I'm not sure if anything ever came of it, but I remember years back that there was some development effort put in to switch over to free software. Possibly related to https://preview.voat.co/ which is basically a test version.

There was a BTC address posted publicly and some goats over there did some digging providing conflicting information. I don't know much about bitcoin so I never ventured out to research deeper into this.

But it's fair to say money wasn't the issue. What I found most credible is that the admin was in a position of either shutting down or compromising the place and went for the shut down. Of course, since the canary died ages ago, lots of goats think the place was compromised anyway. If you subscribe to that the most credible thing becomes that the site served it's use.

I'm not especially unhappy, since it got kinda stale over the years, anyway. All the goats that thought the place was compromised went away so the remaining folks dispersing around poal, notabug and other similar places will likely stir things up in those places and maybe make things interesting again. At least I hope so.

The great thing about Voat wasn't that people called OP a niggerfaggot, but that bullshit got caught regularly and that sources to data was provided. Basically, people over there weren't sheep, but goats.

I can't do it like I used to do it but I still look forward to that nightly blaze or that good weather day high when I'm running errands and have the sun shining.

I feel like this would all make sense if I ate a ton of peyote and meditated.

Please do it and report back.

BTC isn't exactly anonymous. If he's ever posted a BTC address publicly, you can then just sort of follow the transactions around even though you may never know the true owner of one address to another.

Does he mention what his operating costs were or what sort of server setup he was rocking? Voat is/was a lot larger than I imagined, I've seen numbers stating hundreds of thousands of users. I'd imagine scaling (especially with whatever BS Microsoft licensing requirements would be) would get quite costly, but well within his ability if that rumor was true.

What was the end game with Voat anyhow? I see where they had previously had an angel investor and some tech money coming in, which isn't bad in it's own, but usually outside funding and investments isn't done based on charity because the guy with the money supports your platform. They usually seek a return of some sort...

I feel like this would all make sense if I ate a ton of peyote and meditated.

Ohh, Weird History looks like it'll be a good one!

I was on Voat for a while but the stuff that got them thrown out of Germany was explicitly vile. I support peoples right to express their feelings, even hateful, but not for monkey to sling digital poop online.

The reason I'm cautious about the US is as you point out, data collection. You have some excellent points, particularly for a public site that allows anonymous access. But those who access the site through clearnet will likely have their IP's logged by network taps and can have their RL ID's connected to their anonymous profiles through data analysis.

Understood. Although this site wasn't launched in response to accommodate a mass influx of users after a reddit ban wave (for example) I'm cool with organized areas of speech that others may find distasteful simply because I don't believe de-platforming changes hearts and minds. As I've said before, I'll tolerate things that even I disagree with because this isn't my personal blog or site. It's just a resource that's available to all. People will still be who they are at their core regardless if they have a place to talk or not, in my opinion, and they might as well have a safe place to do it.

With that said, as you can see, this place is more about privacy, technology, news related to those topics, alternative networks, etc. I would imagine we'll see some Voat refugees here, and they're welcome, but there are many other established places like Ruqqus with more features that the average Voat user may prefer. Perhaps some of the more privacy focused ones will come here, I guess time will tell. Either way, if they want to join in participate in good faith then I'm all for it.

Regarding the hosting, I do encourage and hope people will use whatever method of accessing the site that they feel most comfortable with. I have actually been eye-balling a second location that is technically outside of the whole 5/9/14 eyes realm but I'm not sure how well the network would hold up to DDOS attacks and it is a bit more expensive for a network that isn't "better" and in a country that may be less likely to cooperate with requests, but I'm still researching it. The idea however is that I personally can not share what I do not know, regardless of location, and that using the available methods of access that the users can determine their level of trust. Originally I wasn't going to have a clearnet website available but figured it would be a good idea to have one, if anything, to encourage those visitors to ditch the clearnet and use something like I2P or Tor (for example) to access the website and to support the networks that support their privacy.

Exactly the reasons I made this post. I checked out the system powering Ramble and eventually came across a list of other sites powered by Postmill. Didn't seem like people I'd want to share an online community with. After reading your thoughtful answer it is clear the way you want something different for Ramble.

