From bill.stewart at pobox.com Thu May 1 00:37:10 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 00:37:10 -0700 Subject: text analysis In-Reply-To: References: <3EAE5294.7935CECD@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030501003537.02c9d7d8@idiom.com> At 12:09 AM 04/30/2003 -0500, Jim Choate wrote: >On Tue, 29 Apr 2003, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > > > FWIW: There's a paragraph in the current _Science_ that mentions > > "Winnow", a program by some .il researchers that guesses the sex of > authors by their > > writing. They claim 80% accuracy on general lit > >Perhaps impressive, perhaps not. What's the actual percentage ratio? I bet >it's decidedly male. > > > and 74% accuracy on 30 science papers. > >Considering the known sex ration in science fields one can guess 'male' >all the time and hit that level. Yup. Weather forecasting in Ithaca New York was similarly simple. "50% chance of rain today" (Or snow, in the winter...) From wordspy at logophilia.com Thu May 1 01:16:55 2003 From: wordspy at logophilia.com (Paul McFedries) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 04:16:55 -0400 Subject: The Word Spy for 05/01/2003 -- ethnomathematics Message-ID: ethnomathematics (ETH.noh.math.uh.mat.iks; th as in thin) n. Mathematics as practiced by non-Western ethnic groups and marginalized groups within Western society. Also: ethno-mathematics. --ethnomathematical adj. --ethnomathematician n. Example Citation --------------------------------- Starting in 1993, he traveled across Africa on a Fulbright scholarship to investigate evidence of fractals in windscreens, carvings and textiles. He explored villages -- once leaning precariously out of a small airplane to take pictures of layout patterns. His resulting book, "African Fractals," argues for a mathematical intelligence in African design more complex than generally appreciated. Eglash's research fits in squarely with "ethnomathematics," a term coined in the '80s and usually used to describe the mathematical practices of smaller or indigenous cultural groups. While ethnomathematicians have studied Mayan calendars and even boomerang flights, a unifying theme is an emphasis on mathematical accomplishments outside the Western canon. Advocates see ethnomathematics as a useful way to make math more expansive and relevant to students from different backgrounds. Critics characterize it as a diversion from numbers that could lead to softer standards. --Michael Hill, "In hair and Latin beats, professor creates math lessons," The Associated Press, April 29, 2003 Example Citation #2 --------------------------------- Ethnomathematics -- the general name mathematician Ubiratan D'Ambrosio of Brazil coined for this study of the concepts, practices, and artifacts through which we discover mathematical elements among peoples living outside or on the margins of Western culture -- teaches us to look at "exotic" forms of mathematics as an intrinsic element of the civilizations in which they have flourished, well worth studying for their own sake. --Dirk J. Struik, "Everybody counts," Technology Review, August 1995 Earliest Citation --------------------------------- Native American Mathematics appears at a time when interest in ethnomathematics is on the increase. Educational projects devoted to developing mathematics materials relevant to the Native American heritage, style of learning, and economic environment are currently under way at Northern Arizona University, Oklahoma State University, and the Fort Ojibway School in Minnesota, to name but a few. An International Study Group on Ethnomathematics has been established, a newsletter on the subject is being published, and international meetings have been scheduled. --Charles G. Moore, "Native American Mathematics (book review), Science, May 22, 1987 First Use --------------------------------- Ethnomathematics [is] the maths practised among cultural groups such as national-tribal societies, labour groups, children of a certain age bracket, professional classes and so on. --Ubiratan D'Ambrosio, "Ethnomathematics and Its Place in the History and Pedagogy of Mathematics," For the Learning of Mathematics: An International Journal of Mathematics Education, February 1985 See Also --------------------------------- design ethnographer: http://www.wordspy.com/words/designethnographer.asp edubabble: http://www.wordspy.com/words/edubabble.asp equity education: http://www.wordspy.com/words/equityeducation.asp fuzzy math: http://www.wordspy.com/words/fuzzymath.asp J curve: http://www.wordspy.com/words/Jcurve.asp mathlete: http://www.wordspy.com/words/mathlete.asp Words About Words --------------------------------- Mathematics may be defined as the subject in which we never know what we are talking about, nor whether what we are saying is true. --Bertrand Russell, Welsh mathematician, philosopher, and essayist, _Mysticism and Logic_, 1917 Miscellanea --------------------------------- The WordSpy mailing list is available in an HTML version that bears an uncanny resemblance to the pages on the Word Spy Web site (see the address below). If you'd like to try it out, send a note to listmanager at logophilia.com and include only the command "html wordspy" (without the quotation marks) in the Subject line. For more Word Spy words, see the Word Spy Archives: http://www.wordspy.com/ You are currently subscribed as rah at shipwright.com. To drop this address from the list, you have two choices: Send a message to listmanager at logophilia.com and include only the command "leave wordspy" (without the quotation marks) in the Subject line. Or, Use the following Web address: http://www.wordspy.com/list/remove.asp?Email=rah at shipwright.com&ID=26169 ======================================================== --- end forwarded text -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' From sfurlong at acmenet.net Thu May 1 04:05:11 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 07:05:11 -0400 Subject: Weather forecasts In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030501003537.02c9d7d8@idiom.com> References: <3EAE5294.7935CECD@cdc.gov> <5.1.1.6.2.20030501003537.02c9d7d8@idiom.com> Message-ID: <200305010705.11284.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Thursday 01 May 2003 03:37, Bill Stewart wrote: > Yup. > Weather forecasting in Ithaca New York was similarly simple. > "50% chance of rain today" (Or snow, in the winter...) Weather in Boston is so variable that the weathermen can't even forecast yesterday's weather. Don't like the springtime weather in the Adirondacks? Just wait an hour. (Barely a joke---a couple of weeks ago, we had a day hit almost 80F and the next day had an ice storm that brought down trees and power lines; some people were without power for four days, and this with nighttime lows around 10F. Then the days turned warm enough that the three to six inches of new snow and ice melted in a day or two. Sometimes I miss Arizona...) -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From mv at cdc.gov Thu May 1 07:11:59 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 07:11:59 -0700 Subject: text analysis Message-ID: <3EB12B2F.60101@cdc.gov> At 12:37 AM 5/1/03 -0700, Bill Stewart wrote: >At 12:09 AM 04/30/2003 -0500, Jim Choate wrote: >>On Tue, 29 Apr 2003, Major Variola (ret) wrote: >> >> > FWIW: There's a paragraph in the current _Science_ that mentions >> > "Winnow", a program by some .il researchers that guesses the sex of >> authors by their >> > writing. They claim 80% accuracy on general lit >> >>Perhaps impressive, perhaps not. What's the actual percentage ratio? I bet >>it's decidedly male. >> >> > and 74% accuracy on 30 science papers. >> >>Considering the known sex ration in science fields one can guess 'male' >>all the time and hit that level. > >Yup. >Weather forecasting in Ithaca New York was similarly simple. >"50% chance of rain today" (Or snow, in the winter...) Jeez Bill, I'd expect such cluelessness to be limited to JC.. Don't you think they'd pick their sample set to be more useful? If you're testing weather prediction algorithms then a desert is not a useful place. --- A stopped clock is right more often than one that runs fast (or slow) From mv at cdc.gov Thu May 1 07:29:54 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 07:29:54 -0700 Subject: NTSB can't explain Wellstone wetwork Message-ID: <3EB12F62.3050502@cdc.gov> NTSB: Wellstone Crash Cause Still Unknown MINNEAPOLIS - A faulty landing beacon at the Eveleth airport cannot fully explain why the plane carrying Sen. Paul Wellstone crashed last year, killing him and seven others, according to the National Transportation Safety Board (news - web sites ). http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030430/ap_on_go_co/brf_wellstone_crash_2 .... Privacy's been dead for 30 years because we can't risk it. The only privacy left is the inside of your head. You think we're the end of democracy? I think we're democracy's last hope. Jon Voight as Thomas Brian Reynolds, NSA ENEMY OF THE STATE From eresrch at eskimo.com Thu May 1 08:18:10 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 08:18:10 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Mike Hawash In-Reply-To: <20030501094846.F22466@cluebot.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 1 May 2003, Declan McCullagh wrote: > Tim, come now. He was able to have one phone call a week of up to ten > minutes (or something like that) with his lawyer. I'm SURE it wasn't > monitored. I'm SURE that was sufficient time to discuss legal strategy. > > Truly, your hostile comments do the hard working prosecutors at the > U.S. Department of Justice a grave disservice in their brave fight > against domestic terrorists. You're supposed to add the smily with that kind of comment. Someone might think you were serious, and Tim packs iron (that thows lead real fast)! Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From schear at attbi.com Thu May 1 08:25:10 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 08:25:10 -0700 Subject: Making Money in Digital Money In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030501075232.039c1da0@mail.attbi.com> At 06:19 PM 4/29/2003 -0400, R. A. Hettinga wrote: >-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- >Hash: SHA1 > >At 12:52 PM -0700 4/29/03, Bill Frantz wrote: > >This view of the Digital Silk Road is quite different from the one > >described in the paper, "The Digital Silk Road" by Norman Hardy and > >Eric Dean Tribble . > >However, Robert will enjoy the section, "No Junk Mail!". > >Fine. We'll call it the "original silk road". :-). > >It's Eric Hughes' sanctioned "piracy" distribution scheme, then. >Sorry if I thought they were one and the same. I attended Eric's July 1996 Defcon IV talk on what he called "Universal Piracy". He anticipated many of the potential problems with "recursive auctions" and assumed that most successful content creators would get their money through guarantors, like those that provide movie production investors "completion bonds." Creators would establish themselves by giving away content until they established a sufficient reputation that they could raise money prior to completion or even before commencement of a new work, product or product update. These ideas are now widely credited to J. Kelsey and B. Schneier from their 1998, Third USENIX Workshop on Electronic Commerce Proceedings paper, "The Street Performer Protocol" http://www.counterpane.com/street_performer.html, and later more widely publicized in a First Monday review article http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue6_6/rasch/. Eric refined his ideas at a Cypherpunks meeting that fall (the first one I attended) in his Berkeley house. Its too bad he never published his ideas and got the widespread credit he deserved. steve From declan at well.com Thu May 1 06:16:15 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:16:15 -0400 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: <78FEFA6E-7B33-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net>; from timcmay@got.net on Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 10:45:03AM -0700 References: <01a801c30f07$addc75c0$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> <78FEFA6E-7B33-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030501091615.A22466@cluebot.com> On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 10:45:03AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > I strongly disagree. And, fortunately, the First Amendment has none of > the language you apparently think is in it, the stuff about "lying" and > "political or financial gain." Yes. Falsely saying "I love you" is, last I checked, constitutionally protected. Political speech is by definition intended for political gain and courts have said that lies at the heart of the 1A. As for financial gain, the Supremes will have a chance to weigh in on this -- they heard oral arguments in the Nike case last week -- let's hope they do the right thing. -Declan From timcmay at got.net Thu May 1 09:17:58 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:17:58 -0700 Subject: Making Money in Digital Money In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <79610072-7BF0-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Thursday, May 1, 2003, at 07:44 AM, R. A. Hettinga wrote: > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > Hash: SHA1 > > At 10:58 PM -0700 4/30/03, Steve Schear wrote, at the end of a > rhapsody on amateurism: > >> I see no reason why important security, crypto or financial crypto >> developments must be linked with direct or immediate financial >> compensation. > > Guys, I'm not saying that people won't do cool stuff for free. I'm > saying that if actual markets emerge for that cool stuff, they'll > damn sure *not* do it for free anymore. > > Your exemplar, Einstein, last time I looked, was a *professional* > physicist most of his life. Why? Because various institutions could > hire him, and make money in research budgets, endowment increases, > etc. Einstein did his 1905-published work on special relativity outside of his paid job, which was examining patent applications for the Swiss government. This would be fully comparable to someone here doing his crypto or CP work while working as a drone (on something else) at Cisco or United Technologies. By the time he did his 1915-published work on general relativity, he had of course received various honorary position at universities. The issue is not that people like you or me or Steve or Einstein should not seek to be paid for our work (good if one can get it). The issue I raised, and that perhaps Steve is agreeing with partly, is that way too many people have had the "Hey kids, let's put on a _show_!" view of doing crypto and digital money startups. The script goes like this: -- have a vague idea that crypto, anonymity, geodesic blah blah, etc. is important -- see a few other companies (RSA, Verisign, ...) which have gone public and made their founders a lot of money (before the crash, of course) -- decide to "seek funding" -- without a specific technology or product already in hand! -- the plan being to raise the several millions (dreams of $30 million) and then hire a bunch of eager programmers and then figure out what, exactly, the product should do Well, this is a flawed "pre-business plan," to coin a phrase. We could spend hours discussing the particular circumstanced which allowed RSA to eventually succeed, what happened at ZKS (as the Adams note, still surviving, but in a dramatically different business), and so on and so forth. And Digicash. Suffice it to say I don't think there's _any_ chance that an MBA type can put together a funding package and _then_ develop a technology...not in this market. --Tim May "The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant." --John Stuart Mill From shaddack at ns.arachne.cz Thu May 1 00:27:41 2003 From: shaddack at ns.arachne.cz (Thomas Shaddack) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:27:41 +0200 (CEST) Subject: [speak-freely] SpeakFreely ParanoidPatch - update (fwd) Message-ID: The best way to celebrate the International Workers Day is work. Enjoy its fruit. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 07:41:15 +0200 (CEST) Subject: [speak-freely] SpeakFreely ParanoidPatch - update From: Thomas Shaddack To: speak-freely at fourmilab.ch New changes in my higher-security SpeakFreely patch for Linux. Location: http://213.246.91.154/patches/speakfreely/ Purpose: To make it more difficult for any adversaries (hackers, spies, hostile governments, forensic experts, Thinkpol, ...) to recover keys used in SpeakFreely communication. Keep in mind that current technologies allow capturing the entire encrypted conversation, storing it for unlimited time, and decrypting it later, after seizing the machine used as the endpoint and recovering the key stored there. Particularly important for high-tech high-surveillance low-freedom countries. News: SpeakFreely version 7.6a/Linux fully supported. Maintenance of the patch for version 7.5 abandoned. Option for locking memory against being swapped; useful for both preventing leakage of the keys to swap file, and for increasing performance in high-swapping low-memory situations. Possibility to read encryption keys from stdin; another process then can do the key handshake with the other side, then run sfspeaker and sfmike and feed them with the negotiated session key - possibly with different key for each direction. -H option, a more usual alias to -U (--help is now supported too). A little change, but convenient. Patches for manpages, so the new options are described there. Name sfParanoidPatch assigned to the project. In the older version (1.0): Support for reading key from a file Overwriting the key value if specified as a parameter, making it invisible for 'ps -ef' Support for executing a command immediately after running sfmike, eg. for unmounting encrypted loop from where the key was read Support for running under a specified UID and GID and in chroot jail, if launched as root; provides additional security hardening. Enjoy! :) * * * To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send E-mail containing the word "unsubscribe" in the message body (*not* as the Subject) to speak-freely-request at fourmilab.ch From rah at shipwright.com Thu May 1 06:31:33 2003 From: rah at shipwright.com (R. A. Hettinga) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:31:33 -0400 Subject: The Word Spy for 05/01/2003 -- ethnomathematics Message-ID: --- begin forwarded text From declan at well.com Thu May 1 06:36:28 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:36:28 -0400 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: <4C69C844-7A66-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net>; from timcmay@got.net on Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 10:16:21AM -0700 References: <4C69C844-7A66-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030501093628.B22466@cluebot.com> On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 10:16:21AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > Of course, the idea of reputation matters. And--Declan can correct me > or clarify things--newspapers and perhaps even reporters have > professional organizations and other "standards and practices" type of > seals of approval. Something like "This newspaper is a member of the > National Assocation for the Advancement of Uncolored Journalism," or > somesuch. > > Probably the Weekly World News ("Baby Eats Own Hand, Aliens Suspected") > would not be a member in good standing of the NAAUJ. Right. The ones I'm familiar with are the Society of Professional Journalists and the Online News Association. They have ethical codes their members pledge to adhere to. (In fact, this week is SPJ's national ethics week.) There's the Freedom Forum in Arlington, which serves a related role, and of course many publications have ombudsmen and permanent critics like FAIR and its conservative adversary, whose name I can't remember right now. Catching news organizations in errors is high sport for the competing network or cross-town newspaper. Remember the CNN/Time flap over Operation Tailwind? Professional organizations folks on this list may be familiar with (IEEE, ACM) seem to act like unions in many cases: They argue for protectionist laws, government licensing. Basically creating a cartel and raising barriers to entry. Fortunately, news organizations haven't gone in the same direction. -Declan From declan at well.com Thu May 1 06:39:42 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:39:42 -0400 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: <017401c30f03$86d30240$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk>; from DaveHowe@gmx.co.uk on Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 10:40:27AM +0100 References: <4C69C844-7A66-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net> <017401c30f03$86d30240$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> Message-ID: <20030501093942.C22466@cluebot.com> On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 10:40:27AM +0100, David Howe wrote: > They aren't *knowingly* lieing - that is the point. Church types > firmly believe hell exists, and only pestering a omnipotent and > omniscient being (who therefore already knows what they Are you sure that all "church types" are in it for the good of their faith? Not one preacher or evangelist, in the history of mankind, has secretly become an athiest but concludes: Hey, this is a pretty good gig; I'm going to lie... > Nope. but they should be prosecuted if they front-page splash it as > "earth doomed, we have two weeks to live, there is no hope" and fail > to mention that it is a religious prediction Prosecuted? Put in prison? What the hell are you thinking? > That is borderline. given that the accepted body of fact admits that > the Holocaust not only happened, but was pretty much as described by > the Jewish lobby, then any claims that it You're a bit of a censorial twit, aren't you? -Declan From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Thu May 1 06:42:13 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 09:42:13 -0400 Subject: Mike Hawash Message-ID: Neil Johnson wrote... "An "source" claims he/she "thought" he saw someone "maybe" fitting hawash's description "maybe" talking with the other guys at the hotel in China." Do you know where in China the hotel was? I'm assuming it was out by Afghanistan, in which case Hawash looked like practically everybody there: Western Xinjiang province is very Muslim (Tajiks, Uzbeks, Uigurs), with not too many Chinese (well, no Han Chinese...there may be some Hui Moslems out that far west). Half of the guys there will look like the Hawash picture they're floating these days (yeah, the one where he's wearing a beard and looking real scary...). FYI...the largest Mosque in the world is actually located in that area (Urumqi, maybe? Tashkent? I can't remember...) In other words, that's exceedingly flimsy evidence. -TD >From: Neil Johnson >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Mike Hawash >Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2003 06:21:50 -0500 > >I read the compliant. It is only 43 pages. > >Here's what I gathered. > >It was a quick read, and I fully expect and welcome comments, corrections, >and >opinions. > >Of course mixed between these claims is a bunch of stuff about the >activities >of the "Portland Six", but other than the few assertions below, there is no >direct evidence that Hawash committed any of the acts that the "Portland >Six" >did. > >Hawash - bought a parka and a backpack at REI. (ooooh, ominous). > >Hawash filed a quit claim transferring his house into his wife's name. > >(My dad, a consulting civil engineer, had the deed of our house put solely >in >my mother's name to protect against losing the house in a liability suit. >Hawash could have done it just because he was leaving the country and >didn't >want any issues in case of airplane accident, kidnapping, etc.) > >Hawash had his wife open a bank account in her name only and transferred >$5K >to it. > >($5K ?, Later they document that Hawash made around $320K in 2001, and >$180K >in 2002. Yeah, she could start a new life on that.) > >Hawash flew to China and returned to the US on exactly the same dates as >the >other guys. > >Hawash appears to have stayed in the same building as the other guys. >His and the other guy's lodging was in the same building, but different >hotels, and the hotel that Hawash had reservations to stay at doesn't have >a >record of him being there. > >(Okay, even this does look suspicious to me, but it's definitely seems a >little less than "beyond a reasonable doubt".) > >An "source" claims he/she "thought" he saw someone "maybe" fitting hawash's >description "maybe" talking with the other guys at the hotel in China. > >In searchs of the other guys houses, they found that one of the other guys >had >a business card with Hawash's phone number on it. Some of the other guys >had >Hawash's phone number also. > >One guy mowed Hawash's lawn. Hawash wrote a check for $105 to the guy that >mowed Hawash's lawn. > >The all attended the same Mosque in CA. > >"Neighbors" reported to the FBI that Hawash became withdrawn after the >September 11th attacks, changed his clothing style (From "Western" to >"Eastern"), grew a beard, and starting attending the mosque more regularly. > >(Gee, I saw a lot of press reports about an upsurge of people in the US >taking >their religious convictions more seriously and attending church more >regularly after the Sept 11th attacks, are they potential terrorists too >?). > >Hawash told others that he was going to China to pursue clients for his >software consulting practice. However, his home phone and cell-phone >records >show he made no phone calls to China in advance of his trip. > >(Hmmm, "negative evidence", that's a good one. Hellooooo, ever heard of >e-mail, snail-mail, or communication via intermediaries ?) > >Therefore, he MUST be guilty of conspiracy. > >Even the LE admits that they showed some pictures to one their "sources", >and >He/She didn't recognize Hawash's picture as being one of the "other guys". > >Be afraid. VERY afraid. > >-- >Neil Johnson >http://www.njohnsn.com >PGP key available on request. _________________________________________________________________ Tired of spam? Get advanced junk mail protection with MSN 8. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From declan at well.com Thu May 1 06:42:21 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:42:21 -0400 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: ; from shaddack@ns.arachne.cz on Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 11:09:29AM +0200 References: <04f1b0f3a7ccb7467379ba65cf308a57@dizum.com> Message-ID: <20030501094220.D22466@cluebot.com> On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 11:09:29AM +0200, Thomas Shaddack wrote: > If I speak for myself, the First Amendment applies. > > But should it apply even to corporations? Are such entities considered to > be persons? Should they have "rights"? How about Indymedia? How about a student newspaper collective? How about Slashdot and its editors? How about the New York Times' editorial page? -Declan From declan at well.com Thu May 1 06:42:58 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:42:58 -0400 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: <20030430142825.GB3480@cybershamanix.com>; from hseaver@cybershamanix.com on Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 09:28:25AM -0500 References: <04f1b0f3a7ccb7467379ba65cf308a57@dizum.com> <20030430142825.GB3480@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030501094258.E22466@cluebot.com> On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 09:28:25AM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > I don't believe that corporations do have rights, or at least they certainly > shouldn't. There is a case before the Supreme Court as we speak about whether > Nike has a right to freedom of speech. Hopefully they will say no, which would You need to actually read the case and understand what's at issue in it. -Declan From timcmay at got.net Thu May 1 09:48:20 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:48:20 -0700 Subject: Cheese-eating surrender monkeys In-Reply-To: <20030501100409.I22466@cluebot.com> Message-ID: On Thursday, May 1, 2003, at 07:04 AM, Declan McCullagh wrote: > On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 09:54:21PM +0100, Adam Back wrote: >> Similar vein is the apparent overnight animosity towards the French >> who happened to take a different view. It all comes down to this same >> blind following of leaders, and Bush's inane statements such as "if > > I think I'd largely agree with you about the bias in many news outlets. > > But as for the French: Well, a lot of Americans just don't like the > French, and it has nothing to do with Bush. I took a bottle of French > hard apple cider with me to a family gathering over Easter and got a > round of boos for it, even though that part of the family is pretty > evenly divided between GOP/Dems. > > I fully agree. Though I was, and am, against the war on grounds often discussed here, the French have once again behaved in a tacky way. Besides their ulterior motives (loans to Saddam, oil deals, want a piece of the pie), they are now behaving about as they behaved in 1940. "How many men does it take to defend Paris?" "Nobody knows...it's never been tried." "Why are there trees planted along the Champs-Elysee?" "So the Germans can march in the shade." "One million like-new rifles for sale...only been dropped once." The right-wing columnist Jonathan Goldberg dubbed them "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" several years ago, long before this latest matter. Has a great cadence, and it's accurate. Ever wonder why there are virtually no French folks on this list? A few Belgians, and the one guy who broke one of the crypto challenges in the mid-90s, though he was never much of a commentator on the list per se. But essentially zero French input. I was once invited to give a talk to "Imagina," a French-affiliated conference and trade show held in a ritzy (literally) hotel in Monte Carlo. I was on a panel with David Chaum and also gave a separate talk. I had a few days to talk to my French hosts and panel arrangers, and also to some French journalists. They were fascinated with the postmodern, deconstructionist, philosophical implications of crypto anarchy...and they loved throwing around references to Saussure, Foucault, and various other French lit-crit figures, but the thought of actually programming computers or building technology was, apparently, horrifying to them. No wonder there are no longer any well-known French computer companies...Matra has faded, Thompsen CSF is doing most of its real work in its affiliates and owned companies elsewhere. Finally, a personal story. I lived for more than a year on the French Riviera, in the town of Villefranche sur Mer, between Nice and Monte Carlo. A great experience. The beautiful Cap Ferrat, home to Somerset Maugham, David Niven, and, later, the Rolling Stones, was visible from my bedroom window. But the French people were describable with only one word: ingrates. More than a few times we had French people lecture us on what racists the Americans were...this even as their Algerian problem was all around us. And one old French lady said "We should take all of the Americans out in a boat and sink it." This was in 1964, just one generation after the loss of hundreds of thousands of American lives to liberate France and the rest of continental Europe. This was after the French had put up only token military resistance when the Germans rolled across their borders in 1940. American soldiers fought and died where the French would not. (Yeah, I know, they were all in "Le Resistance." Fatuous nonsense.) This is probably why so many French hated the Americans so much, in a way the Germans and Austrians and Italians did not. The Americans defeated the Axis fair and square and the Germans knew this. They were occupied by the conquering force for several years and moved on with their lives, restarting their once-impressive economy and returning to the forefront of nations. Except for the Nazi atrocities, with a fair amount of honor left. The French, on the other hand, showed no honor. And so they resented and despised the Americans for doing what they themselves were unwilling to do. Fuck them. Again, I was and still am against "foreign entanglements" and "pre-emptive wars," but if there's one good thing that comes out of this war it's that the French are getting their comeuppance. Not only are their loans to Iraq never likely to be repaid, but they are clearly utterly out in the cold on the "rebuilding of Iraq" and on future oil deals. The cheese-eating surrender monkeys are now wining [SIC] that they should be "included" in the aftermath of the war, that they should at least be allow to send in literary theorists to explain the existential significance of the war for the Iraqi people. --Tim May From declan at well.com Thu May 1 06:48:46 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:48:46 -0400 Subject: Mike Hawash In-Reply-To: <507C8598-7AB0-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net>; from timcmay@got.net on Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 07:06:11PM -0700 References: <20030429204451.C25473@cluebot.com> <507C8598-7AB0-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030501094846.F22466@cluebot.com> On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 07:06:11PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > Don't forget the copy of the Koran they found when the ninjas raided > his house. That alone justified the holding without charges, without > bail, without access to a lawyer. Habeas Corpus never recovered from Tim, come now. He was able to have one phone call a week of up to ten minutes (or something like that) with his lawyer. I'm SURE it wasn't monitored. I'm SURE that was sufficient time to discuss legal strategy. Truly, your hostile comments do the hard working prosecutors at the U.S. Department of Justice a grave disservice in their brave fight against domestic terrorists. -Declan From sunder at sunder.net Thu May 1 06:49:25 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:49:25 -0400 (edt) Subject: Quarantines may be justified In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Ah, perhaps there is hope for you yet. Perhaps you're starting to read an entire message before just doing a knee-jerk reply. Perhaps I should read more of your posts again. Too bad you replied to this before reading it and realizing it... but there's hope... ChoateReputationCapital++ ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ <--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Wed, 30 Apr 2003, Jim Choate wrote: > You know, I keep thinking you've said the stupidest thing ever. And then > you say something else. From declan at well.com Thu May 1 06:52:53 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:52:53 -0400 Subject: Mike Hawash In-Reply-To: ; from sunder@sunder.net on Thu, May 01, 2003 at 09:58:01AM -0400 References: <200304300621.50434.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> Message-ID: <20030501095252.G22466@cluebot.com> On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 09:58:01AM -0400, Sunder wrote: > As for the hotel not having a record of him, it could be they misplaced > it, or more likely misspelled his name, etc, or he didn't want to be > tracked so he used Mike Smith... Also keep in mind that the evidence against Hawash re: his China trip largely came from Chinese government functionaries, who as we know from SARS are reliable exemplars of truthtelling at all times. -Declan From declan at well.com Thu May 1 06:55:04 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:55:04 -0400 Subject: Mike Hawash In-Reply-To: ; from sunder@sunder.net on Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 12:24:30PM -0400 References: <00B000C5-7B33-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030501095504.H22466@cluebot.com> On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 12:24:30PM -0400, Sunder wrote: > What trail? You think "Mike" will ever see the light of day? If there's > going to be a trial it will be in secret - by a kangaroo shadow court, and > it will be classified. If he's found innocent, then he'll probably be Actually, the judge seems better than many other members of the federal judiciary. Unlike other "material witness" cases in which judges permitted prisoners to be held for over a year without a trial, the judge gave the DOJ a deadline (this week) to decide what to do with Hawash. Well, now we know. -Declan From sunder at sunder.net Thu May 1 06:58:01 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:58:01 -0400 (edt) Subject: Mike Hawash In-Reply-To: <200304300621.50434.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> Message-ID: Not that I've been there, but the last I heard, China was still an almost totalitarian communist state and free travel in China is not possible. In all likelyhood the hotel he stayed at is one where all westerners stay. It's also possible that airline schedules being what they are provided reasons for the same day arrival departure coincidences. As for the hotel not having a record of him, it could be they misplaced it, or more likely misspelled his name, etc, or he didn't want to be tracked so he used Mike Smith... Many things are possible, not all have to be true. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ <--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Wed, 30 Apr 2003, Neil Johnson wrote: > Hawash flew to China and returned to the US on exactly the same dates as the > other guys. > > Hawash appears to have stayed in the same building as the other guys. > His and the other guy's lodging was in the same building, but different > hotels, and the hotel that Hawash had reservations to stay at doesn't have a > record of him being there. From barabbus at hushmail.com Thu May 1 10:00:24 2003 From: barabbus at hushmail.com (barabbus at hushmail.com) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 10:00:24 -0700 Subject: Time for a New New Deal Message-ID: <200305011700.h41H0P1G048713@mailserver3.hushmail.com> Someone has now created a set of playing cards for a US regime change. These are people the cards' authors would like to remove from power. The set includes mostly people heading corporations, as well as government officials and the Supreme Court judges who made Bush president. See the deck here http://www.gatt.org/regime/ Regime change begins at home! Concerned about your privacy? Follow this link to get FREE encrypted email: https://www.hushmail.com/?l=2 Big $$$ to be made with the HushMail Affiliate Program: https://www.hushmail.com/about.php?subloc=affiliate&l=427 From declan at well.com Thu May 1 07:04:09 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 10:04:09 -0400 Subject: patriotism considered evil In-Reply-To: <20030430215421.A8373912@exeter.ac.uk>; from adam@cypherspace.org on Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 09:54:21PM +0100 References: <20030430071750.A8384419@exeter.ac.uk> <20030430215421.A8373912@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <20030501100409.I22466@cluebot.com> On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 09:54:21PM +0100, Adam Back wrote: > Similar vein is the apparent overnight animosity towards the French > who happened to take a different view. It all comes down to this same > blind following of leaders, and Bush's inane statements such as "if I think I'd largely agree with you about the bias in many news outlets. But as for the French: Well, a lot of Americans just don't like the French, and it has nothing to do with Bush. I took a bottle of French hard apple cider with me to a family gathering over Easter and got a round of boos for it, even though that part of the family is pretty evenly divided between GOP/Dems. -Declan From mv at cdc.gov Thu May 1 10:04:48 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 10:04:48 -0700 Subject: publishing nastygrams, chilling effects, placenta as bhong Message-ID: <3EB153B0.7040700@cdc.gov> http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/zetapicts1.html has an amusing nastygram from lawyers who threaten for even posting their threatening letter. They also whine about copyright violation for good measure. Of course, in doing so, they make their actions newsworthy, as well as making newsworthy the contested photos of a woman giving her fetus nicotine. .... Bluffs will be published if comical but otherwise ignored. -JY From sunder at sunder.net Thu May 1 07:05:22 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 10:05:22 -0400 (edt) Subject: Making Money in Digital Money In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Why would Bob be unable to strip off all signatures, process the sound file to whiten off any watermarking and re-sell it without authentication signatures under another nym with it's own reputation? What would stop Bob from turning the sound file into a plain .ogg or .mp3 with no signatures and reselling millions of copies for 1/1000th the cost, or even for free. Or have Bob be the front of a pool of purchasers who couldn't pay Alice her fees on their own, so they each chip in 1/100th of the cost? Why would Bob's "clients" care if the cost was low enough, or just casually traded? Perhaps using music as a model isn't so wise. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ <--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Wed, 30 Apr 2003, zem wrote: > Alice the music critic buys copies of new content at relatively high > prices from the creator, or close sources. When Bob requests a copy of > a particular file, Alice encrypts it to Bob's public key and signs the > encrypted copy, selling him this 'reviewed' copy for reproduction cost + > profit. Bob can verify he's received a good copy, but he can't > redistribute Alice's reviewed version without revealing his secret key. From sunder at sunder.net Thu May 1 07:08:16 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 10:08:16 -0400 (edt) Subject: VANGUARD: May Day (fwd) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: ChoateReputationCapital-=100 (for positing pro communist spam.) ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ <--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Thu May 1 07:15:19 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 10:15:19 -0400 Subject: Factoring progress (was: RE: All trust is economics) Message-ID: > Eric Cordian[SMTP:emc at artifact.psychedelic.net] wrote: > > Is anyone even working on factoring any more? How long has it been since > the last RSA Challenge number was factored? Seems like aeons. > > RSA-160 was factored only a month ago. This is a 530 bit number. The effort appears comparable to that for the previous 512-bit challenge (much quicker due to advances in hardware over the intervening four years). RSA-160 is one of the old series of challenges, which carried piddling prizes, and were dropped by RSA a few years ago. As a result, Franke's team did not receive a prize from RSA. The newer challenges (see http://www.rsasecurity.com/rsalabs/challenges/) carry more substantial prizes, ranging from $10,000 (RSA-576) to $200,000 (RSA-2048). Note that the labling has changed - the old series denoted challenges by the number of digits in the decimal representation of the moduli. The new series uses the number of binary bits. So, old RSA-160 would be about equivalent to new RSA-530. Peter Trei ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- http://www.loria.fr/~zimmerma/records/rsa160 From sunder at sunder.net Thu May 1 07:20:33 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 10:20:33 -0400 (edt) Subject: Making Money in Digital Money In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Really they are? If Joe P2P User wants to hear a Metallica song, does he really give a shit who signed it and said it was authentic? Is it the signature or the song what he's after? Go find some P2P users and ask them. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ <--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Thu, 1 May 2003, zem wrote: > > So Bob either redistributes the decrypted bits, or cruises through > > the analog hole. Game over. All your Valentis are belong to us. > > Point is Bob can't redistribute the file with Alice's approval rating > still intact. And it's the approval rating that people are paying her > for, not the content. Bob can't redistribute the profitable part, only > the worthless part. From timcmay at got.net Thu May 1 10:30:32 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 10:30:32 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <9C7A5BF2-7BFA-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Thursday, May 1, 2003, at 09:20 AM, Vincent Penquerc'h wrote: > Odd. What you said is pretty close to what I was saying (or maybe > thinking), apart from the fact that I see property as a tool to > reach a goal (of a better life), and you seem to see it as an end > in itself. All the examples you cited are "trying to live a better > life", and there's nothing wrong with that as long as it doesn't > make another person's life worse. Two people start businesses in the same town. Alice works hard, works long hours, concentrates on her business. Bob fails to do this. Alice drives Bob out of business. One can play word games about whether it was Alice's actions, or Bob's actions, or what the meaning of "drive out of business" and "make another person's life worse" is. I would not say Alice made Bob's life worse: Bob may be financially back at zero, but Bob has maybe been taught a good lesson. And if not, capitalism is the process of creative destructionism, as Schumpeter said. Fact is, life is a series of economic and territorial struggles. Some succeed, many fail. What strong crypto will do is create a system where more and more of the wealth is in the hands of the most competent and hard-working. Evading confiscation of income, creation of perpetual trusts, bypassing national borders...all of this works against the unwashed masses and their schemes for income redistribution. For those of you on this on this list who have not figured this out already, well, there's a place for fellow travelers and useful idiots. > --Tim May "He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -- Nietzsche From rah at shipwright.com Thu May 1 07:44:50 2003 From: rah at shipwright.com (R. A. Hettinga) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 10:44:50 -0400 Subject: Making Money in Digital Money In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030430222544.033965c8@mail.attbi.com> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030430092307.009d1910@pop.ix.netcom.com> <5.2.0.9.0.20030430092307.009d1910@pop.ix.netcom.com> <5.2.1.1.0.20030430222544.033965c8@mail.attbi.com> Message-ID: -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 At 10:58 PM -0700 4/30/03, Steve Schear wrote, at the end of a rhapsody on amateurism: >I see no reason why important security, crypto or financial crypto >developments must be linked with direct or immediate financial >compensation. Guys, I'm not saying that people won't do cool stuff for free. I'm saying that if actual markets emerge for that cool stuff, they'll damn sure *not* do it for free anymore. Your exemplar, Einstein, last time I looked, was a *professional* physicist most of his life. Why? Because various institutions could hire him, and make money in research budgets, endowment increases, etc. To bring this back to digital money then, creating a market, a market for internet-delivered digital goods and services in this case, is all bound up with transaction cost. It's literally too expensive to move the money across the net in direct exchange for bits, so people exchange those bits for other things, like, say grins, for lack of a better word. :-). Right now, to pay for things over the net, even digital goods and services, we literally send *signals*, instructions, to move money somewhere *off* of the net: cryptographically tunneling credit card instructions, or ACH records, for instance. Even PayPal really happens off the net, and increasingly so -- try to *pay* money from a PayPal account that's unlinked to a bank account or credit card sometime. The gold transaction systems are getting closer, to the extent that transactions execute, clear, and settle on a machine on the net, even though at least one of those requires is-a-person identity. Paradoxically, if PayPal were to allow "cul-de-sac" accounts, accounts where people couldn't move money in and out of PayPal, but were able to buy and sell stuff in PayPal nonetheless, with a simple account/password, you'd be closer. e-Gold has done this for most of a decade, now. It won't be until we have the ability to get paid, and to be paid -- and, frankly, to invest and earn a return -- all without *ever* needing recourse to off-net settlement that transaction costs will fall. The ultimate form of that, and I would claim the cheapest, will be transactions using internet bearer financial cryptography protocols. You put money that's cheap enough to pay for bits as they come down the wire, and watch the world change. Cheers, RAH -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGP 8.0 - not licensed for commercial use: www.pgp.com iQA/AwUBPrEywcPxH8jf3ohaEQKmZQCaAhRnMw1mQejoDdoSTOV96Run+7kAnR+R 1UACtp1C944MEZhs0LMPvbM2 =U0kp -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Thu May 1 08:02:58 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 11:02:58 -0400 Subject: China (was Mike Hawash) Message-ID: Sunder wrote... "Not that I've been there, but the last I heard, China was still an almosttotalitarian communist state and free travel in China is not possible." Your information is almost staggeringly out of date. Even in the late 1980s when I lived in China it was easy to move about freely (well, easy isn't quite the right word when you couldn't book any rail tickets remotely or in advance!). Now of course, things are even more "free". As for "totalitarian communist state", there's not much communist left about it, except for the name of the ruling party. Right now, most of mainland China is about as capitalist as you can get, with the Army one of the biggest capitalist enterprises around (in the early 90s the central government informed the army they were going to have to find a way to raise money to pay a lot of their own bills!). As for the totalitarianism part,as long as you don't complain too loudly about the government, you're fine for the most part (particularly if you have lots of $$$). (Although every now and then Jong Nan Hai will decide to crack down on something and you may come under fire.) If you want to call it "totalitarian", fine. But like all western terms applied to China, its relevance only has a very limited meaning. -TD >From: Sunder >To: Neil Johnson >CC: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Mike Hawash >Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 09:58:01 -0400 (edt) > >Not that I've been there, but the last I heard, China was still an almost >totalitarian communist state and free travel in China is not possible. In >all likelyhood the hotel he stayed at is one where all westerners >stay. It's also possible that airline schedules being what they are >provided reasons for the same day arrival departure coincidences. > >As for the hotel not having a record of him, it could be they misplaced >it, or more likely misspelled his name, etc, or he didn't want to be >tracked so he used Mike Smith... > >Many things are possible, not all have to be true. > >----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- > + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ > \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ ><--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ > /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ > + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. >--------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ > >On Wed, 30 Apr 2003, Neil Johnson wrote: > > > Hawash flew to China and returned to the US on exactly the same dates as >the > > other guys. > > > > Hawash appears to have stayed in the same building as the other guys. > > His and the other guy's lodging was in the same building, but different > > hotels, and the hotel that Hawash had reservations to stay at doesn't >have a > > record of him being there. _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Thu May 1 08:06:47 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 11:06:47 -0400 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: References: <04f1b0f3a7ccb7467379ba65cf308a57@dizum.com> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030501110228.0455cec0@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 11:09 AM 4/30/03 +0200, Thomas Shaddack wrote: ... >I suggest an "eye test". If it is theoretically possible to talk with it >eye-to-eye[1], then the Constitution applies. If it isn't possible to talk >with it without a proxy person - a CEO, a spokesperson, etc. - no "higher >rights" apply. So, if I have a right to free speech, and so do you, why would a voluntary association we formed together not have it? And what impact would that have on the ability of people like you and me to actually get our ideas out there? What happens when some media are so expensive that they're virtually never owned by a single person--does that mean laws can regulate what they are and aren't allowed to say? >A non-personal entity should be considered to voluntarily give up its >"right" to existence by an act of knowingly lying. A death penalty - the >entity liquidation - should swiftly follow. So if I want to destroy Intel, all I have to do is get one provocateur into their PR department, to issue a press release that says "The sky is green"? --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Thu May 1 08:10:53 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 11:10:53 -0400 Subject: Anonglish (was: Re: Authenticating Meat) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030501110756.045598b0@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 08:41 AM 4/30/03 -0400, Sunder wrote: >According to Schneier doing this is a bad idea - (or so I recall from the >A.P. book which I've not reread in quite a while - I may be wrong) if you >use the same (or similar) cypher. i.e.: > >blowfish(blowfish(plaintext,key1),key2) is bad, Nope. As long as key1 and key2 are independent, this can't make things worse if the cipher is any good. Suppose there is no attack on blowfish(plaintext,key1), but there is an attack on blowfish(blowfish(plaintext,key1),key2) when the two keys are independent. As an attacker, you automatically get an attack on blowfish(plaintext,key1) from this, by just choosing a random key2, encrypting the ciphertext from single-blowfish with that key, and then forgetting key2 and applying your attack on double-blowfish. --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 From Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk Thu May 1 03:42:32 2003 From: Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk (Vincent Penquerc'h) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 11:42:32 +0100 Subject: Quarantines may be justified Message-ID: > While we're at it, there should be a law against noisy kids playing Why is it that many people here get red faced whenever someone hints at their private property and can't even imagine that some people might have a slightly different view of the world they're in ? Why do you want private property ? You want it because it helps you live a better life, basically. So I'll pass the ownership of land (as it's a dumb concept but unfortunately unavoidable to enable the ownership of immobile goods (like what's built upon it)), so property rights are just a visible barrier people put between them and others. It makes perfect sense to imagine this barrier having a different geometry for other people. I, for one, am very annoyed at people who take a bath in perfume and seem to have destroyed their nose doing it for their lifetime. Anyway, the whole thing is trying to live a better life through a mix of interaction with others and separation from others. And property rights is just a way to attain this. Someone needn't start tinkering with your owned stuff to interact with you, be it in a way you like or not. Property rights are only a part of the notional barrier, which is really the barrier of where others' freedom stops and yours begin. And it's a fuzzy barrier at best. Property rights are just an attempt at codifying it, and not perfect, though sufficient in a variety of ways. And to get back to this moronic argument that says "if you don't like smoke, don't go downwind", have you fucking considered that maybe I *didn't* go downwind, but the fucking smoker went upwind of where I was ? -- Vincent Penquerc'h From sunder at sunder.net Thu May 1 08:47:49 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 11:47:49 -0400 (edt) Subject: Quarantines may be justified In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Fine, I'll take on your arguement. Humans want private property because of the kind of creatures that we are. We want homes, not just for shelter but as an extension of our identities. This is why people decorate their homes. Decorations don't serve as something to prevent exposure to extreme weather. Nor do they provide food, food storage, food preparation, or a place to sleep. They provide entertainment - which we own. We own appliances not for their decorative abilities - though you could if you wanted to - i.e. chrome retro toasters and such, but for their ability to help us store/prepare our food, or keep our clothes clean. We own radio's, TV's VCR's, DVD players, stereos, etc. because they entertain us when we are bored. These things are all property. Few people in modern countries would give these items up to live in a tent. But say you do live in a tent, at that point, the tent is your property and is of immense value as are clothes and tools - they help your survival. Would you give them up? Only if you didn't need them (for instance you might have had spares.) Land also serves as a property - there are many other creatures who are territorial and also view the places of their shelters as their property. Birds build nests, etc... cats (large and small) as well as dogs and other canines mark their territory. This is something that is instinctual and with it comes the concept of "This is mine, I will protect it to keep it" and so on. If you're going to try and argue against property ownership, try taking a t-bone from the mouth of a big dog. Also for example, my dad's dog likes to play property games too. If I shake a plastic bag or a piece of paper around, he'll come over a grab it and hold on to it. He won't let go of it until I let go of it. He let's it drop to the floor - if I try to take it off the floor, he puts his paw on it, and if I continue, he'll bite to protect it. Dogs understand property. So do cats. Ever have a cat rub it's head on you? It's not showing affection, it's just marking you as it's property. All of this predates laws, governments and even modern humans. Property becomes an extension or a tool of the individual. Birds nests for example, and Bowers which don't serve as a shelter - but more as art intended to attract female bower birds for mating, etc. Once you start from there, private property makes sense, and is no longer in question - except if you're a Marxist/communist which goes against this ingrained relationship to property and therefore is doomed to fail. Private ownership of land is no different. Some peoples don't have this concept, they are nomads, but like it or not, they too must live off the land. Afer all, their either hunt or plant vegetation or both. For the time, the land is under their care. They may move on frequently and not attach themselves to it, but there is always a camp, or a caravan or something that is property. Now, the original arguement was about smoking and being up or downwind from someone's cigarette. It was on the street - something which is considered non-private property or the commons. Being exposed forcibly to second hand smoke was the gripe, and banishment of the act of exposing others to second hand smoke by the law in places such as Pubs and restaurants was the core of the arguement. At some point, Harmon chimed in with the idiotic idea that all smoking should be banned on public streets because he hates walking behind someone who is smoking. But this is an issue of the commons. One is free to simply be elsewhere. Another street, another side of the street, another city, or even one's property. One is not forced to breathe another's exhaust. While on the street, it's not your property, and hence you can't declare that the guy infront of you must stop smoking because he's violating your property rights so long as you can move out of the way of that smoke. You're also welcome to wear gas masks or whatever (let's ignore the fact that the cops will think you a suspect for something for the sake of the arguement.) Point is that street, and that air is not your property, it's shared property - and hence not subject to your whims, likes and distates, but upto the community to decide its usage. If a large enough population who uses said street wishes to smoke there, then the whims of a small minority of who are offended by second hand smoke should not force the rules to be changed. As to why some people get red faced when private property gets mentioned, it's very simple: the ones mentioning it are usually the ones interested in taking it away (read theft.) For example: communists, socialists, fascists, dictators and totalitarians in every form, cultists, and mobsters. Some may believe in thir professed (and flawed) ideals, but in the end, they are governed by greed or are making the way for those who are governed by greed to steal said private property. Especially when they claim such gems as private ownership of imovable items such as land or what's built on them is senseless. Tell that to countries, states, cities, neighborhoods and so forth. It's after all, not just about trying to live a better life. It's true that trying to live a better life is a huge goal. Hence, the grass is always greener on the other side. But it's mainly about property, not everyone gets the concept - until they actually live in a commune (or under a totalitarian regime) and find out first hand why it doesn't work. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ <--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Thu, 1 May 2003, Vincent Penquerc'h wrote: > > While we're at it, there should be a law against noisy kids playing > > Why is it that many people here get red faced whenever someone > hints at their private property and can't even imagine that some > people might have a slightly different view of the world they're > in ? > > Why do you want private property ? You want it because it helps > you live a better life, basically. So I'll pass the ownership of > land (as it's a dumb concept but unfortunately unavoidable to > enable the ownership of immobile goods (like what's built upon > it)), so property rights are just a visible barrier people put > between them and others. > > It makes perfect sense to imagine this barrier having a different > geometry for other people. I, for one, am very annoyed at people > who take a bath in perfume and seem to have destroyed their nose > doing it for their lifetime. > > Anyway, the whole thing is trying to live a better life through > a mix of interaction with others and separation from others. And > property rights is just a way to attain this. Someone needn't > start tinkering with your owned stuff to interact with you, be it > in a way you like or not. Property rights are only a part of the > notional barrier, which is really the barrier of where others' > freedom stops and yours begin. And it's a fuzzy barrier at best. > Property rights are just an attempt at codifying it, and not > perfect, though sufficient in a variety of ways. > > > And to get back to this moronic argument that says "if you don't > like smoke, don't go downwind", have you fucking considered that > maybe I *didn't* go downwind, but the fucking smoker went upwind > of where I was ? > > > -- > Vincent Penquerc'h From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 1 09:50:14 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 11:50:14 -0500 Subject: Quarantines may be justified In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030501165014.GA6815@cybershamanix.com> On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 11:47:49AM -0400, Sunder wrote: > > Point is that street, and that air is not your property, it's shared > property - and hence not subject to your whims, likes and distates, but > upto the community to decide its usage. If a large enough population who > uses said street wishes to smoke there, then the whims of a small minority > of who are offended by second hand smoke should not force the rules to > be changed. > You've got it exactly backwards -- it's only a small (and decreasing as well) portion of the population that smokes, and it's the majority who don't want to breath the second-hand smoke. That's why the mayor of NYC is able to get away with banning smoking in bars and restaurants. Get over it -- public smoking is going to be banned everywhere, plenty of cities have already banned it in restaurants, public buildings, etc. It's only a matter of time before it's also banned on the street, and there are already proposed laws being considered to do just that. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From sunder at sunder.net Thu May 1 08:55:53 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 11:55:53 -0400 (edt) Subject: patriotism considered evil In-Reply-To: <20030501100409.I22466@cluebot.com> Message-ID: You should have asked them if they thought we should return The Statue of Liberty back to France. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :NSA got $20Bil/year |Passwords are like underwear. You don't /|\ \|/ :and didn't stop 9-11|share them, you don't hang them on your/\|/\ <--*-->:Instead of rewarding|monitor, or under your keyboard, you \/|\/ /|\ :their failures, we |don't email them, or put them on a web \|/ + v + :should get refunds! |site, and you must change them very often. --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Thu, 1 May 2003, Declan McCullagh wrote: > But as for the French: Well, a lot of Americans just don't like the > French, and it has nothing to do with Bush. I took a bottle of French > hard apple cider with me to a family gathering over Easter and got a > round of boos for it, even though that part of the family is pretty > evenly divided between GOP/Dems. From emc at artifact.psychedelic.net Thu May 1 12:54:10 2003 From: emc at artifact.psychedelic.net (Eric Cordian) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 12:54:10 -0700 (PDT) Subject: The Holocaust (sm) (tm) In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030501133840.02073b50@mail.well.com> Message-ID: <200305011954.h41JsAPJ008470@artifact.psychedelic.net> Declan writes: > The problem is that if you create a rule that can be used to imprison the > Holocaust deniers (a loathsome sort, I agree), it can be used to jail those > who challenge the conventional orthodoxy, even if they believe they're > right. More to the point, even if they *are* right. The Holocaust has undergone a great deal of evolution over the years. I remember in the post-war years, that Jewish suffering during the war was a taboo subject. The Jews were horribly ashamed of it, and never spoke about it, and the most important thing people would tell their kids when visiting a Jewish family was, "Don't mention the war." The "great holocaust of the Jews" is actually a bit of prophecy from ancient times. Any big famine, flood, earthquake, or other major disaster over the years, which claimed many Jewish victims, was suspected of being this event. When massive attrition of European Jews happened during World War II, the holocaust meme merged with real events, and "The Holocaust" was born, and after many decades of concerted trademark-building now has name recognition right up there with the biggies like "Microsoft" and "Intel." The Holocaust justifies Israel's thuggery, extorts gold from Switzerland, and rationalizes Draconian anti-free speech laws throughout most of Europe. As the constantly varying repository of both true World War II lore, and wild rumors that have not yet been proven completely bogus, the Holocaust is its own operational definition, and tautologically incapable of being "denied." During the early 90's, the Holocaust came under a fairly severe attack by scholars, and was only salvaged by a quick purge of obvious nonsense by the Jewish Community, like soap, lampshades, and gas chambers at Treblenka. The Holocaust demonstrates that people will believe pretty much anything, if you dig up mass graves, and push the bodies around with bulldozers while speaking. And in a world where people are so easily made to believe that Saddam ordered 9/11, and that Al Queda was a Baghdad operation, the belief that 6 million Jews were herded into showers with gas-enabled nozzles naturally follows. It should be noted that even Steven Spielberg, when making the definitive motion picture about the Holocaust, cut himself ample historical waffle room by not showing a single Jew being gassed in a specific identifiable location. He contented himself with showing Jews nervously looking at smoke rising from buildings, being separated into groups, and experiencing anxiety based on rumors they had heard as to whether water would really come out of the shower heads. Regardless of what future historians decide is the truth about how many were gassed, and at which camps, Spielberg's legacy as not having made a fool of himself is assured. The term "Holocaust Denier" is hurled at anyone who questions even the most absurd insigificant detail of the historical record as approved and promulgated by the ADL. Much as the term "anti-Semite" is hurled at anyone who dares to suggest that some people who happen to be Jewish might act collectively in their own enlightened self-interest, or that Israel shouldn't run over peace activists with bulldozers, and then smirk about it later. The Holocaust has had some surprising victories in court, mostly because the Jewish community has spent millions goading and baiting a few high profile individuals who criticized it, and then used anti-semitic remarks deliberately provoked and elicited after whatever adademic work they were targeting was written, to smear the author in court. David Irving comes to mind here. "Holocaust Denier" is the neoconservative catch phrase for those critically examining the historical record and Jewish political meddling, just as "advocating the right of adults to have sex with children" is the catch phrase for all criticism of right wing sex and porn laws, and "Who is more dangerous to world peace, George Bush or Sadam Hussein?" is the catch phrase used to harpoon anyone who criticizes the invasion of Iraq and the Neoconservative World Order. When I hear someone being called a "Holocaust Denier", my reaction is not to think of that person as "loathsome", but rather to ask who is attacking them with an agenda. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law" From shaddack at ns.arachne.cz Thu May 1 04:08:39 2003 From: shaddack at ns.arachne.cz (Thomas Shaddack) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 13:08:39 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Quarantines may be justified In-Reply-To: <20030430170156.GA3592@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 30 Apr 2003, Harmon Seaver wrote: > "merely annoy"? Excessive noise, or smoke, or chemical pollutants are not > mere annoyances, they are detrimental to health and safety and are physical > assaults, and anyone has a moral right, at least, to use force to protect > themselves from such. IMHO, long-term psychical stress, so common in raging capitalism with nonexistent or weak safety nets - worrying about keeping/losing/finding job, fear of a longer-term illness that would cause you to lose job and medical insurance - has much worse effect than occassional exposure to low levels of chemical contaminations or not-really-that-loud[1] sounds. We often forget about psychological stress, resulting from the quest for higher and higher "effectivity" and other factors of Holy Capitalism, when evaluating situations. Communism was nothing starry, but when you kept your mouth shut up, you had time for yourself, for your family. My dad was "nationalizing" electronics parts for me, from his workplace, which helped (or maybe caused) me to learn electronics. Many things were available without having to pay for them, which lowered barriers to entry. Hightech books were cheaper. Schools had clubs for students with interests - chemistry, electronics, computers - the Regime needed to breed the next generation of skilled workers. It had a lot of drawbacks as well - lack of material wealth was the most notable one - but it wasn't overly difficult to partially compensate; you just had to be able to do things yourself. >From sewing clothes - if you were dissatisfied with what was available in stores, you got cloth and a sewing machine and made something yourself - to electronics. If you were able to repair things - TVs, electroinstallations, plumbing - you were widely in demand and you had privileged access to scarce goods[2] for exchange for your services. Virtually everyone was a member of this "gray" economy; what you knew was more important for your real social position than what you owned. People were more creative - it was making life more comfortable. These skills are vanishing as more and more people rely on money than on their own improvisation skills instead. The cities were gray and dull - but I sometimes doubt if a genuine grayness wasn't better than faked and empty cheery colors of mass-produced advertising flooding the cities now. People had time to read books; today they usually return from the job late, too tired for anything more challenging than plopping down in front of a TV. The unhappiness and resulting escapism mirrors in increased demand for drugs and amusement industry, quick and low-efforts ways to "get out". There was escapism before as well - but it was generally more creative; cottaging was very common, together with numerous kinds of other hobbies. The change from active to passive leisure activities, the turn from doing to consuming, disturbs me a lot. Remarkable percentage of local population thinks fondly about the Old Days where there was no rat-race, when you didn't live in fear you will get a pink slip, when you didn't have to worry about day to day income. Easy availability of material wealth or the freedom to travel has low relevance when you can't afford it, nor when you have no time and energy to actually enjoy it. And the pace is increasing. We are all the galleymen, rowing for the corporations owning increasing chunks of our time, and their drums get faster every year. The Revolution happened, the situation changed. I want to believe it is a good thing. But by far not every change was good. The local population is much more stressed out now... [1] A jet plane taking off next to you is a really-that-loud sound. A car stereo isn't. [2] back then, there were periods of scarcity of various goods. Once it was toilet paper. Naturally, jokes appeared. Hope I translated the following sample correctly: A man meets his friend on the street. His friend carries two bags full of rolls of toilet paper. "Where did you buy them?" "I didn't buy them. I got them from dry cleaning." From wmo at rebma.pro-ns.net Thu May 1 11:12:56 2003 From: wmo at rebma.pro-ns.net (Bill O'Hanlon) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 13:12:56 -0500 Subject: Quarantines may be justified In-Reply-To: <20030501165014.GA6815@cybershamanix.com> References: <20030501165014.GA6815@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030501181256.GA23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 11:50:14AM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Get over it -- public smoking is going to be banned everywhere, plenty of > cities have already banned it in restaurants, public buildings, etc. It's only a > matter of time before it's also banned on the street, and there are already > proposed laws being considered to do just that. And because the majority (or the state) is for it, it must be right? Admit it: you're a statist when it suits you. Why are you here? -Bill From rah at shipwright.com Thu May 1 10:34:21 2003 From: rah at shipwright.com (R. A. Hettinga) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 13:34:21 -0400 Subject: Making Money in Digital Money In-Reply-To: <79610072-7BF0-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <79610072-7BF0-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 At 9:17 AM -0700 5/1/03, Tim May wrote: >The issue I >raised, and that perhaps Steve is agreeing with partly, is that way >too many people have had the "Hey kids, let's put on a _show_!" >view of doing crypto and digital money startups. Actually, we're talking about markets for digital goods, copies of bits that have been made already. Or digital services, selling opinions, or telesurgery, or whatever, and whether people would make new bits for free if there was a market for those bits already. The fact that you can sell them, means that you won't do them for free, was my point, made, what, 5 times now. That's just plain common sense, right? So, having attempted to make a point 5 times, I'm going to quit repeating myself. The proof will be data, after all, and we'll see that it means when and if we get some. Cheers, RAH -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGP 8.0 - not licensed for commercial use: www.pgp.com iQA/AwUBPrFam8PxH8jf3ohaEQINKwCff0LcjGQ5WKpRnoV+Ab+PzXx+my0Ani9h TCGcB2aqXYi0XwTQNHxowwyr =wt2n -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' From sunder at sunder.net Thu May 1 10:43:31 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 13:43:31 -0400 (edt) Subject: Quarantines may be justified In-Reply-To: Message-ID: No, not at all. Trying to live a better life is a larger goal. What I said is that property and the idea of it is much larger and older than humans and that even dogs and cats have it, and that it's not just utilitarian in value. I never claimed that by using property one is just aiming to live a better life, but that the concept of property existed before humans and is something we have in common with other creatures on this land. This isn't the same thing as wanting to live better, though it certainly is one means to do so. There is a distinction between the two. Sure, you would willing trade one property that was unnecessary for one that was desired, and this is where trade and economics comes in, etc. But do we want property for the purpose of improving our lives or just owning it? Hard to tell. Do dogs have goals to live better lives, or do they live day to day? How can we tell one way or another? Back to smoker's rights: in terms of the commons, I'm not a lawyer, and don't play one on TV, nor do I strive to be a poly-tick-ian. What I do know is that the community gets to set the standards of living and what is acceptable, neither the 10-pack-per-day smoker, nor the hypersensitive loon get to do that. This is why we vote, etc. Even those ascetics who give up their property aren't really doing so. They still have to eat - the food becomes property. They have to pray, their temple/church/mosque becomes their home and property, etc. I do not buy the theory that humans as a race can do without the concept of property. Even in pure Marxist communism (which to me is pure unworkable bullshit), the community owns property which is what distinguishes it from the non-community, and punishes those who steal from it. You can't have theft unless you had property to begin with, right? They share property, so they own it communally as partners. But the tendancy to own personal private property isn't necessarily extinguished, and as soon as you have leaders or respected elders, etc., they tend to own more of that shared property than the community by virtue of being able to influence the others. At which point, it falls apart in terms of an egalitarian state. We aren't saying exactly same things... similar perhaps. I agree that there are a lot of ways to secure a better life. I disagree that giving up some/all property is one of them for example, and see seeking and defending of property as something inherent to humans and other creatures as separate than (perhaps overlapping with) the hope of improving one's life. Perhaps it may work for some, but I don't see how it would. In the end, all existence is property. The food you eat becomes your property even if it hadn't been yours initially. The air you breathe is yours - you claim it as soon as you breathe. The clothes you wear are yours until you give them to another (voluntarily or by force), the thoughts you have are yours and so are your memories, your body is yours, etc. To negate any of the above means that you are some other entity's slave - not your own property but another's - either a slave to a community or a dictator of whatever sort. Even family is based on property - though we may not own people in the sense of slavery. But we say "My girlfriend, my wife, by husband, my boyfriend, my uncle, my neice, my father, mother, etc." There is a sense of property there as well. Even in 'my country, my king, my elected official, my street, my neighborhood, my bus (i.e. I missed my bus because I was late by 3 minutes), my cold (as in "you caught my cold.")' So we're back to property as a state of existance whichever way you twist it. Without the atoms, the bits can't exist. Chosen atoms are property. So are the bits traveling from MY keyboard, to MY CPU, throught MY ethernet card, through the router on MY network, etc. And so we have yet another memme surface - one has existed for millenia. But this one expression of it IS MINE. :) And ok, partially yours because your words and thoughts led to it's creation, and partially the property of others here who participated in it... ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ From declan at well.com Thu May 1 10:43:37 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 13:43:37 -0400 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: <009101c31007$83de3820$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> References: <4C69C844-7A66-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net> <017401c30f03$86d30240$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> <20030501093942.C22466@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030501133840.02073b50@mail.well.com> At 06:30 PM 5/1/2003 +0100, David Howe wrote: >> Nope. but they should be prosecuted if they front-page splash it as > >> "earth doomed, we have two weeks to live, there is no hope" and fail > >> to mention that it is a religious prediction > > Prosecuted? Put in prison? What the hell are you thinking? > That it is no different from shouting "fire" in a crowded theatre - >which appears to be the standard example in this sort of discussion. First, it's "falsely shouting fire," and second, I wonder how you would draw a distinction between a newspaper saying that, someone saying that on this list, and someone saying it in a public park. Imprison all of 'em? > > You're a bit of a censorial twit, aren't you? > If you chose to see it that way, yes. Enough holocaust deniers have >tried to duke it out in court and lost that I am more than a bit >sceptical about yet another one. The deeds of the nazis were so dark the >term "war crime" was almost invented to deal with them - certainly the >hague court was - and the nazis are such an obvious black reference >point that almost anyone seems clean by comparison. The problem is that if you create a rule that can be used to imprison the Holocaust deniers (a loathsome sort, I agree), it can be used to jail those who challenge the conventional orthodoxy, even if they believe they're right. More to the point, even if they *are* right. -Declan From shaddack at ns.arachne.cz Thu May 1 05:15:51 2003 From: shaddack at ns.arachne.cz (Thomas Shaddack) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 14:15:51 +0200 (CEST) Subject: All trust is economics In-Reply-To: <200304270354.h3R3s19G028645@artifact.psychedelic.net> Message-ID: On Sat, 26 Apr 2003, Eric Cordian wrote: > How silly. Factoring is like the Poincare Conjecture. Solving it doesn't > let us do anything new and exciting, and nothing else we care about has a > reduction into it. > > Fast factoring will be greeted by "oh, yes, of course", and the sound of > mass yawning and moving on. Fast factoring will be greeted (if it wasn't already) by loud and top-secret cheer of all the No-Such-Agencies. We the People will be told much later. That Joe Sixpacks will yawn and move on will only signify his lack of understanding of the problem. > In 10 years, "factor" will be a commodity microprocessor opcode. Why? Solving it doesn't let us do anything new and exciting, and nothing else we care about has a reduction into it. And every opcode occupies some chip space, and chip space is (at least for now) too expensive for unimportant functions. > Is anyone even working on factoring any more? How long has it been since > the last RSA Challenge number was factored? Seems like aeons. That there is no published activity doesn't mean there is no activity. > Yes, I believe Joe Sixpack saying that he promises to keep my key safe to > be on the same footing as Joe Sixdiploma saying that because he can't > figure out how to factor 309 digit numbers quickly, it must not be > possible. So far it doesn't seem to be possible. If it is, then the method has so high strategical value that it is not used for less important operations, in order to not disclose its existence by indirect clues[1]. But for operations with so high stakes you should use one-time pads on one of the layers anyway. > All RSA is faith-based crypto. What alternative do you suggest? [1] If decrypted plaintexts start popping up from nowhere, being used in all kinds of prosecutions, it's a strong evidence the encryption algorithm was compromised. However, the current trend with secret courts and secret evidence can make it less evident. From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 1 12:47:01 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 14:47:01 -0500 Subject: Quarantines may be justified In-Reply-To: <20030501181256.GA23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> References: <20030501165014.GA6815@cybershamanix.com> <20030501181256.GA23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> Message-ID: <20030501194701.GA6911@cybershamanix.com> On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 01:12:56PM -0500, Bill O'Hanlon wrote: > On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 11:50:14AM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > Get over it -- public smoking is going to be banned everywhere, plenty of > > cities have already banned it in restaurants, public buildings, etc. It's only a > > matter of time before it's also banned on the street, and there are already > > proposed laws being considered to do just that. > > > And because the majority (or the state) is for it, it must be right? > > Admit it: you're a statist when it suits you. Why are you here? Bullshit -- it's about the basic right to having your own personal space and to not be assaulted by others, something that some knee-jerk rightwingers don't get. Everyone has a right to use whatever drug they want, they don't have a right to force others to partake of it. Nothing could be more simple. But because we have a number of people in this society who don't get it, and who are too selfish and inconsiderate of others to observe common courtesies, we get laws to spell it out for them. It's like drunk driving laws, zoning laws, etc. Yes, you can drink all you want, but no, you can't then drive. Yes, you have a right to private property, but no, you can't allow the house to fall down or do something else with it that adversly affects my property value. There's always going to be at least a minimal state that lays out these sort of restraints, it's the only way large numbers of people can live in close proximity to one another. Which, BTW, is what the thread started with -- the fact that the state has to have some powers to deal with seriously infectious diseases. And likewise that it has to have some power to restrain those who don't respect the rights of others. I think that some of the people here have some fantasy that the state will totally wither away and there will be no restraints on anyone's behavior except economic ones. Or else believe in some equally fantastized society where everyone will just willingly respect others and all will live in peace and harmony -- which is absurd, especially given the fact that for whatever reason, young people are increasingly oblivious to the rights of others and very much unconcerned with anything but thier own gratification. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 1 14:07:13 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 16:07:13 -0500 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: <20030501094220.D22466@cluebot.com> References: <04f1b0f3a7ccb7467379ba65cf308a57@dizum.com> <20030501094220.D22466@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <20030501210713.GA7129@cybershamanix.com> On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 09:42:21AM -0400, Declan McCullagh wrote: > On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 11:09:29AM +0200, Thomas Shaddack wrote: > > If I speak for myself, the First Amendment applies. > > > > But should it apply even to corporations? Are such entities considered to > > be persons? Should they have "rights"? > > How about Indymedia? How about a student newspaper collective? How > about Slashdot and its editors? How about the New York Times' editorial page? > That's obviously covered under the 1st's "freedom of the press". What does that have to do with non-humans (corporations) having Constitutional rights? The arguement always put forth is that corporations have the right to make campaign contributions, because that's "freedom of speech". But I guess if those rights are going to be extended to non-humans like corporations, then there's no way to stop them from being extended to other non-human entities as well, such as animals and trees. Or even rocks. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk Thu May 1 09:20:36 2003 From: Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk (Vincent Penquerc'h) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 17:20:36 +0100 Subject: Quarantines may be justified Message-ID: Odd. What you said is pretty close to what I was saying (or maybe thinking), apart from the fact that I see property as a tool to reach a goal (of a better life), and you seem to see it as an end in itself. All the examples you cited are "trying to live a better life", and there's nothing wrong with that as long as it doesn't make another person's life worse. My point is just that property rights aren't the only possible way to improve one's life. It's just an easy way to approximate it well enough, but it only approximates, as shown by the smoke example: how to solve this problem with property rights without it being too intrusive ? > It's after all, not just about trying to live a better life. > It's true that trying to live a better life is a huge goal. It is. Some people have different goals, but everyone of them will strive for a better life, which is a different measure for everyone, a mixture of everything, possessions (and by this, the knowledge that use (etc, you see what I mean) of it is secured for the present and (hopefully) future), but also entertainment, as you mentionned, contentment of senses (whether it is food, sex, or whatever), spiritual beliefs, or even the warm fuzzy feeling of having altruistically helped another person. In having property rights and defending them, you are trying to secure a better life for you, and possibly others. But there are other ways that can be used to make one's life better, be it in addition or (partial) replacement of property rights. But just because there could be other ways to make your life better doesn't mean you should think property rights are in danger :) Hey, I own stuff, and I'd be pretty pissed off if someone stole them :) -- Vincent Penquerc'h From bill.stewart at pobox.com Thu May 1 17:25:55 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 17:25:55 -0700 Subject: China (was Mike Hawash) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030501141055.02bf67e0@idiom.com> At 11:02 AM 05/01/2003 -0400, Tyler Durden wrote: >Sunder wrote... > >"Not that I've been there, but the last I heard, China was still an >almosttotalitarian communist state and free travel in China is not possible." >Your information is almost staggeringly out of date. Even in the late >1980s when I lived in China it was easy to move about freely (well, easy >isn't quite the right word when you couldn't book any rail tickets >remotely or in advance!). Interesting. I've recently been reading a book by a guy who spent much of the mid-90s illegally tramping around the ethnic areas of western China (particularly the Tibet/Burma borders with Sichuan and Yunnan) trying not to get thrown out of the country too often. He was a broke trekker crewing for a crazy French photographer who wanted to document some of the minority cultures that Westerners had never seen before the Han government and Western television homogenized them into history, so perhaps that didn't make things easier; sometimes they were able to get permits for some of the areas (though not usually where they really wanted to go...) and sometimes they were able to bribe officials into ignoring them, but they kept getting caught and jailed and kicked out, because foreigners weren't allowed there. From timcmay at got.net Thu May 1 17:41:27 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 17:41:27 -0700 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: <20030501210713.GA7129@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: On Thursday, May 1, 2003, at 02:07 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 09:42:21AM -0400, Declan McCullagh wrote: >> On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 11:09:29AM +0200, Thomas Shaddack wrote: >>> If I speak for myself, the First Amendment applies. >>> >>> But should it apply even to corporations? Are such entities >>> considered to >>> be persons? Should they have "rights"? >> >> How about Indymedia? How about a student newspaper collective? How >> about Slashdot and its editors? How about the New York Times' >> editorial page? >> > > That's obviously covered under the 1st's "freedom of the press". > What does > that have to do with non-humans (corporations) having Constitutional > rights? The > arguement always put forth is that corporations have the right to make > campaign > contributions, because that's "freedom of speech". But I guess if > those rights > are going to be extended to non-humans like corporations, then there's > no way to > stop them from being extended to other non-human entities as well, > such as > animals and trees. Or even rocks. I cited the full text of the First. It doesn't talk about who has rights: it says "Congress shall make no law." Again, the full text. You need to read it, and absorb exactly what it says: "-- Amendment I Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. -- " So, yes, if Congress tried to pass a law about the speech of trees or rocks, it would be unconstitutional under the "shall make no law" language. This doesn't mean trees and rocks have "freedom of the press" or "free speech rights." More practically, the First means Congress shall make no law about speech, period. Or about the other things covered. Notice the word "or." This is important. The First does not say "Congess shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech of individual persons when engaged in press activities or political speech." It says what it says. The "rights of corporations," to use your phrasing, thus derive from the specific prohibition placed on Congress (and thus on all states, through their requirement to support and defend the Constitution as a condition of joining the Union...and repeated in the 14 Amendment because some states didn't think the words of the Constitution applied to their fiefdoms). "A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked ...A complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be patched up to make it work. You have to start over, beginning with a working simple system." -- Grady Booch From DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk Thu May 1 10:30:18 2003 From: DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk (David Howe) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 18:30:18 +0100 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother References: <4C69C844-7A66-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net> <017401c30f03$86d30240$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> <20030501093942.C22466@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <009101c31007$83de3820$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> at Thursday, May 01, 2003 2:39 PM, Declan McCullagh was seen to say: > On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 10:40:27AM +0100, David Howe wrote: >> They aren't *knowingly* lieing - that is the point. Church types >> firmly believe hell exists, and only pestering a omnipotent and >> omniscient being (who therefore already knows what they > Are you sure that all "church types" are in it for the good of their > faith? Not one preacher or evangelist, in the history of mankind, has > secretly become an athiest but concludes: Hey, this is a pretty good > gig; I'm going to lie... Almost certainly. and it would be a major pain to try and separate them out from the people who actually believe they are acting for the good of their God or Gods. >> Nope. but they should be prosecuted if they front-page splash it as >> "earth doomed, we have two weeks to live, there is no hope" and fail >> to mention that it is a religious prediction > Prosecuted? Put in prison? What the hell are you thinking? That it is no different from shouting "fire" in a crowded theatre - which appears to be the standard example in this sort of discussion. >> That is borderline. given that the accepted body of fact admits that >> the Holocaust not only happened, but was pretty much as described by >> the Jewish lobby, then any claims that it > You're a bit of a censorial twit, aren't you? If you chose to see it that way, yes. Enough holocaust deniers have tried to duke it out in court and lost that I am more than a bit sceptical about yet another one. The deeds of the nazis were so dark the term "war crime" was almost invented to deal with them - certainly the hague court was - and the nazis are such an obvious black reference point that almost anyone seems clean by comparison. The worst excesses of the nazis are increasingly in the past - well over half a century ago now - and there has been no credible evidence presented in that time that the jewish lobby invented or exaggerated anything that happened in those death camps for their own gain. I class the holocaust deniers pretty much the same as the religious fanatics who try to deny evolution - firmly convinced of their own rightness, despite an overwhelming body of evidence disproving their position. Its nice they have firmly held beliefs, but I don't feel any real reason to listen to them, and a big enough body of people trying to force *their* beliefs on me is irksome (cue any of asimov's frequent comments on "ignorance waving the bible") If you are asking if I believe that people should be prosecuted for simply believing this, or even publicly stating this belief then no - it is only when (like with evolution) they try to get their version of events accepted as the "official" version that they should provide proof - if (for example) a history teacher taught his entire class that WW2 was in fact started by the jews and that they turned on the nazis when they saw the war was lost, faking evidence to make it look like, far from being equal partners with the nazis in the war, they were a persecuted minority - then I would expect that teacher to be suspended at the very least, if not prosecuted (hence the evidence - he would be free to present his overwhelmingly persuasive evidence as to the true facts of the war in court) From eresrch at eskimo.com Thu May 1 19:11:29 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 19:11:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Quarantines may be justified In-Reply-To: <20030501194701.GA6911@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 1 May 2003, Harmon Seaver wrote: > I think that some of the people here have some fantasy that the state will > totally wither away and there will be no restraints on anyone's behavior except > economic ones. Or else believe in some equally fantastized society where > everyone will just willingly respect others and all will live in peace and > harmony -- which is absurd, especially given the fact that for whatever reason, > young people are increasingly oblivious to the rights of others and very much > unconcerned with anything but thier own gratification. "young" is a point of view too. Did you care much more about anything but yourself when you were 1 year old? Of course not, and I don't think that view expands all that fast for most people. By the time we're ten, we know the rest of the world is out there, but who cares? The basic view is "how does it affect *me*?" Nobody cares about the rights of others, they only care about themselves. Which is why we end up with stupid laws. Being able to abstract what we want to others always involves the assumption that others are like us. That's why politicians are so good at name calling, they know they lie cheat and steal, so they blame the other guy for doing the same thing. Jumping up a level of abstraction to figure out how we really can all be different and still get along is a very hard chore. This list is a microcosim of the whole world - it's weird, it's different and it has more than enough town fools. Some temples burn incense all day long - that's "smoking" too. Is a zoning law going to interfere with first amendment rights of religion? Maybe. Airports are always initially built far away from cities, and then people move in around them and complain about the noise. It's the same thing - you try to solve the problem, but it comes back later anyway. Being able to draw lines and say where and when things are allowable makes more sense than banning behavior. If some societies decide smoking in public isn't allowed, that's one solution. Other societies might choose to draw the line in children's parks. The point is the group that decides has to live with its decisions - and we can argue all we want about how stupid the decisions are, but we still gotta convince the voters to change their minds. And until it directly actually affects them, most people just won't care. Freedom is too abstract, until it's *your* door that gets kicked down in the middle of the night. Especially if you happen to be smoking ganja. Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From schear at attbi.com Thu May 1 19:56:31 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 19:56:31 -0700 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: References: <20030501210713.GA7129@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030501181130.052f3088@mail.attbi.com> At 05:41 PM 5/1/2003 -0700, Tim May wrote: >On Thursday, May 1, 2003, at 02:07 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > >>On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 09:42:21AM -0400, Declan McCullagh wrote: >>>On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 11:09:29AM +0200, Thomas Shaddack wrote: >>>>If I speak for myself, the First Amendment applies. >>>> >>>>But should it apply even to corporations? Are such entities considered to >>>>be persons? Should they have "rights"? >>>>I cited the full text of the First. It doesn't talk about who has >>>>rights: it says "Congress shall make no law." > >Again, the full text. You need to read it, and absorb exactly what it says: > >"-- >Amendment I > >Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or >prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, >or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to >petition the government for a redress of grievances. >-- >More practically, the First means Congress shall make no law about speech, >period. Or about the other things covered. Notice the word "or." This is >important. > >The First does not say "Congess shall make no law...abridging the freedom >of speech of individual persons when engaged in press activities or >political speech." > >It says what it says. > >The "rights of corporations," to use your phrasing, thus derive from the >specific prohibition placed on Congress (and thus on all states, through >their requirement to support and defend the Constitution as a condition of >joining the Union...and repeated in the 14 Amendment because some states >didn't think the words of the Constitution applied to their fiefdoms). Funny thing about the 14th, the representatives of the Southern States (who had previously been sworn in and seated for the session) didn't get to vote on it. They were ejected and the doors barred (the Senate even barred a New Jersey rep. who held the deciding vote and was strongly opposed to the measure). They then reported that the majority (of those in the room) approved the measure, which was sent on to the states for ratification. A similar travesty played out in the counting of ratifying states and reporting out the results. When challenged in the Supreme Court the robed ones punted, saying it was a "political matter for Congress to decide". Thus spake Tyranny. Most all current federal authority rests on the 14th and the unwarranted expansion of the Commerce Clause (Wilkert v. Filburn) after FDR and Congress threatened to pack the bench with additional justices in order to pass unconstitutional New Deal legislation. steve From zem at vigilant.tv Thu May 1 17:14:40 2003 From: zem at vigilant.tv (zem) Date: Thu, 01 May 2003 20:14:40 -0400 Subject: Making Money in Digital Money Message-ID: > Why would Bob be unable to strip off all signatures, process the sound > file to whiten off any watermarking and re-sell it without authentication > signatures under another nym with it's own reputation? > > What would stop Bob from turning the sound file into a plain .ogg or .mp3 > with no signatures and reselling millions of copies for 1/1000th the cost, > or even for free. Or have Bob be the front of a pool of purchasers who > couldn't pay Alice her fees on their own, so they each chip in 1/100th of > the cost? > > Why would Bob's "clients" care if the cost was low enough, or just > casually traded? Spam. The reason clients pay Alice or Bob to receive their approval ratings is to avoid downloading bogus files - incomplete, poorly encoded, misnamed, or deliberately spoofed files (cf Madonna's "what the fuck?" example). Bandwidth isn't free. Time and effort isn't free. If it's cheaper for someone to pay Alice the Editor to tell them which files meet a particular standard, rather than spend their own time and bandwidth downloading and listening to half a dozen potential copies, then Alice makes a profit. People aren't paying Alice for the content - they can get that anywhere. They're paying for Alice's opinions. The reason Alice's opinions are worth something is that they are backed by Alice's reputation. That's why Bob can't merely strip off Alice's signature, resign and redistribute: the thing he is redistributing is no longer backed by Alice's reputation, it's backed by Bob's reputation. It's no longer Alice's opinion, it's Bob's. Process is the same for other domains, not just mp3 sharing. Think anti-spam services, search engines. People aren't paying to receive more content - they're paying to receive _less_. There's a good reason why Google is able to resell its opinions to other search engines, even though those opinions are effectively freely available from other sources. -- mailto:zem at vigilant.tv F289 2BDB 1DA0 F4C4 DC87 EC36 B2E3 4E75 C853 FD93 http://vigilant.tv/ "..I'm invisible, I'm invisible, I'm invisible.." From timcmay at got.net Thu May 1 21:35:11 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 21:35:11 -0700 Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <7647970C-7C57-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Thursday, May 1, 2003, at 04:08 AM, Thomas Shaddack wrote: > IMHO, long-term psychical stress, so common in raging capitalism with > nonexistent or weak safety nets - worrying about keeping/losing/finding > job, fear of a longer-term illness that would cause you to lose job and > medical insurance - has much worse effect than occassional exposure to > low > levels of chemical contaminations or not-really-that-loud[1] sounds. In a free society, nothing stops an employee from seeking a lower stress, less demanding, lower profit margin employer, lower-paying job. In America, these low-paid employees are called "public teachers." > > We often forget about psychological stress, resulting from the quest > for > higher and higher "effectivity" and other factors of Holy Capitalism, > when > evaluating situations. Communism was nothing starry, but when you kept > your mouth shut up, you had time for yourself, for your family. My dad > was > "nationalizing" electronics parts for me, from his workplace, which > helped > (or maybe caused) me to learn electronics. And our teachers in public schools are similarly free to not operate at their full potential, or even close to it, and yet be paid a moderate salary. They can even steal stuff the way your father did. (But they'd better not do it in corporations such as the one I worked for: we fired their asses. No severance pay, and a blacklist from working in other companies. We told prospective employers of their thefts.) > Many things were available > without having to pay for them, which lowered barriers to entry. > Hightech > books were cheaper. Probably because they were either pirated or were rehashes/copies of Western books. Not in all cases. I have a few Soviet physics and math texts written by some of the greats of Soviet physics and math. Printed on cheap paper, with the authors barely compensated, they were certainly cheap. And, of course, often prone to having ideology inserted by the commisars. My first roommate in college was from Hong Kong. He had the Feynman Lectures printed on rice paper editions with the print bleeding through. Very inexpensive. Feynman, of course, saw no royalties. Which is OK, but understand that your country was operating as a Napster country. > Schools had clubs for students with interests - > chemistry, electronics, computers - the Regime needed to breed the next > generation of skilled workers. Do you think American schools do not have such clubs? I was in a dozen of them, and President of several. > It had a lot of drawbacks as well - lack of > material wealth was the most notable one - but it wasn't overly > difficult > to partially compensate; you just had to be able to do things yourself. >> From sewing clothes - if you were dissatisfied with what was >> available in > stores, you got cloth and a sewing machine and made something yourself > - > to electronics. If you were able to repair things - TVs, > electroinstallations, plumbing - you were widely in demand and you had > privileged access to scarce goods[2] for exchange for your services. > Virtually everyone was a member of this "gray" economy; what you knew > was > more important for your real social position than what you owned. > People > were more creative - it was making life more comfortable. These skills > are > vanishing as more and more people rely on money than on their own > improvisation skills instead. The cities were gray and dull - but I > sometimes doubt if a genuine grayness wasn't better than faked and > empty > cheery colors of mass-produced advertising flooding the cities now. > People > had time to read books; today they usually return from the job late, > too > tired for anything more challenging than plopping down in front of a > TV. > The unhappiness and resulting escapism mirrors in increased demand for > drugs and amusement industry, quick and low-efforts ways to "get out". > There was escapism before as well - but it was generally more creative; > cottaging was very common, together with numerous kinds of other > hobbies. > The change from active to passive leisure activities, the turn from > doing > to consuming, disturbs me a lot. You seem to be pining for central control, for state subsidies, for communism. I doubt you'll like what we have to offer on this list. A pity. You seem like a reasonable, even nice, person. We've had some good exchanges in e-mail about language. But your rant above says you would probably be happier under state socialism, which makes this list your absolute worse enemy. Take care of yourself in whichever socialist paradise you can find. Albania is out, as of a few years ago....Vietnam is rapidly going free market...China is an industrial giant with a Politburo...perhaps you could try Myanmar? > Remarkable percentage of local population thinks fondly about the Old > Days > where there was no rat-race, when you didn't live in fear you will get > a > pink slip, when you didn't have to worry about day to day income. Free markets are often rough. They mean there is no one to provide food for those who have no skills to offer. Think of it as evolution in action. The burnoff of useless eaters will be glorious. --Tim May From jamesd at echeque.com Thu May 1 22:11:31 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 22:11:31 -0700 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother Message-ID: <3EB19B93.20889.1BA79D7F@localhost> -- On 30 Apr 2003 at 12:00, David Howe wrote: > Which of the two will 98% of the public believe, and which > will be derided as a crackpot theory (hint, the answer isn't > "whichever is true") > > remember that more than half of americans are firmly > convinced saddam was responsible for 9/11 You are demented. This much reported fact is not a fact. You, not americans, live in a deranged world of your own. Very few americans believe saddam was responsible for 9/11. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG nyGGBaDcPbxvHeeaxPrVstyxhpCdk2/CSYXN8x5i 4eP9dWr2HeA5nEHeHmfVREVaoq4YL32ytKew35bN3 From jamesd at echeque.com Thu May 1 22:11:31 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 22:11:31 -0700 Subject: Making Money in Digital Money In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3EB19B93.12116.1BA79DD9@localhost> -- On 1 May 2003 at 10:20, Sunder wrote: > Really they are? If Joe P2P User wants to hear a Metallica > song, does he really give a shit who signed it and said it > was authentic? Is it the signature or the song what he's > after? Go find some P2P users and ask them. My library is nearly all old songs. I would value some source of good songs, whose recommendation was sufficient for me to try something I had not heard -- indeed, if there was some convenient way to make micropayments, I would put a quarter in their player, to see what was playing. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG a53K6g90F+W3lpSUE83AfxHTo1Jjzh1726kciUj4 4u/+InWapRqXUJ813rOSnG1spl5BFB7d7cL5k0qEQ From jamesd at echeque.com Thu May 1 22:11:31 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 22:11:31 -0700 Subject: patriotism considered evil Message-ID: <3EB19B93.22862.1BA79E01@localhost> -- On 30 Apr 2003 at 11:15, Tim May wrote: > Of course, this isn't a survey of the _prevalence_ or > _magnitude_ of the claims, but it's an example that at least > some Brits on the pro-war side are using slurs about the > patriotism of the opponents. Galloway was paid the equivalent of half a million US dollars a year by Saddam, and that is why they think him unpatriotic. By the way, every time I defend free trade and so called sweatshops, I ask Nike to put me on their payroll, but so far they have not replied. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG N0mPTEGvv6f4r9v6Qj1IzfvUzTngQhZTpTfgWkS3 4PzoR0ZyFqhFp3kizgfP+09cN94WufYCU4JLEIpZg From jamesd at echeque.com Thu May 1 22:15:25 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 22:15:25 -0700 Subject: patriotism considered evil Message-ID: <3EB19C7D.30046.1BAB3071@localhost> -- On 30 Apr 2003 at 7:17, Adam Back wrote: > I'm not American. I'm dual-national British/Swiss, I've > lived in Britain, Scotland, Canada and now the US. But I > have not noticed anyone in Britain, or British press > discussing "un-British" behavior, or putting down anyone > attempting to ask questions as "un-patriotic". (Ditto for the > other countries). Press coverage of Iraq is varyingly biased > in those countries (ridiculously so in the US, somewhat in > the UK due to their involvement). I do not think so: Observe CNN whitewashing Saddam. Observe NBC imagining "unexpectedly strong Iraqi resistance", predicting that the battle of Baghdad would resemble the siege of Stalingrad, and observe its conspicuous failure to notice that the US was winning decisively in the cities. If you watched NBC, then when the statue fell, you would say "Hey, what happened!!" Ann coulter has been having a great time parodying the foolish pinkos that dominate the news media. www.anncoulter.com : : Liberals Meet Unexpected Resistance April 30, 2003 : : : : THOUGH MANY had anticipated a cakewalk for the media : : in undermining the war on terrorism, instead : : liberals are caught in a quagmire of good news about : : the war. Predictions that liberals would have an : : easy time embarrassing President Bush have met : : unexpected resistance. They're still looking for the : : bad news they said was there. Experts believe the : : media's quagmire results from severely reduced : : troops. The left's current force is less than half : : the size of the coalition media that undermined the : : Vietnam War. This is a melange of infamous claims issued by the New York Times, NBC, and CNN --- "US ofrces meet unexpected resistance" She has been doing much the same in every column since the statue fell. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG Mz00mZ5gWkjnT0B8TL9Q/ovyfF/rh8UgopMSl51V 4hokukmt8BDA5AtehHVy0Gm+1fzARkRhDtq8q9MRR From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Thu May 1 20:35:12 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 22:35:12 -0500 (CDT) Subject: NOWAR - Showdown in Texas, Teach-ins, and More (fwd) Message-ID: ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2003 10:33:17 -0500 From: NOWAR To: nowar at lists.tao.ca Subject: NOWAR - Showdown in Texas, Teach-ins, and More Hello, all. More information about the Showdown in Texas, which will happen this weekend. Also a correction on the location of tonight's event. On Wednesday, April 30, at 7:00 pm, there will be a teach-in on "Enhancing Democracy? Why the U.S. Military Won't Bring Democracy to the World." Speakers include UT History Professor Geoffrey Schad, speaking on Syria; Communications Professor Dana Cloud; and Rahul Mahajan of the Nowar Collective, author of the forthcoming "Full Spectrum Dominance: U.S. Power in Iraq and Beyond" (http://www.sevenstories.com/Book/index.cfm?GCOI=58322100353810). Location: UT Campus, Gearing 105 (Gearing is at 24th and University. http://www.utexas.edu/maps/main/buildings/gea.html). On Saturday, May 3, the Showdown in Texas commences (other related events will already be in progress -- see http://www.showdowntx.com/html/schedule.html). The Showdown rally is a demand for human security, not "homeland" security: funding for healthcare, housing, education and jobs; environmental sustainability; protection of civil liberties for citizens, immigrants and indigenous peoples, a moratorium on the death penalty, and an end to US military interventions and war at home and abroad. Starting at 11:00 am at least 6 issue marches starting in different locations (see http://www.showdowntx.com/html/schedule.html for details) will converge at the Capitol at High Noon for an opening rally. This rally will be followed by a mass march past some of the top defense industry contractors located in downtown Austin and end up back at the Capitol for a Festival of Love and Resistance. The main events are at the State Capitol: 12:00 noon. Opening rally with a large slate of national speakers, including Lucius Walker of Pastors for Peace, Medea Benjamin of Global Exchange (http://www.globalexchange.org), Cheri Honkala of the Kensington Welfare Rights Union, and Rania Masri. 1:15 Military Reality March - participants will march past some of the downtown corporate and military defense contractors and back to the Capitol building. 3:00-5:00 pm - Festival of love and Resistance. More speakers, music, and a special guest star. Also poets, breakdancers, low riders, and much more. On Sunday, May 4, from 6:00-8:00pm, there will be a teach-in on "The Texas Military-Industrial Complex: Profiting from War and Occupation." This event is associated with the Showdown. Speakers will talk about Lockheed Martin, Dyncorp, the role of oil in the Military-Industrial Complex, and the connection of Texas to the occupations of Palestine and Iraq. Speakers include Rahul Mahajan of the Nowar Collective, author of the forthcoming "Full Spectrum Dominance: U.S. Power in Iraq and Beyond" (http://www.sevenstories.com/Book/index.cfm?GCOI=58322100353810), Stefan Wray (http://www.iconmedia.org/mdp), and Quent Reese. Location: UT Campus, Jester Auditorium, 21st and Speedway, across Speedway from the Perry-Castaneda Library. All events are free and open to the public. Please forward where appropriate. In Solidarity, the Nowar Collective From skquinn at speakeasy.net Thu May 1 21:39:41 2003 From: skquinn at speakeasy.net (Shawn K. Quinn) Date: Thu, 1 May 2003 23:39:41 -0500 Subject: stuff Message-ID: <200305012339.59210.skquinn@speakeasy.net> This message contains the word "fuck" just to trip the silly content filter at uspto.gov. Have a nice day. -- Shawn K. Quinn From justin at soze.net Thu May 1 19:27:26 2003 From: justin at soze.net (Justin) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 02:27:26 +0000 Subject: China (was Mike Hawash) In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030501141055.02bf67e0@idiom.com> References: <5.1.1.6.2.20030501141055.02bf67e0@idiom.com> Message-ID: <20030502022726.GH17685@dreams.soze.net> At 2003-05-02 00:25 +0000, Bill Stewart wrote: > At 11:02 AM 05/01/2003 -0400, Tyler Durden wrote: > > Sunder wrote... > > > "Not that I've been there, but the last I heard, China was still > > > an almosttotalitarian communist state and free travel in China is > > > not possible." > > Your information is almost staggeringly out of date.... > > Interesting. I've recently been reading a book by a guy who spent > much of the mid-90s illegally tramping around the ethnic areas of > western China (particularly the Tibet/Burma borders with Sichuan and > Yunnan) trying not to get thrown out of the country too often. Is that sort of like documented immigrants (not undocumented _citizens_ like Mexicans who live within earshot of the border, speak no english, pay no taxes, and think they're part of Aztlan - perhaps there's an analog to this class of _citizens_ in China; I'm no expert on politics in East Asia) who are being jailed and kicked out of the United States, also for just about no good reason at all? -- Freedom's untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. --Rumsfeld, 2003-04-11 From nobody at dizum.com Thu May 1 17:50:05 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 02:50:05 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Making Money in Digital Money Message-ID: <0cdf430384f8616dadb6d54a58d678f4@dizum.com> Zem writes: > Alice the music critic buys copies of new content at relatively high > prices from the creator, or close sources. When Bob requests a copy of > a particular file, Alice encrypts it to Bob's public key and signs the > encrypted copy, selling him this 'reviewed' copy for reproduction cost + > profit. Bob can verify he's received a good copy, but he can't > redistribute Alice's reviewed version without revealing his secret key. Four points: First, I want to reiterate that the original idea of the so-called "recursive auction" is fatally flawed. Apparently Eric Hughes was aware of this, but it never sunk into Bob Hettinga's thick head. All this talk of editing and reputation is a different idea with a different goal. The original recursive auction was simple, as Hettinga described it: you sell the first copy for a lot, the next for somewhat less, the next for even less, and so on. That doesn't work. End of story. Second, your idea above for preventing redistribution doesn't work. Aside from the workaround you came up with, using a throw-away encryption key, it is easy to redistribute the signed data. When the file was encrypted to Bob's key, using PK cryptography, what actually happens is that a single-use key is generated, which we'll call K. This is a symmetric crypto key, like for AES or 3DES. K is encrypted with Bob's public key, and then the file is encrypted using K. So all Bob has to do is to reveal K when he redistributes the Alice-signed, encrypted file. This allows everyone to read the data and see that Alice did sign it in encrypted form. The fact that K produces a meaningful decryption of the AES encrypted file is itself proof that K is valid, but if more is needed, it is easy to release additional information to prove that K is a valid decryption of the PK encrypted part. Third, there are better cryptographic ways to do what you want. You can use Chaum's designated confirmer signatures, which Alice can issue such that only Bob can confirm the signature. Or you could use the ring signatures from Rivest et al, which produce a file which could have been signed either by Alice or Bob, meaning that when Bob redistributes it there is no actual evidence that Alice signed it. (That's how the designated confirmer signatures work, too.) Neither of these approaches requires the data to be encrypted, just signed. Or even simpler, Alice can avoid signing entirely, making the file available for download to subscribers who authenticate with SSL. The key exchange in this case involves Bob sending K to Alice, encrypted with her public key; and the fact that she decrypts it proves to Bob that she is who she claims. But this is not a transferable proof because Bob could have forged it all. Fourth, Eric Hughes pointed out the fundamental flaw in this whole approach, many years ago. As others have pointed out, Bob can simply distribute Alice's files under his own name, and quickly gain a reputation for faithfully passing along Alice's information. If Alice threatens to cancel subscribers who do this, Bob redistributes under a different identity. Now we are back to watermarking to try to figure out which subscribers are passing along her reports, with all the countermeasures and counter-countermeasures that entails. There is no evidence that the content protector can expect to win such a battle. From timcmay at got.net Fri May 2 09:10:49 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 09:10:49 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 06:14 AM, Vincent Penquerc'h wrote: > > As a side note: I'd have different views on your example if > Alice was specifically trying to get Bob out of business, and > depending on the methods she was using to further these ends. Arguing "intent" in business matters comes very close to being pure "thoughtcrime." I was a participant in Intel Corporation's famous "CRUSH" program, a program to try to drive competitors, including AMD, out of business. If you think businesses are not trying to drive other businesses into bankruptcy, you need to wake up and look around. Nothing illegal about this, nothing unconstitutional. As with so-called "hate crimes" like burning effigies or crosses, existing laws about vandalism, trespassing, theft, etc., are more than enough. No additional laws about trying to drive a competitor out of business or burning a cross to protest the Holocaust Myth are needed. --TIm May "We are at war with Oceania. We have always been at war with Oceania." "We are at war with Eurasia. We have always been at war with Eurasia." "We are at war with Iraq. We have always been at war with Iraq. "We are at war with France. We have always been at war with France." From mv at cdc.gov Fri May 2 09:16:01 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 09:16:01 -0700 Subject: Making Money in Digital Money Message-ID: <3EB299C1.63AA69F4@cdc.gov> At 08:14 PM 5/1/03 -0400, zem wrote: >> Why would Bob's "clients" care if the cost was low enough, or just >> casually traded? > >Spam. > >The reason clients pay Alice or Bob to receive their approval ratings is >to avoid downloading bogus files - incomplete, poorly encoded, misnamed, >or deliberately spoofed files (cf Madonna's "what the fuck?" example). Zem, the editor need not be a single or static entity. Consider slashdot, which uses its readers as ephemeral editors. Consider the (new) KaZaa ratings system which does the same. Consider ebay's user rating system. So yes, the editing *function* is valuable, but it needn't be implemented by a paid individual. --- E pur si muove -G Galilei From timcmay at got.net Fri May 2 09:20:16 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 09:20:16 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 08:35 AM, Vincent Penquerc'h wrote: > > What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not > > understand? > > > > Yes, someone may chose to smoke at a time which is convenient > > for you, but > > why should you be able to dictate that to someone else? Mind your > own > > fucking business - even if it's just hypothetical. > > I kind of agree, to a point, but then you (and others) do the same > with imposing your own ideals to others, don't you ? As long as people > interact, they'll have to impose stuff to others. I'm imposing my > ideals (in this case, forbidding to smoke to people who want to) ? > You do yours (annoying people who don't like smoke, because you want > to smoke). I don't usually annoy smokers when they do. If I'm annoyed > by it, I just move. Unless I can't, that is. But you just act as if > *your* ideals were *obviously* the right ones. I reject that idea. > They might, and they sure are popular here. But you do impose them > all the same. The solutions to your problems lie in the "Schelling points" many in open societies have established for dealing with others: -- non-initiation of force -- territorial boundaries, aka property rights Pollution in general, whether of rivers or lakes or the air, is a complicated issue. It's more important to establish the fundamental principles widely applicable and helpful in creating a free and open society than it is to quibble about second hand smoke from 20 meters away. There's a saying in American law: "Hard cases make bad law." Meaning, cases where there are multiple, conflicting, nuanced issues tend to make for unclear or contradictory law. As for smoking, this is clear-cut when property rights are clear-cut: it should not be the function of the state to tell a restaurant owner what his smoking or non-smoking policies should be. Harmon Seaver's rants about breathing in second-hand smoke on public streets do not apply in this case, as anyone is free to enter or not enter a restaurant, or a bar, or a bookstore, or ride on a jet, or on a bus, or work in a company, all of which may or may not allow smoking by their own rules. Harmon's second-hand smoke example does not apply in _any_ of the above cases, all of which are based on the obvious property rights of the owners and the freedom of choice of customers to abide by the rules or not. Establishing this, even if smoking were then to be restricted on "public" streets, would be a positive development. --Tim May "The State is the great fiction by which everyone seeks to live at the expense of everyone else." --Frederic Bastiat From timcmay at got.net Fri May 2 09:23:56 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 09:23:56 -0700 Subject: Cheese-eating surrender monkeys In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <791F977F-7CBA-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 07:50 AM, Trei, Peter wrote: >> Tim May[SMTP:timcmay at got.net] wrote: >> >> The right-wing columnist Jonathan Goldberg dubbed them "cheese-eating >> surrender monkeys" several years ago, long before this latest matter. >> Has a great cadence, and it's accurate. >> > No one expects the Pedantry Police! > > Goldberg used the phrase in a 1999 column, but he did not invent it. > > It's from a actually from a 1995 Simpsons episode, "Round Springfield" > (production number 2F32) Here's the quote in context: > > [I agree with most of the post, but couldn't let this misquote stand] > Peter Trei Yes, now that you remind me, I remember this. And I think Goldberg acknowledged his source in an interview I saw with him just before the war started. Likewise, my quotes below come from Blair and Bush, respectively. --Tim May "We are at war with Oceania. We have always been at war with Oceania." "We are at war with Eurasia. We have always been at war with Eurasia." "We are at war with Iraq. We have always been at war with Iraq. "We are at war with France. We have always been at war with France." From timcmay at got.net Fri May 2 09:42:44 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 09:42:44 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? Message-ID: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> In looking over the traffic of the past weeks, I am struck by how many of the posts are defending statism and state action. Mostly by Europeans, coincidentally or not. Did some mention of our list in the Journal of Social Action cause you to subscribe? Why are you here? --Tim May "They played all kinds of games, kept the House in session all night, and it was a very complicated bill. Maybe a handful of staffers actually read it, but the bill definitely was not available to members before the vote." --Rep. Ron Paul, TX, on how few Congresscritters saw the USA-PATRIOT Bill before voting overwhelmingly to impose a police state From estone at synernet.com Fri May 2 07:18:38 2003 From: estone at synernet.com (Ed Stone) Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 10:18:38 -0400 Subject: patriotism considered evil In-Reply-To: <3EB19C7D.30046.1BAB3071@localhost> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.2.20030502101323.00a5b820@localhost> At 01:15 AM 5/2/03, you wrote: >I do not think so: Observe CNN whitewashing Saddam. Observe >NBC imagining "unexpectedly strong Iraqi resistance", >predicting that the battle of Baghdad would resemble the siege >of Stalingrad, and observe its conspicuous failure to notice >that the US was winning decisively in the cities. If you >watched NBC, then when the statue fell, you would say "Hey, >what happened!!" > >Ann coulter has been having a great time parodying the foolish >pinkos that dominate the news media. The bias of the US news media is most clearly demonstrated by the general absence of questions or discussion along the lines of "For months the US sought a resolution from the UN authorizing an attack to 'disarm Saddam of his weapons of mass destruction'. Now where are the weapons of mass destruction? Has the US done the equivalent of shooting a man holding his ID instead of a gun, but on a scale of tens of thousands? Wasn't WMD simply a pretext for starting a war of aggression that had been long planed and desired?" From mv at cdc.gov Fri May 2 10:22:18 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 10:22:18 -0700 Subject: Students who ran file-sharing systems will each give the recording industry up to $17,500 Message-ID: <3EB2A94A.60806@cdc.gov> 4 lives destroyed by record companies. Time to add onion routing. Note that the record companies didn't go after *downloaders*, only offerers. Note that its legal to have ripped tracks on your computer, and P2P clients often auto-search for content you don't intend to share. Perhaps the defendants should have quickly gotten CDs with the tracks on their machine, and used that defense. Oh, that's right, these are poor students without funds for defense. Burn, baby, burn. 4 Pay Steep Price for Free Music Students who ran file-sharing systems will each give the recording industry up to $17,500. Four college students learned Thursday that free music downloads can carry a hidden price tag  $12,000 to $17,500, to be exact. The major record companies had accused the students  two at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and one each at Princeton University and Michigan Technological University  of fueling music piracy by running file-sharing networks on campus and offering hundreds of songs for copying. On Thursday, the four settled the companies' claims and promised not to violate their copyrights. Although they did not admit to committing or aiding piracy, they each agreed to pay thousands of dollars to the Recording Industry Assn. of America, the labels' trade group. The settlements mark the first time the record companies have recovered money from individuals in the United States accused of piracy on file-sharing networks. But they may be a harbinger of more lawsuits, as the industry starts taking its battle against online piracy directly to users. Evan Cox, a copyright attorney in San Francisco who has helped software companies battle piracy, said the amounts are high enough to catch the attention of file swappers. "I'd personally think twice about doing something that would cost me $12,000 to $17,500 to avoid spending 12 to 15 bucks on the occasional CD," Cox said. But Howard Ende, an attorney for 18-year-old Princeton University sophomore Daniel Peng, predicted that the tactic would backfire. "This case had very little to do with Dan Peng and everything to do with the recording industry's attempt to intimidate Internet users around the country and college students in particular," Ende said. "They looked to instill fear, but instead they got fear and loathing." In the settlements, all four  Peng; Joseph Nievelt, a 21-year-old junior computer science student at Michigan Tech in Houghton, Mich.; Jesse Jordan, a 19-year-old freshman information technology student at Rensselaer in Troy, N.Y.; and Aaron Sherman, a student studying management and computer networks at Rensselaer  agreed not to infringe or support the infringement of the companies' copyrights. Peng and Nievelt each agreed to pay $15,000. Sherman agreed to pay $17,500, and Jordan agreed to pay $12,000. For Nievelt, who was raised in a Detroit suburb, the payment amounts to nearly three years' tuition. For each of the other three, the settlement translates to about half a year's worth of classes. None of them appear to have made any money off the file-sharing systems they operated, which were confined to their campuses' computer networks. "It's been kind of a bad day, and a bad week and a really, really, really bad month," Nievelt said from the dorm room he shares with two other students, where the corkboard is covered with exam announcements and fliers touting anti-RIAA rallies. The lanky Nievelt started tinkering with computers in the seventh grade and gradually moved on to explore the flexibility of computer networking. Last summer he landed an internship at *Microsoft *Corp., working as a development engineer in the software giant's headquarters in Redmond, Wash. There, he met fellow intern Sherman, who also had spent much of his young life steeped in technology. While attending Huntington High School in Long Island, N.Y., the short-haired, clean-cut student launched a Web site dedicated to a rare genetic condition, Triplo-X syndrome. At Rensselaer, he quickly became involved in a variety of activities, including joining the fraternity Lambda Chi Alpha and publishing extensive research on "Efficient Solutions for Peer to Peer Resource Discovery on Local Area Networks." When officials from Michigan Tech called him one April afternoon and told him that the RIAA was serving him with legal papers, Nievelt felt sick. "My dad's not happy. My mom's more on the paranoid side," Nievelt said. "For a while, it seemed that they [the RIAA] were going to get more money than we ever would have had in the family." Sherman, who could not be reached for comment late Thursday, has written or contributed to several academic papers related to file sharing and MP3, the most popular format for music on file-sharing networks. These include a treatise on FlatLan, the file-sharing software at the center of the record labels' suit against him. For Jordan, the $12,000 settlement will wipe out his college savings account. It was money the quiet freshman  who wrote his first computer program at age 9 and helped test Microsoft's Windows 98 operating system at age 13  had earned by working summers at a pet store near the family home in Oceanside, N.Y. And it was money that the family was counting on to stretch the loans and scholarships that helped cover Jordan's $29,000 annual bill for tuition and housing. "I've been out of work for a while," said Jordan's father, Andy, 54, a former technology manager for financial service companies. "We had a small fund set aside for his schooling, but that was in the markets and is pretty much gone." Noting that he owns thousands of records and CDs, Andy Jordan added: "They [the RIAA] have sued one of their most avid customers. The RIAA says that they wanted to teach these kids and their families a lesson. The lesson we learned is that we will never, ever buy another product from any of those companies again. That's the lesson we're going to tell everyone." Peng, a former salutatorian of Manalapan High School in central New Jersey, is a physics whiz who won a silver medal at the 2001 International Physics Olympiad in Antalya, Turkey. On his personal Web site, the young scientist detailed his hopes of majoring in electrical engineering or computer science, as well as his love of authors Ayn Rand and Isaac Asimov. The Nievelt, Sherman and Jordan settlements took the form of court orders that, if violated, could subject the students to fines and jail terms. They and Peng were allowed to pay the record companies in installments spread over two or more years. Many record company executives blame the protracted slump in CD sales on file-sharing networks, which let users copy songs from one another's computers for free. They responded by suing the most popular networks, with mixed results. The music industry's suit against Napster Inc. effectively shut down the pioneering network and forced the company into insolvency. But a federal judge in Los Angeles ruled last week that two other popular networks, Morpheus and Grokster, were not liable for the unauthorized copies made by their users. Nevertheless, every judge on the cases has held that users on these networks who offer or download files without the copyright owner's permission are violating the law. Those rulings have supplied the RIAA with ammunition for lawsuits against individual file swappers. Peng said in a news release, "I don't believe that I did anything wrong." His attorneys also defended him, saying he'd simply set up an index that enabled others on the Princeton network to find and copy all kinds of files from one another's computers. Lawyers for the record companies, however, said the four students facilitated piracy the same way that Napster did  by providing on their computers a central directory to unauthorized copies of songs. They also offered 1,800 to 6,000 songs from their own computers for others on their campuses to copy, the companies alleged. The lawsuits, which were filed early last month, asked for damages of up to $150,000 per infringement. That translated to hundreds of millions of dollars for each of the students. Matt Oppenheim, senior vice president of business and legal affairs for the RIAA, said the settlements, although well below what the companies asked for, are "the right amount given the situation." Most students "will view $15,000 as a fairly significant amount of money," Oppenheim said. He also noted that since the four suits were filed, at least 18 campus file-sharing networks have been taken down by their operators. "The message," Oppenheim said, "is clearly getting through that distributing copyrighted works without permission is illegal, can have consequences, and that we will move quickly and aggressively to enforce our rights." http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-settle2may02,1,6792735.story?coll=la%2Dhome%2Dleftrail From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Fri May 2 07:24:17 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 10:24:17 -0400 Subject: MailVault to sell of user mail, PGP keys (was: MailVault.com for auction (LFCity dissolution)] Message-ID: > LFCFA[SMTP:webmaster at lfcfa.org] writes: > > For seven years, the Laissez Faire City International Trust built and > planned Laissez Faire City, the first sovereign international city > domiciled in cyberspace. In 2002, Laissez Faire City closed its > doors. Since then, important steps have been taken to bring the > organization to a just and final dissolution. This week, we are > taking one of the final steps in that process: to auction off > remaining assets, both intellectual and physical property. > > Among the properties available for public bidding is Mailvault(R), > the first private, PGP-encrypted e-mail service on the Internet. The > LFCIT supported and funded the Mailvault(R) service; as of April > 2003, more than 5000 users take advantage of Mailvault's fast, easy, > PGP-enabled service to keep their communications private. > Mailvault(R) itself, as well as several other domain names, software > projects and more, are all available for sale during this sale. We > hope that this auction will help us settle accounts with our > creditors, and find new homes for these projects. > > The auction is available to the public at http://www.lfcfa.org > starting now. Bids will be accepted on items or lots listed for sale, > from now until Monday, May 5th 2003, at 5:00pm CST. Following an > internal deliberation period, winners will be announced at the > http://www.lfcfa.org web site on Friday evening, May 9th 2003. > I took a peek at the items on sale. Of particular interest to privacy buffs is Item U1 (see https://www.lfcfa.org/auction/prop.aspx) 4.User Data ITEM: U1 Mailvault service user data DESCRIPTION: all manner of user data currently stored in the Mailvault system - this includes user accounts, stored mail, PGP keys. If I were a Mailvault customer, I would find this perturbing. Peter Trei Disclaimer: My opinons! No one elses! From eresrch at eskimo.com Fri May 2 10:47:50 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 10:47:50 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: On Fri, 2 May 2003, Tim May wrote: > In looking over the traffic of the past weeks, I am struck by how many > of the posts are defending statism and state action. Mostly by > Europeans, coincidentally or not. > > Did some mention of our list in the Journal of Social Action cause you > to subscribe? > > Why are you here? To drive you nuts. We all work for the CIA, MI5 and Mossad. :-) Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Fri May 2 07:50:47 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 10:50:47 -0400 Subject: Cheese-eating surrender monkeys Message-ID: > Tim May[SMTP:timcmay at got.net] wrote: > > The right-wing columnist Jonathan Goldberg dubbed them "cheese-eating > surrender monkeys" several years ago, long before this latest matter. > Has a great cadence, and it's accurate. > No one expects the Pedantry Police! Goldberg used the phrase in a 1999 column, but he did not invent it. It's from a actually from a 1995 Simpsons episode, "Round Springfield" (production number 2F32) Here's the quote in context: ---------------------- [A little later, Bart puts his hand up]. Bart: Mrs. Krabappel, I'm done failing the test. Can I _please_ go to the nurse? Edna: Gosh, Bart, maybe you really are in pain. Well...it would be cruel not to let you go. [files her nails, hums the national anthem] [hums part of "Stars and Stripes Forever"] Heh heh heh, _now_ you may go. Bart: [walking into nurse's room] Lunch Lady Doris? Why are you here? Doris: Budget cuts. They've even got Groundskeeper Willy teaching French. Willy: "Bonjourrr", you cheese-eating surrender monkeys! ---------------- First broadcast: April 30, 1995 More info than you wanted to know: http://www.snpp.com/episodes/2F32.html [I agree with most of the post, but couldn't let this misquote stand] Peter Trei From eresrch at eskimo.com Fri May 2 10:54:22 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 10:54:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: <1A893BC9-7CC3-11D7-839C-003065BD2A5E@vonu.net> Message-ID: On Fri, 2 May 2003, jburnes wrote: > But this is typical in the overly 'politically correct' society. The > one thing that > really amazed me when I moved to Colorado is the number of middle aged > hippie types that 30 years ago were blasting the establishment for > controlling > what they wanted to smoke have now *become* the establishment. A > professor > friend of mine was smoking some Drum and shooting the bull with me in > Pearl Street > Mall (in Boulder). Some new ager comes by and reprimands him for > generating smoke. > He wasn't even a middle-aged hippie. The middle-aged hippie types are > now > running the city council, living in $500,000 homes and laying down nazi > laws > for the rest. Yeah I miss boulder in the 70's. "hey man, you need some weed, acid or coke?" You couldn't go 10 steps on Pearl street without hearing that. Hypocrisy is the in thing now tho. If the President can go from snorting coke to stealing millions of barrels of oil a day, why can't everyone else? It's so much easier to steal than to work after all. Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Fri May 2 09:03:10 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 11:03:10 -0500 Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030502160310.GB8121@cybershamanix.com> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:21:05AM -0400, Sunder wrote: > What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not understand? What part of "Don't impose your drug addiction on others" do you not understand? Tobacco junkies are worse than crackheads, especially concerning their irrational behavior. > > Yes, someone may chose to smoke at a time which is convenient for you, but > why should you be able to dictate that to someone else? Mind your own > fucking business - even if it's just hypothetical. > > > ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- > + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ > \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ > <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ > /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ > + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! > --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ > > On Fri, 2 May 2003, Vincent Penquerc'h wrote: > > > gain something (pleasure) from smoking). But the smoker could > > gain the same pleasure from smoking at another time (though if > > smoking was forbidden everywhere, that would be a different > > matter) for little annoyance. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Fri May 2 09:07:04 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 11:07:04 -0500 Subject: Showdown at the FCC Message-ID: <20030502160704.GC8121@cybershamanix.com> SHOWDOWN AT THE FCC MoveOn Bulletin Friday, May 2, 2003 Co-Editors: Don Hazen and Lakshmi Chaudry, AlterNet Subscribe online at: http://www.moveon.org/moveonbulletin/ You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking here: http://moveon.org/s?i=1334-1692048-4yD_r3kLzrTkA0oje7vXpQ CONTENTS: 1. Eli Pariser: Why Worry About Who Owns the Media? 2. Jeff Chester: Showdown at the FCC 3. Neil Hickey: The Gathering Storm Over Media Ownership 4. Bill Moyers: Barry Diller Takes On Media Deregulation 5. Danny Schechter: The Media, the War, and Our Right to Know 6. Eric Boehlert: Clear Channel's Big Stinking Deregulation Mess 7. Paul Schmelzer: The Death of Local News 8. Caryl Rivers: Where Have All the Women Gone? 9. About the Bulletin ------------------------------ WHY WORRY ABOUT WHO OWNS THE MEDIA? MoveOn Bulletin Op-Ed by Eli Pariser It's like something out of a nightmare, but it really happened: At 1:30 on a cold January night, a train containing hundreds of thousands of gallons of toxic ammonia derails in Minot, North Dakota. Town officials try to sound the emergency alert system, but it isn't working. Desperate to warn townspeople about the poisonous white cloud bearing down on them, the officials call their local radio stations. But no one answers any of the phones for an hour and a half. According to the New York Times, three hundred people are hospitalized, some are partially blinded, and pets and livestock are killed. Where were Minot's DJs on January 18th, 2002? Where was the late night station crew? As it turns out, six of the seven local radio stations had recently been purchased by Clear Channel Communications, a radio giant with over 1,200 stations nationwide. Economies of scale dictated that most of the local staff be cut: Minot stations ran more or less on auto pilot, the programming largely dictated from further up the Clear Channel food chain. No one answered the phone because hardly anyone worked at the stations any more; the songs played in Minot were the same as those played on Clear Channel stations across the Midwest. Companies like Clear Channel argue that economies of scale allow them to cut costs while continuing to provide quality programming. But they do so at the expense of local coverage. It's not just about emergency warnings: media mergers are decreasing coverage of local political races, local small businesses, and local events. There are only a third as many owners of newspapers and TV stations as there were in the 1970s (about 600 now; over 1,500 then). It's harder and harder for Americans to find out what's going on in their own back yards. On June 2, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is considering relaxing or getting rid of rules to allow much more media concentration. While the actual rule changes are under wraps, they could allow enormous changes in the American media environment. For example, one company could be allowed to own ABC, CBS, and NBC. Almost certainly, media companies will be allowed to own newspapers and TV stations in the same town. We could be entering a new era of media megaliths. Do you want one or two big companies acting as gatekeepers and controlling your access to news and entertainment? Most of us don't. And the airwaves explicitly belong to us -- the American people. We allow media companies to use them in exchange for their assurance that they're serving the public interest, and it's the FCC's job to make sure that's so. For the future of American journalism, and for the preservation of a diverse and local media, we have the hold the FCC to its mission. Otherwise, Minot's nightmare may become our national reality. ------------------------------ Interested in taking on the FCC and other media-related concerns? Join the MoveOn Media Corps, a group of over 29,000 committed Americans working for a fair and balanced media. You can sign up now at: http://www.moveon.org/mediacorps/ ------------------------------ SHOWDOWN AT THE FCC Jeffrey Chester and Don Hazen, AlterNet Despite wide protests and the Clear Channel debacle, the FCC is about to award the nation's biggest media conglomerates a new give-away that will further concentrate media ownership in fewer hands. The impact on the American media landscape could be disastrous. Recent TV coverage of the Iraq war already illustrates that US media companies aren't interested in providing a serious range of analysis and debate. This overview describes what's at stake and offers an introduction to the following articles. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15796 ------------------------------ THE GATHERING STORM OVER MEDIA OWNERSHIP Neil Hickey, Columbia Journalism Review CJR's editor-at-large explains just what is at stake in this fight over media ownership. He provides an in-depth look at the issues, and major players in a battle that is pitting journalists against their bosses, breaking up old alliances, and gathering momentum as the day of reckoning draws near. He traces the snowballing trend of media consolidation and its implications for the future, revealing just how the drive for profit is eroding diversity, local control, and more importantly giving a few mega-corporations a monopoly over the dissemination of news. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15654 ------------------------------ BARRY DILLER TAKES ON MEDIA DEREGULATION Bill Moyers, Now with Bill Moyers The founder of Fox Broadcasting and present CEO of USA Networks is an unlikely but passionate opponent of plans to loosen media ownership rules. In an interview with Bill Moyers, the media mogul explains how deregulation creates corporations with "such overwhelming power in the marketplace that everyone has to do essentially what they say." Diller argues that government regulation is essential to prevent media companies from controlling everything we see, read, and hear. As he puts it, "Who else is gonna do it for us?" http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15768 ------------------------------ THE MEDIA, THE WAR, AND OUR RIGHT TO KNOW Danny Schechter, MediaChannel.org Why did the media do such a poor job of reporting on the Iraq war? The boosterism of news anchors, the suppression of antiwar views, and the sanitized images of war that defined television coverage are not a simple matter of bias or ineptitude, says media analyst Danny Schechter. He draws attention to the connection between the decisions made by journalists and the lobbying efforts of owners who will profit immensely from the upcoming FCC decision in June. http://www.mediachannel.org/views/dissector/moveon.shtml ------------------------------ CLEAR CHANNEL'S BIG STINKING DEREGULATION MESS Eric Boehlert, Salon Clear Channel, the radio and concert conglomerate, has been the greatest beneficiary of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which stripped all ownership limits in the radio industry. The rapacious company, led by Bush supporter Lowry Mays, has grown from 40 stations to 1,225 since then, and now uses its power to routinely bully advertisers and record companies, and more recently censor antiwar artists. However, as Eric Boehlert points out, its "success" may be the most powerful weapon in the arsenal of media activists. Clear Channel's stranglehold on the radio industry is the best and clearest example of the effects of rampant deregulation. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15281 ------------------------------ THE DEATH OF LOCAL NEWS Paul Schmelzer, AlterNet Meet the Sinclair Broadcast Group, the "Clear Channel of local news." Since 1991, the company has managed to acquire 62 television stations or 24 percent of the national TV audience. The company's modus operandi is the centralized production of homogenized, repackaged faux "local" news. Its success offers an alarming glimpse of the post-deregulation world in which all news may be produced in one giant newsroom and from a single viewpoint -- which in Sinclair's case is wholeheartedly conservative. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15718. ------------------------------ WHERE HAVE ALL THE WOMEN GONE? Caryl Rivers, Women's Enews Once the war on Iraq took center-stage in the headlines of newspapers and magazines across the country, women writers became increasingly rare in the media. In their place are mostly white men who write on a narrow band of foreign policy issues, mostly recycling their views over and over again. From the all-male line-ups in the op-ed pages of the Washington Post and the New York Times to the dwindling female bylines in the New Yorker and Atlantic Monthly, women's voices have been caught in a "spiral of silence" that is unprecedented since the pre-women's movement days. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15677 ------------------------------ ABOUT THE MOVEON BULLETIN AND MOVEON.ORG The MoveOn Bulletin is a free email bulletin providing information, resources, news, and action ideas on important political issues. The full text of the MoveOn Bulletin is online at http://www.moveon.org/moveonbulletin/; you can subscribe to it at that address. The MoveOn Bulletin is a project of MoveOn.org. MoveOn.org is an issue-oriented, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that gives people a voice in shaping the laws that affect their lives. MoveOn.org engages people in the civic process, using the Internet to democratically determine a non-partisan agenda, raising public awareness of pressing issues, and coordinating grassroots advocacy campaigns to encourage sound public policies. You can help decide the direction of MoveOn.org by participating in the discussion forum at: http://www.actionforum.com/forum/index.html?forum_id=223 This is a message from MoveOn.org. To remove yourself (Harmon Seaver) from this list, please visit our subscription management page at:
http://moveon.org/s?i=1334-1692048-4yD_r3kLzrTkA0oje7vXpQ ----- End forwarded message ----- -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From matt at rearviewmirror.org Fri May 2 11:18:22 2003 From: matt at rearviewmirror.org (Matt Beland) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 11:18:22 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> On Friday 02 May 2003 09:42 am, Tim May wrote: > In looking over the traffic of the past weeks, I am struck by how many > of the posts are defending statism and state action. Mostly by > Europeans, coincidentally or not. > > Did some mention of our list in the Journal of Social Action cause you > to subscribe? > > Why are you here? Here's a better question, Tim. Why are you upset about it? I mean, there are two possibilities. Either this mailing list is for useful discussion, or it's not. If it *is*, then you should *welcome* the statists, the communists, the apologists, the Klansmen, feminists, nazis, Libertarians of any sort, Democrats, Greens, Republicans... anyone with the intelligence to write a coherent statement. (One could even argue against *that* limitation, but I won't.) Certainly, you have your views, and you should be expressing them, and you should encourage and support others who agree with you. But if this list is to be in any way useful, then you have to actually do this where people who *disagree* can read it. Preaching to the choir makes you feel warm and fuzzy, perhaps, and it makes for a smooth sermon, but it doesn't do a whole lot of good. Besides - what's the fucking point of supporting freedom of speech if you keep telling people to shut up? You're dangerously close to sounding like those cranks who claim they're being patriotic by attacking the Dixie Chicks for their speech. If it's not for useful discussion, just let us know. We'll all leave, and you can continue spreading the good word to precisely nobody. One of the worst things about this wonderful invention we call the Internet is that so many people choose to listen only to those they already agree with. -- Matt Beland matt at rearviewmirror.org http://www.rearviewmirror.org From timcmay at got.net Fri May 2 11:20:51 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 11:20:51 -0700 Subject: Mike Hawash In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Thursday, May 1, 2003, at 08:18 AM, Mike Rosing wrote: > On Thu, 1 May 2003, Declan McCullagh wrote: > >> Tim, come now. He was able to have one phone call a week of up to ten >> minutes (or something like that) with his lawyer. I'm SURE it wasn't >> monitored. I'm SURE that was sufficient time to discuss legal >> strategy. >> >> Truly, your hostile comments do the hard working prosecutors at the >> U.S. Department of Justice a grave disservice in their brave fight >> against domestic terrorists. > > You're supposed to add the smily with that kind of comment. Someone > might > think you were serious, and Tim packs iron (that thows lead real fast)! Smileys are almost never needed. Those who miss irony don't deserve smileys and emoticons for hints. As for packing iron, of course I do. Various weapons bought untraceably, long before the current bans. I don't recognize the gun laws which violate the Second Amendment. John Ross had it right. I even rigged a flame thrower a while back. I keep it ready to go and practice with it occasionally. Seeing some ninja thugs running around in flames would be a wonderful sight to behold, I think..screaming for their mommas as their flesh bubbles and chars. My perimeter alarms I don't discuss. And whether I have set booby traps and claymores is something I won't discuss, either. I've had Feds threaten me, I've had them publish my Social Security Number (a major sin, in my opinion, and worth of extreme retribution, when the time is right). They know I am their enemy and I know they are my enemy. They seek to disarm us, to generate so many laws that we are all lawbreakers (even them, but they rarely prosecute members of their own clan), and to force everyone into plea bargains or face draconian, mandatory sentencing, illegal combatant laws. --Tim May From sunder at sunder.net Fri May 2 08:21:05 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 11:21:05 -0400 (edt) Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles In-Reply-To: Message-ID: What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not understand? Yes, someone may chose to smoke at a time which is convenient for you, but why should you be able to dictate that to someone else? Mind your own fucking business - even if it's just hypothetical. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Fri, 2 May 2003, Vincent Penquerc'h wrote: > gain something (pleasure) from smoking). But the smoker could > gain the same pleasure from smoking at another time (though if > smoking was forbidden everywhere, that would be a different > matter) for little annoyance. From DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk Fri May 2 03:38:08 2003 From: DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk (David Howe) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 11:38:08 +0100 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother References: <4C69C844-7A66-11D7-ADBC-000A956B4C74@got.net> <017401c30f03$86d30240$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> <20030501093942.C22466@cluebot.com> <5.2.0.9.0.20030501133840.02073b50@mail.well.com> Message-ID: <002501c31097$18961160$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> at Thursday, May 01, 2003 6:43 PM, Declan McCullagh was seen to say: > At 06:30 PM 5/1/2003 +0100, David Howe wrote: > First, it's "falsely shouting fire," and second, I wonder how you > would draw a distinction between a newspaper saying that, someone > saying that on this list, and someone saying it in a public park. > Imprison all of 'em? If they make false statements in a public forum that causes a mass panic, *and* fail to defend their actions in court - why not? I am not arguing for prior restraint here (telling them "you must not do these things") but I think they should be required to face the consequences of their actions. > The problem is that if you create a rule that can be used to imprison > the Holocaust deniers (a loathsome sort, I agree), it can be used to > jail those who challenge the conventional orthodoxy, even if they > believe they're right. More to the point, even if they *are* right. True enough - and the world is full of people with wild beliefs (like the Holocaust deniers) who are willing to go to jail as "martyrs" for their beliefs... I suppose my problem is I believe that a act (even speech) that damages the community as a whole or influences those legally not yet equipped to make their own decisions (children) should be subject to challenge in court - not precensure, but legal challenge after the fact. If he is unable to convince (in court) a jury mutually chosen by his lawyers and the prosecution that he acted reasonably, then perhaps he didn't? From timcmay at got.net Fri May 2 11:57:43 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 11:57:43 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> Message-ID: On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 11:18 AM, Matt Beland wrote: > > Besides - what's the fucking point of supporting freedom of speech if > you keep > telling people to shut up? In order. First, "freedom of speech" is a legal issue, not a matter of whether one likes or supports or gives a platform for speech. This has been covered many times. Second, I have no power to make people shut up. As for "telling" them, I don't. I do wonder why they are on the list given the implications of the technologies. I don't think they've realized the implications for their world view and for the breeders and useless eaters they support. > You're dangerously close to sounding like those > cranks who claim they're being patriotic by attacking the Dixie Chicks > for > their speech. And as in that debate, where "free speech" is tossed around a lot, nothing in the Dixie Chicks case has involved freedom of speech in any way whatsoever. Think about it. --Tim May "Ben Franklin warned us that those who would trade liberty for a little bit of temporary security deserve neither. This is the path we are now racing down, with American flags fluttering."-- Tim May, on events following 9/11/2001 From eresrch at eskimo.com Fri May 2 12:17:41 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 12:17:41 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030502180728.GA28831@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: On Fri, 2 May 2003, Adam Shostack wrote: > All three? Man, MI5 started demanding refunds when they found I was > selling the same reports to them and the boys in Langley. Or maybe it > was the fact that it was all gossip columns from the Telegraph. But > boy, were they pissed. The KGB isn't what it used to be, they'd make it easier to recycle all that stuff. China is up and coming tho, it's a lot easier to make it go around when you have lots of double agents to blame it on. The key is make sure they aren't pissed at *you*. Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From jburnes at vonu.net Fri May 2 10:25:43 2003 From: jburnes at vonu.net (jburnes) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 12:25:43 -0500 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: <20030502160310.GB8121@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <1A893BC9-7CC3-11D7-839C-003065BD2A5E@vonu.net> On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 11:03 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:21:05AM -0400, Sunder wrote: >> What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not >> understand? > > What part of "Don't impose your drug addiction on others" do you not > understand? Tobacco junkies are worse than crackheads, especially > concerning > their irrational behavior. > Actually it may be quite rational. A certain percentage of the population may be self-medicating for type 2 ADD (nicotine fills in for acetylcholine that they lack). Some others use tobacco to focus and tune out the really high levels of environmental noise and distraction that are part and parcel of modern society. Some others may do it just because they like it. Man, cypherpunks has really gone down quite a ways when members are advocating who should be allowed to consume what and when. Next it will be laws to stop people from blowing their noses in restaurants. I say let people go to hell in their own way. Cigarettes or Jack Black or cocaine. But this is typical in the overly 'politically correct' society. The one thing that really amazed me when I moved to Colorado is the number of middle aged hippie types that 30 years ago were blasting the establishment for controlling what they wanted to smoke have now *become* the establishment. A professor friend of mine was smoking some Drum and shooting the bull with me in Pearl Street Mall (in Boulder). Some new ager comes by and reprimands him for generating smoke. He wasn't even a middle-aged hippie. The middle-aged hippie types are now running the city council, living in $500,000 homes and laying down nazi laws for the rest. Hypocrites. Animal Farm come true. Sometimes I really wish for the 70's. Cheesy clothes and Jimmy Carter were small threats to world order. jim burnes From DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk Fri May 2 04:50:14 2003 From: DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk (David Howe) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 12:50:14 +0100 Subject: The Holocaust (sm) (tm) References: <200305011954.h41JsAPJ008470@artifact.psychedelic.net> Message-ID: <01a601c310a4$8f6be640$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> Impressive. I personally think the biggest problem with almost any label of universal disgust (and "Holocaust denier" is almost as good as "pedophile" for this purpose) is that it gets abused as a method to suppress unrelated or marginally related discussion. Holocaust denier is a bad label for someone who (for example) doubts the "skin lampshades" story - they aren't denying the holocaust, they are arguing for the untruth of a selected fact; only by questioning the validity of individual elements of an accepted theory can you maintain the truth of that theory, or find a greater truth that extends human knowledge. saying "$FOO is provably true so you must accept unquestioningly everything I ever say as being equally true, regardless of proof" is as unreasonable a position as denying $FOO without any counterproof to the original assertion. Doubting the validity (or legallity) of Israeli policy in the occupied territories isn't anti-semitic or even anti-Israeli - it is opposed to current israeli policy, possibly specific current israeli political figures, but not groups of people described by religious or geographical location. Ditto Saddam (not Iraqis), Bush (not christians or americans) or Kim Il Sung (not buddists or North Koreans) - individual people may be ultimately responsible for acts I can despise, but on the whole their people are just getting on with their lives as best they can. From justin at soze.net Fri May 2 06:15:16 2003 From: justin at soze.net (Justin) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 13:15:16 +0000 Subject: Fake News for Big Brother In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030501181130.052f3088@mail.attbi.com> References: <20030501210713.GA7129@cybershamanix.com> <5.2.1.1.0.20030501181130.052f3088@mail.attbi.com> Message-ID: <20030502131516.GI17685@dreams.soze.net> At 2003-05-02 02:56 +0000, Steve Schear wrote: > Funny thing about the 14th, the representatives of the Southern States (who > had previously been sworn in and seated for the session) didn't get to vote > on it. They were ejected and the doors barred (the Senate even barred a > New Jersey rep. who held the deciding vote and was strongly opposed to the > measure). They then reported that the majority (of those in the room) > approved the measure, which was sent on to the states for ratification. A > similar travesty played out in the counting of ratifying states and > reporting out the results. When challenged in the Supreme Court the robed > ones punted, saying it was a "political matter for Congress to > decide". Thus spake Tyranny. That may be so, but stories abound of drunk state legislators, corruption, bribery, and other shenanigans involved in the ratification of every Amendment from the Reconstruction up to the point people became serious about doing the Right Thing (tm) with stuff like female suffrage and the repeal of the prohibition amendment. There are serious questions about the validity, specifically, of the 16th, 17th, and 18th amendments, and it is quite clear that even were there no trickery involved in the passage of the civil rights amendments, Confederate States were required to ratify them as a condition for re-joining (read cessation of occupation) the Union. Just like the 16th, if someone got a serious opposition movement going against the 14th, Congress and the States would quickly ratify an amendment authorizing ex-post-facto law in the specific instance in question (and probably for all the Amendments that were questionably ratified so they'd only have to deal with it once), and a follow-on amendment similar to the 14th which would have effects retroactive to the "ratification" of the 14th. -- Freedom's untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. --Rumsfeld, 2003-04-11 From adam at homeport.org Fri May 2 11:07:28 2003 From: adam at homeport.org (Adam Shostack) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 14:07:28 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030502180728.GA28831@lightship.internal.homeport.org> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 10:47:50AM -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: | | To drive you nuts. We all work for the CIA, MI5 and Mossad. All three? Man, MI5 started demanding refunds when they found I was selling the same reports to them and the boys in Langley. Or maybe it was the fact that it was all gossip columns from the Telegraph. But boy, were they pissed. Adam -- "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -Hume From patrick at lfcgate.com Fri May 2 13:08:02 2003 From: patrick at lfcgate.com (Patrick) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 14:08:02 -0600 Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <00a801c310e6$8aa94f20$0200a8c0@scylla> > Most of the parts were batches that didn't make it through entry-level > tests. Tesla wasn't making exactly stellar things, so reliability tests > had to be performed on the batches before they were put into production. > There were regulations about destroying the batches considered defective. > But stealing something that's scheduled for destruction anyway is not > stealing in its true sense - depriving the owner of enjoying the object. This is disgusting. Next you'll be redefining rape and murder. "Yes I fucked her without consent, but it doesn't count as rape because she was in a coma at the time." Patrick http://lucrative.thirdhost.com/ From eresrch at eskimo.com Fri May 2 14:14:13 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 14:14:13 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: <200305021638.44030.sfurlong@acmenet.net> Message-ID: On Fri, 2 May 2003, Steve Furlong wrote: > What's wrong with Cambridge, MA? > > (Harvard Square, the world's last bastion of hard-line communism.) That's good, I thought it was Madison WI. Home of the "The Progessive" magazine. Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk Fri May 2 06:14:38 2003 From: Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk (Vincent Penquerc'h) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 14:14:38 +0100 Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles Message-ID: > Two people start businesses in the same town. Alice works hard, works > long hours, concentrates on her business. Bob fails to do this. Alice > drives Bob out of business. The point is to balance consequences of everyone's actions for everyone. In your case, Alice works hard and drives Bob out of business because she gains something in it (as the smoker did gain something (pleasure) from smoking). But the smoker could gain the same pleasure from smoking at another time (though if smoking was forbidden everywhere, that would be a different matter) for little annoyance. Alice could not do with changing business to help Bob, this would be a huge strain on her. So, you see, there is a large difference in the two examples, though I grant you they seem similar. Now, you might also say that being exposed to the smoke is only a small inconvenience, but this is to be compared to the small inconvenience for the smoker. As a side note: I'd have different views on your example if Alice was specifically trying to get Bob out of business, and depending on the methods she was using to further these ends. > capitalism is the process of creative destructionism Life as a whole is, whether at the micro level of one's life or at the macro level of evolution. -- Vincent Penquerc'h From bill.stewart at pobox.com Fri May 2 14:17:26 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 14:17:26 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030502193123.GJ17685@dreams.soze.net> References: <20030502180728.GA28831@lightship.internal.homeport.org> <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030502180728.GA28831@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030502141227.02cad588@idiom.com> At 07:31 PM 05/02/2003 +0000, Justin wrote: >At 2003-05-02 18:07 +0000, Adam Shostack wrote: > > > On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 10:47:50AM -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > > | > > | To drive you nuts. We all work for the CIA, MI5 and Mossad. > >One of these things is not like the others; one of these things just >doesn't belong... Hate to break this to you, Justin, but Tim may be too old to recognize that one unless he had younger siblings or friends with TV-watching kids... My sister who was born in 1963 watched it; I don't think my brother who was born in 1960 watched it much. If Tim's parents were early adopters of television, he'd be more likely to recognize Howdy Doody and Mickey Mouse Club. From timcmay at got.net Fri May 2 14:32:20 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 14:32:20 -0700 Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <8DFD1896-7CE5-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 12:53 PM, Thomas Shaddack wrote: > >> In a free society, nothing stops an employee from seeking a lower >> stress, less demanding, lower profit margin employer, lower-paying >> job. >> In America, these low-paid employees are called "public teachers." > > Lower stress? In the job where you can get shot? (Well, luckily not in > all > locations.) Don't believe what you see on television or movies is any measure of the norm. Similar to the "inspection paradox," what one is observing is usually not the norm. While a few teachers all around the world (U.S., Australia, Scotland, Germany, etc.) have gotten shot, this can happen in lots of professions. It's what happens when there are a few billion people with television cameras and reporters in close proximity. > >> Do you think American schools do not have such clubs? I was in a dozen >> of them, and President of several. > > I am not surprised. :) How expensive they were to attend? What are you talking about? All of the clubs I knew of were free. A few were closed except to those invited (based on various criteria), but most were open to anyone with interest. Same as Cypherpunks. > > Capitalism is a good idea, as long as it has the form of a lot of > small, > widely varying subjects. The current trend of consolidation brings away > both the competition and the choice, and with high-enough barriers to > entry there will be no new small subjects to disrupt the balance. Yes, you are right, the great electronics companies of the 1960s sit astride our economic life, crushing the life out of real competition! With Fairchild and Rheem Semiconductor and Mohawk Data Sciences controlling everything, new ideas and innovations cannot be developed! And the 1970s were much, much worse, with the computer companies consolidating their power and dominating all computer work! Who can innovate when Burroughs, Honeywell, Data General, Univac, NCR, DEC, and CDC utterly dominate? >> But your rant above says you would probably be happier under state >> socialism, which makes this list your absolute worse enemy. > > Not necessarily. I just dislike the situation when money are the > beginning, the center, and the end of virtually everything, and where > people are degraded to mere replaceable "human resources". Nonsense. Anyone who has recruited, hired, fired, and otherwise managed employees know the true story. Namely, that good people are hard to find, hard to hire, hard to keep, and that they must be coddled and accommodated in their idiosyncracies. Do you think Declan's employees view him as just an interchangeable part? Better yet, do you think I have changed all that much since when I was a physicist working for Intel? I was considered a trouble maker, a shit disturber....but a damned good thinker and problem solver. I often solved problems almost "on the spot," in meetings where I was brought in, when roomfuls of idiots had been assigning each other "action items" for months. (A lot of time people seem to think they cannot solve a problem by thinking about it, so they try to look busy, shuffle papers, and hope someone else solves the problem. I merely listened, poked around, and developed mental images of what was happening. Usually this worked very quickly.) For this, they cut me a lot of slack. They gave me a big lab and told me to keep on doing what I was doing. This is about as far from "degraded to mere replaceable "human resources"" as one can get. And there were a lot of people treated like me. And when I had to hire people, finding them and keeping them was no easy chore. (Getting rid of some of them was also difficult...especially the coloreds. Our Personnel people practically flipped out when a colored person had to be fired. We had to do extra steps, and still we got sued for "racial discrimination." I don't think any of the coloreds ever won their cases, though.) You seem to have some very skewed ideas of what "capitalism" means. You seem to think it means mean old capitalist bosses whip the proles and fire them at will. Your teachers are still teaching you the Marxist dialectic, I think. > >> Free markets are often rough. They mean there is no one to provide >> food >> for those who have no skills to offer. > > Contemporary free markets (we'll leave aside the fact they aren't > really > free) are driven by short-term profits. Higher investments aimed to > distant future are rare and far between. Basic research suffers, like > virtually everything with no immediate profitable application. Nonsense. Basic research is being done by many people. Corporations have never been the best place for blue-sky, academic research. This is one reason the U.S. and Western Europe have thousands of excellent universities and colleges offering Ph.D. programs and all the things that go with them (professors doing research, grant money, tie-ins with corporations, etc.). "Research" is a very broad topic, covering many fields and many issues. Issues of basic physics vs. applied technology, issues of biological principles vs. new drugs and new tools, issues of fundamental mathematics vs. computer programming. I think research is doing very well. Some fields are "mined out" in terms of major new paradigms, at least in terms of the energies and scales we can now probe. Some are undergoing rapid change. Some are hotbeds of academic research, some are most closely related to corporation projects. All to be expected. --Tim May "The Constitution is a radical document...it is the job of the government to rein in people's rights." --President William J. Clinton --Tim May "The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant." --John Stuart Mill From timcmay at got.net Fri May 2 14:55:37 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 14:55:37 -0700 Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: <8DFD1896-7CE5-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 02:32 PM, Tim May wrote: (quoting Thomas Shaddack) >> Contemporary free markets (we'll leave aside the fact they aren't >> really >> free) are driven by short-term profits. Higher investments aimed to >> distant future are rare and far between. Basic research suffers, like >> virtually everything with no immediate profitable application. > > Nonsense. Basic research is being done by many people. Corporations > have never been the best place for blue-sky, academic research. This > is one reason the U.S. and Western Europe have thousands of excellent > universities and colleges offering Ph.D. programs and all the things > that go with them (professors doing research, grant money, tie-ins > with corporations, etc.). > > "Research" is a very broad topic, covering many fields and many > issues. Issues of basic physics vs. applied technology, issues of > biological principles vs. new drugs and new tools, issues of > fundamental mathematics vs. computer programming. > > I think research is doing very well. Some fields are "mined out" in > terms of major new paradigms, at least in terms of the energies and > scales we can now probe. Some are undergoing rapid change. Some are > hotbeds of academic research, some are most closely related to > corporation projects. All to be expected. I want to add something to this, as the topic (and Thomas' views) are both angering me and stimulating me to write about this. Item: Research in astrophysics and cosmology is booming today. No corporate interest in figuring out the role of dark matter, dark energy, superstrings, anthropic reasons for the neutrino mass, inflation, and a dozen other currently hot topics. Much of the work came from the fruits of industrial development, just as much of the astronomy work of the past 150 years, even longer, has come from industrial methods and tools. In the 1930s, the ability to construct very large Pyrex mirrors...I lived in the 1950s within a pleasant Sunday drive to Mount Palomar, for a long time the very largest telescope in the world. The same ferment is also happening in several other fields. Physics went through this ferment in the 1920s-60s, though things have tapered off in the past couple of decades (with some conspicuous exceptions). Item: In today's news is a report that two groups have sequenced the SARS virus. Which brings up "sequencing." A single guy, a surfer and LSD user at UC San Diego, invented polymerase chain reaction (PCR) as a way of "amplifying" tiny samples into things which machines could sequence. Hence was gene sequencing invented. Not a corporate lab, but a guy thinking about things as he paddled his surfboard. Similar examples abound. Item: In crypto, Diffie and Hellman were at Stanford, Merkle was at Berkeley, and Rivest, Shamir, and Adelman were at MIT. Again, no corporate labs. Nobody either "stifling innovation" or "failing to support basic research." Also in crypto, David Chaum was at UC Santa Barbara working on his ideas, then at Berkeley (affiliated or living there, doesn't much matter). I reject the claim that corporations and capitalism are either stifling innovation or that innovation is not happening because corporations aren't doing "enough" basic research. (There are some practical reasons why corporations are usually not great places for very basic research. I could write a few pages on this, but will not do so here.) I think innovation is doing perfectly well, and I further think the innovations which have come out of the corporate/capitalist/open society/Western system have been a whole lot greater in all respects than what have come out of socialist/closed society/Iron Curtain systems. Which makes claims that capitalism is not doing enough research even more wrong-headed. Thanks to Thomas for triggering this rant, though. --Tim May "The Constitution is a radical document...it is the job of the government to rein in people's rights." --President William J. Clinton From matt at rearviewmirror.org Fri May 2 15:08:20 2003 From: matt at rearviewmirror.org (Matt Beland) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 15:08:20 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030502213842.GB23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030502213842.GB23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> Message-ID: <200305021508.20397.matt@rearviewmirror.org> On Friday 02 May 2003 02:38 pm, Bill O'Hanlon wrote: > On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:18:22AM -0700, Matt Beland wrote: > > Why are you upset about it? > > It's a constant distraction. > > It's analogous to a radio astronomy mailing list constantly being trolled > by flat earthers. Bad analogy. It is more like a radio astronomy list being populated by astronomers who support both the constant-expansion ("open") universe model and those who support the eventual-collapse ("cyclic") universe model. Both groups are astronomers, but because they are both intelligent people who support different models, the models are constantly refined to prove one side or the other. > > If it's not for useful discussion, just let us know. We'll all leave, and > > you can continue spreading the good word to precisely nobody. > > Once the flat earthers leave, the conversation will get interesting again. Not supported by current evidence. A few years ago, this list was highly interesting, and highly volatile. Populated by libertarians, anarchists, crypto experts, feds, political science students, scientists, cranks, gun nuts, gun control nuts, etc. Now? Looks like you've driven most of the interesting people away. Who's left? The ones who agree with you? Where's the fun in that? Don't you get tired of talking into an echo machine? -- Matt Beland matt at rearviewmirror.org http://www.rearviewmirror.org From jya at pipeline.com Fri May 2 15:18:42 2003 From: jya at pipeline.com (John Young) Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 15:18:42 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: Matt Breland wrote: >Besides - what's the fucking point of supporting freedom of speech if you keep >telling people to shut up? You're dangerously close to sounding like those >cranks who claim they're being patriotic by attacking the Dixie Chicks for >their speech. > >If it's not for useful discussion, just let us know. We'll all leave, and you >can continue spreading the good word to precisely nobody. > >One of the worst things about this wonderful invention we call the Internet is >that so many people choose to listen only to those they already agree with. Well said. But don't leave, get combative, truth comes out by hammer blows not friendly persuasion. Telling people to shut up is a national craze reports the Wall Street Journal, like aroma therapy. Tim is customarily wide minded about most things, including who posts here. When he goes on the attack, though, its purposeful, usually to hot poker fat-ass noodling. Don't expect from Tim polite disagreement, far less polite agreement. Nobody is in charge here, nobody is the man. Everybody is a bull shitting loser, or a loon, as Tim anoints his taunters reflexively. Choate is the norm, goddam mule, vainly stubborn and resistant to reason as you'd expect of any coddled American self-indulgent supremacist racist ignorant peasant who believes he's an unrecognized Mensa. Give a fool money and he's a genius, and often a crank to ward off panhandlers. Best to stay alert to getting your ass rasped if you get lazy, or presume this vile extreme fighting pit a comfortable refuge. Fuck such fake-wrestling fools to death, as the old fart might snarl -- just before he blows their pea-brains out to make a barbeque stew stirred with cactus in a vat of dragon-fire jalapenos. Statist, communist, those old word farts are over if you're under 30. Whatever happened to the iron-gut cypherpunk who was blackbelt in gobbling jalapenos? From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Fri May 2 12:51:24 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 15:51:24 -0400 Subject: [Factoring] TWIRL and RSA key sizes Message-ID: This just came to me over one of our internal mailing lists. It may be of interest. Peter Trei RSA Security --------------------- > A new technical note on Adi Shamir's "TWIRL" design for integer > factorization has just been posted on the RSA Labs site, at > http://www.rsasecurity.com/rsalabs/technotes/twirl.html. > > Executive Summary: The popular 1024-bit key size for RSA > keys is becoming the next horizon for researchers in integer > factorization, as demonstrated by the innovative "TWIRL" > design recently proposed by Adi Shamir and Eran Tromer. > The design confirms that the traditional assumption that a > 1024-bit RSA key provides comparable strength to an 80-bit > symmetric key has been a reasonable one. Thus, if the 80-bit > security level is appropriate for a given application, then TWIRL > itself has no immediate effect. Many details remain to be > worked out, however, and the cost estimates are inconclusive. > TWIRL provides an opportunity for review of key sizes in > practice; RSA Laboratories' revised recommendations are > given in Table 1 below. > > -- Burt > > > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From schear at attbi.com Fri May 2 16:17:32 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 16:17:32 -0700 Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: References: <7647970C-7C57-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030502155919.045be830@mail.attbi.com> At 09:53 PM 5/2/2003 +0200, Thomas Shaddack wrote: >Capitalism is a good idea, as long as it has the form of a lot of small, >widely varying subjects. The current trend of consolidation brings away >both the competition and the choice, and with high-enough barriers to >entry there will be no new small subjects to disrupt the balance. Of >course it will collapse later, but human lives have finite length, so >longer-term waiting isn't the option I'd be exactly happy to take. I gave a presentation at a conference a few years back in which I raised the idea that since Intellectual Property (e.g., trademarks) isn't, its really a lease, that our society should consider setting limits on the market penetration (say 50%, which is already in excess of the what many economists call the "friction free" point wherein companies can continue to gain market share merely by dint of their already considerable presence) of single companies in markets whose size (the therefore probably importance) exceeds some minimum threshold of the GDP. However, instead of enforcing these limits via the Department of Justice, they would become a civil matter and one's competitors can use the courts to strip a company of its sole lease on a trademark or patent applied to this market. >Contemporary free markets (we'll leave aside the fact they aren't really >free) are driven by short-term profits. Higher investments aimed to >distant future are rare and far between. Basic research suffers, like >virtually everything with no immediate profitable application. I guess then the many science (especially theoretical) and technology developments by "amateurs" over the past three were just a fluke? > > Think of it as evolution in action. The burnoff of useless eaters will > > be glorious. > >...if they won't rise up instead and steamroll over everything. And, as >nobody paid enough care to the public education system, they are too dumb >to rebuild the society in any sensible way after then. > >The most important thing to take care of, for the long-term future, is the >education system (we started with the teachers, so why not to end with the >teachers). If statistically significant amount of people will be able (and >willing!) to think for themselves, many problems (eg, sheeple) will >disappear or be reduced. Not only this is less stinky and more aesthetical >(though less spectacular) approach than an outright burnoff, it can also >be more effective. An excellent treatise on this can be found in Leonard Peikoffs' "The Ominous Parallels," 1982. The author dissects many of the parallels between the raise of Nazism and the then current situation in the U.S. He lays much of the cause for its raise and our "ominous" future in a lack of development in individual thinking, especially philosophical, the kind that launched America. steve From Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk Fri May 2 08:35:47 2003 From: Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk (Vincent Penquerc'h) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 16:35:47 +0100 Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles Message-ID: > What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not > understand? > > Yes, someone may chose to smoke at a time which is convenient > for you, but > why should you be able to dictate that to someone else? Mind your own > fucking business - even if it's just hypothetical. I kind of agree, to a point, but then you (and others) do the same with imposing your own ideals to others, don't you ? As long as people interact, they'll have to impose stuff to others. I'm imposing my ideals (in this case, forbidding to smoke to people who want to) ? You do yours (annoying people who don't like smoke, because you want to smoke). I don't usually annoy smokers when they do. If I'm annoyed by it, I just move. Unless I can't, that is. But you just act as if *your* ideals were *obviously* the right ones. I reject that idea. They might, and they sure are popular here. But you do impose them all the same. -- Vincent Penquerc'h From wmo at rebma.pro-ns.net Fri May 2 14:38:42 2003 From: wmo at rebma.pro-ns.net (Bill O'Hanlon) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 16:38:42 -0500 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> Message-ID: <20030502213842.GB23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:18:22AM -0700, Matt Beland wrote: > > On Friday 02 May 2003 09:42 am, Tim May wrote: > > In looking over the traffic of the past weeks, I am struck by how many > > of the posts are defending statism and state action. Mostly by > > Europeans, coincidentally or not. > > > > Did some mention of our list in the Journal of Social Action cause you > > to subscribe? > > > > Why are you here? > > Here's a better question, Tim. > > Why are you upset about it? It's a constant distraction. It's analogous to a radio astronomy mailing list constantly being trolled by flat earthers. > > If it's not for useful discussion, just let us know. We'll all leave, and you > can continue spreading the good word to precisely nobody. > Once the flat earthers leave, the conversation will get interesting again. -Bill From sfurlong at acmenet.net Fri May 2 13:38:44 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 16:38:44 -0400 Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: <7647970C-7C57-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <7647970C-7C57-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305021638.44030.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Friday 02 May 2003 00:35, Tim May wrote: > Take care of yourself in whichever socialist paradise you can find. > Albania is out, as of a few years ago....Vietnam is rapidly going > free market...China is an industrial giant with a Politburo...perhaps > you could try Myanmar? What's wrong with Cambridge, MA? (Harvard Square, the world's last bastion of hard-line communism.) -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From matt at rearviewmirror.org Fri May 2 16:50:08 2003 From: matt at rearviewmirror.org (Matt Beland) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 16:50:08 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030502231430.GC23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021508.20397.