[users] Public Gemini hosting?

[Mansfield]

On Thu, Apr 8, 2021 at 9:20 AM Jason McBrayer <jmcbray@carcosa.net> wrote:

>
> Mansfield writes:
>
> > https://ondollo.com/mansfield currently offers free gemini hosting.
>
> > Thanks for asking, and thanks for writing up something to help
> > newcomers!
>
> Hi! I'm deeply ambivalent about recommending your application to new
> users. On the one hand, your app does *almost exactly* what I think is
> the Right Thing for Gemini publishing: provide a unified native app for
> both reading and publishing, with integrated account creation. I
> honestly want to commend you for that.
>
>
Thanks! I think we're meeting our original objective in providing something
that goes from nowhere to creating content in Geminispace with as little
work or explanation as possible. That's awesome that you feel that way too.


> On the other hand, neither your client nor your server are Free
> Software. I can't really recommend to new users to run an untrusted
> binary that I can't provide any security/privacy assurances for. Despite
> my interest, I haven't even run it myself, for that reason.
>

Yeah, the untrusted part is something we're still working through. I doubt
I would run it myself if I hadn't written it! :-D

I also think that paying to sign the binaries would still *not* be enough,
right? At least, from my perspective (imagining I hadn't written it) I
would still not trust the client or server.


> Likewise, the client locks the user into using your server for
> publishing. While that's certainly the easiest approach starting out,
> I'd rather see an open standard for registration and publishing,
> preferably using existing protocols.
>
>
Interesting perspective... I think I would have characterized it
differently, but that's OK. When you mention 'using existing protocols', I
would assume you mean SSH - is that what you were meaning?


> Again, thanks for doing this experiment, because I think it's the right
> direction for things to go; I just can't recommend it to new users at
> this time.
>
> --
> Jason McBrayer      | “Strange is the night where black stars rise,
> jmcbray@carcosa.net | and strange moons circle through the skies,
>                     | but stranger still is lost Carcosa.”
>                     | ― Robert W. Chambers,The King in Yellow
>

Makes sense. I'll keep chipping away at something to see if progress can be
made.

I think, from your perspective, you're looking for something that is...
open source... and that uses a more standard approach for registering and
publishing, right?

Maybe if the client were written to run in the browser? But then the server
wouldn't be open... humm... though... I'm curious... is there *any* server
that is running where the code being run can be verified? I could see
someone saying, "I'm running the open source version of FOO as the server",
but they could have tweaked it to be FOO' or something... thoughts?

Again - thanks! We'll keep thinking about this.