[music]
Hi, my name is Meinrad Ben and I'm a Cypherpunk and I'm currently working on Freedom Browser. Yeah, so Freedom Browser is an interface for the Web 3. And uh more specifically the decentralized part of it, so like the DWeb, decentralized web. And uh it really came out of uh the need for an easy-to-use interface for anything that's DWeb, so it could be IPFS or Swarm. So, these networks exist, they host content, and they are mature, but I found it very difficult to kind of view content.
Uh uploading is okay, but to view content and to display it in a meaningful manner, I was really imagining uh like a web interface, and it didn't really exist, especially with cross-links. So, then I just kind of prototyped around a little bit, and uh I built uh yeah, a very simple uh proof-of-concept browser, and I gave it sort of a placeholder name, Freedom Browser, and that name stuck, and I think it really transports exactly what we're doing. And uh in the meantime, Florian also joined me and contributes to the project. And uh yeah, it really um what it does, you can enter like an ETH domain in the address bar, and it does everything in the background, and it's a it's a node uh which directly connects to the DWeb, so there's no gateways. It really your computer becomes a node, and the browser kind of just translates that to a very easy easy-to-use interface.
Decentralized networks at the moment are often accessed through centralized gateways, therefore defeating the point and putting back the control to the gateway uh in forms of censorship or like even uh reliance, so if that gateway is down, uh it doesn't work, right? So, and one big mission of Freedom Browser is also to uh resolve this uh yeah, this uh oxymoron of like uh being centralized while trying to be decentralized and uh we talked about theater later kind of making the theater of pretending to be decentralized reality so that it actually is decentralized and we're on a very good way for that. We're building applications that have the whole stack decentralized so you cannot pull the plug and that's I think super important and will happen and we're trying to push that as much as possible. Also I like how crypto winters are always creating a sort of a shakeout of people that are really just focusing on the monetary part of of cryptocurrency and blockchain networks or decentralized technology. It really gives an opportunity to be really focused free from destruction or mostly free from destruction and come together with people that really share these values hardcore and that build through the the huddle and build you know that's that's really the opportunity that we have right now at the moment.
We know the next type is just around the corner and now we can kind of build really good stuff that will then be accelerated and launched into the stratosphere by the next type but we're building the engines and the rockets right now for the spaceships that will start in the next type. So I was doing Cypherpunk things since the early 2000s without kind of knowing that term even. I was just kind of doing encryption for NGOs writing open source code and setting up my own server project with encrypted and environmental hosting kind of solarpunk ideas and then I founded my company and I worked for like 10 years really hard to build that and then a few years ago I exited operationally and I looked back into things that also matter for me and then I came back to sort of my hacker roots and I got contacted by a friend to join the Cypherpunk retreat last year near Berlin. And there I got in contact with the Cypherpunk scene again much more. And I saw that some needs are still the same.
And specifically the conversation with Brewster Kahle of archive.org where he described the need for an easy-to-use interface to the DWeb which brings everything in one app like reading, writing, uploading and kind of also having an identity element. And I was like, "Okay, that that would be cool to have." And I looked around as I said earlier and I didn't really find it. And then I just built it myself.
So the inspiration really came from there and also being around these people again and shout out to Jaromil which really kind of he called me and I was like he didn't call me in years. This must be important so that's why I joined the camp. So the Cypherpunk retreat near Berlin last year I really liked because it was very select group of people that are really hardcore focused on this mission and uh everybody was there with a purpose. And I was kind of quiet mainly mainly an observer in most conversations. And but it was really inspiring and really gave me this this urge to to build something.
And I also like the sort of like activities outside the hacking kind of the ride on the boat and then these sort of things. That was really cool to connect to people. And the location was amazing, very quiet, very retreat-like, very much to remove from the city. And just yeah in general all these conversations and uh just a very different vibe to a conference. It was a very very much focused on building and having concrete outcomes, building new connections and teams.
And uh the laser-sharp focus. I think that's the one thing that I really really liked about this. So for me privacy is it sounds a bit cheesy. It's a human right. Not cheesy, but like it's a bit of a trope.
