
To the Pirate Bay: a modest proposal - cstross
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2012/03/pirate-airships-an-alternative.html
======
jonshea
In 1729 Jonathan Swift anonymously published “A Modest Proposal for Preventing
the Children of Poor People From Being a Burden on Their Parents or Country,
and for Making Them Beneficial to the Publick” [1], which suggested that
poverty and overpopulation in Ireland could be alleviated if the poor would
either eat their children, or sell their children as food to the rich. In
allusion to the original, the phrase “A Modest Proposal” is used to introduce
suggestions that are satirical, hyperbolic, and sarcastic. Not knowing the
origin of the phrase, some authors use it to introduce proposals that are
genuinely modest, much to the disappointment of this reader.

fn. 1: <http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1080>

~~~
heliostatic
To be clear, the title of the post, "Pirate LOSS? An alternative ...", makes
no allusion to Swift.

~~~
xnxn
While true, the submission title does, and the submitter is the author.

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nkoren
In the biomimicry department, I'd look to the birds. Imagine an ornithopter
mimic that seeks out power lines, clamps onto them, and powers itself via
inductive pickups in its feet. Its battery gives it a 10-minute flying range;
this gets recharged first. Then it goes into broadcast mode.

Sure, its signals could be triangulated, but if the mimicry is clever enough
then it might be difficult to distinguish from a real bird. And it could be
equipped with various means of monitoring its environment (such as an RF
receiver which monitors the strength of nearby police-frequency broadcasts),
which would allow it to rapidly bug out at the first sign of trouble. It takes
to the air, circles for a few minutes, then finds another power line and
starts over again.

~~~
dclowd9901
Maybe I don't understand electrical engineering well enough, but wouldn't an
ornithopter then also have to carry some sort of heavy duty (several hundred
or thousand-pound) transformer as well?

~~~
DasIch
A transformer consists of two inductors that transform electricity by - you
guessed it - induction.

You don't need a transformer because you can just get the electricity in the
correct voltage by using the right inductor. I haven't made any calculations
but I would expect the battery to be bigger and of greater weight than a
sufficient inductor.

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femto
No need to hide them. All you need is a "data limpet", sort of like a limpet
mine, but it serves data instead of explosions.

Take a small single board computer, with meshing WiFi, data store and solar
power. Put it in a tiny flat cylindrical case with a solar panel on one
circular face and a nice strong rare earth magnet on the other. Make them
cheap, so they can be mass produced.

The challenge is to then place as many as possible in the most inaccessible
spots possible. Attachment methods might include:

* Throw them

* Dangle them from an RC helicopter flying close enough to the target for the magnet to attach.

* Launch them from a trebuchet

* Air canon or rail gun

* Use your imagination. Coolest and most spectacular idea wins.

Locations can be anywhere there is ferrous material, the higher and more
inaccessible the better:

* Tops of tall bridges

* Radio masts

* Transmission towers

* Buildings

* ...

Even if the data limpet is in full view, if it is on a sheer face hundreds of
metres off the ground, it'll probably take ages to sort out the access
difficulties, both physical and legal, to remove it. It would also be an
unequal contest, in that removal is a major deal, but placement isn't.

The tech could be applied in any situation where a powerful entity is trying
to silence a powerless entity.

Edit: formatting

~~~
francoisdevlin
Wouldn't a sniper rifle "remove the mine" from the MPAA's perspective?

~~~
unreal37
If these things are cheap ($<20), and there are hundreds of them scattered in
various not-so-easy-to-find places around the city, good luck trying to snipe
them all. Or even find them. (Imagine hiding one inside a vent shaft inside a
building. Or in the sewer.)

This idea is brilliant. True decentralized piracy without a a network to
connect them all. Impossible to stop!

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jgrahamc
The Pirate Bay's LOSS proposal is so far from reality that it's close to a
joke. It's not 'low orbit' and just because Raspberry Pi is small it doesn't
help you with keeping the UAV up there for a length of time. And such a device
would be easy to find via RDF and would be jammable and incredibly vulnerable
to attack. It would be easy for a government to cause a UAV to crash.

