http://www.securityfocus.com/news/294 "Once the online haunt of top cryptographers, the Cypherpunks list was characterized by its mix of revolutionary politics and advanced mathematics. This week, a founder pronounced it dead and buried" -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin@mfn.org If Governments really want us to behave like civilized human beings, they should give serious consideration towards setting a better example: Ruling by force, rather than consensus; the unrestrained application of unjust laws (which the victim-populations were never allowed input on in the first place); the State policy of justice only for the rich and elected; the intentional abuse and occassionally destruction of entire populations merely to distract an already apathetic and numb electorate... This type of demogoguery must surely wipe out the fascist United States as surely as it wiped out the fascist Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The views expressed here are mine, and NOT those of my employers, associates, or others. Besides, if it *were* the opinion of all of those people, I doubt there would be a problem to bitch about in the first place... --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001 measl@mfn.org wrote:
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/294
"Once the online haunt of top cryptographers, the Cypherpunks list was characterized by its mix of revolutionary politics and advanced mathematics. This week, a founder pronounced it dead and buried"
Somebody should tell the other seven (7) nodes (on 2 continents). The reality is we declared the founder and his list dead long ago. Wonder if they'd print that... -- ____________________________________________________________________ Day by day the Penguins are making me lose my mind. Bumper Sticker The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, Jim Choate wrote:
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001 measl@mfn.org wrote:
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/294
"Once the online haunt of top cryptographers, the Cypherpunks list was characterized by its mix of revolutionary politics and advanced mathematics. This week, a founder pronounced it dead and buried"
Somebody should tell the other seven (7) nodes (on 2 continents).
That was, of course, my point :-) -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin@mfn.org If Governments really want us to behave like civilized human beings, they should give serious consideration towards setting a better example: Ruling by force, rather than consensus; the unrestrained application of unjust laws (which the victim-populations were never allowed input on in the first place); the State policy of justice only for the rich and elected; the intentional abuse and occassionally destruction of entire populations merely to distract an already apathetic and numb electorate... This type of demogoguery must surely wipe out the fascist United States as surely as it wiped out the fascist Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The views expressed here are mine, and NOT those of my employers, associates, or others. Besides, if it *were* the opinion of all of those people, I doubt there would be a problem to bitch about in the first place... --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001 measl@mfn.org wrote:
That was, of course, my point :-)
I guess I'm humor impaired :) -- ____________________________________________________________________ Day by day the Penguins are making me lose my mind. Bumper Sticker The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Thursday, November 29, 2001, at 01:47 PM, measl@mfn.org wrote:
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, Jim Choate wrote:
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001 measl@mfn.org wrote:
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/294
"Once the online haunt of top cryptographers, the Cypherpunks list was characterized by its mix of revolutionary politics and advanced mathematics. This week, a founder pronounced it dead and buried"
Somebody should tell the other seven (7) nodes (on 2 continents).
That was, of course, my point :-)
The article is not a bad one, and actually makes some good points. Predictably, the headline is lurid and derogatory. Fact is, lists and other fora have lifecycles just like anything else. The peak for the list was no doubt in the 1993-4 period, when Clipper was hot news, and when many ideas were being exposed to lots of others for the first time. By 1995, there were already schism lists forming, lists with allegedly higher-minded goals. And the original focus of the list, the deployment of various crypto protocols, began to drift into areas of copyright issues, legal battles, and weirdnesses from Parker, Bell, Vulis, and others. Other lists also covered much of the same material, and some no doubt flocked to the "moderated" forums maintained by Lewis McCarthy (who?), Perry Metzger, Declan McCullagh, and others. Not for me. I favor not having some nanny deciding what I can post. (Eric Murray's lne.com policies I have nothing against. In fact, he implemented his list shortly after I posted an article outlining similar reasonable policies: only subscribers to one of the CDR lists have their articles go through, plus all articles through remailers. This should, and did, cut out 98% of the spam and "hit and run" posts.) As for John Gilmore, I wish him the best. But let us face reality: John was never an active poster on the list even in the 1992-94 period. Check the archives if you doubt me. No doubt he had other projects occupying this time. But let's not kid ourselves that it was "his" list. In fact, the genesis of the mailing list took place on the Sunday after the Saturday original Cypherpunks gathering. Eric Hughes, Hugh Daniel, and I were walking to a Noah's Bagel in Oakland and talking about how to keep the spirit of the previous day's meeting going. Eric or Hugh suggested a mailing list, and Hugh said he could set it up to run on some machine or another, probably the Hoptoad machine that John Gilmore owned. John gave his permission