The Contortions of Cypherpunks
N.Szabo <szabo@netcom.com> in RISKS
I'd like to assure the readers of RISKS that I am in fact a unique person, distinct from the other names L. Detweiler listed. Of the people on his list I know from personal contact, all are distinct people in Real Life(tm).
Give specific evidence to support your claim or retract it. Who do you know from personal contact? What do you mean that you are `distinct from other names'?
Well before his post to RISKS, L. Detweiler was provided means of personally verifying that many of the names he listed are distinct True Names (eg phone numbers he can call), but it doesn't seem to help.
You appear to be referring to my private mail among many different people. Please elaborate on your claim, or retract it.
L. Detweiler:
Give specific evidence to support your claim or retract it.
Uncle! I retract my claim! I'm not me! My abject apologies for being a traitorous criminal pseudospoof, deluding even myself in the process! (Very good VR tech they've got here!) Detweiler, I don't know what is wrong with you, but there are quite a few cypherpunks nearby in Colorado; many of them know know many of us. Several of us whom you have explicitly or strongly implicitly accused of being "pseudospoofs" have violated their own desire for privacy and sent you their phone numbers. Some post them publicly as a matter of course. (Have you returned the favor? Does anybody know Detweiler's phone number?). You seem to lack all conception of how completely silly your accusations look from the perspective of a Bay Area cypherpunks meeting, with all us "tentacles of Medusa" overfilling a largish meeting room, jokingly speculating about who will be detweiled next. With less altruism than some fellow "tentacles", I have decided I don't trust you with anything more than I already give out by posting my True Name to the net. In hindsight, even my True Name is probably too much trust with people like you in the world, who would subject cultural practices they do not understand to the extreme violent retribution consequent of something being a crime or treason. If I may engage in some detweiling myself, a long overdue return of volleys: The damage that can be caused by the demogaugic stalkers of the world is vastly greater than can be caused by swaying a few peer pressure prone readers here and there with "pseudospoofing". As if a centralized news media, politic polls, etc. don't already sway follow-the-crowd types to a degree vastly surpassing anybody's capabilities on the net. The desire to keep track of identity may sound innocent enough, but behind the rhetoric of "accountability" looms the bloody claws of violent politics, the quest to create a centralized identity enforcement agency, a net-based panoptic extortion racket with a potential for tyrrany surpassing anything the world has has yet seen. Do you doubt Detweiler favors such an outcome over the dreaded "pseudospoofing"? I'll be happy to forward Detweiler's posts in imp-interest on the matter, assuming everybody's not grown long since tired of these rants. And with that bit of my own detweiling I will myself retire from the field, lest detweilosis be contagious. Nick Szabo szabo@netcom.com
post them publicly as a matter of course. (Have you returned the favor? Does anybody know Detweiler's phone number?). You
Here's some info folks might appreciate (all numbers area code 303, unless otherwise noted): Lance is the college of engineering subdomain. Scott Douglas (lance sysadmin) scott@lance.colostate.edu 491-7954 College of Engineering Dean's Office: 491-6603 (Dr. Jorge Aunon) Vice President, Student Affairs (discipline): 491-5312 (Keith Miser) ACNS switchboard (Computation center) 491-5133 (Gary Edelen) ACNS Consulting Desk 491-7276 CSU Information 491-1101 Degree Verification 491-7159 Hold off for a bit on these numbers; it's still not clear who (if anyone) is really responsibile for him now. I had a very productive talk with Gary Edelen who (like me) is not pleased that state funds are going to subsidize someone's highly disruptive, insane, quasi-religious rants; he's contacting Scott Douglas, who is apparently the administrator of record for the lance subdomain. Lawrence Detweiler was awarded a BS in Engineering Science in Spring of 1993. LD's finger: ------------ Notes: He is no longer listed with student information or as a staff/faculty member, nor is he listed with 303 directory; there is no L. Detweiler listed in Fort Collins anymore, or in Denver/Boulder, although there is a Jeff Detweiler listed in the 1991 phone book; a call to 498-8278 got an answering machine, 491-5893 forwards to the Kater Laboratory Optical Core. The 1-5893 number is for the Department of Anatomy, Dennis Giddings (staff member). LD apparently worked for the Kater Laboratory as an hourly student. Rene Olson (491-6849) used to be his supervisor, but could not be reached for comment. --------------------------------- [longs.lance.colostate.edu] Login name: ld231782 In real life: L. Detweiler Phone: 15893, 498-8278 Directory: /users/UNGRAD/ES/ld231782 Shell: /bin/tcsh Most recent logins: parry Fri Nov 12 22:20 mears Thu Nov 11 15:42 jenkins Sat Nov 13 21:11 casco Mon Nov 15 01:02 Never logged in. No Plan. -------------------------------- Note that this is just the easy stuff, I have folks digging deeper. More to come... -- ---------------- /\ Douglas Barnes cman@illuminati.io.com / \ Chief Wizard (512) 448-8950 (d), 447-7866 (v) / () \ Illuminati Online metaverse.io.com 7777 /______\
# ... who (like me) is not pleased # that state funds are going to subsidize someone's highly disruptive, insane, # quasi-religious rants; ... Censoring public nets from unpopular viewpoints is not what cypherpunks should be advocating. If we cannot practice either tolerance or inbox-filtering in our own group, we cannot expect the rest of the world to agree with our ideas for free speech nets. strick
If we cannot practice either tolerance or inbox-filtering in our own group, we cannot expect the rest of the world to agree with our ideas for free speech nets.
