[artinfo] Announcing Fluid Nexus

[Nicholas Knouf]

FLUID NEXUS
===========

Announcing the re-launch of Fluid Nexus: mobile messaging without 
centralized networks.

Website: http://fluidnexus.net
Download: http://fluidnexus.net/download
E-mail: fluidnexus at fluidnexus.net
Announcement mailing list: announce-subscribe at fluidnexus.net

CONCEPT
In the second decade of the twenty-first century, networks continue 
to be defined by their stable topology represented in an image or 
graph. Peer-to-peer technologies promised new arrangements absent 
centralized control, but they still rely on stationary devices. 
Mobile phones remain wedded to conventional network providers.

Instead, the combination of peer-to-peer with mobility enables a new 
concept of an information transfer infrastructure that relies on 
fluid, temporary, ad-hoc networks. People and devices are at once 
implicated as mobile nodes in this network (known in computer science 
as a sneakernet).

Fluid Nexus bypasses Internet intermediaries' control over the 
identification and circulation of messages. This makes Fluid Nexus an 
important tool for activists. Access to the data stored by Fluid 
Nexus requires a search warrant for your own devices-or another 
device running the software. No identifying information regarding the 
sender is attached to a message, putting the sender in control. And 
in conjunction with other software such as ObscuraCam 
(https://guardianproject.info/apps/securecam/) identities can be 
further obfuscated as desired or necessary.

In the event that information needs to reach a broad audience, we've
added another feature called the Nexus (http://fluidnexus.net/nexus). 
The Nexus is a space on this site for "public" messages to be 
automatically uploaded by any Fluid Nexus user. The Nexus includes 
text, audio, images, and video capabilities. The sender has control 
whether the message will become public or not.

For more information on Fluid Nexus, see the paper "Transnetworks and 
the Fluid Nexus Project"
(http://fluidnexus.net/static/pdfs/DCM2009Submitted.pdf), forthcoming 
in Fall 2011 in the proceedings of dis/connecting/media 2009.

Fluid Nexus Team