> practices consisting in shipping binaries (jars) of unknown provenance

this fits in with an article I'm thinking of writing, about various undesirable consequences to software freedom of some recent software packaging trends. thanks for providing me with yet another undesirable consequence to mention

> All of this dark aura of crime-enabling goes away if I have a data-sharing service where *I* select and curate *exactly what I want to host and nothing else*.

*nod*, that makes it a kind of service that does not preserve privacy. those are fine for publishing stuff, not so much for e.g. cooperating off-site backups

but we are back to your being able to observe what goes through your wires, the bit that was already clear, while I was trying to explore was the exception that made it acceptable, even desirable for a data transport service to not know what it's carrying (because it's encrypted), that I assume might extend to caching and longer-term forms of encrypted data storage. Here, again, you, should you choose to be the provider, would not know what's going through your wire, so you couldn't possibly assess how much of the data is lawful, any more than a Tor relay node operator could. IIUC, you wouldn't want to run these, and I guess you wouldn't want to run an ISP either

some analysis of consequence of drawing this line as I guessed (correctly or not):
criminals will strive to hide their activities, and thus they will naturally seek privacy-respecting communication services for these activities
noncriminals, in turn, should they decide whether or not to participate using this line, will see the criminals there, that are likely to be early adopters, and steer themselves away from privacy-respecting therefore criminal-infested services, and stick to services that do NOT respect privacy
meanwhile, noncriminals that use a different line, such as the *potential* for lawful uses of privacy-respecting services, might join, and turn the services into ones where the majority of uses are lawful, enabling even people who draw the line as I guessed do
so I guess this line wouldn't prevent its adopters from joining, after all, it just makes them later adopters of privacy-respecting services, provided the services succeed at attracting many lawful adopters first

> by far a clear majority of legitimate, lawful use cases
aah, that's the line that seems to clear it up for me.
it's not just that there must be lawful uses, it's not that lawful uses might be concocted, it's (I guess) that you must be able to see for yourself that most uses a lawful, and therefore, if everything is encrypted, you can't check, so it's not acceptable for you. (do I guess right? if so, I think I heard a click here
thanks again

> how many times
sorry if I wasn't loud and clear myself, but I've got that point already. what I haven't quite got is the exception:
> If I was *selling* access to the network to others, that might be different
I don't see why being paid would make it acceptable to host or route child porn, or to be a drug mule for that matter.
what makes it hard for me to grasp it is that, in some of the services we're talking about, people are not paid to offer them, while in others, people get similar service in return, which may count as payback, but none of this seems to matter. while in other cases, as you mentioned, selling them seems to be a key element in making it acceptable. I'm sure that makes sense to you, and I look forward to grasping that reasoning myself, and I hope you're still willing to explore and expose it further. regardless, I thank you for your help so far

> It must be the users' choice as to what data goes on it.
right, but that doesn't seem to apply to our ISPs, not because they must be allowed to chose what data goes through their wires, but because they have common carrier status, which has nothing whatsoever to do with any moral objections they might have.

so if we our own computers play the role of routers, caches, or otherwise storage for others, and if we had similar immunity to that given to common carriers, would that be enough to alleviate your concerns about hosting or routing data for others?

I expect that, if the data is encrypted so that you can't possibly have a clue as to what it is, it would be pretty hard to hold you criminally liable for it. nearly all criminal law requires intent, which would be challenging to establish if neither you nor anyone else can tell what's in there. it's like carrying a bunch of harmless subatomic particles, that only a machine someone else has can rearrange into (il?)legal matter

erhm, I thought I understood your stance as a moral one, rather than a liability-averting one, but your response about "common carrier" status seems to point the opposite direction. surely being labeled, or regarding oneself as a common carrier, vs a common mule, doesn't address any of the moral issues that you appeared to be more concerned about. I guess it's a combination of both moral and legal, after all?