Worse, you can't convince anyone new to the list that you're not just a group of children with large egos and complex privacy enhancing toys. I've seen a few well written messages in this group and some pointers to interesting information, but by far the most volume on this list, and the xtropians list for that matter, has been petty bickering. I had higher hopes .... -David
David Kovar had higher hopes:
Worse, you can't convince anyone new to the list that you're not just a group of children with large egos and complex privacy enhancing toys. I've seen a few well written messages in this group and some pointers to interesting information, but by far the most volume on this list, and the xtropians list for that matter, has been petty bickering. I had higher hopes ....
It's unfortunate that many people think others must write interesting articles for them. I don't want to pick on David, but his comments underscore the problem. If people want interesting stuff, they need to write it! In looking over my archives, I only found two (2) past messages from David Kovar, one here about creating false electronic identities and one on Extropians about he Panix system and its management. (I may have not saved all of David's posts...if so, I apologize for any mischaracterization of his contributions.) As to the flames, I'm as unhappy about it as David is. But what to do about it? I haven't called for Detweiler to be censored, though I did take the precaution of nofifying Dewtweiler's postmaster--the first time I've ever done this--after recieving numerous threatening messages ("You will be hung by the neck until dead and then sent to Hell.") and an explicit statement from him that he intended to continue harassing Eric Hughes and me until we recanted or begged forgivness or somesuch nonsense. For more than a month I ignored his public comments and didn't respond at all to his private letters to me (threats, foamings, manic-depresssive mood swings....he even tried to enlist my support in his battle against Hughes...this after calling for my execution just days earlier!). This didn't work. It's too bad this is disrupting the list. But, to be blunt, I consider all the fatuous "why can you just get along?" comments to be equally disruptive. Several people, notably Hal Finney, Doug Barnes, others, have stepped into the breach to try to cool Larry's fevered imagination--for their troubles they were declared to be Tentacles of the Medusa. Part of the Dark Side of the Force, as Larry sees things. Detweiler recently sent me e-mail cackling about how proud I must be of my latest Nym Tentacle, a certain Hal Finney. I guess I'm honored. Don't know about Hal, though. What more can I say? I never called for Detweiler to be kicked off, and I've tried to limit my comments about him to a couple of explanatory posts. (I have to struggle with my Neo-Calvinist urges. To a Neo-Calvinist, ignorance is its own punishment...if people believe false ideas, then Reality will punish them. "Think of it as evolution in action." Thus, when Detweiler makes outrageous remarks, those who believe him are choosing their own punishment. Normally, I thus see no reason to "set the record straight." I did, however, a while back when many follow-up posts to Detweiler's began to take his "pseudospoofing" as a fact of the list, as a starting point. This misapprehension of reality seemed to be taking on a life of its own, so I wrote a long piece on the Detweiler matter.) I intend for this to be my last word on the subject, unless some major and different kind of information comes to light. Clearly he is succeeding in pressing a lot of buttons. --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.
