One issue I have with rolling out a new form of encryption to replace the current Gopher protocol is that old clients will become obsolete and less useful.
Even if an encryption algorithm is decided on and widely adopted, clients will need to be updated to use it, meaning compatibility for older clients (which happens to be one of Gopher's core strengths, try surfing the modern web on NCSA Mosaic for a day) will be tarnished.
As it stands, I can use Gopher comfortably on Mac OS 9 with Cyberdog, Windows 95 with WSGopher32, old Java-based phones, and apparently on the Commodore 64, but yet also a high-speed broadband connection on my PC and Android phone. Trying to enforce some security standard on the entirety of Gopherspace will mean the earlier hardware will be more obsolete than they're already considered to be.
As a general rule, if it's a file you can serve it over Gopher. And Gopher's query selector type (`?`) can be used for searching and simple applications.
As an example Floodgap has weather information, feeds, xkcd strips, a Figlet gateway and Gopher link shortener, file archives for classic Macintosh software in particular, among others. And that's just Floodgap's server, elsewhere there are independent phlogs (blogs over Gopher), text adventure games (mozz.us), music, more files..
It may seem obsolete but there's a passionate community behind it. It just looks like that since it doesn't have wide-spread encryption and most clients have tried to treat gopher menus just as basic web pages. Although you can do that, it really limits what clients can do; I could drag mp3 files out of a Gopher menu onto my desktop with Cyberdog, and no client quite like that has come for modern systems (yet), nor can you do that with a webpage. I believe Gopher should be thought of as an improved anonymous FTP rather than a stripped down Web.
Thanks a bunch for the detail, I'm pretty familiar with Gopher as a thing, just didn't realize it still had a sort of vintage hobbyist following and that brings me great joy to hear :)
Even if an encryption algorithm is decided on and widely adopted, clients will need to be updated to use it, meaning compatibility for older clients (which happens to be one of Gopher's core strengths, try surfing the modern web on NCSA Mosaic for a day) will be tarnished.
As it stands, I can use Gopher comfortably on Mac OS 9 with Cyberdog, Windows 95 with WSGopher32, old Java-based phones, and apparently on the Commodore 64, but yet also a high-speed broadband connection on my PC and Android phone. Trying to enforce some security standard on the entirety of Gopherspace will mean the earlier hardware will be more obsolete than they're already considered to be.