December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: misunderstandings of PICS
by Joseph M. Reagle Jr. 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:48 PM 5/6/96 -0700, you wrote: >PICS *doesn't*involve*the*page*designer*. this is an absolutely >key component of its design. This isn't exactly true (as you indicate later). PICS labels can be incorporated into the html <meta> tag by the content creator, it can be sent by way of the http server (using the 'get') or it can be collected from a third party label bureau. >I think is going to be far from the main use of ratings in the future) However, self rating will be a significant use in the future, and it is the only way PICS is being used effectively today (at RSAC). >may be made by different organizations. they may be contradictory. >this is a basic part of the design of PICS. True. >2. everything in cyberspace must be rated by government agency X, >and no pages are allowed to be transferred that do not have >acceptable ratings. > >the second is censorship. the first is free choice. the first >is what PICS aims for. notice it accomplishes this through absolutely >no action on the part of page designers. by the fact that they >have a URL, the PICS standard uses that URL as a reference. Two may be quite successfully accomplished using PICS. Europe (Germany and Nazis) and China/Singapore could make quite effective use of PICS if they require that all browsers in their country be sold with their rating (censorship) system included (and if they mandate that government label bureaus _must_ be used.) The reason self-rating is mentioned is to forestall the fear of mandated/arbitrary third party rating. Rather than some MPAA like system being imposed by the govt., the self-rating was a better political/strategic position. Also, self rating scales well until third party label bureaus are sufficiently developed. _______________________ Regards, Men govern nothing with more difficulty than their tongues, and can moderate their desires more than their words. -Spinoza Joseph Reagle http://farnsworth.mit.edu/~reagle/home.html reagle(a)mit.edu E0 D5 B2 05 B6 12 DA 65 BE 4D E3 C1 6A 66 25 4E

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Re: Why I Pay Too Much in Taxes
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 8:46 PM 5/7/96, Black Unicorn wrote: >I'm not sure I understand what you mean. I sent the text of the law to >the list. The position that you take (that increse in inflation can send >you into the next tax bracket) is incorrect. I wrote my comment before I saw your message. Does this make it clearer? I agree that the fewer brackets have lessened the problem in the last couple of years, but, then, inflation has not been an issue in the last couple of years. (I seem to recall an explicit statement that the brackets would not be adjusted upward, as the bill called for, because the inflation rate had been below the threshold....). In any case, my larger point has been about the effect over the last decade or so, where significant numbers of people are now up at the 40-45% marginal tax rate (Federal plus state, in many states). ... >Rates will not change with respect to inflation (to the extent that >inflation is accurately measured by the CPI). > >I believe an exception was made for the top bracket in 1994, but I don't >recall how it was implemented. The top marginal rate was increased. As I recall, from around 38% to around 42%. (As the money runs out, as the so-called trust funds turn out to be empty, as "entitlements" expand, and as more and more people are too poorly-educated and -motivated to succeed in high-paying jobs, I expect the top marginal rate to continue to be ratcheted upward. Until other forces come into play, of course.) --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Police tactics question
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I've often heard of the police/postmaster mailing someone child pornography prior to going in and busting them for possession of it. What are the legal matters in such cases? Thanks, -Allen

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Re: Police tactics question
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"froomkin(a)law.miami.edu" "Michael Froomkin" 6-MAY-1996 23:23:44.91 >One of my students has written a paper that may answer some of your >questions, Online Stings: High Tech Entrapment or Innovative Law >Enforcement?, by Jeffrey D. Weinstock >http://www.law.miami.edu/~froomkin/seminar/papers/weinstock.htm Thank you; I found it using Alta Vista earlier. >Note: these are *student* papers. Not everything in them is exactly right. >And no, I won't tell you their grades. Any egregrious errors in that one? -Allen

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Senator Leahy's Public Key
by frantz＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

The more I think about Senator Leahy's public key, the more I keep coming back to a point I only alluded to before. How do we know the key is actually his key? The key is only self signed. It could be a fake. If, as I have assumed, its primary use will be to sign public statements posted to the net, how will we know they are actually from Senator Leahy, and not some impostor? I strongly urge the senator to join the web of trust and get some other signatures on his key. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Bill Frantz | The CDA means | Periwinkle -- Computer Consulting (408)356-8506 | lost jobs and | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz(a)netcom.com | dead teenagers | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA

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ecash payee anonymity, cpunk archives
by Alex Strasheim 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

A while back someone posted a note saying that an ecash protocol garaunteeing payee as well as payer anonymity had been devised. Did that ever get posted here? The last message I saw said that it would be posted soon. Also, I missed whatever discussion there was about why the archives got shut down. Was it a copyright thing? A lack of resources? No one to volunteer? -- Alex Strasheim, alex(a)proust.suba.com

