December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Re: Anthrax on the 'net [Was Re: Fear of Flying -- from HotWired ]
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 9:14 PM 9/17/96, Mike Fletcher wrote: > The Frank Herbert (of _Dune_ fame) book _White Plague_ comes >to mind. Basically a molecluar biologist's wife and kids are killed >by an IRA bomb while visiting Dublin. He snaps and creates a plague >which kills women (men are carriers) as revenge. All without using >that nasty Internet (in fact, the book was written back before even >ARPAnet). A _very_ minor correction. My copy of "The White Plague" is not handy, but I distinctly recall reading it circa 1980-1, certainly no earlier than 1977-8. The ARPANet was going strong by then. Newsgroups were getting started around 1980, give or take, as I recall. But of course I agree that "The White Plague" was written long before "The Net" became a household name. (Interestingly, Herbert was computer-literate, and he even wrote a book about using PCs, circa the late 70s....something like "Nailing Jelly to a Tree.") --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I 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, Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Wealth Tax vs. Capital Gains Tax Reduction
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I've been thinking a lot about the prospects of a "wealth tax," or "asset tax," in the U.S. With the stock market averages at record levels (and, hey, Intel has gone up $6 just so far today, to an unheard of $94.5 level), and with increasing fractions of people's overall net worth tied up in equities, bonds, houses, property, etc., it may be that the looters will take a more serious look at taxing people's overall wealth, e.g., the 5% of net worth per year that some countries have. (At the same time, there is also a chance that the tax on capital gains will be greatly reduced or even possibly eliminated, also as some countries such as Japan have already done.) The conundrum is this: so long as stocks, bonds, and other holdings are not taxable while unsold, and so long as large amounts of private pension funds and whatnot are flowing into equities, this wealth is "unreachable" to the government tax collectors. Further, much of this wealth is "locked" by the high marginal tax rates on capital gains (35-40%, depending on which state one lives in, on so-called "tax preference items," etc.) Many people will not sell assets if they have to pay 35-40% to the tax man if they sell, but nothing if they just sit on the asset and watch it go up in value. (Obviously, the assets get sold eventually. But many people will choose to simply not worry about the heavy taxes _this_ year, and delay selling 'til some future date. They may also think the capital gains rates will go down, or may have visions of taking their stock certificates and simply moving to Anguilla :-}.) If this trend continues--more money in equities and investments, and a higher overall valuation (as prices are driven up by more folks getting in, and by other conventional factors)--the government would seem to have two main choices: 1. Start taxing the overall wealth, e.g., 5% per year. 2. Reduce capital gains taxes so that the "locked assets" will at least come to market and generate some income from capital gains, even if at a reduced level. At 6:38 PM 9/17/96, Duncan Frissell wrote: >Note too the recent article in the Economist about how European firms are >raising capital in the UK and the US because it is available there in >private pension savings while European government retirement systems suck >loads of capital out of the system leaving nothing but massive government >debts. The flow of capital into equities is truly astounding. Some fraction of Americans are really preparing themselves well for retirement, emergencies, vacations, etc. Of course, a distressing fraction of Americans have no savings plans to speak of, and will essentially have no money as they age. Needless to say, I despise the idea of a "wealth tax," and I can see various loopholes and workarounds. I'd also expect a lot of folks to simply move out of the country if this were to happen. In the current political climate, I'd say the chance of a wealth tax in the next several years is small. Ditto for a capital gains tax rate reduction. As with selling assets, "doing nothing" is often the likeliest path. --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I 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, Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: Snake-Oil FAQ
by Krenn 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- It would be nice to have a list of actual products which are deemed potential snake-oil. Such a list could be maintained anonymously through a nym to avoid all the annoying legal problems with commenting on another's product. Though truth is the best defense against libel charges, it would be very annoying to be sued or some such by some hairbrained snake-oil peddler. Krenn -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMj84gEnqfwPpt/QVAQEWZAP9EZ7+3dQol+ZBLYQIiEk8f8avKDje5LBh EmE5GVxFXDgD9wAmcccMMuVxxCaUhN0kc8Q4StQ4aZGjwdrCGouHq4aNJdd73ERP vuk+VpQrlUwSvwwPlfXKUIQrM1PHfNigXrS5OrsQe/H/GjLw2lFa/WI2urR2Cuqg oMmtuQKrJik= =r2wq -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: Bernstein hearing: The Press Release
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 5:10 AM 9/23/96, Brian Davis wrote: ... >There isn't such a clause. The allowed restrictions were developed in >case law. > >Constitutional literalists take note: the First Amendment says nothing >about what the executive branch or the states can do .... Which is why President Jefferson was able to say: "While the Constitution says "Congress shall make no law...," I am hereby outlawing all discussion of the following subjects:.... And I have had it with the Catholics and Jews in this country. While Congress has no power to make laws respecting the establishment of religion or the exercise thereof, I am under no such restrictions. Therefore, I am ordering the immediate arrest and summary execution of all Papists and Jews...." Seriously, does not the Constitution and Bill of Rights define what states may do? And Presidents? The Executive is under various restrictions, and cannot behave unconstitutionally. After all, if Alabama, for example, reinstituted slavery, would not the 14th Amendment trump this? If California were to, say, ban speech critical of women's or homosexual's rights, would not the First Amendment trump this attempt? --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I 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, Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: Internet File System?
by azur＠netcom.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

