significant evidence to the contrary). While I disagree with their rather depressing outlook on humanity, there are more sophisticated mechanisms which do appeal to people's self-interest, such as "Fairshare", where people can buy in to artists much as a venture capitalist will buy into an idea they like, and if that artist is successful they will be rewarded in proportion to their original contribution. This has the nice effect of encouraging people to give more money to obscure artists who they believe have potential. If their investment doesn't pay-off, then they still have the satisfaction that they contributed to an artist whose work they enjoy. |
> > |
11. Approcci più sofisticati: l'equa quota ("fairshare")Qualcuno, naturalmente, considererà ridicola questa idea per il motivo (presumo) che nessuno sarebbe mai disposto a pagare per qualcosa a meno che non ne sia costretto (ma ci sono molte prove contrarie). Prima di tutto, non condivido una simile visuale, piuttosto deprimente, dell'umanità, e poi vi sono dispositivi più sofisticati, che fanno appello allo stesso interesse personale: per esempio "l'equa quota", secondo cui si può investire negli artisti, in un'idea che piace, come un capitalista investe in una venture, e se l'artista ha successo si guadagna in proporzione al proprio contributo iniziale. Un bel vantaggio è che così s'incoraggia a versare più denaro per artisti sconosciuti che si ritiene abbiano un potenziale di successo. Se l'investimento non dovesse rendere, si avrà pur sempre la soddisfazione di aver dato un contribuito a un artista di cui si apprezzano le opere. |
<<O>> Difference Topic Philosophy (r1.1 - 08 Jan 2002 - MarcoCalamari) |
Added: | |
> > |
%META:TOPICINFO{author="MarcoCalamari" date="1010519820" format="1.0" version="1.1"}%
%META:TOPICPARENT{name="Main.WebHome"}%
The Philosophy behind FreenetBy Ian Clarke1. A DisclaimerThere are many reasons why people get involved in the Freenet Project. Some share the views outlined in this document; some share variations of these views, which are also served by what we are trying to achieve; and some just enjoy the technical challenge. These are the ideas which motivated me to architect the system in the first place, but not necessarily the views that everyone involved in the Freenet project holds.2. Suggested prior readingFor this document to make sense, you should probably know what Freenet is. You can get a good overview on the What is Freenet? page.3. The importance of the Free flow of informationFreedom of speech, in most western cultures, is generally considered to be one of the most important rights any individual might have. Why is the freedom to share ideas and opinions so important? There are several ways to answer this question.3.1 Communication is what makes us humanOne of the most obvious differences between mankind and the rest of the animal kingdom is our ability to communicate sophisticated and abstract concepts. While we constantly discover that animal's communication ability is more sophisticated than previously assumed, it is unlikely that any other animal approaches our own level of ability in this area.3.2 Knowledge is goodMost people, given the option of knowing something and not knowing something, will choose to have more information rather than less. Wars have been won and lost over who was better-informed. This is because being better-informed allows us to make better decisions, and generally improve our ability to survive and be successful.3.3 Democracy assumes a well informed populationMany people today live under democratic governments, and those who don't, probably want to. Democracy is an answer to the question of how to create leaders, while preventing them from abusing that power. It achieves this by giving the population the power to regulate their government through voting, yet the ability to vote does not necessarily mean that you live in a democratic country. For a population to regulate their government effectively it must know what their government is doing, they must be well informed. It is a feedback loop, but this loop can be broken if the government has the power to control the information the population has access to.4. Censorship and freedomEveryone values their freedom, in fact, many consider it so important that they will die for it. People like to think that they are free to form and hold whatever opinions they like, particularly in western countries. Consider now that someone had the ability to control the information you have access to. This would give them the ability to manipulate your opinions by hiding some facts from you, by presenting you with lies and censoring anything that contradicted those lies. This is not some Orwellian fiction, it is standard practice for most western governments to lie to their populations, so much so, that people now take it for granted, despite the fact that this undermines the very democratic principals which justify the government's existence in the first place.5. The solutionThe only way to ensure that a democracy will remain effective is to ensure that the government cannot control its population's ability to share information, to communicate. So long as everything we see and hear is filtered, we are not truly free. Freenet's