on Mon, Oct 01, 2001 at 07:28:56AM -0500, Jim Choate (ravage@ssz.com) wrote:

http://www.nypost.com/news/worldnews/5334.htm

A suggestion I've made before in other circles: Open source the data. There are clearly a few wrinkles to be worked out, but there are some inflection points that can be used to define the task: - Open sources intelligence -- data gathered from publicly available data -- may be distributed without fear of compromising sources. - Court-of-law doctrines don't apply: there's no need to tell the truth, the whole truth, or nothing but the truth. Information can be selectively withheld. Disinformation may be submitted. Details may be distorted. Scenarios may be projected for the purpose of analyzing possible outcomes. - Covert intelligence may also be selectively leaked, with or without intentional modifications and/or origin masking. - The leaks need not be made under the auspices of the US (or allied) intelligence services, but could be injected anonymously or pseudonymously into existing discussions on Usenet, Webboards, mailing lists, Internet indices such as Google, the press, or other channels. One of the natural problems is identifying *useful* discussion forthcoming. Some existing channels have meaningful ways of idnetifying useful or more meaningful content (proxies such as user tracking, or direct measures such as moderation, preference indication, or collaborative filtering). One of the first discussions I had with a friend following the 9/11 attacks was the similarities between terrorist organization and the free software movement: decentralized operations which are difficult to locate and/or isolate. On reflection, I decided that the distinctions were more meaningful. One of the great strengths (and a frequent criticism) of the free software community is that it is *so* open and deliberative. In particular, organized criticism or oposition often finds itself buried under an onslaught of response. Witness many journalists with a Microsoft bent and their complaints of the seething unwashed GNU/Linux hoards, or this past weekends conclusive denunciation of W3C for proposing and promoting a highly free-software unfriendly licensing policy. By contrast, the opponents of free software must communicate out of band, covertly. One of the advantages of the forces opposed to terrorism is that a very large portion (though granted: not all) of their communications can be free and open. This increases pathways of intelligence analysis and discovery. Worth considering? Peace. -- Karsten M. Self <kmself@ix.netcom.com> http://kmself.home.netcom.com/ What part of "Gestalt" don't you understand? Home of the brave http://gestalt-system.sourceforge.net/ Land of the free Free Dmitry! Boycott Adobe! Repeal the DMCA! http://www.freesklyarov.org Geek for Hire http://kmself.home.netcom.com/resume.html