From the very richest Forbes Magazine (reprint) come news of a nefarious plot:
There's no better example of the power, and the terror, inspired by blockchain than Gab.com, the social network used by the accused Pittsburgh synagogue gunman to threaten Jews.
About a month and a half before the alleged gunman made good on those threats by opening fire in a Pittsburgh synagogue and killing 11 people, Gab submitted paperwork to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to raise $10 million via an initial coin offering (ICO). The offering, dated September 18, 2018, has so far received commitments to raise $5.6 million in capital for the "free speech" social network, which is a favorite of white supremacists, neo-Nazis and other members of the "alt-right."
Since the shooting on Saturday, Gab has been shut down by a host of mainstream services including payment processors Stripe and Paypal, Web-hosting company Joyent and briefly, domain registry GoDaddy. But that might not matter, because Gab has already taken the first step toward freeing itself from dependence on traditional infrastructure and support mechanisms, thanks to its funding via the ethereum blockchain. Ultimately Gab's goal is to build an entire ecosystem beyond the reach of centralized authorities—whether Facebook, Twitter or venture capitalists—making it nearly indestructible. On this, the tenth anniversary of the publication of Satoshi Nakamoto's whitepaper, which gave birth to bitcoin, Gab epitomizes the darker consequences of his vision.
[...] Gab can also use other blockchain services if mainstream providers try to kick it off the internet by refusing to provide critical services. If Gab needs to replace GoDaddy for domain service (the addresses people use to find websites), Ethereum Name Service provides domains for decentralized applications built on the ethereum blockchain. Web hosting? No problem. Ethereum's Substratum provides a decentralized alternative to Joyent. Others have already pioneered the idea. PeepEth is a nascent ethereum-powered social network, and Mastadon is a blockchain-based Twitter.
Previously: Social Media and the Pittsburgh Shooter: Gab.com Going Down
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Friday November 02 2018, @10:40PM (2 children)
Yes, seconded. Please don't go all violent, jmorris. It was terrible waiting for you to post something after the Pittsburgh shooting, fearing that it might have been you. Almost as bad as when I thought khallow might've gotten ate by a bear.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 03 2018, @02:53AM (1 child)
Ate by a bear? Man, Russian women must be kinky.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday November 03 2018, @03:02AM
The obvious rebuttal is that khallow used to, at least, work in Yellowstone, sucking at the government teat that is the National Park Service, and they got
Griz.