Lots of flames lately about "lunatic ravings" and what Cypherpunks can or can't do to help in the next few days. Here's my take on the situation: * Keep current, read all the various groups covering this. * Add articles and comments whenever you have something to say. Your argument might help one of the lawyers make his case. (One of "our" lawyers, one hopes.) Hal Finney's article this morning falls squarely into this category. We may have few lawyers amongst us, but we can contribute comments and background items that the lawyers may find useful. Not much time left before the grand jury convenes on Wednesday, but time to help after that. I agree of course with the sentiment that "Cypherpunks write code," or at least write text on semi-technical topics, and agree with the current focus of our group on stuff like remailers, digital cash, data havens, and the like. The EFF, CPSR, and ACLU are already focussed on issues of legal cases, privacy laws, etc., and are staffed with mostly lawyers and legal-background folks. We fill a niche they cannot fill. * Phil Karn and others have written about DES implementations that are already described, published, etc., both inside and outside the U.S. This may help with the precedent issue, namely, establishing that DES is already widely available (in case this is an important issue). In particular, see the messages a few days back about compiling a list of published DES (and IDEA, too) codings. Add to the list if you can. Cypherpunks can help on this, if they have some experience with DES, IDEA, and the like. Perhaps after the indictment (I'm guessing there'll be one) we can find out from the lawyers if our backgrounds in hacking and crypto can be tapped to help in the defense. --Tim May -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Note: I put time and money into writing this posting. I hope you enjoy it.