December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Yeah, Yeah But what are we gonna do!
by avatar＠mindspring.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 01:17 PM 2/10/96 -0500, you wrote: >Spam beget filters. > >Most congresscritters delete email from people other than their >constituents already. > >Adam > Untrue most of them have responded to my correspondence. For example, I live in Atlanta Ga. and Senator Bradley is a representative of New Jersey. Here is his letter. By the way I have many more from many other members of both House and Senate. Thank you for contacting me to express your views concerning the Communications Decency Act of 1995, which was recently passed as part of S. 652, the Telecommunications Act of 1995. I greatly appreciated the opportunity to review your thoughts on this issue. Although the advances being made in our nation's information and communications network are revolutionary and welcome, they also provide openings for individuals to transmit obscene materials to children and to lure children. Throughout my career in the U.S. Senate, I have consistently encouraged the recording industry and the television industry to limit explicit violence and sex on television. Given the widespread growth of information networks, I supported the Communications Decency Act as a means to curtail children's exposure to offensive materials and to give parents some control over the things their children see and hear. While I supported this amendment because I believe there is a need for some safeguards against obscenity, I do have some concerns about the implementation of this provision, if it becomes law. There should be a distinction between indecent and obscene material, as there is in other relevant laws. Furthermore, this particular amendment does not adequately reflect the unique nature of the Internet, in which information crosses many computers and access points before reaching the user. Finally, I was disappointed that the Senate did not have an opportunity to consider an alternative proposal suggested by Senator Leahy. This measure would have provided more safeguards to ensure that First Amendment rights were preserved, but still would have accomplished the overall objective of the adopted version. Determining who should be held responsible for disseminating obscene material may be difficult. I am concerned that this could lead to an overall chilling effect on online communication as users fear that they may be held responsible for material they did not originate. Please be assured that I will keep your views in mind as the joint House-Senate conference committee attempts to reconcile the differences between the two versions of the Telecommunications Act of 1995. Again, thank you for contacting me to share your views. I hope to hear from you again in the near future. Best wishes. Senator Bill Bradley Washington, DC 20510 (202)224-3224 > Charles Donald Smith Jr. ||The government is my shepherd I need not work. It alloweth me to lie down on a good job. It leadeth me beside stilled factories. It destroyeth my initiative. It leadeth me in the path of a parasite for politics sake. YEA, though I walk through the valley of laziness and deficet spending I shall fear no evil, for the government is with me. It prepareth an economic utopia for me by appropriating the earnings of my grandchildren. It filleth my head with false security. My inefficiency runeth over. Surely, the government should care for me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in a fools paradise forever.................AMEN! || nuke'm if ya got'em||

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[silly] Re: OK, how *do* you spell it?
by Alan Olsen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 11:58 AM 2/10/96 -0500, Robert Hettinga wrote: >I got a spelling ping this morning. > >I'd never really thought about it, before. > >Is it infocalypse or infoclypse? It is Infocalypso. Infocalypso is a new dance involving laptops. It is similar to clog dancing, except the laptops are hit together in a rhythmic fashion while a lively beat is played on magnetic drums. It is usually found in countrys which have alot of spare laptops. It was made popular during certain MIT social gatherings and EFF meetings. The dance has gotten more and more violent as the speed of laptops have increased. --- Alan Olsen -- alano(a)teleport.com -- Contract Web Design & Instruction `finger -l alano(a)teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key http://www.teleport.com/~alano/ "We had to destroy the Internet in order to save it." - Sen. Exon "I, Caligula Clinton... In the name of the Senate and the people of Rome!" - Bill Clinton signing the CDA with the First Amendment bent over.