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030502231430.GC23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> Message-ID: <200305021650.08716.matt@rearviewmirror.org> On Friday 02 May 2003 04:14 pm, Bill O'Hanlon wrote: > I think my analogy is good. I think your error is displayed by your > analogy. In your example, both groups are astronomers. > > In the current situation on this list, both groups are _not_ cypherpunks, > if you accept the definition of cypherpunks as "people who use encryption > technology to make statism impossible." If you don't accept that > definition, that's fine, but I think my definition is consistent with > the history of the list, and my guess is that Tim would agree. And he's > the one who asked the question in the first place. I think it's a good > question, and I'm curious to hear the answer from one of the folks it's > aimed at. Accepting your definition for a moment, your analogy is still flawed because it assumes one group is rejecting science altogether, where here the two groups simply arrive at different conclusions from the same data. But in fact, I don't completely agree with your definition. A Cypherpunk is one who is interested in the technology and use of encryption, and the social and political effects thereof. One definition assumes a conclusion, one definition defines a group in search of a conclusion. And really, my question would remain valid in either case. IF this list is to be the home of any sort of useful discussion, then the discussion must include both sides of the issue. Otherwise you don't have discussion, you have dogma. > You left statists out of your list, unless you were including them when > you said "cranks" and "gun control nuts". The original question was about > statists. Statists and communists both would be included in politician, Republican, Green, Democrat, Libertarian, crank (though not only statists and politicians fit there) and gun control nut. Just pick the flavor that matches the label. > Some interesting people have left. Other interesting people have > joined and are contributing. And being railed at as statists and communists. Oh, some interesting people have joined on the other side, as well - but again, what value in one-sided discussion? -- Matt Beland matt at rearviewmirror.org http://www.rearviewmirror.org From matt at rearviewmirror.org Fri May 2 16:52:10 2003 From: matt at rearviewmirror.org (Matt Beland) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 16:52:10 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <200305021652.10518.matt@rearviewmirror.org> On Friday 02 May 2003 03:17 pm, Declan McCullagh wrote: > There is also an unspoken assumption that folks who hope to be > interesting list posters will share a common vocabulary and > literature. Books that seem to influence cpunks include Applied > Crypto, Heinlein's earlier stuff, Vinge, Ender's Game, Stephenson's > Cryptonomicon (a little recent, but still), Road to Serfdom, David > Friedman, some of Murray Rothbard and von Mises' work. Lately I've > been rereading some of the original public choice theory work out of > George Mason (and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy," a great > read). All good choices. Add "Ender's Shadow" for an interesting twist on the original story. Terry Pratchett's stuff for a lighter satirical look, although he tends to be cynical about all sides of the debate rather than just one side. And, of course, the classics as well - Gibbon, for example. > I'd guess that except in die-hard lefty cases, it's somewhat difficult > to read those kind of volumes and still remain enthusiastic about tax > rates that exceed, say, 50 percent and the accompanying regulatory > structure. Perhaps more to the point, this list has always been about > (at least I discovered it in late 1994) the social and political > impacts of crypto and related technologies, and those are probably not > incredibly friendly to a hyper-regulatory state. > > So, yes, the "Klansmen, feminists, nazis, Libertarians of any sort, > Democrats, Greens, Republicans" are welcome. But may we ask in turn > that they appreciate the vocabulary and literature? Interesting question. Are they permitted to ask that we appreciate their vocabulary and literature? In reality, I suspect most people here have already read "their" literature, and rejected it as not logical or otherwise flawed. I did. And that makes it harder to respect the majority of them, because it's not really about their disagreement but simply that they're *wrong*. The challenge is to prove this and convince them, not to drive them away with the metaphorical equivalent of sticks. -- Matt Beland matt at rearviewmirror.org http://www.rearviewmirror.org From wmo at rebma.pro-ns.net Fri May 2 16:14:30 2003 From: wmo at rebma.pro-ns.net (Bill O'Hanlon) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 18:14:30 -0500 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <200305021508.20397.matt@rearviewmirror.org> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030502213842.GB23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> <200305021508.20397.matt@rearviewmirror.org> Message-ID: <20030502231430.GC23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 03:08:20PM -0700, Matt Beland wrote: > > On Friday 02 May 2003 02:38 pm, Bill O'Hanlon wrote: > > It's analogous to a radio astronomy mailing list constantly being trolled > > by flat earthers. > > Bad analogy. It is more like a radio astronomy list being populated by > astronomers who support both the constant-expansion ("open") universe model > and those who support the eventual-collapse ("cyclic") universe model. Both > groups are astronomers, but because they are both intelligent people who > support different models, the models are constantly refined to prove one side > or the other. I think my analogy is good. I think your error is displayed by your analogy. In your example, both groups are astronomers. In the current situation on this list, both groups are _not_ cypherpunks, if you accept the definition of cypherpunks as "people who use encryption technology to make statism impossible." If you don't accept that definition, that's fine, but I think my definition is consistent with the history of the list, and my guess is that Tim would agree. And he's the one who asked the question in the first place. I think it's a good question, and I'm curious to hear the answer from one of the folks it's aimed at. > > A few years ago, this list was highly interesting, and highly volatile. > Populated by libertarians, anarchists, crypto experts, feds, political > science students, scientists, cranks, gun nuts, gun control nuts, etc. Now? > Looks like you've driven most of the interesting people away. Who's left? The > ones who agree with you? Where's the fun in that? You left statists out of your list, unless you were including them when you said "cranks" and "gun control nuts". The original question was about statists. Some interesting people have left. Other interesting people have joined and are contributing. -Bill From declan at well.com Fri May 2 15:17:06 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 18:17:06 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org>; from matt@rearviewmirror.org on Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:18:22AM -0700 References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> Message-ID: <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:18:22AM -0700, Matt Beland wrote: > Why are you upset about it? > > I mean, there are two possibilities. Either this mailing list is for useful > discussion, or it's not. I don't think Tim is upset (not speaking for him of course but his message had more the tone of boredom and mild curiosity). Yes, this mailing list is for useful discussion. Remember, going over the same old arguments does get stale after a while. There is also an unspoken assumption that folks who hope to be interesting list posters will share a common vocabulary and literature. Books that seem to influence cpunks include Applied Crypto, Heinlein's earlier stuff, Vinge, Ender's Game, Stephenson's Cryptonomicon (a little recent, but still), Road to Serfdom, David Friedman, some of Murray Rothbard and von Mises' work. Lately I've been rereading some of the original public choice theory work out of George Mason (and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy," a great read). I'd guess that except in die-hard lefty cases, it's somewhat difficult to read those kind of volumes and still remain enthusiastic about tax rates that exceed, say, 50 percent and the accompanying regulatory structure. Perhaps more to the point, this list has always been about (at least I discovered it in late 1994) the social and political impacts of crypto and related technologies, and those are probably not incredibly friendly to a hyper-regulatory state. So, yes, the "Klansmen, feminists, nazis, Libertarians of any sort, Democrats, Greens, Republicans" are welcome. But may we ask in turn that they appreciate the vocabulary and literature? -Declan From sunder at sunder.net Fri May 2 15:29:17 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 18:29:17 -0400 (edt) Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030502213842.GB23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> Message-ID: I find it marginally useful to have the trolls around, then you can build better and better arguements against their supid ideas - it's a good, but wasted excercise. It's something like building better mouse traps - only sadly, these mice don't learn, so the challenge just isn't there. If you're bored, you can tweak them, otherwise in the .procmailrc they go. :) But did you notice how all the spams about "How to build a pipe bomb with stuff that came out from my ass" have vanished in the last few years? I do suspect some of those were morons from AOL (or other unthinking zones on the net), but some of those AOL morons were FedZ. Or so we gather from the fun of the Jimmy B/otoT trials. It wouldn't surprise me to find some of the current trolls are FedZ. Wasn't there something in police tests, where if you're too smart you can't be a cop - because you'd be bored? I wonder if that applies to FedZ too? It would certainly explain the lack of intelligence these neo-trolls display. Where are Dr. Denning and Sterndark when you need a good fight to pick, eh? (Retheroical: I know Denning changed her tune a while ago...) 8^) ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Fri, 2 May 2003, Bill O'Hanlon wrote: > It's a constant distraction. > > It's analogous to a radio astronomy mailing list constantly being trolled > by flat earthers. > Once the flat earthers leave, the conversation will get interesting again. From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Fri May 2 17:02:11 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 19:02:11 -0500 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: <1A893BC9-7CC3-11D7-839C-003065BD2A5E@vonu.net> References: <20030502160310.GB8121@cybershamanix.com> <1A893BC9-7CC3-11D7-839C-003065BD2A5E@vonu.net> Message-ID: <20030503000211.GA8239@cybershamanix.com> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 12:25:43PM -0500, jburnes wrote: > > On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 11:03 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > >On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:21:05AM -0400, Sunder wrote: > >>What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not > >>understand? > > > > What part of "Don't impose your drug addiction on others" do you not > >understand? Tobacco junkies are worse than crackheads, especially > >concerning > >their irrational behavior. > > > Actually it may be quite rational. "Irrational" is what I call junkies so desperate for a fix that they don't care how it affects anyone else. > A certain percentage of the > population may > be self-medicating for type 2 ADD (nicotine fills in for acetylcholine > that they > lack). Some others use tobacco to focus and tune out the really high > levels > of environmental noise and distraction that are part and parcel of > modern society. > > Some others may do it just because they like it. That's their perogative, they just can't force others to indulge along with them. > Man, cypherpunks has > really > gone down quite a ways when members are advocating who should be allowed > to consume what and when. Next it will be laws to stop people from > blowing their > noses in restaurants. I say let people go to hell in their own way. > Cigarettes or > Jack Black or cocaine. Oh, another one who either can't read or is just too clueless to get it. Nobody, but nobody, here has suggested outlawing tobacco (although, actually, now that I think of it, maybe it should be until such time all other drugs are freed -- boy, would that be fun to watch all those nic junkies murdering one another to get a fix). If you'd read the thread, what part of "forcing others to smoke" don't you understand? -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From justin at soze.net Fri May 2 12:31:23 2003 From: justin at soze.net (Justin) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 19:31:23 +0000 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030502180728.GA28831@lightship.internal.homeport.org> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030502180728.GA28831@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: <20030502193123.GJ17685@dreams.soze.net> At 2003-05-02 18:07 +0000, Adam Shostack wrote: > On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 10:47:50AM -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > | > | To drive you nuts. We all work for the CIA, MI5 and Mossad. One of these things is not like the others; one of these things just doesn't belong... -- Freedom's untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. --Rumsfeld, 2003-04-11 From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Fri May 2 17:56:03 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 19:56:03 -0500 Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030503005603.GA8646@cybershamanix.com> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 09:20:16AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 08:35 AM, Vincent Penquerc'h wrote: > > >> What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not > >> understand? > >> > >> Yes, someone may chose to smoke at a time which is convenient > >> for you, but > >> why should you be able to dictate that to someone else? Mind your > >own > >> fucking business - even if it's just hypothetical. > > > >I kind of agree, to a point, but then you (and others) do the same > >with imposing your own ideals to others, don't you ? As long as people > >interact, they'll have to impose stuff to others. I'm imposing my > >ideals (in this case, forbidding to smoke to people who want to) ? > >You do yours (annoying people who don't like smoke, because you want > >to smoke). I don't usually annoy smokers when they do. If I'm annoyed > >by it, I just move. Unless I can't, that is. But you just act as if > >*your* ideals were *obviously* the right ones. I reject that idea. > >They might, and they sure are popular here. But you do impose them > >all the same. > > The solutions to your problems lie in the "Schelling points" many in > open societies have established for dealing with others: > > -- non-initiation of force > > -- territorial boundaries, aka property rights > > > Pollution in general, whether of rivers or lakes or the air, is a > complicated issue. Yes, and we're going to always have anti-pollution laws as a result, just as we'll always have laws against rape, murder, burglary, etc. And men with guns to enforce them. > > It's more important to establish the fundamental principles widely > applicable and helpful in creating a free and open society than it is > to quibble about second hand smoke from 20 meters away. > From 20 meters away is not much of a problem, 2 meters is. One meter even more so -- and totally unaviodable at this point, unless you just don't go out. When you are walking down a sidewalk, say, it's impossible to avoid, and at close range. So the public streets, parks, etc, will eventurally have the same smoking bans as public buildings. > Harmon's second-hand smoke example does not apply in _any_ of the above > cases, all of which are based on the obvious property rights of the > owners and the freedom of choice of customers to abide by the rules or > not. > > Establishing this, even if smoking were then to be restricted on > "public" streets, would be a positive development. > I wouldn't be surprised to see NYC coming up with a license for special "smoking parlors", which might also serve food and drink. Especially once they ban smoking on the street. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From wmo at rebma.pro-ns.net Fri May 2 18:07:49 2003 From: wmo at rebma.pro-ns.net (Bill O'Hanlon) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 20:07:49 -0500 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <200305021652.10518.matt@rearviewmirror.org> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> <200305021652.10518.matt@rearviewmirror.org> Message-ID: <20030503010749.GD23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 04:52:10PM -0700, Matt Beland wrote: > The challenge is to prove this and convince them, not to drive them away with > the metaphorical equivalent of sticks. Some folks might want to spend their time proving and convincing. I think it gets old after a while, and the challenge lacks appeal. I've never thought of the cypherpunks as proselytizing types. But hey, knock your self out. The September that Never Ended was years ago, so there's an infinite supply of people for you to bang your head against. -Bill From mv at cdc.gov Fri May 2 20:25:26 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 20:25:26 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? Message-ID: <3EB336A5.FE3D5411@cdc.gov> t 03:08 PM 5/2/03 -0700, Matt Beland wrote: >Looks like you've driven most of the interesting people away. Who's left? The >ones who agree with you? Where's the fun in that? > >Don't you get tired of talking into an echo machine? "When I was your age we didn't have Tim May! We had to be paranoid on our own! And we were grateful!" --Alan Olsen Perhaps this whole thing is just one person talking to himself, with Tim listening in! -Dr Evil From shaddack at ns.arachne.cz Fri May 2 12:53:20 2003 From: shaddack at ns.arachne.cz (Thomas Shaddack) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 21:53:20 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: <7647970C-7C57-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: > In a free society, nothing stops an employee from seeking a lower > stress, less demanding, lower profit margin employer, lower-paying job. > In America, these low-paid employees are called "public teachers." Lower stress? In the job where you can get shot? (Well, luckily not in all locations.) Teaching is a very sensitive job, especially with the younger students. The initial state of child's mind is inquisitive curiosity; it can be either reared, or killed. Bad teachers, which is the majority of them, are literally murderers of minds. If there has to be any major change, it has to become in schools. But I digress. > And our teachers in public schools are similarly free to not operate at > their full potential, or even close to it, and yet be paid a moderate > salary. They can even steal stuff the way your father did. Most of the parts were batches that didn't make it through entry-level tests. Tesla wasn't making exactly stellar things, so reliability tests had to be performed on the batches before they were put into production. There were regulations about destroying the batches considered defective. But stealing something that's scheduled for destruction anyway is not stealing in its true sense - depriving the owner of enjoying the object. > > Hightech books were cheaper. > > Probably because they were either pirated or were rehashes/copies of > Western books. Not all. But often yes. > Not in all cases. I have a few Soviet physics and math texts written by > some of the greats of Soviet physics and math. Printed on cheap paper, > with the authors barely compensated, they were certainly cheap. And, of > course, often prone to having ideology inserted by the commisars. Soviets had also great compilations. As they didn't pay the royalties, the cost was no issue for including an article into the book. Naturally, they were more complete than their Western counterparts. I was too young to enjoy it back then; but a friend with more experiences mourned the demise of these editions couple months back. > Which is OK, but understand that your country was operating as a > Napster country. Yes. However, I prefer students learning from napsterized books now than risking the lack of qualified people tomorrow (and having to import them from Napster countries). I say this as a potential writer myself. > Do you think American schools do not have such clubs? I was in a dozen > of them, and President of several. I am not surprised. :) How expensive they were to attend? > > to consuming, disturbs me a lot. > > You seem to be pining for central control, for state subsidies, for > communism. Not really. Just comparing and remembering... And was too tired and talked too much. I am not for state control. I am against both the government- and megacorporate-instilled control. This is an important difference. Capitalism is a good idea, as long as it has the form of a lot of small, widely varying subjects. The current trend of consolidation brings away both the competition and the choice, and with high-enough barriers to entry there will be no new small subjects to disrupt the balance. Of course it will collapse later, but human lives have finite length, so longer-term waiting isn't the option I'd be exactly happy to take. > I doubt you'll like what we have to offer on this list. You work with ways to rehash the situation. The corporations, over certain size, aren't as that different from the governments. Especially when they get enough power to buy the governments. > But your rant above says you would probably be happier under state > socialism, which makes this list your absolute worse enemy. Not necessarily. I just dislike the situation when money are the beginning, the center, and the end of virtually everything, and where people are degraded to mere replaceable "human resources". I don't know what approach will handle this; if I'd know, I'd suggest. I don't know what should be done, nor if anything can be done at all. I am just afraid. Very afraid. Besides, preaching to the choir rarely brings the counterarguments telling me when I am wrong. > Free markets are often rough. They mean there is no one to provide food > for those who have no skills to offer. Contemporary free markets (we'll leave aside the fact they aren't really free) are driven by short-term profits. Higher investments aimed to distant future are rare and far between. Basic research suffers, like virtually everything with no immediate profitable application. > Think of it as evolution in action. The burnoff of useless eaters will > be glorious. ...if they won't rise up instead and steamroll over everything. And, as nobody paid enough care to the public education system, they are too dumb to rebuild the society in any sensible way after then. The most important thing to take care of, for the long-term future, is the education system (we started with the teachers, so why not to end with the teachers). If statistically significant amount of people will be able (and willing!) to think for themselves, many problems (eg, sheeple) will disappear or be reduced. Not only this is less stinky and more aesthetical (though less spectacular) approach than an outright burnoff, it can also be more effective. From sfurlong at acmenet.net Fri May 2 19:05:24 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 22:05:24 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200305022205.24810.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Friday 02 May 2003 14:57, Tim May wrote: > And as in that debate, where "free speech" is tossed around a lot, > nothing in the Dixie Chicks case has involved freedom of speech in > any way whatsoever. Think about it. Tim, you're assuming that statists have the wherewithal to think. This assumption has yet to be demonstrated. > I do wonder why they are on the list given the implications of the > technologies. I don't think they've realized the implications for > their world view and for the breeders and useless eaters they > support. I'm not as confident of crypto's chances of destroying the state and leaving the parasites out in the cold. It's just as likely that the government(s) will declare all crypto illegal, except that necessary for the protection of their own secrets. Digital money is right out, of course. All in the name of anti-terrorism, or the War on Some Drugs, or for the chiiiiildren. Powerful computers, strong crypto, and big databases can lead either to anarchy or to an unstoppable Big Brother. Too close to call, right now. -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From lists at crimbles.demon.co.uk Fri May 2 14:46:17 2003 From: lists at crimbles.demon.co.uk (David Crookes) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 22:46:17 +0100 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305022246.18020.lists@crimbles.demon.co.uk> On Friday 02 May 2003 5:42 pm, Tim May wrote: > In looking over the traffic of the past weeks, I am struck by how many > of the posts are defending statism and state action. Mostly by > Europeans, coincidentally or not. > > Did some mention of our list in the Journal of Social Action cause you > to subscribe? > > Why are you here? > We can't get past the perimeter alarms and the claymores, so we thought we'd just irritate you to death... From sfurlong at acmenet.net Fri May 2 20:09:42 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 23:09:42 -0400 Subject: Conspiracy In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200305022309.42907.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Wednesday 30 April 2003 18:49, Andy Lopata wrote: > The only things that > saves [cospiracy] from being a pure thought crime is that a conspiracy must be > an actual agreement between two or more people to commit a crime (or > fraud), and that an affirmative action must be taken in furtherance > of the crime (in some drug-related offenses, this isn't even needed). The "actual agreement" can be inferred by a creative prosecutor *. I don't remember the cases, but can dig out my criminal law case books if pressed. As usual in these discussions, this applies only to the U.S. * Unless that was overturned by the Supremes (unlikely, with the current court) or forbidden by Congress (yah, right) since I took Crim Law. -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From jamesd at echeque.com Fri May 2 23:12:46 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 23:12:46 -0700 Subject: patriotism considered evil In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.2.20030502101323.00a5b820@localhost> References: <3EB19C7D.30046.1BAB3071@localhost> Message-ID: <3EB2FB6E.24737.21060D48@localhost> -- On 2 May 2003 at 10:18, Ed Stone wrote: > The bias of the US news media is most clearly demonstrated by > the general absence of questions or discussion along the > lines of "For months the US sought a resolution from the UN > authorizing an attack to 'disarm Saddam of his weapons of > mass destruction'.' The press is not biased when it fails to report an issue as much as you would desire. The press is biased when their political desires get in the way of reality, as in their reporting of "unexpectedly strong Iraqi resistance" and the inability of large sections of the press to notice that the Iraqis were losing in the cities, as well as the desert. On MSNBC there were a huge number of stories predicting a Stalingrad like battle for Baghdad, and then when the US started taking cities with very low casualties, a viewer of NBC would have had great difficulty in discovering the fact. NBC did not fail to give some stories the emphasis that some people thought they should have. Instead their stories were wrong. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG hwkjthD6v+MskdmauaUDBV+CvO+jdPn9Jj9Svc3c 4/UUeNUN6F3Kre+uv43Zm16jP7DCdPh8fB4Kf7/fJ From schear at attbi.com Fri May 2 23:44:40 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 23:44:40 -0700 Subject: [e-gold-list] Norfolk Island's new currency! Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030502234035.031a3b60@mail.attbi.com> GoldNow is in the process of helping set up an entire small island population (pop. 1900) to accept/trade in e-gold. The second highest priority we have is to educate the new e-gold users on keyloggers, trojans etc. The place is Norfolk Island, approx. 450 miles northwest of New Zealand. They are the descendants of the mutineers from the Bounty. Pitcairn Island was where they came from. The Queen of England at the time asked them to move to Norfolk Island instead, which they did... interested parties can read the history at http://www.nf The author Collen McCulloch lives on Norfolk Island, as well as singer Helen Reddy. NF folk claim to be independent from Australia. OZ government says they're not. They have had a bun fight for about 150 years about this very issue. There is an uneasy truce at present, but the Australian government demands that NF do not mint their own currency. So, that's where GoldNow & e-gold steps in... Graham Kelly CEO GoldNow http://www.GoldNow.St Primary Customer Service +61 3 9776-4886 US Free Call 1-866-999-1717 US Fax 1-213-559-8555 UK Phone +44 (0) 709 233-7612 UK Phone +44 (0) 709 201-4015 CEO "Money runs away from those without valor" - Ayn Rand From jamesd at echeque.com Sat May 3 00:57:13 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 00:57:13 -0700 Subject: The Holocaust (sm) (tm) In-Reply-To: <01a601c310a4$8f6be640$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> Message-ID: <3EB313E9.12777.2165AEBC@localhost> -- On 2 May 2003 at 12:50, David Howe wrote: > I personally think the biggest problem with almost any > label of > universal disgust (and "Holocaust denier" is almost as good > as "pedophile" for this purpose) is that it gets abused as a > method to suppress unrelated or marginally related > discussion. Holocaust denier is a bad label for someone who > (for example) doubts the "skin lampshades" story - they > aren't denying the holocaust, they are arguing for the > untruth of a selected fact; Its a perfectly accurate label. We have good evidence for the skin lampshades, and why would anyone raise the issue except to white wash nazism? The people who are posting in this list that recently existent communism is not so bad, also post that capitalism is really terrible. Obviously they want to do it all over again. Similarly the people who deny the skin lampshades, also argue the Jews had it coming. Hitler did not skin them, but he should have. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG PN8qKUghBxq8kC8Ofm+buqaqXvr4t2DwXYCzRvq4 4tphka/yDJT2EcmBjBs1e9RnMSfau/lCHjrRa904e From nobody at dizum.com Fri May 2 16:10:12 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 01:10:12 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Mike Hawash: Time for an AP site? Message-ID: <9c8981d6984994c2dd42a8c3aef20835@dizum.com> Someone on this board mentioned that a fake AP site might be almost as good as real AP. I suggest that someone create a fake AP board, on the tonga server or wherever, for Mike Hawash. Basically, it would be a website that lists the name of anyone involved in incarcerating this man without due process. It will also sport logos of the various "payment" options, including Paypal, Digicash, egold, or whatever else. It will also have the current $-value associated with each name. Future additions to the name list will be tactical, however. D u b y a, for instance, would not be on there, nor would Fabio, Britney, or any other "funny" slam-dunks. Hopefully, the board will look like its real, and as if there's already a price (and date) established for those involved in holding Hawash. From timcmay at got.net Sat May 3 09:16:23 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 09:16:23 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030503091736.044ef0d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> Message-ID: <95424F40-7D82-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Saturday, May 3, 2003, at 06:49 AM, John Kelsey wrote: > A huge amount of the value of this list, for me at least, is that > events and news are seen through the lens of a certain kind of > skepticism that only security people seem to have, along with some > technological sophistication and a willingness to "think the > unthinkable." This is consistent with a wide range of political and > social and religious beliefs. It's how you can mix anarchocapitalists > and greens and anarchocommunists and various flavors of libertarians > and various others, and still get an interesting list with real > discussion on it, instead of endless flamewars. Where are the endless flamewars? In fact, though Matt Beland has complained that the libertarians have driven off all the good posters, I found that he has written virtually no posts himself, until the last few days. When he added his criticism of libertarians, I did not recognize his name, so I looked for past articles he has written: a few in 2001 and a few in 2002. If he and others like him want more content, they ought to be writing it. --Tim May From timcmay at got.net Sat May 3 09:18:40 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 09:18:40 -0700 Subject: Conspiracy In-Reply-To: <200305031133.AA210108886@1st.net> Message-ID: On Saturday, May 3, 2003, at 08:33 AM, Jay h wrote: >> The "actual agreement" can be inferred by a creative prosecutor *. I >> don't remember the cases, but can dig out my criminal law case books >> if >> pressed. As usual in these discussions, this applies only to the U.S. >> > > Prosecutors have actually argued that people who talked about NOT > doing particular things were actually code talking about commiting the > crimes. > > Sheesh. we're all guilty. A friend of mine described to me the theory of "insider non-trading." You see, if Alice had planned to make a stock trade, but then learned something about the company which was insider information, her failure to then make the trade would be treated by prosecutors as "insider non-trading." --Tim May "That the said Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms." --Samuel Adams From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Sat May 3 06:49:39 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 09:49:39 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> References: <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030503091736.044ef0d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 06:17 PM 5/2/03 -0400, Declan McCullagh wrote: ... >Perhaps more to the point, this list has always been about >(at least I discovered it in late 1994) the social and political >impacts of crypto and related technologies, and those are probably not >incredibly friendly to a hyper-regulatory state. Well, that part is still to be determined. Maybe the direction of technology will ultimately lead to the collapse of the nation state and the rise of David Friedman style anarchocapitalist protection agencies to replace it (good luck solving the military defense problem!), or maybe it will lead to a global, "ubiquitous governance" implementation of Singapore--clean streets, low crime, and economic productivity, all under the watchful eye of the state. Or another zillion possibilities, including the apparently more likely ones that include continuing existence and power of states, but with a change in the balance of powers in different areas--no privacy in public, but enormous privacy in what you do on your computer at home, etc. Or an expansion of the current situation, where the new technology results in less privacy from the government, but enormously more privacy from neighbors and family members. (Think of cellphones, cordless phones, the internet, and home video rentals. For most people, keeping their nosy neighbors from knowing they watch porno films is more important than keeping the FBI from knowing.) >So, yes, the "Klansmen, feminists, nazis, Libertarians of any sort, >Democrats, Greens, Republicans" are welcome. But may we ask in turn >that they appreciate the vocabulary and literature? A huge amount of the value of this list, for me at least, is that events and news are seen through the lens of a certain kind of skepticism that only security people seem to have, along with some technological sophistication and a willingness to "think the unthinkable." This is consistent with a wide range of political and social and religious beliefs. It's how you can mix anarchocapitalists and greens and anarchocommunists and various flavors of libertarians and various others, and still get an interesting list with real discussion on it, instead of endless flamewars. >-Declan --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Sat May 3 07:01:34 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 10:01:34 -0400 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke Message-ID: Harmon Seaver wrote... "Oh, another one who either can't read or is just too clueless to get it. Nobody, but nobody, here has suggested outlawing tobacco (although, actually, now that I think of it, maybe it should be until such time all other drugs are freed -- boy, would that be fun to watch all those nic junkies murdering one another to get a fix). If you'd read the thread, what part of "forcing others to smoke" don't you understand? Yeah, even if there's disagreements with some of the anti-public-smoking arguments, the general principals involved shouldn't be too hard to agree with. Basically, "don't try to kill me". It gets easier when one remembers that cigarette smoke was inches away from being declared a "class A carcinogen", but the tobacco companies through much dinero into the debate. That would have put smoke in the same category as asbestos. So now replace a public smoker with a guy playing tossing around a big blob of asbestos, and watch various cypherpunks start taking out their shotguns. -TD "I was in favor of gun control prior to the Patriot Act." -Tyler Durden >From: Harmon Seaver >To: jburnes >CC: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Hippies Banning Smoke >Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 19:02:11 -0500 > >On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 12:25:43PM -0500, jburnes wrote: > > > > On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 11:03 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > > > >On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:21:05AM -0400, Sunder wrote: > > >>What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not > > >>understand? > > > > > > What part of "Don't impose your drug addiction on others" do you not > > >understand? Tobacco junkies are worse than crackheads, especially > > >concerning > > >their irrational behavior. > > > > > Actually it may be quite rational. > > "Irrational" is what I call junkies so desperate for a fix that they >don't >care how it affects anyone else. > > > A certain percentage of the > > population may > > be self-medicating for type 2 ADD (nicotine fills in for acetylcholine > > that they > > lack). Some others use tobacco to focus and tune out the really high > > levels > > of environmental noise and distraction that are part and parcel of > > modern society. > > > > Some others may do it just because they like it. > > That's their perogative, they just can't force others to indulge along >with >them. > > > Man, cypherpunks has > > really > > gone down quite a ways when members are advocating who should be allowed > > to consume what and when. Next it will be laws to stop people from > > blowing their > > noses in restaurants. I say let people go to hell in their own way. > > Cigarettes or > > Jack Black or cocaine. > > > Oh, another one who either can't read or is just too clueless to get >it. Nobody, but nobody, here has suggested outlawing tobacco (although, >actually, now that I think of it, maybe it should be until such time all >other >drugs are freed -- boy, would that be fun to watch all those nic junkies >murdering one another to get a fix). If you'd read the thread, what part of >"forcing others to smoke" don't you understand? > > > >-- >Harmon Seaver >CyberShamanix >http://www.cybershamanix.com _________________________________________________________________ Protect your PC - get McAfee.com VirusScan Online http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=3963 From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Sat May 3 07:08:03 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 10:08:03 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? Message-ID: Steve Furlong wrote... "Powerful computers, strong crypto, and big databases can lead either to anarchy or to an unstoppable Big Brother. Too close to call, right now." Well, I haven't ruled out the possibility that governments will somehow evolve to roll with the punches. Some new form of government may arise that has characteristics we haven't seen before, or perhaps similar to some of the Sci-Fi out there. (Wasn't it in Snow Crash where Stevens pictures traditional governments basically in competition with numerous franchise governments?) For a long time now I've been very sceptical of any predictions of the future for more than 5 years or so out. Technology and society have a way of generating stuff that's beyond an individual's ability to predict, and government might be the same. Or not. -TD "I used to believe in gun control prior to the Patriot Act." -Tyler Durden >From: Steve Furlong >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this >list now? >Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 22:05:24 -0400 > >On Friday 02 May 2003 14:57, Tim May wrote: > > > And as in that debate, where "free speech" is tossed around a lot, > > nothing in the Dixie Chicks case has involved freedom of speech in > > any way whatsoever. Think about it. > >Tim, you're assuming that statists have the wherewithal to think. This >assumption has yet to be demonstrated. > > > > I do wonder why they are on the list given the implications of the > > technologies. I don't think they've realized the implications for > > their world view and for the breeders and useless eaters they > > support. > >I'm not as confident of crypto's chances of destroying the state and >leaving the parasites out in the cold. It's just as likely that the >government(s) will declare all crypto illegal, except that necessary >for the protection of their own secrets. Digital money is right out, of >course. All in the name of anti-terrorism, or the War on Some Drugs, or >for the chiiiiildren. Powerful computers, strong crypto, and big >databases can lead either to anarchy or to an unstoppable Big Brother. >Too close to call, right now. > >-- >Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel > >Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape >will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby _________________________________________________________________ STOP MORE SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Sat May 3 07:25:15 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 10:25:15 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? Message-ID: "people who use encryption technology to make statism impossible" I just think that's too grandiose a statement. In my particular case, "People who use encryption technology to make interference in my personal communications impossible", where interference is defined as eavesdropping, jamming, "man-in-the-middle" and so on. In other words, an infinitely hard titanium pipe between me and who/whatever is on the other side. As for the state, well, it may come or go as a result of secure communications. I suspect it will find a way to stick around. But if heavy crypto proliferates it will force it to change, at the very least. But the state is secondary. If they get out of my way (or if by technology I push them out of the way) for the important stuff, fine. But then again, the implications of further terrorist attacks (and the reasons) may be relevant here, but one must tread very carefully on any public board..... -TD "I used to be in favor of gun control prior to the Patriot Act." -Tyler Durden >From: Matt Beland >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this >list now? >Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 16:50:08 -0700 > >On Friday 02 May 2003 04:14 pm, Bill O'Hanlon wrote: > > I think my analogy is good. I think your error is displayed by your > > analogy. In your example, both groups are astronomers. > > > > In the current situation on this list, both groups are _not_ >cypherpunks, > > if you accept the definition of cypherpunks as "people who use >encryption > > technology to make statism impossible." If you don't accept that > > definition, that's fine, but I think my definition is consistent with > > the history of the list, and my guess is that Tim would agree. And he's > > the one who asked the question in the first place. I think it's a good > > question, and I'm curious to hear the answer from one of the folks it's > > aimed at. > >Accepting your definition for a moment, your analogy is still flawed >because >it assumes one group is rejecting science altogether, where here the two >groups simply arrive at different conclusions from the same data. > >But in fact, I don't completely agree with your definition. A Cypherpunk is >one who is interested in the technology and use of encryption, and the >social >and political effects thereof. One definition assumes a conclusion, one >definition defines a group in search of a conclusion. > >And really, my question would remain valid in either case. IF this list is >to >be the home of any sort of useful discussion, then the discussion must >include both sides of the issue. Otherwise you don't have discussion, you >have dogma. > > > You left statists out of your list, unless you were including them when > > you said "cranks" and "gun control nuts". The original question was >about > > statists. > >Statists and communists both would be included in politician, Republican, >Green, Democrat, Libertarian, crank (though not only statists and >politicians >fit there) and gun control nut. Just pick the flavor that matches the >label. > > > Some interesting people have left. Other interesting people have > > joined and are contributing. > >And being railed at as statists and communists. Oh, some interesting people >have joined on the other side, as well - but again, what value in one-sided >discussion? > >-- >Matt Beland >matt at rearviewmirror.org >http://www.rearviewmirror.org _________________________________________________________________ STOP MORE SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From timcmay at got.net Sat May 3 10:32:02 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 10:32:02 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <200305022205.24810.sfurlong@acmenet.net> Message-ID: <26D2E932-7D8D-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 07:05 PM, Steve Furlong wrote: > I'm not as confident of crypto's chances of destroying the state and > leaving the parasites out in the cold. I don't recall many discussions here about _timetables_ for such developments. Certainly I don't think _I_ have been so foolish as to say "Real Soon Now" or "Surely by the Year 2010!" Recall that Vinge's "True Names" was set at some indeterminate time in the future. Judging by the power of the computers, and modulo the fact that he wrote it in the 1970s, probably no earlier than 2030. But he was also careful not to specify the time. Likewise, "Ender's Game" took place far into the future. Which is not to say that science fiction novels determine the schedule! But it lends support to my claim that few, if any, of us would be so foolish as to predict when the full implications of strong crypto would have a major effect on governments. Arguably, some effects have been felt for years. And just as arguably, some other effects (notably digital money) seem to be further off now than they seemed to be when Digicash was still in existence. The nice thing for libertarians and anarchocapitalists about working on these sorts of ideas is that it beats the alternative: going to Libertarian Party conventions and trying to convince neighbors to vote for more liberty. Or, as too many good technical people have done, becoming lawyers. (Some of the skills are the same: the ability to absorb a lot of seemingly-unrelated facts, the ability to argue logically, and sometimes even an ideological edge. But since most lawyers don't end up working on cutting-edge constitutional issues, and since the constitutional issues are generally not moving in a libertarian direction despite the efforts of cypherpunks-friendly lawyers and scholars, I personally see going into "the law" as throwing one's life away.) I believe the great social and economic changes in history, affecting people and government and nations, have been largely technological. Geography is important, of course, too. But technology is something we can change, so this is what humans should focus on. These technological changes are obvious: metal-working, writing, weaponry, plumbing, the printing press, the steam engine, interchangeable parts, electrification, and all of the various technologies of the 20th century, including the telephone, television, birth control pills, and so on. The printing press is one of my favorite examples, as it illustrates how the "triad" of technology, law, and culture (similar to Larry Lessig's triad...I think we developed these ideas independently, but I haven't chased down who wrote what first) is "tipped" by major changes. The Church and State, circa pre-Gutenberg, "owned" certain types of knowledge, blessed by the medieval guilds: silversmithing, leathermaking, etc. The royal patents were conferred based on kickbacks, tithing, family connections, etc. Those who violated the patents of the guilds faced various kinds of punishment, I suppose up to and including death. Sort of like the Mafia stopping independent producers of porn from producing movies (a friend in LA had this happen to him). Now the "lawyers" of that age might have argued in courts (such as they were) that the power of the guilds should be broken, that greater economic prosperity would result from breaking the guilds. But little changed. Then came printing (movable type). While the first books printed were the obvious ones: hymnals, bibles, and other religious tracts, the printers began to print "how to" books. Not consciously "Toolmaking for Dummies" books, and not consciously "How to Undermine the Power of the State by Building Your Own Waterwheel," these books were nonetheless early how-to guides. Booklets on technology, on minerals, on all sorts of things a farmer might want to know. For the first time, knowing how to read was a useful skill. Perhaps someone predicted the long-term implications of what this spread of knowledge would mean. (Maybe Nostradamus was influenced this way...I haven't looked for evidence.) Someone trying to set a timetable for the sweeping changes would likely have not gotten it right. As someone wise once said, we tend to overestimate the short-term consequences and underestimate the long-term consequences. In the case of printing, the result over the following century or two was a rise in literacy rates (in the common languages, and this is when German, French, and English, for example, largely solidified into their current forms, viz. the Luther Bible, the King James Version, etc.). And the Protestant Reformation was built on printed words and on the people's ability to directly read the religious texts. A technology undermined the state and the church. This was repeated several more times, with samizdats undermining the power of the state in the USSR, with cassette tapes circulating in Shah-led Iran, with videotapes widely available even where banned in Islamic nations. And e-mail, of course. E-mails to and from the dissidents in Beijing. Repeated around the world. Strong crypto, of course, offers the opportunity for a complete bypassing of controls (more than just ciphers are needed, of course, as stego must be strong, as remailers must be compensated, and so on). Will the effects be that corner grocery stores are converted into cryptoanarchist data havens? Of course not. People will continue to buy and sell goods in their physical world, and this will continue to be a nexus of control and taxation. (Just as taxing land became more important after taxing knowledge, via the no longer all-powerful guilds, became less important. Land remained a nexus of control and taxation, as it does today. My property taxes attest to that, and will not be going down in my lifetime!) So, what changes may happen? Will enough tax evasion happen via cryptoanarchy to make the people fed up and thus give rise to a "tipping point"? (As the Reformation arguably was, with enough people fed up with the selling of indulgences and having the ability to read the religious words themselves.) And so on. I could ask about a dozen speculations of what might happen. But the point is not to predict some withering away of the state. The point is that unfettered communication, with the already-extant ability to use all sorts of alternative financial instruments (offshore accounts, PayPal, E-gold, etc.), is already producing interesting changes in the way the world works. More such changes are likely. When, I don't know. It could be that 5 years from now we'll be looking back a year or two to the rise of a digital cash company which is having the same success E-Bay had and saying "We knew it was coming." (In fact, friends of mine, the late Phil Salin and his colleagues at AMiX, had essentially identical plans for an auction service. And this was as early as 1987, as I did some consulting for Phil in late '87 and into '88. Their company was funded by Autodesk and they rolled out a version of their auction service in 1990-91. This was before Net connections were widely available--and commercial use of the Internet was still problematic--and their system had some problems, like glacial slowness. Also, instead of concentrating on a pure classified ads model, with people selling their used ski equipment and Pez dispensers, they concentrated on people selling their knowledge, their consulting expertise. This was a mistake. But had Autodesk not decided to disband both Xanadu (hypertext) and AMiX, they had a reasonable shot at being the company E-Bay became several years later.) But, getting back to this 5-year "prediction," I don't expect any widespread digital money system in the next few years. Too many regulatory hurdles (and regulators can slow things down, even if the long-term trends are not in their favor). The current police state, the U.S. sitting astride the world, giving orders. The money laundering, terrorism, treason focus of prosecutors. As you say: > It's just as likely that the > government(s) will declare all crypto illegal, except that necessary > for the protection of their own secrets. Digital money is right out, of > course. All in the name of anti-terrorism, or the War on Some Drugs, or > for the chiiiiildren. Powerful computers, strong crypto, and big > databases can lead either to anarchy or to an unstoppable Big Brother. > Too close to call, right now. The important thing is to not become so attached to a specific prediction, or, worse, to a timetable, that one becomes discouraged. Oh, and to repeat something I have said many times, I think starting a company based on some imagined schedule for adoption of digital money is a disaster. I could be wrong on this, and I even hope someone proves me wrong, but I don't think I am. ("And in Year 3 of our business plan, the world converts to Digital Anonibucks (TM) and we all become wealthy.") Better to view digital money technologies as bits and pieces of technology which will be gradually adopted and used by others. The money will probably be made by folks who are qualified to work as engineers and programmers in other companies. Which is not to say people should not be thinking about forming small companies to do interesting things. Whether in digital money or data havens or timestamping, niches will exist. (But most of the people in the world don't see any particular need for these technologies--the technologies don't _yet_ do anything for them, and people don't usually make huge efforts purely for ideological reasons...especially when the ideology is not even theirs.) I expect early adopters to be in the "illegal" markets: pornography of various kinds (the most illegal kinds), on-line betting, information selling (a la BlackNet), and tax evasion. For mundane uses, people are happy giving credit card numbers and using relatively weak protocols like PayPal (for convenience, not security). But I've written about this in other articles, so no need to get into it here. The bottom line is this: we tend to overestimate short-term consequences and underestimate long-term consequences. So don't give up. --Tim May, Citizen-unit of of the once free United States " The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. "--Thomas Jefferson, 1787 From jamesd at echeque.com Sat May 3 11:29:14 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 11:29:14 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030503091736.044ef0d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> References: <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <3EB3A80A.11219.23A8502D@localhost> -- On 3 May 2003 at 9:49, John Kelsey wrote: > Maybe the direction of technology will ultimately lead to the > collapse of the nation state and the rise of David Friedman > style anarchocapitalist protection agencies to replace it > (good luck solving the military defense problem!) Against the Soviet Union in its prime, or against the Nazi commie alliance, an anarcho capitalist america would have been in deep trouble, if it had the same level of technology as the actually existent america had back then. Against current enemies, not a problem. Observe the big role and great effectiveness of "special forces" (small numbers of high quality espionage style forces). An anarcho capitalist america, while it would have trouble fielding big armies, would probably do special forces operations considerably better than big government bureacracies do. Current enemies are not much, because americans have a technological lead. Americans have a technological lead because america is the close to the most capitalist country in the world, and it is the most capitalist large country. An anarcho capitalist America would in time have an even greater technological lead. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG 9kQD8V66S+pVcKVRtUTYuDE0WULh6Xn1tbd021Hm 4W9L1mnKxVqx/QMuhjG/OVrV6Jsb7op/OGb86Jonc From jamesd at echeque.com Sat May 3 11:29:14 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 11:29:14 -0700 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <3EB3A80A.19214.23A84F79@localhost> -- On 3 May 2003 at 10:01, Tyler Durden wrote: > It gets easier when one remembers that cigarette smoke was > inches away from being declared a "class A carcinogen", but > the tobacco companies through much dinero into the debate. > That would have put smoke in the same category as asbestos. > So now replace a public smoker with a guy playing tossing > around a big blob of asbestos, and watch various cypherpunks > start taking out their shotguns. Not this cypherpunk -- the evils of asbestos are ninety percent hot air. The superstitious and ignorant tend to believe in black magic killers, invisible imperceptible causes of great harm, and award colossal damages on that basis. Supposedly biotechnology will make the cows milk dry up. In reality, if someone is exposed to enough asbestos to be a problem, he is painfully aware of it. Only a minuscule minority among those now receiving stupendous awards were exposed to that level of asbestos. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG 8gm9gCyQYFsIMdu+WBfQDsch65rBj3PGxaGDX58F 4/6al9vqF/sHVMF7iikxBjrsqugs4W7kRkOUPPUFA From jayh at 1st.net Sat May 3 08:33:01 2003 From: jayh at 1st.net (Jay h) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 11:33:01 -0400 Subject: Conspiracy Message-ID: <200305031133.AA210108886@1st.net> >The "actual agreement" can be inferred by a creative prosecutor *. I >don't remember the cases, but can dig out my criminal law case books if >pressed. As usual in these discussions, this applies only to the U.S. > Prosecutors have actually argued that people who talked about NOT doing particular things were actually code talking about commiting the crimes. Sheesh. we're all guilty. j ________________________________________________________________ Sent via the WebMail system at 1st.net From sfurlong at acmenet.net Sat May 3 08:44:02 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 11:44:02 -0400 Subject: Conspiracy In-Reply-To: <200305031133.AA210108886@1st.net> References: <200305031133.AA210108886@1st.net> Message-ID: <200305031144.02801.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Saturday 03 May 2003 11:33, Jay h wrote: > Prosecutors have actually argued that people who talked about NOT > doing particular things were actually code talking about commiting > the crimes. I remember that from school, but I don't recall any successful prosecutions. Not that the topic was emphasized; my criminal law professor was much less leery of the unchecked and unaccountable power of the state. (And some of my classmates viewed conspiracy as a good, all-purpose tool for nailing people you _know_ are guilty but who are so clever as to leave no evidence. Future prosecutors and legislators, no doubt.) > Sheesh. we're all guilty. Well, that _is_ the goal. -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From sfurlong at acmenet.net Sat May 3 08:52:35 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 11:52:35 -0400 Subject: China (was Mike Hawash) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200305031152.35009.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Thursday 01 May 2003 11:02, Tyler Durden wrote: > Sunder wrote... > > "Not that I've been there, but the last I heard, China was still an > almosttotalitarian communist state and free travel in China is not > possible." > > Your information is almost staggeringly out of date.... > > As for the totalitarianism part,as long as you don't complain too > loudly about the government, you're fine for the most part > (particularly if you have lots of $$$). (Although every now and then > Jong Nan Hai will decide to crack down on something and you may come > under fire.) I recently tried to explain the American first amendment to my soon-to-be stepson, who arrived from the PRC last September. He told me that China has freedom of speech, too: if you say something bad about the government, you won't go to jail for too long, maybe a few months, maybe a year. It's not like in the old days when people would get in trouble for that. -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From emc at artifact.psychedelic.net Sat May 3 13:50:50 2003 From: emc at artifact.psychedelic.net (Eric Cordian) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 13:50:50 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking Message-ID: <200305032050.h43KooKq028587@artifact.psychedelic.net> Cypherpunks often think of Crypto as the state-killing technology which will free us all from the clutches of inculcation in the collectivist mentality. It should be noted, however, that advances in complexity theory or quantum computing that would render cryptography useless, would also have a detrimental effect on the state apparatus. So I pose a question. You have two boxes. In the first is crypto so powerful that it will keep peoples data safe for 1000 years, against all advances in mathematics, with perfect forward secrecy. In box number two is technology that will break any crypto designed by mankind in the next 1000 years. You are allowed to take the contents of one of the boxes, and publish it on the Internet. You wish to do maximum damage to the state, free the Sheeple, enable Tim's libertopian vision of the future, crush totalitarian centralized government, and make the world safe for flowers and other living things. Which box do you pick? And why? -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law" From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Sat May 3 11:03:13 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 14:03:13 -0400 Subject: Burning off the useless eaters In-Reply-To: References: <8DFD1896-7CE5-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030503132604.0461c010@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 02:55 PM 5/2/03 -0700, Tim May wrote: ... >Item: Research in astrophysics and cosmology is booming today. No >corporate interest in figuring out the role of dark matter, dark energy, >superstrings, anthropic reasons for the neutrino mass, inflation, and a >dozen other currently hot topics. Much of the work came from the fruits of >industrial development, just as much of the astronomy work of the past 150 >years, even longer, has come from industrial methods and tools. In the >1930s, the ability to construct very large Pyrex mirrors...I lived in the >1950s within a pleasant Sunday drive to Mount Palomar, for a long time the >very largest telescope in the world. Nitpick: You could argue that much of the research in physics wouldn't be happening without substantial government funding for research. Certainly, it's hard to see who would be funding a lot of this stuff with any eye to practical applications within their lifetimes. ... >I reject the claim that corporations and capitalism are either stifling >innovation or that innovation is not happening because corporations aren't >doing "enough" basic research. This is obviously true. In fact, hearing people say that capitalism stifles innovation, and offering the modern US as an example, is a bit mind-numbing. The pace of innovation in almost every field is breathtaking. Imagine taking a modern, Wal-Mart-available solar powered scientific calculator, and dropping it on Leslie Groves' desk in 1943. That whole group of brilliant scientists and engineers working on the first atomic bomb would have had a hell of a time distinguishing the result from space-alien technology, other than the convenient use of our numbering and lettering system. (And they would have been scared s***less when they saw "made in Japan" on the back!) Nor is this just true of this century. Look at the rate of innovation in the US and UK in the 1800s, under more-or-less capitalistic rules. Railroads and telegraphs and steam ships and radio and electricity and chemical fertilizers and pesticides and the germ theory of disease and the very beginning glimmers of modern physics and machine guns and barbed wire and streetcars and mass production factories and modern steel bridges and.... These two centuries have defined the modern world, and whatever the reasons, nearly all the real innovations have happened in mostly capitalistic countries with substantial personal freedom, and (probably more importantly) the ability to let new technology displace incumbents and to allow innovators to be rewarded for their innovation by the opportunity to do still more innovation. ... >--Tim May --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 From njohnsn at njohnsn.com Sat May 3 13:22:17 2003 From: njohnsn at njohnsn.com (Neil Johnson) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 15:22:17 -0500 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <26D2E932-7D8D-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <26D2E932-7D8D-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305031522.17189.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> One way to look at it: The changes that bringing this computational and communication capabilility to the public are difficult to imagine. It's like looking at a 'horseless carriage' - as early automobiles were called - and imagining strip malls, suburbs, freeways, and drive-by shootings. Scott McGready (yes, that one) -- Neil Johnson http://www.njohnsn.com PGP key available on request. From patrick at lfcgate.com Sat May 3 15:33:13 2003 From: patrick at lfcgate.com (Patrick) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 16:33:13 -0600 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <200305032050.h43KooKq028587@artifact.psychedelic.net> Message-ID: <00cd01c311c3$fdef5000$0200a8c0@scylla> > Which box do you pick? And why? I ignore the thought experiment and work on something at hand. Launching www.printyourownmoney.com in a few days. The technology that makes digital cash possible is also useful for many other things. I realize there's a place for arguing whether "digital money" can work today, tomorrow, or in two hundred years. But Cypherpunks have already spent more than a decade talking about it. Why not try it for a while, to see if it works? It's not so hard. It doesn't take a billion dollars, or a million, or a hundred thousand. Apparently it takes one engineer, without venture capital, a couple of months. The Lucrative source is MIT X license - basically don't blame me for using it, but do whatever you like. Lucrative has an open API - you could ignore the code and use the API. Or you could ignore both and build your own. Or you could hire me - I'm jobless - to do it for you. Patrick http://lucrative.thirdhost.com/ From emc at artifact.psychedelic.net Sat May 3 16:43:54 2003 From: emc at artifact.psychedelic.net (Eric Cordian) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 16:43:54 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <00cd01c311c3$fdef5000$0200a8c0@scylla> Message-ID: <200305032343.h43NhsC9029190@artifact.psychedelic.net> Patrick writes: > I ignore the thought experiment and work on something at hand. > Launching www.printyourownmoney.com in a few days. Let's see. The mint picks a prime, p, a generator, g, and a random number k, and publishes (p, g, g^k mod p). The mint then signs stuff by raising it to the k power mod p, and not telling anyone what k is. We blind coins by picking a random b, and sending the coin times g^b to the mint, and after the mint raises it to the k power and sends it back, we can reverse engineer coin^k. Perhaps you'd care to publish your p, g, and g^k here on the list, so we can begin hacking them while you finish your pre-launch checkout. :) (Does anyone recall the approximate equal difficulty ratio between bits of factorization and bits of discrete log?) -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law" From timcmay at got.net Sat May 3 16:58:42 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 16:58:42 -0700 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <200305032050.h43KooKq028587@artifact.psychedelic.net> Message-ID: <2AEAE9DA-7DC3-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> I'll take this challenge, silly as it is. On Saturday, May 3, 2003, at 01:50 PM, Eric Cordian wrote: > Cypherpunks often think of Crypto as the state-killing technology which > will free us all from the clutches of inculcation in the collectivist > mentality. > > It should be noted, however, that advances in complexity theory or > quantum > computing that would render cryptography useless, would also have a > detrimental effect on the state apparatus. > > So I pose a question. You have two boxes. In the first is crypto so > powerful that it will keep peoples data safe for 1000 years, against > all > advances in mathematics, with perfect forward secrecy. > > In box number two is technology that will break any crypto designed by > mankind in the next 1000 years. > > You are allowed to take the contents of one of the boxes, and publish > it > on the Internet. You wish to do maximum damage to the state, free the > Sheeple, enable Tim's libertopian vision of the future, crush > totalitarian > centralized government, and make the world safe for flowers and other > living things. > > Which box do you pick? And why? By "any crypto designed by mankind" I assume you are excluding one-time pads, which are not breakable by any amount of computer power and any amount of mathematical knowledge. I assume you are referring to public key approaches, where _conceivably_ mathematical advances or almost inconceivable advances in computer power could result in PK ciphers being broken. Assuming your conditions are exactly as you state, I would of course pick box number ONE. We still outnumber those in government, and what they have to hide is mostly of little interest to me or my causes (troop movements, submarine positions, etc.). Also, they can easily fall back to courier-delivered one-time pads, which are not part of the assumption, as I see it. (If you are including even one-time pads being broken, then you are assuming magic, which is not interesting.) Thus, having a way to securely and untraceably communicate and transact business is much more important than being able to read THEIR bullshit communications. That was easy. And the cool thing is that every indication is that cipher-making is still pulling away from cipher-breaking by leaps and bounds, so it looks to me that we are falling further into the right choice. --Tim May "That government is best which governs not at all." --Henry David Thoreau From mv at cdc.gov Sat May 3 17:09:46 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 17:09:46 -0700 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke Message-ID: <3EB45A49.5E1A6162@cdc.gov> At 06:03 PM 5/3/03 +0100, Dave Howe wrote: > >Actually I agree - you should be free to smoke all you want to; however, >given that >a) the rest of us don't want to share your smoke >b) you don't want to share the smoke you are paying for *with* us >the real problem is the inefficiencies of your drug equipment - you really >should have some system so you get 100% of the smoke you paid for (rather >than less than 30% as now) Hey, we should *encourage* people to smoke, drink, fuck whatever moves, eat whatever you're served, because we are *coerced* into paying for their retirement. If we weren't, we wouldn't care; but since we are, please, take up whatever reduces your lifespan. And of course, if someone tries to stop you from whatever consensual-'harm' you wish, waste the fuckers, who have claimed ownership of your bodies. Or enjoy your slavery. From timcmay at got.net Sat May 3 17:11:06 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 17:11:06 -0700 Subject: Loyalty Day In-Reply-To: <20030503231510.GA50084@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: On Saturday, May 3, 2003, at 04:15 PM, Adam Shostack wrote: > Please register to participate. > > http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html > Dear Mr. President, Thank you for defeating the bad people who wear rags on their heads and pray to a heathen god! And thank you for arresting those bad people who went out into the forest to shoot their guns and who had copies of that book they call "the koran" in their houses. I think they should go to prison! And thank you Mr. President for promising to extend the assault rifle law. I don't think the Constitution means that people who are not in the government should have guns. And I hate the Dixie Chicks, too! And thank you for increasing spending, for not rolling back government, and for generally acting like a not very bright Democrat. Since I hate the Democrats, you are helping me to make my arguments that they are bad people who also should be treated as illegal combatants. Oh, Mr. President, I am answering your request and am enclosing a list of 17 of my neighbors who I think should be investigated for UnAmerican Activities. With the PATRIOT, HomeSec, and Protection of the Reich Acts, I am already feeling more comfortable. --Tim, Mrs. Orwell's Sixth Grade Class From mv at cdc.gov Sat May 3 17:12:40 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 17:12:40 -0700 Subject: whitehouse.gov taken over? Message-ID: <3EB45AF8.F8B6B1E4@cdc.gov> At 07:15 PM 5/3/03 -0400, Adam Shostack wrote: >Please register to participate. > >http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html > Please tell me someone played a DNS game. From emc at artifact.psychedelic.net Sat May 3 17:45:55 2003 From: emc at artifact.psychedelic.net (Eric Cordian) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 17:45:55 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <2AEAE9DA-7DC3-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305040045.h440jtGi029436@artifact.psychedelic.net> Tim writes: > I'll take this challenge, silly as it is. Yes, please humor me. I do so yearn to be entertained. > By "any crypto designed by mankind" I assume you are excluding one-time > pads, which are not breakable by any amount of computer power and any > amount of mathematical knowledge. I assume you are referring to public > key approaches, where _conceivably_ mathematical advances or almost > inconceivable advances in computer power could result in PK ciphers > being broken. I would exclude one-time pads equal in length to the message. I would include all public key crypto, and all use of symmetric block ciphers where an attacker given both the correct key and a wrong key could tell which was which. Let's assume the "technology" in box two can do big exponential searches almost instantly. > Assuming your conditions are exactly as you state, I would of course > pick box number ONE. > We still outnumber those in government, and what they have to hide is > mostly of little interest to me or my causes (troop movements, submarine > positions, etc.). Also, they can easily fall back to courier-delivered > one-time pads, which are not part of the assumption, as I see it. (If > you are including even one-time pads being broken, then you are assuming > magic, which is not interesting.) While government secrets may be of little importance to you, governments might very well be harmed if all those years worth of secure phone conversations, faxes, and other communications stored in the archives of various intelligence agencies were suddenly decrypted en masse and made public. Consider the economic impact of SSL no longer hiding your credit card numbers from hackers, or ssh being no more secure than telnet. The cost of having no secure communications without the parties meeting to exchange one-time pads generated by nuclear decay would run into the many billions. > Thus, having a way to securely and untraceably communicate and transact > business is much more important than being able to read THEIR bullshit > communications. > That was easy. > And the cool thing is that every indication is that cipher-making is > still pulling away from cipher-breaking by leaps and bounds, so it > looks to me that we are falling further into the right choice. Cough. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law" From nobody at remailer.privacy.at Sat May 3 09:03:12 2003 From: nobody at remailer.privacy.at (Anonymous) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 18:03:12 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Some CA elected officials need killing Message-ID: <21432466ade377114b2a5f2825036b1d@remailer.privacy.at> arch criminals 1. John Longville (62) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [1] midlevel criminals 2. Paul Koretz (42) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [2] lesser criminals 3. Rudy Bermudez (56) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] 4. Jackie Goldberg (45) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] 5. Mark Leno (13) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] [1] "Assemblyman Longville, who earlier was casting votes self-admittingly having no idea which bill he was voting on, was likewise indifferent to the concerns of La Suer, Spitzer and most of the assembled audience. When asked on the sidelines how he was leaning, Longville rather blithely explained, I dont know. I'll vote which ever way the speaker tells me to." [2] "One by one La Suer dissected the claims of what was soon exposed as just another myopic gun ban pushed to center stage while the economy burned. At one point, La Suers growing disgust crossed its limit. The Assemblyman vehemently expressed his outrage that the time and resources of the state were being diverted from the economy to even consider such a blatant sham and he called on Koretz to pull the bill so they could get on with real work. Koretz simply smiled and refused, knowing the fix was in. His fellow Democrats on the committee seemed all-too eager to rubber-stamp the bill in spite of the facts." [3] "At the end of the day, partisan politics once again proved stronger than right or reason. Down the line the five Democrats on the committee cast their obligatory yes votes and AB50 moved one step closer to becoming law in California. Even staunch liberals in attendance were stunned. One woman leaving the proceeding stated, Im not a big fan of guns but right now Im ashamed to say those people are from my party. What are they thinking?" source: soon-to-be-published fcspi.org news item event: Apr ?29th? sham of a committee meeting CA assembly's committee on public safety From DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk Sat May 3 10:03:46 2003 From: DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk (Dave Howe) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 18:03:46 +0100 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke References: <1A893BC9-7CC3-11D7-839C-003065BD2A5E@vonu.net> Message-ID: <006a01c311c7$e6f229a0$01c8a8c0@DaveHowe> Actually I agree - you should be free to smoke all you want to; however, given that a) the rest of us don't want to share your smoke b) you don't want to share the smoke you are paying for *with* us the real problem is the inefficiencies of your drug equipment - you really should have some system so you get 100% of the smoke you paid for (rather than less than 30% as now) From measl at mfn.org Sat May 3 16:18:35 2003 From: measl at mfn.org (J.A. Terranson) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 18:18:35 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Press Conduct Message-ID: Reference: http://www.cnn.com/2003/LAW/05/03/smart.inquirer.ap/index.html SALT LAKE CITY, Utah (AP) -- Two reporters fired for working with the National Enquirer on an Elizabeth Smart story revealed their law enforcement sources to avoid legal action against them by the Smart family. Leaving aside the fact that the story and all of the components were patently false, I am interested in the opionions of the few press-persons we have here on the actions of the reporters. As a press person, are there any conditions under which you would reveal confidential sources? If so, under what conditions would you do so? If not, do you have any observations/comments/yawns you would like to share on the instant case? -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin at mfn.org From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Sat May 3 16:52:44 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 18:52:44 -0500 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: <006a01c311c7$e6f229a0$01c8a8c0@DaveHowe> References: <1A893BC9-7CC3-11D7-839C-003065BD2A5E@vonu.net> <006a01c311c7$e6f229a0$01c8a8c0@DaveHowe> Message-ID: <20030503235244.GA9621@cybershamanix.com> On Sat, May 03, 2003 at 06:03:46PM +0100, Dave Howe wrote: > > Actually I agree - you should be free to smoke all you want to; however, > given that > a) the rest of us don't want to share your smoke > b) you don't want to share the smoke you are paying for *with* us > the real problem is the inefficiencies of your drug equipment - you really > should have some system so you get 100% of the smoke you paid for (rather > than less than 30% as now) Yes, like a vaporizer people use for smoking pot. Almost zero secondhand smoke, only what is breathed out. And, if operated properly, doesn't really create smoke in the first place. Much more efficient, much healthier as well, you don't get all the tars and crap. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From adam at homeport.org Sat May 3 16:15:11 2003 From: adam at homeport.org (Adam Shostack) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 19:15:11 -0400 Subject: Loyalty Day Message-ID: <20030503231510.GA50084@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Please register to participate. http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html -- "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -Hume From measl at mfn.org Sat May 3 17:16:07 2003 From: measl at mfn.org (J.A. Terranson) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 19:16:07 -0500 (CDT) Subject: [SSZ Error] Message-ID: Hey Jim, this has been going on for weeks now - you need to fix your PTRs... May 3 19:12:12 mx2 sm-mta[97105]: h440CBD6097105: ruleset=check_mail, arg1=, relay=root@[207.200.56.4], reject=451 4.1.8 Domain of sender address owner-cypherpunks-outgoing at einstein.ssz.com does not resolve May 3 19:13:57 mx2 sm-mta[97104]: h440BtD6097104: from=, size=3267, class=0, nrcpts=0, proto=ESMTP, daemon=MTA, relay=root@[207.200.56.4] May 3 19:13:57 mx2 sm-mta[97104]: h440BtD7097104: ruleset=check_mail, arg1=, relay=root@[207.200.56.4], reject=451 4.1.8 Domain of sender address owner-cypherpunks-outgoing at einstein.ssz.com does not resolve May 3 19:13:58 mx2 sm-mta[97104]: h440BtD7097104: from=, size=7093, class=0, nrcpts=0, proto=ESMTP, daemon=MTA, relay=root@[207.200.56.4] May 3 19:14:13 mx2 sm-mta[97105]: h440CBD6097105: from=, size=2502, class=0, nrcpts=0, proto=ESMTP, daemon=MTA, relay=root@[207.200.56.4] May 3 19:18:46 mx2 sm-mta[97134]: h440IjD6097134: ruleset=check_mail, arg1=, relay=root@[207.200.56.4], reject=451 4.1.8 Domain of sender address owner-cypherpunks-outgoing at einstein.ssz.com does not resolve May 3 19:18:49 mx2 sm-mta[97135]: h440InD6097135: ruleset=check_mail, arg1=, relay=root@[207.200.56.4], reject=451 4.1.8 Domain of sender address owner-cypherpunks-outgoing at einstein.ssz.com does not resolve May 3 19:18:49 mx2 sm-mta[97135]: h440InD6097135: from=, size=11356, class=0, nrcpts=0, proto=ESMTP, daemon=MTA, relay=root@[207.200.56.4] May 3 19:18:57 mx2 sm-mta[97136]: h440IuD6097136: ruleset=check_mail, arg1=, relay=root@[207.200.56.4], reject=451 4.1.8 Domain of sender address owner-cypherpunks-outgoing at einstein.ssz.com does not resolve May 3 19:19:14 mx2 sm-mta[97145]: h440JED6097145: ruleset=check_mail, arg1=, relay=root@[207.200.56.4], reject=451 4.1.8 Domain of sender address owner-cypherpunks-outgoing at einstein.ssz.com does not resolve su-2.05b# nslookup einstein.ssz.co -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin at mfn.org From measl at mfn.org Sat May 3 18:16:43 2003 From: measl at mfn.org (J.A. Terranson) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 20:16:43 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: <1A893BC9-7CC3-11D7-839C-003065BD2A5E@vonu.net> Message-ID: On Fri, 2 May 2003, jburnes wrote: > The one thing that really amazed me when I moved to Colorado is the number > of middle aged hippie types that 30 years ago were blasting the > establishment for controlling what they wanted to smoke have now *become* > the establishment. A professor friend of mine was smoking some Drum and > shooting the bull with me in Pearl Street Mall (in Boulder). Some new > ager comes by and reprimands him for generating smoke. > He wasn't even a middle-aged hippie. The middle-aged hippie types are > now running the city council, living in $500,000 homes and laying down nazi > laws for the rest. That my generation, once noted for their significant progress towards human freedoms, has turned into the single largest source of repressive laws and McCarthyesque attitude, is something I have sorrowfully noted for many years. That it keeps getting worse and worse is the only thing that continually fucks with my mind :-/ How did we go from libertarians to fascists? > Hypocrites. Animal Farm come true. Sometimes I really wish for the > 70's. Cheesy > clothes and Jimmy Carter were small threats to world order. > > jim burnes Amen. -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin at mfn.org From justin at soze.net Sat May 3 13:50:12 2003 From: justin at soze.net (Justin) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 20:50:12 +0000 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <26D2E932-7D8D-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <200305022205.24810.sfurlong@acmenet.net> <26D2E932-7D8D-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030503205012.GP17685@dreams.soze.net> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 At 2003-05-03 17:32 +0000, Tim May wrote: > But the point is not to predict some withering away of the state. The > point is that unfettered communication, with the already-extant ability > to use all sorts of alternative financial instruments (offshore > accounts, PayPal, E-gold, etc.), is already producing interesting > changes in the way the world works. Interesting changes in this case means executive orders and increasing harassment of individuals by financial institutions, which are simultaneously forced to comply with continuously constricting regulations and rules, not to mention a vague and exploding "watchlist" of restricted entities and individuals. To wit http://www.ustreas.gov/offices/enforcement/ofac/sdn/sdnlist.txt rtsp://167.216.132.211:554/cspan/ndrive/ter102802_aba.rm (2:19:00) rtsp://167.216.132.211:554/cspan/ndrive/ter102802_aba2.rm (3:11:44) a brief/pedantic overview of the first part of the second realmedia file above: If you transact with a major financial institution and the transaction looks suspicious to them, SARs (Suspicious Activity Report) and CTRs (Currency Transaction Report) can now be filed online (theoretically meaning instantaneously) with FinCEN and Treasury's OFAC via forms signed/encrypted with certificates issued by http://www.aces.att.com/. It's called PACS (Patriot Act Communication System - isn't it cute - http://pacs.treas.gov/index.jsp), and those reports are analyzed by the Detroit data processing center of, you guessed it, the IRS. Fun for the whole family. (incidental industry note for terms in the videos: BSA = banking secrecy act, AML = Anti-Money Laundering) - -- Freedom's untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. --Rumsfeld, 2003-04-11 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.2rc2 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAj60K4QACgkQnH0ZJUVoUkMx7gCffxH1NVveUkTcxOOza4tNAUb8 dtkAnRpxlr11xT1s6HMpVjv43zkgO3uS =QM32 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- From schear at attbi.com Sat May 3 20:50:20 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 20:50:20 -0700 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <00cd01c311c3$fdef5000$0200a8c0@scylla> References: <200305032050.h43KooKq028587@artifact.psychedelic.net> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030503204751.0496c840@mail.attbi.com> At 04:33 PM 5/3/2003 -0600, Patrick wrote: > > Which box do you pick? And why? > > I ignore the thought experiment and work on something at hand. > > Launching www.printyourownmoney.com in a few days. I don't need no stink'n web site to print my own money. Been 'doin it for years. Just need the right paper, Photoshop and a good dye sublimation printer. Hehe steve From alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu Sat May 3 21:00:08 2003 From: alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu (Andy Lopata) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 21:00:08 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 11:18 AM, Matt Beland wrote: >> >> You're dangerously close to sounding like those >> cranks who claim they're being patriotic by attacking the Dixie Chicks >> for >> their speech. Friday, May 02, 2003 11:58 AM, Tim May wrote: >And as in that debate, where "free speech" is tossed around a lot, >nothing in the Dixie Chicks case has involved freedom of speech in any >way whatsoever. Think about it. Of course the Dixie Chicks controversy does not implicate Constitutional freedom of speech. The government is not restricting the DC's speech (i.e. not throwing them in jail or censoring them). However, the ever consolidating corporate media (in conjunction with the powers that be in Washington) very effectively limits and contains the scope of debate about national and international issues. See Manufacturing Consent (Chomsky/Herman) http://www.commoncouragepress.com/chomsky_consent.html. The DCs got in hot water because they dared to step outside the narrow range of permissible debate in the mainstream infotainment industry. Sure there was plenty of debate about the war, but the media treats different views in very different ways. The DCs are held out as opponents of the war to show who stupid opposing the war was - they are just country singers - what the hell do they know about global politics. And the infotainment industry (news included) ignores the multitude of articulate, intelligent speakers who could forcefully explain the numerous reasons the war was immoral, unjust, and not in the interest of the U.S. The treatment is subtle, but very effective. Why is this restriction on speech and debate any less insidious than statist control? Why is capitalist self-censorship better than state-controlled explicit censorship? I subscribe to this list for a number of reasons. One of them is because of the potential crypto has for destabilizing capitalist/monopolist and state control over information and expression (e.g. Freenet). -Andy Lopata from the People's Republic of Eugene. From alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu Sat May 3 21:03:00 2003 From: alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu (Andy Lopata) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 21:03:00 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: <8DFD1896-7CE5-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 12:53 PM, Thomas Shaddack wrote: >> Capitalism is a good idea, as long as it has the form of a lot of >> small, >> widely varying subjects. The current trend of consolidation brings away >> both the competition and the choice, and with high-enough barriers to >> entry there will be no new small subjects to disrupt the balance. On Friday, May 02, 2003 2:32 PM, Tim May wrote: >Yes, you are right, the great electronics companies of the 1960s sit >astride our economic life, crushing the life out of real competition! >With Fairchild and Rheem Semiconductor and Mohawk Data Sciences >controlling everything, new ideas and innovations cannot be developed! >And the 1970s were much, much worse, with the computer companies >consolidating their power and dominating all computer work! Who can >innovate when Burroughs, Honeywell, Data General, Univac, NCR, DEC, and >CDC utterly dominate? What about Intel and Microsoft? When the few microchip companies make a deal with the copyright content cartels (RIAA and MPAA) and the desktop operating system monopoly (MS), then gov't action isn't needed to restrict the way we use our computers - and the flow of information. Simply put, markets lead to consolidation. Consolidation leads to monopoly. Monopoly leads to control from above, with no accountability. Is this better than gov't? I certainly see the dangers of gov't: state terrorism, state ineptitude, state racism and xenophobia, but I see market control as at least as dangerous since corporations are not accountable to any sort of democratic control - and I don't think the people with the most capital necessarily make the best decisions. From measl at mfn.org Sat May 3 19:28:24 2003 From: measl at mfn.org (J.A. Terranson) Date: Sat, 3 May 2003 21:28:24 -0500 (CDT) Subject: whitehouse.gov taken over? In-Reply-To: <3EB45AF8.F8B6B1E4@cdc.gov> Message-ID: On Sat, 3 May 2003, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > At 07:15 PM 5/3/03 -0400, Adam Shostack wrote: > >Please register to participate. > > > >http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html > > > > Please tell me someone played a DNS game. Not at all: this is to be expected after the three minute hate... -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin at mfn.org From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Sat May 3 18:49:19 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 21:49:19 -0400 Subject: Hippies Banning Crysotile Message-ID: James Donald wrote... >Not this cypherpunk -- the evils of asbestos are ninety percent >hot air. That's about the right percentage. >In reality, if someone is >exposed to enough asbestos to be a problem, he is painfully >aware of it. Only a minuscule minority among those now >receiving stupendous awards were exposed to that level of >asbestos. Not really. This party line is equally hot air. Basically, there are two main modes of asbestos related disease: asbestosis and melothemeoma (I probably spelled that last one wrong.) The Manville miners inhaled huge quantities of Asbestos and almost all of them died of asbestosis. This can occur when exposed to any type of asbestos in large quantities. Another form of asbestos-related death is a whole different story. Melothemeoma is due to when the non-serpentine types of asbestos pierce the lung wall and push stray genetic refuse into cell nuclei, starting a really bad lung cancer. The form of asbestos most closely associated with this is crocidilyte, which is needle-like and a beautiful dark blue in color. That form of asbestos can cause cancer even in very low exposures. Forunately, its exceedingly rare. Back in the late 80s I only saw perhaps half a dozen samples of it in the course of viewing many thousands of asbestos. As for floor tiles using asbestos, I would never bother removing them...the asbestos in them probably mitigates far more fire-related danger than it causes exposure-related risk. As for hanging clumps of Asbestos down in your boiler room, close the door and don't let the kids play down there. Don't abate, as you'll probably create more exposure than if you left it alone. Summary: your odds of dying due to low levels of asbestos exposure are exceedingly low, but decidedly nonzero. -TD > --digsig > James A. Donald > 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG > 8gm9gCyQYFsIMdu+WBfQDsch65rBj3PGxaGDX58F > 4/6al9vqF/sHVMF7iikxBjrsqugs4W7kRkOUPPUFA _________________________________________________________________ Tired of spam? Get advanced junk mail protection with MSN 8. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From bill.stewart at pobox.com Sat May 3 23:04:21 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 23:04:21 -0700 Subject: China (was Mike Hawash) In-Reply-To: <20030502022726.GH17685@dreams.soze.net> References: <5.1.1.6.2.20030501141055.02bf67e0@idiom.com> <5.1.1.6.2.20030501141055.02bf67e0@idiom.com> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030503225528.02cf6ab0@idiom.com> At 02:27 AM 05/02/2003 +0000, Justin wrote: >At 2003-05-02 00:25 +0000, Bill Stewart wrote: > > Interesting. I've recently been reading a book by a guy who spent > > much of the mid-90s illegally tramping around the ethnic areas of > > western China (particularly the Tibet/Burma borders with Sichuan and > > Yunnan) trying not to get thrown out of the country too often. > >Is that sort of like documented immigrants (not undocumented _citizens_ >like Mexicans who live within earshot of the border, speak no english, >pay no taxes, and think they're part of Aztlan No, it's more like the US in ~1870 or 1890 - the big neighboring territory had pretty much been conquered, though a lot of them still spoke Spanish, and the other big neighboring territory had been reconquered, but a lot of larger minority ethnic groups like the Navajo hadn't been totally wiped out, though the smaller tribes were gradually getting killed off or having their land stolen and getting forced onto smaller reservations and having US military forts put in the middle to govern them (which was bad) or whatever the Bureau of Indian Affairs sent out to "help" them and "civilize" them (which was ultimately more devastating), and there was a deliberate attempt to wipe out the local economy (there's no real equivalent to killing off the buffalo, but periodically "taxing" all their livestock is sort of similar.) From bill.stewart at pobox.com Sat May 3 23:32:50 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 23:32:50 -0700 Subject: Loyalty Day In-Reply-To: <20030503231510.GA50084@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030503232546.02d34f98@idiom.com> At 07:15 PM 05/03/2003 -0400, Adam Shostack wrote: >Please register to participate. >http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html Too late - we missed it! It was on May Day, aka May 1. Obviously it's designed to give American Labor Unions something to do when the rest of the world is celebrating Labor Day, since of course American Unions aren't Commies and never have been. (Unfortunately they are mostly Democrats, so the Administration is still looking for ways to crush them, but they'd better be Loyal Americans anyway...) I don't know how the turnout for the San Francisco May Day Parade went. It used to alternate between hippie maypole dance things and commie parades, and this year looked like another commie year plus it was raining like mad... From bill.stewart at pobox.com Sat May 3 23:58:12 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 23:58:12 -0700 Subject: whitehouse.gov taken over? Cheese-eating surrender monkeys... In-Reply-To: References: <3EB45AF8.F8B6B1E4@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030503233543.02d5b338@idiom.com> At 09:28 PM 05/03/2003 -0500, J.A. Terranson wrote: >On Sat, 3 May 2003, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > > At 07:15 PM 5/3/03 -0400, Adam Shostack wrote: > > >Please register to participate. > > > > > >http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html > > > > > > > Please tell me someone played a DNS game. > > >Not at all: this is to be expected after the three minute hate... Oh, right, who's today's target? Are we still practicing hating Saddam, or is it Bashar al-Assad this week, or the French? Tim and Peter have been discussing the origins of "Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys" and the general hatred of the Frogs, but I've got to disagree with Tim's assertion that it's been going on for a long time. Sure, there's been some low-level dislike, and Jay Leno's always made fun of their liking for Jerry Lewis, and Parisians have a reputation for being as rude as New Yorkers, but it seemed like there was such as rush of anti-French surrender jokes and anti-French political commentary that it's more than just coincidence; it seemed like the meme was being pushed hard and fast by somebody. Perhaps the meme was just sitting around from DeGaulle's time, waiting to be triggered by France's lack of participation in US Unilateralism and unwillingness to join the COW coalition this time. But it didn't seem that way. From eresrch at eskimo.com Sun May 4 07:30:40 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 07:30:40 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Loyalty Day In-Reply-To: <20030503231510.GA50084@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: Holy shit, I thought it was joke. I can't wait to spread this one around Madison! Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike On Sat, 3 May 2003, Adam Shostack wrote: > Please register to participate. > > http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html > > > > > -- > "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." > -Hume From timcmay at got.net Sun May 4 08:26:16 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 08:26:16 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Saturday, May 3, 2003, at 09:00 PM, Andy Lopata wrote: > Of course the Dixie Chicks controversy does not implicate > Constitutional > freedom of speech. The government is not restricting the DC's speech > (i.e. > not throwing them in jail or censoring them). > > However, the ever consolidating corporate media (in conjunction with > the > powers that be in Washington) very effectively limits and contains the > scope > of debate about national and international issues. See Manufacturing > Consent (Chomsky/Herman) > http://www.commoncouragepress.com/chomsky_consent.html. The DCs got > in hot > water because they dared to step outside the narrow range of > permissible > debate in the mainstream infotainment industry. Sure there was plenty > of > debate about the war, but the media treats different views in very > different > ways. The DCs are held out as opponents of the war to show who stupid > opposing the war was - they are just country singers - what the hell > do they > know about global politics. And the infotainment industry (news > included) > ignores the multitude of articulate, intelligent speakers who could > forcefully explain the numerous reasons the war was immoral, unjust, > and not > in the interest of the U.S. The treatment is subtle, but very > effective. > > Why is this restriction on speech and debate any less insidious than > statist > control? Why is capitalist self-censorship better than > state-controlled > explicit censorship? The Dixie Chicks catered to the right wing, country music, monster truck rally crowd. Not surprising that when they insulted their crowd's leader, the crowd reacted. Being against the war hasn't hurt Michael Moore's popularity in _his_ crowd. It's silly to say that "freedom of speech" implies that people should continue to find popular those who have insulted their views or their leaders. --Tim May "He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -- Nietzsche From timcmay at got.net Sun May 4 09:05:17 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 09:05:17 -0700 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <3278A898-7E4A-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Saturday, May 3, 2003, at 06:16 PM, J.A. Terranson wrote: > On Fri, 2 May 2003, jburnes wrote: > >> The one thing that really amazed me when I moved to Colorado is the >> number >> of middle aged hippie types that 30 years ago were blasting the >> establishment for controlling what they wanted to smoke have now >> *become* >> the establishment. A professor friend of mine was smoking some Drum >> and >> shooting the bull with me in Pearl Street Mall (in Boulder). Some >> new >> ager comes by and reprimands him for generating smoke. >> He wasn't even a middle-aged hippie. The middle-aged hippie types are >> now running the city council, living in $500,000 homes and laying >> down nazi >> laws for the rest. > > That my generation, once noted for their significant progress towards > human > freedoms, has turned into the single largest source of repressive laws > and > McCarthyesque attitude, is something I have sorrowfully noted for many > years. That it keeps getting worse and worse is the only thing that > continually fucks with my mind :-/ > > How did we go from libertarians to fascists? Your generation was never libertarian. Libertine, yes, but not libertarian. Antiwar during Vietnam, yes, but not libertarian. Or have you forgotten the support by the college crowd, circa 1966-80, for statist policies like "affirmative action" and "welfare"? I was in college during some of those years, 1970-74, and can assure you that most of the kids around me were very, very far from being libertarian. Yeah, they like free sex and cheap pot, and so on, but they favored "government that works!," and they flocked to lefties like Bobby Kennedy, Gene McCarthy, and even Hubert Humphrey. They saw high tax rates as punishment for capitalists. Angela Davis was their hero, Cuba their idea of a just society. "Eat the rich!" came out of that era. So, with a few exceptions, that generation was socialist and communist, not libertarian. Hence the better question is this: "How did we go from socialists to fascists?" And the answer is obvious: "You were always there." --Tim May "Stupidity is not a sin, the victim can't help being stupid. But stupidity is the only universal crime; the sentence is death, there is no appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity." --Robert A. Heinlein From emc at artifact.psychedelic.net Sun May 4 09:10:41 2003 From: emc at artifact.psychedelic.net (Eric Cordian) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 09:10:41 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <3EB507D6.9080606@algroup.co.uk> Message-ID: <200305041610.h44GAg84032264@artifact.psychedelic.net> Ben Laurie wrote: > Such a machine cannot exist. Proof: > Let O be an oracle such that any encrypted message, E can be decrypted > by O. That is, if E=Enc(M), then O(E)=M. Now, encrypt a message I as > follows. Let S be the set of all bitstrings. Let, C, the set of all ciphers, be the set of all finitely denumerable primitive recursive injections of S into itself. Let O, our oracle, associate with each M in C a map M', from range(M) onto S, such that for x,y in S and y = M(x), x = M'(y). > If bit 0 of I (I_0) is 1, then choose E_0 s.t. the MS bit of O(E_0)=0 > If bit 0 of I is 0, then choose E_0 s.t. the MS bit of O(E_0)=1 > Then for each subsequent bit, proceed as follows: > If I_n is 1, then choose E_n s.t. O(E_n||E_{n-1}||...E_0) has an MS > bit that is 0. > If I_n is 0, then choose E_n s.t. O(E_n||E_{n-1}||...E_0) has an MS > bit that is 1. > Then the encrpytion of I is X=E_N||E_{N-1}...