Re: Recommendation: Creation of "alt.cypherpunks"

Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM wrote:

ichudov@algebra.com writes:

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1. A newsgroup like comp.privacy.cypherpunks will be carried on a lot of corprate news servers that don't carry alt.* (or even soc.*). Note that soc.org.cypherpunks is inappropriate since cp is *not* an organization. :-) Another possibility is sci.crypto.cypherpunks. (True, people whose corporat newsservers don't carry soc.* and talk.* can use dejanews - provided their firewall lets them.)

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2. It takes more work to create a comp.* newsgroup than an alt newsgroup. It takes a vote. I'm willing to be one of the proponents and generally help with the process. (Both I and Igor have been co-proponents of major Usenet newsgroups - don't know about other people onthis list. :-)

Not only it takes a vote. What is more important is what a vote gives: a good discussion of the newsgroup and the formal RFD/RFD/CFV process ensures that, on average, a good balance is found between various groups of readers.

I am not concerned as to what the name of the group will be, it is not important. What is important is that it should be in a more or less flame-free zone.

I'm concerned about smart people stuck behind corporate firewalls and able to see comp.* and sci.*. Nearly every big Wall St firm is that way. Did I ever relate to you the story how I had to break through the firwall at GS to accomplish mywork?

Would be interesting.

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It is too late to stop alt.cypherpunks, but if I had to make a prediction again, I would predict that soon posters will BEG to help them create comp.*.cypherpunks, because of spam and alt.flamage.

Timmy has a valid point: the reason why a comp.* newsgroup might have less cross-posted and "off-topic" crap is because net.cops would be more likely to complain to posters' sysadmins. Having a charter state that cypherpunks have technical means to ignore traffic they don't like, and don't need anyone forging cancels or complaining to sysadmins or otherwise getting silenced, is a good idea.

It is not only because of that. There are two categories of people who simply do not visit com.* groups: sex spammers and trollers (who post articles like I RAPED A NIGGER CHILD to tens of newsgroups). If the group is created in a space that is isolated from them, that is already good. As for net.cops, check out what Scott Nudds does in comp.lang.c++

What's going to happen when (not if) someone posts something in alt.cypherpunks that Chris Lewis (spit) judges to be "spam" and forges a cancel? Or someone posts a binary and Richard "little dick" Depew forges a cancel?

Chris Lewis can exclude newsgroups from his spam watch. I think that if cypherpunks put something forbidding third party cancels into the charter, he will not cancel stuff posted there.

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3. An unmoderated Usenet newsgroup would have even ore crap than this maili list. I've been thinking of how to deal with crap, and with the obvious des by some people to delegate their decision what to read and what not to read to other people.

It is alt.* and soc.* that has most crap, sci and comp are way better.

There's a bunch of net.cops in e.g. comp.lang.eiffel that complain to sysadmins of anyone posting to that newsgroup who's in a member of the "in" crowd". It may or may not cut down on the crap, but is it worth it?

Yes, there is a notorious net.cop The Right Reverend Colin James III (spit). A sample of his stukachestvo is attached at the bottom of this letter.

From ares.csd.net!cjames Fri Dec 8 00:00:29 1995 Return-Path: Received: from ares.csd.net by espcbw.stat.ncsu.edu.stat.ncsu.edu with smtp (Smail3.1.29.1 #5) id m0tNxjG-000EDPC; Fri, 8 Dec 95 00:00 PST Received: by ares.csd.net (5.65/DEC-Ultrix/4.3) id AA08055; Thu, 7 Dec 1995 22:02:44 -0700 Message-Id: <9512080502.AA08055@ares.csd.net> From: cjames@ares.csd.net (Colin James III (The Rt Rev'd)) To: ichudov@espcbw.stat.ncsu.edu (Igor Chudov), postmaster@espcbw.stat.ncsu.edu, postmaster@stat.ncsu.edu, postmaster@ncsu.edu Subject: Re: Nauseating typedefs -- pros and cons Date: Fri, 08 Dec 1995 03:13:53 GMT Organization: CEC Services Reply-To: cjames@ares.csd.net References: <461dph$ske@saba.info.ucla.edu> <48np3j$1b4@solutions.solon.com> <4a 7rpv$fj@taco.cc.ncsu.edu> X-Mailer: Forte Agent .99b.112 Status: RO

On 7 Dec 1995 23:02:23 GMT, ichudov@espcbw.stat.ncsu.edu (Igor Chudov) wrote with possible deletions: | Douglas Evan Cook (cookd@bert.cs.byu.edu) wrote: | * The real question comes down to: when do you need to | * use INT32 or INT16? Usually, you only need it when you are saving info | * to a disk or when you need to make sure that your numbers won't | * overflow. A little bit of hardware control is also given. But when you | * don't get those advantages, a plain int is just great. | | It is NOT great at all. Each variable is associated with a range of | values. This range of values comes from the requirements of external world. | Say, some program _must_ be required by business rules to store | $$ amount as an integer value, and it may be specified in the | requirements that $$amount cannot be more than $1,000,000. If I, | as a careless programmer, program variable dollar_amount as int | just because my RS6000 has 32-bit ints, this program will NOT be | portable to 16-bit computers. | | You can invent an untold amount of such situations. If I defined | DollarAmount_t as UINT32, I would effectively avoid this trouble. | | * So for your scanf | * vars, just use ints. Then do range checking and then assign them into | * the UINT16 type or whatever only if you need to. | | The solution is very simple and cool (IMHO). | | In the same file where you define INT16, UINT32, etc, add the following: | | #ifdef AIX | typedef long INT32; | #define F_INT32 "ld" | | typedef unsigned short UINT16; | #define F_UINT16 "u" | #endif | | #ifdef YOUR_FAVORITE_MACHINE | typedef short INT32; // Maybe for 64-bit machines, never worked with them | #define F_INT32 "d" | ... etc etc ... | | Then you define your user types: | | typedef INT32 DollarAmount_t; | #define DollarAmount_f INT32_F // You make it a rule to define | // formats right along with types | | Usually, in scanf (and printf) people write things like this: | | printf( "%ld is the dollar amount for customer %4.4d\n", | amount, cust ); | | Instead, you write | | printf( "%" DollarAmount_f " is the dollar amount for customer " | "%4.4" Cust_f, | amount, cust ); | | It is a totally portable code. All you need to port primitive types | is to recompile it. | | -- | - Igor. (My opinions only) http://www.algebra.com/~ichudov/index.html | For public PGP key, finger me or send email with Subject "send pgp key" | | You know you have achieved perfection in design, not when you have nothing | more to add, but when you have nothing more to take away. | - Antoine de Saint Exupery. Kindly remove comp.lang.eiffel from distribution of this thread. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Colin James III, Principal Scientist cjames@csd.net CEC Services, 2080 Kipling St, Lakewood, CO 80215-1502 USA Voice: 303.231.9437; Facsimile: .231.9438; Data: .231.9434 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ - Igor.