
Show HN: DPAGE – build and publish webpages on the decentralized internet - brisky
https://dpage.io/
======
vrepsys
Hi, one of the DPAGE creators here. We’re a team of two guys who used to work
at Wix (website builder). We felt that there are not many good options if you
want to quickly set up a minimalistic webpage or publish some content online.
So we built dpage. With dpage you can edit your pages in a dropbox paper-
inspired editor and give them human readable urls. We want it to be good for
personal homepages, keeping and sharing your notes, snippets and embedded
content (e.g. youtube videos, twitter posts, or github gists).

In terms of tech, it’s built on top of Blockstack’s decentralized
infrastructure. You log into DPAGE using a decentralized id, and your data is
stored on Blockstack's decentralized storage hub (Gaia). At any point you can
run your own storage hub and store your data on your own server.

DPAGE doesn’t store user data, it connects to user’s storage hub from the
browser when user logs into the app. Gaia storage hubs are usually publicly
accessible, but all private information is end-to-end encrypted with the
private keys associated with the user’s Blockstack id.

As a result, there’s no vendor lock-in with DPAGE, users can bring their data
with them to other apps, they have complete control over their data. For
example, if Facebook was built this way, a user who doesn’t like FB could
seamlessly start using another app and keep all their contacts and messages.

We realize that it might be harder to monetize a product, when you can’t lock-
in users into your app. You basically voluntarily open yourself up to the
competition. On the other hand, the total value that the product can create
for the world is much greater if the data is controlled by the users and they
can permission other apps to use it. Imagine all the innovation that could
happen if all the data on Facebook was open to developers (with the permission
of users who own the data).

We’d love to hear your thoughts or feedback about the idea or the app.

~~~
bduerst
How is this different than using containers across different cloud providers?
Is it just a WYSWYG webpage editor that you can run from your own machine?

Also, what's your plan to handle illegal content? You're on major cloud
providers now, but they've shown that they will reject some customers who have
harmful/illegal user-generated content. Anything marketed as _decentralized_
tends to attract flies like honey.

~~~
vrepsys
DPAGE is not able to remove user data (even if it's illegal), because we don't
store it. However, storage hub providers will have the ability remove it.

What dpage can do is deny the access to illegal content by blocking illegal
dpage.io urls. But then, a user can pick to use another app that serves the
pages created on dpage.

------
theamk
My usual question for decentralized storage system is "who is paying".

The DPAGE page says: "your data are by default stored on a free Blockstack’s
Gaia storage hub". When I looked at the Blockstack, their page says "Personal
data lockers built on Google, AWS, and Azure."

Does this mean that my data is stored (encrypted) on Google/AWS/Azure, and
that Blockstack is currently paying for this? So if Blockstack runs out of
money, all the pages are gone?

~~~
nemo1618
I wish people would ask this question of IPFS more often. Storage, especially
long-term storage, requires incentives! Just look at BitTorrent -- at _best_ ,
you continue seeding a file after downloading it out of the goodness of your
heart, or (more commonly) because you can't be bothered to remove each torrent
file after it finishes. In practice, the only way to keep torrent files alive
for a long time is out-of-band incentives, primarily in the form of "points"
on a private tracker. Even then, seeders have little incentive to seed content
that isn't personally valuable to them, since they can get just as many
"points" for seeding an equal amount of valuable content. In other words, good
luck finding high-quality seeders for your personal photos. Ultimately, if you
want someone to store your data, _you need to pay them_ (in traditional
currency or otherwise)!

~~~
cercatrova
Platforms like Sia, Filecoin, Storj, and Maidsafe do exactly this; they pay
their hosters their requisite amount in coins by the hostee.

~~~
nemo1618
I guess I should have disclosed that I am the co-founder of Sia. So I may be
slightly biased in my opinion of which decentralized storage option is best.
:P

------
fiatjaf
"Your Blockstack ID that you use to log in is stored on blockchain"

What is this "blockchain" they're talking about? I've read the Blockstack
pages and I can only find references to "blockchain", no specification of what
or where.

~~~
jude-
Blockstack engineer here.

Your Blockstack ID is anchored to the Bitcoin blockchain, so everyone else can
find (1) your public key and (2) the location(s) where your profile and
application data are stored. The naming system is described here:
[https://docs.blockstack.org/core/naming/introduction.html](https://docs.blockstack.org/core/naming/introduction.html)

It warms my heart to hear that people can use Blockstack and not have to think
about blockchains :')

------
JamesHageman
There's probably some really cool tech here, but it's unclear how a new user
would start using it. The landing page shows an FAQ and a button saying "Login
with Blockstack" that doesn't work when you click it in a normal web browser.

Should I have some other browser installed? Some extension?

~~~
atomicUpdate
Chrome on iOS seems to get far enough to try and create an ID. I didn’t go any
farther than that though.

~~~
JamesHageman
I tried in Safari on MacOS and it fails, because Safari doesn't recognize
blockstack:eyJ0eXA... urls. Chrome seems to redirect the user to download
their browser here: [https://browser.blockstack.org/sign-
up](https://browser.blockstack.org/sign-up).

------
wesleytodd
If people are interested in this they may also be interested in Beaker Browser

[https://beakerbrowser.com/](https://beakerbrowser.com/)

------
anc84
Why does this need blockchain for?

~~~
mhendric
User IDs and URLs to where users store their data with apps such as DPAGE are
on chain to guarantee self-sovereign control of identity and data.

~~~
anc84
Couldn't I simply cryptographically sign my content instead?

------
thepra
I can't add pictures on the mobile version, is that supposed to be like that?

~~~
vrepsys
You should be able to just copy-paste a link to a picture and it should appear
below the link. Just like in the desktop version.

Send us an email if you still can't get it working.

------
terrycody
This indeed a serious cool product, hope more people realize it.