||E_0, and, by > construction, O(X) != I. Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt. While we may without loss of generalization view O as acting on bitstrings, by encoding the ciphers and their inverses, neither the domain nor range of O is going to be the set of all bitstrings. Ergo, we can not simply "choose" things based on the application of O to bitstrings we arbitrarily construct. Your proof can be fixed, of course, but I think you'll find that it boils down to the usual diagonal argument that we can find a function on the integers which is not primitive recursive, by ordering the countable set of primitive recursive functions, and defining a new function that is for an input of N, something other than the output of the Nth function for N. As long as we restrict the ciphers to a countable set of "reasonable" computer programs which halt for all inputs and don't have neverending descriptions, the oracle exists, and your proof does not. > Cheers, Cheers, -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law" From adam at homeport.org Sun May 4 07:35:54 2003 From: adam at homeport.org (Adam Shostack) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 10:35:54 -0400 Subject: Loyalty Day In-Reply-To: References: <20030503231510.GA50084@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: <20030504143554.GA58271@lightship.internal.homeport.org> I think it was Vinge who said that reality is getting ahead of an author's ability to invent it. On Sun, May 04, 2003 at 07:30:40AM -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: | | Holy shit, I thought it was joke. I can't wait to spread this one around | Madison! | | Patience, persistence, truth, | Dr. mike | | On Sat, 3 May 2003, Adam Shostack wrote: | | > Please register to participate. | > | > http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html | > | > | > | > | > -- | > "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." | > -Hume | > | > | -- "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -Hume From ben at algroup.co.uk Sun May 4 05:30:14 2003 From: ben at algroup.co.uk (Ben Laurie) Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 13:30:14 +0100 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <200305032050.h43KooKq028587@artifact.psychedelic.net> References: <200305032050.h43KooKq028587@artifact.psychedelic.net> Message-ID: <3EB507D6.9080606@algroup.co.uk> Eric Cordian wrote: > In box number two is technology that will break any crypto designed by > mankind in the next 1000 years. Such a machine cannot exist. Proof: Let O be an oracle such that any encrypted message, E can be decrypted by O. That is, if E=Enc(M), then O(E)=M. Now, encrypt a message I as follows. If bit 0 of I (I_0) is 1, then choose E_0 s.t. the MS bit of O(E_0)=0 If bit 0 of I is 0, then choose E_0 s.t. the MS bit of O(E_0)=1 Then for each subsequent bit, proceed as follows: If I_n is 1, then choose E_n s.t. O(E_n||E_{n-1}||...E_0) has an MS bit that is 0. If I_n is 0, then choose E_n s.t. O(E_n||E_{n-1}||...E_0) has an MS bit that is 1. Then the encrpytion of I is X=E_N||E_{N-1}...||E_0, and, by construction, O(X) != I. Cheers, Ben. -- http://www.apache-ssl.org/ben.html http://www.thebunker.net/ "There is no limit to what a man can do or how far he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." - Robert Woodruff From jamesd at echeque.com Sun May 4 13:57:27 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 13:57:27 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: References: <8DFD1896-7CE5-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <3EB51C47.22056.13F5BA@localhost> -- On 3 May 2003 at 21:03, Andy Lopata wrote: > Simply put, markets lead to consolidation. So said Marx. He also said that markets would make the workers poorer and poorer. Despite the fact that the trend has been in the other direction for the past two hundred years, despite the fact that what Marx wrote was obviously false then, and has become more obviously false in the 150 years since he wrote, Marxists repeat Marx's prophecies with the more confidence, the more obviously the facts contradict them. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG Ic1xAeCT1HkM0xATi9N8p+jTR40FPoz4Ej6T5Oep 4hL/SG1g6h/sdIbk/IJWPDxc3E/XmQj/f3wE3EYS1 From jamesd at echeque.com Sun May 4 13:57:27 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 13:57:27 -0700 Subject: Hippies Banning Crysotile In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <3EB51C47.18132.13F588@localhost> -- James A. Donald: > >In reality, if someone is exposed to enough asbestos to be a > >problem, he is painfully aware of it. Only a minuscule > >minority among those now receiving stupendous awards were > >exposed to that level of asbestos. On 3 May 2003 at 21:49, Tyler Durden wrote: > Not really. This party line is equally hot air. Basically, > there are two main modes of asbestos related disease: > asbestosis and melothemeoma But almost none of the money currently being awarded is going to people with absestosis or mesothelioma. It is almost all going to people with "asbestos-related pleural and pulmonary disease" -- a fictitious medical category that includes any deviation from perfect health in any part of any person's breathing system. > The form of asbestos most closely associated with this is > crocidilyte, which is needle-like and a beautiful dark blue > in color. That form of asbestos can cause cancer even in very > low exposures. Yes, unnoticeable exposures to blue asbestos does cause harm in a witchcraft like manner -- but while very few people have been exposed to blue asbestos, almost all jury awards are based on witchcraft like harm, where the person is harmed by some imperceptible magical agent that is impossible to notice. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG qqEdCNdKpP0eW/wImgFKX4aggGjKBoltAHX90h3y 4A9O47A6pAry1m2qjcdaggEVqtn5UKXBbfoHzRZGj From jamesd at echeque.com Sun May 4 14:15:59 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 14:15:59 -0700 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: References: <1A893BC9-7CC3-11D7-839C-003065BD2A5E@vonu.net> Message-ID: <3EB5209F.23666.24EEA6@localhost> -- On 3 May 2003 at 20:16, J.A. Terranson wrote: > That my generation, once noted for their significant progress > towards human freedoms, has turned into the single largest > source of repressive laws and McCarthyesque attitude, is > something I have sorrowfully noted for many years. That it > keeps getting worse and worse is the only thing that > continually fucks with my mind :-/ > > How did we go from libertarians to fascists? That is of course a rhetorical question, but it has a straightforward answer I was in the movement during the late sixties and early seventies and watched the authoritarianism become visible the seventies, and eventually realized it had always been present, but hidden by the war against conscription. Initially, the movement started off against racist Jim Crow laws, issues where leftism and libertarianism, and Marxism were all on the same side. So naturally the Marxists called themselves lovers of liberty, and no doubt believed themselves. With Jim Crow laws out of the way, but the draft not yet the big issue, Marxism took the reins, and it has held those reigns ever since, though since the fall of the Soviet Union nazism has started to share authority. When the draft ended, the movement took up issues such as enslaving the third world and political correctness. It became visible as the enemy of freedom and human life the seventies, when so many third worlders were enslaved or murdered, but not many cared, because the goal were far away. Since then, issues like the anti sex laws in the workplace, expanding the war on some drugs to include tobacco, and support for the 9//11 terrorists and Saddam has caused increasing numbers of ordinary people to care about these evil people. When the Jim Crow laws were out of the way, but the war in Vietnam had not yet begun to bite, caring and activist youths cast about for new issues, and adopted "social justice", Of course "social justice", being a form of cosmic justice, implies a vast authoritarian state to do good to people with baton and gun whether the beneficiaries like it or not, so to counterbalance that they adopted a criticism of existing state institutions as unresponsive to the will of the people, and a program of "participatory democracy" to make those institutions responsive to the will of the people. Of course the program of "social justice", and helping the poor and oppressed brought out the Marxist in all of us. Subconsciously we visualized ourselves holding the whips and guns and beating in the faces of those bloody ungrateful poor and oppressed until they showed us the gratitude we deserved. I observed this in myself and others in the late sixties, and reading of earlier movement activities, I can see it the writers, though they could not see this in the themselves. As Pinochet is alleged to have said, but did not, everyone is a Marxist, but only some know it. The actual poor and oppressed in the west sensed the condescension, hatred, and intended violence, and rejected the do gooders of the movement as long haired creeps, recognizing them as the class enemies that they were. Embittered by this rejection, the movement turned its benevolence on those too tightly controlled to fight back, the third worlders, and came to identify emotionally with governments such as Castro's which swiftly tortured anyone who was insufficiently grateful for all the good that had been done to him with electric shocks. So emotionally the activists were already no longer the anti authoritarians they thought they were, but there was as yet no contradiction between the movement's belief in itself as anti authoritarian, and what it was actually doing. The movement set about implementing participatory democracy within itself. Participatory democracy in actual practice has a striking resemblance to Lenin's democratic centralism. To the extent that it actually is participatory, he with the strongest bladder wins, but what usually happens is not "participation" (rule by those with iron bladders and incredible tolerance for boredom), but instead Leninist democratic centralism, rule by a secretive and conspiratorial organized minority. We called ourselves "the caucus", but the caucus was, in practice, "the party". The movement rapidly came to be controlled by people who thought of the themselves as secret communists or open communists, a small conspiracy, hostile to the existing order, aimed at taking power, acting under a mask in a hostile world, which we expected to become violently repressive as it entered the throws of the expected world revolution.. Among us were many people who thought of themselves as secret agents for an outside power, some of whom may perhaps have accepted some small change from those who actually were agents of that power, many of whom accepted substantial non money benefits from China, Russia, or one of Russia's puppet regimes. At that point, the point where I became part of the movement, and part of the caucus, the movement was fundamentally authoritarian, but we believed ourselves to be libertarian, and what we were doing did not obviously contradict that belief. With the end of conscription however, the authoritarian mindset of the movement became increasingly visible. This was most spectacularly revealed with the fall of Vietnam and Cambodia, when the movement came out in defence of tyranny, slavery, and mass murder, glibly forgetting the liquidation of those such as the NLF that they had claimed to identify with. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG fj+tCcy65aP3mGsmaTn0aQ67N3yJfffYK4Xa2D1v 4iwyi++c8DsRZqC4ThvnGSIU90wpqTA4DXf8TrmjV From emc at artifact.psychedelic.net Sun May 4 15:04:25 2003 From: emc at artifact.psychedelic.net (Eric Cordian) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 15:04:25 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Zundel's Mouth Declared Weapon of Mass Destruction Message-ID: <200305042204.h44M4P2w001315@artifact.psychedelic.net> The tale of Holocaust commentator Ernst Zundel has taken another strange turn. As you may know, Zundel is seeking political asylum in Canada, after being run out of the US at gunpoint over an expired visitor's visa, at the behest of Israeli sympathizers in the US state department. Now his asylum hearing has been quashed by the Canadian government serving his with a document declaring him a "national security risk." The certificate suspends his application for asylum, and permits him to be deported after a secret hearing at the Federal Court. The apparent goal of all of this is to deport Zundel to Germany, where he may be charged under that nation's anti-free speech laws with saying things that offend Jews. Immigration Minister Denis Coderre said that Zundel was an individual whose presence promotes violence. It would seem to me that if Jews commit violence because they do not like Mr. Zundel's comments, then the solution would be to arrest the Jewish lawbreakers, as opposed to declaring Mr. Zundel a national security threat. No doubt I'll get death threats for articulating that opinion. http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20030503/UZUNDN/ Speaking of death threats, that's exactly what the Santa Rosa Junior College's student newspaper, the "Oak Leaf" got after publishing a little essay by Mark McGuire titled "Is anti-Semitism ever the result of Jewish behavior?" http://www.pressdemocrat.com/local/news/02srjc_a1.html The newspaper had to close its offices, and board up its mail slot, amid violent graphic death threats against the 19 year old student newspaper editor, who has now been offered a police escort on campus. Making death threats is supposed to be against the law, but again, different rules apparently apply if you're a protected class. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law" From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Sun May 4 14:41:20 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 17:41:20 -0400 Subject: China (was Mike Hawash) Message-ID: Bill Stewart wrote... >From: Bill Stewart >To: Justin >CC: cypherpunks at ssz.com >Subject: Re: China (was Mike Hawash) >Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 23:04:21 -0700 > >At 02:27 AM 05/02/2003 +0000, Justin wrote: >>At 2003-05-02 00:25 +0000, Bill Stewart wrote: >> > Interesting. I've recently been reading a book by a guy who spent >> > much of the mid-90s illegally tramping around the ethnic areas of >> > western China (particularly the Tibet/Burma borders with Sichuan and >> > Yunnan) trying not to get thrown out of the country too often. >> >>Is that sort of like documented immigrants (not undocumented _citizens_ >>like Mexicans who live within earshot of the border, speak no english, >>pay no taxes, and think they're part of Aztlan > >No, it's more like the US in ~1870 or 1890 - the big neighboring territory >had pretty much been conquered, though a lot of them still spoke Spanish, >and the other big neighboring territory had been reconquered, >but a lot of larger minority ethnic groups like the Navajo hadn't been >totally wiped out, though the smaller tribes were gradually getting >killed off or having their land stolen and getting forced onto smaller >reservations and having US military forts put in the middle to govern them >(which was bad) or whatever the Bureau of Indian Affairs sent out to >"help" them and "civilize" them (which was ultimately more devastating), >and there was a deliberate attempt to wipe out the local economy >(there's no real equivalent to killing off the buffalo, >but periodically "taxing" all their livestock is sort of similar.) Well, I'd say it's more complex than that. Until recently, the view in China towards minorities was that Minorities are fine and dandy as long as they don't exhibit traits that are too obviously non-Han while presenting a threat to Han-dominated areas. Now, it's more like "Hum...how can we turn a profit with these folks? Tourism? Manufacturing?" Overall, the Chinese have never seemed to have the bloodlust that western countires had...they'd always prefer to absorb another culture rather than kill it outright. And yes, while in China I tried to travel to Tibet with a Japanese buddhist monk, but Tibet was suddenly "closed" due to the 80s riots in Lhasa (and look on a map...that's a LARGE area to simply declare "closed", but it was fairly enforceable due to the few viable routes into Tibet). IN addition, in 1988 there were many cities closed to foriegners. But that's mostly all gone now, as joint foerign-market-oriented factories proliferate in more and more parts of China. Right now, you'd have to say that China was fairly "free" from an economic standpoint, and not free politically, with all other areas somewhere in between. _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Sun May 4 15:56:47 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 17:56:47 -0500 (CDT) Subject: [SSZ Error] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Sat, 3 May 2003, J.A. Terranson wrote: > > Hey Jim, this has been going on for weeks now - you need to fix your PTRs... > > May 3 19:12:12 mx2 sm-mta[97105]: h440CBD6097105: ruleset=check_mail, > arg1=, > relay=root@[207.200.56.4], reject=451 4.1.8 Domain of sender address > owner-cypherpunks-outgoing at einstein.ssz.com does not resolve > May 3 19:13:57 mx2 Thanks, I sent a note to the folks who are -supposedly- taking care of DNS....;( Just another reason to change the current setup on this end. If all works well I'll be changeing the SSZ feed from this ISDN we've had since '94 and taking it to SDSL. I'll also take back all the DNS and related services as well. It's amazing how many people find DNS hard to manage. The change should take place sometime in the June/July time frame. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Sun May 4 16:02:05 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 18:02:05 -0500 (CDT) Subject: [eff-austin] Biometrics ID bill hearing on Thursday (fwd) Message-ID: ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 15:59:10 -0500 From: Adina Levin To: Leaders , eff-austin at effaustin.org, shenson at austin.rr.com Subject: [eff-austin] Biometrics ID bill hearing on Thursday SB945 sponsored by Ogden is being heard in the Defense Affairs and State-Federal Relations Committee on Thurday. The bill enables the use of facial, thumb, fingerprints, and other biometric identifiers for *a broad range of state purposes to authenticate identity.* Several people on this list have professional experience with the reliability issues with biometric ID. ** The legislators don't understand the technology. If you have relevant information, please let legislators know. ** If you'd like to testify or communicate your expertise to the committee members, please contact Scott Henson at ACLU-TX, shenson at austin.rr.com, who will let you know who's most effective to talk to. Or fax a letter to committee members. From ben at algroup.co.uk Sun May 4 10:30:54 2003 From: ben at algroup.co.uk (Ben Laurie) Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 18:30:54 +0100 Subject: Randomness Message-ID: <3EB54E4E.4040002@algroup.co.uk> People might be interested in a paper I've written on randomness: http://www.apache-ssl.org/randomness.pdf. Comments, as always, are more than welcome. Cheers, Ben. -- http://www.apache-ssl.org/ben.html http://www.thebunker.net/ "There is no limit to what a man can do or how far he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." - Robert Woodruff From measl at mfn.org Sun May 4 17:56:06 2003 From: measl at mfn.org (J.A. Terranson) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 19:56:06 -0500 (CDT) Subject: whitehouse.gov taken over? Cheese-eating surrender monkeys... In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030503233543.02d5b338@idiom.com> Message-ID: On Sat, 3 May 2003, Bill Stewart wrote: > >Not at all: this is to be expected after the three minute hate... > > Oh, right, who's today's target? Are we still practicing hating Saddam, > or is it Bashar al-Assad this week, or the French? I kind of wonder whatever happened to Quaddafi? Did he learn to love Big Brother? Or did he have an accidental demide while I was not looking? > Tim and Peter have been discussing the origins of > "Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys" and the general hatred of the Frogs, > but I've got to disagree with Tim's assertion that it's been going on > for a long time. Sure, there's been some low-level dislike, > and Jay Leno's always made fun of their liking for Jerry Lewis, > and Parisians have a reputation for being as rude as New Yorkers, > but it seemed like there was such as rush of anti-French surrender jokes > and anti-French political commentary that it's more than just coincidence; > it seemed like the meme was being pushed hard and fast by somebody. The French took the opportunity presented to not only decline to join the party, but to do so in a way that demonstrated our own hypocrisy in an in-your-face manner. That meme was distraction in action ;-) -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin at mfn.org From cpunk at lne.com Sun May 4 20:00:00 2003 From: cpunk at lne.com (cpunk at lne.com) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 20:00:00 -0700 Subject: Cypherpunks List Info Message-ID: <200305050300.h45300up007252@gw.lne.com> Cypherpunks Mailing List Information Last updated: Sep 12, 2002 This message is also available at http://www.lne.com/cpunk Instructions on unsubscribing from the list can be found below. 0. Introduction The Cypherpunks mailing list is a mailing list for discussing cryptography and its effect on society. It is not a moderated list (but see exceptions below) and the list operators are not responsible for the list content. Cypherpunks is a distributed mailing list. A subscriber can subscribe to one node of the list and thereby participate on the full list. Each node (called a "Cypherpunks Distributed Remailer", although they are not related to anonymous remailers) exchanges messages with the other nodes in addition to sending messages to its subscribers. A message posted to one node will be received by the list subscribers on the other nodes, and vice-versa. 1. Filtering The various CDRs follow different policies on filtering spam and to a lesser extent on modifying messages that go to/from their subscribers. Filtering is done, on nodes that do it, to reduce the huge amount of spam that the cypherpunks list is subjected to. There are three basic flavors of filtering CDRs: "raw", which send all messages to their subscribers. "cooked" CDRs try to eliminate the spam on that's on the regular list by automatically sending only messages that are from cypherpunks list subscribers (on any CDR) or people who are replying to list messages. Finally there are moderated lists, where a human moderator decides which messages from the raw list to pass on to subscribers. 2. Message Modification Message modification policy indicates what modifications, if any, beyond what is needed to operate the CDR are done (most CDRs add a tracking X-loop header on mail posted to their subscribers to prevent mail loops). Message modification usually happens on mail going in or out to each CDR's subscribers. CDRs should not modify mail that they pass from one CDR to the next, but some of them do, and others undo those modifications. 3. Privacy Privacy policy indicates if the list will allow anyone ("open"), or only list members, or no one ("private") , to retrieve the subscribers list. Note that if you post, being on a "private" list doesn't mean much, since your address is now out there. It's really only useful for keeping spammers from harvesting addresses from the list software. Digest mode indicates that the CDR supports digest mode, which is where the posts are batched up into a few large emails. Nodes that support only digest mode are noted. 4. Anonymous posting Cypherpunks encourages anonymous posting. You can use an anonymous remailer: http://www.andrebacard.com/remail.html http://anon.efga.org/Remailers http://www.gilc.org/speech/anonymous/remailer.html or you can send posts to the list via cpunks_anon at einstein.ssz.com and your mail's headers will be stripped before posting. Note that this doesn't provide complete anonymity since the receiving site will still have log file entries showing the source of the mail (or you have to trust that they delete them). You also will be 'sharing' a reputation with the other entities that post through this alias, and some of them are spammers, so some subscribers will have this alias filtered. 5. Unsubscribing Unsubscribing from the cypherpunks list: Since the list is run from a number of different CDRs, you have to figure out which CDR you are subscribed to. If you don't remember and can't figure it out from the mail headers (hint: the top Received: line should tell you), the easiest way to unsubscribe is to send unsubscribe messages to all the CDRs listed below. How to figure out which CDR you are subscribed to: Get your mail client to show all the headers (Microsoft calls this "internet headers"). Look for the Sender or X-loop headers. The Sender will say something like "Sender: owner-cypherpunks at lne.com". The X-loop line will say something like "X-Loop: cypherpunks at lne.com". Both of these inticate that you are subscribed to the lne.com CDR. If you were subscribed to the algebra CDR, they would have algebra.com in them. Once you have figured out which CDR you're subscribed to, look in the table below to find that CDRs unsubscribe instructions. 6. Lunatics, spammers and nut-cases "I'm subscribed to a filtering CDR yet I still see lots of junk postings". At this writing there are a few sociopaths on the cypherpunks list who are abusing the lists openness by dumping reams of propaganda on the list. The distinction between a spammer and a subscriber is nearly always very clear, but the dictinction between a subscriber who is abusing the list by posting reams of propaganda and a subscriber who is making lots of controversial posts is not clear. Therefore, we tolerate the crap. Subscribers with a low crap tolerance should check out mail filters. Procmail is a good one, although it works on Unix and Unix-like systems only. Eudora also has a capacity for filtering mail, as do many other mail readers. An example procmail recipie is below, you will of course want to make your own decisions on which (ab)users to filter. # mailing lists: # filter all cypherpunks mail into its own cypherspool folder, discarding # mail from loons. All CDRs set their From: line to 'owner-cypherpunks'. # /dev/null is unix for the trash can. :0 * ^From.*owner-cypherpunks at .* { :0: * (^From:.*ravage at ssz\.com.*|\ ^From:.*jchoate at dev.tivoli.com.*|\ ^From:.*mattd at useoz.com|\ ^From:.*proffr11 at bigpond.com|\ ^From:.*jei at cc.hut.fi) /dev/null :0: cypherspool } 7. List of current CDRs All commands are sent in the body of mail unless otherwise noted. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Algebra: Operator: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at algebra.com Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at algebra.com Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at algebra.com Posting address: cypherpunks at algebra.com Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: ??? Info: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- CCC: Operator: drt at un.bewaff.net Subscription: "subscribe [password of your choice]" to cypherpunks-request at koeln.ccc.de Unsubscription: "unsubscribe " to cypherpunks-request at koeln.ccc.de Help: "help" to to cypherpunks-request at koeln.ccc.de Web site: http://koeln.ccc.de/mailman/listinfo/cypherpunks Posting address: cypherpunks at koeln.ccc.de Filtering policy: This specific node drops messages bigger than 32k and every message with more than 17 recipients or just a line containing "subscribe" or "unsubscribe" in the subject. Digest mode: this node is digest-only NNTP: news://koeln.ccc.de/cbone.ml.cypherpunks Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Infonex: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at infonex.com Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at infonex.com Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at infonex.com Posting address: cypherpunks at infonex.com Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Lne: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at lne.com Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at lne.com Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at lne.com Posting address: cypherpunks at lne.com Filtering policy: cooked Posts from all CDR subscribers & replies to threads go to lne CDR subscribers. All posts from other CDRs are forwarded to other CDRs unmodified. Message Modification policy: 1. messages are demimed (MIME attachments removed) when posted through lne or received by lne CDR subscribers 2. leading "CDR:" in subject line removed 3. "Reply-to:" removed Privacy policy: private Info: http://www.lne.com/cpunk; "info cypherpunks" to majordomo at lne.com Archive: http://archives.abditum.com/cypherpunks/index.html (thanks to Steve Furlong and Len Sassaman) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Minder: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at minder.net Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at minder.net Help: "help" to majordomo at minder.net Posting address: cypherpunks at minder.net Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: private Info: send mail to cypherpunks-info at minder.net --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Openpgp: [openpgp seems to have dropped off the end of the world-- it doesn't return anything from sending help queries. Ericm, 8/7/01] Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to listproc at openpgp.net Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to listproc at openpgp.net Help: "help" to listproc at openpgp.net Posting address: cypherpunks at openpgp.net Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ssz: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at ssz.com Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at ssz.com Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at ssz.com Posting address: cypherpunks at ssz.com Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: Subject line prepended with "CDR:" Reply-to cypherpunks at ssz.com added. Privacy policy: open Info: http://www.ssz.com/cdr/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sunder: Subscription: "subscribe" to sunder at sunder.net Unsubscription: "unsubscribe" to sunder at sunder.net Help: "help" to sunder at sunder.net Posting address: sunder at sunder.net Filtering policy: moderated Message Modification policy: ??? Privacy policy: ??? Info: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pro-ns: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at pro-ns.net Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at pro-ns.net Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at pro-ns.net Posting address: cypherpunks at pro-ns.net Filtering policy: cooked Posts from all CDR subscribers & replies to threads go to local CDR subscribers. All posts from other CDRs are forwarded to other CDRs unmodified. Message Modification policy: 1. leading "CDR:" in subject line removed 2. "Reply-to:" removed Privacy policy: private Info: http://www.pro-ns.net/cpunk From alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu Sun May 4 20:40:48 2003 From: alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu (Andy Lopata) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 20:40:48 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: <20030504231737.A8601828@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: On Sunday, May 04, 2003 3:18 PM, Adam Back wrote: >Well I guess Microsoft and Intel aren't quite monopolies. At least >with Intel there are viable competitors selling compatible products: >AMD, transmeta, VIA, etc. And AMD processor are some of the time at >the top of the heap performance-wise, and most of the time offer the >best value for money processors (best performance/$). >Anyway my view is that what props up software virtual monopolies is >the current IP laws. If they were revised to remove copyright, and >patents I think it would help level the playing field. Removing patents would undercut your argument for the market working well in the processor markets. Removing patent and copyright protection for software would be great, but politically unrealistic (because of the power of the copyright content cartels among Congress). However if Freenet, or some other technology, makes untraceable anonymous file-sharing effective and wide-spread, it could mean the effective end of copyright for digital materials. On the other hand, if the anti-copy technology produced through agreement between MS, the processor producers and the copyright cartel, becomes a reality, it could severely hamper, marginalize, or effectively destroy any type of anonymous file-sharing technology. I think that IP in general is a bad idea, especially when there are other methods of compensating creator's for their works. Those who argue that the market is the best way to produce innovation and a better world rely on the false gov't stamp of "property" on these non-rivalrous goods. >As to virtual monopolies being worse than government: I disagree >businesses aim to maximise profit margin and this places a limit on >the depths of unethical and bad for the individual behavior they can >do. They won't do it becaues it's not profitable: unhappy customers >are not good business. Maximization of profits does not create moral results. It creates the greatest short-term gain for the enterprise and low prices for the consumer at the expense of any other considerations about how the enterprise's operation affects other people or businesses or the environment. Of course when business interests butt up against each other, there is usually a compromise. But when poor people or the environment gets shit on, it's an up-hill battle to force business to consider these effects as "costs" worth punching in to there business model calculations. Customers are happy with low prices and good service, but who else suffers? Monopoly control and collusion among huge corporations takes the danger a step further since this results in artificial manipulation of market forces for further consolidation and control. These conglomerates make decisions for us. If there is essentially no alternative and consumers have no choice and no effect on markets. Fortunately there is Linux as an alternative to MS and Apple, but if the hardware has built-in copy controls, this may not be enough. >Current governments on the other hand are almost universally bad for >the economy, liberty and freedoms. They have no competition and are >so corrupt that it's difficult for them to act anywhere near as >efficiently or sanely as a company. Any huge organization of people is bound to be corrupt and inept. I am a constant critic of the gov't, but think there is at least some chance of democratic control or influence which is completely missing in the corporate setting. The capitalism oligarchy and our government have never been more closely aligned. Both represent dangers to the economy (of all people), liberty and freedoms. -Andy Lopata "The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal well-meaning but without understanding." - Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Sun May 4 20:57:46 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 22:57:46 -0500 (CDT) Subject: [eff-austin] [Fwd: [aclulegteam] Re: Biometrics ID bill hearing on Thursday] (fwd) Message-ID: ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 20:25:52 -0500 From: Adina Levin To: Leaders , eff-austin at effaustin.org, shenson at austin.rr.com Subject: [eff-austin] [Fwd: [aclulegteam] Re: Biometrics ID bill hearing on Thursday] EFF team -- here's a copy of the ACLU fact sheet, and advice from the ACLU's Scott Henson. Call or visit committee members to oppose this experiment in unproven technology and privacy violation. Committee members' offices and phone numbers are listed below. "Worse, SB 945 would expand DPSs use of this information from drivers license authentification to any purpose requiring identity authentification. Other government agencies could do the same thing if they entered into interagency agreements with DPS." I'll submit this to Slashdot. Any other press attention would be useful. -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [aclulegteam] Re: Biometrics ID bill hearing on Thursday Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 20:08:23 -0500 From: Scott Henson To: CC: References: <3EB57F1E.5070106 at alevin.com> Adina Any and all groups or individuals who are interested in opposing SB 945 requiring DPS to collect biometric information about every Texas driver should express their opposition not only at the hearing Thursday May 8 at 8 a.m., room E1.020, but if possible should also contact members before and after the hearing to express their opposition. Because we 'missed' opposing this bill in the Senate, we need to gin up as much public opposition to this thing as possible, ASAP. Any media work or other outside game stuff folks want to do is appropriate and would be appreciated. So call out the troops on this one to the extent you can. Find attached a fact sheet I'm turning into an ACLU action alert. Here's the committee members in Defense Affairs: Corte, Frank (R) - CHAIR 4N.06, 463-0646 Campbell, Scott (R) - VICE CHAIR E2.820, 463-0331 Berman, Leo (R) - CBO E2.908, 463-0584 Delisi, Dianne White (R) GW.16, 463-0630 Seaman, Gene (R) E2.406, 463-0672 Mabry, John (D) E2.416, 463-0135 Merritt, Tommy (R) E1.302, 463-0750 Moreno, Paul (D) 1W.09, 463-0638 Noriega, Rick (D) E2.718, 463-0732 Thanks, Scott ----- Original Message ----- From: "Adina Levin" To: "Leaders" ; ; Sent: Sunday, May 04, 2003 3:59 PM Subject: Biometrics ID bill hearing on Thursday > SB945 sponsored by Ogden is being heard in the Defense Affairs and > State-Federal Relations > > Committee on Thurday. > The bill enables the use of facial, thumb, fingerprints, and other > biometric identifiers for *a broad range of state purposes to > authenticate identity.* > > Several people on this list have professional experience with the > reliability issues with biometric ID. > > ** The legislators don't understand the technology. If you have relevant > information, please let legislators know. ** > > If you'd like to testify or communicate your expertise to the committee > members, please contact Scott Henson at ACLU-TX, shenson at austin.rr.com, > who will let you know who's most effective to talk to. > > Or fax a letter to committee members. > > ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Rent DVDs from home. Over 14,500 titles. Free Shipping & No Late Fees. Try Netflix for FREE! http://us.click.yahoo.com/BVVfoB/hP.FAA/uetFAA/59cplB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: aclulegteam-unsubscribe at yahoogroups.com Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ [demime 0.97c removed an attachment of type APPLICATION/MSWORD which had a NAME of Oppose SB 945.doc] From adam at cypherspace.org Sun May 4 15:17:37 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 23:17:37 +0100 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: ; from alopata@darkwing.uoregon.edu on Sat, May 03, 2003 at 09:03:00PM -0700 References: <8DFD1896-7CE5-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030504231737.A8601828@exeter.ac.uk> Well I guess Microsoft and Intel aren't quite monopolies. At least with Intel there are viable competitors selling compatible products: AMD, transmeta, VIA, etc. And AMD processor are some of the time at the top of the heap performance-wise, and most of the time offer the best value for money processors (best performance/$). Anyway my view is that what props up software virtual monopolies is the current IP laws. If they were revised to remove copyright, and patents I think it would help level the playing field. As to virtual monopolies being worse than government: I disagree businesses aim to maximise profit margin and this places a limit on the depths of unethical and bad for the individual behavior they can do. They won't do it becaues it's not profitable: unhappy customers are not good business. Current governments on the other hand are almost universally bad for the economy, liberty and freedoms. They have no competition and are so corrupt that it's difficult for them to act anywhere near as efficiently or sanely as a company. Adam On Sat, May 03, 2003 at 09:03:00PM -0700, Andy Lopata wrote: > Simply put, markets lead to consolidation. Consolidation leads to > monopoly. Monopoly leads to control from above, with no > accountability. Is this better than gov't? I certainly see the > dangers of gov't: state terrorism, state ineptitude, state racism > and xenophobia, but I see market control as at least as dangerous > since corporations are not accountable to any sort of democratic > control - and I don't think the people with the most capital > necessarily make the best decisions. From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Sun May 4 21:20:06 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 23:20:06 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Weekly Social, Project Planning, Open Forge - RIP Message-ID: Asymmetric Clustering... Distributed Name Space... Global Sign-on... Guerrilla Networking... Open Source Technology... Do these words make your heart beat faster and your breath go shallow? If so then perhaps you should become involved with Hangar 18. We are a tit-for-tat group of computer hobbyist of a wide range of skills intent on building the next computing infra-structure using Open Source technology. We don't focus on any one form of technology but instead focus on real world applications in grid or large scale distributed computing. Time: May 8, 2003 Every Thursday, excluding national holidays 7:00 - 9:00 pm (or later) http://open-forge.org Location: Buffet Palace, N. Lamar @ I-35 @ Anderson. In the parking lot in front of Hobby Lobby. The location varies from week to week so be sure to check with an active Hangar 18 member (or join the mailing list!) for more information. Identification: We'll be the group with the Plan 9 OS box on the table...;) As some of you who come to the weekly meetings will be aware there has been a cash flow issue regarding the T1 and extending projects through the Open Forge domain. Well it finally came to a head after nearly 18 months of trying to find a way around the issue. Because of cash flow and an increasingly unstable work environment with respect to the other sponsors of the T1 feed it will be phased out over the summer. This does not mean any immediate changes for at least the next 4-6 weeks. It does mean we will lose the T1 and possibly the Phantoms's Mansion site. We will continue to operate the SSZ site and at the appropriate time the resources hosted through Open Forge will be migrated to SSZ. One of the first two things I need to do is up my bandwidth from the current ISDN to a SDSL (~384kb/s both ways v the current 128kb/s total). One nice thing about this transfer is my monthly net feed bill will go down by about $50. So I'm not complaining about that. It also means that I'll take over the operation of the DNS so we will once again have full support for alternate domain names (ie .ssz, .cpunks, etc.). The other aspect will be the tranfer of all the current services (eg mailing lists) over to SSZ. In the interim I'll be working to add new services (eg IRC) on the SSZ site since its clear no such work will happen on Open Forge. We will give at least a couple of weeks notice prior to the change so hopefully it won't take anyone by too big a surprise. Rob and I had been in the proces of upgrading the Open Forge Hangar 18 page. We will continue with that effort but will mirror all material on SSZ so that when Open Forge goes down the transition should be very smooth. This will -not- effect any services or projects other than the basic services on Open Forge. The OAON, 802.11a/b, 802.16, 900MHz repeater, Plan 9 Auth services & namespace, development services (Anyone using Cons currently?), Squeak VRML, etc. will -not- suffer as a result. Further, this will -not- effect the commercial Open Source technology development efforts planned via In Silica other than perhaps allowing us to move forward on some specific projects -earlier- than we had currently planned. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Sun May 4 21:21:35 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 23:21:35 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Austin Cypherpunks - Montly Physical Meeting Message-ID: Time: May 13, 2003 Second Tuesday of each month 7:00 - 9:00 pm (or later) Location: Central Market HEB Cafe 38th and N. Lamar Weather permitting we meet in the un-covered tables. If it's inclimate but not overly cold we meet in the outside covered section. Otherwise look for us inside the building proper. Identification: Look for the group with the "Applied Cryptography" book. It will have a red cover and is about 2 in. thick. Contact Info: http://einstein.ssz.com/cdr/index.html#austincpunks -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From adam at cypherspace.org Sun May 4 15:53:53 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 23:53:53 +0100 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <26D2E932-7D8D-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net>; from timcmay@got.net on Sat, May 03, 2003 at 10:32:02AM -0700 References: <200305022205.24810.sfurlong@acmenet.net> <26D2E932-7D8D-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030504235353.B8601828@exeter.ac.uk> Interesting discussion. I'm thinking another inflection point which could tip the balance would be some travel technology breakthrough -- 100x faster, 100x cheaper (relative to individual wealth -- which itself increasing in real terms over time as productivity improves due to automation, efficiency, process improvement etc). If you could shrink the world so that people can basically commute from anywhere to anywhere for a cost significantly less than the difference in tax rates between tax havens such as Bahamas (0% income tax) compared with western direct and investment tax rates of 40-60% and beyond marginal rates. - This is mostly why I was disappointed to see the plans to scrap concorde -- it was expensive in real terms due to current fuel and current salaries as set by current economic climate; however with a cruise speed of mach 2.0 it was 2.4x as fast as typical passenger jets. (Originally planned for mach 2.5 - mach 3.0, but material science wasn't up to the task when concorde's were built in the 70s). But scrapping them seems like a step backwards. So there were merchant bankers and celebrities jetting backwards and forwards from new york on it. But what wealthy are doing today can be what everyone is doing some years on when things have become cheaper relatively speaking. - The other aspect of travel speed -- the crappy depature and arrival procedures -- have gotten significantly worse since WTC terror attack. The current political climate is as a result a poorer one for business as it has basically increased the cost of travel (in convenience). - So what about other travel: magnetic levitation trains, mag lev trains in vacuum tubes, nuclear powered transport (with design margin to amply cope with safety issues); and further out maybe teleportation. - The other issue is how governments would react to transportation advances -- maybe just change tax laws so you get charged the max of countries you work or reside in. - Another potential and probably more likely to happen medium term technology could be improvements in display technology making telepresence more functional. 3d projective displays able to project into free-space for example allowing basically free-form tele-presence. It would be harder for governments to attempt to tax remote workers, but they might try it anyway by passing the tax burden on to the employers -- forcing them to collect local taxes against remote workers. Crypto-anarchy has interface problems also, it just allows you to be a virtual remote worker because your location is no longer discernable. Still governments may try to force local companies to pass the tax burden on. India is an interesting example of remote workers -- many US companies are apparently moving jobs wholesale to India to try to reduce costs in the face of poor economy. Another corporate trend to avoid US taxation is where companies move their notional headquarters off-shore so that they are not taxed on international sales. Either way the fact that companies are doing this suggests that currently companies themselves are ahead of individuals in mobility to avoid taxation. This same principle should allow for example remote workers, or virtual remote workers to work for the notional off-short company. Virtual identities with documentation demonstrating domicile in Bahamas or other tax-havens should even allow a virtual worker to work for a company under government imposed obligations to employ virtual remote workers in the US. Adam On Sat, May 03, 2003 at 10:32:02AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > [...] > These technological changes are obvious: metal-working, writing, > weaponry, plumbing, the printing press, the steam engine, > interchangeable parts, electrification, and all of the various > technologies of the 20th century, including the telephone, television, > birth control pills, and so on. > > The printing press is one of my favorite examples, as it illustrates > how the "triad" of technology, law, and culture (similar to Larry > Lessig's triad...I think we developed these ideas independently, but I > haven't chased down who wrote what first) is "tipped" by major changes. > The Church and State, circa pre-Gutenberg, "owned" certain types of > knowledge, blessed by the medieval guilds: silversmithing, > leathermaking, etc. The royal patents were conferred based on > kickbacks, tithing, family connections, etc. Those who violated the > patents of the guilds faced various kinds of punishment, I suppose up > to and including death. Sort of like the Mafia stopping independent > producers of porn from producing movies (a friend in LA had this happen > to him). > > Now the "lawyers" of that age might have argued in courts (such as they > were) that the power of the guilds should be broken, that greater > economic prosperity would result from breaking the guilds. > > But little changed. > > Then came printing (movable type). While the first books printed were > the obvious ones: hymnals, bibles, and other religious tracts, the > printers began to print "how to" books. Not consciously "Toolmaking for > Dummies" books, and not consciously "How to Undermine the Power of the > State by Building Your Own Waterwheel," these books were nonetheless > early how-to guides. Booklets on technology, on minerals, on all sorts > of things a farmer might want to know. For the first time, knowing how > to read was a useful skill. > > Perhaps someone predicted the long-term implications of what this > spread of knowledge would mean. (Maybe Nostradamus was influenced this > way...I haven't looked for evidence.) > > Someone trying to set a timetable for the sweeping changes would likely > have not gotten it right. > > As someone wise once said, we tend to overestimate the short-term > consequences and underestimate the long-term consequences. > > In the case of printing, the result over the following century or two > was a rise in literacy rates (in the common languages, and this is when > German, French, and English, for example, largely solidified into their > current forms, viz. the Luther Bible, the King James Version, etc.). > And the Protestant Reformation was built on printed words and on the > people's ability to directly read the religious texts. > > A technology undermined the state and the church. > > This was repeated several more times, with samizdats undermining the > power of the state in the USSR, with cassette tapes circulating in > Shah-led Iran, with videotapes widely available even where banned in > Islamic nations. > > And e-mail, of course. E-mails to and from the dissidents in Beijing. > Repeated around the world. > > Strong crypto, of course, offers the opportunity for a complete > bypassing of controls (more than just ciphers are needed, of course, as > stego must be strong, as remailers must be compensated, and so on). > > Will the effects be that corner grocery stores are converted into > cryptoanarchist data havens? Of course not. > > People will continue to buy and sell goods in their physical world, and > this will continue to be a nexus of control and taxation. (Just as > taxing land became more important after taxing knowledge, via the no > longer all-powerful guilds, became less important. Land remained a > nexus of control and taxation, as it does today. My property taxes > attest to that, and will not be going down in my lifetime!) > > So, what changes may happen? Will enough tax evasion happen via > cryptoanarchy to make the people fed up and thus give rise to a > "tipping point"? (As the Reformation arguably was, with enough people > fed up with the selling of indulgences and having the ability to read > the religious words themselves.) > > And so on. I could ask about a dozen speculations of what might happen. > > But the point is not to predict some withering away of the state. The > point is that unfettered communication, with the already-extant ability > to use all sorts of alternative financial instruments (offshore > accounts, PayPal, E-gold, etc.), is already producing interesting > changes in the way the world works. From bill.stewart at pobox.com Mon May 5 00:22:11 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 00:22:11 -0700 Subject: whitehouse.gov taken over? Cheese-eating surrender monkeys... In-Reply-To: References: <5.1.1.6.2.20030503233543.02d5b338@idiom.com> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030505000835.02d38d80@idiom.com> At 07:56 PM 05/04/2003 -0500, J.A. Terranson wrote: >On Sat, 3 May 2003, Bill Stewart wrote: > > > >Not at all: this is to be expected after the three minute hate... > > > > Oh, right, who's today's target? Are we still practicing hating Saddam, > > or is it Bashar al-Assad this week, or the French? > >I kind of wonder whatever happened to Quaddafi? Did he learn to love Big >Brother? Or did he have an accidental demide while I was not looking? He's been relatively quiet for a few years; I'm not sure if we're saving him for later (unlikely; North Korea's really lots more fun, and strategically important because otherwise there'd be lots of good reasons for getting the US military out of South Korea and the rest of that corner of the Pacific, but now we can't do that because there's a convenient nu-cu-lur madman around.) As it was, I was spell-checking Hafez al-Assad when Google reminded me that he'd died a couple years ago from cancer, and his kid Bashar had taken over. Bashar's smarter brother Bassel had been supposed to succeed him, but had a suspicious "car accident" in the mid 90s. Syria still has a Baath Socialist Party, as Iraq did, but it's not clear whether there's really a strong enough relationship to worry about, and while America Has Always Been At War With Hafez al-Assad, and Krauthammer thinks we should be at war with Bashar, there's a lot of opinion that maybe he'll fail to be a credible enough target for the warmongers to really pull off an invasion of convenience. From nobody at cryptofortress.com Mon May 5 03:15:02 2003 From: nobody at cryptofortress.com (Anonymous) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 05:15:02 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking Message-ID: <03edc333578b426568d98e13a82e44fc@remailer.cryptofortress.com> Eric Cordian writes: > Let's see. The mint picks a prime, p, a generator, g, and a random number > k, and publishes (p, g, g^k mod p). > > The mint then signs stuff by raising it to the k power mod p, and not > telling anyone what k is. > > We blind coins by picking a random b, and sending the coin times g^b to > the mint, and after the mint raises it to the k power and sends it back, > we can reverse engineer coin^k. A few years ago I discovered that this allows the bank to "mark" the cash. The bank can use a different exponent k' instead of the exponent k it is supposed to be using, on certain withdrawals. On every deposit, it checks the incoming coin using both k and k', and is able to quietly identify the marked withdrawals. In more detail: during withdrawal, the user submits y * g^b. The bank, to mark the cash, raises it to the k' power rather than the k power. The creates y^k' * g^bk'. The user unsuspectingly unblinds by calculating g^kb and dividing it, leaving y^k' * g^(b(k'-k)). This is what is later submitted to the bank, along with y. The bank, at this point, knows y, k, k', g, and the product above. It does not know b. It can calculate y^k' and divide to get g^(b(k'-k)). It can raise to the inverse power of (k'-k) to get g^b. Now it can multiply by y to get y * g^b. This is the same value which was submitted to be signed in the first place. By keeping a record of the values which were signed using the special k' exponent, the bank can look back and see which one this one is, thereby linking the deposit to the withdrawal, which is exactly what blinding is supposed to prevent. In order to avoid this, the bank can prove that it operated correctly (that is, it raised its input to the same k power that g is raised to in the public g^k value) using a zero-knowledge proof. I believe the latest version of the Lucre software does this. However, it's possible that the Lucre ZK proof is only honest-verifier zero knowledge. An honest-verifier ZK proof is one which is ZK only if the verifier follows the protocol; for example, when it is supposed to choose a random value, it in effect flips a coin. The point of a ZK proof is that a transcript is unconvincing to third parties, because the verifier would have been able to create a fake transcript. He could do so by, in effect, working backwards from chosen results to figure out what his coin flips would have had to be. However, if the verifier chooses his bits using a fixed sequence like a strong PRNG, then when he reveals the transcript, he can also show that his "random" bits were determined by his PRNG seed. This proves that he did not in fact have the flexibility to choose his bits by working backwards, and therefore the proof is convincing to a third party. In this case, the transcript of the "ZK proof" would in fact prove that the bank knew the k of g^k. The transcript is therefore a signature, and in conjunction with the coin, it is arguably a blind signature. Blind signatures are patented until July, 2005. Given that the whole point of this application of Wagner blinding was to avoid the Chaum blind signature patent; that that patent expires in two years; that the current licensee has shown no effort to enforce the patent; that Wagner blinding also risks falling under another patent, on Chaum's undeniable signature; and that the bank's operation even with Wagner blinding looks an awful lot like a blind signature; then why not just use Chaum's blinding? It would be enormously simpler, and safer too. It's far more widely analyzed and there are a number of improvements in the literature. From adam at cypherspace.org Sun May 4 22:11:07 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 06:11:07 +0100 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: ; from alopata@darkwing.uoregon.edu on Sun, May 04, 2003 at 08:40:48PM -0700 References: <20030504231737.A8601828@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <20030505061107.A8690581@exeter.ac.uk> On Sun, May 04, 2003 at 08:40:48PM -0700, Andy Lopata wrote: > >Anyway my view is that what props up software virtual monopolies is > >the current IP laws. If they were revised to remove copyright, and > >patents I think it would help level the playing field. > > Removing patents would undercut your argument for the market working > well in the processor markets. I think if anything the processor market would be made more competitive yet by removal of patents as competitors with the fabrication technology could just outright copy other companies processors, after reverse-engineering them. (If it was cheaper to reverse-engineer than design one). > Removing patent and copyright protection for software would be > great, but politically unrealistic (because of the power of the > copyright content cartels among Congress). But that's a symptom of a corrupt government and laws against the public interest. Companies in many areas have more political power than individuals. For example the DMCA. This to me doesn't argue for more government, but for less government and system reform. > However if Freenet, or some other technology, makes untraceable > anonymous file-sharing effective and wide-spread, it could mean the > effective end of copyright for digital materials. I agree: I think anonymous file sharing should be the next generation in p2p evolution. > On the other hand, if the anti-copy technology produced through > agreement between MS, the processor producers and the copyright > cartel, becomes a reality, it could severely hamper, marginalize, or > effectively destroy any type of anonymous file-sharing technology. I don't think Palladium and other DRM hardware such as recently proposed by Paul Kocher et al can realistically make any difference to file sharing. It seems unrealistic to think that hardware in the hands of it's attackers (p2p file rippers) can withstand long term attack. And anyway the content will always be amenable to re-encoding from the analog output, or digital signal. Kocher's scheme is essentially hardware-tamper resistant watermarking -- it encodes the hardware identifier in the analog output to trace who ripped content. However it is vunlerable to collusion over some parameter of colluders (5 with the example system parameters). Even then it can't be too hard to obtain hardware anonymously removing the tracing risk even if you don't bother colluding to avoid the tracing risk; the remaining risk is that the player may be unable to decode new content if the player keys are revoked after it is detected as a source of ripped content. > I think that IP in general is a bad idea, especially when there are > other methods of compensating creator's for their works. I agree. > Those who argue that the market is the best way to produce > innovation and a better world rely on the false gov't stamp of > "property" on these non-rivalrous goods. But I think IP is something created, subsidized and only made possible by governments. > >As to virtual monopolies being worse than government: I disagree > >businesses aim to maximise profit margin and this places a limit > >[...]. They won't do it becaues it's not profitable: unhappy customers > >are not good business. > > Maximization of profits does not create moral results. It creates the > greatest short-term gain for the enterprise and low prices for the consumer > at the expense of any other considerations about how the enterprise's > operation affects other people or businesses or the environment. Correct. But at least they're trying to be profitable, which most of the time means keeping their customers happy. Governments on the other hand have no such objective, and most governments burn off 25%+ of GDP -- that's a lot of money to do evil with. > Any huge organization of people is bound to be corrupt and inept. I > am a constant critic of the gov't, but think there is at least some > chance of democratic control or influence which is completely > missing in the corporate setting. While I agree political reform is badly needed in many aspects of government and law, it's difficult to see how one can get there from here using only the political process. Your only chance is individual mobility -- individuals voting with their feet to create competition in government. I guess it's a similar situation in some respects -- government is a virtual monopoly, in the sense that you don't have to accept your current government, you can move. However people have ties to their country, they have friends and relatives who live there; plus the alternatives have disadvantages too. While IP laws do vary, it's a pity there are no major governments that compete on IP -- by providing a copyright and patent free environment. So while governments and corporations, and corporations buying government favor are frequently against the interests of the individual lobbying for reform doesn't seem likely to improve things much. Adam From mv at cdc.gov Mon May 5 07:43:39 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 07:43:39 -0700 Subject: mil-style intrusion sensors in city parks Message-ID: <3EB6789A.7E52786A@cdc.gov> 'Smart Park' Is Keeping Watch Surveillance cameras, infrared sensors and other high-tech gadgets help monitor facilities. To civic planners in Glendale, Palmer Park has everything a recreation area needs  kiddie swings, walking trails and infrared sensors concealed in the shrubbery. If someone scales the fence after the park closes at 10 p.m., more than a dozen electronic sentries whirl into action. One foot on the manicured lawn triggers the sprinklers, while the sensors set off alarms at the park rangers' headquarters. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-parks5may05,1,2646721.story?coll=la%2Dheadlines%2Dcalifornia Of course, tripping the sensors without going inside the park would be entertaining... From alan at clueserver.org Mon May 5 07:58:37 2003 From: alan at clueserver.org (alan) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 07:58:37 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Loyalty Day In-Reply-To: <20030504143554.GA58271@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: On Sun, 4 May 2003, Adam Shostack wrote: > I think it was Vinge who said that reality is getting ahead of an > author's ability to invent it. "There is a fine line between insanity and parody and he has erased that line." - Quote refering to Scott Lively, a member of the Oregon Citizen's Alliance, who claimed that gays were responsible for the Holocaust. Part of perpetrating an effective hoax is presenting absurd ideas in a manner that people want to believe. The problem is that every once in a while the people you are attacking with the hoax will make a statement so far off the edge of reality that nothing you can come up with could match it. "Loyalty Day" fits that category quite well. From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Mon May 5 05:12:15 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 08:12:15 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <3EB3A80A.11219.23A8502D@localhost> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030503091736.044ef0d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030505073913.044e2030@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 11:29 AM 5/3/03 -0700, James A. Donald wrote: >On 3 May 2003 at 9:49, John Kelsey wrote: > > Maybe the direction of technology will ultimately lead to the > > collapse of the nation state and the rise of David Friedman > > style anarchocapitalist protection agencies to replace it > > (good luck solving the military defense problem!) > >Against the Soviet Union in its prime, or against the Nazi >commie alliance, an anarcho capitalist america would have been >in deep trouble, if it had the same level of technology as the >actually existent america had back then. This is the core question: What happens when the anarchocapitalist society and the aggressive authoritarian one have similar technology levels? It's easy to see how just about any social organization will work for defending yourself from enemies at a much lower technology level. But when the forces are within spitting distance of having the same technology, social organization becomes very important. If one side is organized as several hundred independent, overlapping protection agencies, some with mutual defense treaties, others without them, while the other is organized as a centralized army, it looks to me like the centralized forces have huge advantages. ... >Current enemies are not much, because americans have a >technological lead. Americans have a technological lead >because america is the close to the most capitalist country in >the world, and it is the most capitalist large country. An >anarcho capitalist America would in time have an even greater >technological lead. This is the interesting question: Would the anarchocapitalist society have and keep an advantage? I don't think you can answer it except by experiment, but it's at least as feasible to me that the right kind of authoritarian state might be pretty damned good at keeping up with an anarchocapitalist one for technology, and would be better at some technology. (Think of what you can learn about engineered diseases when you have a big population of "volunteers" from your political prisons to experiment on, a la Draka.) And the biggest problem is that an open society won't keep things secret all that well. That's good for progress--you can't predict who is going to make the next breakthrough--but it's not so good for security. But it's hard to see why a technically adept authoritarian society couldn't keep up by simply reading the open literature and planting a few spies. Especially if it could also occasionally manage a takeover, or an ideological conversion. As an example of this, think of NSA and related agencies, vis-a-vis the public crypto community. I'm sure they never had any idea of some of the stuff that's been done in academic cryptography before it was published. But they still have an advantage, because they don't publish and we do. Nor is "technologically adept authoritarian society" an obvious contradiction, no matter how nice it would be if it were. Germany wasn't exactly a hotbed of classical liberal thought before the two world wars, and certainly wasn't a free society once the Nazis took over, and yet it was unambiguously able to do high tech well. The USSR was basically a third-world country, complete with starving peasants, and yet was able to keep up with the West in military technology for many years. > --digsig > James A. Donald --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 From ulrich at nemunet.de Sun May 4 23:15:54 2003 From: ulrich at nemunet.de (Torsten Ulrich) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 08:15:54 +0200 Subject: unsubcribe Message-ID: <000001c312cd$ca1c6500$0a00a8c0@hq.nemunet.local> unsubcribe From declan at well.com Mon May 5 05:23:24 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 08:23:24 -0400 Subject: Today in DC... Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030505082101.01fbbf18@mail.well.com> BIOTECHNOLOGY National Academies Meeting of the Committee to Review Proposals from former Soviet Biological Weapons Scientists in the FSU, May 5-6. Highlights: 9 a.m. - Open session: briefings by Defense Department, State Department and Civilian Research and Development Foundation representatives Location: National Academies, 500 5th St., NW, Washington, D.C.. Contact: Sara Gray, 202-334-2923; e-mail, sgray at nas.edu POLITICS Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations News conference to release previously closed transcripts of executive sessions held by the subcommittee during the McCarthy era. Participants: Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, chairman, Governmental Affairs Committee; Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., and Donald Ritchie, associate Senate historian Location: 325 Russell Senate Office Building. 9:30 a.m. Contact: Bonnie Heald, 202-224-6134 or Kathleen Long, 202-228-3685 **REVISED** From mv at cdc.gov Mon May 5 10:23:17 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 10:23:17 -0700 Subject: delusional US quarantines, Denver bioattack, sim Message-ID: <3EB69E05.57485DE0@cdc.gov> The unfolding situation precipitated a series of increasingly stringent containment measures. By the end of the first day, the Expert Committee issued a travel advisory restricting travel in 16 Denver Metro counties. But, one person noted, "the public was not [heeding] the voluntary travel advisory." Some people, in fact, were reported to be racing out of the state. As part of the travel advisory, persons were advised to stay home unless they were close contacts of diagnosed cases or were feeling sick, in which case they were directed to seek medical care. As one observer noted: "They told 1 million people to stay in their homes. How would we have enforced this?" When asked what would be possible if the situation actually required it, the police and National Guard responded to the Expert Committee that they would be unable to keep people at home. Another participant commented that by the end of the exercise, "people had been asked to stay in their homes for 72 hours...How were they were supposed to get food or medicine?" "With borders closed, how were we planning to feed 4 million people?...Many of the control measures ordered were delusional." http://www.hopkins-biodefense.org/pages/news/quarter2_2.html From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Mon May 5 07:24:48 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 10:24:48 -0400 Subject: whitehouse.gov taken over? Cheese-eating surrender monkeys.. . Message-ID: > Bill Stewart[SMTP:bill.stewart at pobox.com] > > > At 09:28 PM 05/03/2003 -0500, J.A. Terranson wrote: > >On Sat, 3 May 2003, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > > > At 07:15 PM 5/3/03 -0400, Adam Shostack wrote: > > > >Please register to participate. > > > >http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html > > > Please tell me someone played a DNS game. > >Not at all: this is to be expected after the three minute hate... > > Oh, right, who's today's target? Are we still practicing hating Saddam, > or is it Bashar al-Assad this week, or the French? > > Tim and Peter have been discussing the origins of > "Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys" and the general hatred of the Frogs, > but I've got to disagree with Tim's assertion that it's been going on > for a long time. Sure, there's been some low-level dislike, > and Jay Leno's always made fun of their liking for Jerry Lewis, > and Parisians have a reputation for being as rude as New Yorkers, > but it seemed like there was such as rush of anti-French surrender jokes > and anti-French political commentary that it's more than just coincidence; > it seemed like the meme was being pushed hard and fast by somebody. > > Perhaps the meme was just sitting around from DeGaulle's time, > waiting to be triggered by France's lack of participation in US > Unilateralism > and unwillingness to join the COW coalition this time. > But it didn't seem that way. > American distaste for the French was not very strong till recently; but goes back a long way. The "Cheese-eating surrender monkeys" line goes back to 1995, as I showed - even then it was uncontroversial. As long as I can remember, there has been a love-hate relationship. This is based on the notion, held by many French and some Americans, that France has a superior, more sophisticated culture than the US. Some Americans just accept this, others see vast pretentiousness. Examples: "An American in Paris" (1951) - uncritical acceptance. "Funny Face" (1957) - Young Audrey Hepburn accepts until Flostre's real intentions towards her become all too obvious. Mark Twain had a LOT to say about the French - check http://www.twainquotes.com/French.html For an interesting essay on the evolution of European attitudes towards the US, try: THE UNLOVED AMERICAN by SIMON SCHAMA Two centuries of alienating Europe. > http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?030310fa_fact > Peter Trei From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Mon May 5 07:28:14 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 10:28:14 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: >In the case of printing, the result over the following century or two was a >rise in literacy rates (in the common languages, and this is when German, >French, and English, for example, largely solidified into their current >forms, viz. the Luther Bible, the King James Version, etc.). And the >Protestant Reformation was built on printed words and on the people's >ability to directly read the religious texts. > >A technology undermined the state and the church. This is why I still bother reading Tim May's posts. Every now and then he comes up with a good one. In response to this I'd point out that it would have been easy (and wrong) to say that, "The Printing Press, The telescope, town clocks and Protestantism will reduce the power of the church to the point where it will collapse." (Actually, many educated catholics probably thought this at the time.) And although the Catholic church did lose power on many fronts, it by no means dissappeared. (You could almost say it propered, but probably by virtue of the fact that it might be the single largest real estate dealer in the world.) _________________________________________________________________ Tired of spam? Get advanced junk mail protection with MSN 8. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Mon May 5 07:28:17 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 10:28:17 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: >In the case of printing, the result over the following century or two was a >rise in literacy rates (in the common languages, and this is when German, >French, and English, for example, largely solidified into their current >forms, viz. the Luther Bible, the King James Version, etc.). And the >Protestant Reformation was built on printed words and on the people's >ability to directly read the religious texts. > >A technology undermined the state and the church. This is why I still bother reading Tim May's posts. Every now and then he comes up with a good one. In response to this I'd point out that it would have been easy (and wrong) to say that, "The Printing Press, The telescope, town clocks and Protestantism will reduce the power of the church to the point where it will collapse." (Actually, many educated catholics probably thought this at the time.) And although the Catholic church did lose power on many fronts, it by no means dissappeared. (You could almost say it propered, but probably by virtue of the fact that it might be the single largest real estate dealer in the world.) _________________________________________________________________ Tired of spam? Get advanced junk mail protection with MSN 8. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Mon May 5 07:36:27 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 10:36:27 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: >In the case of printing, the result over the following century or two was a >rise in literacy rates (in the common languages, and this is when German, >French, and English, for example, largely solidified into their current >forms, viz. the Luther Bible, the King James Version, etc.). And the >Protestant Reformation was built on printed words and on the people's >ability to directly read the religious texts. > >A technology undermined the state and the church. This is why I still bother reading Tim May's posts. Every now and then he comes up with a good one. Hell, I'd recommend he stick with technology and stop worrying about blacks and other "social problems". In response to the main post I'd point out that it would have been easy (and wrong) to say that, "The Printing Press, The telescope, town clocks and Protestantism will reduce the power of the church to the point where it will collapse." (Actually, many educated catholics probably thought this at the time.) And although the Catholic church did lose power on many fronts, it by no means dissappeared. (You could almost say it prospered, but probably by virtue of the fact that it might be the single largest real estate dealer in the world.) The church morphed, changed, fought itself and the rest of the world and found a nice cozy niche for itself. ANd part of this is due to mere social inertia... but also, the church probably still serves a function that people need (or at least want), and so they continue to feed it $$$ and whatnot. But the Catholic church has become one possible option, and arguably they've learned to "compete" for donations and members. Likewise with governments. I still need my trash taken out, and for potholes to be fixed. And although these services can be provided privately (maybe) if strong crypto gives people opportunities, government might be forced to learn how to do some things more efficiently so that people can "opt-in" if they choose to. Hell, this has already happened to some extent with the US mail service. So while I don't believe heavy crypto will kill off governments, I DO believe it will eventually force them to change into something we probably can't imagine too well right now. -TD _________________________________________________________________ Tired of spam? Get advanced junk mail protection with MSN 8. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From nobody at dizum.com Mon May 5 02:10:01 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 11:10:01 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list n Message-ID: <90c889644baec2a3d6a9fe62f60de701@dizum.com> Andy Lopata writes: > I subscribe to this list for a number of reasons. One of them is because of > the potential crypto has for destabilizing capitalist/monopolist and state > control over information and expression (e.g. Freenet). Excellent point. Few participants here understand that private attempts to suppress freedom of speech are just as surely defeated by crypto as government efforts. Remember when Tim May a few days ago suggested that newspaper editors who printed false stories should be tortured and killed? > But the journalist and his editors are still alive. > When they have been necklaced and lit, we can rest easier. ("Necklacing" refers to the practice, common in South Africa during the turbulent years fighting apartheid, of putting an automobile tire around an opponent's neck, cutting his tongue and throat so that it hung down like a neck tie, and lighting the tire on fire. Tim May endorses this form of torture.) Cryptography can free publishers from intimidation by the likes of May just as much as it protects them from coercion by the government. Tim May and other hate-filled thugs will not be able to use threats of violence to prevent unpopular voices from being heard. The mere fact that no one complains about language like this from May, in a forum which supposedly fights for freedom of speech, is prima facie evidence of the chilling effect of his violent language. Only those of us protected by the shield of anonymity have the freedom to criticize this vile and hateful man. From patrick at lfcgate.com Mon May 5 11:02:47 2003 From: patrick at lfcgate.com (Patrick) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 12:02:47 -0600 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <200305032343.h43NhsC9029190@artifact.psychedelic.net> Message-ID: <006f01c31330$895346c0$0200a8c0@scylla> > Perhaps you'd care to publish your p, g, and g^k here on the list, so we > can begin hacking them while you finish your pre-launch checkout. :) > -- > Eric Michael Cordian 0+ Lucrative mints support an arbitrary number of simultaneous series, so the g, p, and g^k components will vary, but here's a set to work on. p is straight from Ben Laurie's Lucre paper (8.1). (8.2) gives us a good g as well: 4. g=4 p=ffffffffffffffffc90fdaa22168c234c4c6628b80dc1cd129024e088a67cc74020bbe a63b139b22514a08798e3404ddef9519b3cd3a431b302b0a6df25f14374fe1356d6d51c2 45e485b576625e7ec6f44c42e9a637ed6b0bff5cb6f406b7edee386bfb5a899fa5ae9f24 117c4b1fe649286651ece45b3dc2007cb8a163bf0598da48361c55d39a69163fa8fd24cf 5f83655d23dca3ad961c62f356208552bb9ed529077096966d670c354e4abc9804f1746c 08ca237327ffffffffffffffff public=1fd29bb747e2db8f3389d7be7abc1a6abb6d7f698f7eb85b49fb83d41be883cd5 de6d6afb802913c5df7621688b91ee647971742fbf8f5ec82873ea72dedfe755e95fe6eb 30d4143645ac43d8660a5d54d837aabaa56be93598a452b6bf951a1be342c4b3dd53a0a5 64bdabb6802f408472a9bdfefea909bc224af381d52bb3b4e21401888b2b053b82d422d1 ac0a6f2ae35d33da9b1b69951eeef73d09da617ad01cb18017374423de47ee3de33730ac be0a86f55c2764f9a01e377175b785d Knock yourself out! If you can identify a weakness, I would be very grateful. Patrick http://lucrative.thirdhost.com/ From sunder at sunder.net Mon May 5 12:18:25 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 15:18:25 -0400 (edt) Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles In-Reply-To: Message-ID: I actually don't impose my ideals. I do however urge others to accept and adopt them. Point in case, you have assumed that I smoke. I actually don't, and never have (past the odd one or two cigarettes that I've tried back when I was young, and found I didn't like.) That in and of itself should give you an inkling of why I believe my ideals are correct. Incase it's not, consider this: I'm not imposing, I'm asking. I don't have a law book to thump, nor a gun to point at you, nor a cop waiting to arrest you if you disagree with what I say. Nor am I asking for such laws to prevent or limit others in similar ways. On the other hand, some trolls around here, wish to do just that, in order to impose their ideals on all of us (in various cities.) ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Fri, 2 May 2003, Vincent Penquerc'h wrote: > I kind of agree, to a point, but then you (and others) do the same > with imposing your own ideals to others, don't you ? As long as people > interact, they'll have to impose stuff to others. I'm imposing my > ideals (in this case, forbidding to smoke to people who want to) ? > You do yours (annoying people who don't like smoke, because you want > to smoke). I don't usually annoy smokers when they do. If I'm annoyed > by it, I just move. Unless I can't, that is. But you just act as if > *your* ideals were *obviously* the right ones. I reject that idea. > They might, and they sure are popular here. But you do impose them > all the same. From patrick at lfcgate.com Mon May 5 15:46:25 2003 From: patrick at lfcgate.com (Patrick) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 16:46:25 -0600 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking Message-ID: <001501c31358$2933b450$0200a8c0@scylla> (I didn't see this come back through the list, so I'm sending it again.) > > Perhaps you'd care to publish your p, g, and g^k here on the list, so we > can begin hacking them while you finish your pre-launch checkout. :) > -- > Eric Michael Cordian 0+ Lucrative mints support an arbitrary number of simultaneous series, so the crypto components will vary, but here's a set to work on. p is straight from Ben Laurie's Lucre paper (8.1). (8.2) gives us a good g as well: 4. g=4 p=ffffffffffffffffc90fdaa22168c234c4c6628b80dc1cd129024e088a67cc74020bbe a63b139b22514a08798e3404ddef9519b3cd3a431b302b0a6df25f14374fe1356d6d51c2 45e485b576625e7ec6f44c42e9a637ed6b0bff5cb6f406b7edee386bfb5a899fa5ae9f24 117c4b1fe649286651ece45b3dc2007cb8a163bf0598da48361c55d39a69163fa8fd24cf 5f83655d23dca3ad961c62f356208552bb9ed529077096966d670c354e4abc9804f1746c 08ca237327ffffffffffffffff public=1fd29bb747e2db8f3389d7be7abc1a6abb6d7f698f7eb85b49fb83d41be883cd5 de6d6afb802913c5df7621688b91ee647971742fbf8f5ec82873ea72dedfe755e95fe6eb 30d4143645ac43d8660a5d54d837aabaa56be93598a452b6bf951a1be342c4b3dd53a0a5 64bdabb6802f408472a9bdfefea909bc224af381d52bb3b4e21401888b2b053b82d422d1 ac0a6f2ae35d33da9b1b69951eeef73d09da617ad01cb18017374423de47ee3de33730ac be0a86f55c2764f9a01e377175b785d Knock yourself out! If you can identify a weakness, I would be very grateful. Patrick http://lucrative.thirdhost.com/ From eresrch at eskimo.com Mon May 5 18:50:53 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 18:50:53 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list n In-Reply-To: <90c889644baec2a3d6a9fe62f60de701@dizum.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 5 May 2003, Nomen Nescio wrote: > Remember when Tim May a few days ago suggested that newspaper editors who > printed false stories should be tortured and killed? How do you know he's serious? He could just be trolling you. > The mere fact that no one complains about language like this from May, > in a forum which supposedly fights for freedom of speech, is prima facie > evidence of the chilling effect of his violent language. Only those of > us protected by the shield of anonymity have the freedom to criticize > this vile and hateful man. Naw, we just use more subtle techniques. Like calling Tim a "soccer mom". Anybody who takes Tim seriously is messed up. Like the feds :-) He's just your run of the mill nut case who's pretending to be a white supremiscist because it gets people riled up. Then again, maybe he really is a texan living in CA. What difference does it make really? If he's scaring you, then you need to visit the wizard and get some courage. It's better to laugh at him. That's what I do :-) And I don't have to worry about him reading any of this, because he "plonked" me a long time ago! So chill out dude, and enjoy the conversation as just ephemeral bits. Now and then even a blind chicken gets a kernel of corn, so it doesn't hurt to skim things. Besides, there's more than enough skill here to nuke Tim off the face of the earth if we *really* have to. It's just more fun to take a hit and laugh tho. Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From measl at mfn.org Mon May 5 19:11:27 2003 From: measl at mfn.org (J.A. Terranson) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 21:11:27 -0500 (CDT) Subject: [AntiSocial] [IP] The Boot Heel of the Patriot Act (fwd) Message-ID: Forward of a forward, so kill me... ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 18:33:51 +0000 (/etc/localtime) From: Benson Schliesser To: antisocial at mfn.org Subject: [AntiSocial] [IP] The Boot Heel of the Patriot Act (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sat, 03 May 2003 06:57:29 -0400 From: Dave Farber Subject: [IP] The Boot Heel of the Patriot Act Sponsored by ------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-halperin2may02,1,4171430.story?col l=la%2Dheadlines%2Doped%2Dmanual Feeling the Boot Heel of the Patriot Act By Jason Halperin May 2, 2003 Several weeks ago, my roommate Asher and I went to an Indian restaurant just off Times Square in the heart of midtown Manhattan. We helped ourselves to the buffet and sat down to begin eating. Suddenly there was a terrible commotion and five police officers in bulletproof vests stormed down the stairs. They had their guns drawn and were pointing them indiscriminately at the restaurant staff and at us. "Go to the back of the restaurant," they yelled. I hesitated, lost in my own panic. "Did you not hear me? Go to the back and sit down," they demanded. I complied and looked around at the other patrons. There were eight men including the waiter, all of South Asian descent and ranging from late teens to senior citizen. One of the officers pointed his gun in the waiter's face and shouted: "Is there anyone else in the restaurant?" The waiter, terrified, gestured to the kitchen. The police placed their fingers on the triggers of their guns and kicked open the kitchen doors. Shouts emanated from the kitchen and a few seconds later five Latino men crawled out on their hands and knees, guns pointed at them. After patting us all down, the five officers seated us at two tables. As they continued to kick open doors to closets and restrooms with their fingers glued to their triggers, officials in business suits emerged from the stairwell. Two walked over to our table and identified themselves as agents of the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the Homeland Security Department. Having some limited knowledge of the rights afforded to U.S. citizens, I asked why we were being held. The INS agent said we would be released once they confirmed that there were no outstanding warrants against us and our immigration status was OK. In pre-9/11 America, the legality of this would have been questionable. After all, the 4th Amendment states: "The right of the people to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures. " "You have no right to hold us," said Asher. But they explained that they did: This was a homeland security investigation under the authority of the Patriot Act. The Patriot Act was passed into law on Oct. 26, 2001, in order to facilitate the post-9/11 crackdown on terrorism. Among the unprecedented rights it grants to the federal government are the right to wiretap or detain without a warrant. As I quickly discovered, the right to an attorney has been fudged as well. When I asked to speak to a lawyer, the INS official told me I did have the right to a lawyer but I would have to be taken to the station for security clearance before being granted one. When I asked how long that would take, he replied with a coy smile: "Maybe a day, maybe a week, maybe a month." We insisted that we had every right to leave and were going to do so. One of the police officers, with his hand on his gun, taunted: "Go ahead and leave, just go ahead." We remained seated. Our IDs were taken. I was questioned why my license was from out of state and asked whether I had "something to hide." The police continued to hassle the kitchen workers, demanding licenses and dates of birth. One of the kitchen workers was shaking and kept providing the day's date March 20, 2003 over and over. As I continued to press for legal counsel, a female officer put her finger in my face. "We are at war, we are at war and this is for your safety," she exclaimed. As she walked away from the table, she continued to repeat it to herself. "We are at war, we are at war; how can they not understand this?" I most certainly understand that we are at war, and that we need some measure of security in times like these. But I also understand that the freedoms in the Constitution were meant specifically for times like these. After an hour and a half, the INS agent returned our licenses. An officer escorted us out. Before we left, the INS agent apologized. Among the customers, there were four taxi drivers, two students, one newspaper salesman. Several said they were U.S. citizens. I doubt they received apologies. Nor have the hundreds of immigrants being held without charge. Apparently, this type of treatment is acceptable. Three days after the incident, I phoned the restaurant. The owner was nervous, embarrassed and did not want to talk about it. But I managed to ascertain that the whole thing had been one giant mistake. A mistake. Loaded guns pointed in faces, people made to crawl, police officers kicking in doors, taunting, keeping their fingers on the trigger even after the situation was under control. A mistake. And, according to the ACLU, a perfectly legal one, thanks to the Patriot Act. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Jason Halperin lives in New York City. Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/ --------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo at mfn.org with "unsubscribe antisocial" as the entire message. From declan at well.com Mon May 5 18:19:19 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 21:19:19 -0400 Subject: Congresscritters get SARS briefing Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030505211908.011880a8@mail.well.com> In preparation for the hearing beginning at 2:00 p.m. on May 7, 2003, the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations will hold a Member Briefing on SARS at 1:30 p.m. in 2123 Rayburn House Office Building. Dr. David L. Heymann, Executive Director, Communicable Diseases, World Health Organization (WHO), will brief Members via videoconference hookup from Geneva, Switzerland. This even event will be open to the public and webcast live. For the latest information, please visit http://energycommerce.house.gov/108/markups/05072003Markup919.htm From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Mon May 5 19:36:28 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 21:36:28 -0500 Subject: Loyalty Day In-Reply-To: References: <20030503231510.GA50084@lightship.internal.homeport.org> Message-ID: <20030506023628.GA20030@cybershamanix.com> Yes, this is one of the most amazing things, most people refuse to believe it. Wish I'd known about before May 1st, what great fun it would have been to celebrate a "Dis-loyalty Day". On Sun, May 04, 2003 at 07:30:40AM -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > Holy shit, I thought it was joke. I can't wait to spread this one around > Madison! > > Patience, persistence, truth, > Dr. mike > > On Sat, 3 May 2003, Adam Shostack wrote: > > > Please register to participate. > > > > http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030430-26.html > > > > > > > > > > -- > > "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." > > -Hume -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Mon May 5 19:37:19 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 21:37:19 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Mon, 5 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > > >In the case of printing, the result over the following century or two was a > >rise in literacy rates (in the common languages, and this is when German, > >French, and English, for example, largely solidified into their current > >forms, viz. the Luther Bible, the King James Version, etc.). And the > >Protestant Reformation was built on printed words and on the people's > >ability to directly read the religious texts. > > > >A technology undermined the state and the church. > > > This is why I still bother reading Tim May's posts. Every now and then he > comes up with a good one. Hell, I'd recommend he stick with technology and > stop worrying about blacks and other "social problems". Except he's wrong. No government fell and the printing press did nothing but increase the power of the church, his own example demonstrates it. > In response to the main post I'd point out that it would have been easy (and > wrong) to say that, "The Printing Press, The telescope, town clocks and > Protestantism will reduce the power of the church to the point where it will > collapse." NONE of those devices did that. They changed the approaches used but did not in any significant way do this. What -did- was the growth of concepts like equality and self-determination. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From barabbus at hushmail.com Mon May 5 21:41:05 2003 From: barabbus at hushmail.com (barabbus at hushmail.com) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 21:41:05 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: <200305060441.h464f6sB005548@mailserver2.hushmail.com> At 11:53 PM 5/4/2003 +0100, Adam Back wrote: >- Another potential and probably more likely to happen medium term technology could be improvements in display technology making telepresence more functional. 