December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Socio-Economic Cults (Re: CypherPunk Cults)
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

gturk wrote: >You must be referring to the Cult of Redistribution. Tis true that as these accusatory options for blaming others are displayed here, it becomes hard to tell who's potshotting from what shifting position to gain better fire lines at friend and foe and own foot. As the Bastiat quote shows, the 19th century is a fount of apologies for wizened rapacity, as are those stuck in that time warp of heyday national and indiivudal self-destruction in the cause of unshakeable rigteousness, an affliction far from cured in nations and individuals wanting to be Number One while totally whacked out on ... take your pick from the socio-politico-econo bazaar, most of which derives from the days of pre-Bastiat and now recycled by crazy-lazy-minded 20th century rip-offers of the insecurely rich. Will evolution in action ever kick in, or will the promise of it, like dreams of social justice and faith in the constitution and arms, forever cheat the maniacally despairing with so few other choices for peace of mind? Are there any reliable prefabricated alternatives from history, from today, to self-imposed sheepledom of your sole invention? Now, to move on to the day's news: Is Tim going to be kidnapped by a gang of mixed breed cops and ammo merchants, shot instantly and chained in dugout till his loved redeems his maggoty carcass by redistributing his nestegg? That's the topic of the NYT's lead business story today, the need for secret ransom insurance, so secret that it does not make you a free-for-taking target like the usual unwise display of peacockery. Hide it if you got it, hide your lush affiliations too, the poor reporters advise, or the world's scum with nothing else to do but watch and wait are gonna snag your unsmart ass when you least expect it, now as in ages past, unless, to be sure, more scum-world guardians are hired and more big-nuke prayerbooks and ransom policys are arsenaled bedside, 4X, ankle and thigh.

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Oddly enough, Clipper is helpful
by Deranged Mutant 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Despite a few rants about how the NSA has monkeywrenched potential standards for encryption with Clipper (market forces being what they are, even if there were no Clipper we may still have no standard by now...), I think there is oddly a good side to Clipper: the issue has thrown cryptography and security into the public debate, even if marginally. Prior to Clipper, PGP was not featured in national and international features in TV, newspapers and magazines... now a lot of people want their hands on it. People have become aware of communications security issues--very avaerage folks who one might even consider techno-illiterates or luddites are now concerned with the government's ability to listen in and watch them. Think of Clipper as an opportunity to propose something better, as an opportunity to make people more aware of the issue.

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curfew laws
by Mark Hedges 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

In response to an earlier thread about curfew laws being unconstitutional, apparently a federal appeals court thinks so too. The San Diego curfew law was struck down on June 9, 1997. The ACLU prosecuted. For the report and a link to the decision see http://www.aclusandiego.org/curfew.html. Mark Hedges

