Less Flaming, More Civility
Folks, the level of flaming and gratuitous insulting (insultations?) is getting in the way of our message. We have on our list folks from Netscape, First Virtual, and (maybe) Digicash. Amongst others. And we certainly know that some of our messages are being forwarded to others. It behooves us to bear this in mind. If we can't calmly and clearly make our points about why privacy is important (and I mean in the sense of personal responsibility, not just the buzzword), about why end-to-end encryption is generally better than transport-level security, and about why "certifying authorities" is (to many of us) a flawed approach, then we are failing. More concisely, the Cypherpunks list is one of several "watering holes" that have appeared. Rather than trashing schemes which are not "'punkly correct" (PC, to coin a term), or which seem to have been put together in haste (perhaps for good reason)), we should instead use this golden opportunity to influence things. Call me an elitist, but I think the Cypherpunks list has an important role to play in influencing: -- Web development (Netscape, InterCon, others) -- digital cash (DigiCash, First Virtual, others) -- key escrow policies and plans (TIS, Microsoft, etc.) -- the future of PGP, tools, etc. -- etc. These things will have more of an effect on the future than convincing Aunt Erma to encrypt her mail. It may be that the comments made here about the security model of Netscape and First Virtual are on the mark, that these models need a lot more work. But I don't know see how insults or derision, or imputing bad motives to these folks, will help. (I think I was careful this past motive to avoid slinging mud at Bill Gates, for example, during the debate about reports that Microsoft could be including some form of key escrow in future OS releases. Not to say I've never flamed...) One lesson that's become clear is to expect that derisive comments made here will often find their way back to those derided. I always write with the expectation that folks as disparate as David Chaum and Dorothy Denning will perhaps be reading my words! (Hi, David! Hi, Dotty!) They may read them because someone forwards the messages to them, or because in 1996 the Cypherpunks list is sold on CD-ROM, or because one of them has access to the main NSA search engines (:-}). Whatever, my point is that insults are rarely helpful, and are unpersuasive. Insults also set a tone for later debate that is hard to get beyond. Not all debate recently has been insulting, of course. In fact, most hasn't been. But the insulting tone persists in some of the thread titles, and in the generally adversarial nature. (If I were Marc A. or Kipp, I'd not feel very welcome here....a situation which is counterproductive to our presumed goals.) Hal Finney nicely summarized why folks want some privacy on Web pages, and why transport-level security is generally less desirable than end-to-end security (including the special case of anonymous origination). This is the usual "who do you trust?" motif, which comes up in mail delivery _and_ in key certification. (Sidebar: In my view, Web browsers like Netscape and Mosaic, etc., should not get overly involved in these issues. These are issues for Web page owners to worry about and set policy on. The browsers may want the right hooks in them to allow authentication policies to be implemented, but the browser-makers should probably stay out of the gory details of which crypto algorithms are used, what access policies are set, etc. This makes it easier to drop-in stronger systems at a later time. I may be misunderstanding plans, I admit.) So, this is my little rant on "Can't we all just get along?" expressed in a different way. The Cypherpunks list has become one of several de facto "watering holes" where diverse participants interact. Let's not blow it. --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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
A minor correction, when I wrote:
It may be that the comments made here about the security model of Netscape and First Virtual are on the mark, that these models need a lot more work. But I don't know see how insults or derision, or imputing bad motives to these folks, will help. (I think I was careful this past motive to avoid slinging mud at Bill Gates, for example, ^^^^^^ during the debate about reports that Microsoft could be including some form of key escrow in future OS releases. Not to say I've never flamed...)
I meant to say "this past summer." --Tim -- .......................................................................... 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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
ÝËXXëÞÞÃËû\\ On Wed, 14 Dec 1994, Timothy C. May wrote:
A minor correction, when I wrote:
It may be that the comments made here about the security model of Netscape and First Virtual are on the mark, that these models need a lot more work. But I don't know see how insults or derision, or imputing bad motives to these folks, will help. (I think I was careful this past motive to avoid slinging mud at Bill Gates, for example, ^^^^^^ during the debate about reports that Microsoft could be including some form of key escrow in future OS releases. Not to say I've never flamed...)
I meant to say "this past summer."
--Tim
-- .........................................................................
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Peter F Cassidy wrote:
rgnKxSRXXCmixjI3IVVVXFdQsCxIYylsKLrmrdU+s2Jes6X8v1MvwWzvVQ0K qnRz4bCwVV3xW8J9bDVw9qizVMxNyarXPug+s2Jes6X8v1MvwWzvVQ0K5Njz 3fJc69ra+75I8c3WLbTBJHBHRec400kzIEphLDFn2iCsTLp4N1FJNd5sDQri tr/2DQpFXaTbVqpLXm1yumvm8FI=
This was one of those "MIME" things I got, that tell me to "Hit any key to go on," "Now press ^H-Alt-Hyper-Abort to return to the main menu." Did I miss something here? This is not a flame, but there sure has been an increase in the frequency of this strange MIME messages lately. (At least with the practical demise of NeXT, I've been seeing fewer and fewer of those "NewGrazer" (?) messages.) --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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) writes: [...]
