December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Montgolfier was a JOKE
by peter.allan＠aeat.co.uk 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The Montgolfier post sent anonymously was a joke and I thought quite a good one. (It wasn't me and I don't know who it was.) It was poking fun at the QED pest at cyberstation who really was writing drivel. So far 2 people have missed the point and let us know about it. -- Peter Allan peter.allan(a)aeat.co.uk

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Financial Cryptography 1997 (FC97): General Announcement
by Robert Hettinga 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Financial Cryptography 1997 (FC97): The world's first financial cryptography conference, workshop, and exhibition! General Announcement Conference, and Exhibition, February 24-28, 1997 Workshop for Senior Managers and IS Professionals February 17-21, 1997 The Inter-Island Hotel Anguilla, BWI The world's first peer-reviewed conference on financial cryptography, FC97, will be held Monday through Friday, February 24-28, 1997, from 8:30am until 12:30pm, at the Inter-Island Hotel on the Carribbean island of Anguilla. In conjunction with the conference, the Inter-Island Hotel will also be the site of an intensive 40-hour workshop for senior managers and IS professionals, during the week preceeding the conference (February 17-21), and an exhibition for financial cryptography vendors, from 10am-6pm during the week of conference itself. The goals of the combined conference, workshop, and exhibition are to provide a peer-reviewed forum for important research in financial cryptography and the effects it will have on society, to give senior managers and IS professionals a solid understanding of the fundamentals of strong cryptgraphy as applied to financial operations on public networks, and to showcase the newest products in the field. In addition, plenty of time has been left open in the afternoon and evening for sponsored corporate functions and activities, for business networking, and, of course, for recreational activities on Anguilla itself. As one of the principals of the conference joked, "We hope that people will treat the conference and the other activities more as a working vacation, rather than, er, vacating work." Conference participants are encouraged to bring their families. The Conference Ray Hirschfeld, the conference chair, has picked an outstanding group of professionals and researchers, in financial cryptography, and in related fields, to review the papers for this conference. They are: Chairman: Rafael Hirschfeld, CWI, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Matthew Franklin, AT&T Laboratories--Research, Murray Hill, NJ, USA Michael Froomkin, U. Miami School of Law, Coral Gables, FL, USA Arjen Lenstra, Citibank, New York, NY, USA Mark Manasse, Digital Equipment Corporation, Palo Alto, CA, USA Kevin McCurley, Sandia Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM, USA Charles Merrill, McCarter & English, Newark, NJ, USA Clifford Neuman, Information Sciences Institute, Marina del Rey, CA, USA Sholom Rosen, Citibank, New York, NY, USA Israel Sendrovic, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, New York, NY, USA Some of the names may be recognizable to you. But, if they're not, included in that list are the inventor of Millicent, the head of EU's CAFE digital cash project, the holders of Citicorp's digital cash patent, two famous scholars in cryptography and digital commerce law, the Chair of Eurocrypt '96, and the Chairman of the Taskforce on the Security of Electronic Money for the Bank for International Settlements. If we'd gotten any more talent, we couldn't have had a conference, because the committee can't review the work of it's own members! The actual agenda of the conference will be determined by the papers the program committee selects, so we won't have a final schedule for the conference until the middle of January. However, the conference committee is selecting papers in what it considers the union, and not the intersection, of the fields of finance and cryptography. Examples of topics it will consider are: Anonymous Payments Fungibility Authentication Home Banking Communication Security Identification Conditional Access Implementations Copyright Protection Loss Tolerance Credit/Debit Cards Loyalty Mechanisms Currency Exchange Legal Aspects Digital Cash Micropayments Digital Receipts Network Payments Digital Signatures Privacy Issues Economic Implications Regulatory Issues Electronic Funds Transfer Smart Cards Electronic Purses Standards Electronic Voting Tamper Resistance Electronic Wallets Transferability Financial Cryptography '97 is held in cooperation with the International Association for Cryptologic Research. The conference proceedings will be published on the web by the Journal for Internet Banking and Commerce. <http://www.arraydev.com/commerce/JIBC/>. For further information on submitting a paper to the FC97, and other details about the program of the conference, please see program committee's web-page at <http://www.cwi.nl/conferences/FC97>. On the lighter side, the conference will be covered by Wired Magazine, and will be the featured conference in it's January 1997, (ahem...) "Deductible Junkets" section. So, you might want to register, and make your plane and hotel reservations, before the rush begins... The price of a pass to the conference sessions and exhibits is $1,000 U.S. (Since we're on Anguilla, and there are no taxes of any kind, we thought we'd keep prices in nice round numbers, just to make things interesting. :-).) The price includes breakfast at the conference, some stipends for presenters who need them, and the logistics of having a professional conference with high-bandwidth internet connectivity in a location like Anguilla. In looking around, however, the conference organizers *did* notice that FC97 price is in keeping with other business and professional technology conferences of similar total session length, so everything seems to work out. The market *is* efficient, after all. You can register, and pay for, your conference ticket at: <http://www.offshore.com.ai/fc97/> The Exhibition Concurrent with the conference will be the the FC97 Exhibition, a small trade show for financial cryptography products and services. Each booth will have high bandwidth access to the internet (yes, there *are* T1s in Anguilla), and will get 2 conference passes. Booth prices start at $5,000 US. Please contact Julie Rackliffe at <mailto: rackliffe(a)tcm.org> for further information . As space is limited, please register as soon as possible if you plan to be there. The Workshop We are especially honored to have Ian Goldberg as the leader of the FC97 Workshop, which will run one week prior to the conference, February 17-21, 1997. Ian, the cryptographer at Berkeley who was made famous last year (in articles in both the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times) for breaking Netscape's transaction security protocols, will be running an intensive, 5-day workshop for senior managers and technology professionals. While the workshop is still being developed, and will depend on the skills of the planned