January 2002 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: cell phone guns
by Faustine 02 Jan '02

02 Jan '02

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Eric wrote: >22 caliber four-shot pistol hidden inside a cell phone, uncovered >during police raids in Europe. >"Cell phone users will have to be made aware that reaching for their >phones in some circumstances could be misinterpreted as a threat by >authorities" Not surprising, since cell phone holster decoys have been around for ages. Why settle for a .22 when you could be packing a Glock 30? Like this... Holster Solutions Concealed Carry for Today's Lifestyle "Now you can own the same, comfortable, and accessible holster that intelligence agencies, security forces, and professional bodyguards worldwide have had for years! Our patented Executive Series Holsters look exactly like a cellular phone and pager that are nicely held in a durable, quality leather case." http://www.holstersolutions.com/product.htm ~F. *** He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself. - --Thomas Paine -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGPsdk version 1.7.1 (C) 1997-1999 Network Associates, Inc. and its affiliated companies. (Diffie-Helman/DSS-only version) iQA/AwUBPC0GGfg5Tuca7bfvEQLJ6wCgvWZbxuctVpvYLNXk7Ih6Fg3+ODEAnjga OBgbpDcvOXTZxld+dwwJgLNM =3d6c -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Death to the State.
by mattd 02 Jan '02

02 Jan '02

A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C E http://www.ainfos.ca/ ________________________________________________ This text is a translated part from a statement issued by the Croce Nera Anarchica and the Gruppo Anarchico per lAzione Diretta Globale on dec. 25th. Wednesday, december 19th : 2 guys are arrested in the area of the + banca di Bologna ; and are accused of planning a robbery. They are arrested while driving 2 bikes and allegedly had latex gloves, knives and tights on them. Their names are Carlo Tesseri and Horst Fantazzini. A few hours later, the cops searched their houses and confiscated books, magazines, flyers, stickers as well as a computer, agendas, mail and money. After 32 years of prison, Horst had since a few months been in partial release (until 2019) and Carlo had been freed in july after 7 years of prison. The same day the public prosecutor from Bologna confirmed their arrest. The two used their right to refuse to declare anything. December 24th : Horst is found dead in the prison of Dozza. The official explanation is that he died of a heartattack while under his shower. But then what the fuck is the reason for this heartattack ? Who stopped his heart ? His children noticed he had several bruises on his body. The only thing we are sure of is that this is another state murder that striked an anarchist who intended to live free, to struggle against any kind of authority and against the prisons in which he spent half of his life. The death of Horst in prison has been planned for long. His sentence was supposed to end in 2019. He already has been seriously wounded by prison guards when he tried to escape earlier. On dec. 24th our comrade died while in their hands, locked in the cage of the state. We consider as particulary responsible for this death the public prosecutors from Bologna, Orso and Pescatore, but also the Dozza prison director and the whole staff working within its walls. Murderers, we are not gonna forget you ! Our thought go to Carlo, also locked in this same prison, old friend and comrade of Horst, to whom the visit from family members was denied. His girlfriend asked for a visit of urgency, and was denied this right. One director said that Horsts death was not important enough to let her visit Carlo. Lets stay in solidarity with Carlo in this difficult period, lets remind him that he is not alone. Freedom for all ! Burn all prisons ! Prison address : C. Dozza, via del Gomito, 40136 Bologna Statement from Croce Nera Anarchica and Gruppo Anarchico per lAzione Diretta Globale from dec. 27th. Dying in prison. Everytime a human being dies behind bars, the state commits a murder, because prison kills, and all those who, in one way or another, support this institution of pain and death are murderers. Prison kills, hour after hour, month after month, year after year. Horst, who spent at least 32 years in prison, has been literally slaughtered. This is the only certainty we have and this is the only truth no doctors would write in his report : killed by prison, state murder !! We think with love and rage about the comrade and friend Horst Fantazzini, and we swear him that his life full of revolt has not been lived in vain. Last minute (dec. 29th) A gathering in solidarity with Carlo Tesseri has been called. About 80 people are gathering in front of the prison of Dozza and they will go to Horst Fantazzinis funeral later. -------------------------------------------------------------- Alter-EE mailing list Alter-EE(a)lists.most.org.pl http://www.lists.most.org.pl/cgi-bin/listinfo/alter-ee