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None
by Anonymous 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 07:06 PM 8/21/97 +0200, a confused Zooko Journeyman wrote: >BULL SHIT. Two words used to describe EVERTHING Zooko is about to say. >This is a cop-out, used by emotionally stunted men to excuse >themselves from their solemn responsibility to ethically >justify their own actions and to deal fairly with their fellow >humans. What the hell is an "Emotionally stunted man", any way, Zooko? >By reciting mantras to one another emphasizing their sense of >having been mistreated and their sense of having >_unquestionable_ moral superiority, people in this situation >persuade each other to become more and more fanatical in their >attitudes, less and less in touch with reality, and less and >less compassionate towards the "others" who have been demonized >in the process. I don't see what's fanatical about hating a government. >Note that this process _always_ includes a group of other >humans which are demonized in order to serve as a scapegoat and >as a concrete focus for the participant's negative emotions. Question, Zooko: Who the fuck makes gun laws, helps pass censor laws, anti-freedom and encryption laws, anyway??? >This process is objectively identical to the process >experienced by _all_ hate groups, gangs and nationalists. We don't *demonize*, we put the blame on the guilty. >You are standing in the auditorium, Louis Freeh's face is >displayed on the screen, interposed with film of jackbooted >thugs breaking down your door, and you are screaming wordlessly >at him along with all of your brethren during the Two Minutes >Hate. Think about this, Zooko: You are standing, along with your other sheeple, screaming, throwing objects, at Tim McVeigh, with images of Flag-waving freedom-fighters (terrorists, by government terms) behind his face. >THAT should give you pause for thought, Ray. THAT above should give YOU pause for thought, Zooko. >Listen to me: I might take up arms in the trenches next to you >someday, if it comes to that. I might murder enemies or >civilians in their sleep, if I were convinced that it was the >only way to preserve the people and the ideals that I love. >I might work to deploy ideas and technologies that threaten to >induce social chaos, if I believed that those ideas and >technologies were the only way to ensure the blessings of >liberty and prosperity for my children. And that is what most of us feel. >But I will _never_ take one of these actions while intoxicated >by a cloud of hatred and self-righteousness. I will _never_ >tell myself that I am part of a sacred jihad which absolves me >of all guilt, and I will _never_ re-classify my enemies as >sub-human in order to justify my treatment of them. Sacred Jihads who work to overthrow the U.S. government, in order to establish a more libertarian one? I consider anyone as being sub-human who bursts through my door, armed heavily, and with intent to steal my possesions, and my freedom, and my sovreignity over my house. >So take a fucking BREAK man. Just get up from the computer and >go for a fucking walk in the mountains and think about your >fucking family and loved ones. And I'm sure you'll be thinking the same thing one day if THEY bust down YOUR door, and fire at your wife, holding a baby daughter of yours. If they come at your house with a tank, outside standing, are hundreds of armed ATF agents. If they come to steal your wealth, force you from your house, after seeing your are an enemy of the people, destroy your possesions, and force you to a concentration camp. Think about it, Zooko. Don't close your mind in the shroud of hatred for those different from you.

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Re: ASN.1 and Kerberos version 5
by ethridge＠Onramp.NET 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>I don't think that the concept of ASN.1 is as bad as Jeff makes out. If it >worked >then ASN.1 would be very very usefull. But is just plain don't. > >ASN.1 is worse than useless, it means that a very good idea is rendered >unusable >because of a baddly botched implementation. > I'm not familiar with ASN.1 except for the occasional short piece in various books. But i was under the impression that it was similar to the language used to define TCAP and ROSE standards. These standards are reasonably well defined. I've gotten to the point where i get annoyed when working with protocols that treat everything like abitrarily organized bits and bytes (like NA Cellular protocols and PGP). So, would use of the language used to define TCAP and ROSE applications be a possibility? I've occasionally thought about developing such a protocol for PGP. allen

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Reputations and Reading Preferences
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