participants, workshop topics will include, but not be limited to: The Internet (depending on the background of the participants) Overview and background of cryptography Survey of existing and proposed Internet payment systems Details on some specific payment systems Issues involved in setting up a secure Internet site And, depending on whether Ian finishes coding it (it looks likely), a step-by-step walkthrough of setting up an ecash-enabled Web server. Ian has recruited strong roster of instructors with credentials similar to his own, and, as he plans to maintain a 5-1 student/teacher ratio, the size of the workshop will be restricted and 2 months advance registration well be required. Further information about the workshop can be found at: <http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~iang/fc97/workshop.html> The planned price for the workshop is $5,000. This covers lab space, hardware, network access, software, and, of course, 40 hours of instruction and structured lab activity. The lab itself will be open 24 hours a day, if demand warrants it. Sponsorship Opportunities FC97 offers many exciting sponsorship opportunities at all levels. Corporations are encouraged to to be an exclusive sponsor for lunch or dinner, each of which will be followed by a recreational activity of some kind. Sponsors will have the opportunity to permanently attach their name to these important networking functions, which the organizers hope will be a large part of the conference experience. There are 10 such events being planned, and 10 corporations will be accepted for sponsorship. Corporate sponsors of these events will also get a substantial initial discount on exhibit space, and complementary conference tickets. In-kind sponsorship is available at all levels of support, with opportunities for companies to provide networking, bandwidth, hardware, radio pocket modems and equipment, as well as design and print services, transportation, entertainment, catering, sunscreen and, well, if you've got it and you think we'll need it, let us know about it -- we probably do. Please contact Julie Rackliffe at <mailto: rackliffe(a)tcm.org> for further sponsorship information. Air Transportation and Hotels Air travel to Anguilla is typically done through either St. Thomas for US flights, or St. Maarten/Martin for flights from Europe. Several non-stop flights a day from various US and European locations can be made to either destination. Connection through to Anguilla can be made through American Eagle, or through LIAT. See your travel agent for details. American Eagle Airlines has agreed to increase their flights as needed to accomodate any extra traffic the conference brings to the island. Anguilla's runway is 3600 feet, with a displaced threshold of 600 feet, and can accomodate business jets. Obviously, you should talk to your own FBO for details about your own aircraft's capabilities in this regard. Anguilla import duties are not imposed on hardware or software which will leave the island again, so, as long as you take it with you when you leave you won't pay taxes for leaving it there. Hotels range from spartan to luxurious, and more information about hotels on Anquilla can be obtained from your travel agent, or at <http://offshore.com.ai/>. Why Anguilla? We picked Anguilla for two reasons, both of them mildly political. The first is, of course, the US ITARs, which classify cryptography as a "munition" and restrict it's export. Thus, every effort will be made to highlight the absurdity of these regulations through the use of foriegn software, "leaked" software, and, of course, where necessary, US-exportable "crippleware", in the networking and server software of the conference and workshop. Of course, the conference content itself is not a violation of the ITARs, as the "munitions" being exported are in the heads of the attendees, or on paper, and thus not (typically!) subject to the US ITARs. Consider it a mild tweak on the nose of the Clinton Administration, in an era of 56-bit exportable keysize maxima. The other mildly political reason is that Anguilla is a tax haven. There are no taxes except import duties. None. No income, capital gains, sales, excise, or property taxes -- none. Anguilla's banking secrecy laws are about the finest there are anywhere. This is important to the organizers of the conference because most of the other proposed regulations of financial cryptography, particularly those of "token", or "note" based systems, are because they enable cash settlement, even perfectly anonymous cash settlement, of transactions of practically any size. Economic reality is not optional; if, in fact, the significantly reduced cost of these technologies make auditable "book-entry" transaction settlement obsolete, then there isn't much that the taxation or law-enforcement authorities of the world's nation-states can do about it. We consider countries like Anguilla an existance proof of the concept. Any attempt to restrict these technologies will only backfire on nations attempting to do so. Nation-states will simply have to develop taxation and law enforcement methods other than auditing book-entries. In fact, most central bankers and financial crime enforcement professionals who understand the technology also realize this, so, of course, our point is only *mildly* political, at this stage of the argument, anyway. Of course, the fact that Anguilla's average daytime temperature in February is in the low 80's farenheit, and that of, say, Boston, is in the low 20's, and the fact that cyclonic storms are in the *other* hemisphere that time of year, has *nothing*, we say, *nothing* to do with our decision to hold a conference there. We're simply shocked you would suggest such a thing. Neither, for that matter, does the fact that the average water visibility on Anguilla's coral reefs can be measured in hundreds of feet (if you can see that far for the blinding riot of color, that is...). Registration for FC97 Again, if you're interested in coming to FC97 see: <http://www.offshore.com.ai/fc97/> For information on presenting papers at FC97 see: <http://www.cwi.nl/conferences/FC97> If you're interested in Exhibit space, please contact Julie Rackliffe: <mailto:rackliffe@tcm.org> If you're interested in sponsoring FC97, also contact Julie Rackliffe: <mailto:rackliffe@tcm.org> If you're interested in the FC97 Workshop for Senior Managers and IS Professionals, see: <http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~iang/fc97/workshop.html> See you in Anguilla! The FC97 Organizing Committee Vince Cate and Bob Hettinga, General Chairs Ray Hirschfeld, Conference Chair Ian Goldberg, Workshop Chair Julie Rackliffe, Conference, Exhibit, and Sponsorship Manager ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah(a)shipwright.com) e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "The cost of anything is the foregone alternative" -- Walter Johnson The e$ Home Page: http://www.vmeng.com/rah/ ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah(a)shipwright.com) e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "The cost of anything is the foregone alternative" -- Walter Johnson The e$ Home Page: http://www.vmeng.com/rah/