This is not a flame, but there sure has been an increase in the frequency of this strange MIME messages lately.
Probably because that is the direction mail is going. If you can't do it too bad, but don't expect everyone else to wait around for you to catch up. Time to move your mail into the early 90s and get a MIME-aware mail agent... jim
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Jim McCoy writes:
tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) writes: [...]
This is not a flame, but there sure has been an increase in the frequency of this strange MIME messages lately.
Probably because that is the direction mail is going. If you can't do it too bad, but don't expect everyone else to wait around for you to catch up. Time to move your mail into the early 90s and get a MIME-aware mail agent...
I'm using a version of ELM which claims to be MIME-compliant and usually is, but all I saw in Peter Cassidy's message was a collection of random-looking extended-ASCII characters. Usually when something arrives in a locally- unsupported MIME format (like Amanda's GIF a while back), I just get an "unrecognized format" error message. I didn't see any error messages at all this time, just a meaningless jumble of characters (different, incidentally, from the PGP-cipherptext-like characters Tim quoted). We have enough dumb flamewars raging on this list right now; let's not revive an old one. - -L. Futplex McCarthy; PGP key by finger or server "The objective is for us to get those conversations whether they're by an alligator clip or ones and zeroes. Wherever they are, whatever they are, I need them." --FBI Dir. Freeh -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.1 iQCVAwUBLu9u4Wf7YYibNzjpAQEUBwP/fwjNOFefKF+fpNnBGyAaU8nOFuLMABuq dj/NUMLR7ZrEi7k7HMPNl5F+RyERGOVemWmowh0ZNHy9uVkNk5OtriptbnQCQDWl hEv7Vn+K9PfAy0kLUFLYzY1kUQbgQFHzr5npLgfqQ6S4PBVtAdIJyHcKv4RgCNMM 0cCaMVM1r5M= =+lPD -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- on Wed, 14 Dec 1994 15:56:52 -0600 (CST) mccoy@io.com wrote:
tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) writes: [...]
This is not a flame, but there sure has been an increase in the frequency of this strange MIME messages lately.
Probably because that is the direction mail is going. If you can't do it too bad, but don't expect everyone else to wait around for you to catch up. Time to move your mail into the early 90s and get a MIME-aware mail agent...
This IS a flame. It must be nice to be a sysadmin of a net where you have the time to run around and make sure all your users have access to MIME-aware mail agents. I only manage 50 users on three flavors of U*NX using 5 different terminal emulators, and just can't seem to find the time. Maybe I can talk the tax-payers of CA into paying me overtime to do this. Gee I'm really sorry I couldn't add a graphic to this message. I guess us neanderthals just don't have it together. BTW, with your superior sense of technology, I'm quite shocked at the lack of signature on your missive. Dave Otto -- dave@marvin.jta.edd.ca.gov -- daveotto@acm.org "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!" [the Great Oz] finger DaveOtto@ACM.org/or server for PGP 2.6 key <0x3300e841> fingerprint = 78 71 3A 5B FD 8A 9A F1 8F BC E8 6A C7 BD A4 DD -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBLu9wEyuceIAzAOhBAQFzKwP/ZMEIA9IBkEtDK0Tf2TAdS7U+IlX2XN19 jmZxnejpzf/t2zxKc3cEQ9C1VRt7UjVbCYehAjoW9hCycnxLVrlN1+HX9i2oVu4h V338Hfk8RjGX8VcNtI0OrpmJ4LV71IqFNA3vS7QbRWD8qJXIYKYxJXI9OVVSct2E e27rnsNzEO8= =+RaW -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
On Wed, 14 Dec 1994, Jim McCoy wrote:
Probably because that is the direction mail is going. If you can't do it too bad, but don't expect everyone else to wait around for you to catch up. Time to move your mail into the early 90s and get a MIME-aware mail agent...
But if you are not including an enhanced attachment i.e. binary file, why not just send it as a standard mail message? MIME messages are difficult at best to forward, for example. -NetSurfer #include <standard.disclaimer>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> == = = |James D. Wilson |V.PGP 2.7: 512/E12FCD 1994/03/17 > " " o " |P. O. Box 15432 | finger for full PGP key > " " / \ " |Honolulu, HI 96830 |====================================> \" "/ G \" |Serendipitous Solutions| Also NetSurfer@sersol.com > >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Notice: MPEG-II Video Mail Attached: Quicktime 2.1-compatible. This messages has been formatted as a HyperMIME document. Do not attempt to read it on a non-HyperMIME-compliant system. ASCII-only portion--hit "n" to download the MPEG-II attachment, hit "^&-D" to stop the automatic transfer which has already begun, hit "##23" to receive a QuarkExpress document describing how to use HyperMIME. If you see garbage characters below, in the ASCII portion of this message, it means you are not on the bleeding edge of technology. Fij4@Jim McCoy 89g1~wroteiio900deW: ASCII Excerpt> tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) writes: ASCII Excerpt> [...] ASCII Excerpt> > This is not a flame, but there sure has been an increase in the ASCII Excerpt> > frequency of this strange MIME messages lately. ASCII Excerpt> ASCII Excerpt> Probably because that is the direction mail is going. If you can't do it ASCII Excerpt> too bad, but don't expect everyone else to wait around for you to catch ASCII Excerpt> up. Time to move your mail into the early 90s and get a MIME-aware mail ASCII Excerpt> agent... ASCII Excerpt> ASCII Excerpt> jim FG00998Thanks, Jim, I think you're right. This parochial dependency on archaic things like ASCII and the sentimental attachment we have to 80-column displays is keeping us from advancing. (You'll know you're stuck in the 80-column swamp if the quoted message above overran your display...me, I am switching to a 120-column mode soon, and may adopt a 1280 x 1024 dual column format for all of my messages. If you can't read it, time to move your mail into the early 90s! NOTICE: The JPEG-II movie that accompanies this message has been installed in your root directory. It can be viewed with the HyperMIMEPlayer software, version 1.04 (but don't use 1.03 or earlier, as that will crash your system!). The .WAV files can be listened to with version 4.2 or later MIMEaural players. The Singularity is approaching...soon we'll be changing our system software every few days to keep up with the incompatible messages being sent. I love it. [Tim May's ASCII sig has been replaced by a more modern Postscript version, which was downloaded while you were reading this message and sent directly to your laser printer. All part of HyperMIME making your life easier.]