>The other day, it occurred to me that Java could really take off if there >was some sort of file system. And, since you can't write to local files >with Java, the obvious solution is to set up the 'fopen, fclose(), etc) >set of functions that are 'rpcs' to some server application on the same >computer as the web server the applet comes from. > >Since I never manage to come up with new concepts, I assume someone is already >working on this, or has already created this. > Eric Hughes, well known cypherpunk, presented a two-part paper at DEFCON IV. The first part of the paper, entitled the "Universal Piracy System" or UPS, addresses an Internet/Web file system which offers universal access and privacy. The second part addresses how the UPS can be the enabler for the demise of copyright while offering a market driven replacement of an entirely different character. I hear Eric is refining these ideas and we hope to see something published soon. Perhaps he's lurking and will respond. PGP Fingerprint: FE 90 1A 95 9D EA 8D 61 81 2E CC A9 A4 4A FB A9 --------------------------------------------------------------------- Snoop Daty Data | Internet: azur(a)netcom.com Grinder | Voice: 1-702-655-2877 Sacred Cow Meat Co. | Fax: 1-702-658-2673 7075 W. Gowan Road, #2148 | Las Vegas, NV 89129 | --------------------------------------------------------------------- Just say NO to prescription DRUGS.

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Re: Macintosh Mixmaster port... Who's doing it?
by Greg Broiles 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 03:16 PM 9/22/96 -0500, Adam Shostack wrote: > A real Mac port of Mixmaster, that integrated with Claris >EMailer and Eudora would be a huge boon to the millions of Mac users >out there. I have no doubt that Vinnie's mac crypto conference talked >a lot about this sort of thing. Actually, the Mac crypto conference didn't spend any time at all on Mixmaster - which is not intended as a criticism of either the conference or of Mixmaster, but it just didn't happen. I gave a very short talk and said that I thought the Mac needed three apps, for people who wanted to jump in a write something useful to the cause of privacy on the net and didn't want to reinvent any wheels: a remailer client with a good user interface, a Mac-native remailer, and an implementation of DC-nets. Mixmaster would, of course, address two of those three. Lucky tells me that there is already a Mac implementation of DC-nets, but it doesn't seem to be very well known. My impression of the demographics of the conference was that it was folks who are mostly working developers who aren't necessarily up-to-the minute on crypto and ecommerce stuff, but are interested enough to at least think about including it in their applications. I'm pottering around with a Java-based remailer that acts like a POP client so it can run on a client machine, not a Unix box; but other people should take that as a challenge to see if they can finish one before/better than me, not a reason to avoid writing one. Hal Finney has already done some very nice work with Java and mailing; see his home page (the address of which I don't have immediately at hand) for more details. For what it's worth, I think future remailer/Mixmaster development might do well in Java. I'm not especially sold on or trusting of the alleged security or trustability features of Java (sorry, no offense) but I *do* think it's a neat tool for building non-machine specific network aware applications. Ignore the fact that people use it to build silly animations or that downloadaded applets may or may not be secure - it's still useful as a development tool. -- Greg Broiles | "We pretend to be their friends, gbroiles(a)netbox.com | but they fuck with our heads." http://www.io.com/~gbroiles | |

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Re: Go away CIA
by Wayne H. Allen 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:45 AM 9/23/96 -0400, Wearen Life wrote: >The CIA has many powers both great and small. If the can cover up findings >of UFO's Has this list sunk that low? Wayne H.Allen whallen(a)capitalnet.com Pgp key at www.capitalnet.com/~whallen

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Re: Please do not post off-topic flames to the list.
by Adamsc＠io-online.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Unfortunately, you've probably all received something that started out like this: >> You are being gently flamed because. Sorry about that. I've been gone for the last few days and found out that one of my incoming mail filters was somewhat flawed. Instead of sending that generic response only to the esteemed Dr. Vulis it was sending it to any message with his address *in the header*. It also replied to any cc:ed addresses. Ooops... Also, there is no need to speculate about any ulterior motives. It was entirely a setup glitch. There's an important reminder here: don't make setup changes at 2 am and then disappear for 4 days! Again, sorry to the list about this. # Chris Adams <adamsc(a)io-online.com> | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp # cadams(a)acucobol.com | V.M. (619)515-4894 "I have never been able to figure out why anyone would want to play games on a computer in any case when the whole system is a game. Word processing, spreadsheets, telecoms -- it's all a game. And they pay you to play it." -- Duncan Frissell