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handgun carry
by david 02 Jan '02

02 Jan '02

After you acquire a handgun you have to figure out what to do with it. Are you going to carry it on your person, or leave it in your vehicle or at home? Obviously it is most readily accessible if you carry it in a holster. This is also the most secure place for your weapon. You know absolutely where it is and who has it. If you decide on holster carry buy the best quality you can find. It makes no sense to spend several hundred dollars on a handgun and then stuff it into a $15 one size fits all leather sleave. A well designed holster will hold the weapon securely without the use of thumb snaps, etc.; will allow you to assume the correct firing grip while your gun is in the holster; will not allow access to the trigger while the weapon is holstered; and it will retain its shape so that you can reholster with one hand. Handguns can also be carried conviently in a fannypack or a purse. If you carry in a purse, personal planner, etc., you must train yourself to always retain control of it. It takes a lot of practice to learn to never set it down and move away from it without securing it somehow. The next step is to learn how to get your handgun into action as rapidly as possible without shooting yourself in the ass or the foot (which wastes ammo and and impairs your ability to survive a shootout). Ideally you should attend course where you can learn the correct skills and tactics from the start. I took personal handgun courses from the American Small Arms Academy and Front Sight. Other well known schools are Gunsight, Thunder Ranch, and Lethal Force Institute. Two good books to purchase are "The Modern Technique of the Pistol" by Gregory Boyce Morrison and "Combat Handgunnery" by Chuck Taylor. Both books cover all the basic gun handling skills, defensive tactics, and principles of firearms safety. T hey also break down the presentation from the holster (quick draw) into individual steps which can be repeated until they are programmed into your muscle memory. When an action is repeated 3,000 times it becomes a programmed response which is performed automatically. Because of that I couldn't possibly fire too soon during a high speed presentation. To shoot myself during my draw I would literally have to slow down and do it intentionally. Keep your powder dry, David Neilson

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Reg - Linotype copyright action on Adobe-format fonts
by Bill Stewart 02 Jan '02

02 Jan '02

"ATM" is "Adobe Type Manager". Linotype is a big font house. Intellectual Property laws for fonts are normally even stranger than for regular material, but if any of these are in Postscript, they're also programs, so there may be DMCA issues, and there's obviously some contractual relationship with Adobe that lets them copyright implementations. (I have *no* idea if there's Dmitri Sklyarov-related material here, as in "Did Adobe do Something Bad, or was Someone Else careless", but it's entertaining speculation, at least in the absence of actual knowledge.) Does anybody know ATM implementation details? Adobe's web page describes ATM Light as a "Free font utility for viewing and printing PostScript fonts Adobe. Type Manager. (ATM.) Light is a system software component that automatically generates high-quality screen font bitmaps from the PostScript. outlines in Type 1 or OpenType. format." which implies that at least some ATM fonts are real Postscript. Fairly usable Fair Use reformatted excerpt from The Register's article follows. http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/23427.html Linotype gets heavy over free ATM font downloads By John Lettice - john.lettice(a)theregister.co.uk Posted: 17/12/2001 at 12:15 GMT German company Linotype Library GmbH is flexing its ATM font copyright muscles via 'cease and desist' letters with potential $30,000 legal tabs attached. The fonts in question do seem to be owned by Linotype (or to be strictly accurate, its parent company Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG), but are probably part of a batch that accidentally wandered into the shareware sector in the early 90s. The fonts are frequently found for download on OS/2 sites, and have tended to propagate via mirrors, with the assumption that they're shareware propagating along with them. This was the case for Ian Manners, who runs www.os2site.com, and who contacted The Register after receiving his letter from Linotype. .... What does seem clear is that Linotype is making heavy legal noises in order to clear the fonts off download sites. And strangely enough, the fonts themselves (Cascade, Flora, Frutiger, Helvetica, Isadora, Linotext, Linoscript, Optima, Palatino, Peignot, Present, Shelley and Univers), are currently on sale at Linotype Library's site. The fonts Ian was hosting complicate matters further, in that internally they have an Adobe copyright stamp in them. Adobe itself sells the fonts in question, and labels them as Linotype's trademark on its site. It seems fairly clear that the fonts are Linotype's property, and that even people offering cloned versions under the same names are going to be vulnerable to legal threats. From the Linotype letter, however, it doesn't seem to be the case that they're universally trademarked throughout the world, which could make actual legal action complicated.