In article <199412150210.SAA05624@netcom7.netcom.com>, you wrote:
Notice: MPEG-II Video Mail Attached: Quicktime 2.1-compatible. This messages has been formatted as a HyperMIME document. Do not attempt to read it on a non-HyperMIME-compliant system.
<ROTFLMAO> Thanks Tim, I needed that! And thanks also for your insightful, albeit less humorous, posts. -rex PS, just read of your intended departure. Please don't. The list really needs your viewpoint. There are some vocal, abusive, elitists on the list who (IMO) haven't a clue how many people are stuck with less than bleeding edge software, no SLIP access, etc. Without some counterpoint they may totally lose contact with the rest of us.
Timothy C. May says:
Notice: MPEG-II Video Mail Attached: Quicktime 2.1-compatible. This messages has been formatted as a HyperMIME document. Do not attempt to read it on a non-HyperMIME-compliant system.
You know Tim, I agree with you. This newfangled technology stuff is just too hard to deal with. Multimedia email is an obvious dead end. I'd suggest that we all move back to paper and pencil -- thats a simple common denominator that we all are capable of managing. In fact, we all ought to just gather about in our stone cave around the fire and chat about this in person -- its friendlier that way. Perry Who still remembers telling people who thought that dealing with the NCP to TCP transition was too hard and is suprised to note that there are no more NCP hosts around. Who still remembers the terror in the eyes of floundering mainframe programmers realizing that they might have to learn something other than COBOL if they wanted to keep working for more than minimum wage.
Perry E. Metzger wrote:
Timothy C. May says:
Notice: MPEG-II Video Mail Attached: Quicktime 2.1-compatible. This messages has been formatted as a HyperMIME document. Do not attempt to read it on a non-HyperMIME-compliant system.
You know Tim, I agree with you. This newfangled technology stuff is just too hard to deal with. Multimedia email is an obvious dead end. I'd suggest that we all move back to paper and pencil -- thats a simple common denominator that we all are capable of managing.
In fact, we all ought to just gather about in our stone cave around the fire and chat about this in person -- its friendlier that way.
I see two "stable attractors" for text/graphics/multimedia/etc. sent over the Net: 1. Straight text, ASCII, 80 column format. All systems can handle this, all mailers and newsreaders can handle it, it's what the Usenet is essentially based upon, and it gets the job done. It meets the needs of 95% of us for 95% of our needs. 2. The Web, for graphics, images, etc. This will be the next main stable attractor, deployed on many platforms. (I'm assuming the debate here about Netscape standards does not imply much of a fragmentation, that Mosaic, Netscape, MacWeb, etc., will all basically be able to display Web pages in much the same way.) I'm not arguing against technology, as Perry surely knows. I used FrameMaker 4.02 for my Monte Carlo paper, prettified with nice fonts and printed in 2-column format. I am willing to supply a "FrameViewer" version to this list, if there's enough interest. Other standards I have to deal with are Replica and Acrobat (my Smalltalk vendor likes these), Postscript versions, and the usual assortment of semi-proprietary standards for PhotoShop, Painter, MORE, and so on. The issue is not unwillingness to use new technology, it is, rather, the issue of "stable attractors." That is, what can I/we reasonably expect others to also have. Clearly if I issued my paper to the list in FrameMaker format, or Acrobat format, or even TeX format, only a few people would be able to read it. Fewer still would actually take the steps needed to actually display the paper. Standards, standards, standards! I don't think the minor extensions to e-mail (loosely called "MIME," though MIME serves other functions besides attaching graphics) are worth the effort, frankly. Most of the MIME messages (the ones that tell me about "ISO 558972 fonts" and "Press any key to return") don't seem to warrant the effort....I think in 90%+ of the cases people simply send messages as MIME by default, not becuase non-ASCII stuff is included. If we make the leap, I say make the leap to the Web: cave drawings --> text --> e-mail --> Web (By Web I of course mean the whole ball of wax involving HTML/HTTP/etc.) This is not a rejection of new technology, just a wise selection of which technology to bet on. --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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) wrote: [...]
