December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Metcalf and Other Net.Fogies
by mccoy＠communities.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

perry(a)piermont.com writes: > Alan Olsen writes: > > Metcalfe may have a valid prediction here. > > Metcalfe is talking out his ass. He's reached the "old geezer who's > impeding his own field" stage. Many of his articles seem to be written > as though no one was trying to fix problems. Well, having talked with people involved with the problems I can assure you that they are real. The net brownouts when MAE-East dumps its BGP core or the fact that when one of the NAPs upgraded to FDDI it soon found that by the time people had installed the upgrades to the routers the bandwidth was already saturated should indicate that there are problems. Most of the problems are in the routers, even the top of the line Cisco boxes can only handle so much. The sky is not falling, but these sorts of problems are cracking the whip behind IPv6 and pushing the companies that make the routers pretty hard (Have you ever tried to buy even a lowly Cisco 2401? Do you know what the wait is on delivery? I really wish I had bought Cisco stock earlier...) > > When I run traceroutes, the blockage is in MCI or Sprintnet land. > > How do you manage to determine where you are losing bandwidth using > traceroute? That must be a mighty powerful traceroute to do that -- > most traceroutes I've seen are hard pressed just to find out what the > connectivity path is. Then you should probably upgrade your traceroute, preferably to one which allows source routing of the packets and then couple the output to a nice udp source routing script which will bounce a few packets between links with slow response times. Most of the problems are at the exchange points where packets go from one company's network to another. It seems that users have the annoying habit of wanting to talk to other people's customers...imagine the nerve :) > > The bandwidth to the net has been oversold. > > Always the case. Big deal. Bandwidth is still increasing pretty > fast. There are, naturally, growing pains, but the outages and > bandwidth situation are pretty good, all things considered. Compared > to the way things were eight or nine years ago they are amazing; > compared to four years ago they are still astoundingly better. Bandwidth may be increasing quickly, but demand for it is increasing even faster with every moron wanting tose the web while the routers to hook it all together and make it work are still very expensive and not being produced fast enough to satisfy the demand. Compared to the way things were even a few years ago the aggregate bandwidth that one person can expect is decreasing, it seems that no one writing internet protocols passed an Intro to Sociology/Poly Sci course and assumed that the tragedy of the commons did not apply to them. The upside of all of this is that it is creating a demand for value-added services which offer users dedicated bandwidth and faster response time in return for a little coin. This will probably push micro-currency on to the net faster than any other consumer demand... jim

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Re: Court challenge to AOL junk-mail blocks
by mccoy＠communities.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

frogfarm(a)yakko.cs.wmich.edu writes: > This is utter horseshit. AOL, like any private individual or organization, > has the right to refuse service to anyone at any time for any reason, or > even for no reason at all. The gubmint isn't doing SQUAT, except forcing > AOL to allow the spammers access. AOL has a service agreement with their customers, and they are not allowed to change the rules just because they feel like it (I believe that this is called a contract :) This is the jist of the injunction. jim

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Re: Conservation Laws, Money, Engines, and Ontology (fwd)
by Adamsc＠io-online.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Fri, 6 Sep 96 14:04:51 -0500, Andrew Loewenstern wrote: >> I don't think any one step will solve all our spam problems >> but I wouldn't mind spending, say, 5 cents for each real piece >> of mail I sent outside my company and if end machines charged >> 5 cents per piece of ouside mail received, I think spamming >> would be crippled. (Note that with bad guy lists, you could >> collect the money and then just throw away the mail.) >So would you be willing to pay $50.00 for this message you sent to >cypherpunks? If there are a thousand recipients and each one charges $0.05 >for the priveledge of you sending it e-mail.... It seems like such a scheme >would not only cripple spam, but public discussion lists like this one. It's likely his $.05 would go to the list owner. When signing up for the list you would forfeit the right to collect on junk mail. Charging spammers would be up to the list... - "'Anonymity is bad,' says a source who wishes to remain anonymous." - Nuff' said. * Home: Chris Adams <adamsc(a)io-online.com> | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp * Autoresponder: send email w/subject of "send resume" or "send PGPKEY" * Work: cadams(a)acucobol.com | V.M. (619)515-4894 | (619)689-6579 * Member in good standing of the GNU whirled hors d'oeuvre

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Re: What the NSA is patenting
by Adamsc＠io-online.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Fri, 06 Sep 1996 11:59:18 -0500, John Deters wrote: >I hope some hardware hacker who knows their low-level stuff will be able to >write a secure disk wiper. They have: it's called a bulk tape eraser. <g> I'd just store everything sensitive on a floppy. Those are easy to erase with a heavy duty magnet (not a wimpy refrigerator magnet). I understand slagging one in the microwave is also effective <g>. - "'Anonymity is bad,' says a source who wishes to remain anonymous." - Nuff' said. * Home: Chris Adams <adamsc(a)io-online.com> | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp * Autoresponder: send email w/subject of "send resume" or "send PGPKEY" * Work: cadams(a)acucobol.com | V.M. (619)515-4894 | (619)689-6579 * Member in good standing of the GNU whirled hors d'oeuvre

