Still, it might make sense for someone from this list to give them some help on the crypto aspects. This could be a safe and fun environment in which people could be introduced to crypto, and it could even expand Unless this list undergoes some VERY radical changes, it will never be a "safe and fun environment" to introduce new people to anything. At the moment, in order to get anything out of it, one has to devote large quantities of queue space and time to the subscription, and sift through the flames and other noise to locate the rare bit of truly valuable info. There are very few

people on this list who routinely post things worth reading, and many who _never_ post things worth reading, and seem to be only around for the flame wars. And god forbid that a newcomer should ask a QUESTION! Dear lord no. That newcomer will be flamed so totally that no burn unit around will be able to save them. Most of those that are persistent or resiliant enough to survive what this list can often put people through may or may not decide to stay. I would imagine that such negative experiences would turn a lot of people off to the whole idea of crypto-privacy. If I hadn't already been committed to privacy when I joined the list, I would have immediately unsubscribed, called Fort Meade, and asked what I could do to help. The vast majority of people who post on this list and respond to other people's posts are obnoxious idiots who are willing to flame at the slightest provocation, and will do so until the person they attack backs down or simply gives up. No one on this list is entirely to blame, nor is anyone entirely blameless for this. Several of the top figures on the list (TC May and Eric Hughes to name two) have recently adopted an inappropriately elitist attitude toward the direction of the list, and the movement. No one can stop Eric from running the _list_ however he wants, but the _movement_ belongs to all of us, thank you. Even though I respect the crypto-political opinions that they express a great deal, I think that they and their supporters have taken this too far. And worse, they have not taken a firm stand against the kind of flame war that is continually erupting over individual posts on the list. For the leaders to sit back and watch this go on is simply not the appropriate way to handle things. Until we fix the serious problems in this list, it will never be an appropriate environment for newcomers to learn about crypto-privacy, just a training ground for flame-throwers. Dare I suggest (why not? I'm already burning to a crisp, how much worse could it get?) that we create a moderated newsgroup that would gateway the substantive traffic from this list into a more accessible forum (but NOT the other way around). In that manner, we could provide a place for newcomers to learn about cryptography and the movement, without forcing them to sift through mountains of flame wars. Questions could be referred to qualified personnel, instead of going to the list where they act like little flame magnets. This newsgroup would not replace the list, nor would it be more than marginally connected (because of the selected cross-postings), but it would provide the kind of environment that the list does not or cannot provide. Go ahead and dump flames in my mailbox. I've long since gotten used to it. I'm not going to back down until someone convinces me that a hospitable environment with informative traffic and a high s/n ratio is a bad idea. Or, you can save bandwidth and send the flames to /dev/null, because that's where anything that doesn't make sense will go. Rational comments are welcome, though. Oh, and for those of you that are tired of seeing me post, you can rest assured that you will never see it again. Contributing to this list has brought nothing but trouble to my life, and I have better things to do with my time than wade through piles of flamage in my personal mail box. -- Matthew B. Landry ml7694a@american.edu (Finally!) mbl@ml7694a.leonard.american.edu