I see two "stable attractors" for text/graphics/multimedia/etc. sent over the Net: [1. ASCII text, proving once and for all that Tim has never had to do any significant work with cross-OS networking or managing a heterogeneous LAN...]
2. The Web, for graphics, images, etc. [...]
Hmmm... and what kind of protocol does HTTP use for structuring the messages it passes from the server to the client.... RTFM Tim.
I don't think the minor extensions to e-mail (loosely called "MIME," though MIME serves other functions besides attaching graphics) are worth the effort, frankly. Most of the MIME messages (the ones that tell me about "ISO 558972 fonts" and "Press any key to return") don't seem to warrant the effort....I think in 90%+ of the cases people simply send messages as MIME by default, not becuase non-ASCII stuff is included.
You should try spending some time working with mail crossing multiple gateways running different OSs and even different character sets [an EBCDIC<->ASCII cross is particularly fun...] The fact is that there are a variety of different commercial systems out there and they all seem to want to speak thier own language. MIME provides a means of seperating the message itself from the method and systems used to transport that message. A mail message is the most basic form of communication structure that is commonly used on the net. News is just an extension of the mail message, MIME is another extension of the message, but in a different direction. It seperates the message from the program that created it. ObCrypto: Without MIME crypto will never have the unification we seek. With the MIME message format it is possible to put together a mail message that will not be mangled by passing through several different gateways or other network boundary objects, and it allows the message to bundle itself up into functional parts. It allows one to seperate the signature from the message if you want, or create an encrypted message that can pass from a PC running on a Microsoft Mail system across the net to a Amiga that downloads it off a Fido BBS without the end-users needing to worry about what path it took and what kind of changes may have been made upon the message during transport. On this particular subject you just haven't got a fucking clue what you are talking about Tim. jim
Jim McCoy wrote:
On this particular subject you just haven't got a fucking clue what you are talking about Tim.
So polite, so succinct. I'll remember this. --Tim -- .......................................................................... 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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
Tim wrote:
Jim McCoy wrote:
On this particular subject you just haven't got a fucking clue what you are talking about Tim.
So polite, so succinct.
I'll remember this.
Please do. There are a great many issues which your input and opinions are a valuable contribution to the content of this list. There are others where you seem to make guesses as to where things are going without having much of a leg to stand on. Your MIME position hurts the widespread use of cryptography because the advantages MIME gives to crypto far outweigh the short-term costs associated with a systemic upgrade to a better method for message transport and encapsulation. jim
>
Tim wrote:
Jim McCoy wrote:
On this particular subject you just haven't got a fucking clue what you are talking about Tim.
So polite, so succinct.
I'll remember this.
Please do. There are a great many issues which your input and opinions are a valuable contribution to the content of this list. There are others where you seem to make guesses as to where things are going without having much of a leg to stand on. Your MIME position hurts the widespread use of cryptography because the advantages MIME gives to crypto far outweigh the short-term costs associated with a systemic upgrade to a better method for message transport and encapsulation.
jim
People should learn when to yield sometimes.... sdw -- Stephen D. Williams 25Feb1965 VW,OH sdw@lig.net http://www.lig.net/~sdw Senior Consultant 510.503.9227 CA Page 513.496.5223 OH Page BA Aug94-Dec95 OO R&D AI:NN/ES crypto By Buggy: 2464 Rosina Dr., Miamisburg, OH 45342-6430 Firewalls/WWW servers ICBM: 39 38 34N 84 17 12W home, 37 58 41N 122 01 48W work Pres.: Concinnous Consulting,Inc.;SDW Systems;Local Internet Gateway Co.29Nov94
Timothy C. May says:
I see two "stable attractors" for text/graphics/multimedia/etc. sent over the Net:
1. Straight text, ASCII, 80 column format. All systems can handle this, all mailers and newsreaders can handle it, it's what the Usenet is essentially based upon, and it gets the job done.
Sorry, Tim, but this isn't true. I know people who still own VIC-20s that can't handle 80 columns. Also, users of ASR-33 teletypes might be left out by the requirement to handle full ASCII. I was using an ASR-33 full time only 15 years ago. Now, I know that all usenet postings in Japan these days use ISO-2022 encoded characters, and MIME and all that, and that people in Russia use similar methods to carry their stuff, but they are just bounders. I say its back to 38 columns and upper-case only Baudot in order to meet the lowest common denominator.
2. The Web, for graphics, images, etc. This will be the next main stable attractor, deployed on many platforms. (I'm assuming the debate here about Netscape standards does not imply much of a fragmentation, that Mosaic, Netscape, MacWeb, etc., will all basically be able to display Web pages in much the same way.)
And of course there are no MIME standards; its physically impossible to deploy MIME on two different platforms identically. Why, the specifications are all written in english, and we know no engineers can read! I can see why you would reject MIME so vehemently.
The issue is not unwillingness to use new technology, it is, rather, the issue of "stable attractors."
I see.
I don't think the minor extensions to e-mail (loosely called "MIME," though MIME serves other functions besides attaching graphics) are worth the effort, frankly. Most of the MIME messages (the ones that tell me about "ISO 558972 fonts" and "Press any key to return") don't seem to warrant the effort....
