alt.cypherpunks.ebonics

[jim bell]

At 11:16 AM 2/18/97 -0500, Alec wrote:

>A friend, who, in the CP tradition requested to remain anonymous, and I were
>doing an informal analysis of those subjects/topics which over the past year
>generated the most discussion and, by implication, interest on the CP list.
>Since the list at that time was reportedly unmoderated, we felt some weight
>should be given to members' interests/desires as measured by their posts,
>regardless of the applicability to the list topic.
>
>With the exceptions of AP (oh so clearly way off-topic),


Quite to the contrary, AP is NOT "oh so clearly way off-topic."   First AP, 
as I've sketched it uses many of the 
encryption/digital-signature/verification techniques which are often 
discussed here and are essentially universally agreed as being on-topic.  
Secondly, the _PROSPECT_ of AP (or, if you'd like, more generally, the whole 
field of cryptoanarchy, which disables the State by making it unnecessary 
and powerless) would be and probably is most of the motivation for the 
various "let's control encryption" proposals that the US government and 
others have pushed over the last few years.

On the other hand, it is equally clear that while AP is "on-topic," 
nevertheless it is quite distinctly distasteful to a few people around here 
who seem to believe that the _political_ and _technical" implications of 
good encryption can be kept safely separated.  It is obvious that you are 
one of those people.  It is equally obvious that you are not honest enough 
to admit that.  So rather than say merely "I don't like it" you try to 
embellish your claims with "oh so clearly way off-topic."



Jim Bell
jimbell at pacifier.com