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a chat w/ Paul Strassman about his remailer article
by tbyfield＠panix.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Now I have a firmer grasp on the dynamics of escalation. ;) A couple of notes. (1) The people Mr. Strassman CCed in his first response remained CCed throughout; one of them is his co-author, William Marlow (Senior Vice President, Science Applications International Corporation [SAIC]). (2) He hasn't responded to my last mail, and probably won't, at least in private; obviously, he's free to respond to it on Cypherpunks. (3) I find his claims to understand and properly represent the arguments for remailers to be, er, lacking: claims like "remailing capabilities are operated [...] as a public service, almost always at no charge because it costs so little to set one up," the absence of the standard penet-type arguments--about support-group discussion re sexual abuse etc.--speak for themselves, imo. Anyway: >To: paul(a)strassmann.com (Paul A. Strassmann) >From: tbyfield(a)panix.com (t byfield) >Subject: Re: your article on remailers > >Greetings. > Your article on remailers <http://www.strassmann.com/pubs/ >anon-remail.html> was fascinating. > The "connection" you draw between disease and techniques of >anonymity is arbitrary and tendentious: in place of a careful, sustained >analysis of anonymous remailers _as such_, your article relies on a >bizarre rhetorical substitution of disease for anonymity--"Information >terrorism poses a threat; anonymity prevents punishment; the fact that >legislative and policy bodies aren't dealing with the issue reminds me of >the history of public medicine; therefore anonymity is a disease like >AIDS; Russian criminals are using remailers; this is how remailers >work..." This isn't an argument--it's a hodgepodge of free-associations >and very peculiar allegations. What evidence is there that "the Russian >(ex-KGB) criminal element" (whatever that is) constitutes a *statistically >significant* segment of remailer-users? If they aren't statisticaly >significant, why mention them? In the absence of any specific evidence, I >can only assume that this claim is pure fantasy--like the confusing >association between "AIDS" and "terrorism." Certainly, both are bad for >society, but so are many other things--littering, starvation, and poor >workmanship. > If you plan to develop your work on remailers further and present >it to governmental agencies and NGOs, please take the time to *understand* >the arguments of remailer advocates, rather than merely quoting them at >length. You'll be doing yourself a favor--because, really, the only >sections of your article that seem to make much sense are the quotations >from people who develop and maintain remailers. > >Ted Byfield <address> ----------------------------- >X-Sender: pas(a)pop.connix.com >Mime-Version: 1.0 >Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 10:31:10 -0500 >To: tbyfield(a)panix.com (t byfield) >From: paul(a)strassmann.com (Paul A. Strassmann) >Subject: Re: your article on remailers >Cc: "William Marlow" <William_Marlow(a)cpqm.saic.com>, > "Tim Leshan" <LESHAN(a)ksgrsch.harvard.edu>, > BRIAN KAHIN <KAHIN(a)HULAW1.HARVARD.EDU> > > Dear Mr. Byfield: > >Thanks for your comments about our remailer paper. I believe a few points >are in order in response to your observations: > >1. It does not seem that you have finished reading the paper. There is a >long section in the end captioned <Why Remailers?> which summarizes a wide >spectrum of opinions and beliefs of those who develop and offer remailer >services. I am satisfied that I have represented fairly the views of those >who see in remailers the defense of privacy and civil liberties. I also >conclude that remailers are here to stay. > >2. With regard to the evidence of that remailers are used by the criminal >element, and particularly by the Russian (ex-KGB), I am satisfied with the >evidence I have seen so far. As court proceedings become unsealed, everyone >will have an opportunity to examine that evidence. Meanwhile, you may wish >to browse for recent stories with the keywords <Citicorp> and <Cybercrime> >for such disclosures. > >3. In your letter you employ a technique which is not appropriate for the >conduct of a civilized discourse. You start by attributing to me >statements which I did not make. Then, you proceed to debunk them. Let me >illustrate: > >I did not use the expression "statistically significant" in describing the >use of remailers by the criminal element. Therefore, your argument "...if >they aren't statistically significant why mention them?" is both false as >well as logically inconsistent. > >Your debating style shows similar flaws by avoiding facts and arguing your >own constructs of what you attribute as my views. It is only because of the >importance of this subject matter that I have decided to respond to your >"flame". > >Sincerely, > >Paul Strassmann <full quote of my email omitted> --------------------------------------------- >To: paul(a)strassmann.com (Paul A. Strassmann) >From: tbyfield(a)panix.com (t byfield) >Subject: Re: your article on remailers > >At 10:31 AM 2/7/96, Paul A. Strassmann wrote: > >Mr. Strassmann-- > Since you may not wish to pursue any further discussion with >someone you don't know, I'll cut to the chase: may I submit your response >(unabridged) to the Cypherpunks mailing list? I notice that you've CCed my >mail to three people unknown to me without my permission. (Hi, >everyone...) > Here are a few further remarks, if you're interested; I hope you are. >I've reproduced your remarks out of their original order for purposes of >brevity. > >>3. In your letter you employ a technique which is not appropriate for the >>conduct of a civilized discourse. You start by attributing to me >>statements which I did not make. Then, you proceed to debunk them. Let me >>illustrate: > > You are, I trust, familiar with the phenomenon commonly called >"asking a question"? That is what I did when I asked you whether Russian >criminal elements constitute a statistically significant segment of >remailer users: I asked you a question. This process can sometimes be >confusing--for example, when the criteria that questioner and questionee >judge to be important differ. I feel that, in matters of public policy, >relative numbers are important: thus, if tens or hundreds of thousands of >people use remailers for benign purposes while only a handful of Russian >criminals do so for nefarious purposes, then public policy decisions on >remailers should not be founded primarily on the latter fact. By analogy, >it seems likely that someone, somewhere, has taught a monkey to drive a >car--there might even be a documented instance of it; should we then take >this into consideration in debating national automotive policy? After all, >if it weren't illegalized, the chaos that could be caused by pet >chimpanzees tooling around on public roads can't be understated... > Obviously, you're free to differ on the subject of relative >numbers and their bearing on policy, just as you're free to persevere >under the belief that a question can be "false." > I can't, however, resist pointing out that asking c[are]fully >worded questions that conform to established scientific criteria is >considered "appropriate for the conduct of a civilized discourse." Again, >you're free to disagree, of course. [brackets in 1st line = spelling >correction] > >>2. With regard to the evidence of that remailers are used by the criminal >>element, and particularly by the Russian (ex-KGB), I am satisfied with the >>evidence I have seen so far. As court proceedings become unsealed, everyone >>will have an opportunity to examine that evidence. Meanwhile, you may wish >>to browse for recent stories with the keywords <Citicorp> and <Cybercrime> >>for such disclosures. > > "If you knew what I knew" arguments have needlessly become a >staple of the national security establishment; but in all but the rarest >instances are they a valid basis for policy decisions. I understand full >well that the Russian "mafia" and former apparatchiks throughout the >former Soviet bloc are serious problems that we ignore only at our peril; >and, also, that invoking them increases one's chance of funding in the >security establishment. But I also understand that certain segments of the >USG would ultimately be better off distinguishing between its citizenry >and the Russian mob, rather than continually invoking the latter in >advocating legislation that pertains primarily to the former. > > In any case, I cannot wish you well in your endeavors in this >regard, since I disagree with most of what you say; I can, however, wish >you well in other regards, and I do. > Please take a moment to answer my original question regarding the >Cypherpunks mailing list. > >Regards, > >Ted Byfield <address> ----------------------------- >X-Sender: pas(a)pop.connix.com >Mime-Version: 1.0 >Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 22:00:05 -0500 >To: tbyfield(a)panix.com (t byfield) >From: paul(a)strassmann.com (Paul A. Strassmann) >Subject: Re: your article on remailers >Cc: "William Marlow" <William_Marlow(a)cpqm.saic.com>, > "Tim Leshan" <LESHAN(a)ksgrsch.harvard.edu>, > BRIAN KAHIN <KAHIN(a)HULAW1.HARVARD.EDU> > >I have no problem with your posting my messages. Thanks for asking except >you should do so only after you include the text of all messages, including >this one. > >You have totally misunderstood my response to your points about the >relevance of whether ex-KGB criminals ( or monkeys) are a statistically >significant number. The problem with your communications has been that you >have continued to disregard my conclusions where I stated that anonymous >remailers are here to stay for good reasons. Whether the number of abusers >is or is not statistically significant has therefore no bearing on our >exchanges. For that reason I did not read your text at all as "asking a >question", but as your own assertion. This makes it unacceptable as an >argument. > >I disagree with your assertion that you have "...asked a carefully worded > questions that conform to