Lets get down to serious issues for a moment. Because you've got a shitty MIME reader, you've concluded that the technology is bad. Thats all it comes down to. MIME allows fully multimedia in the style of the Web, you know. You can't say that the Web is good and consistantly call MIME bad. If you want to see what a difference implementation makes, try using a text-based Web browser for a few hours and then compare it to Netscape. If you'd ever used NeXTMail, you'd understand why MIME is a good thing. Just because you are using a kludgy reader doesn't mean MIME is kludgy. Perry
Perry E. Metzger wrote:
Timothy C. May says:
I see two "stable attractors" for text/graphics/multimedia/etc. sent over the Net:
1. Straight text, ASCII, 80 column format. All systems can handle this, all mailers and newsreaders can handle it, it's what the Usenet is essentially based upon, and it gets the job done.
Sorry, Tim, but this isn't true. I know people who still own VIC-20s that can't handle 80 columns. Also, users of ASR-33 teletypes might be left out by the requirement to handle full ASCII. I was using an ASR-33 full time only 15 years ago.
But this isn't 15 years ago, and I daresay there isn't a _single_ subscriber to the Cypherpunks list using a VIC-20 or anything remotely similar. Of the 600 or so subscribers, and certainly of the 100-200 involved posters, I would bet that essentially all of them can display ASCII text on an 80-column screen. (I won't get into a Scholastic argument about what "all" means, as in "all systems can handle this," especially as in my message I later said "95%," but clearly 80-column ASCII is nearly universal these days. Not 15 years ago, perhaps, but this is now.)
Now, I know that all usenet postings in Japan these days use ISO-2022 encoded characters, and MIME and all that, and that people in Russia use similar methods to carry their stuff, but they are just bounders. I say its back to 38 columns and upper-case only Baudot in order to meet the lowest common denominator.
You are once again misrepresenting my points. I said no such thing.
And of course there are no MIME standards; its physically impossible to deploy MIME on two different platforms identically. Why, the specifications are all written in english, and we know no engineers can read! I can see why you would reject MIME so vehemently.
I said no such thing, so your sarcasm is wasted.
The issue is not unwillingness to use new technology, it is, rather, the issue of "stable attractors."
I see.
Do you? You seemed to have read into my message what you wished to, that I was making some argument for going backward, as this has been the thrust of your sarcasm. I made no such point. There's no point in arguing this any further. --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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
The point, Tim, is that you keep conflating a bad MIME read that you happen to use with the notion that MIME is bad. MIME doesn't force its users to understand anything about formats, character sets or anything else. Your mail reader is whats doing that. If you were, say, using the Andrew Messaging System which now understands MIME, you could remain blissfully ignorant the whole time of how the underpinnings work. .pm
As Perry is actually making some points without sarcasm (*) and without demonizing me as some Neanderthal bent on converting the list to a 20-column, all caps past, I'll respond: Perry E. Metzger wrote:
The point, Tim, is that you keep conflating a bad MIME read that you happen to use with the notion that MIME is bad. MIME doesn't force its users to understand anything about formats, character sets or anything else. Your mail reader is whats doing that. If you were, say, using the Andrew Messaging System which now understands MIME, you could remain blissfully ignorant the whole time of how the underpinnings work.
Perhaps, but I don't have the Andrew Messaging System, nor do I expect most of the subscribers here. I see lots of AOL, Compuserve, Portal, Netcom, etc., accounts, and the range of mailers available to (most) of them does not include the AMS or similar things. I deeply resent--but will try not to take it personally, so no animosity to Perry or Jim or others is intended--the insinuation through sarcasm or through direct statements that I am hopelessly wedded to a past of ASR-33 terminals and good old-fashioned typewriters. Like a lot of folks here, I use stuff that's far beyond simple ASCII. I think I've adequately covered this point. Eric Hughes wrote a nice piece several weeks back about adoption of new technology, new tools all being a matter of _return on investment_. For example, I could spend some number of hours switching from my current mail progam (elm) to some other editor which perhaps better-supported the MIME messages seen here. But if all I got for several hours of using, learning, and becoming comfortable with, say, "pine," was the ability to see an _italicized_ word, or a word in Cyrillic, then I would consider this a poor ROI. And nobody has yet said there's anything worth doing this for in any of the MIME messages I've yet seen. Sure, Amanda W. exercised the process by including a GIF....a process which several people saw errors with, and no doubt many others skipped completely. Does this make me backward? No. It's all ROI. Like it or not, we are now in a mostly-ASCII Net environment. This shows up when people fail to convert special characters (apostrophes, left and right quotes, em dashes, bullets, etc.) into the "straight ASCII" characters (such as ', ", --, *) that most of the rest of us can display easily. People right complain about posts and messages filled with "^H" and other oddball symbols. (And it certainly doesn't mean that people like me don't have the capability of displaying extended character sets....I clearly can, given the right tools, effort, etc. Many can't, and many won't. The "Display Postscript" standard was an attempt to bootstrap the world to a new standard for document display, and it failed. Maybe the "Andrew Message System" is another such fix. Maybe it's even better designed. All well and good. But it ain't available to most of us. Nor would I even install it if all I got was em dashes and the like displayed correctly. ROI, again.) Please don't characterize my views as Luddite wishes for a simpler world. --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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
Timothy C. May says:
For example, I could spend some number of hours switching from my current mail progam (elm) to some other editor which perhaps better-supported the MIME messages seen here. But if all I got for several hours of using, learning, and becoming comfortable with, say, "pine," was the ability to see an _italicized_ word, or a word in Cyrillic, then I would consider this a poor ROI.