If they really want to do something I'd suggest that they build a screen saver
that allows them to distribute their database across machines all over the
world.

~~~
patrickk
Spot on. It always struck me as an elaborate joke just to spook the
authorities and see what kind of a reaction they would get.

~~~
cstross
Ahem. "I am ruling out nuclear propulsion because I assume The Pirate Bay do
not have access to a supply of fissionable materials. Otherwise, it's Game
Over for the MPAA."

No smileys here: No sir.

~~~
patrickk
I was referring to the original Pirate Bay post describing their plan for the
LOSS proposal, not this particular article. Plenty of people here seem to be
treating it as a serious project, judging by the comments here at least....

~~~
narag
Building underground pizza-eating rat robots (with or without smilies) sound
as serious as the original proposal, that didn't include smilies either.

~~~
cstross
I am shocked, SHOCKED sir, that you could possibly suspect anyone would write
a humorous piece without smilies!

I am sure Jonathan Swift is spinning in his grave.

~~~
jokermatt999
Poe's Law makes satire difficult these days. With the huge amount of tech
sites that post stories like this with a straight face, I actually wasn't sure
it was satire, and I follow your blog pretty regularly. I thought it was out
of character based on earlier posts (your analysis on space travel), but I've
seen worse serious posts pop up on reddit and even here.

~~~
narag
My rule of thumb: if I LOL, it's satire. If I don't, it doesn't matter. I
remember a couple of times it was embarrasing, though.

One was at the movies. Pulp Fiction. Christopher Walken is telling the story
of the watch. When it reaches certain level, I am the only laughing person
around. The more I feel everybody throwing me vicious looks in the dark, the
less I can't stop.

Edit: BTW, I enjoyed the story a lot, thanks cstross!

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hipsterelitist
I think most of you are missing the point of the title
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Proposal>). His suggestions are not
meant to be taken seriously, and as others have pointed out, it is quite
likely that TPB's suggestion may not be entirely serious either.

It might be worth considering that the whole reason they put forth the idea of
drones or LOSS or however you want to define them was to a) inspire
technologists to consider creative ways of dealing with draconian
policy/enforcement, b) draw parallels between the projection of power
manifested by drones operating in US interests overseas under
questionable/controversial legal circumstances and their own situation.

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blhack
Have we all already forgotten how the internet works?

Flying raspberry pis, or birds on power lines, or pirates in space are all
cool...

but how do you get those bits from up there in the sky to me, down here, in
Phoenix, AZ? Is TPB planning to also buy up fiber? And then copper to my
house? TPB is now getting into the telecoms industry! (Which would be a cool
pivot, I guess)

The servers might be in LEO, or floating in a blimp, but the routers are still
sitting in a meet-me room somewhere on the ground, and those routers and
cables are still vulnerable to "stop routing TPB or we stop peering with you".

Here. "Gibson's guide to internet work":
<http://www.thingist.com/t/item/2926/>

~~~
dsl
I came to post this exact same thing. The whole project is a joke.

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ma2rten
_I am ruling out nuclear propulsion because I assume The Pirate Bay do not
have access to a supply of fissionable materials. Otherwise, it's Game Over
for the MPAA._

Maybe The Pirate Bay should get in contact with North Korea, they'd be more
than happy to help undermine the capitalist system from the inside.

Seriously, though, I think this entire thing is merely a PR stunt by the The
Pirate Bay. They were never even thinking about doing that. Just like a
company they need PR to continue to exist and get donations. Remember, TPB
also "tried to buy" Sea Land at some point in time, an oil platform that some
people claim is a country? Anyway, it is a good PR stunt, many startups can
learn from that.

~~~
tobiasu
Sealand was a WW2 anti-aircraft platform. It's too close to shore for doing
anything really criminal (like, copyright infringement - murder would probably
be fine).

The problem these days is that organisations who don't want to be under US
rule have to possess a reasonable number of operational nuclear warheads...
It's not enough to set sail and stay in international waters.

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stephengillie
Are you proposing TPB creates an Android app to host their magnet links, from
a phone attached to a Romotive, broadcasting wifi, powered by several means
(induction, solar, etc)?