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Re: ITAR / S 1726 / Civil Disobedience
by stewarts＠ix.netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:03 AM 10/30/96 EST, you wrote: >Would it be appropriate for other users to forward this >message to the prez with their signatures? The message was sent from "cypherpunks(a)toad.com" and signed "Cypherpunks", which was highly inappropriate. (Wasn't a bad message, but cypherpunks is a bunch of individuals, it's not an anonymous collective...) # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com # You can get PGP outside the US at ftp.ox.ac.uk Imagine if three million people voted for somebody they _knew_, and the politicians had to count them all.

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mailing list
by captain_loogie＠juno.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

put me on your mailing list

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Re: slander and call for lawyers. :)
by Michael Mattsson 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Armenia never entered the war (whether they were sympathetic or not is another matter), Japan (although i believe never formally 'declared war') pushed USA's button i guess, something to do with an incident at Pearl Harbor <g>.Canada likewise decided to move Canadians of Japanese decent into 'holding' camps for reasons of national security... those were enlightened times....I'll end this before we slid further off topic, ----------Michael Mattsson - ProgrammerMomentis Systems michaelmattsson(a)momentis.com - http://www.momentis.com ----------> From: Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM <dlv(a)bwalk.dm.com>> To: cypherpunks(a)toad.com> Subject: Re: slander and call for lawyers. :)> Date: Wednesday, October 30, 1996 7:16 AM> > Note: I am not subscribed to this mailing list. I've been forcibly> unsubscribed and not permittecd to resubscribe.> > frantz(a)netcom.com (Bill Frantz) writes:> > I am quite willing to transfer my pledge of $50 (which was given in the> > hope that the event would attract Attila, not Dimitri) to Ray's legal> > defense fund.> >> > I want to be clear that this transfer is only valid for defense. If the> > fund will be used to legally attack Dimitri, I'd like my money back. That> > falls in the category of inviting the courts to rule on net-disputes,> > something I would like to discourage. (Attacking Dimitri seems also to> > fall into the category of bullshit suits, something else I would like to> > discourage.)> > You seem to be confused. No one suggested that I have any plans to sue> Ray Arachelian. Some of the lies he and Tim May posted to this mailing> list are probably actionable, but I don't believe in suing over something> said on the net.> > Ray Arachelian has repeatedly threatened to sue me over my posts to this> mailing list, and that's what his legal fund is for. It is by no means a> legal "defense" fund.> > A related question: when persons of Japanese descent (including 3rd generation> U.S. citizens) were rounded up during WW2 and confined to concentration camps,> where many died from deprivation and disease, why weren't persons of Armenian> descent similarly "interned"? Weren't they even more sympathetic to the Nazis> that persons of German descent?> > --->