You misunderstand the purpose of MIME. It is a way of standardizing the encapsulation of non-ascii information and references inside of an RFC-822 mail message. It allows you to do things like get cyrillic or what have you, but more importantly, it allows things like recursive encapsulation of your messages inside encrypting transformations, the transmission of attachments allong with documents, mailing HTML, embedding external references in mail (i.e. "Click here to get a copy of my latest program) and dozens of other significant things. MIME and HTML are complementary to each other -- HTTP is one way of transporting HTML, but with MIME you can see a Web page, cut it out, paste it into your MIME aware gee-whiz mailer, and send it to someone who could then treat it just like he was looking at the Web, provided he, too, had a good enough MIME capable reader. You could send out your latest document, in parallel, in postscript and in Word format (or whatever) so that lots of people could read it and prepend an explanatory document describing what the contents were -- some MIME readers will then display the attachment as an icon that you could then drag and drop into an appropriate viewer or printer. MIME is a general infrastructural mechanism for this and more. Its a bit of a toy right now on mailing lists because too many people lack MIME capable readers, but in environments where MIME is universally used it has already taken over and is a fundamental part of the way people do business. Once you've seen a secretary who barely understands anything drag a spreadsheet into a mail message and send it to someone on another continent who, equally ignorantly, just double-clicks on it and then has the spreadsheet program launch, you will understand what the point of MIME is. Without a MIME capable reader you can't do any of these things, of course. Even with one, you might not initially see any benefits because you might be using a mediocre reader or you might not have any correspondants who do snazzy things. However, MIME is rapidly being deployed and is going to be universal within a couple of years. Its not just a silly way to sign your name with a GIF.
Like it or not, we are now in a mostly-ASCII Net environment.
We are in a mostly graphical net environment. Its been seven years since I used a machine (for more than a few minutes) that didn't have a bitmapped display. The Macintosh you are sitting in front of right now knows nothing about ASCII -- its a bitmapped display, not a character generator based display, and it can show whatever font you like. What you are actually saying is that you use a primitive interface into your network service provider rather than, say, SLIP or PPP, and that because of this you are restricted to dumb-terminal type operations on a computer that is far more capable than that. Were I you, I'd get PPP account from Netcom and a POP based mailer to handle your mail reading directly on your Mac. You will no longer have to bitch about downloading your mail to the mac to decrypt it -- you will be able to just drag and drop mail into PGP with the right tools. You won't have to worry about MIME with the right package, either.
The "Display Postscript" standard was an attempt to bootstrap the world to a new standard for document display, and it failed.
Display postscript was for windowing systems. It had nothing to do with document displays per se. I can view postscript just as easily here on my workstation as ASCII. Display postscript was not a document viewer technology but a way of building things like NeXTStep, which did indeed fail -- but thats because X won, and X is in wide use. Perry
I actuallly sympathize with Tim's position and Eric's earlier comments about adopting tools as as function of ROI. I often experience somethign similar wiht "potentially faster but non-deterministic time solutions," vs. "probably slower but deterministic time solutions." That said, I think that MIME, for all its implementation difficulties, is going to be an attractor, if for no other reason that the fact that there is an increasing demand for _something_ to encapsulate all the divergent stuff that people want to push and pull across the net, and MIME is the standard for doing this. For instance, it is used to encasulate html, and some advocate an expansion of its use in conjunction with the web. [Note that this does not make the various cock-ups that can occur in conjuction with its expanding use in e-mail any less annoying.] I'm also curious what James is using on his Sun, as Sun's mailtool (at least the version I have) is pre-MIME, but MIME-ish, and can choke in amusing ways on MIME messages. Doug
Perry E. Metzger writes
The point, Tim, is that you keep conflating a bad MIME read that you happen to use with the notion that MIME is bad.
No two mimes seem to entirely agree what mime format is. I use Sun's stuff. It is a pile of stinking shit. This a new spark station 20, state of the art and all that. Sure, mime would be great if everyone had a great Mime and every diverse system with every diverse mime interpreter all worked and they all worked in the same way. This is not the case. -- --------------------------------------------------------------------- We have the right to defend ourselves and our property, because of the kind of animals that we James A. Donald are. True law derives from this right, not from the arbitrary power of the omnipotent state. jamesd@netcom.com
On Thu, 15 Dec 1994, James A. Donald wrote:
Perry E. Metzger writes
The point, Tim, is that you keep conflating a bad MIME read that you happen to use with the notion that MIME is bad.
No two mimes seem to entirely agree what mime format is.
I use Sun's stuff. It is a pile of stinking shit.
Sure, mime would be great if everyone had a great Mime and every diverse system with every diverse mime interpreter all worked and they all worked in the same way.