If the publication of this information is intended as a prelude to the RL persecution or harassment of Mr. Detweiler, I want to lodge a strong dissenting opinion. Mr. Detweiler's posts, made in an open forum, are his opinions on a number of matters relevant to the social implications of encryption and privacy. If we disagree with his views, we can post responses, or simply ignore them. Once anyone see's L. Detweiler on the header of any post, he or she has a pretty good idea of the tenor of what's coming. If you know it's going to enrage you, then why bother reading it? I personally think that, under the avalanche of rhetoric, he raises some very germane issues. I would miss him if he left. But even if I thought him 100% mistaken, I wouldn't endorse posting RL information about him so that people unhappy with his views could contact Mr. Detweiler's associates to complain about him. On Mon, 15 Nov 1993, Douglas Barnes wrote:
post them publicly as a matter of course. (Have you returned the favor? Does anybody know Detweiler's phone number?). You
Here's some info folks might appreciate (all numbers area code 303, unless otherwise noted):
Lance is the college of engineering subdomain. Scott Douglas (lance sysadmin) scott@lance.colostate.edu 491-7954 College of Engineering Dean's Office: 491-6603 (Dr. Jorge Aunon) Vice President, Student Affairs (discipline): 491-5312 (Keith Miser) ACNS switchboard (Computation center) 491-5133 (Gary Edelen) ACNS Consulting Desk 491-7276 CSU Information 491-1101 Degree Verification 491-7159
Hold off for a bit on these numbers; it's still not clear who (if anyone) is really responsibile for him now.
I had a very productive talk with Gary Edelen who (like me) is not pleased that state funds are going to subsidize someone's highly disruptive, insane, quasi-religious rants; he's contacting Scott Douglas, who is apparently the administrator of record for the lance subdomain.
Lawrence Detweiler was awarded a BS in Engineering Science in Spring of 1993.
LD's finger: ------------
Notes: He is no longer listed with student information or as a staff/faculty member, nor is he listed with 303 directory; there is no L. Detweiler listed in Fort Collins anymore, or in Denver/Boulder, although there is a Jeff Detweiler listed in the 1991 phone book; a call to 498-8278 got an answering machine, 491-5893 forwards to the Kater Laboratory Optical Core.
The 1-5893 number is for the Department of Anatomy, Dennis Giddings (staff member). LD apparently worked for the Kater Laboratory as an hourly student.
Rene Olson (491-6849) used to be his supervisor, but could not be reached for comment.
--------------------------------- [longs.lance.colostate.edu] Login name: ld231782 In real life: L. Detweiler Phone: 15893, 498-8278 Directory: /users/UNGRAD/ES/ld231782 Shell: /bin/tcsh Most recent logins: parry Fri Nov 12 22:20 mears Thu Nov 11 15:42 jenkins Sat Nov 13 21:11 casco Mon Nov 15 01:02 Never logged in. No Plan. --------------------------------
Note that this is just the easy stuff, I have folks digging deeper. More to come...
-- ---------------- /\ Douglas Barnes cman@illuminati.io.com / \ Chief Wizard (512) 448-8950 (d), 447-7866 (v) / () \ Illuminati Online metaverse.io.com 7777 /______\
Arthur Chandler:
If the publication of this information is intended as a prelude to the RL persecution or harassment of Mr. Detweiler, I want to lodge a strong dissenting opinion.
This raises an interesting meta-point. What fundamentally important reason is there beyond the threat of physical persecution (often as retribution or preemption against a wrong real or perceived), to actively seek a net user's physical identity on the net against that user's will? Should "accountability" for offenses committed on the net include a threat of physical violence, or should the scope of the punishment be limited to the scope of the offense, namely "plonking" of the offender's reputation on the net? I contend that in a sufficiently mature net culture (ie with "kill" files, reputation ratings, and digital cash) there is no possible offense evil enough to require violent retribution. My ideal is to see a day when threats of violence on the net, including the nasty, implicit threat of violence lying behind many calls for "accountability", are rendered moot by voluntary self-disclosure and tolerance for a wide variety of pseudonymity and anonymity. Cyberspace with pseudonymity allows us for the first time to create a rich subculture that is nonviolent in a way Gandhi could only dream of. On the specific case of info on Detweiler: this net stalker has explicitly made violent threats against several list members while at the same time attempting to track down their identities, and implicitly made threats against most of us by branding cypherpunks "criminals", "traitors", etc. in a wide variety of forums, implying that the normal violent retribution for such states of infamy is in order. In an ideal net culture, Doug Barnes' action would be reprehensible. But the world is far from ideal, and while we still must put our physical identities at risk we need some defense against demogogic stalkers of the world, and thus I applaud Doug Barnes' efforts in providing us information about Detweiler, just as Detweiler is seeking information about us. Nick Szabo szabo@netcom.com
participants (7)
-
Arthur Chandler -
cman＠IO.COM -
David Kovar -
henry strickland -
L. Detweiler -
szabo＠netcom.com -
tcmay＠netcom.com