Ben Eng on Nostr: Expanding on foundational technology for distributed data for decentralized apps, we ...
Expanding on foundational technology for distributed data for decentralized apps, we must recognize the separation of concerns between an app's data versus the user's data.
If someone offers an AI image generator as a service, the app's own data includes the model weights. This is distinct from the end user's preferences, prompts, and generated images. We would want to enable the end user to own his data, so that he can control the access (privacy, sharing) and he can take his data to other services. For data to be as censorship-resistant as identity (SSI), we introduce the concept of self-sovereign data (SSD). The user's data can be scattered and replicated throughout the Internet, served by diverse storage services without any one platform having control over availability. Think of this being enabled by a contemporary bittorrents protocol, because we want to preserve a p2p approach for censorship-resistance.
Through this separation of app data and end user data (SSD), we would design every app to honor this bring your own data (BYOD) approach. This becomes the norm for the future decentralized Internet. Every app must support bring your own identity and bring your own data, so that end users can never be locked in (and rug-pulled) by the service provider.
If someone offers an AI image generator as a service, the app's own data includes the model weights. This is distinct from the end user's preferences, prompts, and generated images. We would want to enable the end user to own his data, so that he can control the access (privacy, sharing) and he can take his data to other services. For data to be as censorship-resistant as identity (SSI), we introduce the concept of self-sovereign data (SSD). The user's data can be scattered and replicated throughout the Internet, served by diverse storage services without any one platform having control over availability. Think of this being enabled by a contemporary bittorrents protocol, because we want to preserve a p2p approach for censorship-resistance.
Through this separation of app data and end user data (SSD), we would design every app to honor this bring your own data (BYOD) approach. This becomes the norm for the future decentralized Internet. Every app must support bring your own identity and bring your own data, so that end users can never be locked in (and rug-pulled) by the service provider.
quoting nevent1q…5hkmCentralized control through government tyranny, cronyism, and corporate monopolization are the underlying dynamics that must be mitigated through decentralization, but we are falling behind. Foundational technologies are lacking.
First we need identity. Id must be self-sovereign, so that the individual controls their own private keys, sharing them with no one, holding custody securely with unbreakable secrecy. Everything else is built on SSI as a foundation, because we need ownership, privacy, authenticity, integrity, and access control---all dependent on identity.
Next, we need dis-intermediated communication. Individuals need to be able to exchange messages reliably without being tied irreplaceably to a third party. This includes being able to identify, find, and address each other according to their identity.
Over top of p2p comms, we need censorship-resistant apps that are capable of interacting with one's social network. This includes commerce, so Bitcoin for store of value and for payments is a foundational element of the architecture.
For apps and the services that individuals can offer for commerce to be censorship-proof, we need for hosting of logic on compute to be distributed, and we need the data that is processed to be distributed.
Here is the point where the analysis necessarily veers away from the simple explanation that I've tried to stick to, so I'll stop this thread here, and I'll start exploring the details in separate threads as my wandering mind spontaneously gets to them, as I did in this thread.