-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 03:38 AM 3/10/96 -0800, Timothy C. May wrote:
Not my "trademark," though it was my coinage (in 1987). I'm happy it's gaining usage, by people as diverse as David Friedman, Dorothy Denning, and various journalists.
Well, it's a very apt invention.
(By the way, I also figured out the anonymous markets for assassinations bit, too, in 1988, and discussed it in detail then with Eric Drexler, Marc Stiegler, Mark Miller, Robin Hanson, and others. Several of us on the Extropians list discussed the implications, countersteps that might be taken, etc., several years ago.
Well, until about 3/4 of a year ago, I spent no time on Internet except through a FIDO gateway on Libernet and Libernet-d, so I missed all that. I'm a bit ashamed to admit that I haven't read the vast majority of Cybernomicon, although somebody was nice enough to email me a section on the subject of anonymous assassination markets. I wondered why you hadn't extended the idea to a more general system, but then again that was a bit early if you talked about it in 1988. Without the invention of digital cash, it's a bit hard to reward the assassin.
I recall incisive comments by Robin Hanson, David Friedman, Hal Finney, Nick Szabo, and others. And on this list, the topic was discussed a bit later. The archives may be helpful...though I'm not sure I want to help Jim Bell figure out the holes in his logic!)
You might be surprised: There is far more to this than I've described so far. I go into as much detail as a person asks, but it turns out that there are many more apparent "problems" that I've already solved long ago which have never been anticipated by anyone else, "problems" that I've never publicized because by the time the idea was ready for publicity, they were not "problems" anymore. This disappoints me, a little, because I'd hope that somebody (for example, a critic) would be a more effective discoverer of such problems/holes.
And your insulting comments about people whom you disagree with, or people whom you think are not taking your ideas seriously enough, are reminiscent of the ravings of the last victim here of late stage Detweiler's Syndrome. --Tim May
Well, maybe at times I do get a bit testy, but most recently on this Leahy bill I'm disgusted to see organizations that SHOULD be sounding the alarm actually express only mildly guarded support for that bill, "wart and all." I'd love to see _most_ of the bill pass, but the one bad section is a real killer. Jim Bell jimbell@pacifier.com -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMUOetPqHVDBboB2dAQEEtwP+L/TjsCr17KwjFMByi+322CCv7E/HJRp/ C0R/LC26rESzHZUawhtZGJzQ5ormn/HpEbNysygYVMs/WbE/1M+gFJK3CJcGwj1F o/d5URKDT1M7IQNF/V5XTsYcZzz1/Cxq0zc3GQ1mtERHyicb/AwhcIXrXVkk9VVt zvvTFMtG/so= =kBX/ -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----