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Coded child pornography and torture.
by mattd 02 Jan '02

02 Jan '02

The drachma was the standard silver coin of antiquity. Commerce and conquest, particularly by Alexander the Great, took the coin as far east as Afghanistan, where it became the model for another coin - the dirham - a measure of currency still applied in the Islamic world, Mr Tzamanis said. The drachma later disappeared until 1832, when Greece gained independence. The modern drachma was intended to revive the spirit of classical Greece. Instead, said Athanassios Tarasouleas, a currency authority, "It's no wonder we feel so sentimental about the drachma. It embodies 170 years of contemporary Greek hardship and survival." In 1942, inflationary pressures forced Greece to issue the largest note denomination in European history - a note for 100 billion drachma, which at the time was the price of a loaf of bread. In 1953, the state ordered Greeks to strike three zeros off every note they owned. Still, the vulnerable drachma was regarded with great affection, and Greeks call it "drachmoula," likening it to a feisty woman. Not surprisingly, some were put off by the appearance of the euro. Daft Punk gets best album nod Wednesday 2 January 2002 Dance duo Daft Punk have beaten acts such as Basement Jaxx and Radiohead to the title of best album of 2001 in a year-end UK poll of polls. The French pair's second album Discovery topped a list compiled by music retailer HMV for its consistent plaudits from music publications in their reviews of the year. Daft Punk - who have taken to dressing as chrome-plated robots to avoid having their photos taken - have been acclaimed for their retro dance sound. In-your-face with a bum By SOPHIE BEST Wednesday 2 January 2002 Bum jokes, as every five-year-old knows, are a crack-up. From Chaucer's bawdy Miller's Tale to Mr Hankey the Christmas Poo from the South Park cartoon, the humour of bums and their odorous side-products is, well, bottomless. Hence the giggles as commuters pass the enormous pink bum outside RMIT that's promoting The Day My Bum Went Psycho, a children's theatre production based on the best-selling book by Australian author, Andy Griffiths. The Day My Bum Went Psycho tells the story of 12-year-old Zack Freeman and his runaway bum. Zack's bum has been enlisted in a guerilla army of bums, led by the elusive and sinister Great White Bum, who leads Zack and his crack squad of bum hunters on a merry, smelly chase. It's the kind of zany, gross-out humour that kids love, even if grown-ups sniff at the "snot, bot, grot" genre of children's literature. "I don't have a problem with snot, bot and grot," says Griffiths. "That's partly why I wrote Bum - people are branding me anyway, so I'll own it!" Some people, however, do have a problem with bums. In August, The Day My Bum Went Psycho was withdrawn as the Literacy Week drawcard when the federal Department of Education, Training and Youth Affairs deemed its cover - with a picture of a toddler's backside - might offend "certain sections of the community". Griffiths' dementedly silly brand of humour - part whimsy, part wild-eyed anarchy - exudes a punk defiance, evidenced when he used to front a band called Gothic Farmyard. Now a full-time writer and father of two girls, Griffiths' love for alternative music still informs his work. "Music feeds everything I do," he says. "I take that rock'n'roll energy, and try to bring it into a story." RMIT Union arts director, Lynne Ellis, shares Griffiths' passion for music. "Theatre is rock'n'roll, in a way," she says. "Especially with kids' theatre, you have to go at such a pace, with fast sequencing, and all that raw energy - it's very in-your-face." The "in-your-face" nature of Bum, the play, is achieved on a low budget. "We don't have the facilities to make huge bum puppets," says Ellis, "so we have fibreglass bums, painted bright pink." A live soundscape by sound designer Daniel O'Shea includes an electronic kaleidoscope of fart noises and a theremin-like "wind machine". Ellis, who has directed the RMIT children's shows for 15 years, collaborated with Griffiths last year to produce Just Andy!, based on his popular Just! series (Just Tricking!, Just Annoying!, Just Stupid! and Just Crazy!). "We've got a reputation as the only group that involves multimedia, cartoon imagery, up-to-date music, lots of lights and soundscapes in kids' theatre," she says. "I'm really hot for that, because (it's) where the next generation of theatre-goers comes from." Griffiths' fans also represent a new generation of readers - particularly among boys, although he receives as many fan letters from girls. "There does appear to be something that happens around grade 6, when boys don't want to be seen reading," he says. "They want to be seen as active, to push away the feminine, and reading is seen as passive and introverted and characterised as feminine - quite unfairly, I think." Together with influences such as Monty Python and Enid Blyton, Griffiths cites Joseph Campbell and his studies in comparative mythology, which identified the archetypal hero's journey as a universal pattern in storytelling. "My aim was to tell a heroic story, based on an absurd premise," says Griffiths. "I'm very aware that Zack is undergoing a hero's journey, discovering powers he never knew he had." Ellis was initially unnerved by the book's military themes, coming so soon after September 11. "With all the imagery kids were getting on television, I thought, 'How am I going to approach all these terrorist bums?' " she recalls. For Griffiths, humour is a perfectly sane response to terrorism. "We spend so much time preparing kids for life, but one of the best values you can teach children is humour," he says. "A punchline jolts us into a different way of interpreting a situation, and protects us from fundamentalism at a deep level. It's hard to be fundamentalist when you can see there are other ways of seeing the world. "The fundamentalist Christians who are complaining about Harry Potter obviously can't make sense of the books, and I suspect they can't make sense of the world." The Day My Bum Went Psycho, from today at the Kaleide RMIT Union Theatre, Swanston Street, city, Tuesdays to Saturdays at 1.30pm until January 19. Griffiths will do readings and book signings after the January 5 and 12 shows. Book on 9685 5111.

