-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Eric wrote:

...

I think the real flaw there--what keeps me so uncomforable with it (even though my gut tells me it's a logical conclusion)--is reflected in the sheer number of people I've seen change their minds once they found out a little more about how insecure they really are.

We call these people hobbyists. The size of the hobbyist market will never be more than a fraction of the size of the appliance market.

Interesting points, but it might have been useful if I had been more clear that the kind of people I end up affecting aren't "granny and sis", rather people I know from work and classes: scientists, mathematicians, engineers, economists, larval policy analysts with any-of-the-above backgrounds. Not "sheeple", just uninformed. Not really interested in computers for their own sake (part of what I think you mean by hobbyist), but as a tool to get their analytic work done. Whatever you want to call that, I certainly seem to have met plenty of them who were receptive to crypto, once presented with the right set of facts. Everyone who posts here must have their own stories of how they became passionate about encryption (or at least interested enough to think posting about it is a worthwhile way to pass time). If you remember back to whatever it was that made you take a stand, surely it's not too much of a stretch to figure out what to present to other like-minded people to interest them as well. There's no reason it has to be a waste of time, as Tim implied. If you have the slightest scrap of value for someone, telling them about their vulnerablities when they're completely blind to them is the only decent thing to do. If they don't feel like listening to you, of course they're on their own, but I wouldn't feel right saying nothing. Sometimes just e-mailing a link or two at the right time will do it: it costs me next to nothing and gets more people to use privacy tools and PGP, where's the downside. Give it a try, you might be surprised. ~Faustine. *** The right to be let alone is indeed the beginning of all freedoms. - --William O. Douglas, Associate Justice, US Supreme Court -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGPsdk version 1.7.1 (C) 1997-1999 Network Associates, Inc. and its affiliated companies. (Diffie-Helman/DSS-only version) iQA/AwUBO/nN5Pg5Tuca7bfvEQLoyACfYZBl0YF/dvMh9YoinMvyslyv8BkAn2W4 LG28NSGiL1R23cldZdFGnKJ8 =h0Sw -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----