There is only ONE MIME - it's in the rfc (I've forgotten the number). If it's the same as the rfc - it's MIME. if it ain't then it aint MIME. The sun stuff is a good example of how bad it can get. But it's not MIME. not mailtool anyway. It is a stinking pile of [insert expletive here]. But it's not MIME. -Jon -- j.fletcher@stirling.ac.uk "opinions are my own. not necessarily those of anyone or aything else"
On Fri, 16 Dec 1994, Jonathon Fletcher wrote:
There is only ONE MIME - it's in the rfc (I've forgotten the number). If it's the same as the rfc - it's MIME. if it ain't then it aint MIME.
The sun stuff is a good example of how bad it can get. But it's not MIME. not mailtool anyway. It is a stinking pile of [insert expletive here]. But it's not MIME.
So how can I do true graphical mime with the wondrous window like drag and drop features described by Perry on a Sparc 20 or an IBM PC running sockets and TIA under windows? Obviously, once you can drag and drop from html to mime and back again, and PGP is properly mimed, then we will have a tool such that even the chairman of the board will use PGP. But right now the tools I have are seriously short of this glorious goal While I am not expecting crypto nirvana right away I would like to stop using an interface originally designed for paper terminals where you had to hit the keys with a five pound hammer. Obviously, once you can drag and drop from html to mime and back The reason that I joined the rant against the latest progress is not because I am a fan of character mode unix -- I most definitely am not -- but because tools for GUI internet stuff were rather raw the last time I tried them. --------------------------------------------------------------------- We have the right to defend ourselves and our property, because of the kind of animals that we James A. Donald are. True law derives from this right, not from the arbitrary power of the omnipotent state. jamesd@netcom.com
"James A. Donald" says:
So how can I do true graphical mime with the wondrous window like drag and drop features described by Perry on a Sparc 20
The mail handler that comes with the Andrew package does do the graphics inline. You can just FTP it and compile it for your machine. I don't know if it does drag and drop. There is a commercial product called Zmail that is pretty good and handles all the drag and drop (motif style) that you would want -- it doesn't do the graphics inline, though -- it spawns new windows to show the images. I understand you can get demos by FTP from the company.
Obviously, once you can drag and drop from html to mime and back again, and PGP is properly mimed, then we will have a tool such that even the chairman of the board will use PGP.
Well, people will first have to incorporate the new Security Multiparts stuff into their MIME implementations -- its brand new (just approved a week ago) so I suspect that it will take a bit of time. Perry
James A. Donald says:
Perry E. Metzger writes
The point, Tim, is that you keep conflating a bad MIME reader that you happen to use with the notion that MIME is bad.
No two mimes seem to entirely agree what mime format is.
Well, the specification is pretty clear. Its pretty simple stuff, actually, and remarkably well designed.
I use Sun's stuff. It is a pile of stinking shit.
When last I checked, Sun's "Mailtool" did not support MIME, but supported a proprietary enclosure format. (This may have changed in the Openwindows supplied with 2.4, but to my knowledge 2.4 only came out weeks ago and it is unlikely that you are using it.) Perry
James A. Donald says:
No two mimes seem to entirely agree what mime format is.
Perry E. Metzger writes
Well, the specification is pretty clear. Its pretty simple stuff, actually, and remarkably well designed.
Quite true. But the technology has not achieved the critical mass that you need for most software producers to support it properly. Sun does not support it, Microsoft screws it up royally last time I looked. Thus mime is, as Tim earlier complained, bleeding edge. Netscape is leading edge. Obviously mime is the right solution for Email in the long run. Equally obviously, none of the tools that I prefer to use, on any of the systems that I have connected to the internet, handle mime in a way that I am willing to tolerate. -- --------------------------------------------------------------------- We have the right to defend ourselves and our property, because of the kind of animals that we James A. Donald are. True law derives from this right, not from the arbitrary power of the omnipotent state. jamesd@netcom.com
James A. Donald says:
Thus mime is, as Tim earlier complained, bleeding edge.
Netscape is leading edge.
Please note that MIME is an encapsulation methodology -- ZMail, Eudora, AMS and others are implementations. Netscape is an implementation. HTML and HTTP are the things that it implements (along with some other protocols). Just keep in mind the distinction between a standard and the implementations of that standard -- they are different. Perry
I want to add something to what I just sent out, something of direct relevance for PGP efforts:
I see two "stable attractors" for text/graphics/multimedia/etc. sent over the Net:
1. Straight text, ASCII, 80 column format. All systems can handle this, all mailers and newsreaders can handle it, it's what the Usenet is essentially based upon, and it gets the job done. It meets the needs of 95% of us for 95% of our needs.
2. The Web, for graphics, images, etc. This will be the next main stable attractor, deployed on many platforms. (I'm assuming the debate here about Netscape standards does not imply much of a fragmentation, that Mosaic, Netscape, MacWeb, etc., will all basically be able to display Web pages in much the same way.)
