Ask HN: Is there a way to build an alternative internet?
2 comments
Not until Net Neutrality is repelled.
Yes, though the extent to which this is feasible is limited by hardware, commerce, and law. Even now, there exist alternative protocols and communities of varying scope for every part of our de facto stack (https://github.com/redecentralize/alternative-internet). Certainly creating an alternative infrastructure poses the biggest challenge, but GuiFi, Freifunk, Ninux and others have met that, and then some.
One project not mentioned in the above link is RINA (https://csr.bu.edu/rina/). According to RINA, the very notion of an "alternative Internet" makes no sense for two reasons: (1) the Internet as we know it is not actually an Inter-net so much as a single, flat network that we accrete; (2) under the RINA model, every network could be considered "alternative," and in almost a Platonic sense, RINA treats every network and every connection as already existing. If this is of interest, I highly recommend the book "Patterns in Network Architecture."
One project not mentioned in the above link is RINA (https://csr.bu.edu/rina/). According to RINA, the very notion of an "alternative Internet" makes no sense for two reasons: (1) the Internet as we know it is not actually an Inter-net so much as a single, flat network that we accrete; (2) under the RINA model, every network could be considered "alternative," and in almost a Platonic sense, RINA treats every network and every connection as already existing. If this is of interest, I highly recommend the book "Patterns in Network Architecture."