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Bundling crypto with Pron
by mattd 02 Jan '02

02 Jan '02

Privacy and the public interest Wednesday 02 January, 2002 The Age Any commodity increases in value as it becomes more scarce. Privacy is no exception. As our medical records are computerized, our Internet transactions logged and our banking done electronically, it becomes easier for govts and other undesirables to ferret out information about us. Add to this the huge amount of personal data maintained by large institutions such as insurance companies and remailers that operate loyalty schemes, and the need to shield oneself from unwanted scrutiny becomes even more pressing. This makes the Federal Government's new privacy legislation welcome, even though it has its flaws. The legislation, which took effect just before Christmas, forbids companies to pass on personal information to third parties without the consent of the individual concerned. Consumer groups have expressed disappointment that the new laws do not ban the collection of large databases of personal information for marketing purposes but consumers do now have the right to opt out of direct marketing lists, and marketers will be obliged to tell consumers how to do this. A key change is that consumers, including medical patients, will be able to demand access to information that is held about them and have the right to correct any errors More at ... http://www.it.mycareer.com.au/news/2002/01/02/FFXNGYPZXVC.html

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The End Of Anonymous Money?
by Matthew Gaylor 02 Jan '02

02 Jan '02

Euro bank notes to embed RFID chips by 2005 By Junko Yoshida, EE Times Dec 19, 2001 (5:14 AM) URL: <http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20011219S0016> SAN MATEO, Calif. - The European Central Bank is working with technology partners on a hush-hush project to embed radio frequency identification tags into the very fibers of euro bank notes by 2005, EE Times has learned. Intended to foil counterfeiters, the project is developing as Europe prepares for a massive changeover to the euro, and would create an instant mass market for RFID chips, which have long sought profitable application. The banking community and chip suppliers say the integration of an RFID antenna and chip on a bank note is technically possible, but no bank notes in the world today employ such a technology. Critics say it's unclear if the technology can be implemented at a cost that can justify the effort, and question whether it is robust enough to survive the rough-and-tumble life span of paper money. A spokesman for the European Central Bank (ECB) in Frankfurt, Germany confirmed the existence of a project, but was careful not to comment on its technologies. At least two European semiconductor makers contacted by EE Times, Philips Semiconductors and Infineon Technologies, acknowledged their awareness of the ECB project but said they are under strict nondisclosure agreements. The euro will become "the most common currency in the world" at midnight on Jan. 1, when 12 nations embrace it, according to Ingo Susemihl, vice president and general manager of RFID group at Infineon. The ECB and criminal investigators in Europe are already on high alert, worried not only about counterfeiting of a currency most people haven't seen, but also of a possible increase in money laundering, given the euro's broad cross-border reach. [...] ************************************************************************** Subscribe to Freematt's Alerts: Pro-Individual Rights Issues Send a blank message to: freematt(a)coil.com with the words subscribe FA on the subject line. List is private and moderated (7-30 messages per week) Matthew Gaylor, (614) 313-5722 ICQ: 106212065 Archived at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/fa/ **************************************************************************