And these two attractors are where the efforts on encryption have the biggest pay-offs. We already know that PGP is "text"-oriented, and that PGP messages can be read on a variety of machines, from terminal to DOS to Macs to Suns, etc. PGP is well-suited to a straight text world, as it makes no assumptions about non-ASCII capabilitites. (Using the ASCII-armor mode that most of us use.) It is when assumptions are made by programs, think of "Lotus Notes" or "DECMail," that interoperability is lost. The Lesson: Beware of making any assumptions about MIME sorts of extensions to use with PGP, as many people will--for whatever reasons--not be able or willing to process MIME mail. The Web is where I think a lot of future efforts on integrating PGP in should happen. (I'm speaking of when the Web is used to send e-mail, which I hear is being worked on by many groups; clearly a lot of Netscape/Mosaic/etc. users expect to use these products as their main interface to the Net, and not have to have separate mail programs.) This is where I would put my money. --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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
On Thu, 15 Dec 1994, Timothy C. May wrote:
I see two "stable attractors" for text/graphics/multimedia/etc. sent over the Net:
1. Straight text, ASCII, 80 column format. All systems can handle this, all mailers and newsreaders can handle it, it's what the Usenet is essentially based upon, and it gets the job done. It meets the needs of 95% of us for 95% of our needs.
2. The Web, for graphics, images, etc. This will be the next main stable attractor, deployed on many platforms. (I'm assuming the debate here about Netscape standards does not imply much of a fragmentation, that Mosaic, Netscape, MacWeb, etc., will all basically be able to display Web pages in much the same way.)
Okay, I'll go with that. I'd just like to point out that http (transport for documents serverd on the web) uses mime. That's how your browser knows something is html, or a picture of some format, or postscript. find a web server (pick one) and telnet to it: % telnet my.web.server 80 enter the following line and press return *twice* HEAD / HTTP/1.0 (you need the second line because the server is expecting a mime header from you - ended by a blank line). You'll get some answer like: HTTP/1.0 200 OK Date: Friday, 16-Dec-94 01:09:44 GMT Server: NCSA/1.3 MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/html Last-modified: Tuesday, 06-Dec-94 06:10:37 GMT Content-length: 1067 That's the server's answer to your query - one mime header (the http HEAD request asks for info about a document). If you have a mailer that doesn't automagically verify signatures and pack and unpack pgp messages it's a pain (I know tim will agree with this). If you have a mailer that can't pack and unpack mime then it's a pain too. Just because your mailer doesn't support it doesn't mean that mime (or email privacy !) is a bad thing. -Jon PS: for those with macs or pcs or unix machines don't have mime. please take a look at mpack - might find it usefull. ftp://ftp.andrew.cmu.edu/pub/mpack -- j.fletcher@stirling.ac.uk "opinions expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of anyone or anything else."
Timothy C. May says:
This was one of those "MIME" things I got, that tell me to "Hit any key to go on," "Now press ^H-Alt-Hyper-Abort to return to the main menu."
It wasn't real mime -- the content type was listed as TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII with a base64 content transfer encoding, but the contents were not seven bit ascii. I have no idea what the thing was. .pm
Perry E. Metzger wrote:
Timothy C. May says:
This was one of those "MIME" things I got, that tell me to "Hit any key to go on," "Now press ^H-Alt-Hyper-Abort to return to the main menu."
It wasn't real mime -- the content type was listed as TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
with a base64 content transfer encoding, but the contents were not seven bit ascii. I have no idea what the thing was.
My system marked it as MIME, as the attachment below will show. (To Jim McCoy: My system is in fact capable of handling MIME, but clearly "elm," which I and a lot of other people use, sees messages like this differently from what some others see.) When I quoted the attached junk, it put it in slightly different form than it was originally. Here's what I saw on my screen, cut-and-pasted: M 97 Dec 14 Peter F Cassidy (26) Re: Less Flaming, More Civility [This show that elm marked it as MIME, the "M," even though Perry's system said it was not true MIME.] Date: Wed, 14 Dec 1994 16:18:21 +0001 (EST) From: Peter F Cassidy <pcassidy@world.std.com> Subject: Re: Less Flaming, More Civility To: "Timothy C. May" <tcmay@netcom.com> Cc: "Timothy C. May" <tcmay@netcom.com>, cypherpunks@toad.com, tcmay@netcom.com . JE$W\)"F27!UU\WP0,Hc)l(:f-U>3b^3%|?S/AloU *tsa00U]q[B}l5pv(3TLMI*W>h>3b^3%|?S/AloU dXs]r\kZZ{>HqMV-4A$pGEg8SI3 Ja,1gZ ,L:x7QI5^l b6?v E]$[V*K^mr:kfpR [some whitespace deleted] Press any key to return to index. [end of what I saw on the screen.] -- .......................................................................... 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: 2^859433 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Cypherpunks list: majordomo@toad.com with body message of only: subscribe cypherpunks. FAQ available at ftp.netcom.com in pub/tc/tcmay
participants (14)
-
Brad Dolan -
Dave Otto -
db＠Tadpole.COM -
James A. Donald -
jamesd＠netcom.com
-
Jonathon Fletcher -
L. McCarthy -
mccoy＠io.com -
NetSurfer -
Perry E. Metzger -
Peter F Cassidy -
rshea＠netcom.com -
sdw＠lig.net -
tcmay＠netcom.com