At 8:08 PM 9/16/95, Greg Broiles wrote:
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No disrespect intended, but I think that the various "let's sanitize the Cypherpunk message for mass acceptance" marketing/soundbite proposals are pointless. Cypherpunks is a mailing list, not a political party (or a platform).
- From my perspective, the organizing meme for the list is not "strong crypto is really important, so let's write some and lobby our lawmakers to make sure it stays legal" but "strong crypto is here and is changing the dynamics of force, politics, and power, so let's see what we can do with it."
Hear, hear! Greg is absolutely right. (And Dave Mandl was, too, about our mailing list not being a corporation trying to increase market share.) I applaud the efforts to lobby Congresscritters to vote in ways we would find desirable (though I note with some irony that the Congressman who has come out most strongly _against_ Net censorship is Newt Gingrich, often demonized by many. To the credit of EFF and EPIC, and others of that ilk, they noted this fact.) But as Greg points out, we are not a political party. More to the point, we have no centralized resources, no staff, no travel budgets, no ability to appoint spokespunks to speak to the media. This is a weakness, and a strength. I think it was Bill Stewart who noted that the "conventional" cyberspace lobbying groups, such as EFF, EPIC, CPSR, etc., are largely "director-driven," with a handful (or just one or two) directors making decisions, speaking publically, and getting all the attention. The Cypherpunks group is not like that. Lacking any formalized leadership, and--most importantly--lacking offices in D.C., we can't be asked to perform like the usual trained seals who produce the soundbites that fit into the stories too many reporters want. Again, a weakness and a strength. I sense in the debate here that some of us want to have more of an impact, more of a political impact. The cynic in me says these people have just not been in the game long enough to become realists (to a cynic, cynicism is realism).
(And no, I don't think it's important to spread that "meme" (a term I use with some trepidation) around to get "market share" for it. Ideas are not football teams nor initiative proposals.)
I appreciate and support and have participated in various write-yer- legislator activities. They're useful short-term. But if Tim May and Duncan Frissell and the other list members who've dared to make predictions about the impact of crypto on government and economics are correct, what the government and the legislators want doesn't matter. If they're wrong, what we want doesn't matter.
I suppose it is mainly Duncan and I that make these points, with contributions also from Sandy Sandfort, Black Unicorn, Lucky Green, and others (sorry if I've left you out of the Cryto Anarchy Hall of Shame^H^H^H^H^H Fame). Please understand that I am not elitist in the sense of wishing to limit access to ideas many of us espouse. I discourage no one from calling in to radio talk shows, from writing articles, and so on. But I'm not convinced that "political action" matters very much. As Greg puts it, if we're right, politics won't matter. And if we're wrong, politics won't matter. --Tim ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^756839 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."