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Re: Bernstein hearing: The Press Release
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 2:23 PM 9/23/96, Declan McCullagh wrote: >On Sun, 22 Sep 1996, Timothy C. May wrote: > >> If California were to, say, ban speech critical of women's or homosexual's >> rights, would not the First Amendment trump this attempt? > >Not necessarily. > >The Supreme Court has upheld Title VII's ban on workplace "harassment." >The Court said it occured when "discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and >insult" in a workplace create an uncomfortable "working environment." > >Then there's public accomodation law, under which the (I recall) Greek >owner of a privately-operated diner was held liable for using the word >"nigger" where a black woman could overhear. Whoops! I didn't mean to intersect with "workplace" issues--I mean simple, pure, nonworkplace-related speech. To make this clearer and to separate Title VII stuff out: If California were to, say, ban speech which included the word "orange," or to ban speech which mentioned "Allah," wouldn't the First trump this attempt? As to Title VII and all that garbage, I think the First Amendment means what it says, and that there's something desperately wrong when many blacks call each other "niggers," as in "Yo, Nigga!," but nonblacks can be hit with lawsuits for letting this word slip out. By the way, I just read chunks of Ronald Dworkin's new book on the Constitution, and he makes some interesting comments on the feminist view that words hurtful to women ought to be censored...he's against such interpretations, and argues that if speech hurtful to women, or images hurtful to women, etc., are banned, then why not ban speech critical of Creationists, and speech insulting to Flat Earthers? --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I 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, Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: Bernstein hearing: The Press Release
by Rich Burroughs 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 04:39 PM 9/21/96 -0800, Jim Bell wrote: >At 02:03 PM 9/18/96 -0700, John Gilmore wrote: [snip] >>* Any legal framework that allows a government bureaucrat to >>censor speech before it happens is an unconstitutional prior restraint. >>The government is not allowed to set up such a drastic scheme >>unless they can prove that publication of such information will >>"surely result in direct, immediate, and irreparable damage to our >>Nation or its people" and that the regulation at issue is necessary >>to prevent this damage. > >At the risk of being a devil's advocate, let me suggest that you are >conceding too much even with the preceding paragraph. The 1st amendment >says nothing about preventing speech which (even admittedly) would result >in "direct, immediate, and irreparable damage to our nation or its people." [snip] Jim, that's a quote of Potter Stewart from the Pentagon Papers case, if I'm not mistaken. It's not written in the Constitution, but Supreme Court precedent is the next best thing as far as con law goes. >The way you've written the paragraph I've quoted above, it appears that you >are somehow acknowleding that there are certain circumstances where certain >types of speech are controllable because they are "harmful," but you fail to >explain how even this constitutional restiction is tolerable. Frankly, I >don't see it! What you need to do is to be far more specific about such >speech and exactly where it can be controlled. What you need to do is look at the case law :) The government can restrict speech in time, place or manner, according to the courts. Restricting content is more difficult, and places a much heavier burden on the gov. To expect people writing about and arguing the case to completely ignore the existing case law is foolish, IMHO. >I should point out, also, that this is the second time I've mentioned this. >You're doing us a disservice if you concede too much in this area. I think that John and EFF are doing us a huge service by their involvement in the case. I am very optimistic about the outcome of the Bernstein case. Judge Patel's ruling that source code = speech really puts the debate in the plaintiff's court, and we saw some of that in the hearing on Friday, IMHO. Much of the argument was about prior restraint, with the government trying to claim that they are only trying to restrict a specific functionality of crypto code and not the ideas behind it. This seemed to be a fairly weak argument to me, and the plaintiff's attorney pointed out that the ideas embodied in the source code are what dictate the functionality. The plaintiff's attorney (Cindy Cohn) also argued 3 lines of cases that bear on the issue: 1) Compelled speech. 2) Anonymity. 3) Freedom of association. Cohn also argued that the statute is vague (terms like "general principle" and "fundamental research") and overbroad; also that the current version of ITAR does not even meet the scrutiny of the DOJ's own OLC review of the statute. When the attorney for the gov tried to drift back to the issue of whether source code is speech, Judge Patel said, "You'll get that chance again in another court with more judges." Near the end of the hearing, the government attorney stated that the statute describes "what is not controlled," which elicited a pretty hearty laugh from the spectators. Not a real strategic admission. The plaintiff's brief is at: http://www.eff.org/pub/Privacy/ITAR_export/Bernstein_case/Legal/960726_filin g/motion_partsj.html There's quite a bit of info in that same directory. Rich ______________________________________________________________________ Rich Burroughs richieb(a)teleport.com http://www.teleport.com/~richieb See my Blue Ribbon Page at http://www.teleport.com/~richieb/blueribbon U.S. State Censorship Page at - http://www.teleport.com/~richieb/state New EF zine "cause for alarm" - http://www.teleport.com/~richieb/cause

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