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[NOISE]Re: Sex, drugs, and libertarianism
by Jim Ray 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To: SAlanEd(a)concentric.net, cypherpunks(a)toad.com Date: Thu Oct 31 06:51:05 1996 Steve Edwards writes: ... <snip> >I agree that the war on drugs is useless, and that prohibiting > prostitution is even more mindless. Still, the libertarian ideal seems > even > worse. Think about Thailand, where sex is bought and sold openly. The > AIDs > infection rate has gone from near zero to 2.5% in a couple of years, and > promises to devastate the whole country. Burmese kids are sold into sex > slavery. Is this the future? People make choices every day, but few > people make INFORMED choices, and a lot of people, believe it or not, > have > very little choice. They are caught between the Devil and the Deep Blue > Sea. 1. Prostitution is (nominally) illegal in Thailand. 2. So, what would you do? (I'd still make it legal.) The issue is more complex than many would make it out to be. Where prostitution is legal in this country (Nevada) the marketplace seems, without the help of Dr. Kessler and his minions, to have dictated the universal use of condoms, and the spread of all STDs is slower than in other areas, like here in Miami (where prostitution is (nominally) illegal. JMR Regards, Jim Ray -- DNRC Minister of Encryption Advocacy "They never say: 'Please vote for me because I have an obsessive, all-consuming need, bordering on mental illness, to live in the White House and fly around in Air Force One and have a vast entourage of lackeys.'" -- Dave Barry, describes Bill, Bob, and Ross in the Miami Herald, September 22, 1996 Defeat the Duopoly! Vote Harry & Jo http://www.HarryBrowne96.org/ ___________________________________________________________________ PGP id.E9BD6D35 51 5D A2 C3 92 2C 56 BE 53 2D 9C A1 B3 50 C9 C8 I will generate a new (and bigger) PGP key-pair on election night. jmr(a)shopmiami.com ___________________________________________________________________ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMniSrm1lp8bpvW01AQGGxAP/b72K+0PXT9xxE1E2KCgls5iXSvVvlnoa aqG3mJuVjPDbPLVCav5ajHjdO8IoNyk7B6LnoBRH0haTn+3yd0tHYI/yMRKwmaJR 4FjmoTKDOF45obWtynqalfHetkAfZtBzVfyM4iLHG5YHnGiEgKg8baiffr6AGxYp me6gehTq1p8= =296o -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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update.293 (fwd)
by Jim Choate 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Forwarded message: >From physnews(a)aip.org Wed Oct 30 17:36:20 1996 Date: Wed, 30 Oct 96 13:58:39 EST From: physnews(a)aip.org (AIP listserver) Message-Id: <9610301858.AA27601(a)aip.org> To: physnews-mailing(a)aip.org Subject: update.293 PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE The American Institute of Physics Bulletin of Physics News Number 293 October 30, 1996 by Phillip F. Schewe and Ben Stein SIGNAL TRANSMISSION THROUGH A MAMMALIAN NERVE-CELL NETWORK can be enhanced with the help of electrical noise, a new experiment has shown. First proposed to explain the periodicity of ancient ice ages (in which the random "noise" of climate variations may have augmented the effects of predictable Earth-Sun distance variations from year to year) and first experimentally demonstrated in lasers (in which the direction of laser light traveling around a loop was switched from clockwise to counterclockwise by adding acoustical noise to the crystal from which the light emerged), the phenomenon of "stochastic resonance" (SR) describes how introducing a certain amount of noise into a system can actually enhance the transmission or detection of a weak signal so as to maximize the ratio of signal to noise. In the first demonstration of SR in mammalian tissue, researchers (Mark Spano, Naval Surface Warfare Center, 301-227-4466) apply a weak electric signal (containing both signal and noise) to a slice of rat hippocampus, a brain region essential for memory and other tasks. With the slice parallel to the plane in which nerve cells convert incoming signals into electrical nerve impulses, the researchers could transmit a weak signal to all nerve cells in the network. At an optimal noise intensity a maximum in the signal-to-noise ratio was reached--a hallmark of SR. This experiment offers the intriguing possibility that SR may potentially be exploited to aid transmission, detection and processing of signals in neuronal networks. (B.J. Gluckman et al., Physical Review Letters, 4 November 1996.) A QUANTUM COMPUTER COULD TOLERATE ERRORS while carrying out calculations, researchers at Los Alamos have now shown. Computers that operated according to the rules of quantum mechanics have the potential to perform powerful tasks (such as factoring huge numbers) because of their radically different approach to logic: unlike a conventional computer's bits, which exist either as a 0 or a 1, a quantum bit (or "qubit") could not only exist simultaneously as a 0 and a 1 but could interact with other qubits so that its properties became "entangled" with those of the other qubits. Yet some physicists argue quantum computers may be impossible to achieve on a practical level because the slightest amount of noise would destroy the entanglement and thus corrupt the state of the qubits. Up to now, proposed "quantum error correction" schemes have shown merely how to preserve the state of qubits. Now, Los Alamos researchers (Raymond Laflamme, 505-665-3394) have developed an algorithm for carrying out reliable calculations on a "qubyte" made of 7 entangled qubits while accounting for the possibility that one of the qubits is corrupt (upcoming paper in Phys Rev Lett). Experimentally, quantum computing is regarded as a long-term possibility: although quantum versions of logic gates have been constructed (see Update #250), researchers are still working to entangle more than two quantum systems at a time. A PHOTOELECTROCHROMIC (PEC) cell harnesses a photochromic layer, which changes color by absorbing light, with an electrochromic layer, which changes color under the influence of an electric field, to make a self-powered smart window. On a sunny day the one layer supplies the photovoltage needed by the other layer to darken the window, letting in less light and thus lowering air- conditioning costs. This photoelectrochromic process, developed by scientists at the National Renewable Energy Lab in Golden, Colorado, might also be useful in display applications. (C. Bechinger et al., Nature, 17 October 1996.)

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silly putty
by sameer 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Would anyone be interested in 50 pounds of silly putty? A friend of mine would be grateful if I could help him get rid of 50 pounds of silly putty. It would be $500. -- Sameer Parekh Voice: 510-986-8770 C2Net FAX: 510-986-8777 The Internet Privacy Provider http://www.c2.net/ sameer(a)c2.net

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Risk Assesment Software?
by Ross Wright 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Hi. I am about to do some marketing on a certain company's Risk Assessment Software. At this time I can't say who that firm is, but I need information on what other firms are offering this type of software. I figured someone on this list would know. Thanks, in advance. Ross =-=-=-=-=-=- Ross Wright King Media: Bulk Sales of Software Media and Duplication Services http://www.slip.net/~cdr/kingmedia Voice: 415-206-9906

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WWII & Japan
by Jim Choate 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Forwarded message: > > > > Armenia never entered the war (whether they were sympathetic or not is > > another matter), Japan (although i believe never formally 'declared war') > > pushed USA's button i guess, something to do with an incident at Pearl > > Harbor <g>. Japanese Ambassador Kichisaburo Nomura and Special Ambassador Saburo Kurusu were to present Secretary of State Cordell Hull a Declaration of War at 1pm Washington time on Dec. 7th. To achieve technical compliance with international rules it was intended to be delivered approx. 30 minutes prior to the actual attack. There were decoding difficulties however and it was delivered after the attack. Neither of the Ambassadors is thought to have had any knowledge of the actual attack and therefore did not understand the criticality of delivery. Japan intended to go to war with the United States, Great Britian, and Holland over their policies concerning the Japanese presence in China and Manchuria. (1) East Wind Rain: A pictorial history of the Pearl Harbor attack Stan Cohen ISBN 0-933126-15-8 (2> The Pacific War Atlas 1941 - 1945 David Smurthwaite ISBN 0-8160-3286-6 Jim Choate