and the list started about a week or two after the first meeting. Anyway, to those who wander away because the owner of "toad.com," a site that is not even part of the regular CDR system, declares us irrelevant I have just one message: good riddance. I don't expect the list to ever have the significance it had in the glory years, but I find it a better mix of topics than most other lists. Fact is, most other lists are the private fiefdoms of their owners, whether Lewispunks (coderpunks) or Perrypunks (cryptography) or one of any number of other such lists ("Interesting People," "Politech," etc.). And several of these lists are avowedly "non-political." How absurd. What's the point of a crypto list if there's no political angle? Yeah, maybe a handful of people want to chat about pure math and programming tricks...but not a lot, judging by the very low volumes of such discussions even on the "non-political" lists. And without political issues, what's the motivation to even talk about remailers, data havens, digital cash, etc.? Fact is, a _lot_ of people on all lists, on the Net, are losing sight of "why we fight." While we don't need politics of the Democrat vs. Republican kind, or even the libertarian vs. socialist kind, without some goals about where crypto can take us there is not much left except obscure debates about Rijndael and elliptic curves and other applied number theory obscuria. One of the lifecycle aspects of all lists is boredom. Those who found the Cypherpunks ideas exciting in 1994 moved on a few years later. Some joined companies, some even formed companies. All predictable. The fact that John is now pulling the plug is one of the few surprises of recent years....I thought his site at toad had gone away several years ago! That's when he announced he was shutting it down. That he let it dribble on a dumping ground for those not smart enough to find the cyberpass.net, algebra.com, sunder.net, lne.com, or Choate's site doesn't mean his node was "the list." The more things change... So, I wish him well. I am thankful that he let Hugh Daniel host the list on one of his machines in the 1992-96 period. But rumors of the death of Cypherpunks are greatly exaggerated. --Tim May
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, Tim May wrote:
Fact is, ... for the first time. By 1995, there were already schism lists forming, ...
Fact is, this is revisionist crap. They closed the original list. Members (none of the original founders including Timmy) decided that this was not acceptable so they fixed the problem of having any one person in charge of the list. In the process the new lists decided to broaden the topics to crypto, civil liberties, and economics since these topics have always been hot on the list. Rich, motivated guy like yourself could start their own Cypherpunks list with no hassle and minimum cost. It's interesting that you bitch about what other people do with their list but you don't have the gumption to do anything about it (just like when the original list you helped found floundered because of incompetent handling). -- ____________________________________________________________________ Day by day the Penguins are making me lose my mind. Bumper Sticker The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------
At 04:34 PM 11/29/01 -0600, Jim Choate wrote:
Rich, motivated guy like yourself could start their own Cypherpunks list with no hassle and minimum cost.
Um, Jim, despite the slump, there still plenty of free lowbrow sites for Joe Random to start a mailing list for anything, so Tim's financial status is irrelevent.
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, David Honig wrote:
Um, Jim, despite the slump, there still plenty of free lowbrow sites for Joe Random to start a mailing list for anything, so Tim's financial status is irrelevent.
But Joe Random isn't a Cypherpunks Leader... -- ____________________________________________________________________ Day by day the Penguins are making me lose my mind. Bumper Sticker The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, Jim Choate wrote:
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, David Honig wrote:
Um, Jim, despite the slump, there still plenty of free lowbrow sites for Joe Random to start a mailing list for anything, so Tim's financial status is irrelevent.
But Joe Random isn't a Cypherpunks Leader...
Oh my god! The Cypherpunks have a *leader*? -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin@mfn.org If Governments really want us to behave like civilized human beings, they should give serious consideration towards setting a better example: Ruling by force, rather than consensus; the unrestrained application of unjust laws (which the victim-populations were never allowed input on in the first place); the State policy of justice only for the rich and elected; the intentional abuse and occassionally destruction of entire populations merely to distract an already apathetic and numb electorate... This type of demogoguery must surely wipe out the fascist United States as surely as it wiped out the fascist Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The views expressed here are mine, and NOT those of my employers, associates, or others. Besides, if it *were* the opinion of all of those people, I doubt there would be a problem to bitch about in the first place... --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001 measl@mfn.org wrote:
But Joe Random isn't a Cypherpunks Leader...
Oh my god! The Cypherpunks have a *leader*?
That was my feeling as well...:) -- ____________________________________________________________________ Day by day the Penguins are making me lose my mind. Bumper Sticker The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Thursday, November 29, 2001, at 08:49 PM, measl@mfn.org wrote:
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, Jim Choate wrote:
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, David Honig wrote:
Um, Jim, despite the slump, there still plenty of free lowbrow sites for Joe Random to start a mailing list for anything, so Tim's financial status is irrelevent.