established scientific criteria." My experience > as editor of several scientific journals prevents me from acknowledging > your messages as conforming to any scientific criteria. You have > selectively picked arguments from the front of my paper, while totally > disregarding what I said at the end. What you have is not scientific, but > extractions to support your arguments. > >You are using inference (such as "chance of funding the security >establishment", "advocating legislation" etc.) for attributing to me what >you see as reprehensible views. You do that by saying that I have used the >"if you knew what I knew" arguments as a cover. Again, you are exhibiting a >debating technique where you assign to me a position I have not taken and >then proceed to argue against it. > >Let me repeat again, your allegation that I have not taken into >consideration the arguments of remailer advocates is not only false but >totally misleading. If you would bother to read the entire paper, you >would find that the views or remailer advocates are not only represented, >but found to be of sufficient weight and importance to warrant my >conclusion that anonymous remailers are here to stay. I also say that in a >democratic society it "...becomes politically unacceptable to designate >remailers as a potential source of criminal actions. Such absolute >prohibitions would never pass through a legislative process in a free >society." > >If you are looking for some totalitarian monster, you better look somewhere >else to vent your apprehensions. > >Paul <full quote of my second message omitted> ------------------------------------------ >To: paul(a)strassmann.com (Paul A. Strassmann) >From: tbyfield(a)panix.com (t byfield) >Subject: Re: your article on remailers > >>You have totally misunderstood my response to your points about the >>relevance of whether ex-KGB criminals ( or monkeys) are a statistically >>significant number. The problem with your communications has been that you >>have continued to disregard my conclusions where I stated that anonymous >>remailers are here to stay for good reasons. Whether the number of abusers >>is or is not statistically significant has therefore no bearing on our >>exchanges. For that reason I did not read your text at all as "asking a >>question", but as your own assertion. This makes it unacceptable as an >>argument. > > You seem quite adamant that your repeated assertion that >"remailers are here to stay" somehow serves to stave off any criticism (or >at least any criticism from your struly) of your article. I read your >article in its entirety and understood it quite well, and I agree with >*some* of it--for example, with your conclusion that remailers are here to >stay. I could just as easily read some lngthy tome full of rubbish whose >conclusion is that "stuff exists" and agree with its conclusion while >remaining skeptical about the bulk of the book. > I would submit to you that your article would be much improved if >you edited out this pathological-biological metaphor. > >>I disagree with your assertion that you have "...asked a carefully worded >> questions that conform to established scientific criteria." My experience >> as editor of several scientific journals prevents me from acknowledging >> your messages as conforming to any scientific criteria. You have >> selectively picked arguments from the front of my paper, while totally >> disregarding what I said at the end. What you have is not scientific, but >> extractions to support your arguments. > > Of course I've selectively picked arguments from your paper--I >even addressed some from the *middle*! (As for the end, see my remarks >above.) Unfortunately, try as you might, my remarks aren't really what's >at issue here. You published an article that made extensive use of dubious >metaphor and made unsubstantiated allegations that, even if they were >substantiated, are of doubtful significance; when I pointed out that this >method of argumentation is generally inappropriate for a democratic >society, you redouble your efforts to assess my reading comprehension as >low and my remarks as utterly without merit. > >>You are using inference (such as "chance of funding the security >>establishment", "advocating legislation" etc.) for attributing to me what >>you see as reprehensible views. You do that by saying that I have used the >>"if you knew what I knew" arguments as a cover. Again, you are exhibiting a >>debating technique where you assign to me a position I have not taken and >>then proceed to argue against it. > > I've said nothing of "reprehensible views," nor need I do so; I'm >quite content with merely _disagreeing_ with some of what you have >written. As for "assign[ing] to you a position [you] have not taken": (1) >in your article you mentioned that "the Russian (ex-KGB) element" uses >remailers; (2) I questioned the truth and noteworthiness of this claim; >(3) you responded... > >>2. With regard to the evidence of that remailers are used by the criminal >>element, and particularly by the Russian (ex-KGB), I am satisfied with