IPFS - What is it and Why it's Important

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3 years ago

IPFS - What is it and Why its Important

If you're like the vast majority of people, when someone says "IPFS", you may think it's a type of game (FPS?), perhaps an acronym for a thing someone does at work (TP reports?), or some weird Internet geek thing that you don't care about (UDP port numbers??) ... however, "IPFS" is an acronym you should know as it is in the process of slowly revolutionizing the web, let's talk about it.



What is "IPFS"

You know what http:// or https:// is right?

It's what you type into your address bar. That "http" is one "protocol" you are using to access data on the web. "IPFS", is another protocol you can use to access information. For example ipfs://. But what is IPFS?

The InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) is a protocol and peer-to-peer network for storing and sharing data in a distributed file system. IPFS uses content-addressing to uniquely identify each file in a global namespace connecting all computing devices. Source wikipedia.org

Translated into simple speak: IPFS is a potential way to address the issue of having centralized data servers, and all data hosted on that server. By use of a IPFS protocol, data is shared across a wide network of data locations, ensuring better stability, faster downloads, and increasing the data's ability to be censorship resistant. It's sort of like, using BitTorrent to download files from multiple peers, and not just download from one location.

Why should you care?

Well, if data is hosted at one location and that goes down or someone removes the data (or censors it), you don't get it anymore. If however its decentralized and multiple locations have the data, the data is redundant and accessible by all, even if it is censored or removed at one location.

For a greater explanation of what IPFS is, we strongly recommend you read this article from TechCrunch - "Why The Internet Needs IPFS Before It’s Too Late" . In the article they go into much greater detail of what IPFS is, and its benefits.



The biggest takeaway to remember here is ...

  • IPFS protocol can reduce or eliminate the ongoing systemic data censorship that governments and big corporations engage in every day.



If you are an advocate for freedom of speech and freedom of information, We hope you can see now why the IPFS protocol is very important.

What is even more exciting is that the open source BRAVE browser now supports this protocol. Here's an article from the 19th of this January 2021 announcing they rolled out full support for this. "IPFS Support in Brave".


  • Side note: We encourage you to use the BRAVE web browser. It is fast, crypto friendly, and has a lot of great security features. You can download the BRAVE web browser HERE



The BRAVE browser currently has around 24 million active users, with the recent addition for full support for IPFS, this move will help thrust the IPFS protocol into the limelight and, with luck help replace the current HTTP protocol used by the majority of browsers today.

D.Buzz and IPFS

Currently, D.Buzz is using IPFS to host the image that are uploaded through dbuzz. To do this, we make use of a third party service provider called https://fleek.co.

Image upload are sent to our microservice and our microservice will connect to fleek's API service.

As our platform expands, we are going to keep integrating solutions (*Such as IPFS) to help better secure and protect you data and, better protect your voice.

Questions?

  • Please post them in the comments below. :)

We hope you found this article informative you now have a better understanding of IPFS and why it may just be the future of the decentralized Internet.

Over and out.

D.Buzz



D.Buzz is ...

Is a censorship-resistant short form microblogging platform that empowers you to share your thoughts in 280 characters or less.

Censorship resistant and built for the community with love.



We strive to have a fun and neutral stance on topics. If you have any concerns with the content, please contact @jacuzzi, who writes and generates the content for our articles, or the @dbuzz team for clarification.


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