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Re: What the NSA is patenting
by Adamsc＠io-online.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On Fri, 6 Sep 1996 14:03:43 -0700, Timothy C. May wrote: >>A maybe usefull program would be a little tsr that constantly >>overwrite unused sectors of the entire drive with random patterns >>(maybe seeded with a fast keyboard interval timer). Like at the very >>moment I am writing this, my HD has been idle for several minutes... >The NSA STM method is related to reading _very subtle_ variations in >magnetic domain modifications. Jitter in read-write head positions can be >thought of as a noise (N) added to some signal (S)l. Extraction of signals >in low S/N ration environments is a well-developed science. > >Not to start another round of "thermite bomb" posts, but I would not trust >n-pass erasures. It's still likely that if you left it running after a month or so it would be next to impossible to do (assuming the NSA didn't get lucky - you still have to worry!) >Of course, this is about the least of my concerns. If the Feds are planning >to use STM probes on your seized drives, you've got more serious problems. Such as asking why you didn't use some very strong crypto software? Work out some sort of parallel port dongle that could be connected, the software generates a random key, the parallel port device is written and then removed. Further access would involve connecting. The code & chips needed have been provided in many places; DDJ for one. Allows a very convincing "Well it was encrypted and your goon stepped on the key!" >(The oft-discussed possibility of more secure dongles, or secret decoder >rings. is still off in the future. Most of us just enter our various >passwords, and our local disk drives reveal all.) This is too true. - "'Anonymity is bad,' says a source who wishes to remain anonymous." - Nuff' said. * Home: Chris Adams <adamsc(a)io-online.com> | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp * Autoresponder: send email w/subject of "send resume" or "send PGPKEY" * Work: cadams(a)acucobol.com | V.M. (619)515-4894 | (619)689-6579 * Member in good standing of the GNU whirled hors d'oeuvre

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[NOISE] Propaganda Bit: C
by Bill Stewart 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 10:50 AM 9/6/96 -0800, Jim Bell wrote: >Since red liquid running in the streets is generally so reviled, one of the >things which mystifies me is why there aren't more simulation-type programs >used to test out hypotheticals, for example a "SimEconomy." For example, As someone else pointed out recently, this depends _so_ strongly on the assumptions built into your model, both explicit and implicit. SimHealth, for instance, was a propaganda piece put out for the last election so people could play with different approaches to managing other peoples' health care. If Duncan were to write something like that, anybody who tinkered with the economy would make it go downhill. If Ross Perot wrote it, anybody who started making the deficit larger would find his picture at the bottom of the screen having the ears grow larger. I assume that if Jim wrote it, anybody who did anything to the economy other than decrease government involvement would find a bunch of nasty little dwarves throwing stone knives at them.... # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com # <A HREF="http://idiom.com/~wcs"> # You can get PGP software outside the US at ftp.ox.ac.uk/pub/crypto

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IDC_ard
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

9-8-96. NYP Mag: "The True Terror Is In the Card." Faced with rising crime, illegal immigration, welfare fraud and absentee parents, many bureaucrats and members of Congress insist that the nation would run more smoothly if we all had counterfeit-proof plastic identity cards. Let's be clear that this is a one-way street. Once having established a requirement to carry photo ID, it will be difficult if not impossible to reverse. Don't we realize the dangers of allowing the Government to establish identity and legitimacy? Isn't it, in fact, the responsibility of the citizenry to establish the legitimacy of the Government? ----- http://jya.com/idcard.txt (11 kb) IDC_ard

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Re: What is the EFF doing exactly?
by Duncan Frissell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 10:20 PM 9/6/96 -0400, David Lesher / hated by RBOC's in 5 states wrote: >> >> So switch to Fedex. The P.O. gives lousy service anyway. Privitize. >> > >Try & mail an anonymous FedEx package. >Try and pay cash in most Fedex offices. Buy money order. Slip it into the plastic pouch with the airbill. Drop it into collection box. Works. DCF

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ASP_oil
by jya＠pipeline.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

9-7-96. FiTi: "Indian herb trick turns water into kerosene." A young, unemployed south Indian has flummoxed India's top government scientists by demonstrating an apparently simple recipe for producing a kerosene-like fuel by boiling a "mystery" herb in water: prospectively, he hopes, revolutionising the world energy industry. "We have no doubt we are sitting on something very big," said Mr Valangiman Ramamurthi, India's top science bureaucrat. Watching scientists professed little idea how or why the process worked, but said it conclusively produced "a clear oil separation in substantial quantities" which tests have identified as a hydrocarbon similar to kerosene. "Its properties make it better than petrol," said one. "Apparently the herb can grow widely in all types of soil -- it is very exciting." 9-7-96. WaPo: "More in the Pipeline." In the 1970s fear gripped the Western world that Earth was running out of oil. Since then, vast new reserves have been discovered that can be extracted with current technology. The known crude oil reserve now amounts to one trillion barrels -- enough for 45 to 50 years at current world production rates, and estimated reserves are at least one trillion barrels more. ----- http://jya.com/aspoil.txt (6 kb for 2) ASP_oil

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Re: What the NSA is patenting
by jim bell 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 12:18 AM 9/7/96 -0800, Adamsc wrote: >On Fri, 06 Sep 1996 11:59:18 -0500, John Deters wrote: > >>I hope some hardware hacker who knows their low-level stuff will be able to >>write a secure disk wiper. > >They have: it's called a bulk tape eraser. <g> > > >I'd just store everything sensitive on a floppy. Those are easy to erase with a >heavy duty magnet (not a wimpy refrigerator magnet). I understand slagging one >in the microwave is also effective <g>. Just remember that an AC-driven bulk eraser will be far more effective than a permanent magnet at erasing data securely. An oscillating magnet field re-magnetizes the floppy 120 times per second, as opposed to the single magnetization done by the permanent magnet. Each pass through the hysteresis curve brings down residual signals somewhat, maybe 10 db. With the AC field, it's hard NOT to have a good erase. Jim Bell jimbell(a)pacifier.com

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