(This post has a second part, "Using Web Sites to Get Distributed Ratings," which you might want to read even if the first part looks uninteresting.} Hal has some interesting comments, as usual, about how positive feedback about authors can be integrated into mail readers and news readers. (Or at least I took Hal's post as a jumping off point to think about these issues--again.) I've given this some thought recently, but have reached no firm conclusions, except: it's probably not needed by most of us. That is, I have little interest in what others think. If the herd votes that "America's Funniest Home Videos" is their favorite program, or that Jackie Collins is their favorite author, who cares? At least I don't. I don't read stuff on the basis of a "beauty contest." I suspect the same is true of many others. But Hal was perhaps thinking in terms of the more sophisticated approach of creating scoring systems in which a matrix R[u,v] is created, where each element corresponds to the rating of u given by v. On the Cypherpunks list, for example, with more than 500 subscribers, each of the 500 might have a rating of perhaps 100 of the active posters, maybe only the 20 or 30 most active and memorable posters. (That is, many of you 500 readers would not have a meaningful entry, just because you have posted so little.) And more sophisticated models take into account one's reputation given to the views expressed by others. That is, some of those R[u,v] are discounted, some are held in high esteem. This results in a further weighting of the reputations. As an example, Madonna gives a good rating (0.8) to Da Dogg Pound, but I dislike Madonna and her taste, so I weight her rating accordingly. And one can imagine scoring systems in which cumulative ratings are considered. E.g., a lot of people whom I respect like the works of Thomas Pynchon, so I'll give him a try. (I use a simple scoring system in YA-Newswatcher, though it needs more work, IMO.) Things rapidly spin out of control, in terms of the communication needed, the difficulty of getting participation (like a lot of polls, the most thoughtful often are the least likely to respond), and so on. A few years ago on the Extropians list this was a hot topic, and various "rating systems' were proposed. I recall a particularly complex scheme by Alexander Chislenko which purported to solve this problem...unfortunately, it still looked to me to have the essential characteristics of a beauty contest. Fortunately, I can't see the need. Why not? And what's the better alternative? Here's a recipe which seems to work pretty well, and not just for me: * Apply filters based on one's own likes and dislikes. Killfile some posters, skip some threads, etc. * Periodically get inputs from others that one respects, a la book recommendations, movie reviews, etc. This effectively generates what the mass rating scheme would generate, albeit not identically (how could it?). One's favorite posters get read, and one's favorite posters can make some recommendations of other authors one should look at. Informal, but with many emergent advantages. Using Web Sites to Get Distributed Ratings Concretely, one way to do this is for people to do what Eric Blossom is doing with his "Cypherpunks Lite" mailing list. Or with the Web archives that Todd Masco has been running, and that Jay Campbell just started. Imagine: Rudy the Rater sets up a mail-to-Web-site archive, using whatever these folks above are using. Except, he screens the stuff to separate the bad from the good, using whatever criterion he thinks is right. People either use his site, or don't. (A Web site has some logistical advantages over subscribing to various mailing lists which do the same filtering.) Other services emerge with differing rating criteria, different aesthetic standards of goodness, or even different interests. (Some sites could filter out all of the political posts, others could filter out all the programming posts, etc.) Readers could pick the sites they wish to read, and simultaneously be exposed to authors they might have otherwise overlooked. The authors they like, and the filtering of the site operator, create a "clique" (as in math terminology) that effectively is similar to the vector weighting scheme present in the R[u,v] scheme. An advantage of the distributed site model over the R[u,v] model is the lack of any central coordination, the market anarchy of the process. Shared kill files are another possibility. As kill files become more commonly used, they may be traded around, weighted in the same way as described above. Again, I claim that an adequate and workable solution is not to solve the more general problem of everybody rating everyone else, but just of having access to a limited number of killfiles from people one respects. These approaches are doable today. Especially the distributed Web competing "best of" sites. I may do one myself! (If Jay Campbell lets me have Web stuff on his system.) --Tim May ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^756839 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Microsoft TV announces new TV Dinner product
by nobody＠REPLAY.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

INSTRUCTIONS FOR MICROSOFT'S NEW TV DINNER PRODUCT : : You must first remove the plastic cover. By doing so you agree to : accept and honor Microsoft rights to all TV dinners. You may not : give anyone else a bite of your dinner (which would constitute an : infringement of Microsoft's rights). You may, however, let others : smell and look at your dinner and are encouraged to tell them how : good it is. : : If you have a PC microwave oven, insert the dinner into the oven. : Set the oven using these keystrokes: <\mstv.dinn.//08.5min@50%heat// : Then enter: <ms//start.cook_dindin/yummy\|/yum~yum:-)gohot#cookme. : : If you have a Mac oven, insert the dinner and press start. The oven : will set itself and cook the dinner. : : If you have a UNIX oven, insert the dinner, enter the ingredients of : the dinner (found on the package label), the weight of the dinner, : and the desired level of cooking and press start. The oven will : calculate the time and heat and cook the diner exactly to your : specification. : : Be forewarned that Microsoft dinners may crash, in which case your : oven must be restarted. This is a simple procedure. Remove the : dinner from the oven and enter : <ms.nodarn.good/tryagain\again/again.rats!. : This process may have to : be repeated. Try unplugging the microwave and then doing a cold : reboot. If this doesn't work, contact your hardware vendor. : : Many users have reported that the dinner tray is far too big, larger : than the dinner itself, having many useless compartments, most of : which are empty. These are for future menu items. If the tray is : too large to fit in your oven you will need to upgrade your : equipment. : : Dinners are only available from registered outlets, and only the : chicken variety is currently produced. If you want another variety, : call MicrosoftHelp and they will explain that you really don't want : another variety. Microsoft Chicken is all you really need. : : Microsoft has disclosed plans to discontinue all smaller versions of : their chicken dinners. Future releases will only be in the larger : family size. Excess chicken may be stored for future use, but must : be saved only in Microsoft approved packaging. : : Microsoft promises a dessert with every dinner after '98. However, : that version has yet to be released. Users have permission to get : thrilled in advance. : : Microsoft dinners may be incompatible with other dinners in the : freezer, causing your freezer to self-defrost. This is a feature, : not a bug. Your freezer probably should have been defrosted anyway.