~~~
bigiain
I don't see why not - seems much better designed than some "enterprise"
systems I've had to deal with…

~~~
omh
But Pirate Bay don't have a support contract that they're trying to sell us

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Ryanmf
I really enjoy reading Charlie's thoughts on just about anything, I loved
_Accelerando_ , and definitely don't mean to take a shot at him here.

When I encounter a title which includes the phrase "A Modest Proposal" I
assume the words that follow are generally facetious. Swift wasn't actually
advocating for the devouring of delicious Irish adolescents; I'm certain
Charlie is well aware of that fact (in the case of other writers who invoke
the title, I am sometimes less confident).

TPB's LOSS initiative is probably absurd enough to meet the requirements, as
is Charlie's ratbot counter proposal. Except it seems he's sort of serious?
Then he concludes by posing to his readers what appears to be a completely
honest request for their dream implementations of Raspberry Pi. Many
commenters both on his blog and in this HN thread have apparently taken the
post at face value.

It could be that this was just a slam dunk bit of satire, achieving exactly
the desired result. If that's the case, to me this post doesn't exactly live
up to its namesake. Charlie's identified a ridiculous plan, and suggested an
equally ridiculous alternate plan, without so much as a wink or a nod.

Now what?

~~~
rictic
I read it as an exercise in science fiction, and imagining what will be
possible with stuff that's not far beyond the current state of the art. Yes
all of these ideas are unworkable right now.

The shocking thing, when I stopped to think about it, is how much closer they
are to being realistic than my gut instinct felt like they were.

Sufficiently powerful computation, storage, and solar power are cheap and
miniaturized. Hobbyists have used cameras tied to balloons to take video of
the edge of space. Research projects have produced robots that can power
themselves from biomass and sugars. All science fact.

Ten years ago these ideas would have been obvious science fiction. Now it
takes a bit longer to establish what parts are outlandish because so much of
it is so much more plausible. It makes me think about how things will look in
2022. I don't have a strong expectation that any of these ideas in particular
will come true. The future will likely be stranger still.

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jhnewhall
This problem will solve by itself. How ? when teens have no favorite series to
download via TPB, they will have to distract with other things such as
politics. And when they get into politics, guess what they will want: to
outlaw the opression of the people by the few, and their TPB back.

~~~
humblest_ever
You are very cute like a small child.

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bascule
Here's an idea, instead of building anything that moves, how about building a
cheap, disposable server you can install covertly anywhere you want that
automatically dials home after installed and can use WiFi or Ethernet?

<http://pwnieexpress.com/>

You can make it look like an air freshener! No one will be the wiser. The
ethernet cable is there so you can remotely check the levels of air freshener
in its cartridge, of course:

<http://www.ien.com/uploadedImages/ien/IENblog/PwnPlug.jpg>

Stolen power + Stolen network = Practical Path to Piracy!

~~~
mellifluousmind
I am almost sold, until I read that it only does WEP cracking... For $500+,
WPA2 crack at minimum...

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sdfjkl
Sewers are often below several meters of concrete/rock/earth, interwoven with
steel reinforcements, metal tubing, wires, power conduits and other stuff that
would make for very poor wireless reception even when directly above the
ratbot. The airborne approach on the other hand guarantees maximum range.

Perhaps a small, solar-powered dirigible would be a better approach? They
don't require massive amounts of power just to stay airborne and solar cells
(battery buffered) could arguably provide enough power to stay stationary in
most wind situations.

A miniaturized version of this perhaps:
<http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/space/4324155>

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timdiggerm
Balloons don't require anchor cables if you give them some rotors. Use the
propellers to keep within a certain area, but you don't need to expend so much
energy on lift.

On the one hand, helium is running out. On the other hand, hydrogen explodes.

~~~
ConstantineXVI
Hydrogen exploding may not be such a bad quality in this use case. It would be
difficult for an aggressor party to get the drone back in one piece; snipers
would be ineffective. A sniper could still take out the floating server, but
(properly designed) the resulting explosion would wipe away any useful
evidence of the server's purpose. One would likely need another drone built to
separate the server from the balloon without aggravating the hydrogen.