the >>evidence I have seen so far. As court proceedings become unsealed, everyone >>will have an opportunity to examine that evidence. Meanwhile, you may wish >>to browse for recent stories with the keywords <Citicorp> and <Cybercrime> >>for such disclosures. > > ...very clearly asserting that you have seen evidence that is not >publicly availlable because it remains sealed: "if you knew what I knew," >in shorthand. (4) I said that, imo, by and large this is not a valid basis >for policy decisions. And now you tell me that I'm arguing against a >position you haven't taken? > >>Let me repeat again, your allegation that I have not taken into >>consideration the arguments of remailer advocates is not only false but >>totally misleading. If you would bother to read the entire paper, you >>would find that the views or remailer advocates are not only represented, >>but found to be of sufficient weight and importance to warrant my >>conclusion that anonymous remailers are here to stay. I also say that in a >>democratic society it "...becomes politically unacceptable to designate >>remailers as a potential source of criminal actions. Such absolute >>prohibitions would never pass through a legislative process in a free >>society." > > To be sure, you "represent" the views of remailer advocates, >though for the most part through extensive quotation--extensive enough, >indeed, that one of the authors quoted has publicly expressed misgivings >about the fact that you never sought permissions. Editor of several >scientific journals, you say? Perhaps your extensive experience with >classified documents, which of course quote material beyond fair use >without permission, has shaped your editorial sensibilities? > >>If you are looking for some totalitarian monster, you better look somewhere >>else to vent your apprehensions. > > I think maybe you've strayed a bit from the subject. This is, I >think, a strange way to respond to my closing: > >> In any case, I cannot wish you well in your endeavors in this regard, >>since I disagree with most of what you say; I can, however, wish you well in >>other regards, and I do. > > You're rather keen to pathologize things, aren't you? First it's >remailers, which "remind" you of diseases; and now you've doubly >pathologized me, as someone positively bent on finding "totalitarian >monsters" where there are none. Please rest assured that I don't think >you're anything of the sort. > >Cheers, >Ted

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Re: Need a "warning" graphic of some kind for CDA
by Lynne L. Harrison 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 11:26 AM 2/10/96 -0600, Sten Drescher wrote: > > Then why didn't the Prez announce that he was ordering the >Justice Department to not defend the CDA provisions, like he did the >AIDS expulsion provision in the military spending bill? Because it's an election year and, IMO, the topics he discussed in his State of the Union address gave a clear message that he was going to sign this bill. ******************************************************* Lynne L. Harrison, Esq. | "The key to life: Poughkeepsie, New York | - Get up; E-mail: | - Survive; lharrison(a)mhv.net | - Go to bed." *******************************************************

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Re: The Agincourt Project
by printing＠explicit.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Here is a thank you rant from the OCAF that I got in my mail today. William Knowles printing(a)explicit.com --(Fwd)-- >From Oklahomans for Children And Families (OCAF) ocaf(a)aol.com ocaf(a)telepath.com ----------------- Thank you for requesting our document "The Agincourt Project". We hope you have had time to read and digest it. And we very much hope you will join us in our fight to end illegal pornography and child pornography on the Internet. - If you are a concerned citizen, we hope you will follow the suggestions in our Action Plan. We need your help to get our document in the hands of law enforcement officials across America. This is a complicated issue, but we have found that once the police and prosecuting attorneys understand how an ISP operates, the criminal liability of the ISP becomes obvious. - If you are a law enforcement official or a prosecuting attorney responding to our notices of potential illegal activity in your jurisdiction, we are ready to answer any questions you or your staff may have. - If you are a representative of a media organization, we stand ready to answer any questions you may have and to make ourselves available for interviews. - And, finally, if your are an Internet Service Provider who is concerned about our activities, your concern is justified. We hope that you have already made the decision to remove illegal pornography and child pornography from your news server. And we sincerely thank you if you have done so. If you have not, please understand that we are receiving help from concerned citizens across the United States. Sooner or later, the police in your area will be contacted. Also understand that we do not intend to find one large ISP for a test case. We are encouraging law enforcement in every city to use existing laws to put an end to the illegal pornography and child pornography in newsgroups. Again, thank you for your interest in our work. --(End fwd)--