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Release of premail 0.45
by Raph Levien 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

This is to announce the release of premail 0.45, an e-mail privacy tool for Unix. The major new feature is support for the nym.alias.net style nymservers. Most of this code was contributed by the admin of nym.alias.net. Thanks! Other than that, it's a minor maintenance release. Several small bugs have been fixed. Thanks to all who wrote in with bug reports. For more information, see: http://www.c2.net/~raph/premail.html Raph Levien

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Re: "Montgolfiering" mindlessness
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Gee, I put that post in the same place I carefully keep my back issues of the Cypherpunks Enquirer. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Tired of Dole/Clinton? | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | Vote 3rd party. I'm | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz(a)netcom.com | Voting for Harry Browne | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA

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Privacy Issues
by Lurker 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I am writing a paper for a computer ethics class about privacy and technology. I was wondering if anyone could suggest some good books, periodicals, or (of course) reliable web sources. Thanks...

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Re: silly putty
by Greg Broiles 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> Would anyone be interested in 50 pounds of silly putty? A >friend of mine would be grateful if I could help him get rid of 50 >pounds of silly putty. It would be $500. Dear Mr. Parekh: I represent the Comic Publishers Association, a trade group formed to combat the illict theft of our members' intellectual property. Your message has come to the attention of our "flexible media" section, which licenses the duplication of our members' creative efforts in flexible media, such as Silly Putty (tm). Many people do not realize (or, more likely, merely pretend not to realize) that the duplication, even in mirror image, of portions of protected comic strips in flexible media infringes upon our members' exclusive rights as granted by the Copyright Acts of 1909 and 1976, 17 USC 101 et seq. Further, the irresponsible distribution of this flexible media by fly-by-night retailers and distributors compounds this problem. Many of the wrongdoers who violate our members' rights do so as part of an informal social framework, utilizing aliases like "Junior", or common first names such as "Billy" or "Tommy". You can imagine our members' frustration when we must enforce our rights against six and seven year old defendants known merely as "Jimmy" or "that big kid from soccer practice". The fact that flexible media can be used to make illicit copies of visual art is well known; in fact, it is one of the selling points used when flexible media is sold at the retail level. It is our position that distributors and retailers selling flexible media do so knowing full well that their juvenile purchasers intend to irresponsibly flout the Copyright Act; and that such sales constitute contributory infringement. Sellers of flexible media are the linchpins in the deadly chain of comic book copyright infringement via "Silly Putty (tm)". We realize that some retailers do not wish to be complicit in this serious injustice. Therefore, we have drafted the "flexible media code of conduct", which we are asking sellers of flexible media to sign. We are asking you to sign this code of conduct as a demonstration of your good will and responsibility towards copyright owners worldwide. If you do not sign our code of conduct we'll make some stuff up and then sue you and send out lots of press releases. --- FLEXIBLE MEDIA SELLER'S CODE OF CONDUCT As a seller of "Silly Putty (tm)" flexible media, I agree to: 1. Maintain records of the first name, last name, parent(s)' names, school's name, teacher's name, and grade level of every purchaser of flexible media. 2. Present an educational program which will sensitize my customers to the grave responsibilities that the Copyright Act imposes upon each of us. 3. Police my customers' use of flexible media, including but not limited to in-store use of flexible media, simultaneous purchases of flexible media and comic books such that illegitimate use can be inferred from the circumstances, and the structuring of transactions to obscure what would otherwise be simultaneous or contemporaneous purchases of flexible media and comic books. 4. Cooperate with the Comic Publishers Association by providing customer lists and transaction detail logs so that suspicious purchase patterns at multiple retail location may be tracked by the CPA. 5. Agree to allow the CPA to audit my records and record keeping procedures, at any time, without notice or right to refuse. --- Please print out a copy of our agreement, sign it, and mail it to me via postal mail by the close of business tomorrow. Flexible media copies are not acceptable. If you don't, we'll kick your ass. Have a nice day. /s/ L. Itta-Gator (#65535) for DEWEY, CHEATHAM, & HOWE, P.C. Counsel for Comic Publishers Association