~~~
kmm
Sadly (or happily), hydrogen doesn't explode that easily. The hydrogen
autoignition temperature is 500 degrees Celsius. Even if a bullet were to
effectively transfer heat, it's still 100 of degrees to cold. Hydrogen got a
bad reputation from Hindenburg. It's irresponsible to use only because so many
lives depend on it but still relatively safe. The first airship to
circumnavigate the globe was a hydrogen zeppelin! And it never spontaneously
combusted during its 12 year life apparently.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LZ_127_Graf_Zeppelin>

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wazoox
I think that a swarm of cubesats[1] would be a very possible solution. Much
more practical than small drones and probably not that expensive.

[1]: <http://www.cubesat.org/>

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lukejduncan
Will the first replicators be born from piracy?

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rheide
Given that the wi-fi range would be a lot less than an airborne solution I
wonder if it wouldn't be easier for the police to pinpoint their location. It
would also limit the practicality as you'd need a lot more of them to get the
same coverage.

As for fuel, perhaps human waste can serve as a viable source of power?

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stcredzero
Tether the drones across the countryside. Supply power through the tether.
Make them a Redundant Array, so that loss of a single drone doesn't lose any
data.

Rig them, so that if the tether is cut, they erase their copy of the hard
drive encryption key, then fly to a "safe house."

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stfu
Somewhat odd to see that people around here are trying to shoot down a bold
idea like that. I would argue that the idea is not at all that "crazy" as some
here try to make it sound. The great thing is, that there is a very active RC
plane community with many brilliant minds around.

For example the arguments, that planes have to land every so often are highly
questionable, when there are already long-range planes in reasonable size and
weight such as the Tam-26.

With relatively unsophisticated components they were able to make the flight
across the Atlantic (1888 miles) in about 40 hours (
<http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=941744>)

Countless other efforts are at the moment working on how to solve the problems
using solar power for RC planes. And the problems seem to be at least in
theory not that unrealistic.

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dkhenry
So this article is a little ill informed. If the pirate bay is working on what
other people are working on It won't be a little quadrocopter.

NPR recently did a story on what the future of commercial drones are shaping
up to be [1]. The deal is they are working on drones with huge wingspans that
require very little propulsion to stay airborne and can carry both solar
panels to collect energy and batteries to store that energy. The planed flight
time for one of these aircraft would be on the order of years. As of today
they have successfully tested drones of this kind that can stay aloft for
weeks. If thats the kind of technology the LOSS will leverage then it will fit
the role nicely.

[http://www.npr.org/2011/12/05/143144146/drone-technology-
fin...](http://www.npr.org/2011/12/05/143144146/drone-technology-finding-its-
way-to-american-skies)

------
Too
Who said a UAV has to be an airplane? Why not a balloon/blimp? They should be
able to stay airborne passively. Then powering the server is another problem
but with a blimp weight isn't really that big of an issue.

~~~
dkokelley
It has more to do with control in high winds, but you're right in that LTA
craft are probably better suited for the task.

------
dchichkov
Cheap daytime solution could be a 'solar balloon'... Like these:
<http://www.solar-balloons.com/howto.html>

------
nextparadigms
It's good that this idea is getting the attention it deserves, but I saw this
idea on Reddit yesterday, among other alternatives (could've been the same
author, though).

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derrida
I'll take the bait. Replace 'robot-rat' with 'rat'.

~~~
gee_totes
I'm more thinking along the line of replace 'rat' with 'human'. We could all
form a living peer-to-peer (in every sense of the phrase) network.

~~~
majmun
or vehicles. like car parasites . so this thing like attaches to a car and
transmitts pirate software over wi-fi or hosts other free software. it can
change host cars by itself if needed.

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nutjob123
Robots which go through the sewers broadcasting to the internet. Reminds me of
the matrix.

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majmun
for a moment i thought he will propose implating chips on live rats.

~~~
aurelianito
Actually, this would be a better idea than the one in the article! If we can
use the rat as an energy source it would beg almost unstoppable.

~~~
majmun
i wonder if there are already been research of rechargin bateries from bodiliy
fluids or something

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rthomas6
This sounds like something out of a Neil Stephenson novel.

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seclorum
I think the big point is being missed: whatever technology our military
masters decide to use, we can use it too.

Spy bots patrolling our streets to see who is downloading illegal content or
doing something illegal? We have that. So, we can use the same tech to keep
doing what we want.

