Re: [tor-talk] Tor as ecommerce platform

[Maxim Kammerer <mk@xxxxxx>]

On Wed, Aug 8, 2012 at 8:09 PM, Andrew Lewman <andrew@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> How would you have us promote Tor?

The “Tor users” page isn't presented as a promotional page, it is
presented as a factual one. I also remember discussion on this list
where I expressed doubt about some aspects listed there (military
uses), and the overall claim was that the page is a good
representation of the current userbase.

> We have a FAQ (as you pointed out) to answer the obvious questions
> about criminal usage of Tor. We're fully aware criminals can and do use
> Tor.

So why not answer those questions honestly, and not pretend that users
are stupid? As I said, it detracts from the project's credibility.
Anyone who installs Tor (or I2P, for that matter) and explores the
hidden services, immediately sees the overwhelmingly illegal (mostly,
since it depends on jurisdiction) content. Anyone who runs an exit
node immediately sees that a sizable portion of the traffic is of
questionable nature. [1]

> If Tor shuts down today, who loses and who wins?

Why would it be shut down? Why would you structure an anti-censorship
project in such a way that it depends on goodwill of authorities?

> I notice a lack of child abusers, terrorists, money-launderers, and
> drug dealers as use cases on the Liberté Linux motivation page
> (http://dee.su/liberte-motivation).

That's a motivation page (in a dire need of an update, but that's
beside the point) — I don't care if any of these categories of people
use Liberté. Why should I? Their activities are someone else's
problem. Moreover, if any of them help improve Liberté (be it via bug
reports, suggestions, patches, promotion) — then great, and it's
welcome. I don't feel a need to justify a project by pretending that
most users are some goodwill elves. Do you? I have a strong suspicion
that if I didn't mention the possibility of gathering .onion access
statistics in Tor network, then I would get the usual replies that
there is no evidence of most active .onion resources being of
questionable nature.

[1] http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/vdhs8/hi_iama_we_are_core_members_of_the_tor_project/c53jzqv

-- 
Maxim Kammerer
Liberté Linux: http://dee.su/liberte
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