From: IN%"tcmay@got.net" 13-SEP-1996 20:33:15.39
I'm fully aware of the rights of remailers to limit what they pass on. I just don't think it wise, nor do I think it fits with pious calls for "free speech."
I've been looking over your original posting... such as at your comment about situations working out the best when only the parties involved are involved in rulemaking. I'd agree... and remailer operators are among the parties involved in these cases. This may be via direct individual pressure (for remailers without front ends) or through conscience/social pressure (for remailers with disposable front ends or chaining-only remailers), but they're still involved. To me, there are two different types of filtering that can be done. There's the filtering of data into their appropriate categories - e.g., a moderator of a mailing list deciding that something is off-topic _for that list_, not for any discussion - and filtering of data into stuff that should be transmitted and shouldn't be transmitted, even though, e.g., it's on topic for a given mailing list. I discourage people from doing the second type of filtering - it's something that government shouldn't do at all, and that makes in my view the person doing such filtering responsible for _everything_ that they do let through (preferably legally responsible). The first type is tricky enough to tell from the second that I don't want government doing it, but I don't discourage others from doing so. There's also the matter that it will take some improvements to get to a situation where remailer operators won't have to deal with so much - e.g., expiration of some patents so that remailers can take digital cash. It's just that I don't see pressure such as from spamming through remailers as helping to get those improvements, all in all. Some of it may - e.g., encouragement of dropping of inadequately secure remailers like anon.penet.fi (sorry, Julf), as you mentioned - but this isn't the case for all of it. -Allen