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The Idiot Chip
by John Young 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The New York Times, February 10, 1996 The Idiot Chip By Frank Rich [Columnist] In the annals of dumb solutions to serious problems, history will have a ball with the V-chip, the antidote to trash TV that became the law of the land on Thursday when Bill Clinton signed the telecommunications bill. Far from making television safer for children, the V-chip will merely postpone and confuse the issue until well into the next century -- even as it provides politicians with convenient cover. By embracing the V-chip, Democrats and Republicans alike can posture as if they care about children without actually having to do anything to improve their cultural lot. Let Mr. V-chip do the job instead! The V-chip is a gimmick that has as much to do with ameliorating TV for kids as the Forbes flat tax has to do with serious tax reform. To see why, it's essential to realize that a cultural revolution took place in America this week. Contrary to the headlines and sound bites, the new telecommunications law is not just about cable rates and phone service, the explosion of new technologies and the unconstitutional effort to stamp out "indecency" and abortion information on the Internet. If you look at the bigger picture, this law is also about a mammoth expansion of mass culture -- more media, more outlets -- and a rapid expansion of power for the handful of mega-corporations that control it all, from TV, movies, music and publishing to both print and electronic news. It was perfectly symbolic that on the day Mr. Clinton signed the bill, Disney got its official Federal approval to swallow up ABC. Into this vast new universe of omnipotent media goliaths comes the tiny V-chip, designed to help parents block the coarse outpourings of an exploding digital universe. Common sense alone dooms this gizmo to failure. Who can rate some 600,000 hours of programming broadcast per year by even our current 70-channel cable systems? (Hollywood only has to rate roughly 550 movies -- 1,000 hours -- per year.) Should crime-sated local news be blocked? "MASH" reruns? Reports from a future gulf war? "E.R."? Pro football? "Schindler's List"? (If so, a network may be tempted to duck a V-chip block -- which would lower ratings and revenue -- by sanitizing the Holocaust.) Even if all the practical, political and legal questions raised by the V-chip could be miraculously resolved overnight, it is still pie-in-the-sky. The chips are only required on new TV sets, so it will be years before most households, especially multi-set households, will be in the V-chip's harness. Even then, parents with kids in different age groups will have to choose between their younger and older children as they decide whether to flick the switch each night. Weaker parents will take the same path of least resistance they do now. As the founder of Action for Children's Television, Peggy Charren has been fighting for kids decades longer than most politicians. She is not only skeptical that the V-chip will transform lax parents into concerned ones, but points out that the chip doesn't even address the Saturday morning blight of brainwashing commercials ("worse than the programming") for violent toys and junk food. Nor, Ms. Charren adds, is there any language in the telecommunications law to require networks to increase the quantity and quality of good children's TV that might offer an after-school alternative to "Jenny Jones." Mr. Clinton will press for better programming when he meets with Hollywood potentates -- some of whom are his campaign contributors -- at the White House on Feb. 29. A far tougher idea -- one adopted by the British Government last month -- is being promoted by the Media Access Project, a public-interest organization. It argues that the one gift the networks still want from Congress and didn't get in the telecommunications law -- more space on the public airwaves (so-called "spectrum") for additional channels -- be given only if they agree to cede some of it to public-service broadcasting, including top-notch children's TV. But the greedy media goliaths will fight any such proposal as vehemently as they oppose the V-chip. The politicians, hiding behind the V-chip, will let them get away with it. Delinquent parents, told that their children will soon be in the hands of an electronic nanny, will have a new excuse for doing nothing. And like each TV generation before it, today's children will grow up to fight this battle for their children on yet another day. [End]

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White House Fax #
by random 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

if anyone is interested... >Here's the fax number for the White House...(202) 456-2461.