Um But it really is it it kind of exists for me like air and I I naturally have these let's say habits that keep me keep myself private because I know technology coming from the very ages very early ages of the internet and I saw how privacy was more more undermined. It started by default being very private and then through obviously all the corporations things got really really data mined and that's one thing then governments really took their own turn in undermining privacy. So it in essence in a essence it's like bringing it back to the original roots and kind of making sure that this has a solid foundation technical foundation but also good UI's. And privacy should be something that end users don't have to think about. It should be supported also by regulation to a certain extent but people should always have the choice to to do that.
And uh privacy is important this usual I have nothing to hide. I think people are now aware that it's more about the behavioral change that if you are observed by someone that you have even like without knowing. So if someone looks at you with a camera you will not scratch your bum or you will not pick your nose because you kind of censor yourself. This is just about kind of things you do but think about like forbidden thoughts or that kind of critical of the current government of the system you're in or the future government that might be in that space where you are right now. And you have a a big needs to kind of do things yeah just for yourself and share it with friends and this always needs to be preserved and you need to be able to and be anonymous and not followed with every single step that you do.
So what does it mean to be a neo cypherpunk today? For me uh It's a it's a loaded term. So like there's so many concepts in there neo like a new thing, and cyphering. For me it's just being and being what I always was, hacking open source, using encryption tools. Now as a rather new addition using cryptocurrency and making sure that it's private.
It's using these tools, building these tools, and distributing these tools for free. I So also freedom browser at this point doesn't have a business model, and it's it's not really a company, it's a project around an idea that needs to exist in the world to give access to an already amazing decentralized networks. So my favorite privacy tools are VPNs. So a VPN is is great. It keeps a certain privacy.
I don't use onion too much. No particular reason for that, but I really like like it and like what it offers to the world. And also cryptocurrency is a privacy tool if you use it in the right way. If you use a transparent address system, maybe not. But if you have sort of zero knowledge addresses, it becomes very very private.
And also the what is it? The private tab of the browser. It's a kind of good privacy tool sometimes as well just to kind of be disconnected from your history to at least to a certain extent. The biggest challenge in building a browser is the multitude of features. So it's like a it's easy to become bloatware because there's so many people that want this, they want like the bookmarks to behave this way, they want support for this network, support for that network.
Just for uh everything to be as lean as possible. And kind of deciding what should be included, what shouldn't be included. I think that's the biggest challenge because in a way you want There's all great stuff and you want to support it, but there's only so many hours in a day and so many hours that one does coding or one does live coding. Um that's that is a challenge. So, technical challenges I don't think exist really.
It's like Uh, one person once said to me in software everything is possible. So, I kind of really believe that and I can feel that. Uh, there's currently a temporary challenge I would call with uh, centralized gateways to query uh, the blockchains. So, you have these RPC endpoints. But, that's been a big topic also this year's ECC to make this decentralized or even completely decentralized.
So, that challenge is being solved by others. But, for me it's really like this social challenge of deciding what to include. The positive outcome of all of this, let's say the uh, cypherpunks win. Ha. I think to some extent they have already won.
But, uh, the world doesn't know it yet. Um, is that there's these uh, bubbles of privacy and kind of complete freedom where we can build things uh, in a safe space if you will. And uh, exported into the mainstream. So, you have that and the mainstream kind of picks it up and does something useful without even knowing that they're doing this. They just feel more freedom.
They're like, "Oh, suddenly I have this great publishing tool. It cost me nothing." Or suddenly I have something that cannot be censored or I can use this uh, currency, this new money. I can use it everywhere in the world. Just kind of introducing uh, kind of on a subtle level these these freedom tools and uh, doing it with software and not being disrupted.
But, also that completely into other parts of life as it already has done. Like uh, the idea of open knowledge through Wikipedia uh, has for example, Wikipedia or like first open source then Wikipedia has really gone to many levels of technology but also beyond that as open law, there's open design uh, then many other open technologies that have adopted cypherpunk values without knowing that they are uh, and uh, kind of having that continued and maybe even going into politics as well, where politics are more fair and transparent, and therefore whole societies can be governed by Cypherpunk values. I would think that would be a quite nice goal to achieve.
Automatic transcript — names and jargon may be misspelled.