At 09:37 AM 8/1/01 -0700, Tim May wrote:
Exactly so. This list, like so many other lists, is gradually moving toward "public politics" and "the law" as the focus of many members.
More public policy than "public politics," but the general point is true. I'm not sure what the reason is. Perhaps a combination of more stuff happening by the Feds than, say, eight years ago. It's true we had SJG and CDA (well, starting in 1994-1995) and crypto restrictions and CALEA (starting in 1994) and Clipper. But that's a pretty short list compared to what DC is involved with today. Also many of the broader cypherpunkly themes have been well thought out and well-discussed. Some people have gone on to create companies around these ideas; most of those have failed, or at least have not been wildly profitable successes. Other cypherpunkly projects, like Freenet, have their own lists and networks of programmers, who may not even read cypherpunks. Some things have remained constant for the past four years or so: The number of remailers, to a first approximation, and the number of years before digital cash happens. :)
We risk becoming just a pale--a very, very pale!--imitation of the Cyberia-L list.
Nah. Cyberia's gone downhill. Folks there have fled to private law lists too (I'm on one). -Declan