Anonymous Posting

[An Metet]

Faustine wrote:
> So why is it that the vast majority of the technical and insightful
> contributions here seem to come from people who aren't averse to
> using a reasonable simulacrum of a real name and address?

I find the content from remailers is far higher than average for the
list.

> I made the deliberate choice not to use a remailer because I think
> it's more interesting to contribute while having a prior body of
> posts "attached" to me. People come to know more what to expect--and
> if I irritate/bore/piss them off too much, they stop reading
> me. Which is exactly as it should be.

So sign your messages.  With your true name, if that's important.

> Though if you're after complete privacy re: your opinions and the
> details of your life, you're better off not writing them down in the
> first place, here or anywhere else.

The technology isn't there yet, true, but it won't get there without
deploying it and using it.  Why isn't this obvious?

> I assume everyone here weighed those considerations for themselves
> before they got here: as far as I'm concerned, nobody has the
> slightest business deciding it for anyone else.

Don't worry, the cypherpunks list isn't going anywhere.  It's just not
realistic to put that genie back in the bottle.  It would have to be a
separate list entirely or one which rode on the current cypherpunks
list.

We may not be able to decide for others, but we can certainly look
down on so-called cypherpunks who, in many cases, cannot even encrypt
a message, never mind "writing code".  Many, in fact, exhibit
hostility towards remailers and anonymity, as you do.

What I fail to understand is why such people are on this list in the
first place, but, as you say, people make their own decisions.

(None of these comments apply to Tim May, of course.)