Timeline for Use of Mediafire or Anonymous Hosting links in Answers
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
23 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Jun 5, 2012 at 17:17 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan | As for the idea that I'm "not willing to back up" my points: I am willing to post a link to mediafire, or dropbox, or a PPA that's hard to verify as safe, when the situation merits it. If were were instead discussing whether or not it's ever appropriate to quote from other distros' manpages, I'd say that sometimes it is and that we shouldn't ban the practice, but I wouldn't go and do it on main just to prove that, since I consider it acceptable, but not frequently very appropriate. | |
| Jun 5, 2012 at 17:16 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan | @mateo_salta No, I don't want to remove anything automatically! In any particular scenario where something seems sketchy, it should be flagged and moderators can decide. (Furthermore, you're right that not all Launchpad links are as dangerous as DropBox or Mediafire links. Some certainly are, though.) | |
| Jun 5, 2012 at 16:50 | comment | added | Mateo | People can check up on certain things on launchpad, they can read the text of the script on pastbin, I not only think they are safer, I can check for my self that these are coming from real users in the community. | |
| Jun 5, 2012 at 16:30 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan | @mateo_salta Links to these sites do not always expire quickly--this depends on a number of factors including which site, whether or not the file was uploaded by someone with a paid account, and how many downloads there are. Some sites may even allow content to uploaded again and accessed by the same download link. As for usefulness, the content in the answer that started this question is an instance of something made available by a project (though the answer didn't thoroughly enough explain the download, and also it was probably not actually suitable for the specific question being answered). | |
| Jun 5, 2012 at 16:26 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan | Another example where it might be the best available option is when a project, lacking resources, uses such a site to make content available. Ideally (as for any download link external to a project's site) the link would be accompanied in my AU post by a link to the project's page. However, if the project page was down (temporarily or permanently), I wouldn't hesitate to post the download link if I had it. You seem to have said that we should, officially or unofficially, insist on using download sites that make people feel safer whether or not they actually are safer. Am I misunderstanding? | |
| Jun 5, 2012 at 16:24 | comment | added | Mateo | Exactly, Normal users don't find it helpful to use downloads from the sites, and for experienced users there are simply much better alternatives. Not to mention that the links expire quickly. | |
| Jun 5, 2012 at 16:22 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan |
One example of when posting such a link might be the best available option is if I had a virtual machine/appliance that performed some task well that was nontrivial to do otherwise (for example, a 10.04 LTS based GUI-less VM for running a single important KDE3 app and making it accessible to the host via ssh -X). In that situation, I would choose a download site based on which seemed like the best solution. I would consider how many people would likely download, bandwidth limits, and how long the file would remain available.
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| Jun 5, 2012 at 16:18 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan | @mateo_salta You've apparently misunderstood my position. I don't "believe in" sites like mediafire; I don't think they're particularly good for AskUbuntu. Rather, I think links to them are no worse than any other download links whose safety are not easily verified, like links to DropBox. So far, I've avoided having to post any hard-to-verify download links on AskUbuntu. If/when the day comes when I do post such a link, I'll use a site like mediafire or a site like dropbox or some other site based on what works best in that situation. I won't do it to make a point. | |
| Jun 5, 2012 at 0:22 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan | @mateo_salta Requiring that someone fill in a "name" field and an "email address" field and check a checkbox labeled "I agree" doesn't make a service harder to abuse. I certainly hope we don't consider a website more reputable based on this, either. (And what does the reputability of a "middleman" file hosting site have to do with safety? The most reputable sites that host arbitrary user-posted files still disclaim all responsibility for what those files are and what they do.) In any case, the red car comparison was intended to illustrate a statistical fallacy, not to be an exact analogy. | |
| May 31, 2012 at 22:38 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan | @LordofTime "One-click" download sites are very useful for hosting files to a lot of people without worrying about download quotas. These sites are valuable to bad guys for the same reason that they are valuable to good guys. The "anonymity" of the sites has nothing to do with it. If you find that blocking them decreases exploits, it's probably because you are blocking some percentage of all downloads. (Decreased activity means less of everything including exploits.) I agree that download links that don't explain precisely what they're for should be removed, but that's for any download at all! | |
| May 30, 2012 at 15:51 | comment | added | Thomas Ward Mod | @Eliahkagan And while current policies suggest that any download link being used be explained so people assume what it is, the case I am trying to make is that unless such links as the one referenced earlier are vetted, or explained in far greater detail than "This download has [something] to do what you need. [link]", those posts should be removed, or at least the links be removed. | |
| May 30, 2012 at 15:50 | comment | added | Thomas Ward Mod | @EliahKagan While I agree the scope of "Anomymous Hosting" can be extremely vague, I am attempting to argue against the use of random links without greater explanation and verification of those files, as well as potentially not allowing mediafire specifically, given that they have ZERO requirement for identifiers, and almost no restriction of what can/can't be uploaded (I've seen ITSec baddies uploaded there, so...) ... | |
| May 30, 2012 at 15:49 | comment | added | Thomas Ward Mod | @EliahKagan sorry, i didnt see it was your answer. Assume the scope of my post here is to refer specifically to the use of mediafire links that are just thrown into posts such as the one linked earlier in this question. Such "random links" in the universe of users are assumed to be valid. In the ITSec community, its the biggest vulnerability hole in corporate systems. Similarly, its the leading cause of residential vulnerabilities in 95.86% of the clients i've worked with. ... | |
| May 30, 2012 at 15:33 | comment | added | Thomas Ward Mod | @EliahKagan you dont seem to be getting the point of the "scope" or the reason for bringing this up. If you wish to discuss this further about my scope of this question, I created discussion room and sent you an invite. If you don't want to discuss, then do me a favor and post your opinion as an answer to here. | |
| May 30, 2012 at 15:24 | comment | added | Eliah Kagan | @LordofTime Because bad guys can't make an account, and claim some identity? | |
| May 30, 2012 at 12:38 | comment | added | Thomas Ward Mod | When I mean anonymous i mean sites with no account or identifier connected to them, such as filedump.net, mediafire, rapidshare (although it needs free accounts for uploading), and a few others. Any site that has a reliable identification method (github, sourceforge, launchpad, upstream developer sites, etc) should not be considered "Anonymous" | |
| May 30, 2012 at 2:29 | comment | added | Nathan Osman | Does DropBox count? | |
| May 29, 2012 at 20:53 | history | edited | Bruno PereiraMod | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| May 29, 2012 at 20:43 | history | edited | Bruno PereiraMod | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| May 29, 2012 at 20:42 | comment | added | Bruno Pereira Mod | No, I think we are referring to sites where there is no need to have an account associated like rapidshare, mediafire or similar ones. | |
| May 29, 2012 at 20:38 | comment | added | jrg Mod | Define "anonymous" please - does that include launchpad, github, sourceforge etc? | |
| May 29, 2012 at 20:37 | history | edited | Bruno PereiraMod | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| May 29, 2012 at 20:27 | history | answered | Bruno PereiraMod | CC BY-SA 3.0 |