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Re: Police tactics question
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"reagle(a)mit.edu" "Joseph M. Reagle Jr." 7-MAY-1996 15:31:28.97 > Also, I'll stick in a plug for a paper I wrote a year ago for Mitch >Kapor's "Political Economy of the Digital Infrastructure" class at the Media >Lab: >Entrapment in Cyberspace -- On The Likelihood of Digital Stings >http://farnsworth.mit.edu/~reagle/career/stuff/sting.html Actually, I found that one also. Nice things, web search robots. Thanks, -Allen

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Re: misunderstandings of PICS
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"vznuri(a)netcom.com" "Vladimir Z. Nuri" 6-MAY-1996 18:53:10.45 >but OK, I see that the CyberAngels have focused on a part of the >PICS proposal that can be twisted into their own unique interpretation. >I see you/they have a semi-valid concept here. frankly, it only suggests >to me how dangerous the "self-rating" concept is, and perhaps that >it should be downplayed in the PICS proposal imho. (any PICS designers >out there listening?) The simplest cure for this, and one that would be effective - unlike implorings by the PICS designers - would simply be to not have inclusion of a rating in a page as part of the protocol. In other words, if you want a rating, get it from an agency. >> Yes, this is an abuse of the market oriented variety of PICS; >>they obviously don't know and/or don't care. If you want to convince them >>otherwise, start cc:ing your messages (and forwarding mine, on this I give >>you permission) on PICS and the CyberAngels to angels(a)wavenet.com. >since you are so interested and brought it up, I think you ought to >do it. I am doing all that I care to do in posting to this group. you >have given me reason to write on the issue. As I have previously stated, I irritated Mr. Hatcher by trying to get the CyberAngels to concentrate on spamming and other actual dangers to the Net, as opposed to their censorship efforts. (I count acting as an informant for governmental censorship a variety of censorship). Consequently, I have been asked not to mail to them. >Incidentally, their pressure (especially the legal variety - acting as >informants) could also include against an ISP that doesn't do the second for >material the CyberAngels don't like. >I do hope the CyberAngels seize on the other aspects of PICS that would >effectively let them put CyberAngel stickers on every single page in >cyberspace, if they have the attention span to actually pull this off. Quite. Anything that both the CyberAngels and, say, the Christian Coalition rate as unsuitable for minors is likely to be interesting. -Allen

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Freedom of Information Act
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

IIRC, the FOI act has come up here before. Possibly this list may provide some answers. -Allen From: IN%"rre(a)weber.ucsd.edu" 7-MAY-1996 00:36:11.83 From: Phil Agre <pagre(a)weber.ucsd.edu> =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= This message was forwarded through the Red Rock Eater News Service (RRE). Send any replies to the original author, listed in the From: field below. You are welcome to send the message along to others but please do not use the "redirect" command. For information on RRE, including instructions for (un)subscribing, send an empty message to rre-help(a)weber.ucsd.edu =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 17:23:13 -0400 Sender: State and Local Freedom of Information Issues <FOI-L(a)LISTSERV.SYR.EDU> From: "Barbara C. Fought" <bcfought(a)MAILBOX.SYR.EDU> Subject: how-tos for FOI-L I've gotten several questions lately about the correct address for this mailing list discussion. It changed a year ago. Some of you may want to unsubscribe for the summer. Or put this on digest (all messages once a week) or vacation stop. Save this message for future reference. For any change in service you send an e-mail message to: listserv(a)listserv.syr.edu In the body of the message you type one of the following, depending on what you want to do: WHAT YOU WANT COMMAND (put in body of email TO DO message, not in the subject line) subscribe subscribe FOI-L firstname lastname unsubscribe unsubscribe FOI-L get a digest set FOI-L digest vacation stop set FOI-L nomail resume delivery set FOI-L mail list of subscribers review FOI-L _____________________________________________________________________________ Barbara Croll Fought Asst. Prof., Broadcast Journalism list manager, FOI-L S.I.Newhouse School, Syracuse University bcfought(a)mailbox.syr.edu 215 University Place voice: 315/443-4054 fax: 315/443-3946 Syracuse, NY 13244-2100 _____________________________________________________________________________

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Re: Transitive trust and MLM
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"hfinney(a)shell.portal.com" "Hal" 7-MAY-1996 18:58:41.28 >Unfortunately we are left with a choice between three not very good >possibilities: accept transitive trust and hierarchical key CA >structures; use very flat hierarchies where one signer validates huge >numbers of keys; or accept that only a small number of keys can be >validated by key signatures. I think all these are troublesome and in >fact it makes me question the whole notion of key signatures. I think the web-of-trust without transitivity of _some_ trust is too limited. If a lot of completely-trusted key signators have signed a key, and that person's key is self-signed and has signed the keys of those key then keys signed with that person's key are significantly more likely to be good than those without this signature. I wouldn't count the person as a completely-trusted signator, but I wouldn't count them at 0 either. However, the above is just my opinion. Have any studies been done of the likelihood of a key to be later discovered to not match up to the claimed nym? I suspect there isn't adequate data as yet, but it could still be a good thing to check. -Allen

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