Bryce wrote:
Hi Dale. I believe I've seen you around. Thanks for replying to my article.
Bryce wrote:
I. Etiquette -- The House Rules At The Virtual Cypherpunks Party The Meta-Rule: It's John Gilmore's virtual house. He is the sole owner of the computer (toad.com) that hosts cypherpunks and the sole authority over what the users of that computer (you) can do with it.
Ordinarily, I'd leave this post alone, but I really hate it when people twist ideas for their own philosophical purposes. To whit: "John is the sole authority over what the users of his computer can do with his computer" (quote approximate). I don't *do* anything with *his* computer. I send email into the ether with an address on it, and he picks it up at his discretion and does what he wants with it. I am in no way involved in that process, and I do not share *any* responsibility for how he handles the email.
Hm. So if you send an email into the ether with "Cc: cypherpunks@toad.com" and "Subject: MAKE MONEY REALLY TRULY FAST!", then you share no responsibility for the fact that a copy of that email is going to arrive in the inboxes of thousands of subscribers? Okay, it could be an interesting discussion, but what's your point? My point was (and is) that neither you nor I have any kind of _right_ to access the services of toad.com against John's will. Seems like a very simple point (deceptively simple, one might say...), but I recall several people, including Dale Thorn, opining that Dmitri Vulis _did_ have the right to access those services with or without John's consent.
Now I've gotcha! If I, Dale Thorn, an ordinary person (not a commercial mailer), realize somehow what your snail mail address is (an analogy), and I send you a personal letter, are you saying I don't have the "right" to do so? Even if I am aware that you redistribute the letter, as, say, a newspaper such as the L.A. Times would? I'm guessing that what you're saying is something to do with the content or size of such a mailing, yes? But whatever the case, I'm not "doing something with" your mailbox if I send you a snail mail letter, and I'm not "doing something with" your computer if I send you a posting. It's you who know the result of opening up your computer to the phone lines, and it's up to you to post *your* "rules", and to date, I don't recall any postings from John Gilmore to me or the list regarding such rules, just a few little tin-plated dictators doing it in his name.