aim is to allow two or more people who wish to share information, to do so.6. Isn't censorship sometimes necessary?Of course no issue is black and white, and there are many who feel that censorship is a good thing in some circumstances. For example, in some European countries propagating information deemed to be racist is illegal. Governments seek to prevent people from advocating ideas which are deemed damaging to society. There are two answers to this however. The first is that you can't allow those in power to impose "good" censorship, without also enabling them to impose "bad" censorship. To impose any form of censorship a government must have the ability to monitor and thus restrict communication. There are already criticisms that the anti-racism censorship in many European countries is hampering legitimate historical analysis of events such as the second world war. The second argument is that this "good" censorship is counter-productive even when it does not leak into other areas. For example, it is generally more effective when trying to persuade someone of something to present them with the arguments against it, and then answer those arguments. Unfortunately, preventing people from being aware of the often sophisticated arguments used by racists, makes them vulnerable to those arguments when they do eventually encounter them. Of course the first argument is the stronger one, and would still hold-true even if you didn't accept the second. Basically, you either have censorship, or you don't. There is no middle-ground.7. But why is anonymity necessary?You cannot have freedom of speech without the option to remain anonymous. Most censorship is retrospective, it is generally much easier to curtail free speech by punishing those who exercise it afterward, rather than preventing them from doing it in the first place. The only way to prevent this is to remain anonymous. It is a common misconception that you cannot trust anonymous information. This is not necessarily true, using digital signatures people can create a secure anonymous pseudonym which, in time, people can learn to trust. Freenet incorporates a mechanism called "subspaces" to facilitate this.8. And what of copyright?Of course much of Freenet's publicity has centered around the issue of copyright, and thus I will speak to it briefly. The core problem with copyright is that enforcement of it requires monitoring of communications, and you cannot be guaranteed free speech if someone is monitoring everything you say. This is important, most people fail to see or address this point when debating the issue of copyright, so let me make it clear:9. But how will artists be rewarded for their work without copyright?Firstly, even if copyright were the only way that artists could be rewarded for their work, then I would contend that freedom is more important than having professional artists (those who claim that we would have no art do not understand creativity: people will always create, it is a compulsion, the only question is whether they can do it for a living). Secondly, it could be questioned whether copyright is effective even now. The music industry is one of the most vocally opposed to enhancements in communication technology, yet according to many of the artists who should be rewarded by copyright, it is failing to do so. Rather it has allowed middle-men to gain control over the mechanisms of distribution, to the detriment of both artists and the public.10. Alternatives to CopyrightFortunately it won't come to this. There are many alternative ways to reward artists. The simplest is voluntary payment. This is an extension of the patronage system which was frequently used to reward artists prior to copyright, where a wealthy person would fund an artist to allow them to create full-time. The Internet permits an interesting extension of this idea, where rather than having just one wealthy patron, you could have hundreds of thousands, contributing small amounts of money over the Internet. We actually practice what we preach in this regard too, on the 15th of March 2001 the Freenet Project started taking donations, and within a week we had collected over $1000.11. More sophisticated approaches: FairshareOf course some people ridicule this idea on the basis (I assume) that nobody would ever pay for something unless forced to do so (despite significant evidence to the contrary). While I disagree with their rather depressing outlook on humanity, there are more sophisticated mechanisms which do appeal to people's self-interest, such as "Fairshare", where people can buy in to artists much as a venture capitalist will buy into an idea they like, and if that artist is successful they will be rewarded in proportion to their original contribution. This has the nice effect of encouraging people to give more money to obscure artists who they believe have potential. If their investment doesn't pay-off, then they still have the satisfaction that they contributed to an artist whose work they enjoy. |
Topic Philosophy . { View | Diffs | r1.3 | > | r1.2 | > | r1.1 | More } |
Revision r1.1 - 08 Jan 2002 - 19:57 GMT - MarcoCalamari Revision r1.3 - 12 Jan 2002 - 12:14 GMT - MarcoCalamari |
This website is distributed under the GNU Documentation License |