Welcome! And… exactly! Most people simply don’t think (less care!) about privacy, security, robust data storage: all the things this community is so fired up about. They are the things that make the SAFE network so important (and successful on the long run), but for it to take off, it needs to be a better Twitter, a better YouTube, a better Facebook, a better Gmail first.
I want to be able to send / find / watch cat videos quicker / easier / better than on the clearnet, otherwise I simply won’t care.
EDIT: wow now that it got turned into its own topic it’s coming off like i’m a total hater far from it though, as you may all know it already
Bingo! Right on. Endusers/consumers care about free, ease of setup/use, ubiquitous, peer pressure, x-platforms they leave security to their banks and credit card companies. There are no real consequences to compromised cc numbers or bank accounts. Banks (insureds) or retailers cover the consumer losses. This is one big challenge for bitcoin…there is no consumer loss protection. Yeah its inconvenient for the guy to get a new CC or sort through ID theft.
Back on topic: There is a real market for a safenetwork twitter application. IMO its one that will relay the clearnet twitter application to the safenet twitter application - with the option - sending it back safenet-> clearnet. Then the real use-cases can be developed touting best of both worlds.
To take off, SAFE has to be a better BTC exchange (will be the first truly decentralised one ever), a better anonymous / end to end encrypted open source chat / email service (also doesn’t truly exist yet), a better (perfect?) place to store your important files forever, a better way to actually earn money from your PC without all the bitcoin node confusion / mega 90gb downloads, and other niche stuff that it will excel at early on.
We’re talking taking off here.
Outperforming YouTube facebook google etc will ensure #1 global adoption, but it doesn’t need to do all that to take off substantially.
OK lets say its better in all manner of things. YOU know, I know, @Tim87 knows, how will you grow it? Better still, where will you get the $billions needed to run against the grain and onboard users that think they already have the soup you are selling? It takes huge resources to move people laterally. Far fewer to move them forward. (bit still a lot)
It has to be better twitter, better facebook, better storage.
No kidding,
Yes it does, it needs to out-innovate, consistantly, hour-by-hour, daily, weekly, yearly and forever. That my friend takes more than a better BTC exchange, or mega uploads. Thats takes small army and some serious cash. You wont beat facebook at a game it invented. Has to be a new game … a better game.
I would love to agree, but those things are on the fringe. We know about them not because they are substantial, but because we care about these kind of things. Most people don’t.
SAFE doesn’t need to be a better BTC with it’s cute $10B market cap.
It needs to be a better CREDIT CARD.
Or a better DropBox.
Or a better Twitter.
In at least one thing in everyday life (i.e. not something crypto specific), it needs to be the absolute best, and then it will take off.
Otherwise, it’s gonna be an unnecessarily long wait.
Yes, I remember talking about it before, too. We tend to forget that we cannot generalize the level of excitement and anticipation we have in this community to the general population.
I found out about “Lifestuff” (as it was called at the time) after I came up with a very similar idea, and I was specifically researching the very things it was trying to accomplish. Others came through other interests, but mostly cryptocurrencies I think. The point is, people here are not “average” in that they have already been interested in similar concepts; I couldn’t find anybody IRL yet who was at least half as interested as I am.
Most of us here can see that the internet has been becoming a monster, a frighteningly effective tool of surveillance and, as a natural next step, oppression, in the hands of those with much power. The SAFE network can be a similarly effective solution against this move. However, we can’t expect that people in general will inconvenience their life by downgrading their user experience just to upgrade their privacy; this isn’t a natural concern for most when they log in to Facebook, call a friend on Skype, share a file on DropBox, or send an email.
This is why I believe it’s important to have a solution for an everyday problem that is vastly superior than anything on the market. I mentioned DropBox before because SAFE at its core is already a huge document store, so maybe that’s the area with the highest chance of quick success.
Once we have something like that, we can go: Oh by the way this thing does email too. And chat. And movies. And some sorta twitter like thing. And … so on
The beauty of a network is that it’s connected. It only takes a few useful utilities for people to start adopting changes. User experience will play an important role, and the maidsafe team has that figured out.
I can see journalists using the safenetwork for journalism as a start.
One area where SAFE would have an advantage is P2P file sharing, which I think it would inevitably be used for, simply because anonymity would be prudent. Another advantage apps on SAFE would have is reliability, as data is not stored on centralized servers that can suddenly go down. Also, traditional methods to attack websites would not work on sites hosted on the SAFE network. So, although I agree with the premise that most people generally don’t care about their privacy online (there are exceptions such as financial info), there are other advantages that an anonymous and decentralized network will have over client-server networks.
I think the barrier to entry can be very low if done correctly with SAFE. I see the network as a backend. You build an app, throw it on an app store and have SAFE as the back end. There isn’t really a need to have SAFE apps available only on the network, they can be offered on the clearnet just as easily.
Users who do not care or don’t think about security can go about their day not even knowing that SAFE has their back. The key is making the devs aware of it as an option.
I think we are looking at this through rose tinted spectacles of the west. It reminds me of similar conversations around bitcoin. People said why would people use bitcoin when banking works so well for the average Joe. The answer was they wouldn’t.