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Watership Down-The USS Titanic's listing,settling.
by mattd 01 Jan '02

01 Jan '02

If something like cryptosporydium gets in the water,as it did in sydney,au,a few years back,probably from dead foxes,then look forward to an increase in burns admissions to casualty.Boiling water accidents went up sharply.Get that Hilary/OZ style health plan going soon if your smart,like I know your not.Kill the president,mattd. "a possible charge of "criminal association in relation to a terrorist enterprise" would cover anyone suspected of having acted as Mattd's accomplice, officials said."

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Dr. Strangelove (was: Clarification for cpunks_anon@einstein.ssz.com)
by mattd 01 Jan '02

01 Jan '02

>>> But this is a well-established unsolvable problem in > philosophy. It is impossible to examine your fundamental > ideas for they are what you stand on to examine. What > you think are basic are at least one step up from fundamental. But you can cheat if there is a feedback. Suppose that an external party (as opposed to multiple personalities housed in the same wetware) diagnoses you with attribute A (eg. "you write in disconnected fashion and often mention "state") which you neither understand nor agree with. You then, blindly, do the opposite of A (~A) << George Castanza tried this once and it worked well. >>(write closely related sentences and never mention state). This is called acting and many can do it on regular basis. -- Damn, I must stop referring to Kubrick. << It sounds like a similar problem to freudian psychiatry when it attempts to examine the unconscious.Or booting up (bootstraps) a computer from nothing.Problems of philosophy; Mmm, reminds me that someone,(wittgenstein?)once said philosophizing could be compared to having a fever (that needed curing.) Damn,I must stop referring to Clarke.

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bin Laden censors in Switzerland
by Anonymous User 01 Jan '02

01 Jan '02

Bin Laden book banned From AFP December 31, 2001 A FRENCH book about Osama bin Laden, called The Forbidden Truth, had been banned in Switzerland at the request of one of bin Laden's half brothers, Yeslam Binladin, his lawyer, Jurg Brand, said. Binladin is claiming 20 million Swiss francs ($23.73 million) in damages for defamation from the co-authors, Jean-Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasquie, and the publishers of the book, Guy Birenbaum and Olivier Rubinstein of Denoel publishing house. He claims the book falsely says he was closely linked to the man blamed by the United States for the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington. The German translation of the book, which was due to be published in Switzerland in the next few days, has also been banned. Binladin has lived in Switzerland for about 20 years and has held a Swiss passport for nearly a year. Brand said further legal action was planned in Switzerland. A complaint has also been lodged against the French website www.intelligenceonline.fr for promoting the book. The disputed book's co-author, Dasquie, is the editor in chief of the website. Binladin says he has not had any contact with his half brother for a number of years. http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,3514962^1702,…

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