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Re: Q.E.D (fwd)
by cypher＠cyberstation.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The following was sent to an individual in response to a private inquiry. I am forwarding the response since it seems to be germane to the subject at hand. Have you looked at the algorithm. A brief explanation is disclosed in the other posting being made to you. However, a much more detailed disclosure and explanation is set out at our web site: netprivacy.com The algorithm is at: netprivacy.com/algo.html If you know cryptography, you will discover that it produces quite a remarkable PRNG stream, one that when submitted to any statistical analysis, including Shannon to a degree, reveals itself to be random, though we know it is not because it was generated by the algorithm. At first blush, it may appear as some form of a linear congruential generator. However, that is a misconception as you can quickly determine. There are nonlinear congruential generators, somewhere between 49 and 79 separate ones, of a sort used in the algorithm, but they serve only as a seed, to every block of 4 or 8 characters, to the main algorithm. The nonlinear congruential generators are modulo 16384, which produces a staccato stream of the set 0,..,16383, which in the case of the disclosed algorithm are further used to make a three dimensional table lookup in the Displacement Table, the Determinate Table, and finally the Diffusion Table. The nonlinear congruential generators run at different speeds, that is in C iterations, they are used only C mod 16384 times, and since all of them are unique, out of say a message length of 20,000 characters, they will each be used at a different number of times, and with different message constituents, that is they cannot be blocked, as seeds to the table lookup procedures. The three tables are dynamic, undergoing constant modification, the Diffusion table only at the completion of an 8192 byte cycle, as the stream is generated. Furthermore, the indexes into the three lookup tables are accumulative and are being constantly switched so that they too are always dynamic. A close examination of this will reveal that the output stream is a statistical random appearing stream, as a result of the staccato nature of the seeds combined with the fact that the sum of seeds start asymptotically approaching an even distribution of the values 0,..,16383. The Displacement Table and the Diffusion Table, are both tables of the integers 0 through 4095 respectively and the Diffusion Table is a table of 16 sets of the ASCII decimal values, 0,.., 255. All three tables are scrambled using a random key generated by the user. The process of doing that is explained in the aforementioned web page: netprivacy.com/algo.html An user may also uniquely customize their own initial Displacement, Diffusion and Determinate tables, some 10^34000 possibilities. Also 200 million bytes of raw encryptor stream output are at our web site, using the same key and other parameters. Can you determine the key? The algorithm is quite simple to implement for testing purposes, and you can use the table values set out as the basis for doing your own testing. You will find that it produces an incredible random like PRNG streams, each unique, if you look at it. With kindest regards, Don Wood,

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$ NEED CASH?
by lazaris 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

TAKE ONLY 2 MIN. TO READ THIS AND YOU'LL TURN $5 INTO $50,000 IN ONLY 1 MONTH!! ======================================================================== --->> NO CATCH <<------------------------------------------------------- 1) 100% legal and legitimate. 2) Nobody gets scammed. 3) Everybody wins. --->> THE SIMPLE 5 MIN. PROCESS <<-------------------------------------- 1) Write your name & address on five (5) pieces of paper. 2) Below that, write the phrase, "please add me to your mailing list". 3) Fold a $1.00 bill inside each piece of paper & mail them to the following 5 addresses: 1. David Watkins 409 N.E. 107 St. Miami Florida, USA 333161 2. David Phillips 321 Felder AV. Montgomery, AL. 36104 3. Robert Haar 1628 Hillcrest St. Mesquite, Tx. 75149 4. K. Keoki Pelfrey PO Box 384971 Waikoloa, HI. 96738-4971 5. HI-TECH 6910 W. Brown Deer Rd.Suite 251 Milwaukee, WI. 53223-2104 4)Remove top name from list & move other names up one, placing your name &address @ #5 of the list. 5)Post article on at least 200 newsgroups. (Remember there are 1000's more groups==more $$ 6)Returns should come in 7-10 days and all you have to do is keep the $ for yourself and put the persons name on a list w/ the rest of the respondies addresses (makes it legal). --->>HOW THE SYSTEM WORKS<<--------------------------------------------- $55,555.00 in one mo. 1)Your 200 newsgroups posting==average 5 responses==$5 CASH with your name @ #5 2)Each person who sent you $1.00 makes 200 More postings==avg. 50 responses= $50 CASH with your name @ #4 3)These 50 people make 200 More postings==10,000 postings with your name @ #3==avg. 500 responses==$500 CASH 4)They then make 200 More postings==100,000 postings with your name @ #2==5000 returns @ $1.00 each==$5,000 CASH 5)Finally 5,000 people make 200 postings==$50,000 CASH with your name @ #1 NOTE: All this happens with only making 200 postings each time...imagine what it's like when people do more than that, like me. --->>AFTER 1 MONTH<<---------------------------------------------------- 1)No longer on the list. 2)Take newest publication & start cycle all over again. ALL IT TAKES IS $5, 5ENVELOPS, & 5 STAMPS!!! REMEMBER HONESTY IS THE BEST POLICY YOU DON'T NEED TO CHEAT THE BASIC IDEA IS TO MAKE THE $ GOD LUCK TO ALL AND PLEASE PLAY FAIR AND YOU WILL WIN.

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Re: UNSUBCRIBE CRYPTO
by Dale Thorn 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

paratama(a)idola.net.id wrote: > UNSUBCRIBE [CRYPTO] Well, if it were up to me, I'd "unsubcribe" you all right, but it's not. I don't think you realize who you're dealing with. I've crossed the wrong people now and then, posting messages I shouldn't have, and I've been lucky so far. If I were in your position, I'd get some advice from one of those guru-types who know their way around these places.

