At 3:45 PM 7/19/96, Troy Denkinger wrote:

We have an interesting problem here, though. You say that the government has no right to tell you how to set your filter; no doubt about that, imo. However, most people who use these filters are going to be quite happy to allow some corporate entity the privilege of setting their filters for them and, if the consumer should ask about criteria and such, they are told that that's a trade secret. So, people will be allowing a corporate entity that

And? After all, when Coca Cola offers only one formula for Coke (these days, at least) and yet keeps the formula a treade secret, is this not similiarly restrictive of "choice"? The fact is that consumers never have full freedom about what other agents or companies offer to trade to them.

exists for profit to set their filters for them. This is a very scary thing and perhaps even more frightening than having the government do it. I think that the people on this list tend to maintain a healthy scepticism toward the various TLAs, but we have to remember that a large, multinational corporation has not even got a sense of a greater "national good" or even "national security" to guide it.

Magazines, newspapers, and other such sources routinely make editorial decisions about what to cover. And no, they do not necessarily publicize the inner workings of their editorial process. Are we to be "scared" that "Newsweek," for example, has their own filters and is a multinational corporation (gulp)? "Newsweek" has many secrets of their own; the most recent being that their own Joe Klein was the author of the anonymous novel "Primary Colors," and the publisher knew it. People and companies have their own agendas, their own filters, and their own reasons for doing things they do. Get used to it. --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."