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The Communications Decency Act
by deepthroat＠alpha.c2.org 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Why The Communications Decency Act passed, or Follow the money There's been a lot of commentary the last few days about this bill, this strange creature, seemingly of the 'Christian Right.' Talk of how and why its unconstitutional, protests; web pages blackened. But, oddly, no one seems to have examined who pushed the bill through Congress, or why. Theres been a lot of talk lately about 'the rise of the new media,' how first interactive TV, then the net, are going to become this new thing, a way of getting news events. The 'old media' even reported on it; how could it not, it was being pre-empted. IRC beat CNN five years ago during the US-Iraq war. Bill Clinton's campaign took his message (a little) to the net, a little to MTV. But where does that leave the big guys? ABC, NBC, CBS?? Can they survive in this brave new world which the net threatens to be? By and large, they looked at themselves, and saw they could not. They are gargantuan dinosaurs, threatened by, well, hell, you've heard the metaphors. So had the dinosaurs. And, as you should have expected, they reacted, the main way they knew how. They bought themselves a law. This is the way broadcasters have always worked. When there was competition, they created the F.C.C. to tell them what to say and not say. When cable came along, and threatened to destroy them, they got cable regulated. It was interstate commerce after all. Not that space in the ground is a scarce resource, but the broadcasters are a powerful group. They create and maintain campaigns, name recognition, politicians. And they were threatened. Not only where they threatened, but their symbiotes, the politicians they created and maintained, where threatened. Theres not a politician alive who doesn't remember how Nixon looked next to Kennedy. But now, they understand the game, and they play it. Kristol once defined conservatism as the fear of change. Big Media is inherently conservative, and with good reason. They make lots of money the way things are. They don't want that to change. And they weren't going to let it. The net is free-wheeling, easy going, and useful. Its not the stiltified, self-referential, wasteland of television. It has to be stopped. But how to do it? You can't very well say 'This threatens our business interests,' when you're as widely disliked as the mass media. You need allies. You need a cover story. A Gulf of Tonkin incident. You need to protect the children. And who more manipulable today than the religious right? Heads spinning with newfound power and influence, they're the perfect dupes, with a perfect cause. And in driving through a bill to castrate the internet, the religious right had the perfect ally. The media. After all, the media is running scared. They're not going to present this as a big government issue, or a matter of censorship. They're not even going to portray the opposition. They're going to portray it as reasonable people, protecting our kids, vs ACLU free speech absolutists. And they did. The CDA passed. Not only did it pass, it steamrollered the opposition, because the opposition didn't see what was coming. We were deer in their headlights, and now they're feasting on roadkill. So what do we do about it? The satisfying response would be to kill your television. But that really doesn't do any good. Neither does killing your Senator. Ignoring it, in a massive act of uncivil disobedience might work. But turn your web pages obscene won't carry the big ISPs, the way turning them black did. What a waste of time. (Actually, it might not have been. People on the web now all know about the CDA, and can't claim ignorance.) So ignoring it might work. But a better response is arbitrage. Move your web business to Anguilla. Jersey. The Isle of Man. The Seychelles. It doesn't cost much more than hosting them in the USA. Tell your Senators. Tell your Representatives. Tell your President. But most importantly, tell your friends. Your relatives. Your customers. Let business flee these expensive halls, and see how long the regulations last. No Senator can vote against the information superhighway, and when it becomes clear to every American that the CDA is causing America to become a backwater, the rules may change. DT. Deepthroat(a)alpha.c2.org

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Updated type2.list/pubring.mix
by John A. Perry 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hello Everyone, I just put up an updated type2.list/pubring.mix on vishnu.alias.net. I took armadillo out as it has not been responding to pings or to requests to the owner as to it's status. If I hear from the owner, I'll add it back. John Perry - KG5RG - perry(a)vishnu.alias.net - PGP-encrypted e-mail welcome! WWW - http://www.alias.net PGP 2.62 key for perry(a)vishnu.alias.net is on the keyservers. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 Comment: Processed by mkpgp1.6b4, a Pine/PGP interface. iQEVAwUBMRwRFKghiWHnUu4JAQEeAwf+N+3sIloKkhVXqb2TnjpVt6UsmVyUcL6H ZkO2bck/9BsI8DBedr7hyxUni8ZUUOxN0SFZacoTbsvzOFeesYtRHNilApVq+qq/ ZaO3B2DOUyWbMMMtSRoMgjVDvzvmGmw6Z7Ayq6P1z6elWn9Jd+MqWSOjiv3qSSnu SbJmSvnT69eokrXxNSsmIQMRGxdH+r4A5i5iKN6x/9cNxl7AK55i6x10bcxEI5Yo BF2/3tsZiR664wIwrVRk2srdWfnOIAdvnsQbzJV3so57GvBfUid0JbBC96mThYHR Fs5m6PH9A7g5TXveNyylIFQZFRFyD2cq6QBGtPos0DFyAKn/6bp4aQ== =1hD1 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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http://www.eubank.ag
by Alex de Joode 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

application/pgp-message

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