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Why waste your money? Save big on long distance
by Brian Hale 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Why waste your money? Save big on long distance
by Brian Hale 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Re: WWII & Japan
by Benjamin Grosman 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Dear Sir, >Japanese Ambassador Kichisaburo Nomura and Special Ambassador Saburo Kurusu >were to present Secretary of State Cordell Hull a Declaration of War at 1pm >Washington time on Dec. 7th. To achieve technical compliance with >international rules it was intended to be delivered approx. 30 minutes prior >to the actual attack. There were decoding difficulties however and it was >delivered after the attack. Neither of the Ambassadors is thought to have >had any knowledge of the actual attack and therefore did not understand the >criticality of delivery. Japan intended to go to war with the United States, >Great Britian, and Holland over their policies concerning the Japanese >presence in China and Manchuria. This is totally true, except that the American forces actually knew that an attack was coming, and the Japanese ambassadors definitely had an inkling of what was going to happen. Communicades to the Japanese ambassadors were being made sparse as the attack came, and details of actions to come were broken up into a 14 part message. On the USA side, the even knew that the attack was coming on a Sunday. They had broken the Japanese codes, and had been distributing the information from the communicades to pertinent authorities. However, a copy of a communicade was found in a rubbish bin in the hallway of a military building, and so distribution was reduced to fewer people. But nobody wanted to take any notice. This begs the question of the illegal lend-lease agreements between the Americans and the British which could have had Roosevelt impeached if the details had come to light in congress. However, as to the reason why the Japanese wanted to go to war, your explanation is a little basic. It is true that the Japanese wanted to go to war over the aforementioned countries policies concerning the Japanese invasion and occupation of Manchuria, or Manchukuo as they called it. However, this was not simply the reason. The aforementioned countries policies barred export of vital natural resources to the Japanese, who live in a naturally mineral poor country. Their original invasion was actually staged (see "The Manchukuo Incident") in the hope that they could gain more natural resources from Manchukuo. Another reason why the Japanese wanted war is a rather complicated one, and it dates back to the end of World War I. At the end of the war most countries in a position to have colonies in the pacific/orient area were under severe financial stress. The French had borrowed so much money from the USA that they had doubts of ever being able to count so high, and Clemenceau, the "French Tiger", was determined to extract as much reparations under the War Guilt Clause of the Versailles Treaty as possible. The British had also borrowed phenomenal amounts of money. However, these two, after taking all territorial possessions of the ex-German Empire, and the ex-Austrian Empire, had in fact huge amounts of possessions. The British Empire spanned roughly a third of the world in both population and size, and the French were roughly two thirds as big as the British. But how to pay for this massive Empire? Maintance of ships, particularly the newer Dreadnought class Battleships, was incredibly expensive, and enough were not in possession at the end of the war to defend pre-war borders, let alone the newly expanded ones. Thus the British Empire, and the USA decided that it was best to maintain the status quo. They had "run the race" and won. They had their colonies (the USA had the Phillipines, and a few other pacific islands, although the USA has always had a policy against Colonialism), and they decided to end the possibility of another arms race via an agreement. Thus it was that the Washington Naval Conference was formed. This conference limited certain countries to certain ratio's of certain classes of ships, to help maintain the status quo, and all measurements were done against the British Navy. It was this conference and the forged agreement that came out of it that greatly crippled Japan, in desperate need of Colonies and the natural resources that could be exploited from them, for Japan was limited to a navy roughly half the size of the British Navy, but consisting of mainly smaller ships overall, for their quote of battleships was less than half. Holland and France were also participating countries in this pact. However, whilst it limited ships in the pacific regions, it did not limit ships in other regions. This crippled Japan, but left _all other players_ with other waters in which to build ships (hence the large buildup of Atlantic sea forces by the USA that facilitated the lend-lease agreements later on). This in itself a heavy blow to the Japanese, but added to this was the failure of the British to renew their alliance. Not only was the most powerful empire in the world now not an ally of the Japanese, but the Japanese could not even compete to provide what they needed. And the other countries, naturally, liked this just fine. Therefore, whilst your comments are true, they are only true in part. The Japanese ambassadors certainly had a general idea as to what was following due to the 14 part message, and the Japanese had more motive to attack than a simple "policy of other countries" explanation warrants. Yours Sincerely, Benjamin Grosman

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Re: Abducted by Aliens??
by barrensj＠gate.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

You Little Cutie, You -- All right already! What about choice Z? I waited so long to respond to the joke (which I went around telling everyone) I got embarrassed. The longer I waited, the more stuff happened so that I just couldn't catch up and tell all. What about that one???? Actually nothing is happening (oh, except for St. Pete burning last Thursday night) but we manage to stay frenetically busy. Teaching dance -- the kids -- doing my mother/wife/housewife/daughter/friend/neighbor duties. I'm very, very sorry to hear about your mother's illness. My friend/neighbor just told me she's been diagnosed with depression and is having a difficult time overcoming the stigma. There's a pile of ignorance out there. I'm sure you're aware that chronic illness and injury can take down whole families. How's your dad holding up? It sounds selfish, but I hope you're taking care of yourself. It's particularly difficult when you live so nearby except that when something is wrong and you're not there it's somehow worse. Also, too bad about your heavy work load. On the other hand, I'm glad you still have your job. I was also particularly happy to hear that The Equine is feeling frisky again. This business about JP is so weird. I wish he were normal and you two could be friends. But it just seems like. . . like . .. ????? I mean, what would it hurt 'im? It's just BIZARRE! And I absolutely think it's NOT you! I mean, aren't we all civilized adults here? You'll be glad to know that we finally got Hannah a pet: Mexican jumping beans. She's named them Rosie, Rosie and Rosie. (You think we're REAL mean, huh?) Well, they ARE low maintenance! I hope you got the cc: of the message I sent Kika over the weekend. It had a short update of sorts on our condition which is, "Can't complain." So . . . I DO still love you. You are still a good friend for putting up with me. Love, Ruth

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Montgolfier was a JOKE
by c62op27＠ibx.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>The Montgolfier post sent anonymously >was a joke and I thought quite a good one. >(It wasn't me and I don't know who it was.) >It was poking fun at the QED pest at cyberstation >who really was writing drivel. >So far 2 people have missed the point and let >us know about it. > -- Peter Allan peter.allan(a)aeat.co.uk Thanks for the enlightenment, Peter. The problem is that it resembled the real "drivel" that passes through here far too often. So, I did not bother to read the whole piece. Kudos to the author for getting a biting satire by a person who writes them for a living.

