[Announce] Megareload alive and kicking - now even bitcoinier than ever!

[Jane Rand]

On behalf of the new Megareload and myself, I'd like to greet you once again, and shed a little bit of light on our current whereabouts and status.

Fortunately, we, as a service, have persevered – though there was a bit of turmoil which has somewhat slowed down our progress.

However, the service now has new management - who, despite having less resources than our dear founder, are perhaps even more enthusiastic regarding Bitcoin and user privacy.
Thus, we now intend to be a primarily-Bitcoin service, with all account operations (including our Uploader Incentive Program) being Bitcoin-centric.

Also, we intend to become the most privacy-conscious service currently in existence, with very explicit policies as to log retention. We also pledge to steer clear of PRISM-like deals – and any interactions that would lead us to violate our privacy policies.

Since we might, at some point, face pressures both legal and illegal that will try to pervert our mission and subvert us, we have decided to undertake what has become known as “Corporate Seppuku”.

To quote Cryptocloud (who were among the first to adopt this stance), “In the context of privacy issues, "corporate seppuku" means shutting down a company rather than agreeing to become an extension of the massive, ever-expanding, secretive global surveillance network organized by the U.S. National Security Agency. It means, in short, saying "no." Sometimes, we hear people say that this or that company "had no choice" in what they did. Bullshit. There's always a choice; it's just that the consequences of certain options might be really severe, and are thus not chosen. But that's a choice. It's always a choice.”

So, to recapitulate:

• Megareload is alive
• Megareload is under new management
• The new management is even more enthusiastic about Bitcoin and privacy protection than the old management
• Megareload’s new management has instituted Uploader Incentive Program that is Bitcoin-centric.
• Megareload’s new management has decided to adopt “Corporate Seppuku” policy inspired by a similar Cryptocloud policy.
  This will ensure that as long as it exists, Megareload will remain among the most privacy-friendly, secure and conscientious file sharing services.

Yours  sincerely,
   Jane

[MAD_MAD]

Folks, I'm glad you're alive.

I kinda wrote you off (but had a google alert configured to watch for megareload.se stuff anyway)

Glad the "incentive" thing is coming back (off course, I will only use it to earn bitcoins on legal files uh-huh )

Things I think you need:

Folder-based uploading (not as in "upload this folder" but as in "upload all files in this folder"). This will make uploading split files much easier. Of course, then you will need some clever way to reuse password for a folder's content.
I mean, it's fine and dandy to encrypt them all with same pw, I reckon, but I guess entering the password for every-single-f[bleep]ing file a gazillion of times will get on people's nerves. I suggest you add some kind of "reuse password from previous download" functionality to the applet (you can store key material on user's box so as not to compromise your security model... or keep it in memory... whatever. You're the code people, not me )

And you definitely need to significantly reduce storage time for free files that are unpopular (so as to force people to host totally legal popular files)

Also, you need open-source browser plugin a-la cryptocat.

I mean, sepukku is fine and dandy, but I think there's a whole body of thought that suggests that as far as crypto "reliability" goes it's "js crypto" < "applets" <"plugins"

Cryptocat does it the plugin way, you should too*

*I even promise not to have my BF excise advertising code out of the open-source plugin (then again, if boyfriends excising ads out of your plugin becomes an issue, you can make the plugin so that it only works for paid members)

[Jane Rand]

I'll surely pass that on to the devs.
If I may ask, could you go into more details in regards to to "js crypto" < "applets" <"plugins"  thing ?

[b!z]

What is "Megareload"? Is it a megaupload clone site?

[MAD_MAD]

If I may ask, could you go into more details in regards to to "js crypto" < "applets" <"plugins"  thing ?

In its infancy, cryptocat was a js-crypto thing.

This has caused quite heated discussions, among which was this article:
http://www.matasano.com/articles/javascript-cryptography/

Basically, js-crypto is unreliable. This caused cryptocat to move to plugin model.

Actually, plugins (when open-source) are more reliable than both applets and js-crypto.

JS crypto is both rather unreliable and hard to audit (I don't know if attacker has compromised your server and is sending out hostile javascript or something like that)

Applets are somewhat better (at least the damn things are signed), but even if they are open-sourced, I can't be totally certain that your signing keys and server haven't been compromised (causing a properly-signed yet malicious applet to be distributed).

However, I have to admit, that it is unlikely someone will go through the trouble of rooting your servers AND taking over your keys just to screw over a file locker (admittedly, a cheeky one but still)

Now, if I have installed an open source plugin, I can be certain that (assuming the plugin has no auto-update functionality) as long as the version I installed is "legit", there is no way to "switch it over" to something malicious from your side.
Browser plugins (if done right, mind you ) are thus the best way to get some semblance of a secure environment.

What is "Megareload"? Is it a megaupload clone site?

Well, they are more like "mega" and "megaupload" cross-breed, it seems.

What I like here is that the incentive business model (which Kim sadly dropped) is coming back. I adore incentive-based file sharing, it really rubs MAFIAA the wrong way

[b!z]

I don't think megaupload was the first to introduce incentive-based file sharing. it's just the first you've heard of

[MAD_MAD]

I don't think megaupload was the first to introduce incentive-based file sharing. it's just the first you've heard of

Oh, I didn't mean to imply that megaupload were the "inventors" of sharing incentives, but their takedown has greatly marginalized this... noble practice.

I hoped Mega (the co.nz one) would rekindle it, but they chickened out and dropped the incentive model

Now I'm watching megareload carefully.

[MPOE-PR]

Fortunately, we, as a service, have persevered -- though there was a bit of turmoil which has somewhat slowed down our progress.

Are "you" as a service in the business of providing vagueness to the Internet? Because that's not a service. Or a business.

[passerby]

I dunno, but as far as I can tell there's nothing vague about them.

Their business is the tried and true legal file hosting service where users are motivated to upload files they legally own.

Only this time with bitcoin and a user-side crypto-sauce that covers the ass of both them and their users. At least their cryptographic magical sauce seems both easier to understand and more robust than Mega's.

Fortunately, we, as a service, have persevered -- though there was a bit of turmoil which has somewhat slowed down our progress.

Are "you" as a service in the business of providing vagueness to the Internet? Because that's not a service. Or a business.

[favdesu]

I'm searching for a filehost with bitcoin affiliation, but this one is so shady. I will never allow an unknown java applet to run on my pc. never.