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Re: pseudonyms & list health
by suedeenim＠censored.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Is this what your looking for? Love Always, Sue Deenim >but what if these people had just stopped subscribing under >their clear name? and started using a pseudonym? > >well, just some musings for those who unabashadly promote pseudonyms >to contemplate. > >--Vlad Nuri > > -- Member Internet Society - Certified BETSI Programmer - Webmistress *********************************************************************** Carol Anne Braddock (cab8) carolann(a)censored.org 206.42.112.96 My Homepage The Cyberdoc *********************************************************************** ------------------ PGP.ZIP Part [017/713] ------------------- M8H,),S$8G>&.WP(8IRA`-M['+`Q%&_C"">5-F%LX@<_Q$;*P'',Q$Z/AA[8M MF=O0H+*%(-S%&>S%+FS&<LS%3(Q&#W1"<]2%`H^;,]^1C$'HBN8PX$4SYAU^ MPGD<Q0ZLA0D+,`MCT!LA**4M[-JPAK9F?40!AJ,CW"'%DR#:'9?Q)3[%<DQ` ------------------------------------------------------------- for next chunk to export --> http://dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/export/

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RE: Cyphernomicon, and a section on Escrow and Reputations
by Pat Farrell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> I know of a couple of alternative places. I too got tired of Netcom's anon ftp server. An unaltered, ASCII copy of Tim's CP-FAQ is available as http://www.isse.gmu.edu/~pfarrell/crypto/CP-FAQ This is a low usage site, so response should be fine. BTW, there is a page for the DC-area Cypherpunks as http://www.isse.gmu.edu/~pfarrell/dccp/index.html And a guide to every US GovernmentWWW page that I could find (including locations of spook facilities) starting at http://www.isse.gmu.edu/~pfarrell/government/usgov.html Other crypto related resources are available starting at http://www.isse.gmu.edu/~pfarrell/crypto.html Pat Pat Farrell Grad Student http://www.isse.gmu.edu/students/pfarrell Info. Systems & Software Engineering, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA PGP key available on homepage #include <standard.disclaimer>

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Re: Direct Socket to Remailer?
by loki＠obscura.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 7:25 PM 9/1/95, ROBO Mixmaster Remailer wrote: >I've heard of telnetting to port 25 to send SEMI-untraceable e-mail. >The procedure, quite frankly, sounds rather complicated. > >Most of my mail that I don't want traced goes through the Mixmaster >remailer network. I'm using Winsock-compatible software via a PPP >connection. Is it possible, for example, to tell my mailer software >to use the remailer itself, such as "remail.obscura.com" as the mail >host, rather than "mail.myISP.com"? Will it work, at least for >sending, without having an account at "obscura.com", or whatever >remailer? Would that be less traceable than sending it through my >ISP's mail host? I don't think it would provide much more security, but it might keep you ISP from logging the mail. If you are using mixmaster(a)remail.obscura.com as your remailer, you are welcome to use it as the mail host for that mail. It is a slow connection so please do not use is as your regular mail host. You should try the telnet port 25 trick. It is amazingly simple (but not secure). Just "telnet some.machine.com 25" and type help. It will guide you through it. It is quite informative. -Lance ---------------------------------------------------------- Lance Cottrell loki(a)obscura.com PGP 2.6 key available by finger or server. Mixmaster, the next generation remailer, is now available! http://obscura.com/~loki/Welcome.html or FTP to obscura.com "Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra. Suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night the ice weasels come." --Nietzsche ----------------------------------------------------------

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