But Joe Random isn't a Cypherpunks Leader...
Oh my god! The Cypherpunks have a *leader*?
His men would follow him anywhere, if only to see what he'd do next. -- Amendment II, Revised: A well-regulated population being necessary to the security of a police state, the right of the Government to keep and destroy arms shall not be infringed. --Sten Drescher --
At 10:38 PM 11/29/01 -0600, Jim Choate wrote:
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, David Honig wrote:
Um, Jim, despite the slump, there still plenty of free lowbrow sites for Joe Random to start a mailing list for anything, so Tim's financial status is irrelevent.
But Joe Random isn't a Cypherpunks Leader...
Neither is Tim. He's an author. Not every one with an opinion has the disorder that makes them crave the role of leader. In addition to the intrinsic irony of 'cp leader' ---a concept favored by the legal types who think in terms of the subservient hierarchies that they live in, but largely their *projection*. Dogs can't conceive of a group of cats without an alpha cat. Even the folks at eg. lne.com who spam-filter are not moderating, and even moderated lists are not 'led' but edited.
On Fri, 30 Nov 2001, David Honig wrote:
Neither is Tim.
Couldn't tell it from the press releases. -- ____________________________________________________________________ Day by day the Penguins are making me lose my mind. Bumper Sticker The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Fri, 30 Nov 2001, Sunder wrote:
Neither is John Gilmore.
On Thu, 29 Nov 2001, Jim Choate wrote:
But Joe Random isn't a Cypherpunks Leader...
And yet you were the one trying to take the old soda homepage as current gospel for the list... -- ____________________________________________________________________ Day by day the Penguins are making me lose my mind. Bumper Sticker The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------
At 02:19 PM 11/29/01 -0800, Tim May wrote:
Fact is, lists and other fora have lifecycles just like anything else. The peak for the list was no doubt in the 1993-4 period, when Clipper was hot news, and when many ideas were being exposed to lots of others
There is also the FAQ-ization of a contentful group. You yourself have (rightfully, usefully) pointed to your cryptnomicon tome and cypherpunk archives rather than regurgitate something already written.
Anyway, to those who wander away because the owner of "toad.com," a site that is not even part of the regular CDR system, declares us irrelevant I have just one message: good riddance.
The toadlist is infested with spam, and most posters have migrated to something more pleasant like lne.com (blessed be the lne.com folks).
And several of these lists are avowedly "non-political." How absurd. What's the point of a crypto list if there's no political angle? Yeah, maybe a handful of people want to chat about pure math and programming tricks...but not a lot, judging by the very low volumes of such discussions even on the "non-political" lists. And without political issues, what's the motivation to even talk about remailers, data havens, digital cash, etc.?
There are lists which are more exclusively technical. The value of this list is conversing with tech saavy futurists with an interest in social aspects.
The fact that John is now pulling the plug is one of the few surprises of recent years....I thought his site at toad had gone away several years ago! That's when he announced he was shutting it down. That he let it dribble on a dumping ground for those not smart enough to find the cyberpass.net, algebra.com, sunder.net, lne.com, or Choate's site doesn't mean his node was "the list."
Yes! His contribution was very useful and generous at a critical time, but it is not a negative thing at all that he closes that spamchannel.
But rumors of the death of Cypherpunks are greatly exaggerated.
Cypherpunks never die, they just get tarred and gzipped.
"Once the online haunt of top cryptographers, the Cypherpunks list was characterized by its mix of revolutionary politics and advanced mathematics. This week, a founder pronounced it dead and buried"
Years ago, John Gilmore pre-emptively tried to kill the Cypherunks list by first attempting to censor it, and then giving everyone very short notice that he would cease carrying the list at Toad. When the list became even more popular, and distributed, John Gilmore kept his node running, despite the fact it wasn't connected to any of the other nodes, propagated huge amounts of spam, and wasn't officially part of the new system. Now that years have gone by since John Gilmore has made any meaningful contribution to the Cypherpunks list, he sends out an "official" announcement that Toad, which should have stopped carrying Cypherpunks a long time ago, and isn't really even a legitimate node in the new scheme of distribution, will now cease carrying Cypherpunks traffic. This is spun by a clueless ReportWhore into a story that a "Founder" of Cypherpunks has officially announced its demise. Vulis had a nickname for Gilmore. It began with a "C." -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law"
participants (7)
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David Honig -
Eric Cordian -
Jim Choate -
measl＠mfn.org -
Petro -
Sunder -
Tim May