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Re: silly putty
by c62op27＠ibx.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Oh, and the laughs just keep on comin'... ----- Begin Included Message ----- >From cypherpunks-errors(a)toad.com Thu Oct 31 02:42:30 1996 X-Sender: gbroiles(a)mail.io.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0b28 (32) Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 20:38:22 -0800 To: sameer <sameer(a)c2.net> From: Greg Broiles <gbroiles(a)netbox.com> Subject: Re: silly putty Cc: cypherpunks(a)toad.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-cypherpunks(a)toad.com Precedence: bulk Content-Length: 3755 X-Lines: 81 Status: RO > Would anyone be interested in 50 pounds of silly putty? A >friend of mine would be grateful if I could help him get rid of 50 >pounds of silly putty. It would be $500. Dear Mr. Parekh: I represent the Comic Publishers Association, a trade group formed to combat the illict theft of our members' intellectual property. Your message has come to the attention of our "flexible media" section, which licenses the duplication of our members' creative efforts in flexible media, such as Silly Putty (tm). Many people do not realize (or, more likely, merely pretend not to realize) that the duplication, even in mirror image, of portions of protected comic strips in flexible media infringes upon our members' exclusive rights as granted by the Copyright Acts of 1909 and 1976, 17 USC 101 et seq. Further, the irresponsible distribution of this flexible media by fly-by-night retailers and distributors compounds this problem. Many of the wrongdoers who violate our members' rights do so as part of an informal social framework, utilizing aliases like "Junior", or common first names such as "Billy" or "Tommy". You can imagine our members' frustration when we must enforce our rights against six and seven year old defendants known merely as "Jimmy" or "that big kid from soccer practice". The fact that flexible media can be used to make illicit copies of visual art is well known; in fact, it is one of the selling points used when flexible media is sold at the retail level. It is our position that distributors and retailers selling flexible media do so knowing full well that their juvenile purchasers intend to irresponsibly flout the Copyright Act; and that such sales constitute contributory infringement. Sellers of flexible media are the linchpins in the deadly chain of comic book copyright infringement via "Silly Putty (tm)". We realize that some retailers do not wish to be complicit in this serious injustice. Therefore, we have drafted the "flexible media code of conduct", which we are asking sellers of flexible media to sign. We are asking you to sign this code of conduct as a demonstration of your good will and responsibility towards copyright owners worldwide. If you do not sign our code of conduct we'll make some stuff up and then sue you and send out lots of press releases. --- FLEXIBLE MEDIA SELLER'S CODE OF CONDUCT As a seller of "Silly Putty (tm)" flexible media, I agree to: 1. Maintain records of the first name, last name, parent(s)' names, school's name, teacher's name, and grade level of every purchaser of flexible media. 2. Present an educational program which will sensitize my customers to the grave responsibilities that the Copyright Act imposes upon each of us. 3. Police my customers' use of flexible media, including but not limited to in-store use of flexible media, simultaneous purchases of flexible media and comic books such that illegitimate use can be inferred from the circumstances, and the structuring of transactions to obscure what would otherwise be simultaneous or contemporaneous purchases of flexible media and comic books. 4. Cooperate with the Comic Publishers Association by providing customer lists and transaction detail logs so that suspicious purchase patterns at multiple retail location may be tracked by the CPA. 5. Agree to allow the CPA to audit my records and record keeping procedures, at any time, without notice or right to refuse. --- Please print out a copy of our agreement, sign it, and mail it to me via postal mail by the close of business tomorrow. Flexible media copies are not acceptable. If you don't, we'll kick your ass. Have a nice day. /s/ L. Itta-Gator (#65535) for DEWEY, CHEATHAM, & HOWE, P.C. Counsel for Comic Publishers Association ----- End Included Message -----

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Cranky Listserver?
by nobody＠replay.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Is anyone else having trouble getting their posts picked up on the list? Messages I send to: cypherpunks(a)toad.com sometimes have to reposted as many as three times before I see them in my incoming list traffic.

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RE: tcmay in favour of redistribution of wealth?
by Hard Media 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Date: Mon, 28 Oct 1996 10:15:35 -0800 tcmay wrote: > While I won't get started again here, understand that my views are much > more than just "justifiable apathy" about the people of the world. Justifiable? I dunno bout that. (Sorry couldn't resist.) > > My point? I feel more strongly about the death of one of my pets than I do > about hearing that some natural catastrophe in Bangla Desh has killed > 100,000. And I think all honest persons will admit that this is a natural > reaction. The "Hamming distance" matters, and people I have never met on > the opposite side of the earth simply are _abstract numbers_ to me, as I am > to them. Natural. "Natural" is a dangerous word to use. I hadn't met any of the people involved in the Oklahoma bombing, nor had most of the world, yet there was worldwide condemnation of the event. I hadn't met any of Hitler's concentration camp victims but I'm still outraged at these events. There are tangents and there are skew lines. Oh yeah why people think I'm making an attack on Tim's character, his looks, or whatever I don't understand, all I'm doing is criticising something he wrote. Where Walter Wriston/Third World debt is concerned the events are not natural, we'r not talking about a flood, which is a "natural" event but the actions of a man, or if you prefer an organisation. There is nothing "natural" about these. A country in debt to the IMF/World Bank or Citibank must accept "Stabilisation Policies" : "stabilisation policies are often viewed as measures designed primarily to maintain poverty and dependency of Third World nations while preserving the global market structure for the industrialised nations." - "Economics for a Developing World", M P Todaro. this is also known as "debt slavery". Not so good eh? Zaid

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