Yeah... To me, it read that discussion read almost like satire. Everything from being pre-mad and pre-offended by events that haven't occurred to silencing what I was thought was professional discourse. They're a caricature of themselves.. And although I disagree with that site on most aspects politically I have no problem with their existence and if there was a mass exodus of their users, for example, they'd be just as welcomed here. I don't have to agree with someone to understand that they have a voice and in this modern digital age, sometimes it's hard or difficult to have it heard. But I've forked the codebase, hopefully there will be enough use of this site to warrant some custom development for features that this community wants.

That's life though, I guess.

https://v2.incogtube.com/c/WeirdHistory/videos https://v2.incogtube.com/c/YesterworldEntertainment/videos

Very relateable. I try to avoid this by smoking weed erryday.

That's basically it, all those request clogs up them internet pipes.

Regular sites often use CDN's (server networks to share the load), and a clearnet solution would have one server sort out illegitimate requests and serve CAPTCHA's while a different server that doesn't see any of the unwanted traffic host the site.

I've read somewhere that the BC address associated with Voat donations have over $100k. No source.

You're about to learn why I'm Rambler

I've not seen a single wasted sentence in your answer, it has been a joy to read.

Love it or hate it, the USA

Hate it. I'm not too bothered about free speech in the traditional sense, I was on Voat for a while but the stuff that got them thrown out of Germany was explicitly vile. I support peoples right to express their feelings, even hateful, but not for monkey to sling digital poop online.

The reason I'm cautious about the US is as you point out, data collection. You have some excellent points, particularly for a public site that allows anonymous access. But those who access the site through clearnet will likely have their IP's logged by network taps and can have their RL ID's connected to their anonymous profiles through data analysis.

There's also the remote possibility that there could be more direct clowning around by the US government, national security letters I think it was called. Not Ramble nor your host, but further upstream. It's sad to say but I look at US servers today the same way I used to look at .ru-servers in the late 90's.

Private undertaking. I started it out of frustration towards big-tech.

Respect. I have something similar but more geared toward social networking as a private alternative for friends (federerated, no walled gardens).

I got banned from the support forum and lost product support for the open source software powering this site because it's main coder does not support freedom of speech. She is a far far leftist---

Exactly the reasons I made this post. I checked out the system powering Ramble and eventually came across a list of other sites powered by Postmill. Didn't seem like people I'd want to share an online community with. After reading your thoughtful answer it is clear the way you want something different for Ramble.

Thank you for your thoughful and thurough answer.

But wait, there's more! Here is the forum associated with the site: http://www.973-eht-namuh-973.com/forum/i

Was just a dude named Joey.

It's possible. It had been canned once before when it was hosted in Germany.

I don't know much about the guy or the site outside of being a casual lurker since it started, but I wish him luck.

Dreads captchas are rage captchas, even Darkfail admin pointed it out and said that Dread should be avoided as he seems to think Hug is no longer in control of Dread.

I'm not sure what to think but I've avoided it for a while, he updates his canary always late and Paris seems to have a bad relationship with Hug calling him a lazy admin.

I'd rather have a platform where the relationship is good between staff and the Canary is updated on time, but Dread is pretty much the only place people seem to socialise on Tor.

I also don't agree with a captcha every time you write a message, but that's Dread for you.

Looks like you caught the attention of the Aussie Special Forces.

RIP

That's why I only stream for free. Checkmate, government.

Well that's gay.

BRB, a kangaroo is at my door.

Literally.

I'd say we're classy (sticks pinky out when slamming this Bang) , but the community dictates what they want to see and will vote on comments accordingly.

I guess just know your audience. In a /f/privacy thread? May not go over as well there as it would in /f/DarkMemes or a forum you or another user create for a topic of your choice.

I don't care though. Just know that every forum has their own mods so try to respect their wishes.

Is this a problem solvable through certificates? Like you hide the certificates behind a captcha and revoke certificates of misbehaving users.

I wasn't planning on becoming a Voat refugee, since I came to this place before Voat decided to shut down, but I guess now, I am. Can I call people niggerfaggots around here, too, or are people all classy over here?

Yeah, I was a bit surprised when I learned they went the Microsoft route.