However the unbanked do use bitcoin because its better than the alternative. i.e I ll swap you a goat for ten buckets.
It will be the same with Safe. The average western user possibilly wont have a massive need for maid from day to day but there are whole countries such as China, Saudi,Tunisia, Vietnam etc etc who have censored internet. Suddenly Safenet looks superior in everyway.
I also think it will be a huge resource for commercial entities. Super computing power, running your IOT network on Safe, driverless cars.
Talk Talk have lost tens of million in lost data. Why would any company not store customer data on safe whilst keeping the front end on the current internet.
Just like bitcoin is running behind the scenes on many payment apps, safe could potentially run behind the scenes for all current corporate entities. With millions to lose you would be crazy not to.
It certainly will be built out on the back end as an important aspect. But for those that care, or really need private, secure and free applications, SAFE is an easy alternative to Tor. Who will want to use it right away, as soon as it’s proofed as secure and anonymous? Well, spies, for one. Dissidents, for another. Journalists. Whistleblowers. Silk-Roaders. The public furor from political types about how it’s dangerously unregulated will drive curious people to check it out, find it easy and useful, and aboard they come.
The rEvolution has already begun. SAFE will help make it truly viral.
Valid points, but the other part of the story is accessibility and utility. Compared to bitcoin, SAFEnetwork has both more utility to more people (in the West) and will be plug and play. It will also be far easier for an ordinary person to understand the case for them using it, by which I mean: not the privacy benefits.
I think in terms of the privacy argument, your points are more valid, while in terms of useful stuff (cheap, cloud storage, synced data and apps across all your devices by default, all under one account etc etc) the reasons to use SAFE and the low barrier to understanding this fact, and getting access to it, means that for those who don’t care about privacy will still come in droves!
So those who care about privacy will come, and those who don’t care about privacy will come too, but for other reasons IMO.
I agree, I am not saying the average western user wont use it. I just don’t think the initial success of the network is dependent on it.
I think in a lot of ways for the average user will not want to take responsibility for storing their data and NOT loosing the passwords. For me personally I don’t have anything of importance to store so the security of being able to request a new password for my cloud storage out weighs the security concern.
I think a solution to this problem could be for developers to run their back ends on safe but keep the front end on clear net. This provides protection to the data but the responsibility of not loosing access is placed on a corporate entity. Best of both worlds.
Most people goes either from advertising or from what is the best option for the moment. I myself are in the hand of Google, my life is in Googles hand as to say
Just for a few years ago, Maidsafes vision was stupid and impossible. Even in a free world there are limitations. Today with millions of people on fiber the vision can be true but if and only if we all are prepared to pay for the cost.
There are a cost for managing and storing data, Maidsafes vision are that this cost is already payed for and that most people have a “free” unused resource to share. This is not true in my opinion, I am a big spender of storage and computing power, and my storages cost me money today…
But and this is important, I am willing to setup a Vault just to see and just to be in the loop of the “next internet”, and for the services Maidsafe promises. But I am not so stupid to believe that it is for free… There are a costs as storing all data for eternity, and for all communication between vaults… and all of us have to pay in one way or another.
The former is a minority, but we can count on them.
The latter is a potentially much larger group, but they need incentives.
For the vision of the safe internet to succeed, we need as broad adoption as possible.
We know it’s an important vision for even those who can’t recognize it, but that isn’t enough.
We need to get people switch even if they who don’t care and don’t understand.
The solution for that is simple: we need killer apps.
I’m not sure I agree that SAFE is a simple concept (most people have no idea how the “plain” internet works!) but it’s not important that it would be simple, or that they would understand.
How many people understand how GPS works? I mean, really understand, with all the math and at least some of the gory details of how the signals are put together, the challenges and the solutions for them, and so on. Well, most people I know think it’s something like your phone is talking to satellites, and other absurd ideas. Yet, in spite of all the misunderstandings, everybody’s out there running after Pokémons.
Not sure I understand you? We do all have ‘spare’ resources. It would be extremely cheap (just electricity cost of leaving computer on) to contribute those resources to the network. Everything else you have already paid for… hardware, phone line, internet connection etc. So spare resources aren’t completely free (still have electricity cost), but they do obviously out-compete all the ‘economies of scale’ that lead us spiralling into centralisation - since economies of scale have to build the hardware and infrastructure.
Just to be clear, storage on maidsafe will not be free. It will cost you safecoins to store data or create your website there. It should just be a lot cheaper and the pay once last forever model could really work, although it is really hard for anyone to be totally confident about atm; we’ll need to see how it plays out.[quote=“greisa, post:17, topic:11519”]
I am a big spender of storage and computing power, and my storages cost me money today…
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You should definitely keep your eye on this corner of crypto. It could save you a bundle at the same time as offering a lot of very cool advantages. If pay-once-forever doesn’t work, the cost to keep it will still be much cheaper than anywhere else could offer as far as I can tell, so it doesn’t really matter that much if it doesn’t work out like that imo.
I think another potential advantage of SAFE is that it verifies a user when they initially log on onto the network, instead of having to remember 100 different passwords for all the services they use online.
far from it though, as you may all know it already