3d projective displays able to project into free-space for example allowing basically free-form tele-presence. >It would be harder for governments to attempt to tax remote workers, >but they might try it anyway by passing the tax burden on to the employers -- forcing them to collect local taxes against remote workers. I think you will find that an increasing number of professional workers and some companies are moving underground. This has not been uncommon in some trades in which compensation was traditionally cash-based, but the addition of professionals is, I think, something of note. This article discusses the trend of decreasing voluntary tax compliance within the U.S. "Tax Inquiries Fall as Cheating Increases," David Cay Johnston, New York Times, April 14, 2003 http://www.globalpolicy.org/nations/launder/regions/2003/0414inquiries.htm >Another corporate trend to avoid US taxation is where companies move their notional headquarters off-shore so that they are not taxed on international sales. >Either way the fact that companies are doing this suggests that currently companies themselves are ahead of individuals in mobility to avoid taxation. In fact, many taxes individuals face are indeed mobility taxes. Barabbus Concerned about your privacy? Follow this link to get FREE encrypted email: https://www.hushmail.com/?l=2 Free, ultra-private instant messaging with Hush Messenger https://www.hushmail.com/services.php?subloc=messenger&l=434 Big $$$ to be made with the HushMail Affiliate Program: https://www.hushmail.com/about.php?subloc=affiliate&l=427 From schear at attbi.com Mon May 5 21:51:09 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 21:51:09 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: References: <20030504231737.A8601828@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030505214947.04347d70@mail.attbi.com> At 08:40 PM 5/4/2003 -0700, Andy Lopata wrote: >On Sunday, May 04, 2003 3:18 PM, Adam Back wrote: > >Anyway my view is that what props up software virtual monopolies is > >the current IP laws. If they were revised to remove copyright, and > >patents I think it would help level the playing field. > >Removing patents would undercut your argument for the market working well in >the processor markets. Removing patent and copyright protection for >software would be great, but politically unrealistic (because of the power >of the copyright content cartels among Congress). However if Freenet, or >some other technology, makes untraceable anonymous file-sharing effective >and wide-spread, it could mean the effective end of copyright for digital >materials. On the other hand, if the anti-copy technology produced through >agreement between MS, the processor producers and the copyright cartel, >becomes a reality, it could severely hamper, marginalize, or effectively >destroy any type of anonymous file-sharing technology. I think that IP in >general is a bad idea, especially when there are other methods of >compensating creator's for their works. Those who argue that the market is >the best way to produce innovation and a better world rely on the false >gov't stamp of "property" on these non-rivalrous goods. I gave a presentation at a conference a few years back in which I raised the idea that since Intellectual Property (e.g., trademarks) aren't (property), its really a lease, that our society should consider setting limits on the market penetration (say 50%, which is already in excess of the what many economists call the "friction free" point wherein companies can continue to gain market share merely by dint of their already considerable presence) of single companies in markets whose size (the therefore probably importance) exceeds some minimum threshold of the GDP. However, instead of enforcing these limits via the Department of Justice, they would become a civil matter and one's competitors can use the courts to strip a company of its sole lease on a trademark or patent applied to this market. steve From barabbus at hushmail.com Mon May 5 22:34:31 2003 From: barabbus at hushmail.com (barabbus at hushmail.com) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 22:34:31 -0700 Subject: Some CA elected officials need killing Message-ID: <200305060534.h465YV4F074021@mailserver3.hushmail.com> [Can anyone post meatspace identity data (home address, bus, home and cell numbers, SSN, auto licens numbres, recent photos, including family)for the accused? arch criminals 1. John Longville (62) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [1] midlevel criminals 2. Paul Koretz (42) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [2] lesser criminals 3. Rudy Bermudez (56) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] 4. Jackie Goldberg (45) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] 5. Mark Leno (13) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] Concerned about your privacy? Follow this link to get FREE encrypted email: https://www.hushmail.com/?l=2 Free, ultra-private instant messaging with Hush Messenger https://www.hushmail.com/services.php?subloc=messenger&l=434 Big $$$ to be made with the HushMail Affiliate Program: https://www.hushmail.com/about.php?subloc=affiliate&l=427 From frantz at pwpconsult.com Mon May 5 22:42:07 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 22:42:07 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: <20030504231737.A8601828@exeter.ac.uk> References: ; from alopata@darkwing.uoregon.edu on Sat, May 03, 2003 at 09:03:00PM -0700 <8DFD1896-7CE5-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: At 3:17 PM -0700 5/4/03, Adam Back wrote: >As to virtual monopolies being worse than government: I disagree >businesses aim to maximise profit margin and this places a limit on >the depths of unethical and bad for the individual behavior they can >do. They won't do it becaues it's not profitable: unhappy customers >are not good business. Remind me how this relates to the relations between the RIAA, the people who write/perform music, and the people who listen. Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From frantz at pwpconsult.com Mon May 5 22:48:40 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 22:48:40 -0700 Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: <3EAEAA1F.7A160334@cdc.gov> Message-ID: At 9:36 AM -0700 4/29/03, Major Variola (ret) wrote: >Actually, non-standard CDs sold with the CD logo are fraudulent, since >they violate >a published standard which the logo implies. I'm surprised this avenue >hasn't been >taken legally. I believe that the Philips, who holds the trademark for compact disks, has said that copy protected disks do not follow the standard and may not use the trademark. Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From roy at rant-central.com Mon May 5 21:16:05 2003 From: roy at rant-central.com (Roy M.Silvernail) Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 23:16:05 -0500 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list n In-Reply-To: <90c889644baec2a3d6a9fe62f60de701@dizum.com> References: <90c889644baec2a3d6a9fe62f60de701@dizum.com> Message-ID: <20030506041606.84D41111A1@rant-central.com> On Monday 05 May 2003 04:10 am, Nomen Nescio wrote: > The mere fact that no one complains about language like this from May, > in a forum which supposedly fights for freedom of speech, is prima facie > evidence of the chilling effect of his violent language. So your suggestion is to chill Tim's speech. Yep, that's balanced. TCP already suffers the lack of a sarcasm flag. It appears we also lack a hyperbole flag. From schear at attbi.com Mon May 5 23:18:46 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 23:18:46 -0700 Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: References: <3EAEAA1F.7A160334@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030505231754.03b1a8a8@mail.attbi.com> At 10:48 PM 5/5/2003 -0700, you wrote: >At 9:36 AM -0700 4/29/03, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > >Actually, non-standard CDs sold with the CD logo are fraudulent, since > >they violate > >a published standard which the logo implies. I'm surprised this avenue > >hasn't been > >taken legally. > >I believe that the Philips, who holds the trademark for compact disks, has >said that copy protected disks do not follow the standard and may not use >the trademark. If so, couldn't the labels selling be charged with deceptive advertising? steve From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Mon May 5 23:53:47 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 01:53:47 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: <3EB51C47.22056.13F5BA@localhost> Message-ID: On Sun, 4 May 2003, James A. Donald wrote: > On 3 May 2003 at 21:03, Andy Lopata wrote: > > Simply put, markets lead to consolidation. > > So said Marx. He also said that markets would make the workers > poorer and poorer. Because they consolidate, or monopolize. > Despite the fact that the trend has been in the other direction > for the past two hundred years, No it hasn't. Don't confuse a general increase in the level of income with the consolidation of the -majority- of wealth into a smaller and smaller percentage of the population as the same thing, they're not. Markets which are not 'free' in the strictest sense; eg no IP laws or other protectionist practices to protect the status quo from change - in other words "because you have it now doesn't mean you'll have it later. However, there is a problem with strictly free markets in that there is no mechanism to resolve conflicts or breaches of contract other than 'reputation' which makes and requires assumptions of open access and easy capture of information -across the entire market for all players-. Something that really can't happen in the real world. There are time and distance issues which simply can't be resolved in the real world. > prophecies with the more confidence, the more obviously the > facts contradict them. While they do contradict Marx the facts don't indicate a rosey picture for the majority as anything other than a wage-slave. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Tue May 6 00:04:06 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 02:04:06 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Making Money in Digital Money In-Reply-To: <67a09eaa889698d2942dd1e35f0ddd87@remailer.privacy.at> Message-ID: On Thu, 1 May 2003, Anonymous wrote: > Robert Hettinga writes: > > > So, how do you do this? Easy. For software, the first copy is > > auctioned for cash. Then the second copy, wherever it is on the > > network, is auctioned for cash, and so on, until nobody's buying any > > more copies, across the whole network. This is the oldest model of > > trade there ever was. It's how red ochre from Maine ended up in > > Neolithic tombs in Ireland. It's how Homo Habilis traded raw rocks > > for finished hand axes across hundreds of miles of African savanna. > > The Agorics guys called it the "digital silk road" for obvious > > reasons. > > I hate to get into this, because I tried to educate you on this last > year and you were totally impervious. As usual you started firing > invective in all directions in an attempt at misdirection. > > Let me explain it so simply you can't miss it. This system does not > work, because by the time the content is in the hands of just a few > people, they will be bidding against each other to sell it on the net. > Such a state of competition will quickly drive the prices down to the > cost of reproduction, which is effectively zero. Therefore you can't > sell more than a dozen-odd copies of the software at a non-zero price. > > If most of the people buying this software are doing so with the > expectation of recouping their costs by re-selling, then no one will > buy after the first few, since they will not be able to make any money > selling at zero. But this means that even those first few buyers won't > be able to sell at non-zero, since these second-wave potential buyers > were their customers. > > Try to follow the logic here, Bob. The inability to make a profit after > there are a dozen sellers *implies*, logically, that even the very first > seller can't make a profit, because his potential buyers will see that > they have no profit opportunities. > > Therefore the only motivation anyone would have here is to buy the > software for what it is worth to them, and not to redistribute it. So we > are talking about a private-contracting, custom-built software model. > But it's not a software sales model. Exactly! It is what the whole point of Open Source software is supposed to be about. Give the technology away and sell the brains on how to use it to solve somebody elses problem who doesn't have the drive/self-confidence/ whatever to do it themselves. One of the great missed opportunity of most Open Source development is to re-sell -specific versions- in a closed source model to individual buyers to fulfill -local- goals. More Open Source licenses should have a clause that states that if you want to use this software in a closed license model please contact the author for special pricing". It continues to amaze me the way many believe that because the software is 'free' the access and utilization of those who know how to apply it should also be free. Ignorance of market dynamics; pure, plain, and simple. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Tue May 6 00:12:24 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 02:12:24 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Mon, 5 May 2003, Bill Frantz wrote: > At 3:17 PM -0700 5/4/03, Adam Back wrote: > >As to virtual monopolies being worse than government: I disagree > >businesses aim to maximise profit margin and this places a limit on > >the depths of unethical and bad for the individual behavior they can > >do. They won't do it becaues it's not profitable: unhappy customers > >are not good business. > > Remind me how this relates to the relations between the RIAA, the people > who write/perform music, and the people who listen. Adam really should stick to crypto, his understanding of psychology is rather whimsical at best. If people can act through governments to probe the depths of human deprevity there is no reason to believe that adding profit to the equation will alter those depths to the less extreme at all. His faith in the power of the all mighty buck to make people act ethically or in a civil fashio is seriously misplaced. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Tue May 6 00:15:53 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 02:15:53 -0500 (CDT) Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Mon, 5 May 2003, Bill Frantz wrote: > At 9:36 AM -0700 4/29/03, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > >Actually, non-standard CDs sold with the CD logo are fraudulent, since > >they violate > >a published standard which the logo implies. I'm surprised this avenue > >hasn't been > >taken legally. > > I believe that the Philips, who holds the trademark for compact disks, has > said that copy protected disks do not follow the standard and may not use > the trademark. Which actually misrepresents the facts. The fact is that Philips position is one of power and authority, of course they will do this simply to protect their monopoloy (not the consumers rights, which aren't the same thing). If you don't think Philips is looking at how to license their TM to others wanting to add copy protection of various ilks then you are seriously misunderstanding the dynamics of a 'Capitalist' market. It's a matter of time & $$$, not ethical protection of consumer rights or the obligation of inventors/creators to supply the public domain. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Tue May 6 00:19:40 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 02:19:40 -0500 (CDT) Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030505231754.03b1a8a8@mail.attbi.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 5 May 2003, Steve Schear wrote: > At 10:48 PM 5/5/2003 -0700, you wrote: > >At 9:36 AM -0700 4/29/03, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > > >Actually, non-standard CDs sold with the CD logo are fraudulent, since > > >they violate > > >a published standard which the logo implies. I'm surprised this avenue > > >hasn't been > > >taken legally. > > > >I believe that the Philips, who holds the trademark for compact disks, has > >said that copy protected disks do not follow the standard and may not use > >the trademark. > > If so, couldn't the labels selling be charged with deceptive advertising? Probably, -if- it were in Philips best interest. It isn't. What -is- in Philips best interest is to change their standard so that they can license exceptions to this. This means they are in a position to monopolize the market of DRM in regards CD technology. An additional strategy Philips may be trying is to close down CD technology and force the market into some newer standard that would allow Philips a longer-lived income stream. What sorts of patents and IP does Philips have in DVD technology for example? -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Tue May 6 00:29:22 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 02:29:22 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list n In-Reply-To: <20030506041606.84D41111A1@rant-central.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 5 May 2003, Roy M.Silvernail wrote: > On Monday 05 May 2003 04:10 am, Nomen Nescio wrote: > > > The mere fact that no one complains about language like this from May, > > in a forum which supposedly fights for freedom of speech, is prima facie > > evidence of the chilling effect of his violent language. > > So your suggestion is to chill Tim's speech. > > Yep, that's balanced. > > TCP already suffers the lack of a sarcasm flag. It appears we also lack a > hyperbole flag. Actually Nomen misprepresents. Lots of people complain about Tim. that doesn't justify them in actually doing anything about stopping him from spewing. As much as I find is dribble dribble I'd be one of the first to stand up to stop anyone from limiting his access to the list or his expression of ideas irrespective of his word choice. This is one of the reasons that SSZ remains one of the few completely unmoderated nodes left on the CDR (Hi Igor you fascist fucking pig). Fuck that noise. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From sfurlong at acmenet.net Tue May 6 04:34:50 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 07:34:50 -0400 Subject: Hippies Banning Smoke In-Reply-To: <3278A898-7E4A-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <3278A898-7E4A-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305060734.50598.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Sunday 04 May 2003 12:05, Tim May wrote: (To summarize: the youth culture of 1966-1980 was statist rather than libertarian.) > "Eat the rich!" came out of that era. One of my catch-phrases is "eat the poor". This is a combination of letting the poor pay back the productive part of society for the welfare they'd sponged, and a response to the "eating animals is cruel" crowd. Similarly, I proposed to stop benefits to the elderly after they'd taken out all the Social Security they'd put in (plus interest). That was met with howls of protest, so I proposed a no-bag-limit open season on geezers. "Eat the old!" (Believe it or not, I'm viewed as unelectable... But that's ok, I don't want elected office, I just want to shake up the comfortable one-party no-debate shoo-ins that have been the norm in every city in which I've ever lived.) I'm a bit younger than the youth Tim mentioned above, and while my proposals above were not entirely serious, I think the yells of the students a few decades ago were serious. I surely have no patience with the statist mind-set of the boomers. -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From mv at cdc.gov Tue May 6 09:00:26 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 09:00:26 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: <3EB7DC19.32462DF5@cdc.gov> At 10:28 AM 5/5/03 -0400, Tyler Durden wrote: >This is why I still bother reading Tim May's posts. Every now and then he >comes up with a good one. Where the frequency of "every now and then" depends on the reader.. (Actually, many educated catholics probably thought this at the >time.) And although the Catholic church did lose power on many fronts, it by >no means dissappeared. (You could almost say it propered, but probably by >virtue of the fact that it might be the single largest real estate dealer in >the world.) It was also the largest entrenched dealer in software-opiates in an empire entering the steep part of the tech sigmoid. Still a flourishing market, BTW, though there's more competition, from protestants, scientologists, and mohommed is reporting a high compound annual growth rate.. From kvanhorn at ksvanhorn.com Tue May 6 07:01:21 2003 From: kvanhorn at ksvanhorn.com (Kevin S. Van Horn) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 09:01:21 -0500 Subject: Defending decentralized societies from military aggression References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030503091736.044ef0d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> <5.2.0.9.0.20030505073913.044e2030@pop.ix.netcom.com> Message-ID: <3EB7C031.9090401@ksvanhorn.com> John Kelsey wrote: > This is the core question: What happens when the anarchocapitalist > society and the aggressive authoritarian one have similar technology > levels? [...] If one side is organized as several hundred > independent, overlapping protection agencies, some with mutual defense > treaties, others without them, while the other is organized as a > centralized army, it looks to me like the centralized forces have huge > advantages. Let's take a look at some historical examples. 1. Switzerland during WWII. While other more centralized nations were easy pickings for the Nazis, the tiny Swiss nation managed to retain its freedom and independence as a small island of freedom in a sea of fascism. Several factors entered into this, including the Swiss willingness to fight to the bitter end and their long policy of strict neutrality; but one oft-overlooked advantage the Swiss had was their loose confederation and lack of strong central control. Your average Swiss citizen doesn't even know who the Swiss president is; it's just not that important of a position. Whereas other countries gave in to the Nazis without firing a shot when the governmental leaders capitulated and ordered a surrender, in the case of Switzerland there really wasn't anybody with the authority to surrender the country... and the fiercely independent Swiss would have disobeyed any orders to surrender, anyway. (For example, at one point there was some concern among the junior officers in the Swiss military that their higher-ups might be considering capitulation. They formed an organization among themselves with the intention of offing their senior officers and taking over command should any form of surrender be attempted.) As a result, although Hitler made it clear that he loathed Switzerland, and repeatedly had plans drawn up for its invasion, there were always easier targets and other pressing matters to be taken care of first. In the meantime, the Swiss observed the German's military tactics and modified their own defense strategy accordingly. The Swiss maintained their freedom not because they had the military might to defeat Germany; they didn't. They stayed free because they ensured that the price for conquering them would be unacceptably high, and the gains unacceptably low. 2. Ireland and England circa 1100 A.D. Ireland was a lawful anarchy; England was more centralized. When the Normans invaded, it took them not much more than a month to conquer England. All they had to do was obtain the surrender of the appropriate authorities. As is often the case, the existing governmental apparatus was then used to administer the occupation. The conquest of Ireland took 300 years, and some say it was never really completed. Ireland didn't have any central authority that could surrender. The main form of societal organization was the tuath. The territory of a tuath was the sum of the lands of its members; people could and did change their affiliation from one tuath to another without moving their place of residence. The tuath "king" was a religious and military leader; he was not a ruler, and had no special powers to make law nor immunity from lawsuit. This system was an invader's nightmare. The invaders had to fight for every square inch of Ireland. Even when a tuath was apparently defeated, the tuath king could only surrender for himself, but not for the tuath members; they were free to join a different tuath. So effectively, the invaders had to obtain their surrenders one household at a time. 3. Somalia. The world's sole remaining superpower, whose military spending and might exceeds that of the next several contenders combined, was sent packing by the people of a destitute country lacking any significant industrial base and still recovering from a nasty civil war. The Somalis didn't have to defeat the invader to win; they just had to make remaining in Somalia too politically costly for the invader Clinton. From kvanhorn at ksvanhorn.com Tue May 6 07:05:30 2003 From: kvanhorn at ksvanhorn.com (Kevin S. Van Horn) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 09:05:30 -0500 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy References: Message-ID: <3EB7C12A.2090701@ksvanhorn.com> Tyler Durden wrote: > Likewise with governments. I still need my trash taken out, and for > potholes to be fixed. What makes you think government is needed at all for these? My trash is taken out by a private company, not by any government. And privately built and maintained roads have existed for a very long time. From mv at cdc.gov Tue May 6 09:12:04 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 09:12:04 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism Message-ID: <3EB7DED4.D31CCDC3@cdc.gov> At 09:51 PM 5/5/03 -0700, Steve Schear wrote: > >I gave a presentation at a conference a few years back in which I raised >the idea that since Intellectual Property (e.g., trademarks) aren't >(property), its really a lease, that our society should consider setting >limits on the market penetration (say 50%, which is already in excess of >the what many economists call the "friction free" point wherein companies >can continue to gain market share merely by dint of their already >considerable presence) of single companies in markets whose size (the >therefore probably importance) exceeds some minimum threshold of the >GDP. However, instead of enforcing these limits via the Department of >Justice, they would become a civil matter and one's competitors can use the >courts to strip a company of its sole lease on a trademark or patent >applied to this market. A few questions. First, could this be done under the US constitution, or is it fiddling too much with the intent of the prescription that the USG support these? Second, who would judge market penetration? Could PC vendors sue Apple for overpenetration in the graphics market? Also, I don't think you want to do this with trademarks ---they're merely for IDing a manufacturer for reputation purposes. They precede and transcend the US; cf bin Laden heroin. With patents, I suspect the best you could do would be to fiddle with the expiration policies ---something for which there is ample precedent. Of course, other nations are free fnord to alter their laws. And this of course assumes that one of Kim's nukular missiles takes out Hollywood before Hollywood takes over the USG. ----- "Naturally the common people don't want war...But, after all, it is the leaders of a country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship, or parliament or a communist dictatorship. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country." --Hermann Goering, (1893-1946) Nazi Reichsmarschall, at the Nuremberg Trials, 4/18/46. From _Nuremberg Diary_ by Gustave Gilbert. From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Tue May 6 07:28:19 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 10:28:19 -0400 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism: "Obvious" it ain't. Message-ID: James Donald wrote... "Despite the fact that the trend has been in the other direction for the past two hundred years, despite the fact that what Marx wrote was obviously false then, and has become more obviously false in the 150 years since he wrote, Marxists repeat Marx's prophecies with the more confidence, the more obviously the facts contradict them." A lot of people living in the US make this kind of mistake. Actually, developed nations make up a minority of the world's population (though with China and India this may change wihtin our lifetimes). When one considers the abverage living standard for the entire world its been debated that it may actually be going down. I'd argue that in some ways the real standard of living in the US has certainly gone down since the 1950s. Although technology has made things more affordable, the numbers of hours per week has increased steadily since the 1970s, and the number of homes where both parents must work has increased greatly. So "obvious" it ain't. (However, if China and India's standard of living continue to increase, within our lifetimes I think its quite clear that the world's standard of living will certainly be higher, on average, than its ever been.) -TD >From: "James A. Donald" >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Capitalism and monopolism >Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 13:57:27 -0700 > > -- >On 3 May 2003 at 21:03, Andy Lopata wrote: > > Simply put, markets lead to consolidation. > >So said Marx. He also said that markets would make the workers >poorer and poorer. > >Despite the fact that the trend has been in the other direction >for the past two hundred years, despite the fact that what Marx >wrote was obviously false then, and has become more obviously >false in the 150 years since he wrote, Marxists repeat Marx's >prophecies with the more confidence, the more obviously the >facts contradict them. > > --digsig > James A. Donald > 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG > Ic1xAeCT1HkM0xATi9N8p+jTR40FPoz4Ej6T5Oep > 4hL/SG1g6h/sdIbk/IJWPDxc3E/XmQj/f3wE3EYS1 _________________________________________________________________ Help STOP SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Tue May 6 07:28:45 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 10:28:45 -0400 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism: "Obvious" it ain't. Message-ID: James Donald wrote... "Despite the fact that the trend has been in the other direction for the past two hundred years, despite the fact that what Marx wrote was obviously false then, and has become more obviously false in the 150 years since he wrote, Marxists repeat Marx's prophecies with the more confidence, the more obviously the facts contradict them." A lot of people living in the US make this kind of mistake. Actually, developed nations make up a minority of the world's population (though with China and India this may change wihtin our lifetimes). When one considers the abverage living standard for the entire world its been debated that it may actually be going down. I'd argue that in some ways the real standard of living in the US has certainly gone down since the 1950s. Although technology has made things more affordable, the numbers of hours per week has increased steadily since the 1970s, and the number of homes where both parents must work has increased greatly. So "obvious" it ain't. (However, if China and India's standard of living continue to increase, within our lifetimes I think its quite clear that the world's standard of living will certainly be higher, on average, than its ever been.) -TD >From: "James A. Donald" >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Capitalism and monopolism >Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 13:57:27 -0700 > > -- >On 3 May 2003 at 21:03, Andy Lopata wrote: > > Simply put, markets lead to consolidation. > >So said Marx. He also said that markets would make the workers >poorer and poorer. > >Despite the fact that the trend has been in the other direction >for the past two hundred years, despite the fact that what Marx >wrote was obviously false then, and has become more obviously >false in the 150 years since he wrote, Marxists repeat Marx's >prophecies with the more confidence, the more obviously the >facts contradict them. > > --digsig > James A. Donald > 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG > Ic1xAeCT1HkM0xATi9N8p+jTR40FPoz4Ej6T5Oep > 4hL/SG1g6h/sdIbk/IJWPDxc3E/XmQj/f3wE3EYS1 _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: smart spam protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Tue May 6 07:42:40 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 10:42:40 -0400 Subject: Hippies Banning Crysotile Message-ID: "Yes, unnoticeable exposures to blue asbestos does cause harm in a witchcraft like manner -- but while very few people have been exposed to blue asbestos, almost all jury awards are based on witchcraft like harm, where the person is harmed by some imperceptible magical agent that is impossible to notice." I think you're overstating things here. The Manville settlements (which forced Manville into Ch13, as I remember) were jury awarded and to date comprise the lion's share of settlement $$$. And in those cases the harm was no exactly witchcraft-like: only a a few (literally 3 or 4) of the miners were left alive to collect. The rest had died of asbestosis. As for abating the NYC public schools, that was a giant boondoggle that benefited many corrupt parties in NYC (I could go into great detail, but that would make it too easy to locate me in meatspace). A funy story...this guy I went to HS with got fired from the NYC School Construction authority for going to his bosses and demanding a piece of the action! (This guy was and is a famous eccentric.) So to some extent I agree, but the "witchcraft" doesn't have a basis in reality. Call it a "tag-along" boondoggle if you want. -TD >From: "James A. Donald" >To: cypherpunks at minder.net >Subject: Re: Hippies Banning Crysotile >Date: Sun, 04 May 2003 13:57:27 -0700 > > -- >James A. Donald: > > >In reality, if someone is exposed to enough asbestos to be a > > >problem, he is painfully aware of it. Only a minuscule > > >minority among those now receiving stupendous awards were > > >exposed to that level of asbestos. > >On 3 May 2003 at 21:49, Tyler Durden wrote: > > Not really. This party line is equally hot air. Basically, > > there are two main modes of asbestos related disease: > > asbestosis and melothemeoma > > But almost none of the money currently being awarded is going >to people with absestosis or mesothelioma. It is almost all >going to people with "asbestos-related pleural and pulmonary >disease" -- a fictitious medical category that includes any >deviation from perfect health in any part of any person's >breathing system. > > > The form of asbestos most closely associated with this is > > crocidilyte, which is needle-like and a beautiful dark blue > > in color. That form of asbestos can cause cancer even in very > > low exposures. > >Yes, unnoticeable exposures to blue asbestos does cause harm in >a witchcraft like manner -- but while very few people have been >exposed to blue asbestos, almost all jury awards are based on >witchcraft like harm, where the person is harmed by some >imperceptible magical agent that is impossible to notice. > > --digsig > James A. Donald > 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG > qqEdCNdKpP0eW/wImgFKX4aggGjKBoltAHX90h3y > 4A9O47A6pAry1m2qjcdaggEVqtn5UKXBbfoHzRZGj _________________________________________________________________ Tired of spam? Get advanced junk mail protection with MSN 8. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From ben at algroup.co.uk Tue May 6 02:43:42 2003 From: ben at algroup.co.uk (Ben Laurie) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 10:43:42 +0100 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <03edc333578b426568d98e13a82e44fc@remailer.cryptofortress.c om> References: <03edc333578b426568d98e13a82e44fc@remailer.cryptofortress.co m> Message-ID: <3EB783CE.9030703@algroup.co.uk> Anonymous wrote: > In order to avoid this, the bank can prove that it operated correctly > (that is, it raised its input to the same k power that g is raised to > in the public g^k value) using a zero-knowledge proof. I believe the > latest version of the Lucre software does this. Actually, Lucre uses the double-blinding method to avoid this. The paper discusses the ZK proof as an alternate way of doing it, but I chose not to use it because of its potential interpretation as a blind signature. There is an implementation of the ZK proof included in Lucre just for fun, though. Cheers, Ben. -- http://www.apache-ssl.org/ben.html http://www.thebunker.net/ "There is no limit to what a man can do or how far he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." - Robert Woodruff From frantz at pwpconsult.com Tue May 6 10:49:44 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 10:49:44 -0700 Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030505231754.03b1a8a8@mail.attbi.com> References: <3EAEAA1F.7A160334@cdc.gov> Message-ID: At 11:18 PM -0700 5/5/03, Steve Schear wrote: >At 10:48 PM 5/5/2003 -0700, you wrote: >>At 9:36 AM -0700 4/29/03, Major Variola (ret) wrote: >> >Actually, non-standard CDs sold with the CD logo are fraudulent, since >> >they violate >> >a published standard which the logo implies. I'm surprised this avenue >> >hasn't been >> >taken legally. >> >>I believe that the Philips, who holds the trademark for compact disks, has >>said that copy protected disks do not follow the standard and may not use >>the trademark. > >If so, couldn't the labels selling be charged with deceptive advertising? I believe they are being sued for trademark violation. Note that if they do not put the "Compact Disk Digital Audio" trademark on their disks, they aren't violating the trademark. "Compact Disk Digital Audio", your sign that this disk preserves your fair use rights. Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Tue May 6 07:55:23 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 10:55:23 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list n Message-ID: "Only those of us protected by the shield of anonymity have the freedom to criticize this vile and hateful man." Nah. Remember, May's got a big mouth, but I doubt he's ever killed anybody. Hell, I bet he's never even gotten into a real fight (which is probably why he mouths off so much about violence). Speech is speech. I'll worry about May when he actually tries to bring the "hoped for" nuke into downtown DC. Until then, he's a "sleeper cell". -TD >From: Nomen Nescio >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this >list n >Date: Mon, 5 May 2003 11:10:01 +0200 (CEST) > >Andy Lopata writes: > > > I subscribe to this list for a number of reasons. One of them is >because of > > the potential crypto has for destabilizing capitalist/monopolist and >state > > control over information and expression (e.g. Freenet). > >Excellent point. Few participants here understand that private attempts >to suppress freedom of speech are just as surely defeated by crypto as >government efforts. > >Remember when Tim May a few days ago suggested that newspaper editors who >printed false stories should be tortured and killed? > > > But the journalist and his editors are still alive. > > When they have been necklaced and lit, we can rest easier. > >("Necklacing" refers to the practice, common in South Africa during the >turbulent years fighting apartheid, of putting an automobile tire around >an opponent's neck, cutting his tongue and throat so that it hung down >like a neck tie, and lighting the tire on fire. Tim May endorses this >form of torture.) > >Cryptography can free publishers from intimidation by the likes of >May just as much as it protects them from coercion by the government. >Tim May and other hate-filled thugs will not be able to use threats of >violence to prevent unpopular voices from being heard. > >The mere fact that no one complains about language like this from May, >in a forum which supposedly fights for freedom of speech, is prima facie >evidence of the chilling effect of his violent language. Only those of >us protected by the shield of anonymity have the freedom to criticize >this vile and hateful man. _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Tue May 6 08:05:44 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 11:05:44 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: Kevin S. vanHorn wrote... >>Likewise with governments. I still need my trash taken out, and for >>potholes to be fixed. > > >What makes you think government is needed at all for these? My trash is >taken out by a private company, not by any government. And privately built >and maintained roads have existed for a very long time. Of course. But you've got to read further into my post to see the point. I'm thinking that in the future, some aspects of government might be competitive with the private sector to obtain public $$$, much like the US mail now competes with UPS and FedEx. Like in Stephenson's Snow Crash, many functions might be opt-in, including possibly war.... For instance, imagine where budget items are voted on directly, and regularly by voters. Would IraqII have occurred? (I bet not.) (My Jazz musician brother has suggested that "you should be able to vote any elected official directly into jail, no questions asked".) But my point is that heavy crypto will probably have unforseeable effects on the notion of the state, probably not wipe it out. -TD _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From bill.stewart at pobox.com Tue May 6 11:09:29 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 11:09:29 -0700 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <2AEAE9DA-7DC3-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <200305032050.h43KooKq028587@artifact.psychedelic.net> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030506103029.02d89988@idiom.com> At 04:58 PM 05/03/2003 -0700, Tim May wrote: >I'll take this challenge, silly as it is. What Tim said ... >On Saturday, May 3, 2003, at 01:50 PM, Eric Cordian wrote: >>It should be noted, however, that advances in complexity theory or quantum >>computing that would render cryptography useless, would also have a >>detrimental effect on the state apparatus. I'm not sure how detrimental an effect it would have. Most of the evil things that the State can do don't depend on secrecy; the day-to-day bureaucracy doesn't care, and Brinworld would have much more of an effect on them (i.e. people actually bothering to watch their bureaucrats in action, as opposed to wiretapping them.) Disrupting the banking system and online trade is much more of an issue, because tapping the flow of money is critical to the state, and if it's not flowing, they've got problems. Governments like secrecy, and if they assume that they have it, individuals working for more willing to do things that would get them fired, shot, or hanged, and the military would have to go back to sending guys with briefcases handcuffed to their wrists to haul one-time pads around for tactical applications, and jackboot-net the rest of their planning data, which would be annoying but isn't much different from 100 years ago, when we managed to have a War To End All Wars just fine. Tax collectors can work perfectly well without privacy, as long as they don't mind violating their subjects' privacy -- which they don't. Welfare-state bureaucrats and case-workers can redistribute income and poke into people's family business without crypto-privacy. >>So I pose a question. You have two boxes. In the first is crypto so >>powerful that it will keep peoples data safe for 1000 years, against all >>advances in mathematics, with perfect forward secrecy. >> >>In box number two is technology that will break any crypto designed by >>mankind in the next 1000 years. >>.. >>Which box do you pick? And why? The problem, of course, is that you don't get to pick :-) We have crypto that lets you keep your data secure against however many iterations of Moore's Law you believe will happen in your lifetime (unless you believe Nanotech will save us all.) Quantum crypto could trash public-key crypto, and we'd have to resort back to keyserver-based systems like Kerberos. The real risks aren't from picking the front door locks - they're from the back doors. Smart Dust isn't very dusty yet, and Brinworld ubiquitous cameras aren't ubiquitous yet either, but that 10000-bit RSA key and 7-DES don't do much good if you can't enter the keys into your computer securely or read the decrypted results without the dust on your Smart Contact Lenses also reading them or the cameras across the room watching your eyes move (either the hidden ones, or the wall-screen interactive TV ones) or Microsoft Patriotware or Back Orifice relaying your keystrokes to fbivax. Brinworld ain't pretty, but the important tax in the future won't be the cash you pay, but the N% of your time you have to spend watching your government officials at work, and the main way to minimize it is to decrease the number of government workers that need watching. From Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk Tue May 6 04:44:44 2003 From: Vincent.Penquerch at artworks.co.uk (Vincent Penquerc'h) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 12:44:44 +0100 Subject: Capitalism and economic struggles Message-ID: > I actually don't impose my ideals. Not any more than I do, that may be so. I wasn't the one to utter" > What part of "Don't impose your ideals on others" do you not > understand? Did I ask for laws ? I didn't. But that's besides the point, is it ? > I do however urge others to accept and adopt them. Point in case, you > have assumed that I smoke. I actually don't, and never have I have a nasty habit to indiscriminately say "you" instead of "one", and, hmm, "the Americans" when I mean "part of the US govt". Seen from here, anyway. I just can't get the habit out, and it's generalization that hinders discussion. But I'm very aware of it. > I'm not imposing, I'm asking. I don't have a law book to > thump, nor a gun > to point at you, nor a cop waiting to arrest you if you > disagree with what > I say. Nor am I asking for such laws to prevent or limit others in > similar ways. I'm undecided. I was thinking this exact same thing some 15 or 20 years ago. I was really in that Libertarian way of thinking. It makes some kind of superficial sense, and I've still got ties to a lot of that thinking. But I now am of the opinion that if you (someone, not you particularly) do something that affects me, this person actually is imposing something. Not at gunpoint, not with the threat of force, litigation, jail time, whatever. But imposing nonetheless. I'm aware of the difference of scale, and the lack of a formidable power of coercion from an individual compared to a state. My point is other, however, that yours. You say the state should not decide what is and is not allowed. I say that, while the state may indeed not, it still leaves an unresolved problem, which it is futile to dismiss with a wave of "personal freedom", because it doesn't only involve, in this particular case, the smoker. However, I'm torn by the parallel with, say, free speech. Speech can affect others, as well as smoke, or anything else, can. If you impose it, or oppose part of it, where does it stop ? I don't have a solution to that, apart from case by case analysis. But saying "I can do what I want even if affects others, short of murder/rape/theft/etc", no, I don't see that as a solution. -- Vincent Penquerc'h From bill.stewart at pobox.com Tue May 6 13:02:02 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 13:02:02 -0700 Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030505231754.03b1a8a8@mail.attbi.com> References: <3EAEAA1F.7A160334@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030506125544.02da0938@idiom.com> At 11:18 PM 05/05/2003 -0700, Steve Schear wrote: >At 10:48 PM 5/5/2003 -0700, you wrote: >>I believe that the Philips, who holds the trademark for compact disks, has >>said that copy protected disks do not follow the standard and may not use >>the trademark. > >If so, couldn't the labels selling be charged with deceptive advertising? Only if the round pieces of plastic in decorative jewel box cases are labelled "CD-ROM" and/or use the "CD" logo. I've heard that some of the recent sellers of user-preventing round plastic have responded, correctly, to Philips's announcements about the issue by no longer labelling them as CDs. At that point, the implied assertion that the round plastic container for intellectual property packaging is a "CD" is no more deceptive than the implied assertion that it contains "music". From sunder at sunder.net Tue May 6 10:32:38 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 13:32:38 -0400 (edt) Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Unfortunately MSFT has enough clout with hardware manufacturers to dictacte what future PC's will be and attempt to keep them closed. i.e. MSFT's Athens: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/134689749_winhec06.html And tablet PC's. It's not as if they can fully push other designs out of the market, but if there are few places that linux, *bsd, and other OS's can run, they have vast control. This design is closer and closer to the Mac - and for good reason. There is hope and precedent in that when IBM attempted to lock the market into Microchannel they failed miserably - but only because the other hw manufacturers decided to not pay the IBM tax. If the few remaining PC makers decide to go the MSFT way, the industry is Bill's. IBM probably won't, but who knows what HP, Dell, etc. will be willing to put up with. There will probably always be generic x86, ppc boards, and possibly Macintoshes and Sun workstations... but... :( The thing that would allow MSFT to gain this sort of monopoly is the DMCA. It needs to be repealed. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Sun, 4 May 2003, Andy Lopata wrote: > Fortunately there is Linux as an alternative to MS and Apple, but if the > hardware has built-in copy controls, this may not be enough. From schear at attbi.com Tue May 6 17:36:26 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 17:36:26 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: <3EB7DED4.D31CCDC3@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030506172201.042dcac8@mail.attbi.com> At 09:12 AM 5/6/2003 -0700, "Major Variola (ret)" wrote: >At 09:51 PM 5/5/03 -0700, Steve Schear wrote: > > > >I gave a presentation at a conference a few years back in which I >raised > >the idea that since Intellectual Property (e.g., trademarks) aren't > >(property), its really a lease, that our society should consider >setting > >limits on the market penetration (say 50%, which is already in excess >of > >the what many economists call the "friction free" point wherein >companies > >can continue to gain market share merely by dint of their already > >considerable presence) of single companies in markets whose size (the > >therefore probably importance) exceeds some minimum threshold of the > >GDP. However, instead of enforcing these limits via the Department of > >Justice, they would become a civil matter and one's competitors can use >the > >courts to strip a company of its sole lease on a trademark or patent > >applied to this market. > >A few questions. First, could this be done under the US constitution, >or is it fiddling too much with the intent of the prescription that the >USG support these? Considering the latitude to which the Supreme Court has allowed Congress to interpret "limited time' I doubt they would mind. Ask Larry Lessig :) >Second, who would judge market penetration? Good question. Because of the difficulty, I was inclined to focus on only markets which make up a substantial fraction of the GDP. These have been tracked, relatively well, by the Department of Commerce's Standard Industry Codes (SICs). Microsoft falls under software publishing. I would propose that, for purposes of aiding implementation of this IP regime, these codes be broken down into segments which exceed some minimum (say at least 10%) of the original SIC. >Could PC vendors sue Apple >for overpenetration in the graphics market? Not likely. See above. >Also, I don't think you want to do this with trademarks ---they're >merely for >IDing a manufacturer for reputation purposes. They precede and >transcend >the US; cf bin Laden heroin. Trademarks are of primary importance. Imagine what would happen if MS lost any control of the term Windows (indeed they might anyway) related to OS user interfaces. steve From juicy at melontraffickers.com Tue May 6 19:19:29 2003 From: juicy at melontraffickers.com (A.Melon) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 19:19:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Some CA elected officials need killing In-Reply-To: <200305060534.h465YV4F074021@mailserver3.hushmail.com> Message-ID: <33407eb8d1f901ffdf62f0781541219c@melontraffickers.com> At 2003-05-06 05:34 +0000, barabbus at hushmail.com wrote: > [Can anyone post meatspace identity data (home address, bus, home and > cell numbers, SSN, auto licens numbres, recent photos, including family)for > the accused? > > arch criminals > 1. John Longville (62) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [1] > > midlevel criminals > 2. Paul Koretz (42) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [2] > > lesser criminals > 3. Rudy Bermudez (56) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] > 4. Jackie Goldberg (45) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] > 5. Mark Leno (13) - Treason, Betrayal of public trust [3] Koretz, Paul Assembly District 42 Capitol Office: Room 2176 State Capitol, P.O. Box 942849 Sacramento, CA 94249-0042 Phone: (916) 319-2042 Fax: (916) 319-2142 District Office: 8490 Sunset Blvd. Suite 542 West Hollywood, CA 90069 Phone: 310-652-4242 FAX: 310-289-4250 pic: http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a42/ google UNCONFIRMED Paul Koretz, (310) 278-8329, , Beverly Hills, CA 90210 Paul Koretz, (310) 275-4232, 1443 N Doheny Dr, Los Angeles, CA 90069 Paul served as Mayor and City Councilman for West Hollywood for 12 years before being elected to the Assembly. === Longville, John Assembly District 62 Capitol Office: Room 3123 State Capitol, P.O. Box 942849 Sacramento, CA 94249-0062 Phone: (916) 319-2062 Fax: (916) 319-2162 District Office: 201 N. E Street, Suite 205 San Bernardino, CA 92401 Phone: (909) 388-1413 Fax: (909) 388-1176 pic: http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a62/ google UNCONFIRMED John Longville, (909) 820-1201, 175 E Easton St, Rialto, CA 92376 Born September 21, 1949 in St. Paul, Minnesota, John Longville has been a Californian since 1968. He was first elected to the California State Assembly in 1998 after serving for nearly two decades as a councilmember and then as mayor of Rialto. === Bermzdez, Rudy Assembly District 56 Capitol Office: Room 5135 State Capitol, P.O. Box 942849 Sacramento, CA 94249-0056 Phone: (916) 319-2056 Fax: (916) 319-2156 District Office: (Temporary) 16600 Civic Center, 2nd Floor Bellflower, CA 90706 Phone: (562) 866-3391 Fax: (562) 867-3085 pic: http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a56/ Assembly Member Bermzdez and his wife, Nancy are homeowners in Norwalk and have two sons, Rudy and Nicolas. Prior to being elected to the Assembly, he was a parole agent with more than 20 years of experience with the Department of Corrections and California Youth Authority. He is a member of the California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA) and is also a member of the Norwalk Knights of Columbus, League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) and the Parent Teacher Association. === Jackie Goldberg Assembly District 45 Capitol Office: Room 2003 State Capitol, P.O. Box 942849 Sacramento, CA 94249-0045 (916) 319-2045 fax: (916) 319-2145 District office: 106 North Avenue 56 Los Angeles, CA 90042 (323) 258-0450 fax: (323) 258-3807 pic: http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a45/ google UNCONFIRMED Jackie Goldberg - (323) 663-4509 - , Los Angeles, CA 90001 Jackie Goldberg - (323) 664-0711 - 1544 Curran St, Los Angeles, CA 90026 Assemblymember Goldberg resides in Echo Park with her life-partner, poet Sharon Stricker, who is also a teacher and is the Executive Director of LACER, a non-profit organization which runs arts and literacy based after school programs in middle schools in LAUSD. Their son Brian lives and works in San Diego. Goldberg holds her Bachelor of Arts degree from University of California, Berkeley, and a Masters in Education from the University of Chicago. She is a Los Angeles native and has been a resident of the District in Echo Park since 1967. === Mark Leno Assembly District 13 Capitol Office: Room 3146 State Capitol, P.O. Box 942849 Sacramento, CA 94249-0013 Phone: (916) 319-2013 Fax: (916) 319-2113 District Office: 455 Golden Gate Avenue Suite 14300 San Francisco, CA 94102 Phone: (415) 557-3013 Fax: (415) 557-3015 pic: http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a13/ Prior to his election to the State Assembly, Assemblyman Leno served as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors from April 1998 to December 2002. He authored landmark legislation in the areas of affordable housing, universal health care for children, solar energy, late night entertainment, bond oversight, small business services, City CarShare, medical cannabis, equal access to services, and LGBT civil rights. From bill.stewart at pobox.com Tue May 6 19:22:15 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 19:22:15 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: <3EB7DED4.D31CCDC3@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030506185945.02d6b2b0@idiom.com> At 09:12 AM 05/06/2003 -0700, Major Variola (ret) wrote: >At 09:51 PM 5/5/03 -0700, Steve Schear wrote: > > > >I gave a presentation at a conference a few years back in which I > > raised the idea that since Intellectual Property (e.g., trademarks) aren't > >(property), its really a lease, that our society should consider > > setting limits on the market penetration (say 50%, ... >A few questions. First, could this be done under the US constitution, >or is it fiddling too much with the intent of the prescription that the >USG support these? Second, who would judge market penetration? It's not politically feasible, so the discussion's moot. It's probably not constitutionally feasible - patents and copyrights are grants of monopoly for a limited amount of time, and while I suppose they might be able to get away with "Term of small-N years, extensions available under such-and-such conditions", it'd be pretty tough to pull that one off. Writing clear enforceable definitions of terms is likely to be impossible also. If you've got a patent on producing Unobtanium, then you've got 100% market penetration, but if you've got a patent on some particular method to speed up some common process by some small percent, you might have 1% market penetration because other people have other methods of speeding it up. The difference isn't the quality of innovation, it's the definition of "the market" implied by the type of innovation. Trademarks, as Variola points out, aren't really the problem here, though there are certainly annoying conflicts between trademarks of products (where multiple types of things can have the same name) vs. domain names (where there can be only one), and control of DNS by the trademark forces appears to have been one of the main motivations for ICANN. (It's not just the control of the namespace - it's the insistence that everybody who does DNS registration everywhere be required to collect True Names and True ICBM-and-Subpoena-delivery addresses from registrants that's the really ugly problem.) >And this of course assumes that one of Kim's nukular missiles takes out >Hollywood before Hollywood takes over the USG. Before? Sorry, but you're going to have to send Ahnold back in time to do that. We've had the Gipper, Mr. Rogers's Evil Twin Skippy, Elvis with the sex scandal and The War in Albania (except that the scandal was used to cover up the war more than the other way around), Right-Wing Republican Pod People, your favorite Kafka-inspired movies, most of the cast of Dr. Strangelove popping in and out of various administrations, and of course the Sonny Bono Almost-but-not-quite-Permanent Copyright Extension Act. From adam at cypherspace.org Tue May 6 11:25:15 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 19:25:15 +0100 Subject: lucre double-blinding? (Re: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking) In-Reply-To: <3EB783CE.9030703@algroup.co.uk>; from ben@algroup.co.uk on Tue, May 06, 2003 at 10:43:42AM +0100 References: <03edc333578b426568d98e13a82e44fc@remailer.cryptofortress.co <03edc333578b426568d98e13a82e44fc@remailer.cryptofortress.c om> <3EB783CE.9030703@algroup.co.uk> Message-ID: <20030506192515.A8330899@exeter.ac.uk> It's been a while since I looked at the Lucre white paper but extrapolating from the Chaum context doesn't double blinding mean the payer and payee have to be simultaneously online with the bank? Adam On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 10:43:42AM +0100, Ben Laurie wrote: > Anonymous wrote: > > In order to avoid this, the bank can prove that it operated correctly > > (that is, it raised its input to the same k power that g is raised to > > in the public g^k value) using a zero-knowledge proof. I believe the > > latest version of the Lucre software does this. > > Actually, Lucre uses the double-blinding method to avoid this. The paper > discusses the ZK proof as an alternate way of doing it, but I chose not > to use it because of its potential interpretation as a blind signature. > > There is an implementation of the ZK proof included in Lucre just for > fun, though. From nobody at dizum.com Tue May 6 10:30:01 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 19:30:01 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking Message-ID: <5232df1ebb357753c38fa2a23d848fe8@dizum.com> Ben Laurie wrote: > Actually, Lucre uses the double-blinding method to avoid this. The paper > discusses the ZK proof as an alternate way of doing it, but I chose not > to use it because of its potential interpretation as a blind signature. Quoting from an anonymous post to coderpunks, around December 13, 1999: There is still a potential problem with the double blinding that the ZK proof would fix. The bank may intentionally produce a bogus coin by returning junk in the withdrawal transaction. While this is not as useful as being able to specifically mark coins and recognize them at deposit time, it could still be used in practice if people don't very often try depositing junk. After all, why should they do so, since it will never work. In that case the bank may be able to do a "sting" operation by producing junk at deposit time and then assuming that anyone who attempts to deposit a garbage coin is likely to have been the recipient of the junk coin. If such garbage deposit attempts are few, then this will allow the bank to effectively link the deposit to the withdrawal. The bank can even "eat" the cost of the bad coin and the depositor will never know he's been tagged. As a countermeasure there could be a band of cypherpunks who constantly attempt anonymous deposits of junk coins. These would all fail, but they would provide cover. They would make it much more difficult for the bank to issue intentionally-bad coins with the expectation that it could recognize them at deposit time. But lacking such organized activity, it would be better for the withdrawer to be guaranteed that the bank had behaved correctly. If the ZK proof is used then the original Wagner blinding using one factor should be adequate. From timcmay at got.net Tue May 6 19:43:27 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 19:43:27 -0700 Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030506125544.02da0938@idiom.com> Message-ID: On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 01:02 PM, Bill Stewart wrote: > At 11:18 PM 05/05/2003 -0700, Steve Schear wrote: >> At 10:48 PM 5/5/2003 -0700, you wrote: >>> I believe that the Philips, who holds the trademark for compact >>> disks, has >>> said that copy protected disks do not follow the standard and may >>> not use >>> the trademark. >> >> If so, couldn't the labels selling be charged with deceptive >> advertising? > > Only if the round pieces of plastic in decorative jewel box cases > are labelled "CD-ROM" and/or use the "CD" logo. > I've heard that some of the recent sellers of user-preventing round > plastic > have responded, correctly, to Philips's announcements about the issue > by no longer labelling them as CDs. > > At that point, the implied assertion that the round plastic container > for intellectual property packaging is a "CD" is no more deceptive > than the implied assertion that it contains "music". Given that a tax is already collected to make backups of music (the 1992 Home Recording Act levies a tax on blank media), if one were to buy a CD at Tower Records and then not be able to make a copy, one would expect: -- a refund of taxes levied on blank media or -- a refund of the money paid for the alleged CD (plus compensation for the time and mileage consumed) Were Tower Records to refuse a full refund plus compensation, then of course it would be moral to burn down their building. Maybe after a few such burnings and 20 or 30 deaths of co-conspirators, the practice will change. --Tim May > > --Tim May "The great object is that every man be armed and everyone who is able may have a gun." --Patrick Henry "The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." --Alexander Hamilton From timcmay at got.net Tue May 6 19:47:57 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 19:47:57 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <3EB7C12A.2090701@ksvanhorn.com> Message-ID: <4EF6A9A8-8036-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 07:05 AM, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote: > Tyler Durden wrote: > >> Likewise with governments. I still need my trash taken out, and for >> potholes to be fixed. > > > What makes you think government is needed at all for these? My trash > is taken out by a private company, not by any government. And > privately built and maintained roads have existed for a very long > > time. We fix all of the potholes on our road. And more efficiently that "CalTrans" with its headquarter skyscrapers and $80,000/year pothole fillers do. (BTW, we pay exorbitant property taxes partly to pay for local roads, yet most mountain roads are private. Why don't we get a rebate on our taxes? Because money taken by the Gaping Mouth is never returned.) --Tim May "You don't expect governments to obey the law because of some higher moral development. You expect them to obey the law because they know that if they don't, those who aren't shot will be hanged." - -Michael Shirley From bill.stewart at pobox.com Tue May 6 19:51:47 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 19:51:47 -0700 Subject: Defending decentralized societies from military aggression In-Reply-To: <3EB7C031.9090401@ksvanhorn.com> References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030503091736.044ef0d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> <5.2.0.9.0.20030505073913.044e2030@pop.ix.netcom.com> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030506192541.02d87158@idiom.com> At 09:01 AM 05/06/2003 -0500, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote: >1. Switzerland during WWII. While other more centralized nations were >easy pickings for the Nazis, the tiny Swiss nation managed to retain its >freedom and independence as a small island of freedom in a sea of >fascism. Several factors entered into this, including the Swiss >willingness to fight to the bitter end and their long policy of strict >neutrality; but one oft-overlooked advantage the Swiss had was their loose >confederation and lack of strong central control. Your average Swiss >citizen doesn't even know who the Swiss president is; it's just not that >important of a position. IIRC, Switzerland and Australia have both had episodes of the president or prime minister dying and nobody missing them for a few days or nobody recognizing the body when it was found. >Whereas other countries gave in to the Nazis without firing a shot when >the governmental leaders capitulated and ordered a surrender, in the case >of Switzerland there really wasn't anybody with the authority to surrender >the country... and the fiercely independent Swiss would have disobeyed any >orders to surrender, anyway. (For example, at one point there was some >concern among the junior officers in the Swiss military that their >higher-ups might be considering capitulation. They formed an organization >among themselves with the intention of offing their senior officers and >taking over command should any form of surrender be attempted.) > >As a result, although Hitler made it clear that he loathed Switzerland, >and repeatedly had plans drawn up for its invasion, there were always >easier targets and other pressing matters to be taken care of first. In >the meantime, the Swiss observed the German's military tactics and >modified their own defense strategy accordingly. The Swiss maintained >their freedom not because they had the military might to defeat Germany; >they didn't. They stayed free because they ensured that the price for >conquering them would be unacceptably high, and the gains unacceptably low. The Swiss didn't invent one of their major defense technologies, which was mountains that are lousy places to run massed tank battles, but they used them quite effectively, just as they did against massed elephant-mounted forces. Also, the banking business was one of the more useful things in Switzerland (as opposed to cheese and chocolate), and it's much more difficult to usefully steal a bunch of burned fragments of bank account ledgers than a harbor or a bunch of flat farmland. >2. Ireland and England circa 1100 A.D. Ireland was a lawful anarchy; >England was more centralized. When the Normans invaded, it took them not >much more than a month to conquer England. All they had to do was obtain >the surrender of the appropriate authorities. As is often the case, the >existing governmental apparatus was then used to administer the occupation. The Conquest actually took quite a lot longer than that. Sure, after Hastings the Conqueror's forces were on the island, and he was able to use some of Harald's forces against some of the other lesser kings of parts of England, but the solidity of central control over England was always dubious, what with various sets of regional kings, Vikings from Scandinavia, Scots and Picts in the north, Vikings from their hangouts in Ireland, uncles and cousins and younger brothers with claims to the throne (and the willingness to fight for them). The Conqueror stomped down lots of this over the next decade or so, and had more control than anybody had had since maybe Alfred, but it was a couple of generations before the Norman were solidly in control. >3. Somalia. The world's sole remaining superpower, whose military spending >and might exceeds that of the next several contenders combined, was sent >packing by the people of a destitute country lacking any significant >industrial base and still recovering from a nasty civil war. The Somalis >didn't have to defeat the invader to win; they just had to make remaining >in Somalia too politically costly for the invader Clinton. The UN were also sent packing. From mv at cdc.gov Tue May 6 20:05:35 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 20:05:35 -0700 Subject: All Microsoft needs is for good people to do nothing Message-ID: <3EB877FF.5020308@cdc.gov> "If we don't get hardware I'm done" Microsoft's Biddle said. "I have no business wthout some fundamental changes to the PC architecture. And if people don't write software that takes advantage of those changes, I'm done" Peter Biddle, product unit manager in the Security Business Unit at M$ EWeek, 5 May 03 p 14 --- No lieutenant, your serfs are already dead. -Agent Smith From mv at cdc.gov Tue May 6 20:09:47 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 20:09:47 -0700 Subject: RIAA legal attacks on students Message-ID: <3EB878FB.4000002@cdc.gov> At 09:54 PM 5/6/03 +0100, Adam Back wrote: >Here's some more detail about the RIAA legal attacks on four students >recently: > >In fact it turns out that he was just running a search engine that >indexed any files available on windows shares on the local network. >You could search for any type of file; as you might expect some of the >files users searched for and downloaded were mp3 files. Dr Dobb's Journal once published *source code* for such a MS-share search tool. Accessories to a federal felony, no doubt. From mv at cdc.gov Tue May 6 20:20:33 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 20:20:33 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list Message-ID: <3EB87B81.2060500@cdc.gov> At 10:55 AM 5/6/03 -0400, Tyler Durden wrote: > >Speech is speech. I'll worry about May when he actually tries to bring the >"hoped for" nuke into downtown DC. Until then, he's a "sleeper cell". Tyler, we'll excuse you for your relative newness. We are *all* sleeper cells. Its an obligation. Quoth the bubblehead: You're either with us, or against us (tm). --- "There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible to live without breaking laws." -- Ayn Rand, "Atlas Shrugged" "The great object is that every man be armed and everyone who is able may have a gun." --Patrick Henry From mv at cdc.gov Tue May 6 20:26:56 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 20:26:56 -0700 Subject: RPG vs. UN/US Message-ID: <3EB87D00.9030702@cdc.gov> At 07:51 PM 5/6/03 -0700, Bill Stewart wrote: >The UN were also sent packing. The UN, weren't they a wholly-owned subsidiary of the USG until the french flew a jet into that building? Fortunately it was held together by all the wires linking the bugs in the walls.. From timcmay at got.net Tue May 6 20:51:04 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 20:51:04 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <20030506223415.A32287@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <2094D372-803F-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 07:34 PM, Declan McCullagh wrote: > On Sat, May 03, 2003 at 08:50:12PM +0000, Justin wrote: >> Interesting changes in this case means executive orders and increasing >> harassment of individuals by financial institutions, which are >> simultaneously forced to comply with continuously constricting > > To wit: > > http://news.com.com/2100-1026_3-1000133.html?tag=fd_top >> A bill that a House panel approved on Tuesday afternoon takes a >> two-pronged approach toward curbing Internet wagers. It could require >> Internet service providers (ISPs) to delete hyperlinks to offshore >> gambling sites and would order credit cards and online payment systems >> such as PayPal to identify unlawful transactions that might be related >> to gambling. > > (Or E-Gold, or the other gold payment systems...) Since "hyperlinks" are just strings of symbols, that is, speech, how is "could require Internet service providers (ISPs) to delete hyperlinks to offshore gambling sites" not an ipso fact, slam dunk violation of the First Amendment? What part of "Congress shall make no law..." is unclear? They all need killing. I really hope Osama kills that city and all in it. --Tim May ""Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined." --Patrick Henry From njohnsn at njohnsn.com Tue May 6 18:53:39 2003 From: njohnsn at njohnsn.com (Neil Johnson) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 20:53:39 -0500 Subject: Some CA elected officials need killing In-Reply-To: <200305060534.h465YV4F074021@mailserver3.hushmail.com> References: <200305060534.h465YV4F074021@mailserver3.hushmail.com> Message-ID: <200305062053.39273.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> On Tuesday 06 May 2003 12:34 am, barabbus at hushmail.com wrote: > [Can anyone post meatspace identity data (home address, bus, home and > cell numbers, SSN, auto licens numbres, recent photos, including family)for > the accused? > Oh Looky ! Looks like they are trying a new tact now that they have figured out the "How do I build a B*o$o#m%b ?" crap won't work. -- Neil Johnson http://www.njohnsn.com PGP key available on request. From matt at rearviewmirror.org Tue May 6 20:58:55 2003 From: matt at rearviewmirror.org (Matt Beland) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 20:58:55 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030506230249.C32287@cluebot.com> References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021650.08716.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030506230249.C32287@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <200305062058.55597.matt@rearviewmirror.org> On Tuesday 06 May 2003 08:02 pm, Declan McCullagh wrote: > On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 04:50:08PM -0700, Matt Beland wrote: > > But in fact, I don't completely agree with your definition. A Cypherpunk > > is one who is interested in the technology and use of encryption, and the > > social and political effects thereof. > > By that definition, various federal agents, narcs, and prosecutors > would qualify as ardent cypherpunks. Yep. Wrong-headed cypherpunks who must be corrected or destroyed, more than likely. But cypherpunks none the less. After all, just because their end objectives and motives are completely and totally opposite to yours or mine does not mean there aren't significant contributions they could make for our benefit. Just as there are things that other, "correct" cypherpunks could do or have done which are or could be detrimental. -- Matt Beland matt at rearviewmirror.org http://www.rearviewmirror.org From timcmay at got.net Tue May 6 21:06:55 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 21:06:55 -0700 Subject: All Microsoft needs is for good people to do nothing In-Reply-To: <3EB877FF.5020308@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <57605FC4-8041-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 08:05 PM, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > "If we don't get hardware I'm done" Microsoft's Biddle said. "I have > no business > wthout some fundamental changes to the PC architecture. And if people > don't write > software that takes advantage of those changes, I'm done" > Peter Biddle, product unit manager in the Security Business Unit at M$ > EWeek, 5 May 03 p 14 > > --- > No lieutenant, your serfs are already dead. -Agent Smith > A friend of mine (I know him from talking to him at the bookstore) runs the computer book section at Bookshop Santa Cruz. Dave told me, without any promptings or comments from me, that his results for April showed that LISP books outsold C# (C-Sharp, the attempt by M$ to launch a .NET-friendly new language) by 5 to 1. Now he has a little sign posted to this effect. This is fairly amazing, as the number of LISP books has remained small for many years (Guy Steele, Sonia Keene, a few others) and M$ has subsidized the usual shelf full of crap books on C#. (I used LISP in my AI work while still at Intel, then Scheme for some years thereafter, and more recently Mathematica and Squeak (Smalltalk). Nothing I am doing depends on one language over another, though some are more convenient to use.) But if this lack of interest in C# holds, it indicates tougher sledding for M$ ahead. (I cannot recall a single mention of C# on this list, as a data point.) --Tim May From timcmay at got.net Tue May 6 21:15:38 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 21:15:38 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030506230522.E32287@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <8EE75BF1-8042-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 08:05 PM, Declan McCullagh wrote: > On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 08:07:49PM -0500, Bill O'Hanlon wrote: >> Some folks might want to spend their time proving and convincing. I >> think it gets old after a while, and the challenge lacks appeal. > > Right. There's an endless supply of list-newbies who are happy to > post unintentional flame-bait. As Bill said, it gets old after a decade > or so. And I don't think all of the "nonbelievers" are baiters or trollers. A couple of the Europeans seem a bit naive and brainwashed, but they may just need to be exposed to some of the things we in the West have access to for many decades. It's the American trolls I think are beyond salvage. --Tim May "Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice."--Barry Goldwater From adam at cypherspace.org Tue May 6 13:54:02 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 21:54:02 +0100 Subject: RIAA legal attacks on students Message-ID: <20030506215402.A8764568@exeter.ac.uk> Here's some more detail about the RIAA legal attacks on four students recently: http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/03/05/06/191207.shtml?tid=188&tid=141&tid=99&tid=123 and some more on one of the students web pages: http://www.chewplastic.com/ In fact it turns out that he was just running a search engine that indexed any files available on windows shares on the local network. You could search for any type of file; as you might expect some of the files users searched for and downloaded were mp3 files. But I don't see how they can claim he is guilty of contributory infringement anymore than google! Jeeze. So in the previous slashdot thread on the same topic, there were a number of people calling for a fund to be setup that people could donate to to defray the legal expenses and settlements. (The settlements were between $12k and $17kk). Do any of our legally qualified list members know if it is legal to collect money to reimburse a defendant against a settlement in a politically unpopular case. The students apparently admitted no guilt if it helps. I'm thinking all it takes is a paypal account, and a post to slashdot and their expenses would probably be covered. The remainder if any should got to the anti-RIAA lobby; ie whichever of the online rights lobbying groups that is mostly robustly defending against DMCA excesses. Adam From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Tue May 6 20:15:27 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 22:15:27 -0500 (CDT) Subject: seeking Eric Hughes (fwd) Message-ID: YMMV.... ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 12:52:36 -0400 From: Susan Schearer To: owner-cypherpunks at einstein.ssz.com Subject: seeking Eric Hughes I am trying to locate the Eric Hughes who was a Latin student of Maureen O'Donnell in Fairfax VA in the late 1970s. He often called himself "Izbad." If you are he, or if you know how to contact him, please reply to this message. Susan Schearer, Handley High School (retired), Winchester, VA From timcmay at got.net Tue May 6 22:20:29 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 22:20:29 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome Message-ID: <9E4BBFBE-804B-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> A symptom of our weird, statist, collectivist times is that many who excel at math, science, and business are now being increasingly characterized as "having Asperger's Syndrome." (Cf. www.google.com for hundreds of references.) In one line, Asperger's Syndrome is said to be a variant of autism, a kind of "able to function in society" variant on autism. Bill Gates is described as having Asperger's. In the past few weeks, we hear that Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein were "probable Asperger's." Maybe a biochemical or DNA link to a real syndrome, besides brightness, will be found, but I suspect that a lot of people with the ability to concentrate are characterized as being some kind of second-rate Rainmans just because they don't watch "Oprah" and "Survivor" on t.v. I've never met Bill Gates, though I did meet some of his contemporaries (Gary Kildall, Steve Wozniak, and of course all the folks at Intel). He seems a little weird at times...but no more so than a lot of the folks I meet at Cypherpunks, Hackers, PenSFA, etc. My tentative conclusion is that calling someone successful a "case of Asperger's" is just another form of envy or trash-talking. (Or of the popular meme in the past 30 years where child actors are fed lines showing their putative precociousness as they psychoanalyze the adults around them.) --Tim May "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the Public Treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits from the Public Treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy always followed by dictatorship." --Alexander Fraser Tyler From shaddack at ns.arachne.cz Tue May 6 13:21:04 2003 From: shaddack at ns.arachne.cz (Thomas Shaddack) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 22:21:04 +0200 (CEST) Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030505231754.03b1a8a8@mail.attbi.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 5 May 2003, Steve Schear wrote: > >I believe that the Philips, who holds the trademark for compact disks, has > >said that copy protected disks do not follow the standard and may not use > >the trademark. > > If so, couldn't the labels selling be charged with deceptive advertising? An interesting countermeasure would be releasing the sources to the CDR/RW drives' firmware, and possibly the related SDKs. This could stir the CD drive market in an interesting way - "make your own firmware upgrade" brings interesting options. (I'd surely want such drive.) Could have interesting applications, including reading/writing of heavily damaged and nonstandard media, and anything other that you can get by direct access to the laser and the motors of the drive. More later. Awfully busy now. From declan at well.com Tue May 6 19:34:15 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 22:34:15 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <20030503205012.GP17685@dreams.soze.net>; from justin@soze.net on Sat, May 03, 2003 at 08:50:12PM +0000 References: <200305022205.24810.sfurlong@acmenet.net> <26D2E932-7D8D-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030503205012.GP17685@dreams.soze.net> Message-ID: <20030506223415.A32287@cluebot.com> On Sat, May 03, 2003 at 08:50:12PM +0000, Justin wrote: > Interesting changes in this case means executive orders and increasing > harassment of individuals by financial institutions, which are > simultaneously forced to comply with continuously constricting To wit: http://news.com.com/2100-1026_3-1000133.html?tag=fd_top >A bill that a House panel approved on Tuesday afternoon takes a >two-pronged approach toward curbing Internet wagers. It could require >Internet service providers (ISPs) to delete hyperlinks to offshore >gambling sites and would order credit cards and online payment systems >such as PayPal to identify unlawful transactions that might be related >to gambling. (Or E-Gold, or the other gold payment systems...) -Declan From declan at well.com Tue May 6 20:00:24 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:00:24 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: ; from alopata@darkwing.uoregon.edu on Sat, May 03, 2003 at 09:00:08PM -0700 References: Message-ID: <20030506230024.B32287@cluebot.com> On Sat, May 03, 2003 at 09:00:08PM -0700, Andy Lopata wrote: > Why is this restriction on speech and debate any less insidious than statist > control? Why is capitalist self-censorship better than state-controlled > explicit censorship? If a sufficiently repressive government doesn't like what you say, you end up with your ears lopped off, or you're dead and your family is tortured. If the Corporate Media Barons don't like what you say, you get to keep saying it. Hope that helps put things in perspective. It is true that there are government-imposed barriers to entry that aid in keeping the media megaliths in power. But it is also true that a heck of lot of Americans like what they get from the MMs (which must respond to market demand at some level, after all), and it is also true that the claims of MM appear to be loudest from leftist quarters that have little novel to say anyway. -Declan From declan at well.com Tue May 6 20:02:49 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:02:49 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <200305021650.08716.matt@rearviewmirror.org>; from matt@rearviewmirror.org on Fri, May 02, 2003 at 04:50:08PM -0700 References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021508.20397.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030502231430.GC23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> <200305021650.08716.matt@rearviewmirror.org> Message-ID: <20030506230249.C32287@cluebot.com> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 04:50:08PM -0700, Matt Beland wrote: > But in fact, I don't completely agree with your definition. A Cypherpunk is > one who is interested in the technology and use of encryption, and the > social and political effects thereof. By that definition, various federal agents, narcs, and prosecutors would qualify as ardent cypherpunks. -Declan From declan at well.com Tue May 6 20:05:23 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:05:23 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030503010749.GD23232@rebma.pro-ns.net>; from wmo@rebma.pro-ns.net on Fri, May 02, 2003 at 08:07:49PM -0500 References: <19163627-7CBD-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305021118.22797.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> <200305021652.10518.matt@rearviewmirror.org> <20030503010749.GD23232@rebma.pro-ns.net> Message-ID: <20030506230522.E32287@cluebot.com> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 08:07:49PM -0500, Bill O'Hanlon wrote: > Some folks might want to spend their time proving and convincing. I > think it gets old after a while, and the challenge lacks appeal. Right. There's an endless supply of list-newbies who are happy to post unintentional flame-bait. As Bill said, it gets old after a decade or so. -Declan From declan at well.com Tue May 6 20:10:17 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:10:17 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030505073913.044e2030@pop.ix.netcom.com>; from kelsey.j@ix.netcom.com on Mon, May 05, 2003 at 08:12:15AM -0400 References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030503091736.044ef0d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> <3EB3A80A.11219.23A8502D@localhost> <5.2.0.9.0.20030505073913.044e2030@pop.ix.netcom.com> Message-ID: <20030506231017.F32287@cluebot.com> On Mon, May 05, 2003 at 08:12:15AM -0400, John Kelsey wrote: > This is the interesting question: Would the anarchocapitalist society have > and keep an advantage? I don't think you can answer it except by > experiment, but it's at least as feasible to me that the right kind of > authoritarian state might be pretty damned good at keeping up with an > anarchocapitalist one for technology, and would be better at some > technology. (Think of what you can learn about engineered diseases when I think this is right. I would not claim that a purely capitalist state is most efficient at producing technology with warfighting capabilities; I'd argue only that it's best at maximizing the happiness (and therefore the total economic output) of people who lived there. That could lead to technology with military applications or it could just be some pretty funky immersion sim. :) -Declan From declan at well.com Tue May 6 20:27:53 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:27:53 -0400 Subject: Press Conduct In-Reply-To: ; from measl@mfn.org on Sat, May 03, 2003 at 06:18:35PM -0500 References: Message-ID: <20030506232753.G32287@cluebot.com> On Sat, May 03, 2003 at 06:18:35PM -0500, J.A. Terranson wrote: > Leaving aside the fact that the story and all of the components were > patently false, I am interested in the opionions of the few press-persons we > have here on the actions of the reporters. > > As a press person, are there any conditions under which you would reveal > confidential sources? If so, under what conditions would you do so? If not, > do you have any observations/comments/yawns you would like to share on the > instant case? It's late and I'm not really that familiar with that case, so I won't comment on it. But for a reporter, a guarantee of confidentiality is (or at least should be) what a generation ago would have been called a sacred trust. If you can't live up to your end of the bargain, don't promise to preserve confidentiality. The only person to whom I will reveal a confidential source is my editor. This is standard and necessary journalistic practice: a news editor has to be able to make an independent judgment about whether the source is reliable or not. In practice, my editors have trusted me enough not to ask for the source's identity (and they also may not want to be burdened with that knowledge). On my website, I guarantee confidentiality re: email tips but with this addendum: >There is an exception to this guarantee of confidentiality. If someone >sends me a direct and credible threat to harm someone's person or >property, I reserve the right to make that email public. If you're interested, you may want to check out some of the poynter.org forums on the topic. I imagine they're buzzing right about now. -Declan From declan at well.com Tue May 6 20:37:17 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:37:17 -0400 Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: ; from timcmay@got.net on Tue, May 06, 2003 at 07:43:27PM -0700 References: <5.1.1.6.2.20030506125544.02da0938@idiom.com> Message-ID: <20030506233717.H32287@cluebot.com> On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 07:43:27PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > Given that a tax is already collected to make backups of music (the > 1992 Home Recording Act levies a tax on blank media), if one were to > buy a CD at Tower Records and then not be able to make a copy, one Remember what the freedom-loving Bush administration did today in a deal inked with the freedom-loving Singaporean government: http://news.com.com/2100-1045_3-1000110.html?tag=lh >Under the deal, Singapore agrees to prevent its citizens from >manufacturing optical discs unless they hold "a valid license to do >so." The actual text is here: http://www.ustr.gov/new/fta/Singapore/consolidated_texts.htm -Declan From declan at well.com Tue May 6 20:40:34 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:40:34 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <2094D372-803F-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net>; from timcmay@got.net on Tue, May 06, 2003 at 08:51:04PM -0700 References: <20030506223415.A32287@cluebot.com> <2094D372-803F-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030506234034.I32287@cluebot.com> On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 08:51:04PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > What part of "Congress shall make no law..." is unclear? Well, Rep. Ron Paul spoke out against the bill. He was the only 'critter I recall doing that. Nowadays, "Congress shall make no law..." is more and more observed only in the breach. -Declan From timcmay at got.net Tue May 6 23:57:40 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:57:40 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list n In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <3179709C-8059-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 07:55 AM, Tyler Durden wrote: > "Only those of > us protected by the shield of anonymity have the freedom to criticize > this vile and hateful man." > > Nah. Remember, May's got a big mouth, but I doubt he's ever killed > anybody. Hell, I bet he's never even gotten into a real fight (which > is probably why he mouths off so much about violence). > I knocked some teeth out of a kid who mouthed off the way you do. As for murders and suchlike, I've been interrogated for one murder and for one "suspicious" death and was smart enough to keep my mouth shut. It worked. It's not at all surprising to me that the least interesting people here on this list use anonymity to cloak their identities, ranging from "Nomen Nescio" to "Tyler Durden." --Tim May From timcmay at got.net Tue May 6 23:59:57 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:59:57 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <839CEE52-8059-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 08:05 AM, Tyler Durden wrote: > Kevin S. vanHorn wrote... > >>> Likewise with governments. I still need my trash taken out, and for >>> potholes to be fixed. >> >> >> What makes you think government is needed at all for these? My trash >> is taken out by a private company, not by any government. And >> privately built and maintained roads have existed for a very long >> time. > > Of course. But you've got to read further into my post to see the > point. > I'm thinking that in the future, some aspects of government might be > competitive with the private sector to obtain public $$$, much like > the US mail now competes with UPS and FedEx. Like in Stephenson's Snow > Crash, many functions might be opt-in, including possibly war.... > > For instance, imagine where budget items are voted on directly, and > regularly by voters. Would IraqII have occurred? (I bet not.) (My Jazz > musician brother has suggested that "you should be able to vote any > elected official directly into jail, no questions asked".) > > But my point is that heavy crypto will probably have unforseeable > effects on the notion of the state, probably not wipe it out. Banal comments. Come back when you have something to actually say. --Tim May "That the said Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms." --Samuel Adams From eresrch at eskimo.com Wed May 7 07:48:29 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 07:48:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507134232.GA24740@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 7 May 2003, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Could be more sinister than that, an attempt to stigmatize thinkers as > weird. Especially when you look at the phenomenon of the rise of ADD. When I was > growing up, there was no such thing as ADD, and,indeed, I don't remember having > kids in my school who exhibited those symtoms. There were dumb kids, of course, > and daydreamers, but I don't recall the weirdly restless, buzzy kids you see so > many of now. > So what caused ADD -- something in the water, like flouride? Or some food > additive, or some form of pollution? We know that there are a number of Sugar. That's all. Kids get really hyper when fed tons of soda, candy and chocolate. There's a good example of how to eliminate the problem right here in Wisconsin - the Appleton (or Oshkosh, but there abouts) school systems have gone to feeding kids bread, carrots and milk several times during the day, and have no behavioural problems. Getting the obvious to be seen in Madison is quite a chore! > chemicals in the environment today that mimic various hormones which then cause > imbalances in animals, or, for instance, aluminum suspected in alzhimers. > Perhaps in the dumbing down of Americans -- and there is a true dumbdown, US > kids consistently get lower scores than kids in other countries -- those who > weren't exposed to the same nerve agents, say, need to be now demonized as the > "odd ones", the "weirdos", "too smart for their own good", and definitely "too > smart for *our* good" that the proles need to watch out for along with the other > terrorists. It's more like the "publish or perish" syndrome. Some field of profs needs to create a new thing so they can keep getting funding for "research". Dumbing down of Americans has been going on for a long time. But I'm not sure that's real either. How long have the majority of people been going past 8th grade education? I don't think that was true 100 years ago. I don't think people are any dumber now than they have been over the past 10,000 years. We're giving primates cars and supprised they don't understand basic physics. We used to think DDT was great stuff. It took a while to learn otherwise. Maybe smarts comes from being "sick". But I kinda doubt it, it's more likely we're still on the learning curve and we need to get our environment right to optimize collective social intellegence. Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From sfurlong at acmenet.net Wed May 7 04:55:09 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 07:55:09 -0400 Subject: what moral obligation? (Re: DRM technology and policy) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200305070755.09769.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Tuesday 06 May 2003 22:43, Tim May wrote: > Given that a tax is already collected to make backups of music (the > 1992 Home Recording Act levies a tax on blank media), if one were to > buy a CD at Tower Records and then not be able to make a copy, one > would expect: > > -- a refund of taxes levied on blank media > > or > > -- a refund of the money paid for the alleged CD If one were to buy a computer with Windows pre-loaded and then were to install Linux at first boot-up, one would expect to receive a refund of the price of Windows bundled with the computer. You see how well that worked out. Sometimes self-help is the only remedy. -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From mv at cdc.gov Wed May 7 07:59:45 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 07:59:45 -0700 Subject: Iris scanning Message-ID: <3EB91F60.93DF819B@cdc.gov> At 09:08 AM 5/7/03 -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > An article on BBC mentions how little iris scanning has actually been tested, >and that China, for instance, is refusing to use it because of possible dangers, >or at least, perceived dangers. Which has me wondering, could there be actual >dangers from iris scanning, say a malfunctioning laser damaging the eye? Very interesting question. I wonder if the engineers who make the things consider a transient that blows the diode, and fries your fovea too. I'd like to see the technical argument that it "can't happen". 99.999 % still means a few cyclops a year. The laypeoples' (albeit largely irrational) fear of ionizing radiation keeps some domestic body-scans from happening (though not at the borders). There might be more serious cause for concern from lasers in eyes. A few stray lawsuits could obtain free publicity. Maybe from folks taking meds that make them photosensitive, folks with macular degeneration, or just plain HAARP-makes-me-crazy folks. Good question. From mv at cdc.gov Wed May 7 08:13:55 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 08:13:55 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome Message-ID: <3EB922B3.7971AE9C@cdc.gov> At 07:48 AM 5/7/03 -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: >> chemicals in the environment today that mimic various hormones which then cause >> imbalances in animals, or, for instance, aluminum suspected in alzhimers. Al has been discredited, Alz is inherited, or inevitable if your hydraulics keep you ticking that long (a recent development). >It's more like the "publish or perish" syndrome. Some field of profs >needs to create a new thing so they can keep getting funding for "research". Yep. >Dumbing down of Americans has been going on for a long time. But I'm >not sure that's real either. How long have the majority of people been >going past 8th grade education? "Education" has been increasing, but industrial life means that people can be stupider, because they are more shielded. See J. Diamond, http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/diamond/diamond_p1.html >We used to think DDT was great stuff. It is. Malaria kills 3e6 a year. But that's not 3e6 industrials who die, and its industrials who make it. The cigars that indians smoked kept bugs away, and with an aboriginal life span the problems with smoking were insignificant compared to the dangers of bugs. What is adaptive depends on your environment. That probably applies to mental traits like ability to sit still, tolerate presence of others, concentrate on abstract lines of thought etc. 21st century schizoid man. From timcmay at got.net Wed May 7 08:31:08 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 08:31:08 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507134232.GA24740@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 06:42 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Could be more sinister than that, an attempt to stigmatize thinkers > as > weird. Especially when you look at the phenomenon of the rise of ADD. > When I was > growing up, there was no such thing as ADD, and,indeed, I don't > remember having > kids in my school who exhibited those symtoms. There were dumb kids, > of course, > and daydreamers, but I don't recall the weirdly restless, buzzy kids > you see so > many of now. Same here. We pretty much stayed in our seats. None of the spontaneous wandering around the room I have seen in video footage of today's kids. Sure, some kids were more active than others, but nothing like what I hear about and see today. > > So what caused ADD -- something in the water, like flouride? But they were polluting our essence back in the 1950s, when water fluoridation and fluoride toothpaste became common. > Or some food > additive, or some form of pollution? We know that there are a number of > chemicals in the environment today that mimic various hormones which > then cause > imbalances in animals, or, for instance, aluminum suspected in > alzhimers. Aluminum frying pans? Teflon? Or, more likely: endless gallons of sugar water. When I was a kid, a 6-ounce bottle of Coca Cola was a special treat. (Though I recall we drank a fair amount of Kool-Aid. And Fizzies, before they were banned.) Today's kids tank up on Big Gulps and Supersize It! 32-ounce portions. Even soda vending machines in the schools, and soft drinks served with lunch. Likewise, a lot more fast food today. Where once it was a treat to go to a burger place, now they dot the landscape and many kids eat at them nearly every day. And lack of discipline is probably a big factor. If teachers simply told the kids to sit down and stop fidgeting, as they did with us, maybe there would be fewer of these alleged ADHD cases. But the single most likely reason for the rise in alleged ADHD cases is the pharmaceutical industry. And job security for the "psychiatric staff" at K12 schools. Where once there was a nurse bandaging cuts and scrapes, now there's a staff of psychobabblers and sexuality counselors. --Tim May ""Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined." --Patrick Henry From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Wed May 7 06:42:32 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 08:42:32 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <9E4BBFBE-804B-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <9E4BBFBE-804B-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030507134232.GA24740@cybershamanix.com> Could be more sinister than that, an attempt to stigmatize thinkers as weird. Especially when you look at the phenomenon of the rise of ADD. When I was growing up, there was no such thing as ADD, and,indeed, I don't remember having kids in my school who exhibited those symtoms. There were dumb kids, of course, and daydreamers, but I don't recall the weirdly restless, buzzy kids you see so many of now. So what caused ADD -- something in the water, like flouride? Or some food additive, or some form of pollution? We know that there are a number of chemicals in the environment today that mimic various hormones which then cause imbalances in animals, or, for instance, aluminum suspected in alzhimers. Perhaps in the dumbing down of Americans -- and there is a true dumbdown, US kids consistently get lower scores than kids in other countries -- those who weren't exposed to the same nerve agents, say, need to be now demonized as the "odd ones", the "weirdos", "too smart for their own good", and definitely "too smart for *our* good" that the proles need to watch out for along with the other terrorists. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Wed May 7 07:08:34 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 09:08:34 -0500 Subject: Iris scanning Message-ID: <20030507140834.GA24907@cybershamanix.com> An article on BBC mentions how little iris scanning has actually been tested, and that China, for instance, is refusing to use it because of possible dangers, or at least, perceived dangers. Which has me wondering, could there be actual dangers from iris scanning, say a malfunctioning laser damaging the eye? http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3003571.stm -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From declan at well.com Wed May 7 06:25:25 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 09:25:25 -0400 Subject: Private meeting on privacy Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030507092456.02124bc0@mail.well.com> COMMERCE National Academies Meeting on Privacy in the Information Age, May 7-9. Closed session summary posted after the meeting Location: National Academies, 500 5th St., NW, Washington, D.C.. From nobody at dizum.com Wed May 7 01:00:02 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 10:00:02 +0200 (CEST) Subject: lucre double-blinding? (Re: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking) Message-ID: <3443e0018bc7f85f8ece3ff2635bad7c@dizum.com> A Back asks: > It's been a while since I looked at the Lucre white paper but > extrapolating from the Chaum context doesn't double blinding mean the > payer and payee have to be simultaneously online with the bank? No, this is something else. It just means that two random numbers rather than one are used to blind the data when it is sent to the bank to be signed (oops, "transformed"). Doing this makes it impossible for the bank to recognize deposited coins even if it misbehaves. Earlier proposals that used a single random blinding factor were shown to be inadequate. From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Wed May 7 08:01:14 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 10:01:14 -0500 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this li st now? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030507150114.GA25086@cybershamanix.com> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 10:30:27AM -0400, Trei, Peter wrote: > > > An anarchocapitalist society is capable of much > swifter innovation than a centralized one - I think > we agree on that (see Cold War for many > examples). > > However, I don't think that a authoritarian society > can absorb and use innovations gleaned from a > decentralized one of similar size at a pace high > enough to keep up. > > The barrier is that the centralized society requires > some gating mechanism to decide *which* innovations > to adopt. This gating mechanism (presumably a > government ministry of some sort) has to vet innovations > not only for 'is it useful?' but also for 'in the long term, > will it undermine our central control?'. This mechanism > has a limited bandwidth, and acts as a limiting factor > in the centralized societies ability to absorb innovation. > > Examples are numerous; the tight restrictions on > Internet access in many authoritarian countries is > just one of the most recent. > Obviously -- it's like comparing M$ development with linux, there's just no way they can compete except thru repression. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Wed May 7 08:05:18 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 10:05:18 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: References: <20030507134232.GA24740@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030507150518.GB25086@cybershamanix.com> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 07:48:29AM -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > > We used to think DDT was great stuff. It took a while to learn otherwise. > Maybe smarts comes from being "sick". But I kinda doubt it, it's more > likely we're still on the learning curve and we need to get our > environment right to optimize collective social intellegence. > Speaking of DDT, I've always wondered what effect that had on my life, especially my nervous system. When I was a kid in South Carolina in the 50's, we used to ride our bikes behind the spray truck for blocks every time it came by. It was like being in a very, very thick fog. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Wed May 7 07:06:10 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 10:06:10 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: Tim May wrote... >>But my point is that heavy crypto will probably have unforseeable effects >>on the notion of the state, >>probably not wipe it out. >Banal comments. >Come back when you have something to actually say. Poo poo, King of the Anarchists. Those banal comments were made in response to an earlier statement of mine taken out of context. -TD PS: How long, on average, after someone signs onto the list does it take for you to 'plonk' them? I guess this means you need a constant supply of "fresh meat" in order for you to find out what's being discussed! >From: Tim May >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy >Date: Tue, 6 May 2003 23:59:57 -0700 > >On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 08:05 AM, Tyler Durden wrote: > >>Kevin S. vanHorn wrote... >> >>>>Likewise with governments. I still need my trash taken out, and for >>>>potholes to be fixed. >>> >>> >>>What makes you think government is needed at all for these? My trash is >>>taken out by a private company, not by any government. And privately >>>built and maintained roads have existed for a very long time. >> >>Of course. But you've got to read further into my post to see the point. >>I'm thinking that in the future, some aspects of government might be >>competitive with the private sector to obtain public $$$, much like the US >>mail now competes with UPS and FedEx. Like in Stephenson's Snow Crash, >>many functions might be opt-in, including possibly war.... >> >>For instance, imagine where budget items are voted on directly, and >>regularly by voters. Would IraqII have occurred? (I bet not.) (My Jazz >>musician brother has suggested that "you should be able to vote any >>elected official directly into jail, no questions asked".) >> >>But my point is that heavy crypto will probably have unforseeable effects >>on the notion of the state, probably not wipe it out. > >Banal comments. > >Come back when you have something to actually say. > > > >--Tim May >"That the said Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress >to infringe the just liberty of the press or the rights of conscience; or >to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from >keeping their own arms." --Samuel Adams _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: smart spam protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Wed May 7 07:19:30 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 10:19:30 -0400 Subject: Sleeper Cells Message-ID: Variola wrote... > >At 10:55 AM 5/6/03 -0400, Tyler Durden wrote: > > > >Speech is speech. I'll worry about May when he actually tries to bring >the > >"hoped for" nuke into downtown DC. Until then, he's a "sleeper cell". > >Tyler, we'll excuse you for your relative newness. We are *all* sleeper >cells. >Its an obligation. Quoth the bubblehead: You're either with us, or against >us (tm). Can't fully agree with you here, Variola. Anyone who doesn't keep up with CNN's agit-spew (and believe it) is a sleeper cell. -TD _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Wed May 7 07:30:27 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 10:30:27 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this li st now? Message-ID: > On Mon, May 05, 2003 at 08:12:15AM -0400, John Kelsey wrote: > > This is the interesting question: Would the anarchocapitalist society > have > > and keep an advantage? I don't think you can answer it except by > > experiment, but it's at least as feasible to me that the right kind of > > authoritarian state might be pretty damned good at keeping up with an > > anarchocapitalist one for technology, and would be better at some > > technology. > An anarchocapitalist society is capable of much swifter innovation than a centralized one - I think we agree on that (see Cold War for many examples). However, I don't think that a authoritarian society can absorb and use innovations gleaned from a decentralized one of similar size at a pace high enough to keep up. The barrier is that the centralized society requires some gating mechanism to decide *which* innovations to adopt. This gating mechanism (presumably a government ministry of some sort) has to vet innovations not only for 'is it useful?' but also for 'in the long term, will it undermine our central control?'. This mechanism has a limited bandwidth, and acts as a limiting factor in the centralized societies ability to absorb innovation. Examples are numerous; the tight restrictions on Internet access in many authoritarian countries is just one of the most recent. Peter Trei From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Wed May 7 07:51:16 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 10:51:16 -0400 Subject: Iris scanning Message-ID: > Harmon Seaver[SMTP:hseaver at cybershamanix.com] > > An article on BBC mentions how little iris scanning has actually been > tested, > and that China, for instance, is refusing to use it because of possible > dangers, > or at least, perceived dangers. Which has me wondering, could there be > actual > dangers from iris scanning, say a malfunctioning laser damaging the eye? > > http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3003571.stm > Iris scanning does not use lasers. It uses a high-definition TV camera to image the iris (the colored ring around the pupil). Retinal scanning sometimes uses lasers, but does not have to. There are some HUD displays which paint an image directly on the retina with low powered lasers, but they're pretty rare. Biometrics seems to be in a bit of a lull right now. Many people noted the *absence* of many biometrics at the RSA conference this year; I myself saw nothing besides fingerprint readers. Peter Trei From measl at mfn.org Wed May 7 08:54:26 2003 From: measl at mfn.org (J.A. Terranson) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 10:54:26 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507150518.GB25086@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 7 May 2003, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Speaking of DDT, I've always wondered what effect that had on my life, > especially my nervous system. When I was a kid in South Carolina in the 50's, we > used to ride our bikes behind the spray truck for blocks every time it came > by. It was like being in a very, very thick fog. It was obviously harmful in the most severe of ways: you ended up as a demented cpunk :-) -- Yours, J.A. Terranson sysadmin at mfn.org From bill.stewart at pobox.com Wed May 7 11:04:34 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 11:04:34 -0700 Subject: Iris scanning In-Reply-To: <20030507140834.GA24907@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030507110102.02d6c8e0@idiom.com> At 09:08 AM 05/07/2003 -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > An article on BBC mentions how little iris scanning has actually been > tested, >and that China, for instance, is refusing to use it because of possible >dangers, >or at least, perceived dangers. Which has me wondering, could there be actual >dangers from iris scanning, say a malfunctioning laser damaging the eye? > >http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3003571.stm One thing the article said was: > The report found that iris recognition did better than most > but one manufacturer's claim of a 0.5% false identification rate > ballooned to 6% during the DOD tests. > With 13 million people currently on the FBI's watch list, > any large scale biometric system could mean millions of people > being detained when crossing borders. While the point they're trying to make is about false positives, the THIRTEEN MILLION PEOPLE ON THE FBI WATCH LIST just kind of slides by. That's equal to 5% of the US population, on Federal watch lists. (Yes, obviously some of those are foreigners, but then half the US population are young enough that hopefully almost none of them attract Federal attention...) What an outrage! From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Wed May 7 08:13:36 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 11:13:36 -0400 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism: "Obvious" it ain't. Message-ID: James Donald wrote... "Used to be that in the third world most people were skinny, so fat was a status symbol. Now diet books are outselling cookbooks, and Rubenesque women are everywhere out of fashion." Uh, where? In China? In India? Indonesia? RIght there you have almost half the world's population, and what you've written has almost zero applicability. ANd despite the economic advances of, say, China, outside coastal regions acquiring enough calories is still a challenge. And the occasional floods in central China make it extremely difficult every few years. Overall, however, it would seem that the standard of living and life expectancy of both China and India are increasing (and not just for a small number). Based on this I cautiously agree, but it's not exactly "obvious", and a few natural disasters in the most populated parts of China could put a dent in the curve. -TD >From: "James A. Donald" >To: "Tyler Durden" >Subject: Re: Capitalism and monopolism: "Obvious" it ain't. >Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 07:49:19 -0700 > > -- >James Donald: > > > "Despite the fact that the trend has been in the other > > > direction for the past two hundred years, despite the fact > > > that what Marx wrote was obviously false then, and has > > > become more obviously false in the 150 years since he > > > wrote, Marxists repeat Marx's prophecies with the more > > > confidence, the more obviously the facts contradict them." > >On 6 May 2003 at 10:28, Tyler Durden wrote: > > A lot of people living in the US make this kind of mistake. > > Actually, developed nations make up a minority of the world's > > population (though with China and India this may change > > wihtin our lifetimes). When one considers the abverage living > > standard for the entire world its been debated that it may > > actually be going down. > >Dont be silly. > >Used to be that in the third world most people were skinny, so >fat was a status symbol. Now diet books are outselling >cookbooks, and Rubenesque women are everywhere out of fashion. >There are a bunch of statistics that supposedly show people >have more stuff and eat better, but just walking around, you >can see the beggars are fat. Used to be there were famines all >over the place, but for the past fifty years, the only really >serious famines have been those produced by socialism or war. >These days, that means North Korea, though for a while there >was massive malnutrition in Cuba, producing widespread >deficiency related blindness. > > --digsig > James A. Donald > 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG > sSOEbbSEJGo81S1JHNPpZ5ibmlEOAgb/1acJD04s > 491VtSnlEEh03icnNCWM5sIy+8k9imCCYe3WnCgs9 > _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus From ben at algroup.co.uk Wed May 7 04:10:21 2003 From: ben at algroup.co.uk (Ben Laurie) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 12:10:21 +0100 Subject: lucre double-blinding? (Re: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking) In-Reply-To: <20030506192515.A8330899@exeter.ac.uk> References: <03edc333578b426568d98e13a82e44fc@remailer.cryptofortress.co <03edc333578b426568d98e13a82e44fc@remailer.cryptofortress.c om> <3EB783CE.9030703@algroup.co.uk> <20030506192515.A8330899@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <3EB8E99D.4090007@algroup.co.uk> Adam Back wrote: > It's been a while since I looked at the Lucre white paper but > extrapolating from the Chaum context doesn't double blinding mean the > payer and payee have to be simultaneously online with the bank? Lucre coins can _only_ be verified by the bank. However, only the payee needs to be talking to the bank (the payer gives the payee an unblinded coin), and can, at their own risk, defer that conversation (the risk being a double-spend, of course). Double-blinding refers to a method using two blinding factors, not any other weird combination you might have thought of :-) Cheers, Ben. -- http://www.apache-ssl.org/ben.html http://www.thebunker.net/ "There is no limit to what a man can do or how far he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." - Robert Woodruff From morlockelloi at yahoo.com Wed May 7 12:15:20 2003 From: morlockelloi at yahoo.com (Morlock Elloi) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 12:15:20 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20030507191520.65295.qmail@web40613.mail.yahoo.com> > I don't see this as a disease that we'd need a new drug for. If anything, > the public's being dumbed down and exposed to repeated bullshit in the > form of advertising every few minutes, cheap TV programming, etc. I'm not It's a well-established fact that ADD is a very effective immune response to indoctrination ... "get the fuck out of my input bandwidth". ===== end (of original message) Y-a*h*o-o (yes, they scan for this) spam follows: __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo. http://search.yahoo.com From frantz at pwpconsult.com Wed May 7 12:26:46 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 12:26:46 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030506185945.02d6b2b0@idiom.com> References: <3EB7DED4.D31CCDC3@cdc.gov> Message-ID: At 7:22 PM -0700 5/6/03, Bill Stewart wrote: >Before? Sorry, but you're going to have to send Ahnold back in time to do >that. >We've had the Gipper, Mr. Rogers's Evil Twin Skippy, Elvis with the >sex scandal and The War in Albania (except that the scandal was used to >cover up >the war more than the other way around), Right-Wing Republican Pod People, >your favorite Kafka-inspired movies, most of the cast of Dr. Strangelove >popping >in and out of various administrations, and of course the >Sonny Bono Almost-but-not-quite-Permanent Copyright Extension Act. Is Bill Stewart starting the channel John Young? ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From frantz at pwpconsult.com Wed May 7 12:36:57 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 12:36:57 -0700 Subject: All Microsoft needs is for good people to do nothing In-Reply-To: <57605FC4-8041-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <3EB877FF.5020308@cdc.gov> Message-ID: At 9:06 PM -0700 5/6/03, Tim May wrote: >This is fairly amazing, as the number of LISP books has remained small >for many years (Guy Steele, Sonia Keene, a few others) and M$ has >subsidized the usual shelf full of crap books on C#. My experience is that if you want to learn a new computer language, and there is a book on where Guy Steele is listed as an author, that's the book you want to buy. YMMV. Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From frantz at pwpconsult.com Wed May 7 13:01:40 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 13:01:40 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <3EB7C12A.2090701@ksvanhorn.com> References: Message-ID: At 7:05 AM -0700 5/6/03, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote: >Tyler Durden wrote: > >> Likewise with governments. I still need my trash taken out, and for >> potholes to be fixed. > > >What makes you think government is needed at all for these? My trash is >taken out by a private company, not by any government. And privately >built and maintained roads have existed for a very long time. 120-130 years ago, there was a privately owned toll road between Los Gatos and Santa Cruz. Now there is a publicly owned road, with no toll, and I haven't heard much call to go back to the old days. Why are the vast majority of people happy with the current situation? Some ideas: * Paying for roads through gas taxes has much lower transaction costs (in both time and money) than paying tolls. The modern electronic toll systems are a relatively new development, and while they compromise privacy, that privacy will soon be lost to the cameras. * People like the direct influence on road decisions that the political process allows. In the case of the Los Gatos -- Santa Cruz road, the people in Santa Cruz county who don't want their county to be a bedroom community for Silicon Valley have kept the road a twisty 4 lane freeway. Any more ideas? Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From jal at jal.org Wed May 7 11:12:49 2003 From: jal at jal.org (Jamie Lawrence) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 13:12:49 -0500 Subject: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030507181249.GI16535@jal.clueinc.net> On Wed, 07 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > PS: How long, on average, after someone signs onto the list does it take > for you to 'plonk' them? I guess this means you need a constant supply of > "fresh meat" in order for you to find out what's being discussed! OK, you're being a crank now. I've been on the list from one address or another since 1993, have had some fights with Tim, and (so far as I know) never been killfiled by him. I usually only post when I have something to say, which may have something to do with that. And if I were included, who cares? why are cranks so interested in the contents of Tim's killfile? I suppose I don't understand the desire to dance at the edge of a given poster's range of annoyance. I can't speak for Tim, but ranting about list politics is something that gets you into *my* procmailrc rather quickly. I haven't added you next to Choate and profv yet, as you sometimes have a point, but keep working it, and the cost of your postings will outweigh the utility of reading them. Will you then rant about Jamie's killfile? -j -- Jamie Lawrence jal at jal.org Computer Science is Applied Philosophy. From sunder at sunder.net Wed May 7 10:31:31 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 13:31:31 -0400 (edt) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <9E4BBFBE-804B-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: I've never met BillG, however, I do have an anecdote to share. I was at some MSFT bells and whistles demo a long while ago - before even WIn95 came out. Bill came out on stage, did some short intro, and went off stage, some mimes came on stage, did their dance. Now, meanwhile I heard lots of shouting from the right side of the stage (I was in the front rows on the right) and after the mimes went away, out came BillG with now messed up hair. Apparently he took offense at his hair dressers. Admitedly this has little to do with your message, on the surface, but to me it does indicate that he's far less tolerant than most people of whatever it is that pisses him off, and isn't opposed to show it. Various books on BillG take this view of him a well. Perhaps BillG doesn't alow others to interrupt or disrupt his concentration? Or perhaps he's just plain old anti-social? I don't see this as a disease that we'd need a new drug for. If anything, the public's being dumbed down and exposed to repeated bullshit in the form of advertising every few minutes, cheap TV programming, etc. I'm not saying that this causes a real disease, but it takes away from one's ability to concentrate for long periods of time. >From my own personal experience I find that most humans can deal with about an hour and a half to two hours of information when learning before tuning out. Some much less. But things like commercial interruptions, and the annoying pop-up mini-ads at the bottom of the TV screen are hurting the ability of the viewer to concentrate. Perhaps the long term effects of this is that people are being dumbed down and losing their ability to concentrate - thus ADD like symptoms might be appearing from this. (I don't know - I don't play a neurosurgeon on TV either. It's just my guess of what I see.) IMHO - things like video games enhance this ability - you have to concentrate on the game to win - and if the game can go on for a long time, I suspect the excercise in stretching the time spent will help you be able to concentrate for longer periods of time. Perhaps being intelligent or being able to focus on a topic for a long time makes Joe Mediocre Psychoanalyst uncomfortable, so he invents Asperger's Syndrome to cope? ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Tue, 6 May 2003, Tim May wrote: > A symptom of our weird, statist, collectivist times is that many who > excel at math, science, and business are now being increasingly > characterized as "having Asperger's Syndrome." (Cf. www.google.com for > hundreds of references.) > > In one line, Asperger's Syndrome is said to be a variant of autism, a > kind of "able to function in society" variant on autism. > > Bill Gates is described as having Asperger's. In the past few weeks, we > hear that Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein were "probable Asperger's." From DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk Wed May 7 05:52:05 2003 From: DaveHowe at gmx.co.uk (David Howe) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 13:52:05 +0100 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy References: <2094D372-803F-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <06c301c31499$ad8f3020$c71121c2@sharpuk.co.uk> at Wednesday, May 07, 2003 4:51 AM, Tim May was seen to say: > Since "hyperlinks" are just strings of symbols, that is, speech, how > is "could require Internet service providers (ISPs) to delete > hyperlinks to offshore gambling sites" not an ipso fact, slam dunk > violation of the First Amendment? Of course. but they did it for the DeCSS thing... From mv at cdc.gov Wed May 7 14:19:22 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 14:19:22 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism Message-ID: <3EB9785A.173A7934@cdc.gov> At 12:26 PM 5/7/03 -0700, Bill Frantz wrote: > >Is Bill Stewart starting the channel John Young? Anyone can get the John Young channel, you just need to know which satellite/transponder to point at. From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Wed May 7 12:03:11 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 15:03:11 -0400 Subject: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) Message-ID: "I haven't added you next to Choate and profv yet, as you sometimes have a point, but keep working it, and the cost of your postings will outweigh the utility of reading them. Will you then rant about Jamie's killfile?" Well I had two reasons for saying this. First of all, May suggested I stop posting due to the fact that I had "nothing to say". Well, even if that's true, he seems to be exposed to only pieces of my posts that get quoted by others, and in this particular case out of context. So if he's going to suggest I have nothing to say while I am supposedly in his kill file, then it's fair game for me to point out that from his vantage point he can only be full of crap. The next point has to do with him (again) telling me not to post. And from what I can tell, most of the people who've been around for a while and are regular posters have been 'plonked' by the King of the Anarchists, Mr May. That leaves only newer people who either don't have an opinion on anything, or who don't post, or who don't disagree with him. (OK, maybe there are exceptions...) So again I get the distinct impression that Mr May is verbally trying to suppress minds that have any opinion that he didn't already give them. And that's OK, as long as he doesn't try it on me. -TD >From: Jamie Lawrence >To: cypherpunks at minder.net >Subject: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating >long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) >Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 13:12:49 -0500 > >On Wed, 07 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > > > PS: How long, on average, after someone signs onto the list does it take > > for you to 'plonk' them? I guess this means you need a constant supply >of > > "fresh meat" in order for you to find out what's being discussed! > > >OK, you're being a crank now. > >I've been on the list from one address or another since 1993, have had >some fights with Tim, and (so far as I know) never been killfiled by >him. > >I usually only post when I have something to say, which may have >something to do with that. > >And if I were included, who cares? why are cranks so interested in the >contents of Tim's killfile? I suppose I don't understand the desire to >dance at the edge of a given poster's range of annoyance. > >I can't speak for Tim, but ranting about list politics is something that >gets you into *my* procmailrc rather quickly. I haven't added you next >to Choate and profv yet, as you sometimes have a point, but keep working >it, and the cost of your postings will outweigh the utility of reading >them. Will you then rant about Jamie's killfile? > >-j > > >-- >Jamie Lawrence jal at jal.org >Computer Science is Applied Philosophy. _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: smart spam protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From jal at jal.org Wed May 7 13:55:10 2003 From: jal at jal.org (Jamie Lawrence) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 15:55:10 -0500 Subject: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030507205510.GL16535@jal.clueinc.net> On Wed, 07 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > "I haven't added you next > to Choate and profv yet, as you sometimes have a point, but keep working > it, and the cost of your postings will outweigh the utility of reading > them. Will you then rant about Jamie's killfile?" OK, I was dumb enough to post, so I owe you a reply. > Well I had two reasons for saying this. First of all, May suggested I stop > posting due to the fact that I had "nothing to say". Well, even if that's > true, he seems to be exposed to only pieces of my posts that get quoted by > others, and in this particular case out of context. So if he's going to > suggest I have nothing to say while I am supposedly in his kill file, then > it's fair game for me to point out that from his vantage point he can only > be full of crap. Bob the drunk bumb outside of my local store suggested that you bugger children, and leak Amex secrets to competitors. Are you pissed at him, too? > The next point has to do with him (again) telling me not to post. And from > what I can tell, most of the people who've been around for a while and are > regular posters have been 'plonked' by the King of the Anarchists, Mr May. > That leaves only newer people who either don't have an opinion on anything, > or who don't post, or who don't disagree with him. (OK, maybe there are > exceptions...) So again I get the distinct impression that Mr May is > verbally trying to suppress minds that have any opinion that he didn't > already give them. And that's OK, as long as he doesn't try it on me. I hereby command you to never say the word "monkey", nor to reference the creatures in any way. Are you going to rant at me now, because I "verbally tr[ied] to suppress minds", presumably one belonging to you? Tim can be a jerk. So can I. Why are you so excited about him? Move on, or join the trolls. -j -- Jamie Lawrence jal at jal.org Helpful Hint: Unbreakable toys can be used to break other toys. From mv at cdc.gov Wed May 7 15:57:22 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 15:57:22 -0700 Subject: Sheeple Syndrome [was: Asperger's Syndrome] Message-ID: <3EB98F52.1DB0E1D6@cdc.gov> At 04:24 PM 5/7/03 -0400, Trei, Peter wrote: >As long as as people are going to wall off >particular personality types, and label them as >"Something-or-other Syndrome", we ought to be >able to have fun with this too. Financial Stockholm Syndrome: Suffered by people who enjoy paying taxes. From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Wed May 7 13:24:15 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 16:24:15 -0400 Subject: Sheeple Syndrome [was: Asperger's Syndrome] Message-ID: As long as as people are going to wall off particular personality types, and label them as "Something-or-other Syndrome", we ought to be able to have fun with this too. --------------------- Sheeple Syndrome: Characterized by an uncritical acceptance of mass media messages, the SS sufferer is easily led. Poor long term memory is a secondary trait. ------------------------ [more examples are invited] Peter Trei From peg2 at duke.edu Wed May 7 13:50:18 2003 From: peg2 at duke.edu (Philip Gardner) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 16:50:18 -0400 Subject: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) References: Message-ID: <001601c314da$4544aae0$6401a8c0@thiefdom> "Well, even if that's true, he seems to be exposed to only pieces of my posts that get quoted by others, and in this particular case out of context." This is always happening to me. I can never follow the discussions as I only recieve the quoted materials. Is there some other list I should be signed up for as well? PG ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tyler Durden" To: ; Sent: Wednesday, May 07, 2003 3:03 PM Subject: Re: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) > "I haven't added you next > to Choate and profv yet, as you sometimes have a point, but keep working > it, and the cost of your postings will outweigh the utility of reading > them. Will you then rant about Jamie's killfile?" > > Well I had two reasons for saying this. First of all, May suggested I stop > posting due to the fact that I had "nothing to say". Well, even if that's > true, he seems to be exposed to only pieces of my posts that get quoted by > others, and in this particular case out of context. So if he's going to > suggest I have nothing to say while I am supposedly in his kill file, then > it's fair game for me to point out that from his vantage point he can only > be full of crap. > > The next point has to do with him (again) telling me not to post. And from > what I can tell, most of the people who've been around for a while and are > regular posters have been 'plonked' by the King of the Anarchists, Mr May. > That leaves only newer people who either don't have an opinion on anything, > or who don't post, or who don't disagree with him. (OK, maybe there are > exceptions...) So again I get the distinct impression that Mr May is > verbally trying to suppress minds that have any opinion that he didn't > already give them. And that's OK, as long as he doesn't try it on me. > > -TD > > > > > >From: Jamie Lawrence > >To: cypherpunks at minder.net > >Subject: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating > >long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) > >Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 13:12:49 -0500 > > > >On Wed, 07 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > > > > > PS: How long, on average, after someone signs onto the list does it take > > > for you to 'plonk' them? I guess this means you need a constant supply > >of > > > "fresh meat" in order for you to find out what's being discussed! > > > > > >OK, you're being a crank now. > > > >I've been on the list from one address or another since 1993, have had > >some fights with Tim, and (so far as I know) never been killfiled by > >him. > > > >I usually only post when I have something to say, which may have > >something to do with that. > > > >And if I were included, who cares? why are cranks so interested in the > >contents of Tim's killfile? I suppose I don't understand the desire to > >dance at the edge of a given poster's range of annoyance. > > > >I can't speak for Tim, but ranting about list politics is something that > >gets you into *my* procmailrc rather quickly. I haven't added you next > >to Choate and profv yet, as you sometimes have a point, but keep working > >it, and the cost of your postings will outweigh the utility of reading > >them. Will you then rant about Jamie's killfile? > > > >-j > > > > > >-- > >Jamie Lawrence jal at jal.org > >Computer Science is Applied Philosophy. > > _________________________________________________________________ > The new MSN 8: smart spam protection and 2 months FREE* > http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From sfurlong at acmenet.net Wed May 7 14:01:20 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 17:01:20 -0400 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507150518.GB25086@cybershamanix.com> References: <20030507134232.GA24740@cybershamanix.com> <20030507150518.GB25086@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <200305071701.20692.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Wednesday 07 May 2003 11:05, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Speaking of DDT, I've always wondered what effect that had on my > life, especially my nervous system. When I was a kid in South > Carolina in the 50's, we used to ride our bikes behind the spray > truck for blocks every time it came by. It was like being in a very, > very thick fog. You biked behind a truck spraying pesticides? Voluntarily? Of the two, cognitive difficulties and exposure to DDT, which is the cause and which the effect? -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From ben at algroup.co.uk Wed May 7 09:10:22 2003 From: ben at algroup.co.uk (Ben Laurie) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 17:10:22 +0100 Subject: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking In-Reply-To: <5232df1ebb357753c38fa2a23d848fe8@dizum.com> References: <5232df1ebb357753c38fa2a23d848fe8@dizum.com> Message-ID: <3EB92FED.4030204@algroup.co.uk> Nomen Nescio wrote: > Ben Laurie wrote: > >>Actually, Lucre uses the double-blinding method to avoid this. The paper >>discusses the ZK proof as an alternate way of doing it, but I chose not >>to use it because of its potential interpretation as a blind signature. > > > Quoting from an anonymous post to coderpunks, around December 13, 1999: > > There is still a potential problem with the double blinding that the ZK > proof would fix. The bank may intentionally produce a bogus coin by > returning junk in the withdrawal transaction. > > While this is not as useful as being able to specifically mark coins and > recognize them at deposit time, it could still be used in practice if > people don't very often try depositing junk. After all, why should they > do so, since it will never work. > > In that case the bank may be able to do a "sting" operation by producing > junk at deposit time and then assuming that anyone who attempts to deposit > a garbage coin is likely to have been the recipient of the junk coin. > If such garbage deposit attempts are few, then this will allow the bank > to effectively link the deposit to the withdrawal. The bank can even > "eat" the cost of the bad coin and the depositor will never know he's > been tagged. The bank, of course, has to choose a withdrawer to tag, or a small subset of withdrawers, or this doesn't work. Note that the depositor is not tagged, the withdrawer is. And if the withdrawer has simply done an exchange anonymously, nor is she. > As a countermeasure there could be a band of cypherpunks who constantly > attempt anonymous deposits of junk coins. These would all fail, but > they would provide cover. Why would they fail? Since the bank cannot tell its own junk signature from the invented junk signatures, the bank would have to honour these requests. This sounds to me like a bank that is going bust fast. > They would make it much more difficult for > the bank to issue intentionally-bad coins with the expectation that it > could recognize them at deposit time. > > But lacking such organized activity, it would be better for the withdrawer > to be guaranteed that the bank had behaved correctly. If the ZK proof > is used then the original Wagner blinding using one factor should be > adequate. If a bank wants to cheat, it can do so despite a ZK proof - it simply refuses to cash the coins - claiming, for example, a double-spend, or just saying "no". So, given that marking coins with junk signatures is: a) Only effective if you want to mark a small subset b) Costs you a fortune if anyone finds out you are doing it, I am not entirely convinced by this argument. Nevertheless, the ZK option is implemented in Lucre (and documented in the paper) should any mint wish to use it. Cheers, Bven. -- http://www.apache-ssl.org/ben.html http://www.thebunker.net/ "There is no limit to what a man can do or how far he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." - Robert Woodruff From njohnsn at njohnsn.com Wed May 7 15:43:45 2003 From: njohnsn at njohnsn.com (Neil Johnson) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 17:43:45 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507195555.T66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> References: <20030507195555.T66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> Message-ID: <200305071743.45415.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> On Wednesday 07 May 2003 10:03 pm, John Kozubik wrote: > > Another possibility is that a large population of those with corrected > vision had their vision slowly degraded by the early applications of the > correction. I have no experience with vision correction, but I know > anecdotally that most people with corrected vision need their corrections > strengthened throughout their lifetime. In reality, their sight problem > may have stabilized (or even improved) very early on in the absence of > treatment. Thus, our perception of what sight abilities the average > person in the United States has might be artificially deflated by early > and aggressive treatment. Bzzzzzt. I just purchased new glasses recently with a weaker perscription. I was surprised, but my optometrist told me that this is common. -- Neil Johnson http://www.njohnsn.com PGP key available on request. From adam at homeport.org Wed May 7 15:04:42 2003 From: adam at homeport.org (Adam Shostack) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 18:04:42 -0400 Subject: Sheeple Syndrome [was: Asperger's Syndrome] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030507220442.GA13733@lightship.internal.homeport.org> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 04:24:15PM -0400, Trei, Peter wrote: | --------------------- | Sheeple Syndrome: | | Characterized by an uncritical acceptance of | mass media messages, the SS sufferer is easily | led. | | Poor long term memory is a secondary trait. | | ------------------------ Smith's Syndrome is where the sufferer demonstrates an inability to remember things that didn't happen, in contravention of official truth. O'Brian's syndrome is the inability to understand that things witnessed by a person may not be true. -- "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -Hume From timcmay at got.net Wed May 7 18:44:36 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 18:44:36 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <9FF803E4-80F6-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 01:01 PM, Bill Frantz wrote: > At 7:05 AM -0700 5/6/03, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote: >> Tyler Durden wrote: >> >>> Likewise with governments. I still need my trash taken out, and for >>> potholes to be fixed. >> >> >> What makes you think government is needed at all for these? My trash >> is >> taken out by a private company, not by any government. And privately >> built and maintained roads have existed for a very long time. > > 120-130 years ago, there was a privately owned toll road between Los > Gatos > and Santa Cruz. Now there is a publicly owned road, with no toll, and > I > haven't heard much call to go back to the old days. Why are the vast > majority of people happy with the current situation? Some ideas: Why would anyone waste time arguing for something which absolutely could not happen in today's world? I'm serious. People spend time on things they think could be changed. This is why there is "not much call." There is also "not much call" to bring back indentured servitude, even though the arguments for it are compelling. It won't happen, period, short of some Mad Max meltdown, so arguing for it is a waste of neurons and chronons. --Tim May From eresrch at eskimo.com Wed May 7 18:52:43 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 18:52:43 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <3EB922B3.7971AE9C@cdc.gov> Message-ID: On Wed, 7 May 2003, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > At 07:48 AM 5/7/03 -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > >> chemicals in the environment today that mimic various hormones which > then cause > >> imbalances in animals, or, for instance, aluminum suspected in > alzhimers. Missed attribution - I think Harmon wrote that and I quoted him. > Al has been discredited, Alz is inherited, or inevitable > if your hydraulics keep you ticking that long (a recent > development). I think it's back to "we don't really know", but we may have a way to slow it down. > "Education" has been increasing, but industrial life means that > people can be stupider, because they are more shielded. > > See J. Diamond, http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/diamond/diamond_p1.html Thanks for that, interesting. > It is. Malaria kills 3e6 a year. But that's not > 3e6 industrials who die, and its industrials who make it. 3e6 out of 6e9 is pretty small. What's the stats on HIV? > The cigars that indians smoked kept bugs away, and with > an aboriginal life span the problems with smoking were > insignificant compared to the dangers of bugs. > > What is adaptive depends on your environment. What is your environment creates adaptation. > That probably applies to mental traits like ability to sit still, > tolerate presence of others, concentrate on abstract lines of > thought etc. 21st century schizoid man. Yeah, fire did a lot for primates! Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From eresrch at eskimo.com Wed May 7 19:04:30 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 19:04:30 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507150518.GB25086@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 7 May 2003, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Speaking of DDT, I've always wondered what effect that had on my life, > especially my nervous system. When I was a kid in South Carolina in the 50's, we > used to ride our bikes behind the spray truck for blocks every time it came > by. It was like being in a very, very thick fog. Hard to say because you were only exposed a few times. If you don't have any genetic triggers, it may have no effect at all. Not to mention all the other chemicals you've been exposed to that might couteract any effect, and lack of exposure to accelerants. I've seen pictures of DDT fogs at beaches crowded with people. At the time, it was considered harmless to humans. It may actually be harmless to us, it's just not harmless to everything else. A world without mosquitoes would be pretty bleak given how many other things eat them. Better to wipe out the malaria and swat the mosquitos! Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From sfurlong at acmenet.net Wed May 7 16:06:48 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 19:06:48 -0400 Subject: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) In-Reply-To: <001601c314da$4544aae0$6401a8c0@thiefdom> References: <001601c314da$4544aae0$6401a8c0@thiefdom> Message-ID: <200305071906.48685.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Wednesday 07 May 2003 16:50, Philip Gardner wrote: > "Well, even if that's true, he seems to be exposed to only pieces of > my posts that get quoted by others, and in this particular case out > of context." > > This is always happening to me. I can never follow the discussions > as I only recieve the quoted materials. Is there some other list I > should be signed up for as well? You can subscribe to Jim Choate's node, which is unmoderated and unfiltered. Go to http://einstein.ssz.com/cdr for info. Be warned: If you've been reading the cypherpunks feed from a filtered list (I don't know if Minder is filtered or not), you'll be in for an unpleasant surprise. There aren't _that_ many out-and-out idiots posting to the list, but what their posts lack in quality they more that make up with quantity. And there are lots of ass-wipes who sign up cypherpunks nodes for all sorts of spam lists. Before you subscribe to an unfiltered list, compare the inet-one cpunks archive (http://www.inet-one.com/cypherpunks/) to the archive I maintain (http://archives.abditum.com/cypherpunks/). inet-one archives an unfiltered feed. I archive LNE's filtered feed. (Note: as of ten seconds ago, inet-one's site is temporarily down. It's been a while since I visited, so I don't know how temporary "temporarily" is.) SRF -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From timcmay at got.net Wed May 7 19:10:57 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 19:10:57 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030508011703.GB26198@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <4E12877F-80FA-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 06:17 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Ah, yes, just think what the modern protective society is doing to > the gene > pool. Eyeglasses is just one example -- how many people today would > starve > quickly if thrown back into a hunting/gathering culture without their > specs? Except there's no strong evidence that people without glasses saw better a thousand years ago. Maybe 10 thousand years ago. A lot of the "eagle eyes" were just people with naturally 20-20 vision. In most European and Asian societies going way, way back, most people didn't need good long and near vision past a certain age. They held things close, they squinted, and likely they did OK even in hunting parties where the animals were herded over cliffs or into box canyons. Eyeglasses have become common only in the past 100 years (and arguably in the past 60 years, about since the time visits to eye doctors became common). While there have been jokes about "four eyes" not breeding, because they can't get dates, neither this theory nor the converse appear to have any correlation with actual breeding patterns. Do more kids today need glasses than 100 years ago? Than 500 years ago? Than 5000 years ago? An interesting question, but claims that the past 60-100 years of eyeglass wearing have caused some major change in genetics seems to be a stretch. > Or > just look at the difference in the last 100 years or so, where > children who were > "slow" were kept home on the farm, never married; whereas today they > move out on > their own, meet others like themselves, breed. And I'm not even > talking about > the welfare aspect, or the seriously retarded -- when I was a kid > there were a > lot of families with members who stayed home with the folks, or went > to live > with various relations, just a little too slow or too spooky. I agree that things are very different now. I look at the economic side, mostly. Once the slow, or the drunkardly, or the inept, served on farms and estates and kept the horses, did gardening, and so on. Today, we pay them to sit at home and eat Doritos while watching Oprah. And yard workers are hard to find, and expensive. (I just got in from a muddy and dirty day spent moving dirt and sand, spent planting a Minneola Tangelo, and a couple of shrubs. Nearly five hours out digging, shoveling, mixing soil with amendments and manure, digging holes, planting, soaking the root balls, then cleaning up. Which is why I'm now posting, five hours after going out, exhausted, but happy to be back online. And I did much the same a few days ago, and a few days before that, and so on. Those who have been to my house know I have 1.5 acres on a hilltop, and it needs a lot of work to keep the weeds and chapparal from encroaching. My point? The cheap labor--the retards, the shiftless, the drunks--is now being paid out of my taxes (approaching 60% of what I earn) to collect AFDC, welfare, and the catch-all "disability." We need to abolish all of these payments and make the 'tards, the drunks, the unskilled all realize they either hoe the land for a relative pittance or they starve.) (I would hire some of the illegal alien Mexicans who hang out at our local K-Mart except some of them have reportedly tumbled to the fact that they can do a day's work and then threaten to report their illegal work (no SSNs, no Disability Insurance, blah blah) to the INS, who is more interested in catching a gringo hiring wetbacks than in deporting the wetbacks. Also, there are injury scams to collect payouts from gringo suckas.) --Tim May From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Wed May 7 17:59:25 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 19:59:25 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: References: <20030507134232.GA24740@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030508005925.GA26198@cybershamanix.com> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 08:31:08AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 06:42 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > > Could be more sinister than that, an attempt to stigmatize thinkers > >as > >weird. Especially when you look at the phenomenon of the rise of ADD. > >When I was > >growing up, there was no such thing as ADD, and,indeed, I don't > >remember having > >kids in my school who exhibited those symtoms. There were dumb kids, > >of course, > >and daydreamers, but I don't recall the weirdly restless, buzzy kids > >you see so > >many of now. > > Same here. We pretty much stayed in our seats. None of the spontaneous > wandering around the room I have seen in video footage of today's kids. > Sure, some kids were more active than others, but nothing like what I > hear about and see today. > > > > > > So what caused ADD -- something in the water, like flouride? > > But they were polluting our essence back in the 1950s, when water > fluoridation and fluoride toothpaste became common. True, well, almost -- there was a lot of resistence and various areas delayed until well into the 60's-70's. And some perhaps never did. At any rate, I don't think I was ever exposed to fluoride until an adult. > > > >Or some food > >additive, or some form of pollution? We know that there are a number of > >chemicals in the environment today that mimic various hormones which > >then cause > >imbalances in animals, or, for instance, aluminum suspected in > >alzhimers. > > Aluminum frying pans? Teflon? Aluminum pans are a serious no-no, regardless whether they defintely cause alzhimers or not. Once I tried the "take a dark, well-oxidized cooking pan, cook some tomatoes in it" test, I never cooked with Al again. Just read about the new findings of good old teflon migration. Freaky. > > Or, more likely: endless gallons of sugar water. When I was a kid, a > 6-ounce bottle of Coca Cola was a special treat. (Though I recall we > drank a fair amount of Kool-Aid. And Fizzies, before they were banned.) > Today's kids tank up on Big Gulps and Supersize It! 32-ounce portions. > Even soda vending machines in the schools, and soft drinks served with > lunch. > Well, yes, I'm sure the inordinate amounts of sugar has an serious effect. Not to mention all the other weird little additives in candy and pop that humans never evolved with. > Likewise, a lot more fast food today. Where once it was a treat to go > to a burger place, now they dot the landscape and many kids eat at them > nearly every day. > > And lack of discipline is probably a big factor. If teachers simply > told the kids to sit down and stop fidgeting, as they did with us, > maybe there would be fewer of these alleged ADHD cases. > Yup, for sure. I like kids but I'd never want to teach K-12 these days, most kids seem to have no discipline whatsoever, and I don't have that much patience. > But the single most likely reason for the rise in alleged ADHD cases is > the pharmaceutical industry. And job security for the "psychiatric > staff" at K12 schools. Where once there was a nurse bandaging cuts and > scrapes, now there's a staff of psychobabblers and sexuality counselors. > Well, that's sort of what I was getting at. ADHD becomes the norm and the normal kid becomes the weirdo. I remember getting so involved in reading that I'd sometimes not hear the bell and still be sitting there when the class got up and left. Nowadays that sort of behavior would likely get you a visit to the principals office and a piss test. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From john at kozubik.com Wed May 7 20:03:40 2003 From: john at kozubik.com (John Kozubik) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 20:03:40 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <4E12877F-80FA-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030507195555.T66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> > Eyeglasses have become common only in the past 100 years (and arguably > in the past 60 years, about since the time visits to eye doctors became > common). While there have been jokes about "four eyes" not breeding, > because they can't get dates, neither this theory nor the converse > appear to have any correlation with actual breeding patterns. Do more > kids today need glasses than 100 years ago? Than 500 years ago? Than > 5000 years ago? An interesting question, but claims that the past > 60-100 years of eyeglass wearing have caused some major change in > genetics seems to be a stretch. Another possibility is that a large population of those with corrected vision had their vision slowly degraded by the early applications of the correction. I have no experience with vision correction, but I know anecdotally that most people with corrected vision need their corrections strengthened throughout their lifetime. In reality, their sight problem may have stabilized (or even improved) very early on in the absence of treatment. Thus, our perception of what sight abilities the average person in the United States has might be artificially deflated by early and aggressive treatment. Imagine putting back braces on all children that exhibited minor scoliosis - and asking them to leave it there all their life. If this were common, we might be speaking about how back strength and lifting ability must not be what they used to be... ----- John Kozubik - john at kozubik.com - http://www.kozubik.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Wed May 7 18:17:03 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 20:17:03 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <3EB922B3.7971AE9C@cdc.gov> References: <3EB922B3.7971AE9C@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <20030508011703.GB26198@cybershamanix.com> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 08:13:55AM -0700, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > At 07:48 AM 5/7/03 -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > >> chemicals in the environment today that mimic various hormones which > then cause > >> imbalances in animals, or, for instance, aluminum suspected in > alzhimers. > > Al has been discredited, By some. It is, however, a poison, and one that migrates into any even slightly acidic food. > Alz is inherited, or inevitable > if your hydraulics keep you ticking that long (a recent > development). Nonsense. There are far too many very old people with no evidence of alzhimers. They used to say the same thing about senility and dementia, until it was shown that the primary problems were diet and/or a lack of stimulation. And also a problem with -- can't recall the term, but it's a loss of stomach enzymes that absorb B12. (snip) > > >Dumbing down of Americans has been going on for a long time. But I'm > >not sure that's real either. How long have the majority of people been > > >going past 8th grade education? > > "Education" has been increasing, but industrial life means that > people can be stupider, because they are more shielded. > > See J. Diamond, http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/diamond/diamond_p1.html > Ah, yes, just think what the modern protective society is doing to the gene pool. Eyeglasses is just one example -- how many people today would starve quickly if thrown back into a hunting/gathering culture without their specs? Or just look at the difference in the last 100 years or so, where children who were "slow" were kept home on the farm, never married; whereas today they move out on their own, meet others like themselves, breed. And I'm not even talking about the welfare aspect, or the seriously retarded -- when I was a kid there were a lot of families with members who stayed home with the folks, or went to live with various relations, just a little too slow or too spooky. (snip) -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Wed May 7 18:19:44 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 20:19:44 -0500 Subject: Iris scanning In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030507110102.02d6c8e0@idiom.com> References: <20030507140834.GA24907@cybershamanix.com> <5.1.1.6.2.20030507110102.02d6c8e0@idiom.com> Message-ID: <20030508011944.GC26198@cybershamanix.com> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 11:04:34AM -0700, Bill Stewart wrote: > > > >http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3003571.stm > > One thing the article said was: > > The report found that iris recognition did better than most > > but one manufacturer's claim of a 0.5% false identification rate > > ballooned to 6% during the DOD tests. > > > With 13 million people currently on the FBI's watch list, > > any large scale biometric system could mean millions of people > > being detained when crossing borders. > > While the point they're trying to make is about false positives, > the THIRTEEN MILLION PEOPLE ON THE FBI WATCH LIST just kind of slides by. > That's equal to 5% of the US population, on Federal watch lists. > (Yes, obviously some of those are foreigners, but then half the US > population > are young enough that hopefully almost none of them attract > Federal attention...) > What an outrage! Yes, I noticed that. I was wondering (hoping, actually) that a large portion of those were outside the US, but even so... -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From john at kozubik.com Wed May 7 20:41:28 2003 From: john at kozubik.com (John Kozubik) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 20:41:28 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <200305071743.45415.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> Message-ID: <20030507203527.J66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> On Wed, 7 May 2003, Neil Johnson wrote: > > Another possibility is that a large population of those with corrected > > vision had their vision slowly degraded by the early applications of the > > correction. I have no experience with vision correction, but I know > > anecdotally that most people with corrected vision need their corrections > > strengthened throughout their lifetime. In reality, their sight problem > > may have stabilized (or even improved) very early on in the absence of > > treatment. Thus, our perception of what sight abilities the average > > person in the United States has might be artificially deflated by early > > and aggressive treatment. > > Bzzzzzt. I just purchased new glasses recently with a weaker perscription. > I was surprised, but my optometrist told me that this is common. Well, just speculation on my part - I am no professional in this area. However, did he discuss _how_ common it is ? Just because it is common does not mean it is the norm. Further, if your recent vision improvements leave you now with a level of vision that still represents a retrograde motion (albeit smaller) since you first got corrected, it could still be consistent with my uninformed musing. ----- John Kozubik - john at kozubik.com - http://www.kozubik.com From timcmay at got.net Wed May 7 20:52:12 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 20:52:12 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507195555.T66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> Message-ID: <7314078C-8108-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 08:03 PM, John Kozubik wrote: >> Eyeglasses have become common only in the past 100 years (and arguably >> in the past 60 years, about since the time visits to eye doctors >> became >> common). While there have been jokes about "four eyes" not breeding, >> because they can't get dates, neither this theory nor the converse >> appear to have any correlation with actual breeding patterns. Do more >> kids today need glasses than 100 years ago? Than 500 years ago? Than >> 5000 years ago? An interesting question, but claims that the past >> 60-100 years of eyeglass wearing have caused some major change in >> genetics seems to be a stretch. > > Another possibility is that a large population of those with corrected > vision had their vision slowly degraded by the early applications of > the > correction. I have no experience with vision correction, but I know > anecdotally that most people with corrected vision need their > corrections > strengthened throughout their lifetime. In reality, their sight > problem > may have stabilized (or even improved) very early on in the absence of > treatment. Thus, our perception of what sight abilities the average > person in the United States has might be artificially deflated by early > and aggressive treatment. And equally anecdotally, my prescription has changed very little since when I was 14, when I first got glasses. I am now 51 and I can easily wear my glasses from 20 years ago as a backup pair. (Somewhere I have my old John Lennon-style glasses from _32_ years ago, and they are close to my current prescription.) Wearing glasses has not worsened my vision, and I doubt strongly that _not_ wearing glasses would improve my vision...though it might make me squint and strain and pull my eyes the way the girls in high school used to do to see the blackboard. I don't see any evidence that wearing glasses weakens eyes...the issue of vision correction is primarily one of eyeball shape, not the muscles which can, through squinting and straining, improve vision. Most people become nearsighted if they are young and lose their 20-20 vision. Some become farsighted. I see no evidence that those who become nearsighted when they are young would keep their good vision if only they skipped getting glasses. (I did notice a very large fraction of the girls in my high school squinting and using their fingers to pull their eyes, this to avoid wearing glasses. Perhaps this is why so many of them did so poorly in class? The several girls who did well in our school all wore glasses. The cheerleaders didn't, except for one, but they all got pregnant shortly after graduation and worked for Piggly-Wiggly and various banks, as tellers.) If you have some real evidence that wearing glasses is the cause of poor vision, I'm all ears, so to speak. --Tim May "Stupidity is not a sin, the victim can't help being stupid. But stupidity is the only universal crime; the sentence is death, there is no appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity." --Robert A. Heinlein From adam at cypherspace.org Wed May 7 13:09:04 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 21:09:04 +0100 Subject: lucre double-blinding? (Re: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking) In-Reply-To: <3443e0018bc7f85f8ece3ff2635bad7c@dizum.com>; from nobody@dizum.com on Wed, May 07, 2003 at 10:00:02AM +0200 References: <3443e0018bc7f85f8ece3ff2635bad7c@dizum.com> Message-ID: <20030507210904.A8962250@exeter.ac.uk> Yes I remember the introduction of a 2nd blinding factor, your other post in the thread where you reposted the remaining issues with taggability jogged my memory; just the terminology threw me. (Probably more proper to call it the introduction of another blinding factor -- the result is just more effectively blinded -- Brands constructs use 3 blinding factors in some scenarios for example and that is still considered blinded not "triple-blinded") Brands has an optimization of his scheme where (as the user receiving a coin) you have the option of not bothering to perform one of the verifications, the weaker assurance being you are still assured that the bank can't distinguish between tagged coins, though it can distinguish an untagged coin from a tagged coin. However as with Lucre I don't find this very convincing because the bank can still tag one person at a time. If you add in the general lack of connection anonymity, it could certainly be used to confirm suspicions and probably to effectively tag multiple users at once. So I would consider the lucre two blinding factor approach still flawed. Adam On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 10:00:02AM +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote: > A Back asks: > > It's been a while since I looked at the Lucre white paper but > > extrapolating from the Chaum context doesn't double blinding mean the > > payer and payee have to be simultaneously online with the bank? > > No, this is something else. It just means that two random numbers rather > than one are used to blind the data when it is sent to the bank to be > signed (oops, "transformed"). Doing this makes it impossible for the bank > to recognize deposited coins even if it misbehaves. Earlier proposals > that used a single random blinding factor were shown to be inadequate. From john at kozubik.com Wed May 7 21:25:22 2003 From: john at kozubik.com (John Kozubik) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 21:25:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <7314078C-8108-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030507212136.J66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> > If you have some real evidence that wearing glasses is the cause of > poor vision, I'm all ears, so to speak. I have none. I'm happy to say, however, that my anecdotal knowledge of this subject has just been greatly increased over the course of the last hour reading these posts. ----- John Kozubik - john at kozubik.com - http://www.kozubik.com From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Wed May 7 20:13:06 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 22:13:06 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Physics News Update 636 (fwd) Message-ID: ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 11:48:12 -0400 From: physnews at aip.org To: ravage at SSZ.COM Subject: Physics News Update 636 PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE The American Institute of Physics Bulletin of Physics News Number 636 May 7, 2003 by Phillip F. Schewe, Ben Stein, and James Riordon ULTRA-LOW-ENERGY ELECTRONS CAN BREAK UP URACIL, a new study shows. How injurious is radiation (alpha, beta, and gamma rays or heavy ions) to living cells? This important question has been addressed in many ways. Much attention has centered on the secondary particles produced in the wake of the intruding primary radiation, especially electrons (about 40,000 electrons are produced for each MeV of energy deposited) with typical energies of tens of electron volts. Many of these secondary particles quickly lose their energy and become attached (solvated) to water molecules in the cell. What is the general effect of electron energies below 20 eV? A report from three years ago (Boudaiffa et al., Science 287, 1658, 2000) showed that electrons in the 3-20 eV range are able to produce substantial genotoxic damage, including breaking single- and double-stranded DNA? What about secondary electrons with even smaller energies? To look at this energy range for the first time, Tilmann Maerk and his colleagues at the Universitat Innsbruck (Austria) and the University Claude Bernard Lyon (France) scattered a beam of sub-eV electrons from a beam of gaseous uracil molecules. Uracil is one of the base units of RNA molecules, and is thus a crucial component in cells. These scientists found that uracil is efficiently fragmented by electrons with energies as small as milli-electron-volts. It's not the electron's kinetic energy that causes the disruption, but the electron's charge, which changes the uracil's internal potential energy environment. Furthermore, in the process a very mobile atomic hydrogen can be freed, which on its own, as a radical (a free chemical unit by itself), can do damage to biomolecules (see a movie of this process at http://info.uibk.ac.at/ionenphysik/ClusterGroup/Uracil.html; schematic at http://www.aip.org/mgr/png/2003/187.htm ). Maerk (tilmann.maerk at uibk.ac.at, 43-512-507-6240) says that this low-energy damage seems to be a general result since his group has since performed similar work with thymine (a DNA base) and have seen similar fragmentation. (Hanel et al., Physical Review Letters, 9 May 2003; Innsbruck website, http://info.uibk.ac.at/c/c7/c722/e-index.html ) PERFECT INSULIN CRYSTALS. {SSZ: Text deleted] THE TINIEST SOLID-STATE LIGHT EMITTER, produced by Phaedon Avouris and his colleagues at IBM, consists of a single-walled carbon nanotube (NT) strung between two electrodes, and controlled by a third. The business part of this minuscule transistor is a nanotube only 1.4 nm wide and tailored to be semiconducting. In this arena electrons coming from one electrode meet with positively charged "holes" coming from the other electrode. When the two species meet they combine and emit a tiny burst of light. This light is conveniently engineered to be at a wavelength of 1.5 microns, invisible to the human eye but perfect for photonic applications. Why use a NT when a larger piece of bulk semiconductor could also produce light? Because of the potentially much greater energy efficiency and compactness of the light emitting region. Single-molecule light emission has been instigated before, but not under the auspices of solid state wiring. The NT wire also seems to be robust: it is able to carry 6 micro-amps of current, for a current density of more than 100 million amps per square cm. (Misewich et al., Science 2 May 2003.) *********** PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE is a digest of physics news items arising from physics meetings, physics journals, newspapers and magazines, and other news sources. It is provided free of charge as a way of broadly disseminating information about physics and physicists. For that reason, you are free to post it, if you like, where others can read it, providing only that you credit AIP. Physics News Update appears approximately once a week. AUTO-SUBSCRIPTION OR DELETION: By using the expression "subscribe physnews" in your e-mail message, you will have automatically added the address from which your message was sent to the distribution list for Physics News Update. If you use the "signoff physnews" expression in your e-mail message, the address in your message header will be deleted from the distribution list. Please send your message to: listserv at listserv.aip.org (Leave the "Subject:" line blank.) From jamesd at echeque.com Wed May 7 23:24:14 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 23:24:14 -0700 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism: "Obvious" it ain't. In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <3EB9959E.30574.5DC3DF0@localhost> -- James Donald: > > Used to be that in the third world most people were skinny, > > so fat was a status symbol. Now diet books are outselling > > cookbooks, and Rubenesque women are everywhere out of > > fashion. Tyler Durden > Uh, where? In China? In India? Indonesia? Yes. > ANd despite the economic advances of, say, China, outside > coastal regions acquiring enough calories is still a > challenge. A challenge that these days most people meet, and a distressingly large number of people more than meet. iIt used to the be that the third world was visibly getting less skinny. Now it is visibly getting fatter. I could post statistics, but better still, you should look through the photos posted by a chinese introduction agency. Search for Indonesian and Chinese. They are not as fat as us westerners, but they are still too damned fat. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG u7MUgz0PmLBdrqWGV2kE4UCthb6a5Sy2PBf9bEbL 42S4QEWW/Lu0b55LEaa86Qc82eSdITP6tswo9H4eI From roy at rant-central.com Wed May 7 21:28:05 2003 From: roy at rant-central.com (Roy M.Silvernail) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 23:28:05 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507203527.J66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> References: <20030507203527.J66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> Message-ID: <20030508042806.7FA01111A1@rant-central.com> On Wednesday 07 May 2003 10:41 pm, John Kozubik wrote: > On Wed, 7 May 2003, Neil Johnson wrote: > > Bzzzzzt. I just purchased new glasses recently with a weaker > > perscription. I was surprised, but my optometrist told me that this is > > common. > > Well, just speculation on my part - I am no professional in this area. > However, did he discuss _how_ common it is ? Just because it is common > does not mean it is the norm. This is common in nearsighted persons. One tends to farsightedness in ones older age. For a nearsighted person, that equates to vision closer to nominal. It happened to my mother, and judging by the relative flatness of my prescription over the last 7 years (compared with the previous 30), it will happen to me. From adam at cypherspace.org Wed May 7 15:53:30 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 23:53:30 +0100 Subject: Capitalism and monopolism In-Reply-To: ; from frantz@pwpconsult.com on Mon, May 05, 2003 at 10:42:07PM -0700 References: <8DFD1896-7CE5-11D7-8AFB-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030504231737.A8601828@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <20030507235330.A8821881@exeter.ac.uk> The RIAA execesses are bad, but my point is that government is worse: imagine what the government could do to the music industry if it converted it into a state-run monopoly. What is worse about governments is that they are not even optimized for profitability (of the economy as a whole, viz 50%+ marginal tax rates with most of the proceeds burnt off with no retained value for anyone). Also virtual monopolies on the business side are not monopolies in the same way that government is: you can buy independent music, you can not buy music distributed by the most abusive distributors etc. Adam On Mon, May 05, 2003 at 10:42:07PM -0700, Bill Frantz wrote: > At 3:17 PM -0700 5/4/03, Adam Back wrote: > >As to virtual monopolies being worse than government: I disagree > >businesses aim to maximise profit margin and this places a limit on > >the depths of unethical and bad for the individual behavior they can > >do. They won't do it becaues it's not profitable: unhappy customers > >are not good business. > > Remind me how this relates to the relations between the RIAA, the people > who write/perform music, and the people who listen. From jtrjtrjtr2001 at yahoo.com Wed May 7 23:55:34 2003 From: jtrjtrjtr2001 at yahoo.com (Sarad AV) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 23:55:34 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome Message-ID: <20030508065534.2261.qmail@web21205.mail.yahoo.com> That should be some good use for a common citizen of a swat team :) Sarath. >A world without mosquitoes would be pretty bleak >given how many other >things eat them. Better to wipe out the malaria and >swat the >mosquitos! >Patience, persistence, truth, >Dr. mike __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo. http://search.yahoo.com From jtrjtrjtr2001 at yahoo.com Wed May 7 23:59:07 2003 From: jtrjtrjtr2001 at yahoo.com (Sarad AV) Date: Wed, 7 May 2003 23:59:07 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Iris scanning In-Reply-To: <20030508011944.GC26198@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030508065907.39507.qmail@web21210.mail.yahoo.com> hi, Thats the fuzzy factor and that limits the scope of iris scanning.By the way how many people really get caught by iris scans? Sarath. --- Harmon Seaver wrote: > On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 11:04:34AM -0700, Bill > Stewart wrote: > > > > > >http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3003571.stm > > > > One thing the article said was: > > > The report found that iris recognition > did better than most > > > but one manufacturer's claim of a 0.5% > false identification rate > > > ballooned to 6% during the DOD tests. > > > > > With 13 million people currently on the > FBI's watch list, > > > any large scale biometric system could > mean millions of people > > > being detained when crossing borders. > > > > While the point they're trying to make is about > false positives, > > the THIRTEEN MILLION PEOPLE ON THE FBI WATCH LIST > just kind of slides by. > > That's equal to 5% of the US population, on > Federal watch lists. > > (Yes, obviously some of those are > foreigners, but then half the US > > population > > are young enough that hopefully almost > none of them attract > > Federal attention...) > > What an outrage! > > > Yes, I noticed that. I was wondering (hoping, > actually) that a large portion > of those were outside the US, but even so... > > > -- > Harmon Seaver > CyberShamanix > http://www.cybershamanix.com > __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo. http://search.yahoo.com From jal at jal.org Thu May 8 01:18:21 2003 From: jal at jal.org (Jamie Lawrence) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 03:18:21 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030507195555.T66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> References: <4E12877F-80FA-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030507195555.T66029-100000@www.kozubik.com> Message-ID: <20030508081821.GB4093@jal.clueinc.net> On Wed, 07 May 2003, John Kozubik wrote: > > Eyeglasses have become common only in the past 100 years (and arguably > > in the past 60 years, about since the time visits to eye doctors became > > common). While there have been jokes about "four eyes" not breeding, > > Another possibility is that a large population of those with corrected > vision had their vision slowly degraded by the early applications of the > correction. I have no experience with vision correction, but I know > anecdotally that most people with corrected vision need their corrections > strengthened throughout their lifetime. In reality, their sight problem I'm not sure that that's true. I'm certainly not a test case, and I won't hold up my circle of friends as one either. But, being someone who just turned 30 and finding that my prescription is drifting back in the general direction of "normal", I find that an odd assertion. I try to code for a living, when I'm not solving the getting-projects-to-code problem. That involves me staring at a terminal about 14 hours a day, on average. And my vision is getting better. -j -- Jamie Lawrence jal at jal.org First law of debate: Never argue with a fool. People might not know the difference. From declan at well.com Thu May 8 04:27:33 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 07:27:33 -0400 Subject: Overestimating your importance (Was: Re: CDR: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy) In-Reply-To: <20030507181249.GI16535@jal.clueinc.net>; from jal@jal.org on Wed, May 07, 2003 at 01:12:49PM -0500 References: <20030507181249.GI16535@jal.clueinc.net> Message-ID: <20030508072733.A27509@cluebot.com> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 01:12:49PM -0500, Jamie Lawrence wrote: > I can't speak for Tim, but ranting about list politics is something that > gets you into *my* procmailrc rather quickly. I haven't added you next > to Choate and profv yet, as you sometimes have a point, but keep working > it, and the cost of your postings will outweigh the utility of reading > them. Will you then rant about Jamie's killfile? Or mine? I only have two entries in my killfile at this point (and I subscribe to the lne.com node, so reading the list is far more pleasant than it was a few years ago). Jamie makes a good point: Complaining about someone's killfile does not make for interesting reading or compelling discussion. Give it up and move on or be ignored, I'd say. -Declan From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 8 07:01:38 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 09:01:38 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: References: <20030507150518.GB25086@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030508140138.GA27624@cybershamanix.com> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 07:04:30PM -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > On Wed, 7 May 2003, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > > Speaking of DDT, I've always wondered what effect that had on my life, > > especially my nervous system. When I was a kid in South Carolina in the 50's, we > > used to ride our bikes behind the spray truck for blocks every time it came > > by. It was like being in a very, very thick fog. > > Hard to say because you were only exposed a few times. If you don't have > any genetic triggers, it may have no effect at all. Not to mention all > the other chemicals you've been exposed to that might couteract any > effect, and lack of exposure to accelerants. I've seen pictures of DDT > fogs at beaches crowded with people. At the time, it was considered > harmless to humans. It may actually be harmless to us, it's just not > harmless to everything else. Or OTOH, it could have done some strange things to entire generations of humans. Nerve agents being what they are, I wonder if there's ever been a serious neurological study? > > A world without mosquitoes would be pretty bleak given how many other > things eat them. Better to wipe out the malaria and swat the mosquitos! > Yes, having lived for a long time in northern MN where there has never been any spraying for bugs, and where they are far more numerous than in most of the US, I've never been all that bothered by mosquitoes. Black flies are worse, but for a shorter season. We also discovered that if you don't use scented soaps and shampoos, perfumes, etc, you aren't bothered nearly so much. We also didn't use repellent much at all, just a drop or two on the shirt collar and/or cap when they were really bad, and, if you were working in the garden in the evening, a bug headnet was great. It's also a matter of temperament, it was funny to notice how tourists would start flapping around, attracting a cloud of bugs, while you'd stand nearby unaffected, and using no repellent. I doubt the indigs were bothered all that much. Of course, malaria and yellow fever were a problem in the far south, but most of NA doesn't have that problem. West Nile virus is now spreading around, but a large scale study of dead birds on the East Coast determined that most were killed by ag chemicals, not the virus. > Patience, persistence, truth, > Dr. mike -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From ben at algroup.co.uk Thu May 8 01:05:18 2003 From: ben at algroup.co.uk (Ben Laurie) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 09:05:18 +0100 Subject: lucre double-blinding? (Re: Crypto-making vs Crypto-breaking) In-Reply-To: <20030507210904.A8962250@exeter.ac.uk> References: <3443e0018bc7f85f8ece3ff2635bad7c@dizum.com> <20030507210904.A8962250@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <3EBA0FBE.8010800@algroup.co.uk> Adam Back wrote: > Yes I remember the introduction of a 2nd blinding factor, your other > post in the thread where you reposted the remaining issues with > taggability jogged my memory; just the terminology threw me. > > (Probably more proper to call it the introduction of another blinding > factor -- the result is just more effectively blinded -- Brands > constructs use 3 blinding factors in some scenarios for example and > that is still considered blinded not "triple-blinded") 2-factor blinding might be a better way to express it. > Brands has an optimization of his scheme where (as the user receiving > a coin) you have the option of not bothering to perform one of the > verifications, the weaker assurance being you are still assured that > the bank can't distinguish between tagged coins, though it can > distinguish an untagged coin from a tagged coin. > > However as with Lucre I don't find this very convincing because the > bank can still tag one person at a time. If you add in the general > lack of connection anonymity, it could certainly be used to confirm > suspicions and probably to effectively tag multiple users at once. > > So I would consider the lucre two blinding factor approach still > flawed. As I mentioned in another post, the bank either has to reveal its subterfuge, or honour forged coins, so I'm not convinced. Anyway, the ZK proof is available if you want to use it. Cheers, Ben. -- http://www.apache-ssl.org/ben.html http://www.thebunker.net/ "There is no limit to what a man can do or how far he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." - Robert Woodruff From timcmay at got.net Thu May 8 09:17:18 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 09:17:18 -0700 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030508142147.GA27684@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Thursday, May 8, 2003, at 07:21 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > When we were working with the local gov't community garden > committee, and suggested that they quit applying chemical fertilzers > and > pesticides to the garden areas, noting that the Madison community > gardens had > gone organic 30 years ago, one of them stated "Oh, but that's > Madison." Finally > got them to stop the chemicals, but they still insist on coming in > every Spring > with heavy equipment to plow up all the plots, and, given the wet clay > soil > there, can't do that until very late, so people aren't allowed into > their plots > until May 25 -- in an area where you want to plant potatoes and peas > mid > April. Our suggestions that people just be allowed to do it themselves > with > tillers or by hand as they do elsewhere came to naught -- "But we've > always done > it that way." This is a minor, but illustrative, example of why the problem is best fixed by property rights, not collectivism. (Funny, the word "collectivism" rarely pops up here. We ought to use it more, as it better describes a bunch of things we often call socialism.) On your own property, in your own garden, one doesn't have to argue with committees and government officials and city councils about spraying or when one can start working the soil. This is the commons problem cropping up again in this common garden. Me, I have my own garden plot on my own land. And even if I didn't own land, working out a deal with someone who _did_ have land would be preferable to working in a so-called "community garden." (We have a few here in Santa Cruz. Bums and winos make a token effort to stand around and rake. Mostly it's an excuse for community money to be handed out to the "farmers." I've also walked past the weed-choked community garden in Berkeley, on the site of "People's Park," IIRC. Skanks and bums. New slogan for these urban community gardens: "Hoes fo da hoes! --Tim May, Citizen-unit of of the once free United States " The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. "--Thomas Jefferson, 1787 From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 8 07:21:47 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 09:21:47 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: References: <20030507134232.GA24740@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030508142147.GA27684@cybershamanix.com> On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 07:48:29AM -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > On Wed, 7 May 2003, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > > Could be more sinister than that, an attempt to stigmatize thinkers as > > weird. Especially when you look at the phenomenon of the rise of ADD. When I was > > growing up, there was no such thing as ADD, and,indeed, I don't remember having > > kids in my school who exhibited those symtoms. There were dumb kids, of course, > > and daydreamers, but I don't recall the weirdly restless, buzzy kids you see so > > many of now. > > So what caused ADD -- something in the water, like flouride? Or some food > > additive, or some form of pollution? We know that there are a number of > > Sugar. That's all. Kids get really hyper when fed tons of soda, candy > and chocolate. Certainly sugar has a large effect, chocolate, however, should be soothing. > There's a good example of how to eliminate the problem > right here in Wisconsin - the Appleton (or Oshkosh, but there abouts) definitely not Oshkosh, such inovation would never be allowed by city officials. People here are too dumb to ever come up with such an idea anyway, it would have to become the norm everywhere else for a few years before it would be adopted here. When we were working with the local gov't community garden committee, and suggested that they quit applying chemical fertilzers and pesticides to the garden areas, noting that the Madison community gardens had gone organic 30 years ago, one of them stated "Oh, but that's Madison." Finally got them to stop the chemicals, but they still insist on coming in every Spring with heavy equipment to plow up all the plots, and, given the wet clay soil there, can't do that until very late, so people aren't allowed into their plots until May 25 -- in an area where you want to plant potatoes and peas mid April. Our suggestions that people just be allowed to do it themselves with tillers or by hand as they do elsewhere came to naught -- "But we've always done it that way." > school systems have gone to feeding kids bread, carrots and milk several > times during the day, and have no behavioural problems. Getting the > obvious to be seen in Madison is quite a chore! > (snip) -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From mv at cdc.gov Thu May 8 09:33:19 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 09:33:19 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome Message-ID: <3EBA86CF.B4970D94@cdc.gov> At 08:41 PM 5/7/03 -0700, John Kozubik wrote: >However, did he discuss _how_ common it is ? Just because it is common >does not mean it is the norm. Probably means "don't count on it, but I've seen it many times before". >leave you now with a level of vision that still represents a retrograde >motion (albeit smaller) since you first got corrected, it could still be >consistent with my uninformed musing. Its well known that folks become far-sighted (short-armed 8-) with age. Its well known that close-work leads to near-sightedness, or you might just be born with it. So you might think they would cross over at some point --leading to retrograde acuity. I'm nearing 40 and it hasn't happened yet, though I haven't asked my optometrist to plot the second derivative of my resolution. Its encouraging to find that Neil is benefitting from age. He chose better ancestors in that respect than me. From mv at cdc.gov Thu May 8 09:45:18 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 09:45:18 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome Message-ID: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> At 07:04 PM 5/7/03 -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: >A world without mosquitoes would be pretty bleak given how many other >things eat them. Better to wipe out the malaria and swat the mosquitos! Still, you're in the minority. If one could kill all the blood-biting mosquitoes without killing other bugs, birds, 'gators, etc it would be a good thing. Even if you eliminated malaria its not a good vector to have around. And I bet most people would accept losing a very few species, or reducing the productivity of mosquito areas (probably temporarily), to get rid of the mosquito. Throw in poison ivy/oak extinction to convince most of the greens who hike and you've got a winner :-) --- "When one tugs at a single thing in Nature, he finds it hitched to the rest of the Universe" - John Muir --- You can buy patented mice and you're not allowed to copy them. -the state of bio IP From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Thu May 8 07:02:24 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 10:02:24 -0400 Subject: Sheeple Syndrome [was: Asperger's Syndrome] Message-ID: >Smith's Syndrome is where the sufferer demonstrates an inability to >remember things that didn't happen, in contravention of official >truth. So you're saying that "sleeper cells" have something biologically wrong with them? Perhaps they should be quarantined... -TD _________________________________________________________________ Protect your PC - get McAfee.com VirusScan Online http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=3963 From njohnsn at njohnsn.com Thu May 8 08:19:54 2003 From: njohnsn at njohnsn.com (Neil Johnson) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 10:19:54 -0500 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305081019.54569.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> The community gardens near where my folks live are an excellent example of socialism. Gardners spend hours all spring and summer tending their plants, hauling water in old milk jugs, weeding and fertilizing, just have the "fruits" of their labor stolen by freeloaders or smashed by vandals. And the saddest lesson is the fact that the garderners come back year after year. -- Neil Johnson http://www.njohnsn.com PGP key available on request. From njohnsn at njohnsn.com Thu May 8 08:27:31 2003 From: njohnsn at njohnsn.com (Neil Johnson) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 10:27:31 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030508174749.GA32103@shiva.localnet.fake> References: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> <20030508174749.GA32103@shiva.localnet.fake> Message-ID: <200305081027.31260.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> On Thursday 08 May 2003 12:47 pm, harlequin wrote: > > I think that this is the whole point. It's impossible to tell what effect > removing a species from an ecosystem will have due to the phenomenal > complexity of the system. Just removing the mosquito _appears_ to have very > little effect, but the wider ramifications of such an action could be > disastrous. > Not to mention removing the only reason earth hasn't been destroyed by aliens! [1] [1] Watch the movie "Lilo and Stitch" (That was 90 minutes of my life I wish I hadn't wasted). :) -- Neil Johnson http://www.njohnsn.com PGP key available on request. From eresrch at eskimo.com Thu May 8 10:37:52 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 10:37:52 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> Message-ID: On Thu, 8 May 2003, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > And I bet most people would accept losing a very few species, or > reducing > the productivity of mosquito areas (probably temporarily), to get rid > of the mosquito. Throw in poison ivy/oak extinction to convince most of > the greens > who hike and you've got a winner :-) Yeah, the woods are thick with greens around here. All of them hypocrites who'd love that form of extinction! :-) Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From barabbus at hushmail.com Thu May 8 11:19:15 2003 From: barabbus at hushmail.com (barabbus at hushmail.com) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 11:19:15 -0700 Subject: Some CA elected officials need killing Message-ID: <200305081819.h48IJGJN066667@mailserver3.hushmail.com> On Tue, 06 May 2003 18:53:39 -0700 Neil Johnson wrote: >On Tuesday 06 May 2003 12:34 am, barabbus at hushmail.com wrote: >> [Can anyone post meatspace identity data (home address, bus, home >and >> cell numbers, SSN, auto licens numbres, recent photos, including >family)for >> the accused? >> > > >Oh Looky ! Looks like they are trying a new tact now that they >have figured >out the "How do I build a B*o$o#m%b ?" crap won't work. If you're suggesting my request was a baiting or part of some sort of sting, nothing could be further from the truth. B Concerned about your privacy? Follow this link to get FREE encrypted email: https://www.hushmail.com/?l=2 Free, ultra-private instant messaging with Hush Messenger https://www.hushmail.com/services.php?subloc=messenger&l=434 Big $$$ to be made with the HushMail Affiliate Program: https://www.hushmail.com/about.php?subloc=affiliate&l=427 From eresrch at eskimo.com Thu May 8 11:40:38 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 11:40:38 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030508174749.GA32103@shiva.localnet.fake> Message-ID: On Thu, 8 May 2003, harlequin wrote: > *delurking for the first time* Welcome to the insane asylum :-) > I think that this is the whole point. It's impossible to tell what >effect removing a species from an ecosystem will have due to the >phenomenal complexity of the system. Just removing the mosquito _appears_ >to have very little effect, but the wider ramifications of such an action >could be disastrous. > > It may well be that the desire to preserve the mosquito is in the >minority, but amongst those who actually understand the possible >implications I would suspect that there is a different viewpoint. Yup, Muir's quote hit that too. It's interesting that pathogens are learning how to bypass their normal vectors and going straight for the target (HIV and SARS come to mind). Plague rode on fleas that rode on rats, and it covered the planet. SARS rides the host on airplanes and covers the planet a hell of a lot faster. Ebola is fortunatly self limiting, but seems to be wiping out all primates in its zone of influence. Let's hope that thing doesn't learn a better vector! Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 8 11:04:50 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 13:04:50 -0500 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <20030508142147.GA27684@cybershamanix.com> <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030508180450.GA27737@cybershamanix.com> On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 09:17:18AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > > This is a minor, but illustrative, example of why the problem is best > fixed by property rights, not collectivism. Yup, for sure, but community gardens are a nice answer for city dwellers. We own property in the city, but the house takes up 90% of the land, no room for any real garden other than shrubs and flowers. We have no lawn to mow. We also have 40 acres, half fields/half woods, in MN, but can't live there right now. > > (Funny, the word "collectivism" rarely pops up here. We ought to use it > more, as it better describes a bunch of things we often call socialism.) > > On your own property, in your own garden, one doesn't have to argue > with committees and government officials and city councils about > spraying or when one can start working the soil. > > This is the commons problem cropping up again in this common garden. > > Me, I have my own garden plot on my own land. And even if I didn't own > land, working out a deal with someone who _did_ have land would be > preferable to working in a so-called "community garden." Yes, that's what we've done this year. > > (We have a few here in Santa Cruz. Bums and winos make a token effort > to stand around and rake. Mostly it's an excuse for community money to > be handed out to the "farmers." I've also walked past the weed-choked > community garden in Berkeley, on the site of "People's Park," IIRC. > Skanks and bums. New slogan for these urban community gardens: "Hoes fo > da hoes! > Hmm, I've never seen that sort of a problem with community gardens anywhere. The vast majority of the people work pretty hard on their plots. And also there's no reason for tax dollars going into it, especially most places where they don't plow, etc. In fact, it should be fee-generating. Each plot costs $20 @ year here to rent. Why would community money be handed out to the gardeners? -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Thu May 8 10:52:21 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 13:52:21 -0400 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" Message-ID: "We have a few here in Santa Cruz. Bums and winos make a token effort to stand around and rake. Mostly it's an excuse for community money to be handed out to the "farmers." I've also walked past the weed-choked community garden in Berkeley, on the site of "People's Park," IIRC. Skanks and bums. New slogan for these urban community gardens: "Hoes fo da hoes!" Life in NYC is radically different and, I trhink, poses some interesting questions to purer libertarians. In NYC there are many community gardens in poorer neighborhoods. These community gardens receive no meny from either state or city governments, and occur on lots that have been abandoned for (sometimes) decades. In many cases the lot has come under the technical ownership of the city, which left the lot basically a field of bricks and illegally dumped garbage, which the locals transformed into a thing of relative beauty.. Recently, for the purposes of building low-income housing, the city has decvided to bulldoze some of these gardens, which the locals have put a lot of sweat into over the years. Needless to say, the locals don't want their garden bulldozed and, despite the fact that they are often of very low income themselves, don't want additional housing built on the garden's lot. However, the cost of buying the land is normaly well beyond the reach of even a large group of such locals (though a couple of years ago there was a move among some celebs to buy up the land and donate it to the community, but I think that only occured in Manhattan.) So, one could make he argument that "they should have found private property to make their garden", but this misses the point that part of the purpose of the garden is to greatly increase the visual livability of the neighborhood. (Also, these people simply could not afford to buy up such land.) And now, after creating a nice space in those lots for so many years the city wants to bulldoze them. Should thery be allowed to do so? Should the city be forced to sign over such land to the locals for them to "own"? Or should active resistance be utilized tostop the bulldozers? (Or is bulldozing the right thing to do?) I really don't know the answer. Anyone care to comment? -TD >From: Tim May >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" >Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 09:17:18 -0700 > >On Thursday, May 8, 2003, at 07:21 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: >> When we were working with the local gov't community garden >>committee, and suggested that they quit applying chemical fertilzers and >>pesticides to the garden areas, noting that the Madison community gardens >>had >>gone organic 30 years ago, one of them stated "Oh, but that's Madison." >>Finally >>got them to stop the chemicals, but they still insist on coming in every >>Spring >>with heavy equipment to plow up all the plots, and, given the wet clay >>soil >>there, can't do that until very late, so people aren't allowed into their >>plots >>until May 25 -- in an area where you want to plant potatoes and peas mid >>April. Our suggestions that people just be allowed to do it themselves >>with >>tillers or by hand as they do elsewhere came to naught -- "But we've >>always done >>it that way." > >This is a minor, but illustrative, example of why the problem is best fixed >by property rights, not collectivism. > >(Funny, the word "collectivism" rarely pops up here. We ought to use it >more, as it better describes a bunch of things we often call socialism.) > >On your own property, in your own garden, one doesn't have to argue with >committees and government officials and city councils about spraying or >when one can start working the soil. > >This is the commons problem cropping up again in this common garden. > >Me, I have my own garden plot on my own land. And even if I didn't own >land, working out a deal with someone who _did_ have land would be >preferable to working in a so-called "community garden." > >(We have a few here in Santa Cruz. Bums and winos make a token effort to >stand around and rake. Mostly it's an excuse for community money to be >handed out to the "farmers." I've also walked past the weed-choked >community garden in Berkeley, on the site of "People's Park," IIRC. Skanks >and bums. New slogan for these urban community gardens: "Hoes fo da hoes! > > > >--Tim May, Citizen-unit of of the once free United States >" The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of >patriots & tyrants. "--Thomas Jefferson, 1787 _________________________________________________________________ Add photos to your e-mail with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail From bill at scannell.org Thu May 8 12:47:42 2003 From: bill at scannell.org (Bill Scannell) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 14:47:42 -0500 Subject: Defense and Security Commentary Pundit Worth Reading Message-ID: Paul Cox is now publishing a weekly commentary at: http://www.coxreport.com He's not only a first-rate analyst with SAIC, but an good friend of mine, too. He's worth a read. Cheers, Bill 777 --- 777 777 --- 777 "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Thu May 8 13:03:59 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 16:03:59 -0400 Subject: Defense and Security Commentary Pundit Worth Reading Message-ID: SAIC? (A noted defense contractor, BTW..) Which company under the SAIC umbrella? (I used to work for one myself...) -TD >From: Bill Scannell >To: >Subject: Defense and Security Commentary Pundit Worth Reading >Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 14:47:42 -0500 > >Paul Cox is now publishing a weekly commentary at: > >http://www.coxreport.com > >He's not only a first-rate analyst with SAIC, but an good friend of mine, >too. He's worth a read. > >Cheers, > >Bill >777 --- 777 777 --- 777 >"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary >safety >deserve neither liberty nor safety." >- Benjamin Franklin _________________________________________________________________ Help STOP SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From bill at scannell.org Thu May 8 14:24:48 2003 From: bill at scannell.org (Bill Scannell) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 16:24:48 -0500 Subject: Defense and Security Commentary Pundit Worth Reading In-Reply-To: Message-ID: He's with the Strategic Assessment Center (SAC) of SAIC in Virginia. Begin Fair Use quote of Tyler Durden aka camera_lumina at hotmail.com written on 08.5.03 15:03 : > SAIC? (A noted defense contractor, BTW..) Which company under the SAIC > umbrella? (I used to work for one myself...) > > -TD > > > > > > >> From: Bill Scannell >> To: >> Subject: Defense and Security Commentary Pundit Worth Reading >> Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 14:47:42 -0500 >> >> Paul Cox is now publishing a weekly commentary at: >> >> http://www.coxreport.com >> >> He's not only a first-rate analyst with SAIC, but an good friend of mine, >> too. He's worth a read. >> >> Cheers, >> >> Bill >> 777 --- 777 777 --- 777 >> "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary >> safety >> deserve neither liberty nor safety." >> - Benjamin Franklin > > _________________________________________________________________ > Help STOP SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* > http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail > > 777 --- 777 777 --- 777 "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin From emc at artifact.psychedelic.net Thu May 8 18:03:09 2003 From: emc at artifact.psychedelic.net (Eric Cordian) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 18:03:09 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305090103.h49139up018048@artifact.psychedelic.net> Tim wrote: > (We have a few here in Santa Cruz. Bums and winos make a token effort > to stand around and rake. Mostly it's an excuse for community money to > be handed out to the "farmers." I've also walked past the weed-choked > community garden in Berkeley, on the site of "People's Park," IIRC. > Skanks and bums. New slogan for these urban community gardens: "Hoes fo > da hoes! Here, in a city that shall remain unnamed, we have constant war between the community gardeners and the city's homeless population. The gardeners roust the homeless people in the morning by turning hoses on them. They then try to wash away the urine, feces, hypodermic needles, and used condoms. The homeless, meanwhile, find out where the gardeners live, and place spit and other less mentionable homeless-generated organic substances on their doorknobs and steps. It's always amusing when some little old lady surprises a crack ho performing oral sex on a customer in the middle of her plot. Yet, very little is done about the problem, because that would be discrimination against a whole slew of people we are told are disadvantaged. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law" From harlequin at nekrodomos.net Thu May 8 10:47:49 2003 From: harlequin at nekrodomos.net (harlequin) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 18:47:49 +0100 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> References: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <20030508174749.GA32103@shiva.localnet.fake> On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 09:45:18AM -0700, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > At 07:04 PM 5/7/03 -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > >A world without mosquitoes would be pretty bleak given how many other > >things eat them. Better to wipe out the malaria and swat the > mosquitos! > > Still, you're in the minority. If one could kill all the blood-biting > mosquitoes > without killing other bugs, birds, 'gators, etc it would be a good > thing. *delurking for the first time* I think that this is the whole point. It's impossible to tell what effect removing a species from an ecosystem will have due to the phenomenal complexity of the system. Just removing the mosquito _appears_ to have very little effect, but the wider ramifications of such an action could be disastrous. It may well be that the desire to preserve the mosquito is in the minority, but amongst those who actually understand the possible implications I would suspect that there is a different viewpoint. H -- "He who controls the past controls the future; | We are at war with Iraq, he who controls the present controls the past." | We have always been at war -- O'Brien in Orwell's "1984" | with Iraq. From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 8 17:06:47 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 19:06:47 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030508204213.GA5769@dreams.soze.net> References: <20030508174749.GA32103@shiva.localnet.fake> <20030508204213.GA5769@dreams.soze.net> Message-ID: <20030509000647.GA28660@cybershamanix.com> On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 08:42:13PM +0000, Justin wrote: > the point where nature can compete with technology? After that, the > only threats will be from biowarfare programs or from greens who think > up schemes like "let's create a tyrannosaur-pterosaur hybrid and release > thousands to see if they'll 'fix' the food chain." > I guess you never noticed that greens are dead set against genetic engineering, eh? -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From bill.stewart at pobox.com Thu May 8 19:41:54 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 19:41:54 -0700 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <200305081019.54569.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> References: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030508193552.02d5a028@idiom.com> At 10:19 AM 05/08/2003 -0500, Neil Johnson wrote: >The community gardens near where my folks live are an excellent example of >socialism. > >Gardners spend hours all spring and summer tending their plants, hauling >water >in old milk jugs, weeding and fertilizing, just have the "fruits" of their >labor stolen by freeloaders or smashed by vandals. > >And the saddest lesson is the fact that the garderners come back year >after year. Gardening is emotionally rewarding in its own right, as well as getting you food. Lots of people also grow flowers they don't eat... Back when I lived in New Jersey, the Bell Labs plant where I worked had a garden area out back that employees could use, and it was somewhat popular with apartment dwellers who worked there. Given the quasi-rural area and the local population, there wasn't much theft problem, but there was some; a friend of mine said his technique for avoiding theft was to grow kohlrabi "for some reason nobody ever steals it :-)". Occasionally other people used other parts of the back pasture to grow dope, and I've never heard it confirmed or denied whether the official building maintenance policy was to smoke any that they confiscated. From justin at soze.net Thu May 8 13:42:13 2003 From: justin at soze.net (Justin) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 20:42:13 +0000 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: References: <20030508174749.GA32103@shiva.localnet.fake> Message-ID: <20030508204213.GA5769@dreams.soze.net> At 2003-05-08 18:40 +0000, Mike Rosing wrote: > It's interesting that pathogens are learning how to bypass their > normal vectors and going straight for the target (HIV and SARS come to > mind). I'm not sure the relevance. Both seem to have originated in areas not exactly devoid of a variety of common disease vectors. What's selecting [HIV and SARS] viruses for ability to jump directly from primary carrier to humans? All sorts of insects and rodents in Africa could serve as vectors, and China's probably even worse since they've largely screwed up their ecosystem through overpopulation. > Plague rode on fleas that rode on rats, and it covered the planet. > SARS rides the host on airplanes and covers the planet a hell of a lot > faster. Ebola is fortunatly self limiting, but seems to be wiping out > all primates in its zone of influence. Let's hope that thing doesn't > learn a better vector! It's had thousands, probably tens of thousands of years. What are the chances it'll adapt to use a better vector before genetics advances past the point where nature can compete with technology? After that, the only threats will be from biowarfare programs or from greens who think up schemes like "let's create a tyrannosaur-pterosaur hybrid and release thousands to see if they'll 'fix' the food chain." -- Freedom's untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. --Rumsfeld, 2003-04-11 From morlockelloi at yahoo.com Thu May 8 20:51:31 2003 From: morlockelloi at yahoo.com (Morlock Elloi) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 20:51:31 -0700 (PDT) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030509034024.A8886127@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <20030509035131.67956.qmail@web40611.mail.yahoo.com> If one wants a globally visible address, like publishing e-mail address on webbed space, then one will be globally reachable. It's like walking on the street - everyone sees you, including display ads, which is why they cost so much in cities. If you *don't* want to be globally visible, you don't need conmen selecting who will see you. You simply selectively give your e-mail address to those who you want to see you. This is extremely simple concept with zero cost of implementation. ===== end (of original message) Y-a*h*o-o (yes, they scan for this) spam follows: __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo. http://search.yahoo.com From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Thu May 8 17:54:58 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 20:54:58 -0400 Subject: Grid Computing and P2P Message-ID: Hey...I had a great idea today. So great that all will be forced to bow at the feet of Tyler Durden. Of course, I have a decent amount beer in me, and there are unresolved issues, but right now it's lookin' pretty "obvious" so here goes. Kids who currently share files via P2P should instead "earn" song download credits by making their computers available for grid computing. Comments? First let me state what I don't give a crap about... 1) Market for grid computing. For argument sake, let's assume it's there, and that there will increasingly exist compaines that need supercomputing-like capabilities but don't want to buy a Cray or whatever. 2) Kids won't bother. Bullshit. There will certainly exist a % of teenagers that would rather "legitimately" earn song downloads, and who have an "always on" broadband pipe. As for CPUs, those will otherwise be wasted at night. And in case I gotta explain it for the dim-witted, I'm talking about a big company wishing to purchase grid-computing facilities who come to the "P2P Grid Corp", and pay some $$$. These $$$ are then actually paid in part to entertainment companies for the rights to allow subscribers to download files in exchange for making their CPUs available for grid computing. Of course there are open questions. Like, how to value a CPU? (Hettinga?) Also, it would seem to me this system needs to be centralized, in order to control the file sharing. But it also occurs to me that a "song" might actually in itself act as a digibuck of sorts within the system (imagine...the 'gold' doesn't sit in a bank, it's actually encoded into the digibuck itself!) (There's also the issue of how to value the pipe-size into that PC's home...a big FAT-ASS computer within a tiny little 56K pipe might not be super valuable)... -TD _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus From rah at shipwright.com Thu May 8 20:05:41 2003 From: rah at shipwright.com (R. A. Hettinga) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 21:05:41 -0600 Subject: Commie-English Dictionary (was Re: Collectivism in "community gardens") In-Reply-To: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <200305090307.h4937VX8027925@taka.swcp.com> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 At 9:17 AM -0700 5/8/03, Tim May wrote: >Funny, the word "collectivism" rarely pops up here. I prefer "communism", myself, anymore. It's more descriptive of the behavior, it's etymologically true, and it gets people's attention. Someday, maybe, in an attempt to "reclaim" the language, I should bash out a crypto-communist (in the Myra Breckenridge sense...) to plain old American English glossary, viz: Communist English - -------- --------- "Capitalism" Economics "Socialist" Communist "Progressive" Communist "Liberal" (modern usage) Communist "Social" Communist |"Democrat" | Communist "Libertarian" Liberal (original usage) "Reactionary" Liberal (original usage) "Fascist" Liberal (original usage) "Republican" Liberal (original usage) ...and so on... Cheers, RAH -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGP 8.0 - not licensed for commercial use: www.pgp.com iQA/AwUBPrsa38PxH8jf3ohaEQJeEgCg1YZIn2OIQftNMHT0fxpB1WLtUIAAoLGO YjZog0wepCukMoIyjpHDMPyW =b5N2 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Thu May 8 19:13:35 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 21:13:35 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Grid Computing and P2P (fwd) Message-ID: ;) I think we've already covered this sort of app in our 'tit-for-tat' approach with Hangar 18...though we've pretty much decided to opt out of the music/video side of the apps. We have a new webpage to wander through, more stuff soon! We'll be moving more material for the OAON and other references sometime next week. We'll also put an identical copy on the open-forge.org by then also. http://einstein.ssz.com/hangar18/ For the 'old' Hangar 18 page, http://open-forge.org We've also updated the SSZ page as well, http://einstein.ssz.com/ssz/ We'll be getting around to the CDR page one of these days ;) If you want to play, http://plan9.bell-labs.com ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 20:54:58 -0400 From: Tyler Durden To: cypherpunks at minder.net Subject: Grid Computing and P2P Hey...I had a great idea today. So great that all will be forced to bow at the feet of Tyler Durden. Of course, I have a decent amount beer in me, and there are unresolved issues, but right now it's lookin' pretty "obvious" so here goes. Kids who currently share files via P2P should instead "earn" song download credits by making their computers available for grid computing. Comments? First let me state what I don't give a crap about... 1) Market for grid computing. For argument sake, let's assume it's there, and that there will increasingly exist compaines that need supercomputing-like capabilities but don't want to buy a Cray or whatever. 2) Kids won't bother. Bullshit. There will certainly exist a % of teenagers that would rather "legitimately" earn song downloads, and who have an "always on" broadband pipe. As for CPUs, those will otherwise be wasted at night. And in case I gotta explain it for the dim-witted, I'm talking about a big company wishing to purchase grid-computing facilities who come to the "P2P Grid Corp", and pay some $$$. These $$$ are then actually paid in part to entertainment companies for the rights to allow subscribers to download files in exchange for making their CPUs available for grid computing. Of course there are open questions. Like, how to value a CPU? (Hettinga?) Also, it would seem to me this system needs to be centralized, in order to control the file sharing. But it also occurs to me that a "song" might actually in itself act as a digibuck of sorts within the system (imagine...the 'gold' doesn't sit in a bank, it's actually encoded into the digibuck itself!) (There's also the issue of how to value the pipe-size into that PC's home...a big FAT-ASS computer within a tiny little 56K pipe might not be super valuable)... -TD _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 8 19:18:39 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 21:18:39 -0500 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <200305081019.54569.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> References: <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <200305081019.54569.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> Message-ID: <20030509021839.GE28660@cybershamanix.com> And how does this constitute socialism? I guess it depends on the neighborhood, but there certainly doesn't seem to be any of that sort of thing here. Most of the gardeners here are Hmong, and I'd imagine that if such started occuring, people would start doing guard duty. OTOH here, we've had kids torturing animals at the zoo and recently some decided to hack down a lot of the young trees in the main park. At any rate, vandalism and theft certainly isn't socialism, unless it's being done by the government. On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 10:19:54AM -0500, Neil Johnson wrote: > The community gardens near where my folks live are an excellent example of > socialism. > > Gardners spend hours all spring and summer tending their plants, hauling water > in old milk jugs, weeding and fertilizing, just have the "fruits" of their > labor stolen by freeloaders or smashed by vandals. > > And the saddest lesson is the fact that the garderners come back year after > year. > They should come back every year, but they should also learn to inject a little nicotine or other poison in a few of the veggies for those who steal. An old farmer taught me a good trick when I had some firewood ripped off. He said to take a few pieces of firewood and drill a big hole in them, put in a quarter stick of dynamite with caps attached in each, then seal the hole with woodputty and rub some dirt on it while still sticky to hide the hole. Leave on outside of pile where theives will grab it first. Turns those cast iron stoves into grenades. 8-) -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Thu May 8 19:26:50 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 21:26:50 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> References: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <20030509022650.GF28660@cybershamanix.com> On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 09:45:18AM -0700, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > At 07:04 PM 5/7/03 -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: > >A world without mosquitoes would be pretty bleak given how many other > >things eat them. Better to wipe out the malaria and swat the > mosquitos! > > Still, you're in the minority. If one could kill all the blood-biting > mosquitoes > without killing other bugs, birds, 'gators, etc it would be a good > thing. > Even if you eliminated malaria its not a good vector to have around. > > And I bet most people would accept losing a very few species, or > reducing > the productivity of mosquito areas (probably temporarily), to get rid > of the mosquito. Throw in poison ivy/oak extinction to convince most of > the greens > who hike and you've got a winner :-) > Not I. My attire most of the Summer is just tank top and shorts, with very open sandals, no socks - and a spend a lot of time wandaring through the woods hunting mushrooms. My favorite mushroom woods is just thick with poison ivy, I don't even bother to try to avoid it, just wade thru it. And I used to be very allergic to it years ago, but I think you must desensitize to it the more you're around it. And as I said before, the mosquitoes really aren't that bad, just quit swatting at them. I'll take bugs over smokers anytime. > --- > "When one tugs at a single thing in Nature, he finds it hitched to the > rest of the Universe" - John Muir > --- > You can buy patented mice and you're not allowed to copy them. > -the state of bio IP -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Thu May 8 19:34:15 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 21:34:15 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Q: A question of security vulnerability Message-ID: Given a basic Linux (or *nix) system with a user bob. Assume that bob has sudo capability. There are two approaches (I'm not going to use exact syntax): 1. bob sh 2. bob All So, in the first case bob can: sudo sh -c "foo" and in the second bob can: sudo foo Why would the first approach represent a more secure mechanism? It is true that sh could be a wrapper or have sticky bits, etc. We'll assume these are not an issue. The point being why is running a program directly as root in this manner less secure than running the program through a shell as root? Example? Explanation? Thanks. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From declan at well.com Thu May 8 20:55:06 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Thu, 8 May 2003 23:55:06 -0400 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030508180450.GA27737@cybershamanix.com>; from hseaver@cybershamanix.com on Thu, May 08, 2003 at 01:04:50PM -0500 References: <20030508142147.GA27684@cybershamanix.com> <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030508180450.GA27737@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030508235506.A4978@cluebot.com> On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 01:04:50PM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Hmm, I've never seen that sort of a problem with community gardens > anywhere. The vast majority of the people work pretty hard on their plots. >From my window where I'm typing this, I can see (or could see if it were light out) one of Adams Morgans' once-lauded "community gardens." It might have been a big deal in the 1970s, but now it's just a rocky slope with a few scraggly corn stalks growing on it. I've never seen a gardener actually garden there in the seven years I've lived in the neighborhood. -Declan From frantz at pwpconsult.com Fri May 9 00:04:53 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 00:04:53 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <9FF803E4-80F6-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: Message-ID: At 6:44 PM -0700 5/7/03, Tim May wrote: >On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 01:01 PM, Bill Frantz wrote: >> 120-130 years ago, there was a privately owned toll road between Los >> Gatos >> and Santa Cruz. Now there is a publicly owned road, with no toll, and >> I >> haven't heard much call to go back to the old days. Why are the vast >> majority of people happy with the current situation? Some ideas: > >Why would anyone waste time arguing for something which absolutely >could not happen in today's world? > >I'm serious. People spend time on things they think could be changed. >This is why there is "not much call." There have been some proposals to build privately owned toll roads in California. One proposal was from the San Francisco Bay area to Sacramento. As far as I know, that one died from lack of interest. I think there was also one in the LA area, but I know less about it. The idea is a private toll road would have less traffic, and be faster. In fairness, these proposals are "government-private partnerships", and not true private roads. The government provides the eminent domain, and the private provides some of the capital. I never heard a large amount of enthusiasm for these proposals. Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From adam at cypherspace.org Thu May 8 19:40:24 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 03:40:24 +0100 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com>; from nobody@dizum.com on Fri, May 09, 2003 at 03:50:02AM +0200 References: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> Message-ID: <20030509034024.A8886127@exeter.ac.uk> Yes, there is some discussion of it on slashdot, including several other people who have commented similarly to anonymous that it is a pretty big privacy invasion and centralised control point problem. The claim that you can optionally be anonymous and not use a cert, or get an anonymous cert is plainly practically bogus. You'd stand about as much chance of having your mail read as if you shared mail hub with spamford wallace -- ie 90+% of internet mail infrastructure would drop your mail on the floor on the presumption it was spam. Plus a point I made in that thread is that it is often not in the internet user's interests to non-repudiably sign every message they send just to be able to send mail because that lends amunition to hostile recipients who from time-to-time target internet users for bullshit libel and unauthorised investment advice etc. Companies also are I would expect somewhat sensitive to not signing everything for similar reasons as those behind their retention policies where they have policies of deleteing emails, files and shredding paper files after some period. In addition PKIs because of the infrastructure requirements have probem complex to setup and administer. So now we've taken one hard problem (stopping spam) and added another hard problem (hierarchical PKI deployment) and somehow this is supposed to be effective at stopping spam. In addition unless there is significant financial cost for certificates and/or signifcant and enforceable financial penalty and good identification and registration procedures enforced by the CAs it wouldn't even slow spammers who would just get a cert, spam, get revoked, get another cert and repeat. Certificate revocation is already a weak point of PKI technology, and to reasonably stop spam before the spammer manages to send too many millions of spams with a cert, you have to revoke the cert PDQ! And finally it all ends up being no more than an expensive implementation of blacklists (or I suppose more properly whitelists), because the CAs are maintaining lists of people who have not yet been revoked as spammers. Some click through agreement isn't going to stop spammers. Legislation or legal or financial threat is going to stop spammers either because any level of registration time identity verification that is plausibly going to be accepted by users, and this is also limited by the cost -- higher assurance is more cost which users also won't be willing to accept -- will be too easy for the spammers to fake. And email is international and laws are not. It is pretty much an "internet drivers license" for email. I also think that fully distributed systems such as hashcash are more suitable for a global internet service. My preferred method for deploying hashcash is as a token exempting it's sender from bayesian filtering, and any other content based or sender based filtering. That way as an email user you have an incentive to install a hashcash plugin http://www.cypherspace.org/hashcash/ because it will ensure your mail does not get deleted by ever-more aggressive filtering and scattergun blackhole systems. The camram system http://www.camram.org/ is a variant of this. It also more directly addresses the problem: it makes it more expensive for spammers to send the volumes of mail they need to to break even. Adam On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 03:50:02AM +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote: > Lauren Weinstein, founder of People for Internet Responsibility, has > come out with a new spam solution at http://www.pfir.org/tripoli-overview. > > According to this proposal, the Internet email architecture would be > revamped. Each piece of mail would include a PIT, a Payload Identity > Token, emphasis on Identity. This would be a token certifying that you > were an Authorized Email User as judged by the authorities. Based on > your PIT, the receiving email software could decide to reject your > email. > > It is anticipated that all Pits considered acceptable by the vast > majority of all Tripoli-compliant software user would be digitally > signed by one or more designated, trustworthy, third-pary authorities > who would be delegated the power to certify the validity of identity > and other relevant information within Pits. > > In other words, here comes Verisign again. > > It is anticipated that in most cases, in order for the sender of an > e-mail message to become initially certified by a Pit Certification > Authority (PCA), the sender would need to first formally accept > Terms of Service (ToS) that may well prohibit the sending of spam, > and equally importantly, would authorize the certification authority > to "downgrade" the sender's authentication certification in the case > of spam or other ToS violations. > > Thus you have to be politically acceptable to the Powers That Be in > order to receive your license to email, aka your PIT. And be careful > what you say or your PIT will be downgraded. > > Unfortunately he doesn't discuss various crypto protocol issues: > > If the PIT is just a datum, what keeps someone from stealing your PIT > and spams with it? > > If the PIT is a cert on a key, what do you sign? The message? What if > it gets munged in transit, as messages do? You've just lost most of > your email reliability. > > Or maybe you sign the current date/time? Then delayed mail is dead mail. > > Or maybe you respond to a challenge and sign that? That won't work if > relays are involved, because they can't sign for you. > > Spam is a problem, but it's no excuse to add more centralized > administrative control to the Internet. Far better to go with a > decentralized solution like camram.sourceforge.net, basically a matter > of looking for hashcash in the mail headers. This raises the cost to > spammers without significantly impacting normal users. > --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From nobody at dizum.com Thu May 8 18:50:02 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 03:50:02 +0200 (CEST) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? Message-ID: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> Lauren Weinstein, founder of People for Internet Responsibility, has come out with a new spam solution at http://www.pfir.org/tripoli-overview. According to this proposal, the Internet email architecture would be revamped. Each piece of mail would include a PIT, a Payload Identity Token, emphasis on Identity. This would be a token certifying that you were an Authorized Email User as judged by the authorities. Based on your PIT, the receiving email software could decide to reject your email. It is anticipated that all Pits considered acceptable by the vast majority of all Tripoli-compliant software user would be digitally signed by one or more designated, trustworthy, third-pary authorities who would be delegated the power to certify the validity of identity and other relevant information within Pits. In other words, here comes Verisign again. It is anticipated that in most cases, in order for the sender of an e-mail message to become initially certified by a Pit Certification Authority (PCA), the sender would need to first formally accept Terms of Service (ToS) that may well prohibit the sending of spam, and equally importantly, would authorize the certification authority to "downgrade" the sender's authentication certification in the case of spam or other ToS violations. Thus you have to be politically acceptable to the Powers That Be in order to receive your license to email, aka your PIT. And be careful what you say or your PIT will be downgraded. Unfortunately he doesn't discuss various crypto protocol issues: If the PIT is just a datum, what keeps someone from stealing your PIT and spams with it? If the PIT is a cert on a key, what do you sign? The message? What if it gets munged in transit, as messages do? You've just lost most of your email reliability. Or maybe you sign the current date/time? Then delayed mail is dead mail. Or maybe you respond to a challenge and sign that? That won't work if relays are involved, because they can't sign for you. Spam is a problem, but it's no excuse to add more centralized administrative control to the Internet. Far better to go with a decentralized solution like camram.sourceforge.net, basically a matter of looking for hashcash in the mail headers. This raises the cost to spammers without significantly impacting normal users. From wwalker at broadq.com Fri May 9 05:57:18 2003 From: wwalker at broadq.com (Wayne Walker) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 07:57:18 -0500 Subject: [hangar18-general] Q: A question of security vulnerability In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030509125718.GC2474@broadq.com> sudo is actually almost never secure. As you imply, with line 1 bob can do _anything_ just like line 2. Here are some more less obvious examples where bob can do _anything_ 1. bob pine 2. bob vi 3. bob chown 4. bob chmod With any of the 4 above, bob can do anything. With 1 or 2, bob can run any command from within the program (! is allowed in vi, and if you set $EDITOR to vi before running pine...) In 3 and 4, bob can make setuid programs or change perms on /etc and put his own passwd/shadow files in place. Bottom line, if you give someone sudo access you should tgrust them to be root, OR you should only allow them to run very specific _scripts/binaries_ that you wrote for them specifically (e.g. chown_files_to_others_in_his_primary_group, restart_lpd, restart_httpd...) And here you still have to be careful about these programs.... On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 09:34:15PM -0500, Jim Choate wrote: > > Given a basic Linux (or *nix) system with a user bob. Assume that bob has > sudo capability. There are two approaches (I'm not going to use exact > syntax): > > 1. bob sh > > 2. bob All > > So, in the first case bob can: sudo sh -c "foo" > > and in the second bob can: sudo foo > > Why would the first approach represent a more secure mechanism? > > It is true that sh could be a wrapper or have sticky bits, etc. We'll > assume these are not an issue. The point being why is running a program > directly as root in this manner less secure than running the program > through a shell as root? > > Example? Explanation? > > Thanks. > > > -- > ____________________________________________________________________ > > We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I > are going to spend the rest of our lives. > > Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" > > ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org > www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org > -------------------------------------------------------------------- -- Wayne Walker www.broadq.com :) Bringing digital video and audio to the living room From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Fri May 9 05:59:34 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 07:59:34 -0500 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030508235506.A4978@cluebot.com> References: <20030508142147.GA27684@cybershamanix.com> <8A0E3087-8170-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030508180450.GA27737@cybershamanix.com> <20030508235506.A4978@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <20030509125934.GA30621@cybershamanix.com> On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 11:55:06PM -0400, Declan McCullagh wrote: > On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 01:04:50PM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > Hmm, I've never seen that sort of a problem with community gardens > > anywhere. The vast majority of the people work pretty hard on their plots. > > >From my window where I'm typing this, I can see (or could see if it > were light out) one of Adams Morgans' once-lauded "community gardens." > It might have been a big deal in the 1970s, but now it's just a rocky > slope with a few scraggly corn stalks growing on it. I've never seen a > gardener actually garden there in the seven years I've lived in the > neighborhood. > Sounds like you live in one of those neighborhoods which underwent gentrification, or otherwise got yuppiefied, and the new residents are of the sort who don't get their hands dirty, eh? Or at least not with real dirt. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From mv at cdc.gov Fri May 9 09:24:10 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 09:24:10 -0700 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" Message-ID: <3EBBD62A.1BD6E4CD@cdc.gov> At 06:03 PM 5/8/03 -0700, Eric Cordian wrote: >Yet, very little is done about the problem, because that would be >discrimination against a whole slew of people we are told are >disadvantaged. I once counciled a fellow grad student who was growing hot peppers on a little plot for student farmers. Seems he had problems with 'raccoons' that stole his peppers. I pointed out that phenolphlalein, a common pH indicator, was the active ingredient in ex-lax, and very effective, invisible. I suggested depositing some in a few growing peppers. He also posted a sign to that effect. Amazing that racoons can read. From mv at cdc.gov Fri May 9 09:29:33 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 09:29:33 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome Message-ID: <3EBBD76D.1940321A@cdc.gov> At 09:26 PM 5/8/03 -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: >And as I said before, the mosquitoes really aren't that bad, just >quit swatting at them. I'll take bugs over smokers anytime. My serious point is 1. you don't need to hunt for mushrooms to live 2. you haven't had children die from mosquito bites 3. you/yours have access to western med if you get mosquito-vectored diseases Contrast with the state of much of the population.. They would roast all the gnatcatchers to live better and not blink an eye. Dodo burger, anyone? ------ RNA can mutate faster than scientists can sequence. From alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu Fri May 9 09:37:52 2003 From: alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu (Andy Lopata) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 09:37:52 -0700 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030508235506.A4978@cluebot.com> Message-ID: There are waiting lists to get a plot in the many community gardens here in Eugene. -----Original Message----- From: owner-cypherpunks at lne.com [mailto:owner-cypherpunks at lne.com]On Behalf Of Declan McCullagh Sent: Thursday, May 08, 2003 8:55 PM To: Harmon Seaver; cypherpunks at lne.com Subject: Re: Collectivism in "community gardens" On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 01:04:50PM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Hmm, I've never seen that sort of a problem with community gardens > anywhere. The vast majority of the people work pretty hard on their plots. >From my window where I'm typing this, I can see (or could see if it were light out) one of Adams Morgans' once-lauded "community gardens." It might have been a big deal in the 1970s, but now it's just a rocky slope with a few scraggly corn stalks growing on it. I've never seen a gardener actually garden there in the seven years I've lived in the neighborhood. -Declan From alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu Fri May 9 09:37:54 2003 From: alopata at darkwing.uoregon.edu (Andy Lopata) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 09:37:54 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <20030506230024.B32287@cluebot.com> Message-ID: On Tuesday, May 06, 2003 8:00 PM, Declan McCullagh wrote: >On Sat, May 03, 2003 at 09:00:08PM -0700, Andy Lopata wrote: >> Why is this restriction on speech and debate any less insidious than statist >> control? Why is capitalist self-censorship better than state-controlled >> explicit censorship? > >If a sufficiently repressive government doesn't like what you say, you end >up with your ears lopped off, or you're dead and your family is tortured. If the corporations didn't have the government to do their dirty work for them, they'd do it themselves - like the historical terrorizing and killing of labor organizers. But I guess commies deserve it? >If the Corporate Media Barons don't like what you say, you get to keep >saying it. If you don't mind losing your job: http://www.nandotimes.com/entertainment/story/879662p-6132229c.html >Hope that helps put things in perspective. No, it doesn't really help put things in perspective. In a time where it has never been more apparent that the interests of the capitalist powers and the government are very much the same - e.g. the oil industry-controlled/owned gov't invades a sovereign nation for control of more oil, and further consolidation and control of global resources - I do *not* understand the argument that the government is bad, but the forces behind that gov't action, and profits made from that gov't action, are good. My point is only that control of information helps control outcomes that effect everyone. Entrenched corporate powers have a vested interest in controlling information (as do the politicians they own in D.C.) so that decisions regarding technology, etc. benefit them. Crypto and other technologies accessible to all threatens this control - both corporate and gov't. I just don't get the market-will-fix-everything argument. Much of the Internet is based on public resources and many of which (e.g. open protocols) are valuable because they are *not* commodified. Newbie flame-baiter, Andy Lopata From jamesd at echeque.com Fri May 9 09:40:06 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 09:40:06 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <20030508174749.GA32103@shiva.localnet.fake> References: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <3EBB7776.29559.D36FA87@localhost> -- On 8 May 2003 at 18:47, harlequin wrote: > I think that this is the whole point. It's impossible to tell > what effect removing a species from an ecosystem will have > due to the phenomenal complexity of the system. In any one area, species come and go all the time, usually without much consequence. Attempting to stop nature from changing is also an interference in nature. Ten thousand years ago, the natural environment in California was different in almost every way. Who is to say that one was better than the other? --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG BEnR8PihYq9g0xC8I+RKaclqA2jFJl4srhkGkFCi 4W8kkpgJRdeP7h2VR0DnWRaVO5OBU8fUrshdGOgk1 From jamesd at echeque.com Fri May 9 09:40:06 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 09:40:06 -0700 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030509021839.GE28660@cybershamanix.com> References: <200305081019.54569.njohnsn@njohnsn.com> Message-ID: <3EBB7776.5153.D36FAD7@localhost> -- On 8 May 2003 at 21:18, Harmon Seaver wrote: > At any rate, vandalism and theft certainly isn't socialism, > unless it's being done by the government. Private property is defended by private individuals, state property merely by the state. So state property frequently gets trashed. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG g6VqTPkESZu00R7Kv4eRs/189cVaQf5x+b2iESS/ 4X7gYKXhkSAvNmy1CFBe5Oq6eLr4mG1fu6uu5ffty From lynn at garlic.com Fri May 9 09:11:52 2003 From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 10:11:52 -0600 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030509034024.A8886127@exeter.ac.uk> References: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> Message-ID: <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> the proposal in the past has been that ISPs filter spam at ingress from their customers. the counter-argument has been that there are lots of ISPs that can't be trusted to do it. So it is much easier for ISPs to have lists of other trusted &/or untrusted ISPs that they will accept email from. It is orders of magnitude easier (and more efficient) for ISPs to do ingress filtering for SPAM and effectively ISP blacklists than it is to populate the whole consumer infrastructure. There are still some ways to slip thru the cracks with small amounts .... but it isn't the 40-80% volume of all email that is seen today. It does have an analogous downside to the individual privacy issues ... which are that the big ISPs could use blacklisting for other purposes than addressing SPAM issues. Some of the ingress filtering pushback may be similar to the early counter-arguments for packet ingress filtering related to ip-address spoofing. however, that seemed to be more a case of disparity among the router vendors in which could & could not implement ingress filtering. as majority of the router vendors achieved such capability ... the push-back significantly reduced. http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/rfcidx7.htm#2267 2267 - Network Ingress Filtering: Defeating Denial of Service Attacks which employ IP Source Address Spoofing, Ferguson P., Senie D., 1998/01/23 (10pp) (.txt=21032) (Obsoleted by 2827) there already are logs relating ingress email to originating ISP customer id. that could be made available via some sort of legal action. the only issue then is the strength of authentication that is performed on customer connection to the ISP ... rather than some sort of origin authentication for every email. At 03:40 AM 5/9/2003 +0100, Adam Back wrote: >Yes, there is some discussion of it on slashdot, including several >other people who have commented similarly to anonymous that it is a >pretty big privacy invasion and centralised control point problem. > >The claim that you can optionally be anonymous and not use a cert, or >get an anonymous cert is plainly practically bogus. You'd stand about >as much chance of having your mail read as if you shared mail hub with >spamford wallace -- ie 90+% of internet mail infrastructure would drop >your mail on the floor on the presumption it was spam. > >Plus a point I made in that thread is that it is often not in the >internet user's interests to non-repudiably sign every message they >send just to be able to send mail because that lends amunition to >hostile recipients who from time-to-time target internet users for >bullshit libel and unauthorised investment advice etc. > >Companies also are I would expect somewhat sensitive to not signing >everything for similar reasons as those behind their retention >policies where they have policies of deleteing emails, files and >shredding paper files after some period. > >In addition PKIs because of the infrastructure requirements have >probem complex to setup and administer. So now we've taken one hard >problem (stopping spam) and added another hard problem (hierarchical >PKI deployment) and somehow this is supposed to be effective at >stopping spam. > >In addition unless there is significant financial cost for >certificates and/or signifcant and enforceable financial penalty and >good identification and registration procedures enforced by the CAs it >wouldn't even slow spammers who would just get a cert, spam, get >revoked, get another cert and repeat. > >Certificate revocation is already a weak point of PKI technology, and >to reasonably stop spam before the spammer manages to send too many >millions of spams with a cert, you have to revoke the cert PDQ! > >And finally it all ends up being no more than an expensive >implementation of blacklists (or I suppose more properly whitelists), >because the CAs are maintaining lists of people who have not yet been >revoked as spammers. Some click through agreement isn't going to stop >spammers. Legislation or legal or financial threat is going to stop >spammers either because any level of registration time identity >verification that is plausibly going to be accepted by users, and this >is also limited by the cost -- higher assurance is more cost which >users also won't be willing to accept -- will be too easy for the >spammers to fake. And email is international and laws are not. > >It is pretty much an "internet drivers license" for email. > >I also think that fully distributed systems such as hashcash are more >suitable for a global internet service. My preferred method for >deploying hashcash is as a token exempting it's sender from bayesian >filtering, and any other content based or sender based filtering. > >That way as an email user you have an incentive to install a hashcash >plugin http://www.cypherspace.org/hashcash/ because it will ensure >your mail does not get deleted by ever-more aggressive filtering and >scattergun blackhole systems. The camram system >http://www.camram.org/ is a variant of this. > >It also more directly addresses the problem: it makes it more >expensive for spammers to send the volumes of mail they need to to >break even. > >Adam > >On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 03:50:02AM +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote: > > Lauren Weinstein, founder of People for Internet Responsibility, has > > come out with a new spam solution at http://www.pfir.org/tripoli-overview. > > > > According to this proposal, the Internet email architecture would be > > revamped. Each piece of mail would include a PIT, a Payload Identity > > Token, emphasis on Identity. This would be a token certifying that you > > were an Authorized Email User as judged by the authorities. Based on > > your PIT, the receiving email software could decide to reject your > > email. > > > > It is anticipated that all Pits considered acceptable by the vast > > majority of all Tripoli-compliant software user would be digitally > > signed by one or more designated, trustworthy, third-pary authorities > > who would be delegated the power to certify the validity of identity > > and other relevant information within Pits. > > > > In other words, here comes Verisign again. > > > > It is anticipated that in most cases, in order for the sender of an > > e-mail message to become initially certified by a Pit Certification > > Authority (PCA), the sender would need to first formally accept > > Terms of Service (ToS) that may well prohibit the sending of spam, > > and equally importantly, would authorize the certification authority > > to "downgrade" the sender's authentication certification in the case > > of spam or other ToS violations. > > > > Thus you have to be politically acceptable to the Powers That Be in > > order to receive your license to email, aka your PIT. And be careful > > what you say or your PIT will be downgraded. > > > > Unfortunately he doesn't discuss various crypto protocol issues: > > > > If the PIT is just a datum, what keeps someone from stealing your PIT > > and spams with it? > > > > If the PIT is a cert on a key, what do you sign? The message? What if > > it gets munged in transit, as messages do? You've just lost most of > > your email reliability. > > > > Or maybe you sign the current date/time? Then delayed mail is dead mail. > > > > Or maybe you respond to a challenge and sign that? That won't work if > > relays are involved, because they can't sign for you. > > > > Spam is a problem, but it's no excuse to add more centralized > > administrative control to the Internet. Far better to go with a > > decentralized solution like camram.sourceforge.net, basically a matter > > of looking for hashcash in the mail headers. This raises the cost to > > spammers without significantly impacting normal users. > > > >--------------------------------------------------------------------- >The Cryptography Mailing List >Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com -- Anne & Lynn Wheeler http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/ Internet trivia 20th anv http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/rfcietff.htm From ericm at lne.com Fri May 9 10:17:54 2003 From: ericm at lne.com (Eric Murray) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 10:17:54 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com>; from nobody@dizum.com on Fri, May 09, 2003 at 03:50:02AM +0200 References: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> Message-ID: <20030509101753.A23118@slack.lne.com> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 03:50:02AM +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote: > Lauren Weinstein, founder of People for Internet Responsibility, has > come out with a new spam solution at http://www.pfir.org/tripoli-overview. [deletia] > Thus you have to be politically acceptable to the Powers That Be in > order to receive your license to email, aka your PIT. And be careful > what you say or your PIT will be downgraded. Weinsteins proposal is DOA because of the centralized control and the lack of anonymity (oh, but Pit issuers may issue special anonymous certs to "applicants with special needs for identity protection (e.g., human rights groups operating in "hostile" areas, etc.)". Right.) The people like us who would implement it won't. But it's technically possible. The technological issues are the easy part. Creating a new email system is one thing, getting people to use it is another. This idea is pretty unrealistic... sort of the Underpants Gnomes plan for ridding the world of spam: 1. create completely new parallel email system 2. ??? 3. no more spam! > Unfortunately he doesn't discuss various crypto protocol issues: > > If the PIT is just a datum, what keeps someone from stealing your PIT > and spams with it? > > If the PIT is a cert on a key, what do you sign? The message? What if > it gets munged in transit, as messages do? You've just lost most of > your email reliability. > > Or maybe you sign the current date/time? Then delayed mail is dead mail. > > Or maybe you respond to a challenge and sign that? That won't work if > relays are involved, because they can't sign for you. I read it as the Pit is a signature over the Pit contents and the email. It'd include the certs needed to authenticate to the appropriate CA. A PKCS#7 detached signature or similar structure would work fine. The crypto part is the one part that's easy. > Spam is a problem, but it's no excuse to add more centralized > administrative control to the Internet. Far better to go with a > decentralized solution like camram.sourceforge.net, basically a matter > of looking for hashcash in the mail headers. This raises the cost to > spammers without significantly impacting normal users. See the 'getting people to use it' argument above. Solve that and any of 20 different technical solutions would work. Eric From timcmay at got.net Fri May 9 10:26:10 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 10:26:10 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <539D4264-8243-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Friday, May 9, 2003, at 12:04 AM, Bill Frantz wrote: > At 6:44 PM -0700 5/7/03, Tim May wrote: >> On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 01:01 PM, Bill Frantz wrote: >>> 120-130 years ago, there was a privately owned toll road between Los >>> Gatos >>> and Santa Cruz. Now there is a publicly owned road, with no toll, >>> and >>> I >>> haven't heard much call to go back to the old days. Why are the vast >>> majority of people happy with the current situation? Some ideas: >> >> Why would anyone waste time arguing for something which absolutely >> could not happen in today's world? >> >> I'm serious. People spend time on things they think could be changed. >> This is why there is "not much call." > > There have been some proposals to build privately owned toll roads in > California. One proposal was from the San Francisco Bay area to > Sacramento. As far as I know, that one died from lack of interest. I > think there was also one in the LA area, but I know less about it. The > idea is a private toll road would have less traffic, and be faster. There is indeed a private toll road, Highway 73 going from a point near San Juan Capistrano to a point near Irvine. It passes mostly through part of the former Irvine Ranch, mostly uninhabited. Basically, contiguous with part of the Laguna Hills. (Consult a map if interested. Yahoo will show it by entering "Irvine, CA".) I've taken it a few times, at the suggestion of my younger brother, ever-impatient with any delays. We did not take it during rush hour periods. Frankly, it cut a few miles off the normal I-5 route, and was slightly faster. This private toll road would be very hard to build in any other place, as the ownership of the large tract of undeveloped land made it possible. Private developers rarely are granted eminent domain (seizure of lands or property for the people's democratic socialist use) and it is virtually impossible to conceive of a developer acquiring rights of way for a highway through thousands of farms, houses, ranches, schools, shops, etc. (I know about auctions, but there are some markets that don't "clear." There are people who simply refuse to sell. Even when The Donald (Trump) sought to build a casino in Atlantic City there was one parcel owner who refused to sell. Once the state of NJ refused to condemn the property to give it to the Donald, he built _around_ it on three sides.) Even when the population was a fraction of what it is today, this was a problem building railroads. Of course, though the books on free enterprise are light on mentioning this, the private railroads got the land rights by coercion, threats, burning out settlers, bribing state officials, etc. "Blazing Saddles" was not far off the mark. Today, a private toll road could basically not been be built in areas where they are most needed. Q.E.D. > > In fairness, these proposals are "government-private partnerships", > and not > true private roads. The government provides the eminent domain, and > the > private provides some of the capital. > > I never heard a large amount of enthusiasm for these proposals. As I discussed in my reply yesterday, people don't rally enthusiasm for things which are just not going to happen anyway, anywhich, anyhoo. And any emergent enthusiasm would be met with a vast counter-reaction from the neighbors, the affected land owners, etc. --Tim May From mv at cdc.gov Fri May 9 11:50:48 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 11:50:48 -0700 Subject: Fukt Nation Report Message-ID: <3EBBF888.F5D38DC3@cdc.gov> Posse Comitatus dead, getting ready for military occupation of cities: http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030526&s=dreyfuss Schoolchildren owned by Secret Service: http://www.kron.com/Global/story.asp?s=%20%201268949 "When one of the students asked, 'do we have to talk now? Can we be silent? Can we get legal council?' they were told, 'we own you, you don't have any legal rights,'" Felson says. Tool makers liable for tool abuse: Gun Companies Ordered to Pay Boy $50M http://www.kron.com/Global/story.asp?S=1271022 From sunder at sunder.net Fri May 9 08:55:43 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 11:55:43 -0400 (edt) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> Message-ID: Who cares? How fast did Ip6 proliferate again? Right. So why expect that normal SMTP will be banished? And even if it is, you can always run your own alternate server without the PIT bulshit. If we turn the problem on it's head, all servers should use TLS and identify themselves to each other as well as encrypt the traffic. This way, you can weed our spammers by eliminating known spam servers and it won't kill remailers. Speaking of which, what's to stop a remailer from using a verisign signed PIT anyway after removing the original? Exit nodes of remailers are traceable anyway. Even so, there's always the opportunity for self signed or test PIT's, etc... If by "receiving email software" we're talking about your mail program, it doesn't matter much at all. If we mean an MTA (sendmail, postfix, qmail) then it becomes an issue only when you don't control the MTA. Which they claim will not happen during the transition phase. Also: "The Tripoli Pit concept does not require that all senders' messages be authenticated to the same level. It would be completely possible for a sender to generate a message (and associated Pit) that was not fully authenticated or that even was anonymous (within the bounds of associated MTAs/relays and the underlying Internet or local operating system environments to offer anonymous messages or transport parameters). "It is recognized that there are important situations where it may be highly desirable to receive e-mail from poorly- authenticated or completely unauthenticated sources, for example, in the case of a whistleblower submission address, government agencies, or a range of other situations." There certainly is the danger that everyone would opt to not accept anonymous emails, but then alternate means of communication would stil proliferate... say like usenet, but over p2p nets, or whatever. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Fri, 9 May 2003, Nomen Nescio wrote: > Lauren Weinstein, founder of People for Internet Responsibility, has > come out with a new spam solution at http://www.pfir.org/tripoli-overview. > > According to this proposal, the Internet email architecture would be > revamped. Each piece of mail would include a PIT, a Payload Identity > Token, emphasis on Identity. This would be a token certifying that you > were an Authorized Email User as judged by the authorities. Based on > your PIT, the receiving email software could decide to reject your > email. From schear at attbi.com Fri May 9 12:49:18 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 12:49:18 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <539D4264-8243-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030509124520.042d9f58@mail.attbi.com> At 10:26 AM 5/9/2003 -0700, Tim May wrote: >On Friday, May 9, 2003, at 12:04 AM, Bill Frantz wrote: > >>At 6:44 PM -0700 5/7/03, Tim May wrote: >>>On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 01:01 PM, Bill Frantz wrote: >>>Even when the population was a fraction of what it is today, this was a >>>problem building railroads. Of course, though the books on free >>>enterprise are light on mentioning this, the private railroads got the >>>land rights by coercion, threats, burning out settlers, bribing state >>>officials, etc. "Blazing Saddles" was not far off the mark. A more serious treatment of this is found in a very good, but overlooked, film "The Claim," http://us.imdb.com/Details?0218378, which has lately been on premium cable. steve From declan at well.com Fri May 9 09:51:38 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 12:51:38 -0400 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: References: <20030506230024.B32287@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030509124931.019a10d8@mail.well.com> At 09:37 AM 5/9/2003 -0700, Andy Lopata wrote: >If the corporations didn't have the government to do their dirty work for >them, they'd do it themselves - like the historical terrorizing and killing >of labor organizers. Which is and should be illegal. > >If the Corporate Media Barons don't like what you say, you get to keep > >saying it. > >If you don't mind losing your job: >http://www.nandotimes.com/entertainment/story/879662p-6132229c.html Your boss tells you not to do something and you do it anyway, and then get fired? Maybe your boss was stupid, but sheesh, this isn't the same thing as getting tortured, your family imprisoned and raped, and executed. Hope you can see the difference. >Newbie flame-baiter, Andy Yep, that's about right. Teach me to respond to someone who's just trying to start a flamewar. Keep it up and you'll be the third candidate for my killfile! :) -Declan From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Fri May 9 12:20:28 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 15:20:28 -0400 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome Message-ID: >Ten thousand years ago, the natural environment in California was different >in almost every way. Who is to say that one was better than the other? Exactly. That's why we should NUKE THE WHALES! -TD >From: "James A. Donald" >To: cypherpunks at einstein.ssz.com >Subject: Re: Asperger's Syndrome >Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 09:40:06 -0700 > > -- >On 8 May 2003 at 18:47, harlequin wrote: > > I think that this is the whole point. It's impossible to tell > > what effect removing a species from an ecosystem will have > > due to the phenomenal complexity of the system. > >In any one area, species come and go all the time, usually >without much consequence. Attempting to stop nature from >changing is also an interference in nature. Ten thousand >years ago, the natural environment in California was different >in almost every way. Who is to say that one was better than >the other? > > > --digsig > James A. Donald > 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG > BEnR8PihYq9g0xC8I+RKaclqA2jFJl4srhkGkFCi > 4W8kkpgJRdeP7h2VR0DnWRaVO5OBU8fUrshdGOgk1 _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus From frantz at pwpconsult.com Fri May 9 16:56:07 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 16:56:07 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <20030509180010.A21128@cluebot.com> References: <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard>; from bob.cat@snet.net on Fri, May 09, 2003 at 06:00:21PM -0400 <539D4264-8243-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard> Message-ID: At 3:00 PM -0700 5/9/03, Declan McCullagh wrote: >On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 06:00:21PM -0400, BobCat wrote: >> Not impossible, though: >> >> http://www.dullesgreenway.com/cgi-bin/dginfo.cfm >> >> The Dulles Greenway is a privately owned 14-mile toll road that connects >> Washington Dulles International Airport with Leesburg, Virginia. The >> Greenway is the first private toll road in Virginia since 1816. >> Since the Greenway's dedication on September 29th 1995, commuters have >> enjoyed a non-stop alternative to Routes 7 and 28. > >Yep, it's a good counterexample to the general rule. But I recall that >when land acquisition began, that area near Lessburg was still >primarily farm country, which is easier to accumulate in terms of parcels. >Also it's unclear that it was entirely private -- the web page talks >about planning beginning after a 1988 state law was enacted... Perhaps there is a reason that the 5th amendment provided for eminent domain. And, given the government camel nose under the tent, how far do you let it in? It would be nice to introduce some competition to keep CalTrans honest. OTOH, I like the low transaction costs, and the reasonably accurate allocation of cost that go with a fuel tax based road system. (The heavier vehicles use more gas, are harder on the roads, and pay more per mile. The people who drive more, pay more tax. That seems roughly fair. OTOH, it's not clear that the current system builds roads where they are most needed. And there is undoubtedly waste in the system. The computer system scandals come immediately to mind.) Perhaps if some of the gas tax was allocated to support the private toll roads, perhaps a percentage of mileage carried... Of course that approach would work best for maintenance, not construction, which is a more of a gamble on future behavior. Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From mv at cdc.gov Fri May 9 17:18:29 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 17:18:29 -0700 Subject: Its Official: Stego to be demonized Message-ID: <3EBC4554.9B1DA765@cdc.gov> Investigators believe cell members were using a process called stenography, in which special software allows a text message to be hidden inside a small part of a computer photograph. U.S. investigators say many terrorists received instruction on the technique when they trained at al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. http://www.nypost.com/news/worldnews/57502.htm From mv at cdc.gov Fri May 9 17:19:06 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 17:19:06 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: <3EBC4579.307B57A7@cdc.gov> At 12:04 AM 5/9/03 -0700, Bill Frantz wrote: >There have been some proposals to build privately owned toll roads in >California. Proposals? You can *drive* on them now. Some are privately-owned lanes parallel to public lanes (91 in SoCal), some are entirely privately-owned novel tollways (241, 243, parts of 74, 133). You can drive most without a tracking/transponder (ie use currency) though they can photograph your plates on any lane. Financially they're not doing wonderfully, but the roads are there! [resent.. lne having a problem with batching submissions?] From sunder at sunder.net Fri May 9 14:40:05 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 17:40:05 -0400 (edt) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: Message-ID: No, no, no. Whales should be lightly roasted over a charcoal grill after being properly marinated in olive oil, vinegar, salt and pepper. Microwaved whale meat just tastes aweful. There's nothing worse than tasteless food. :) As for dolphins, A1 is the way to go - or you can do chicken fried dolphin steaks. :^) Yumm! ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Fri, 9 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > >Ten thousand years ago, the natural environment in California was different > >in almost every way. Who is to say that one was better than the other? > > Exactly. That's why we should NUKE THE WHALES! From declan at well.com Fri May 9 15:00:10 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 18:00:10 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard>; from bob.cat@snet.net on Fri, May 09, 2003 at 06:00:21PM -0400 References: <539D4264-8243-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard> Message-ID: <20030509180010.A21128@cluebot.com> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 06:00:21PM -0400, BobCat wrote: > Not impossible, though: > > http://www.dullesgreenway.com/cgi-bin/dginfo.cfm > > The Dulles Greenway is a privately owned 14-mile toll road that connects > Washington Dulles International Airport with Leesburg, Virginia. The > Greenway is the first private toll road in Virginia since 1816. > Since the Greenway's dedication on September 29th 1995, commuters have > enjoyed a non-stop alternative to Routes 7 and 28. Yep, it's a good counterexample to the general rule. But I recall that when land acquisition began, that area near Lessburg was still primarily farm country, which is easier to accumulate in terms of parcels. Also it's unclear that it was entirely private -- the web page talks about planning beginning after a 1988 state law was enacted... -Declan From bob.cat at snet.net Fri May 9 15:00:21 2003 From: bob.cat at snet.net (BobCat) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 18:00:21 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy References: <539D4264-8243-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard> From: "Tim May" > This private toll road would be very hard to build in any other place, Not impossible, though: http://www.dullesgreenway.com/cgi-bin/dginfo.cfm The Dulles Greenway is a privately owned 14-mile toll road that connects Washington Dulles International Airport with Leesburg, Virginia. The Greenway is the first private toll road in Virginia since 1816. Since the Greenway's dedication on September 29th 1995, commuters have enjoyed a non-stop alternative to Routes 7 and 28. From bear at sonic.net Fri May 9 18:05:49 2003 From: bear at sonic.net (bear) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 18:05:49 -0700 (PDT) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030509101753.A23118@slack.lne.com> Message-ID: I rather liked the suggestion someone made a while ago that involves paying the recipient when sending email to them. If they reply, you get your money back. But if you spam, it would rapidly become expensive. However, that involves financial payments again, and nobody is willing to do financial anything in a way that allows anonymous players. So if we care about the ability to have anonymous email, we can simply eliminate from consideration anything that requires a paid email license or financial payments to be made in exchange for the right to send mail. There is a better way, of course. But it may not be as profitable for the people who want to sell certs, so nobody's pushing it right now. Remember the "hashcash" proposal from a few years ago? It basically involved the recipient setting some computational task that would take a couple of CPU seconds to complete and demanding the results (from the sending machine) before it would accept an email. IIRC, it was proposed with a probabilistic task, but there's no reason why it couldn't be done with a more precisely controlled linear task such as repeated squaring under a modulus. Or maybe you could ask distributed.net to find a way to use CPU cycles beneficially and provably, and require some number of work-packets to be completed before the mail is delivered. The computational task can get arbitrarily larger, if the recipient system doesn't like the look of the mail. I can picture the MDA going, "wow, I decrypted this one, but it scores 9.2 on my procmail filter scale, so I better ask for and get fifteen MIPS-minutes of CPU time before I actually deliver it." Stuff like this can be done anonymously, can be done on the recipient and sender machines, can depend on filters (the MDA sees it after it arrives and gets decrypted) and limits the per-machine rate at which a spammer can send spam. It requires no central keying authority, no registrations or controls, allows random email from people you don't know or haven't heard from in a while to reach you, is a barrier that's fully customizable at the recipient site, can be implemented purely in software (meaning nobody has to get a licence or a subscription or vouched for by someone else to send mail), and if someone really *does* care enough to dedicate fifteen MIPS-minutes of CPU to getting an advertisement through to you, it probably means he's got a specific reason to believe that it's actually something you'll be interested in, rather than just being a "bottom feeder" who sends out a million emails in the hopes of one response. SMTP is a hole, and needs replaced. We have the technology. It'll work. Bear --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From harlequin at nekrodomos.net Fri May 9 10:12:21 2003 From: harlequin at nekrodomos.net (harlequin) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 18:12:21 +0100 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <3EBB7776.29559.D36FA87@localhost> References: <3EBA899E.178E8C8E@cdc.gov> <3EBB7776.29559.D36FA87@localhost> Message-ID: <20030509171221.GA3831@shiva.localnet.fake> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 09:40:06AM -0700, James A. Donald wrote: > -- > On 8 May 2003 at 18:47, harlequin wrote: > > I think that this is the whole point. It's impossible to tell > > what effect removing a species from an ecosystem will have > > due to the phenomenal complexity of the system. > > In any one area, species come and go all the time, usually > without much consequence. Attempting to stop nature from > changing is also an interference in nature. Ten thousand > years ago, the natural environment in California was different > in almost every way. Who is to say that one was better than > the other? I agree up to a point. Species do disappear all the time, as a natural process of elimination. The difference in this scenario is a deliberate and fast genocide, not the extinction of a species which is not viable. An artificial interference rather than a natural progression. Stopping nature from changing is definitely an interference, and one with which I disagree. This isn't the case here, though. We're not talking about preventing the mosquito from becoming extinct through natural causes, we're talking about not wiping it out. Which environment is better? Well, it's impossible to compare. I think that the current drive is generally to have as little impact on the "natural" evolution of a landscape as is possible. It all depends where you draw the line. It's certainly possible to argue that any species should try as hard as possible to survive, and so we should wipe out everything that threatens us in any way and create a homogenized and safe environment for humans. I don't think that many people would agree with that viewpoint, however. ... and so another delightfully off-topic message ends. H -- "He who controls the past controls the future; | We are at war with Iraq, he who controls the present controls the past." | We have always been at war -- O'Brien in Orwell's "1984" | with Iraq. From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Fri May 9 15:22:18 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 18:22:18 -0400 Subject: Iris scanning In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030507110102.02d6c8e0@idiom.com> References: <20030507140834.GA24907@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030509181655.0450cec0@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 11:04 AM 5/7/03 -0700, Bill Stewart wrote: ... >While the point they're trying to make is about false positives, >the THIRTEEN MILLION PEOPLE ON THE FBI WATCH LIST just kind of slides by. >That's equal to 5% of the US population, on Federal watch lists. > (Yes, obviously some of those are foreigners, but then half the > US population > are young enough that hopefully almost none of them attract > Federal attention...) >What an outrage! Yep. Along with the obvious civil liberties problems there, this implies some incredible level of waste of resources monitoring and harassing mostly innocent people, while spending far fewer resources on actually catching the guys shipping the Pakistani nuke in and loading it on a truck for shipment to D.C. --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Fri May 9 15:28:26 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 18:28:26 -0400 Subject: Sheeple Syndrome [was: Asperger's Syndrome] In-Reply-To: <3EB98F52.1DB0E1D6@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030509182804.0450d170@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 03:57 PM 5/7/03 -0700, Major Variola (ret) wrote: >At 04:24 PM 5/7/03 -0400, Trei, Peter wrote: > >As long as as people are going to wall off > >particular personality types, and label them as > >"Something-or-other Syndrome", we ought to be > >able to have fun with this too. > >Financial Stockholm Syndrome: >Suffered by people who enjoy paying taxes. Or, for that matter, investing in the NASDAQ. --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 From timcmay at got.net Fri May 9 19:43:51 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 19:43:51 -0700 Subject: Private toll roads In-Reply-To: <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard> Message-ID: <3BE852E0-8291-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Friday, May 9, 2003, at 03:00 PM, BobCat wrote: > From: "Tim May" > >> This private toll road would be very hard to build in any other place, > > Not impossible, though: > > http://www.dullesgreenway.com/cgi-bin/dginfo.cfm > > The Dulles Greenway is a privately owned 14-mile toll road that > connects > Washington Dulles International Airport with Leesburg, Virginia. The > Greenway is the first private toll road in Virginia since 1816. > Since the Greenway's dedication on September 29th 1995, commuters have > enjoyed a non-stop alternative to Routes 7 and 28. > If I'm not mistaken--and I haven't done any Googling on this--the new toll road is next to the older and still operating road. (I have not been on the Dulles Access Road since 1991, but I recall the private toll road was under construction next to it, on the same right of way.) I spent most of the 60s in the Langley/Fairfax area, and I took travelled the Dulles Access Road many times. The original "right of way" was of course obtained by condemning hundreds of properties in the 1950s to make way for the Dulles Access Road. Burbclaves like Reston and Herndon later grew up on either side of the condemned right of way, and had only limited connections to each other. If the new toll road is using the original condemned right of way, then my point stands. The new developers presumably bribed the right officials and contributed to the right election campaigns so as to piggyback on the original statist action. If the new toll road is NOT on the orginal right of way, and passes through the various neighborhoods like Herndon, Reston, and Vienna, then I would be very interested in just how they bought up thousands of houses, cut through dozens of surface streets, and generally cut a new swathe through a suburban area. --Tim May From timcmay at got.net Fri May 9 20:00:46 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 20:00:46 -0700 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030509125934.GA30621@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <98A948CA-8293-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Friday, May 9, 2003, at 05:59 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 11:55:06PM -0400, Declan McCullagh wrote: >> On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 01:04:50PM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: >>> Hmm, I've never seen that sort of a problem with community >>> gardens >>> anywhere. The vast majority of the people work pretty hard on their >>> plots. >> >>> From my window where I'm typing this, I can see (or could see if it >> were light out) one of Adams Morgans' once-lauded "community gardens." >> It might have been a big deal in the 1970s, but now it's just a rocky >> slope with a few scraggly corn stalks growing on it. I've never seen a >> gardener actually garden there in the seven years I've lived in the >> neighborhood. >> > > Sounds like you live in one of those neighborhoods which underwent > gentrification, or otherwise got yuppiefied, and the new residents are > of the > sort who don't get their hands dirty, eh? Or at least not with real > dirt. > I said I saw the same thing in Berkeley and Santa Cruz. Both are said to be "progressive" communities, but in both places the so-called community garden areas are essentially for hoboes and deadbeats to scratch at. Why would a "clean and sober" person (I'll call them this instead of "gentrified") want to go dig in the dirt where the dogs have crapped, where the addicts have shot up, and where their best tomatoes and zuchinis and whatnot get filched by the bums and addicts? Real people find garden space to plant in. My general point remains: why "argue" with the city government about when you can access your communal, collective property, or what you can spray on it, or which vegetables are said to be "conflict vegetables" (seeds from some zone the U.N. has declared un-P.C.) (*), when you can simply find a 5 x 9 plot of land, or lease it, and not have to ask permission? (I'm joking about "conflict vegetables." But ever since all the various PC television shows and movies started nattering about "conflict diamonds," I have realized this is just another PC scam. If I buy diamonds from Zaire I don't give a hoot in hell that they were bought from "capitalist roaders" or whomever the U.N. has declared to be politically incorrect. Seeing a James Bond movie centered around "conflict diamonds" made me ill.) --Tim May From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Fri May 9 18:38:21 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 20:38:21 -0500 (CDT) Subject: [hangar18-general] Q: A question of security vulnerability In-Reply-To: <20030509125718.GC2474@broadq.com> Message-ID: Hi Wayne, Hope you and the family are doing well. Kick them kids for me ;) Got any Plan 9 boxes running yet? Exactly, what I was interested in though was are there any situations or programs that one can run using #2 that one can't do using #1. It isn't an issue of security or user rights per se but rather a 'shell compatibility' issue. Is there an aspect of *nix that allows programs to be loaded directly, while they won't run via a shell? Is that clear as mud or what? I believe the first is slightly safer because you could wrap shell (eg put it in another dir and use a script in /bin/sh's place). The reason I believe it is more secure (but only very!!! slightly) is that before we can execute the users target code they -must- execute 'sh' which provides an opportunity for doing something about stopping them. It's an interesting mind game if nothing else. We should do a 1st Saturday sometime this summer ;) On Fri, 9 May 2003, Wayne Walker wrote: > sudo is actually almost never secure. As you imply, with line 1 bob can > do _anything_ just like line 2. > > Here are some more less obvious examples where bob can do _anything_ > > 1. bob pine > 2. bob vi > 3. bob chown > 4. bob chmod > > With any of the 4 above, bob can do anything. > > With 1 or 2, bob can run any command from within the program (! is > allowed in vi, and if you set $EDITOR to vi before running pine...) > > In 3 and 4, bob can make setuid programs or change perms on /etc and put > his own passwd/shadow files in place. > > Bottom line, if you give someone sudo access you should tgrust them to > be root, OR you should only allow them to run very specific > _scripts/binaries_ that you wrote for them specifically (e.g. > chown_files_to_others_in_his_primary_group, restart_lpd, > restart_httpd...) And here you still have to be careful about these > programs.... > > On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 09:34:15PM -0500, Jim Choate wrote: > > > > Given a basic Linux (or *nix) system with a user bob. Assume that bob has > > sudo capability. There are two approaches (I'm not going to use exact > > syntax): > > > > 1. bob sh > > > > 2. bob All > > > > So, in the first case bob can: sudo sh -c "foo" > > > > and in the second bob can: sudo foo > > > > Why would the first approach represent a more secure mechanism? > > > > It is true that sh could be a wrapper or have sticky bits, etc. We'll > > assume these are not an issue. The point being why is running a program > > directly as root in this manner less secure than running the program > > through a shell as root? > > > > Example? Explanation? > > > > Thanks. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From dhodgin1661 at Rogers.com Fri May 9 18:25:27 2003 From: dhodgin1661 at Rogers.com (David W. Hodgins) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 21:25:27 -0400 Subject: Its Official: Stego to be demonized In-Reply-To: <3EBC4554.9B1DA765@cdc.gov> References: <3EBC4554.9B1DA765@cdc.gov> Message-ID: On Fri, 09 May 2003 17:18:29 -0700, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > Investigators believe cell members were using a process > called stenography, in which special software allows a text > message to be hidden inside a small part of a computer > photograph. > > U.S. investigators say many terrorists received instruction > on the technique when they trained at al Qaeda camps in > Afghanistan. > > http://www.nypost.com/news/worldnews/57502.htm > It's a good thing these secrataries didn't go to school someplace where they may have learned a really dangerous tool like steganography. Regards, Dave Hodgins From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Fri May 9 21:01:33 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 23:01:33 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <3EBBD76D.1940321A@cdc.gov> References: <3EBBD76D.1940321A@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <20030510040133.GA31313@cybershamanix.com> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 09:29:33AM -0700, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > At 09:26 PM 5/8/03 -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > >And as I said before, the mosquitoes really aren't that bad, just > >quit swatting at them. I'll take bugs over smokers anytime. > > My serious point is 1. you don't need to hunt for mushrooms to live No, but I did spend 20 years of my life working outside all day, the last 15 of those as a logger in north of Lk. Superior in MN. Awesome bugs. > 2. you haven't had children die from mosquito bites True. I did lose an awful lot of sled dog puppys and other animals (baby goats and rabbits) and get very sick myself from tick-borne Lyme's disease tho, before they knew what it even was, but I don't advocate chemical spraying for deer ticks. > 3. you/yours have access to western med if you get mosquito-vectored > diseases Yah, well, for as much good as it did me. Spent 8 days at Mayo and they didn't have a clue, wasn't diagnosed until two years later, two years of being pretty much totally disabled. > > Contrast with the state of much of the population.. They > would roast all the gnatcatchers to live better and not > blink an eye. Dodo burger, anyone? > That hasn't been my experience with most backwoods people. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From lynn at garlic.com Fri May 9 22:35:36 2003 From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler) Date: Fri, 09 May 2003 23:35:36 -0600 Subject: blackhole spam => mail unreliability (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <20030510060245.A9116582@exeter.ac.uk> References: <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <20030509034024.A8886127@exeter.ac.uk> <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> Message-ID: <4.2.2.20030509231022.00d53e90@mail.earthlink.net> Currently ISPs typically "notice" when they get complaints. ISPs could do a much better job of actively noticing and limiting mail at ingress ... as opposed to waiting for somebody to complain and canceling the account. Many of the recent statements about ISPs can't limit email at ingress dynamically are similar to the comments about not being able to filter ingress packets if their origin address didn't match the ip address of the sender (as stated in the original posting) ... per the ingress packet filtering RFC referenced in the original post. My original post mentioned that the ISPs could then do their own effort of blacklisting (of other ISPs). Currently spam blacklists can be somewhat like vigilantes .... with the argument analogy that since vigilantly justice can make mistakes then there shouldn't be any highway patrol, FBI, and/or secret service. ISPs would be expected to filter on ingress of email from their own customers .... and even if the 10 top ISPs blacklisted other ISPs that didn't do a reasonable job of ingress filtering ... it could start to put a big dent in the spamming business, possibly cutting it from 40-80% of existing email down under 5-10%. It is sort of like stop signs and stop lights .... there are typically hundreds of more intersections than there are traffic enforcers .... however with sufficient leverage ... it can significantly improve the situation ... even if it can be proved that it can't, absolutely, 100% guarantee one hundred percent compliance. I didn't make any statement about ISPs attempting to identify spammers when they register the account .... the original post was only with regard to ISPs doing active email ingress filtering. My ISP recognizes and bills me extra if I'm simultaneously connected multiple times ... there is a little latitude for modem hanging, my dropping the line ... but the modem not reporting it ... and my connecting on a different modem. It also does traffic load-leveling if I really try and hit it hard. If it can bill extra for simultaneous connects and traffic load leveling, it can do both packet ingress filtering and email ingress filtering. past thread drawing the analogy that the information superhighway is something like the wild west .... w/o traffic rules, traffic signs, traffic lights, speed limits, and enforcement. start with a couple hundred people in town .... and went to millions ... and there still isn't even any rule about which side of the road people should be driving on. http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001m.html#30 Internet like city w/o traffic rules, traffic signs, traffic lights and traffic enforcement At 06:02 AM 5/10/2003 +0100, Adam Back wrote: >On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 10:11:52AM -0600, Anne & Lynn Wheeler wrote: > > So it is much easier for ISPs to have lists of other trusted &/or > > untrusted ISPs that they will accept email from. > >Any internet user needs to be able to send mail to any other internet >user. Which means the default has to be open (blacklists rather than >whitelists). Then you have the blackhole lists like ORBs etc, which >block domains used predominantly by spammers. But the problem is >spammers don't stay in one place, they buy service from ISPs and spam >flat-out until the ISP notices and cancels the account. Some ISPs are >more grey -- they want to make money from spammers by providing them >service, and some ISPs just don't notice or respond that quickly. The >ISP can't distinguish spammers from non-spammers when they receive >customer orders. The blackhole people are arbitrary vigilantes by and >large, so the overall effect you might argue does reduce spam, but it >also results in lost mail. > >My experience was I couldn't get mail from my brother who was using >btinternet, one of the largest ISPs in the UK because some idiot >blackholer blackholed their dynamic IPs. Not doubt there were at some >time some spammers using BTinternet as with just about any other ISP. >Recently I couldn't receive mail from John Gilmore, and so it goes. > >So I don't see how this is a "solution", rather it is just a broken >countermeasure with scatter gun fall-out of false positives for all >the other people who find themselves sharing the same ISP as spammers >long enough for the blackhole people to add them. > >Adam -- Anne & Lynn Wheeler http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/ Internet trivia 20th anv http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/rfcietff.htm From bill.stewart at pobox.com Sat May 10 02:25:44 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 02:25:44 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: References: <20030509180010.A21128@cluebot.com> <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard> <539D4264-8243-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030510022002.02da5ec0@idiom.com> At 04:56 PM 05/09/2003 -0700, Bill Frantz wrote: >Perhaps there is a reason that the 5th amendment provided for eminent >domain. And, given the government camel nose under the tent, how far do Eminent domain gets used for all kinds of appalling things - it's not just governments building roads or military bases, or even governments taking land for government-run activities. It's also used for shopping malls and such where the government thinks it can get higher property tax revenues or "improve" the city or increase campaign contributions from real estate developers, and in the past it was used for "urban renewal", i.e. tearing down housing inhabited primarily by black people. In the past year, some major big-box retailer chain had a shareholder proposal to never use eminent domain to acquire their building sites, and management found a way to get it not to be voted on, as opposed to just voting against it. I don't think it was Walmart. From adam at cypherspace.org Fri May 9 22:02:45 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 06:02:45 +0100 Subject: blackhole spam => mail unreliability (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net>; from lynn@garlic.com on Fri, May 09, 2003 at 10:11:52AM -0600 References: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <20030509034024.A8886127@exeter.ac.uk> <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> Message-ID: <20030510060245.A9116582@exeter.ac.uk> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 10:11:52AM -0600, Anne & Lynn Wheeler wrote: > So it is much easier for ISPs to have lists of other trusted &/or > untrusted ISPs that they will accept email from. Any internet user needs to be able to send mail to any other internet user. Which means the default has to be open (blacklists rather than whitelists). Then you have the blackhole lists like ORBs etc, which block domains used predominantly by spammers. But the problem is spammers don't stay in one place, they buy service from ISPs and spam flat-out until the ISP notices and cancels the account. Some ISPs are more grey -- they want to make money from spammers by providing them service, and some ISPs just don't notice or respond that quickly. The ISP can't distinguish spammers from non-spammers when they receive customer orders. The blackhole people are arbitrary vigilantes by and large, so the overall effect you might argue does reduce spam, but it also results in lost mail. My experience was I couldn't get mail from my brother who was using btinternet, one of the largest ISPs in the UK because some idiot blackholer blackholed their dynamic IPs. Not doubt there were at some time some spammers using BTinternet as with just about any other ISP. Recently I couldn't receive mail from John Gilmore, and so it goes. So I don't see how this is a "solution", rather it is just a broken countermeasure with scatter gun fall-out of false positives for all the other people who find themselves sharing the same ISP as spammers long enough for the blackhole people to add them. Adam From adam at cypherspace.org Fri May 9 22:55:20 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 06:55:20 +0100 Subject: blackhole spam => mail unreliability (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <4.2.2.20030509231022.00d53e90@mail.earthlink.net>; from lynn@garlic.com on Fri, May 09, 2003 at 11:35:36PM -0600 References: <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <20030509034024.A8886127@exeter.ac.uk> <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> <20030510060245.A9116582@exeter.ac.uk> <4.2.2.20030509231022.00d53e90@mail.earthlink.net> Message-ID: <20030510065520.A9158985@exeter.ac.uk> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 11:35:36PM -0600, Anne & Lynn Wheeler wrote: > Currently ISPs typically "notice" when they get complaints. ISPs > could do a much better job of actively noticing and limiting mail at > ingress ... as opposed to waiting for somebody to complain and > canceling the account. So this would be the block port 25 except to ISP run mail hub approach? Firstly that only works for end-users; larger customers want their own mail delivery and no abitrary restrictions on what they can do with their pipe. Then what is the ISP going to notice? He shouldn't be actively monitoring his customers traffic. There are lots of tunneling protocols, authentication is weak, spam can identify other people as the sender (to some extent), host security is weak, hosts are vulnerable to viruses. Recently there was a virus with a payload of an open proxy, which it was suspected was distributed by spammers, or at least the spammers had discovered it and were using it. So I understand what you're describing, but it sounds lik a big messy nightmare, which is pretty much where we are now and rapidly getting worse. > My original post mentioned that the ISPs could then do their own > effort of blacklisting (of other ISPs). Let's try something concrete: say some spammer starts using AOL to send a batch to Eathlink. So Earthlink notices and blocks AOL. If you seriously think this is the outcome, then email reliability planet-wide has probably just dropped by 1% (or whatever fraction of internet email travels from AOL->earthlink). Repeat for all major ISPs who are being abused by spammers with disposable free AOL CDs, accounts bought with stolen credit cards, or just regular paid service. Messy right? So I think it is not realistic to assume ISPs can do this without massive reliaibility loss. Typically I'm presuming blackhole lists don't block large ISPs (modulo the BTinternet example I gave) because of the fall out. Basically any ISP of any size has an ongoing turn-around of some proportion of their users who are repeat hit and run-spammers. So a blackhole approach can stop a static IP leased to a spammer, used by the spammer only, but the same approach applied to the hit and run cheaper ISP account using type customers (dynamic IP) causes no end of reliability issues. Analogies about the wild west don't really help in thinking about solutions I think. I like the decentralised nature of the internet. I don't want to have to show government ID to obtain an internet drivers license to send email. When I buy a pipe onto the internet I don't want "no server" AUPs, nor a mish-bash of blocked ports. I understand the problem is hard to address, but let's not damage the useful decentralised open architecture of the internet trying! Adam From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Sat May 10 07:12:57 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 09:12:57 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Q: A question of security vulnerability In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Sat, 10 May 2003, Thomas Shaddack wrote: > For a limited set of specific tasks, there is a workaround. Have a > directory to which the user has write access, have a script run every > minute or every 5 minutes or so from crontab that checks if there is a > file with specified name there, and if so, do an action and erase the > file. > > I solved the problem when one of our programmers needed to occassionally > restart Apache to which he did not have the rights. Instead of messing > with sudo and taking the risk, he now just has to do "touch > /var/cmd/apacherestart" and in next couple minutes it gets done. > > This trick can be used even for passing commands, which then can be put > into the file (echo "commands" > /var/cmd/whatevercommandfile) and the > script then reads them from there (and checks the syntactical validity > of the arguments to prevent eventual attack through this route). I've used that sort of approach as well. With regard to the sh wrapper I mentioned earlier, I like chroot for that sort of stuff. One approach is that when the user executes the sh -c the sh wrapper creates a well know chroot sequence and perhaps copies information from the live file system into the chroot jail. Let's the user makes modes, and when the "foo" command quits the script can then evaluate the results (for example greping for changes to itself in all files in the chroot jail. Assuming it looks ok it can cp the changes back to the live filesystem and away you go. > Should be bulletproof. I -never- make that claim ;) -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From lynn at garlic.com Sat May 10 08:36:43 2003 From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 09:36:43 -0600 Subject: blackhole spam => mail unreliability (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <20030510065520.A9158985@exeter.ac.uk> References: <4.2.2.20030509231022.00d53e90@mail.earthlink.net> <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <20030509034024.A8886127@exeter.ac.uk> <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> <20030510060245.A9116582@exeter.ac.uk> <4.2.2.20030509231022.00d53e90@mail.earthlink.net> Message-ID: <4.2.2.20030510084732.00ae0aa0@mail.earthlink.net> do you think that earthlink would automatically blacklist aol if it found incoming spam from aol? I think that earthlink would contact aol and say ... your ingress filtering doesn't seem to be working. It would only be after all attempts to understand aol's ingress filtering that earthlink might take action. again ... it is analogous to somebody hearing about traffic lights for the first time and coming up with all the reasons why people would ignore traffic lights. I would claim that the current issue isn't that spam exists (aka traffic violations), it is that there are billions of spams each day. and that this easily cuts the majority of it if the top ten start doing ingress mail filtering and that ingress mail filtering is orders of magnitude more efficient than other kinds of solutions. the blacklisting isn't for the mistakes ... it is for the ISPs that obviously aren't going to follow the traffic rules. so there are lots of kinds of tunneling. the major ISPs are already doing ingress filtering for email not coming from a recognizable customer. so tunneling actually reduces to a common vulnerability with ISPs not doing ingress email filtering (aka the tunneling issue to a ISP that isn't doing ingress email filtering is common vulnerability with a customer directly getting an email account with ISP that isn't doing ingress email filtering). So the issue comes back to ISPs that are recognized as not doing ingress email filtering. So lets say this gets something like 80 percent of the traffic violations. So the majority of the random traffic violations are now starting to be taken care of. There are 1) the corporations effectively operating as private ISPs, 2) compromised machines, 3) random anarchy. So both #2 and #3 are vulnerabilities treated just the same as a real spammer getting a real account and directly doing spam. These two vulnerabilities should be caught be ingress email filtering. Real spammers caught by ISP ingress filtering, compromised machines caught by ISP ingress filtering, and hit&run anarchist caught by ingress filtering .... all appear to be a common vulnerability caught by ingress email filtering. The issues actual reduce to a very few simple, non-complex vulnerabilities from a business process standpoint (ignoring all the technology twists and turns): 1) ISPs that do ingress email filtering and 2) ISPs that do not do ingress email filtering. If ISPs are doing ingress email filtering .... then all the situations of known spammers, spammers masquerading enormously getting accounts, spammers compromising other machines and masquerading enormously, tunneling, etc ... all get taken care of. There are still the periodic traffic accidents where somebody might be able to do a couple hundred before getting cut .... but it probably reduces over 90 percent of the traffic. So the remain issue is whether an ISP is following the traffic laws and doing ingress email filtering or flagrantly flaunting the law and letting millions of spam thru. This is regardless of whether it is a real public ISP ... or effectively a corporate/private ISP. The other ISPs then use blacklisting. The first line of defense is that all ISPs are to do ingress email filtering and the 2nd line of defense is that the major ISPs do blacklisting on the ISPs that obviously are flaunting the law. The primary business issue is that majority of spam is being done for some profit .... that the cost of sending the spam is less than the expected financial return. This should address the 99 percentile. Again, it is very simple, first line of defense is ingress email filtering. This is only a moderate extension of what the major ISPs are currently doing with regard to not accepting email from entities that are obviously not their customers, current traffic limiting business rules, etc. The second line of defense is blacklisting ISPs that aren't following the traffic rules. I claim, it actually is rather much simpler and much more effective. So back to the obvious traffic violations. One is the compromised machines. Large proportion of the compromised machines are their because they all got hit by spamming virus. I claim, that over time if over 90 percent of spamming gets cut ... then 90 percent of the machines that get compromised by virus in spam can also get cut. Situation is now down to large number of compromised machines each sending couple hundred emails each ... staying under the ingress filtering radar. That is orders of magnitude better than the current situation but it is starting to reduce the case to manageable traffic violations. So this scenario gets down to providing significantly more focus on compromised machines ... and back to a recent comment about lots of vendors saying that consumers won't pay for better security ... because they have no motivation. This is somewhat the insurance industry theory of improving on severity of traffic accidents (what motivated automobile manufactory to build safer cars). My ISP currently charges me extra over the flat rate for certain behavioral activities. Violating ingress email filtering rules would be such a valid inducement. I get ingress email filtering accident insurance the premiums are based on the integrity of the machine i'm operating. So, two simple rules .... 1) ISPs do ingress email filtering, and 2) ISPs blacklist other ISPs that flagrantly violate the ingress email filtering rules. With a sizeable reduction in spam, there is corresponding sizeable reduction in compromised machines. However, compromised machines that do spam and hit the ISPs ingress email filtering rules, get fined. It is treated as accident and operating an unsafe vehicle. You can get accident and fine insurance .... but the premium is related to kind of machine you operate. Some inducement for consuming public to purchase safer machines. The two simple rules ... with the fines for violations then provides some inducement for consumer buying habit regarding purchasing safer machines. And it is all quite similar to policies and practices currently in place. -- Anne & Lynn Wheeler http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/ Internet trivia 20th anv http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/rfcietff.htm From declan at well.com Sat May 10 06:45:51 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 09:45:51 -0400 Subject: Dulles Greenway is not a private toll road (Was: Private toll roads) In-Reply-To: <3BE852E0-8291-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net>; from timcmay@got.net on Fri, May 09, 2003 at 07:43:51PM -0700 References: <004a01c31676$7e38f5c0$382f3ccc@Leopard> <3BE852E0-8291-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030510094551.B21128@cluebot.com> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 07:43:51PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > If the new toll road is NOT on the orginal right of way, and passes > through the various neighborhoods like Herndon, Reston, and Vienna, > then I would be very interested in just how they bought up thousands of > houses, cut through dozens of surface streets, and generally cut a new > swathe through a suburban area. There are two roads: The Dulles Toll Road, which connects I-66 (near the Beltway) with Dulles Airport, and the Dulles Greenway, which continues northwest away from the city to end in Leesburg. We've been talking about the Greenway. There's a map here: http://www.dullesgreenway.com/cgi-bin/dgmap.cfm I take the Dulles Toll Road whenever I fly out of that airport, but have only taken the Dulles Greenway once or twice (the only people I know in the area are north of Leesburg, and it's easier to connect through Point of Rocks in Maryland). So I'm not really all that familiar with it. A quick search, though, turns up this, which shows that the Greenway was a government project accomplished through eminent domain, that it is run by a private contractor and will return to state control in a few decades, and that it's subject to continued aggressive regulation from local governments. http://www.americancityandcounty.com/ar/government_making_inroads_private/ >On the other side of the country, the Dulles Greenway, a 15-mile >extension of the Dulles Toll Road, connects the Beltway (I-495) >around Washington, D.C., with Dulles International Airport... That >profitability, plus growth in the nearby suburbs, convinced Virginia >to build the extension. Its DOT, however, decided not to build a >public road and awarded the franchise to the Toll Road Corporation of >Virginia (TRCV). The TRCV will operate the Greenway for 40 years, >after which the road becomes state property... The Greenway, >meanwhile, is subject to utility-style regulation by the state's >corporation commission with a target return on equity of 21 >percent... The road also has been subject to extensive >regulation. For example, Greenway officials wanted to raise the speed >limit on the road from 55 to 65 miles per hour, an approval process >that took substantial time and required an act of the Virginia >legislature. Furthermore, state regulators and lenders have to >approve toll restructuring. Not a good example of a privately-owned and privately-built road. -Declan From timcmay at got.net Sat May 10 10:03:43 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 10:03:43 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030510022002.02da5ec0@idiom.com> Message-ID: <5B3E0E0E-8309-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Saturday, May 10, 2003, at 02:25 AM, Bill Stewart wrote: > At 04:56 PM 05/09/2003 -0700, Bill Frantz wrote: >> Perhaps there is a reason that the 5th amendment provided for eminent >> domain. And, given the government camel nose under the tent, how far >> do > > Eminent domain gets used for all kinds of appalling things - > it's not just governments building roads or military bases, > or even governments taking land for government-run activities. > > It's also used for shopping malls and such where the government thinks > it can get higher property tax revenues or "improve" the city or > increase campaign contributions from real estate developers, > and in the past it was used for "urban renewal", i.e. tearing down > housing inhabited primarily by black people. Yes, many such uses by private actors, via bought and paid for public actors. There have been several publicized cases where a longstanding store or restaurant was seized by eminent domain, razed, and then the land has yet to be built upon. Small town residents in one area saw an important store (hardware, I think) seized and razed and now, years later, just an empty lot with no sales or property tax coming in, no employees, and no hardware store. (I think the plan had been for some large box store, but the chain decided the town only could support a smaller-sized store, which was now gone.) I met some Silicon Valley friends for lunch a few days ago. We went to a small place near a set of "out of place skyscrapers" which had been heavily subsidized by a local government. The restaurant was virtually empty, and the owner/chef came out to our table (he knew one of our party from years back) to launch into his tale of woe. For those who know the area, we ate in an old shopping complex called "Town and Country Village," in Sunnyvale, near Mathilda Avenue and Central Expressway. The old T & C Village had fallen onto hard times over the past 20 years, replaced by newer centers. So Sunnyvale decided to subsidize a builder to erect some 6-story office buildings. Three or four massive towers--massive compared to what's all around for a mile or two--got built. And now they are largely empty. Here's the "dot com explosion" optimistic report on this project: Anyway, this restaurant owner was telling us how the town gave him various inducements to open a restaurant to serve the lunch crowd from these several skyscrapers. (Apparently when government gets into the building business it also must worry about how to feed the workers. True in ancient Egypt, true today.) Since the buildings sit nearly empty, many of the new restaurants and delis and lunch places are failing. Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not be in the construction and business development business. (I would go further and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states and localities are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to give to businesses. No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to be. Ditto for governments running gambling operations, but I digress.) According to news reports on this area, Sunnyvale is still losing money on a major indoor mall it built 23-4 years ago ("Sunnyvale Town Center," which I used to live a mile or so away from when it was being built in the late 70s. IMO, there's something very, very wrong about any level of government building shopping malls. --Tim May "The great object is that every man be armed and everyone who is able may have a gun." --Patrick Henry "The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." --Alexander Hamilton From declan at well.com Sat May 10 07:07:48 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 10:07:48 -0400 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <98A948CA-8293-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net>; from timcmay@got.net on Fri, May 09, 2003 at 08:00:46PM -0700 References: <20030509125934.GA30621@cybershamanix.com> <98A948CA-8293-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030510100748.C21128@cluebot.com> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 08:00:46PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > Why would a "clean and sober" person (I'll call them this instead of > "gentrified") want to go dig in the dirt where the dogs have crapped, > where the addicts have shot up, and where their best tomatoes and > zuchinis and whatnot get filched by the bums and addicts? Yep. The decrepit "community garden" that I can see from my window is next to a shady area with park benches and picnic tables. That corner would be pleasant except for the constant homeless presence. In the spring and the fall, there are guaranteed to be homeless people sleeping on the benches. For whatever reason, in the summer they seem to sleep about 50' downslope toward Rock Creek Park, and in the winter they must find a warmer downtown grate to sleep on; I don't know. This despite the fact that the park is supposed to be closed at 10-11 pm or so. There's also a basketball court in the park, which during the summer time is a magnet for the youth from the less-gentrified area a few blocks away. The sound of a basketball bouncing and the assorted whooping and yelling carries pretty far on a quiet summer night at 2 am. Again, so much for posted closing time. There's also a soccer field, which because it's raining hard right now is a muddy swamp that will take a week to drain. Thanks to modern municipal efficiency, the grass has never been replanted and so it's mostly dirt, unfit for a real soccer game. And this is just at the beginning of the summer sports season too, so it'll just get worse. In the mornings, the park is used as an offleash dog run by local militant dog owners, with the predictable watch-where-you-step results. This despite supposedly strict rules against having dogs off leash in the city. The park is a convenient short cut from people living on Rep. Gary Condit's old street and walking to the Metro to go to work in the morning -- which overlaps with Dog Exercise Time. So dogs inevitably run after and bark at the people trying to get to work, which normally isn't a big deal, but you have some people who are really afraid of dogs or you have a small person and a really big dog, with the inevitable shouting matches and hard feelings arising between pedestrians and dog owners who can't or won't control their pets. I've only seen the police drive by the park once during DET, which prompted the dog owners to quickly leash their pets and then unleash them about 10 minutes after the drive by was complete. Anyway, I suspect these problems are hardly unique to this bit of our nation's capital. To go back to the community garden discussion point, yes, who would want to raise veggies in your "plot" when the area is already spoken for by dogs looking for a place to take a dump, soccer players stomping through your plants trying to find their ball, and homeless men looking for a midnight snack? -Declan From shaddack at ns.arachne.cz Sat May 10 02:16:11 2003 From: shaddack at ns.arachne.cz (Thomas Shaddack) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 11:16:11 +0200 (CEST) Subject: [hangar18-general] Q: A question of security vulnerability In-Reply-To: <20030509125718.GC2474@broadq.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 9 May 2003, Wayne Walker wrote: > Bottom line, if you give someone sudo access you should tgrust them to > be root, OR you should only allow them to run very specific > _scripts/binaries_ that you wrote for them specifically (e.g. > chown_files_to_others_in_his_primary_group, restart_lpd, > restart_httpd...) And here you still have to be careful about these > programs.... For a limited set of specific tasks, there is a workaround. Have a directory to which the user has write access, have a script run every minute or every 5 minutes or so from crontab that checks if there is a file with specified name there, and if so, do an action and erase the file. I solved the problem when one of our programmers needed to occassionally restart Apache to which he did not have the rights. Instead of messing with sudo and taking the risk, he now just has to do "touch /var/cmd/apacherestart" and in next couple minutes it gets done. This trick can be used even for passing commands, which then can be put into the file (echo "commands" > /var/cmd/whatevercommandfile) and the script then reads them from there (and checks the syntactical validity of the arguments to prevent eventual attack through this route). Should be bulletproof. From mv at cdc.gov Sat May 10 11:32:58 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 11:32:58 -0700 Subject: faster modexp()? cipheractive Message-ID: <3EBD45DA.90F5258B@cdc.gov> Forwarded from cryptography list... note that this company has a download of their fast RSA library (its probably an assembly hack) ---------- Anyone heard of these guys? An Isreali technology firm that claims to have a new patent-pending process for modexp that's 3-6 times faster depending on playtform. URL is at http://www.com/technology/technology.htm From rsalz at datapower.com Sat May 10 09:06:06 2003 From: rsalz at datapower.com (Rich Salz) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 12:06:06 -0400 (EDT) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030509101753.A23118@slack.lne.com> Message-ID: > > Lauren Weinstein, founder of People for Internet Responsibility, has > > come out with a new spam solution at http://www.pfir.org/tripoli-overview. Phil Hallam-Baker made of Verisign made a similar proposal. (I missed responding to an earlier post on this thread that said "here comes Verisign" or such-like.) Unfortunately, I can't find his post any more; I think it was on one of the XML security WG lists, but the message has already been purged from my mailbox. On thing interesting about the VRSN proposal was they they had a hardware implementation of the "velocity checker" as an option. And a patent applied for that. /r$ --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From morlockelloi at yahoo.com Sat May 10 12:58:41 2003 From: morlockelloi at yahoo.com (Morlock Elloi) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 12:58:41 -0700 (PDT) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20030510195841.76406.qmail@web40602.mail.yahoo.com> I think that any loading of e-mail with computational tasks has to follow the paradigm of the current system, where A sends mail to B and there is absolutely no other communication betwen B and A or C for that matter. For instance, take an assymetric algo, where t=Hard(x) and x=Easy(t). x is something that B can verify is (almost) unique to the message, like x = (B's e-mail address) + timestamp (must be within last n hours). A burns cycles to do t=Hard(x) and sends t with the message to B. B verifies x with x=Easy(t) and accepts or rejects message based on that. The drawback is that sending any mail costs time. I queue mail and in few minutes t is computed and mail sent. It could be as little as minute per message to discourage spam. No intermediaries, no communication protocols. ===== end (of original message) Y-a*h*o-o (yes, they scan for this) spam follows: __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo. http://search.yahoo.com From bill.stewart at pobox.com Sat May 10 18:32:28 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 18:32:28 -0700 Subject: New Nuclear Weapons Design Budget passes Senate Committee Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030510182322.02dbfe98@idiom.com> http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/5830795.htm http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/05/10/1052280479334.html Now that the Bush Administration has finished the War On Some People Who Might Have Weapons of Mass Destruction, they've gotten approval from the Senate Armed Services Committee for their budget request for about $50M in nuclear weapons design research and improvement of their testing facilities. Most of the design half of the budget is for nuclear bunker busters, but they're also starting some work on new small nukes. The "small" nukes are "up to 5 kt", so they're probably not the very small backpack-carriable weapons, while the bunker busters could be up to a megaton. This is just one Senate committee, not the full budget or a complete bill, but it does break the ban on new weapons of mass destruction development that's been around for ~11 years. From eresrch at eskimo.com Sat May 10 20:49:44 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 20:49:44 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Fri, 9 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > > Exactly. That's why we should NUKE THE WHALES! I always saw the sticker NUKE THE UNBORN GAY WHALES. Pisses off more people :-) Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From timcmay at got.net Sat May 10 21:10:01 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 21:10:01 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <20030511034429.GD1140@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <6F8D069A-8366-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Saturday, May 10, 2003, at 08:44 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 10:03:43AM -0700, Tim May wrote: >> Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not be >> in the construction and business development business. (I would go >> further and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states >> and >> localities are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to give >> to businesses. No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to be. >> Ditto for governments running gambling operations, but I digress.) >> > I agree with all the rest of this, however, I think you're wrong > about the > gambling. I think that's the only way gov't ought to be allowed to > fund itself, > by selling lottery tickets. A superficially good idea ("sounds good!"), but ultimately silly. Government bans gambling, or heavily regulates it, or declares illegal the exact odds it grants itself. Lotteries, for example, are the ultimate sucker bet. The payoff is a miniscule fraction of what is betted, and then to add insult to injury, governments state the payoff as "twenty million dollars!!!!" when the actual anuity value is something like $8 million. (Because they declare the 20-year payout as the prize. A casino which tried this, or a private lottery company, would be prosecuted for fraud.) Having government make gambling illegal but then operate gambling operations is no different from making prostitution illegal but then running brothels. I admit it is useful as an illustration of the hypocrisy and dishonesty of government, but I believe all of those who have been involved in government-run gambling where gambling is otherwise illegal should be prosecuted and imprisoned. Several million should be sent to prison for exactly the crimes they send civilians to prison for. --Tim May "The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant." --John Stuart Mill From timcmay at got.net Sat May 10 21:25:51 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 21:25:51 -0700 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030511033203.GB1140@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: On Saturday, May 10, 2003, at 08:32 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 08:00:46PM -0700, Tim May wrote: >> >> I said I saw the same thing in Berkeley and Santa Cruz. Both are said >> to be "progressive" communities, but in both places the so-called >> community garden areas are essentially for hoboes and deadbeats to >> scratch at. >> >> Why would a "clean and sober" person (I'll call them this instead of >> "gentrified") want to go dig in the dirt where the dogs have crapped, >> where the addicts have shot up, and where their best tomatoes and >> zuchinis and whatnot get filched by the bums and addicts? > > Sounds like a very poorly administered community garden. The only > big city > gardens I've seen were in Portland, OR, and they were fenced and gated > and > locked at night. The gardens themselves looked very productive and well > tended. As are all the ones I've ever seen in smaller communities. And > as are > the ones in NYC that Tyler's reported on. For a short while I was on a > list of > community garden administrators, I can post the address if you like, > perhaps you > could get feedback on these particular gardens being the way they are. > From that > traffic on that list, what you are seeing is not at all the norm. Declan described the same thing I see. And my brother in LA is a traffic engineer, one responsibilty being traffic issues in and around such "homeless gardens." He reports even worse situations. You still have not explained why government-operated gardens are a good idea. Believe me, there is plenty of land in America, even in cities. And markets solve the problems you described (arguing with city planners about fertilizers and times of operation). > > 5x9? Why the hell would I bother with a 5x9 plot? The plots in the > local > gardens here are 20x40 and I had two of them, and even that isn't > really at all > sufficient. We used to have one garden of 100'x100' down by the house, > then > another 50x80 up above the house mainly for potatoes and berries, > things the > deer wouldn't eat, plus my wife's flower gardens. I gave an example of a garden plot and you argue for statism on the grounds that my example is too small. A 5 x 9 raised bed plot is much larger than most people can handle as a hobb, while doing other things in their life. If they need large amounts of space, even more justification for doing things noncommunally. (My sister sublet her couple of acres just north of Sacramento to a Hmong family. Sure enough, several members of an extended family worked their gardens many hours a week. This is not "hobby" or "incidental" gardening, this is food production for sale at farmer's markets. Which is fine, but it is not the job of a city to buy land to let food producers farm it. It's also not the job of a city to acquire land for hobby producers, either, lest there be any doubt.) You were the one complaining that you had to argue with the communal czars about fertilizer usage and hours of operation. This is like arguing with a "community television board" about which channels are acceptable and which are not, and what the hours of operation should be, when the obvious and cypherpunkish solution is to bypass the community board and and get a satellite dish with Playboy, CNN, Spice, ESPN, and 200 other channels. Or to acquire your own land, or go in with others, where you can set your own policy on fertilizers and operating times. You remind me of the small-town busybodies who attend city council meetings and argue endlessly about what software should be on the "community" computers, when of course the answer is obvious: "none, because it is not the job of government to provide "community access" to computers." --Tim May "Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice."--Barry Goldwater From timcmay at got.net Sat May 10 21:43:06 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 21:43:06 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <0F110F9B-836B-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Saturday, May 10, 2003, at 08:49 PM, Mike Rosing wrote: > On Fri, 9 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > >> >> Exactly. That's why we should NUKE THE WHALES! > > I always saw the sticker NUKE THE UNBORN GAY WHALES. Pisses off more > people :-) > Doesn't piss off anyone. Anyone able to understand the sticker sees the irony. Anyone not able to just shrugs in agreement. Around 1982 a friend of mine was proposing to convert a "cherished" ocean front dirt lot (something the commies here would like a lot) into a "nuclear-powered whale-packing plant." Even his lefty friends laughed. (Details for the interested. This was Lighthouse Field, which was "saved" from development by Santa Cruz lefties, lesbians of color, and other folks Harmon Seaver and "Tyler Durden" would no doubt like very much. Today the field is a major homeless camp, needle park, and dog crap zone. And the city, which has not allowed a new hotel or conference center in decades, is in dire financial straits. But, hey, they stopped the evil capitalists from buying the privately owned land! Their neighbors down the coast also stopped a private owner from reasonably developing his land into a set of performance stages, hotels, conference centers, etc. He went bankrupt after his land use was blocked, the site is now choked with weeds and needles, there is no beach access at the site, and the community is squawking that there are no "stages" and "performance venues" for the community. I'd take everyone involved in blocking Wingspread, the project, and have them hanged for stealing Ry Kelley's property. I figure killing the 50 or 70 major culprits would send a message. Cryptoanarchy will someday mean the millions who need to be punished for their crimes will in fact be punished and converted into fertilizer, soap, lampshades, and other things which can be sold to partially pay for their crimes.) --Tim May From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Sat May 10 20:32:03 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 22:32:03 -0500 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <98A948CA-8293-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <20030509125934.GA30621@cybershamanix.com> <98A948CA-8293-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030511033203.GB1140@cybershamanix.com> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 08:00:46PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > > I said I saw the same thing in Berkeley and Santa Cruz. Both are said > to be "progressive" communities, but in both places the so-called > community garden areas are essentially for hoboes and deadbeats to > scratch at. > > Why would a "clean and sober" person (I'll call them this instead of > "gentrified") want to go dig in the dirt where the dogs have crapped, > where the addicts have shot up, and where their best tomatoes and > zuchinis and whatnot get filched by the bums and addicts? Sounds like a very poorly administered community garden. The only big city gardens I've seen were in Portland, OR, and they were fenced and gated and locked at night. The gardens themselves looked very productive and well tended. As are all the ones I've ever seen in smaller communities. And as are the ones in NYC that Tyler's reported on. For a short while I was on a list of community garden administrators, I can post the address if you like, perhaps you could get feedback on these particular gardens being the way they are. From that traffic on that list, what you are seeing is not at all the norm. > > Real people find garden space to plant in. > > My general point remains: why "argue" with the city government about > when you can access your communal, collective property, or what you can > spray on it, or which vegetables are said to be "conflict vegetables" > (seeds from some zone the U.N. has declared un-P.C.) (*), when you can > simply find a 5 x 9 plot of land, or lease it, and not have to ask > permission? 5x9? Why the hell would I bother with a 5x9 plot? The plots in the local gardens here are 20x40 and I had two of them, and even that isn't really at all sufficient. We used to have one garden of 100'x100' down by the house, then another 50x80 up above the house mainly for potatoes and berries, things the deer wouldn't eat, plus my wife's flower gardens. The problem with finding other garden plots around here would be that most of the land is either being farmed or subdivided and built on. Even if you were able to find a small corner of a farm field to lease, it would be heavily chemicalized. Actually, some of the local Hmongs have joined together and bought farmland so they can have bigger gardens. 5x9 -- geez, I garden more space than that on my porch roof in containers. Anyway, I think the community garden concept is a pretty good one. It gives city people a chance to grow play in the dirt, and also an opportunity to meet and talk to people who like gardening, see how they do things, etc. It's been really interesting seeing how the Hmongs do stuff, and fun trying to communicate with some of the older ones. And in fact it was my wife working with some of the Hmongs who got the administrators to stop using chemicals on the plots - since the vast majority of gardeners *are* Hmong, the powers that be finally gave in when the Hmongs said they wanted to garden in their traditional way. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Sat May 10 20:38:53 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 22:38:53 -0500 Subject: blackhole spam => mail unreliability (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <4.2.2.20030510084732.00ae0aa0@mail.earthlink.net> References: <4.2.2.20030509231022.00d53e90@mail.earthlink.net> <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> <20030509034024.A8886127@exeter.ac.uk> <4.2.2.20030509095631.00c9dd20@mail.earthlink.net> <20030510060245.A9116582@exeter.ac.uk> <4.2.2.20030509231022.00d53e90@mail.earthlink.net> <4.2.2.20030510084732.00ae0aa0@mail.earthlink.net> Message-ID: <20030511033853.GC1140@cybershamanix.com> On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 09:36:43AM -0600, Anne & Lynn Wheeler wrote: > do you think that earthlink would automatically blacklist aol if it found > incoming spam from aol? I think that earthlink would contact aol and say > ... your ingress filtering doesn't seem to be working. It would only be > after all attempts to understand aol's ingress filtering that earthlink > might take action. > well, I don't know about those two, but I've found Road Runner sometimes blocking mail from ameritech, or at least from part of ameritech. When I asked why my mail to their user was being bounced, their reply was that someone on my subnet was spamming. So then I just had to disconnect my dsl line and reconnect to get on a different subnet and then my mail would go thru, but what sheer idiocy. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Sat May 10 20:44:29 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 22:44:29 -0500 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <5B3E0E0E-8309-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <5.1.1.6.2.20030510022002.02da5ec0@idiom.com> <5B3E0E0E-8309-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030511034429.GD1140@cybershamanix.com> On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 10:03:43AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not be > in the construction and business development business. (I would go > further and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states and > localities are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to give > to businesses. No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to be. > Ditto for governments running gambling operations, but I digress.) > I agree with all the rest of this, however, I think you're wrong about the gambling. I think that's the only way gov't ought to be allowed to fund itself, by selling lottery tickets. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From roy at rant-central.com Sat May 10 21:07:12 2003 From: roy at rant-central.com (Roy M.Silvernail) Date: Sat, 10 May 2003 23:07:12 -0500 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20030511040713.6904A10F75@rant-central.com> On Friday 09 May 2003 04:40 pm, Sunder wrote: > No, no, no. Whales should be lightly roasted over a charcoal grill after > being properly marinated in olive oil, vinegar, salt and pepper. Which would be a waste of olive oil, vinegar, salt and pepper. Whale tastes awful *any* way it's prepared.[1] > As for dolphins, A1 is the way to go - or you can do chicken fried dolphin > steaks. :^) Yumm! Ni! Garlic, olive oil and lime juice. Seal in foil and 20 minutes on the outdoor grill. Chicken fried dolphin is an abomination. [1] Having grown up in rural western Alaska, I've tried a lot of unusual food. Bad as whale tastes, I'd take it over walrus nose anytime. From bill.stewart at pobox.com Sun May 11 00:22:58 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 00:22:58 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <6F8D069A-8366-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <20030511034429.GD1140@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030511000728.02e0dcb8@idiom.com> At 09:10 PM 05/10/2003 -0700, Tim May wrote: >On Saturday, May 10, 2003, at 08:44 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: >> I agree with all the rest of this, however, I think you're wrong >> about the >>gambling. I think that's the only way gov't ought to be allowed to fund >>itself, >>by selling lottery tickets. > >A superficially good idea ("sounds good!"), but ultimately silly. >Government bans gambling, or heavily regulates it, or declares illegal the >exact odds it grants itself. When I was a kid, gambling was illegal because it was immoral, and wasteful, and took bread out of poor children's mouths, and oppressed the less educated, except of course for bingo at the volunteer fire company or Catholic church, in which case it was charitable giving mixed with harmless entertainment for the elderly. (Or for some reason, if it involved horse racing.) Now it's illegal back home because it competes with the state lottery. Sorry, that won't wash. If it's moral for the state to raise money that way, it's hypocritical for them to continue banning private gambling. >Lotteries, for example, are the ultimate sucker bet. Not always, because the "state lotto jackpot" can reach positive expectation, if there's no big winner for enough weeks in a row so lots of suckers have already lost. It's still pretty much a sucker bet, but because the betting isn't all simultaneous, some bettors really can be much luckier than average. All this was different in New Jersey, of course. The state was finally permitted to offer a daily-number lottery as long as the payouts were lower than the main Mafia-run daily-number lotteries, and the lottery point-of-sale posters say where the money goes, so you can tell that in spite of the politicians saying it was for schools and old people, about half the profits went to running prisons. No thanks. Last time I played a government lottery, I didn't win the green suit and guns or the two-year vacation in exciting tropical Southeast Asia. Didn't even win the third-prize government-health-care physical. Ain't planning to play again. From bob.cat at snet.net Sat May 10 23:25:13 2003 From: bob.cat at snet.net (BobCat) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 02:25:13 -0400 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome References: <0F110F9B-836B-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <007901c31786$544720f0$70eafc40@Leopard> > Cryptoanarchy will someday mean > the millions who need to be punished for their crimes will in fact be > punished and converted into fertilizer, soap, lampshades, and other > things which can be sold to partially pay for their crimes.) > > --Tim May Can't we just make them buy lottery tickets, instead? From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Sun May 11 06:35:22 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 08:35:22 -0500 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <6F8D069A-8366-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <20030511034429.GD1140@cybershamanix.com> <6F8D069A-8366-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <20030511133522.GA2538@cybershamanix.com> On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 09:10:01PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > On Saturday, May 10, 2003, at 08:44 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > >On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 10:03:43AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > >>Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not be > >>in the construction and business development business. (I would go > >>further and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states > >>and > >>localities are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to give > >>to businesses. No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to be. > >>Ditto for governments running gambling operations, but I digress.) > >> > > I agree with all the rest of this, however, I think you're wrong > >about the > >gambling. I think that's the only way gov't ought to be allowed to > >fund itself, > >by selling lottery tickets. > > A superficially good idea ("sounds good!"), but ultimately silly. > > Government bans gambling, or heavily regulates it, or declares illegal > the exact odds it grants itself. You're not making much sense here, Tim. Who said anything about making gambling illegal? -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From declan at well.com Sun May 11 06:05:52 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 09:05:52 -0400 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030511033203.GB1140@cybershamanix.com>; from hseaver@cybershamanix.com on Sat, May 10, 2003 at 10:32:03PM -0500 References: <20030509125934.GA30621@cybershamanix.com> <98A948CA-8293-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030511033203.GB1140@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <20030511090552.A12840@cluebot.com> On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 10:32:03PM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > Sounds like a very poorly administered community garden. The > only big city gardens I've seen were in Portland, OR, and they were > fenced and gated and locked at night. The gardens themselves looked > very productive and well tended. As are all the ones I've ever seen I don't claim that all community gardens are decrepit, of course. If a city chooses to spend enough money on high fences, security guards, and locks on gates, they can pull it off. The gardener-activists have every incentive to lobby for that because of the standard public choice reasons: distributed costs and centralized benefits -- hundreds of thousands or millions of people have their taxes raised by perhaps a dollar, even though only a few dozen or a few hundred at most people benefit from the garden. And when that happens, because the small number of gardeners are getting the garden plot at below market cost, they do have an incentive to take advantage of it. Getting the government involved interferes with the price signals that a market approach would have. Because it's not their money, governments tend to funnel money into politically-connected friends -- the fence-building contractor will turn out to be the mayor's brother-in-law's son. Once the garden is established, though, the municipality does not have the same incentive to take care of it as a private property owner does. The same with my muddy, dirt soccer field that's become an illegal dog run (I can see three dogs there right now). Also, as the political supporters of the garden move out of the city or retire from activism, or their friends in government move on to cushy private sector jobs, the garden tends to receive fewer resources. Politicians prefer to campaign on bold platforms like "creating more community gardens" as opposed to "maintaining status quo." At the very least, it's reasonable to weigh the costs against the benefits of community gardens. Where I grew up, my family had an acre of land, more than enough for a garden, but for whatever reason one year we used a community garden that was set up by a local large manufacturing company on its own land. Worked out well, and was a nice gesture. -Declan From schear at attbi.com Sun May 11 09:18:31 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 09:18:31 -0700 Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030511091722.04424f08@mail.attbi.com> At 08:49 PM 5/10/2003 -0700, Mike Rosing wrote: >On Fri, 9 May 2003, Tyler Durden wrote: > > > > > Exactly. That's why we should NUKE THE WHALES! > >I always saw the sticker NUKE THE UNBORN GAY WHALES. Pisses off more >people :-) >I think you forgot the ending... NUKE THE UNBORN GAY WHALES FOR JESUS steve From barabbus at hushmail.com Sun May 11 09:52:11 2003 From: barabbus at hushmail.com (barabbus at hushmail.com) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 09:52:11 -0700 Subject: Website calls for revoking Moore's Oscar, gives email links to Academy Message-ID: <200305111652.h4BGqCV4050790@mailserver3.hushmail.com> BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE Documentary or Fiction? http://www.hardylaw.net/Truth_About_Bowling.html Concerned about your privacy? Follow this link to get FREE encrypted email: https://www.hushmail.com/?l=2 Free, ultra-private instant messaging with Hush Messenger https://www.hushmail.com/services.php?subloc=messenger&l=434 Big $$$ to be made with the HushMail Affiliate Program: https://www.hushmail.com/about.php?subloc=affiliate&l=427 From timcmay at got.net Sun May 11 10:36:08 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 10:36:08 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <20030511133522.GA2538@cybershamanix.com> Message-ID: <0C87AB7A-83D7-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Sunday, May 11, 2003, at 06:35 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 09:10:01PM -0700, Tim May wrote: >> On Saturday, May 10, 2003, at 08:44 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: >> >>> On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 10:03:43AM -0700, Tim May wrote: >>>> Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not >>>> be >>>> in the construction and business development business. (I would go >>>> further and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states >>>> and >>>> localities are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to >>>> give >>>> to businesses. No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to be. >>>> Ditto for governments running gambling operations, but I digress.) >>>> >>> I agree with all the rest of this, however, I think you're wrong >>> about the >>> gambling. I think that's the only way gov't ought to be allowed to >>> fund itself, >>> by selling lottery tickets. >> >> A superficially good idea ("sounds good!"), but ultimately silly. >> >> Government bans gambling, or heavily regulates it, or declares illegal >> the exact odds it grants itself. > > > You're not making much sense here, Tim. Who said anything about > making > gambling illegal? > You're being deliberately obtuse. You're on the verge of entering my filter file. Gambling is not a free market in most U.S. states. Government runs the gambling franchise in most states. This is what I said. --Tim May From sfurlong at acmenet.net Sun May 11 08:24:05 2003 From: sfurlong at acmenet.net (Steve Furlong) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 11:24:05 -0400 Subject: Repulsive food In-Reply-To: <20030511040713.6904A10F75@rant-central.com> References: <20030511040713.6904A10F75@rant-central.com> Message-ID: <200305111124.05466.sfurlong@acmenet.net> On Sunday 11 May 2003 00:07, Roy M.Silvernail wrote: > [1] Having grown up in rural western Alaska, I've tried a lot of > unusual food. Bad as whale tastes, I'd take it over walrus nose > anytime. Ugh. Don't get me started. My fiance is Chinese, and has odd notions of delectability. Odd by American standards, anyway. Black eggs are probably the worst, but they had a lot of competition. We've worked out a compromise on critters that leaves us both happy: I'll bring in a carcass and clean it. I get the muscle tissue and usually the liver, and she gets the skin, bones, fat, and miscellaneous organs. And the head. (Stewed rabbit head. With the fur still on. ) -- Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel Guns will get you through times of no duct tape better than duct tape will get you through times of no guns. -- Ron Kuby From eresrch at eskimo.com Sun May 11 11:56:22 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 11:56:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Asperger's Syndrome In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030511091722.04424f08@mail.attbi.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 11 May 2003, Steve Schear wrote: >I think you forgot the ending... NUKE THE UNBORN GAY WHALES FOR JESUS I must be getting old, I didn't remember that. Sounds like a good addition tho! Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike From mv at cdc.gov Sun May 11 13:59:25 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 13:59:25 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: <3EBEB9AD.59BF9D2C@cdc.gov> At 10:44 PM 5/10/03 -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > I think that's the only way gov't ought to be allowed to fund itself, >by selling lottery tickets. Only if the funds go to math depts. ---- "Today I am going to teach you how to count" --Prof. Arthur Mattuck From mv at cdc.gov Sun May 11 15:25:23 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 15:25:23 -0700 Subject: faster modexp()? cipheractive Message-ID: <3EBECDD3.F9B0BFE2@cdc.gov> At 10:50 PM 5/11/03 +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote: >Could someone please post a pointer to the cryptography >list that is referred to above? I'd ask the good Major >himself directly, but his email address doesn't look replyable. My associate, Major Domo, handles subscriptions at: cryptography at metzdowd.com the list is moderated and mostly politics/killlist/agriculture free :-) From bill.stewart at pobox.com Sun May 11 15:42:18 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 15:42:18 -0700 Subject: faster modexp()? cipheractive In-Reply-To: <34ad785b8c8a2b90f3f5de0b15113ace@dizum.com> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030511153232.02e1ae48@idiom.com> An anonymous person, whose address isn't replyable, wrote: >Could someone please post a pointer to the cryptography >list that is referred to above? I'd ask the good Major >himself directly, but his email address doesn't look replyable. The cryptography-request at metzdowd.com list is managed by majordomo at metzdowd.com - send the correct major email saying "help". This is the old "cryptography at toad.com", later "cryptography at c2.net", list, which Perry Metzger moderates. >>>> info cryptography "Cryptography" is a low-noise moderated mailing list devoted to cryptographic technology and its political impact. Occasionally, the moderator allows the topic to veer more generally into security and privacy technology and its impact, but this is rare. WHAT TOPICS ARE APPROPRIATE: "On topic" discussion includes technical aspects of cryptosystems, social repercussions of cryptosystems, and the politics of cryptography such as export controls or laws restricting cryptography. Discussions unrelated to cryptography are considered off topic. Please try to keep your postings on topic. MODERATION POLICY: In order to keep the signal to noise ratio high, the mailing list is moderated. The moderator does not forward off topic messages, messages that have substantially the same content as earlier messages, etc. Please not that the moderator does not always have the time to send an explanation of why a message was not forwarded. TO POST: send mail with your message to cryptography at metzdowd.com TO UNSUBSCRIBE: send mail to majordomo at metzdowd.com with the line unsubscribe cryptography in the body of your mail. >>>> end END OF COMMANDS From bill.stewart at pobox.com Sun May 11 16:36:45 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 16:36:45 -0700 Subject: faster modexp()? cipheractive In-Reply-To: <3EBD45DA.90F5258B@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030511154314.02dfe1e8@idiom.com> At 11:32 AM 05/10/2003 -0700, Major Variola (ret) wrote: >Forwarded from cryptography list... note that this company has a >download of their fast RSA library (its probably an assembly hack) > >Anyone heard of these guys? An Isreali technology firm that claims to >have a new patent-pending process for modexp that's 3-6 times faster >depending on playtform. > >URL is at http://www.com/technology/technology.htm http://www.cipheractive.com/technology/technology.htm I haven't downloaded and seen whether you need to disassemble the free crippleware to figure out what it's really doing, but my friend John Doe tried unsuccessfully to do so, and perhaps a human will respond to the log messages tomorrow. It wants some kind of public key, probably a raw hex RSA key. Two obvious methods for them to use are - some interesting mathematical breakthrough like Montgomery Multiplication only faster (ok, how to make such a breakthrough isn't obvious, but what to do with it if you had one is.) - no new math, just building a modexp library that uses vector processing features on Intel-like chips like SSE / SSE2 / etc. --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From ericm at lne.com Sun May 11 16:59:47 2003 From: ericm at lne.com (Eric Murray) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 16:59:47 -0700 Subject: testing Message-ID: <20030511165947.A13983@slack.lne.com> Testing new configuration, please ignire. From timcmay at got.net Sun May 11 17:16:23 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 17:16:23 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030511000728.02e0dcb8@idiom.com> Message-ID: On Sunday, May 11, 2003, at 12:22 AM, Bill Stewart wrote: > > Last time I played a government lottery, I didn't win the green suit > and guns > or the two-year vacation in exciting tropical Southeast Asia. > Didn't even win the third-prize government-health-care physical. > Ain't planning to play again. I played the California Lotto game once, shortly after it started (mid-80s, as I recall). I wanted to see what the tickets looked like and whether in fact there was a hash (or other variant of crypto) on the back, as I had heard there was. Yep, for a dollar I confirmed this. I lost the losing ticket amongst my stuff many years ago. (The idea is an obvious one to our crowd. Suppose the winning number is "foobar," in some likely base. Any clod who hears this is the winning number can then use a good printer and make his own winning ticket, or so he thinks. But only the "mint" is able to generate the _other_ number, call it "foobaz," which is either a hash with a secret key of "foobar" or is otherwise computed from "foobar." John Koza, the genetic programming guy at Stanford who has authored several books on the subject, started a Gilroy-based company called Scientific Games, which did a lot of the work on lotteries and their tickets. Now they own several other betting companies. Koza sold out at least 15 years ago and concentrated on genetic programming (which has nothing to do with Scientific Games or lottery tickets).) --Tim May "The Constitution is a radical document...it is the job of the government to rein in people's rights." --President William J. Clinton From dhodgin1661 at Rogers.com Sun May 11 15:22:30 2003 From: dhodgin1661 at Rogers.com (David W. Hodgins) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 18:22:30 -0400 Subject: faster modexp()? cipheractive In-Reply-To: <34ad785b8c8a2b90f3f5de0b15113ace@dizum.com> References: <34ad785b8c8a2b90f3f5de0b15113ace@dizum.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 11 May 2003 22:50:04 +0200 (CEST), Nomen Nescio wrote: > Could someone please post a pointer to the cryptography > list that is referred to above? I'd ask the good Major himself directly, but his email address doesn't look replyable. > > Thanks > The Cryptography Mailing List Subscribe by sending "subscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com It's a low volume list. About 200 posts in the last 6 weeks, most of which are also copied to cypherpunks. Regards, Dave Hodgins. From timcmay at got.net Sun May 11 19:43:15 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 19:43:15 -0700 Subject: Liquidating the staff of the FTC and FDA Message-ID: <7AD41431-8423-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Now the statists in D.C. are in league with the statists of Canada: It's time to kill the FDA and FTC staffers who don't understand the First Amendment. --Tim May "Gun Control: The theory that a woman found dead in an alley, raped and strangled with her panty hose, is somehow morally superior to a woman explaining to police how her attacker got that fatal bullet wound" From cpunk at lne.com Sun May 11 20:00:00 2003 From: cpunk at lne.com (cpunk at lne.com) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 20:00:00 -0700 Subject: Cypherpunks List Info Message-ID: <200305120300.h4C300iY015106@gw.lne.com> Cypherpunks Mailing List Information Last updated: Sep 12, 2002 This message is also available at http://www.lne.com/cpunk Instructions on unsubscribing from the list can be found below. 0. Introduction The Cypherpunks mailing list is a mailing list for discussing cryptography and its effect on society. It is not a moderated list (but see exceptions below) and the list operators are not responsible for the list content. Cypherpunks is a distributed mailing list. A subscriber can subscribe to one node of the list and thereby participate on the full list. Each node (called a "Cypherpunks Distributed Remailer", although they are not related to anonymous remailers) exchanges messages with the other nodes in addition to sending messages to its subscribers. A message posted to one node will be received by the list subscribers on the other nodes, and vice-versa. 1. Filtering The various CDRs follow different policies on filtering spam and to a lesser extent on modifying messages that go to/from their subscribers. Filtering is done, on nodes that do it, to reduce the huge amount of spam that the cypherpunks list is subjected to. There are three basic flavors of filtering CDRs: "raw", which send all messages to their subscribers. "cooked" CDRs try to eliminate the spam on that's on the regular list by automatically sending only messages that are from cypherpunks list subscribers (on any CDR) or people who are replying to list messages. Finally there are moderated lists, where a human moderator decides which messages from the raw list to pass on to subscribers. 2. Message Modification Message modification policy indicates what modifications, if any, beyond what is needed to operate the CDR are done (most CDRs add a tracking X-loop header on mail posted to their subscribers to prevent mail loops). Message modification usually happens on mail going in or out to each CDR's subscribers. CDRs should not modify mail that they pass from one CDR to the next, but some of them do, and others undo those modifications. 3. Privacy Privacy policy indicates if the list will allow anyone ("open"), or only list members, or no one ("private") , to retrieve the subscribers list. Note that if you post, being on a "private" list doesn't mean much, since your address is now out there. It's really only useful for keeping spammers from harvesting addresses from the list software. Digest mode indicates that the CDR supports digest mode, which is where the posts are batched up into a few large emails. Nodes that support only digest mode are noted. 4. Anonymous posting Cypherpunks encourages anonymous posting. You can use an anonymous remailer: http://www.andrebacard.com/remail.html http://anon.efga.org/Remailers http://www.gilc.org/speech/anonymous/remailer.html or you can send posts to the list via cpunks_anon at einstein.ssz.com and your mail's headers will be stripped before posting. Note that this doesn't provide complete anonymity since the receiving site will still have log file entries showing the source of the mail (or you have to trust that they delete them). You also will be 'sharing' a reputation with the other entities that post through this alias, and some of them are spammers, so some subscribers will have this alias filtered. 5. Unsubscribing Unsubscribing from the cypherpunks list: Since the list is run from a number of different CDRs, you have to figure out which CDR you are subscribed to. If you don't remember and can't figure it out from the mail headers (hint: the top Received: line should tell you), the easiest way to unsubscribe is to send unsubscribe messages to all the CDRs listed below. How to figure out which CDR you are subscribed to: Get your mail client to show all the headers (Microsoft calls this "internet headers"). Look for the Sender or X-loop headers. The Sender will say something like "Sender: owner-cypherpunks at lne.com". The X-loop line will say something like "X-Loop: cypherpunks at lne.com". Both of these inticate that you are subscribed to the lne.com CDR. If you were subscribed to the algebra CDR, they would have algebra.com in them. Once you have figured out which CDR you're subscribed to, look in the table below to find that CDRs unsubscribe instructions. 6. Lunatics, spammers and nut-cases "I'm subscribed to a filtering CDR yet I still see lots of junk postings". At this writing there are a few sociopaths on the cypherpunks list who are abusing the lists openness by dumping reams of propaganda on the list. The distinction between a spammer and a subscriber is nearly always very clear, but the dictinction between a subscriber who is abusing the list by posting reams of propaganda and a subscriber who is making lots of controversial posts is not clear. Therefore, we tolerate the crap. Subscribers with a low crap tolerance should check out mail filters. Procmail is a good one, although it works on Unix and Unix-like systems only. Eudora also has a capacity for filtering mail, as do many other mail readers. An example procmail recipie is below, you will of course want to make your own decisions on which (ab)users to filter. # mailing lists: # filter all cypherpunks mail into its own cypherspool folder, discarding # mail from loons. All CDRs set their From: line to 'owner-cypherpunks'. # /dev/null is unix for the trash can. :0 * ^From.*owner-cypherpunks at .* { :0: * (^From:.*ravage at ssz\.com.*|\ ^From:.*jchoate at dev.tivoli.com.*|\ ^From:.*mattd at useoz.com|\ ^From:.*proffr11 at bigpond.com|\ ^From:.*jei at cc.hut.fi) /dev/null :0: cypherspool } 7. List of current CDRs All commands are sent in the body of mail unless otherwise noted. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Algebra: Operator: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at algebra.com Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at algebra.com Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at algebra.com Posting address: cypherpunks at algebra.com Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: ??? Info: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- CCC: Operator: drt at un.bewaff.net Subscription: "subscribe [password of your choice]" to cypherpunks-request at koeln.ccc.de Unsubscription: "unsubscribe " to cypherpunks-request at koeln.ccc.de Help: "help" to to cypherpunks-request at koeln.ccc.de Web site: http://koeln.ccc.de/mailman/listinfo/cypherpunks Posting address: cypherpunks at koeln.ccc.de Filtering policy: This specific node drops messages bigger than 32k and every message with more than 17 recipients or just a line containing "subscribe" or "unsubscribe" in the subject. Digest mode: this node is digest-only NNTP: news://koeln.ccc.de/cbone.ml.cypherpunks Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Infonex: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at infonex.com Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at infonex.com Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at infonex.com Posting address: cypherpunks at infonex.com Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Lne: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at lne.com Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at lne.com Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at lne.com Posting address: cypherpunks at lne.com Filtering policy: cooked Posts from all CDR subscribers & replies to threads go to lne CDR subscribers. All posts from other CDRs are forwarded to other CDRs unmodified. Message Modification policy: 1. messages are demimed (MIME attachments removed) when posted through lne or received by lne CDR subscribers 2. leading "CDR:" in subject line removed 3. "Reply-to:" removed Privacy policy: private Info: http://www.lne.com/cpunk; "info cypherpunks" to majordomo at lne.com Archive: http://archives.abditum.com/cypherpunks/index.html (thanks to Steve Furlong and Len Sassaman) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Minder: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at minder.net Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at minder.net Help: "help" to majordomo at minder.net Posting address: cypherpunks at minder.net Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: private Info: send mail to cypherpunks-info at minder.net --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Openpgp: [openpgp seems to have dropped off the end of the world-- it doesn't return anything from sending help queries. Ericm, 8/7/01] Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to listproc at openpgp.net Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to listproc at openpgp.net Help: "help" to listproc at openpgp.net Posting address: cypherpunks at openpgp.net Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: no modification Privacy policy: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ssz: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at ssz.com Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at ssz.com Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at ssz.com Posting address: cypherpunks at ssz.com Filtering policy: raw Message Modification policy: Subject line prepended with "CDR:" Reply-to cypherpunks at ssz.com added. Privacy policy: open Info: http://www.ssz.com/cdr/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sunder: Subscription: "subscribe" to sunder at sunder.net Unsubscription: "unsubscribe" to sunder at sunder.net Help: "help" to sunder at sunder.net Posting address: sunder at sunder.net Filtering policy: moderated Message Modification policy: ??? Privacy policy: ??? Info: ??? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pro-ns: Subscription: "subscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at pro-ns.net Unsubscription: "unsubscribe cypherpunks" to majordomo at pro-ns.net Help: "help cypherpunks" to majordomo at pro-ns.net Posting address: cypherpunks at pro-ns.net Filtering policy: cooked Posts from all CDR subscribers & replies to threads go to local CDR subscribers. All posts from other CDRs are forwarded to other CDRs unmodified. Message Modification policy: 1. leading "CDR:" in subject line removed 2. "Reply-to:" removed Privacy policy: private Info: http://www.pro-ns.net/cpunk From schear at attbi.com Sun May 11 21:24:10 2003 From: schear at attbi.com (Steve Schear) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 21:24:10 -0700 Subject: Yet Another Reason to Reject the Pledge of Allegiance In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030511122149.00b1a710@mail.well.com> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030511211457.04332220@mail.attbi.com> The firestorm which began a few months back in the 9th Circuit is now before the Supreme Court. At issue is whether a child can be forced to recite a pledge which is abhorrent to either the student's or the parent's religious convictions. But if thought of another reason to reject the Pledge: its a fraud. "I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." There hasn't been a Republic is 150 years. Not since the illegally passed 14th Amendment made Federal law supreme in almost all areas over State laws. The states are now little more than Directorates or Districts (using the French term) of the Federal government. steve "A Jobless Recovery is like a Breadless Sandwich." -- Steve Schear From paul at black-sun.demon.co.uk Sun May 11 14:05:31 2003 From: paul at black-sun.demon.co.uk (Paul Walker) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 22:05:31 +0100 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? References: Message-ID: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> > I submit that if Joe Lunchbox is not spamming, he is unlikely to > need to change his habits regarding having his machine available Mostly unrelated to this, but something's just occurred to me. Probably I'm being really stupid, but ... for the receiving MTA to know that the problem has been processed properly, it would have to know the answer. How does it know what the answer should be? --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From nobody at dizum.com Sun May 11 13:50:04 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 22:50:04 +0200 (CEST) Subject: faster modexp()? cipheractive Message-ID: <34ad785b8c8a2b90f3f5de0b15113ace@dizum.com> On Sat, 10 May 2003 11:32:58 -0700, "Major Variola (ret)" wrote: >Forwarded from cryptography list... note that this company has a >download >of their fast RSA library (its probably an assembly hack) > >---------- > >Anyone heard of these guys? An Isreali technology firm that claims to >have a new patent-pending process for modexp that's 3-6 times faster >depending on playtform. > >URL is at http://www.com/technology/technology.htm Could someone please post a pointer to the cryptography list that is referred to above? I'd ask the good Major himself directly, but his email address doesn't look replyable. Thanks From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Sun May 11 21:02:29 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 23:02:29 -0500 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: <20030512040229.GA21269@cybershamanix.com> On Sun, May 11, 2003 at 10:36:08AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > On Sunday, May 11, 2003, at 06:35 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > > >On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 09:10:01PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > >>On Saturday, May 10, 2003, at 08:44 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote: > >> > >>>On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 10:03:43AM -0700, Tim May wrote: > >>>>Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not > >>>>be > >>>>in the construction and business development business. (I would go > >>>>further and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states > >>>>and > >>>>localities are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to > >>>>give > >>>>to businesses. No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to be. > >>>>Ditto for governments running gambling operations, but I digress.) > >>>> > >>> I agree with all the rest of this, however, I think you're wrong > >>>about the > >>>gambling. I think that's the only way gov't ought to be allowed to > >>>fund itself, > >>>by selling lottery tickets. > >> > >>A superficially good idea ("sounds good!"), but ultimately silly. > >> > >>Government bans gambling, or heavily regulates it, or declares illegal > >>the exact odds it grants itself. > > > > > > You're not making much sense here, Tim. Who said anything about > >making > >gambling illegal? > > > > You're being deliberately obtuse. You're on the verge of entering my > filter file. > > Gambling is not a free market in most U.S. states. Government runs the > gambling franchise in most states. > > This is what I said. I'm being obtuse? Give me a break. I clearly said that "I think that's the only way gov't ought to be allowed to fund itself, is by selling lottery tickets." I can't imagine how anyone could read that and think that I was talking about the situation we live in today. Who cares if gambling is illegal today? WTF does that have to do with anything -- I was clearly talking about some hypothetical future scenario, as in a vastly reduced government where lotteries were what they used for funding instead of taxes. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Sun May 11 21:06:17 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 23:06:17 -0500 Subject: givin it up Message-ID: <20030512040617.GA21292@cybershamanix.com> Looks like the real search for WOMD is over: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3018063.stm -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Sun May 11 20:31:43 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Sun, 11 May 2003 23:31:43 -0400 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" Message-ID: Tim May wrote: > (I'm joking about "conflict vegetables." But ever since all the various > PC television shows and movies started nattering about "conflict > diamonds," I have realized this is just another PC scam. If I buy > diamonds from Zaire I don't give a hoot in hell that they were bought > from "capitalist roaders" or whomever the U.N. has declared to be > politically incorrect. Seeing a James Bond movie centered around > "conflict diamonds" made me ill.) > In the spirit of 'one man's terrorist is another mans freedom fighter', I have taken to calling these 'liberation diamonds'. Peter From crawdad at fnal.gov Mon May 12 06:53:25 2003 From: crawdad at fnal.gov (Matt Crawford) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 08:53:25 -0500 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: Your message of Fri, 09 May 2003 18:05:49 PDT. Message-ID: <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> > The computational task can get arbitrarily larger, if the recipient > system doesn't like the look of the mail. I can picture the MDA > going, "wow, I decrypted this one, but it scores 9.2 on my procmail > filter scale, so I better ask for and get fifteen MIPS-minutes of CPU > time before I actually deliver it." > > Stuff like this can be done anonymously, can be done on the recipient > and sender machines, can depend on filters (the MDA sees it after it > arrives and gets decrypted) and limits the per-machine rate at which a > spammer can send spam. This doesn't fit Joe Lunchbox's current model in which he dumps his outgoing mail onto his provider's server and turns off his machine. His provider either has to deliver synchronously and bounce the computational payment burden back to Joe, pay it for him, or bounce the message. In the latter case, the receiver who demanded cycles needs to recognize the problem it set and accept the answer on a later date. Matt Crawford From ericm at lne.com Mon May 12 09:57:29 2003 From: ericm at lne.com (Eric Murray) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 09:57:29 -0700 Subject: changes at lne.com Message-ID: <20030512095729.A19565@slack.lne.com> The spam load at lne.com is WAY too high. Last month for example there was an average of 96 spams per day submitted to cypherpunks at lne.com. "submitted" means that it was the first time we saw that particular mail. Since the CDR system sends everything to all nodes, that means we got and passed on about 4x that number. 800 spams a day is a waste. So I have changed the way we deal with CDR mail. We will no longer pass to other CDRs mail that we would not send to subscribers. Eliminating outbound spam will cut our cypherpunks spam load in half. I am also going to filter the non-subscriber mail more effectively. Lately I have had to check about 50 spams a day to see if they are actually posts to the list. I find one real post every two or three days. Now I will save for human processing only the non-subscriber mail that is PGP signed or encrypted, or that looks like a reply. The majority of non-subscriber mails I've forwarded to the list have been replies. (I'll save everything for a while to make sure my filtering works). As always, other CDR operators and anyone else interested in running a CDR are welcome to my scripts. Eric From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Mon May 12 07:21:11 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 10:21:11 -0400 Subject: No subject Message-ID: Tim May wrote... "I said I saw the same thing in Berkeley and Santa Cruz. Both are said to be "progressive" communities, but in both places the so-called community garden areas are essentially for hoboes and deadbeats to scratch at." Well, there's a selection effect that's going to take place in many of the cities under discussion. In NYC both rich and poor live in the city (sometimes within blocks of each other, though $$$ are pushing non-$$$ to the outer boroughs). In a lot of American cities, your "inner city" is inhabited by lower income folks and carless down-and-outs almost exclusively. So of course you'll see community gardens overrun. In NYC the phenomenon is entirely different. First of all, the gardens are almost always gated and barbwired. For two, its primarily the non-drugged members of a community that are working the garden, and a prime reason for creating the garden is to pretty up and otherwise crappy looking block. The flowers and produce of the garden are almost tertiary. In addition, in NYC we see a lot of abandoned properties that remain brick/rat/garbage lots for years and years, and so the locals decide to do something about it and clean it up. (Sometimes its city property, sometimes 'private'). Of course, we could talk about philosophy and what these people "should" do, but if I were living in one of those areas and didn't have the $$$ to move out, I'd definitely try to fix up our community, and to hell with philosophies of "collective ownership" statism, communism or so on. You want your block to look nice, and the locals DO something. How simple is that? And then, after years of working the garden, the neighborhood starts to look/feel better and then all of a sudden an "owner" appears who wants to bulldoze your garden. Fuck that. I'd be pissed off too, and try to fight the 'dozers. If Tim May or somebody like him tried to sit me down and explain his philosophies for a few hours and why I "had no right" to stop the 'dozers, I'd probably say, "Well, I'm not smart enough to understand your theories, but I wish you well with them. Hey--there's the bulldozers, gotta go!" -TD _________________________________________________________________ Add photos to your messages with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail From bear at sonic.net Mon May 12 10:27:21 2003 From: bear at sonic.net (bear) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 10:27:21 -0700 (PDT) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> Message-ID: On Mon, 12 May 2003, Matt Crawford wrote: >This doesn't fit Joe Lunchbox's current model in which he dumps his >outgoing mail onto his provider's server and turns off his machine. >His provider either has to deliver synchronously and bounce the >computational payment burden back to Joe, pay it for him, or bounce >the message. In the latter case, the receiver who demanded cycles >needs to recognize the problem it set and accept the answer on a >later date. I submit that if Joe Lunchbox is not spamming, he is unlikely to need to change his habits regarding having his machine available for a computational burden. The mail he sends to people known to him will not ordinarily trip spamfilters at the recieving end that would make such requests. Likewise, all the people who use remailers to send anonymously. As long as what they're sending isn't identifiable as spam, the remailer won't get a CPU-time request. Bear From bill.stewart at pobox.com Mon May 12 10:33:01 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 10:33:01 -0700 Subject: community gardens In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030512102539.02d42a68@idiom.com> >Tim May wrote... >"I said I saw the same thing in Berkeley and Santa Cruz. Both are said >to be "progressive" communities, but in both places the so-called >community garden areas are essentially for hoboes and deadbeats to scratch >at." Minor technical correction - hoboes are migrant workers, as opposed to tramps, who are migrant non-workers, or bums, who are non-migrant non-workers, and hoboes aren't likely to be hanging out in that kind of area, at least during the times of year there's active gardening going on, because that's when they're most likely to be working on farms. That may be different down in Watsonville, where there's a lot of railroad connectivity and a lot of farms, but up in Santa Cruz and certainly up in Berkeley, it's much more likely to just be bums. >At 10:21 AM 05/12/2003 -0400, Tyler Durden wrote: >In NYC the phenomenon is entirely different. First of all, the gardens are >almost always gated and barbwired. For two, its primarily the non-drugged >members of a community that are working the garden, and a prime reason for >creating the garden is to pretty up and otherwise crappy looking block. >The flowers and produce of the garden are almost tertiary. Yup. Barbed wire definitely spruces up a community..... From bill.stewart at pobox.com Mon May 12 10:39:04 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 10:39:04 -0700 Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512095729.A19565@slack.lne.com> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030512103557.02e1cae8@idiom.com> At 09:57 AM 05/12/2003 -0700, Eric Murray wrote: >I am also going to filter the non-subscriber mail more effectively. >Lately I have had to check about 50 spams a day to see if they are >actually posts to the list. I find one real post every two or three days. >Now I will save for human processing only the non-subscriber mail that is >PGP signed or encrypted, or that looks like a reply. >The majority of non-subscriber mails I've forwarded to the list >have been replies. (I'll save everything for a while to make >sure my filtering works). Could you at least bouncegram the mail that you're not saving, or else have SMTP use a reject message that says what it's doing? That way the occasional non-whitelisted non-subscriber human who sends mail to the list will get some indication that the mail's been rejected and what to do about it. From ericm at lne.com Mon May 12 11:05:41 2003 From: ericm at lne.com (Eric Murray) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 11:05:41 -0700 Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030512103557.02e1cae8@idiom.com>; from bill.stewart@pobox.com on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 10:39:04AM -0700 References: <20030512095729.A19565@slack.lne.com> <5.1.1.6.2.20030512103557.02e1cae8@idiom.com> Message-ID: <20030512110541.A20160@slack.lne.com> On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 10:39:04AM -0700, Bill Stewart wrote: > At 09:57 AM 05/12/2003 -0700, Eric Murray wrote: > >I am also going to filter the non-subscriber mail more effectively. > >Lately I have had to check about 50 spams a day to see if they are > >actually posts to the list. I find one real post every two or three days. > >Now I will save for human processing only the non-subscriber mail that is > >PGP signed or encrypted, or that looks like a reply. > >The majority of non-subscriber mails I've forwarded to the list > >have been replies. (I'll save everything for a while to make > >sure my filtering works). > > Could you at least bouncegram the mail that you're not saving, > or else have SMTP use a reject message that says what it's doing? > That way the occasional non-whitelisted non-subscriber human > who sends mail to the list will get some indication that the mail's > been rejected and what to do about it. I'd like to. But bouncing the mail will mean that I have to send 100 bounces and process 100 bounces back, since few spammers use real mail addresses and most of those are already over quota or rejecting mail. So it won't save me much traffic and I'll have to add a hack for dumping the bounce bounces... I don't think I can do an SMTP error message since its getting handled in procmail, after the body is accepted. If I can't filter better than 50% of the non-subscriber spam without filtering some real non-subscriber posts, I'll probably try the bounce message thing. OTOH, the way I review non-subscriber mails after this change lets me see the sender name and subject without looking at the mail like I did before, so it may turn out that it's fast enough for me to review that I don't need to do any filtering at all. Oh, and before Peter asks, next time I mess with it, I'll make messages with the appropriate X-approved header go through without human intervention. Eric From mv at cdc.gov Mon May 12 12:12:51 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 12:12:51 -0700 Subject: Court will decide if police need warrant for GPS 'tracking' Message-ID: <3EBFF232.2D5B8208@cdc.gov> I read somewhere that the original wiretap laws were motivated when police bugged a phone booth (fishing), and snared someone placing a bet. The court held that there was an expectation of privacy. Interesting to see what they say now. Segues nicely with the CALEA/cellphone locator tech too. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/121572_gps12.html Monday, May 12, 2003 Court will decide if police need warrant for GPS 'tracking' By KATHY GEORGE SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER William Bradley Jackson worried that he hadn't properly concealed his victim's shallow grave. So he snuck away one quiet fall day to finish the job, unaware that sheriff's deputies had secretly attached a satellite tracking device to his truck. Police trickery triumphed over his treachery. Spokane County sheriff's investigators used the hidden device to retrace Jackson's path to the gravesite, where they found crucial evidence that would lead to his murder conviction in 2000. But what if the same secret technology, called global positioning satellite tracking, could track anyone at any time? The Washington Supreme Court will decide soon whether police agencies throughout the state may use the device freely -- without a warrant. The Jackson case is the first in the state dealing with the issue. "Do we really want the ability to track everybody all the time, without any suspicion, or without probable cause?" asked Doug Klunder, a Seattle attorney who wrote an amicus brief, or friend of the court, in the case on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington. "How close are we to Big Brother?" Many law enforcement agencies, including the King County Sheriff's Office and King County Prosecutor's Office, believe no warrant is needed for the tracking devices. That's because they simply record electronically what anyone could see by following a vehicle on the public streets. "We'd be shocked if the court said otherwise," said King County sheriff's spokesman Kevin Fagerstrom. In Jackson's case, the state Court of Appeals in Spokane agreed no warrant was needed. The court's opinion last year said, "A law officer could legally follow Mr. Jackson's vehicles on public thoroughfares .... The GPS devices made Mr. Jackson's vehicles visible or identifiable as though the officers had merely cleaned his license plates, or unobtrusively marked his vehicles and made them plain to see." Critics of the Spokane court's opinion say there's a big difference between following someone's real-time movements and recording them for computer analysis later. "There's just something that feels more underhanded about it," said Klunder. It's not just government abuse the ACLU fears. Stalkers could use GPS to find their victims, and jealous husbands could use it to spy on their wives. "If the police can do it without a warrant, then presumably a private citizen can, too," Klunder said. From ericm at lne.com Mon May 12 13:03:05 2003 From: ericm at lne.com (Eric Murray) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 13:03:05 -0700 Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: ; from ptrei@rsasecurity.com on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 03:21:05PM -0400 References: Message-ID: <20030512130305.A21283@slack.lne.com> On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 03:21:05PM -0400, Trei, Peter wrote: > I hope you whitelist known regular posters. I subscribe to > minder, but often post thru lne. I guess it's been a while since I set this up, so people have forgotten. There's a "whitelist" that has subscribers to all the CDRs, anonymous remailers, and anyone that has ever posted to any CDR (assuming we got the mail). It's not often that there is a non-spam post from a sender that isn't on the whitelist-- when there is, I forward it and put the sender on the list. The idea is to filter out the spam without requiring moderation. Eric From barabbus at hushmail.com Mon May 12 13:05:04 2003 From: barabbus at hushmail.com (barabbus at hushmail.com) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 13:05:04 -0700 Subject: New seccure commercial messaging site? Message-ID: <200305122005.h4CK57KY062275@mailserver2.hushmail.com> Stealth Message is a secure messaging system designed for communicating sensitive and confidential information. It protects your privacy, allowing you to communicate in complete confidence with friends and colleagues. http://www.stealthmessage.com/s/home/index.cfm?re=about Concerned about your privacy? Follow this link to get FREE encrypted email: https://www.hushmail.com/?l=2 Free, ultra-private instant messaging with Hush Messenger https://www.hushmail.com/services.php?subloc=messenger&l=434 Big $$$ to be made with the HushMail Affiliate Program: https://www.hushmail.com/about.php?subloc=affiliate&l=427 From cypherpunks at salvagingelectrons.com Mon May 12 10:29:15 2003 From: cypherpunks at salvagingelectrons.com (Tim Meehan) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 13:29:15 -0400 Subject: Homeland insecurity Message-ID: http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/ny-bc-ny--boy-bordercrossin0512may12,0,651000.story?coll=ny-ap-regional-wire Boy bikes undetected into the United States May 12, 2003, 11:11 AM EDT NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. -- A 7-year-old Canadian boy apparently biked into the United States undetected by U.S. Customs officials, leaving his parents and police questioning how such a security breach could occur. Mitchel Hernder rode his bike about 8 1/2 miles Saturday, ending up at a busy intersection in Niagara Falls. U.S. Customs officials on Sunday said they were unsure how the mistake occurred. "What surprises me is that he crossed the border and got through without being caught," Niagara Falls Police Lt. Salvatore Pino told The Buffalo News. "This child basically got through Customs without being stopped by anybody." Mitchel, described as mildly autistic, apparently slipped away from his Niagara Falls, Ontario, home and rode away on his sister's bike. His parents called Niagara Regional Police about 4:15 p.m. and a search was launched involving dozens of officers, family members and neighbors. Across the border, meanwhile, a motorist noticed the boy standing in the middle of a busy intersection and called police about 5:45 p.m. Police suspect Mitchel rode his bike to the two-tier Whirlpool Bridge, about 1 1/2 miles from his home, and made his way across on either the deck for vehicle traffic or one with abandoned train tracks. "How can a kid walk across the border in these times of high security?" his father, Mark Hernder, asked. "It blows me away how he made it that far. I guess someone wasn't watching the gate." The boy told police his name and address and then waited for his father to pick him up at a police station. "If he didn't know his name or his address, I don't think we would have ever found him," Hernder said. "We would have never thought to look for him in America." Janet Rapaport, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Bureau of Customs & Border Protection, said the incident would be investigated. "If he did come across the border, we didn't encounter him," Rapaport said. From sunder at sunder.net Mon May 12 10:52:12 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 13:52:12 -0400 (edt) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: And what about people that use something underpowered like a Palm IV to send email? Does it really make sense to force their little dragonball powered machines to do a whole lot of math? ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Mon, 12 May 2003, bear wrote: > I submit that if Joe Lunchbox is not spamming, he is unlikely to > need to change his habits regarding having his machine available > for a computational burden. The mail he sends to people known to > him will not ordinarily trip spamfilters at the recieving end that > would make such requests. > > Likewise, all the people who use remailers to send anonymously. As > long as what they're sending isn't identifiable as spam, the remailer > won't get a CPU-time request. From ericm at lne.com Mon May 12 14:19:14 2003 From: ericm at lne.com (Eric Murray) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:19:14 -0700 Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512215135.A9279452@exeter.ac.uk>; from adam@cypherspace.org on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 09:51:35PM +0100 References: <20030512215135.A9279452@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <20030512141914.A22096@slack.lne.com> On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 09:51:35PM +0100, Adam Back wrote: > Do you filter on the same header that you build the white-list from? > > Ie I forge all of my mail, it's really coming from ABack at ex.ac.uk; but > I want replies to adam at cypherspace.org. The whitelist lookup is off the From: header. > I've encountered other "subscribers only" situations where my mail > gets bounced because they look too deeply at the headers and see the > received line or Sender so something is ABack at ex.ac.uk and block it > even though the From line is adam at cypherspace.org, and I subscribed as > adam at cypherspace.org The From_ header on this was ABack at ex.ac.uk. If it's not on the whitelist it gets added when I see the bounce. Eric From dhodgin1661 at Rogers.com Mon May 12 12:08:17 2003 From: dhodgin1661 at Rogers.com (David W. Hodgins) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 15:08:17 -0400 Subject: Homeland insecurity In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, 12 May 2003 13:29:15 -0400, Tim Meehan wrote: > http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/ny-bc-ny--boy-bordercrossin0512may12,0,651000.story?coll=ny-ap-regional-wire > > Boy bikes undetected into the United States According to the news reports here, he dropped his bike off on the Canadian side of the bridge, walked across the border and about 10km (6.2 miles) into Niagra Falls N.Y. I guess groups, wanting to smuggle things into the U.S., should recruit really short people, to walk under the guards noses. Regards, Dave Hodgins. From bbrow07 at students.bbk.ac.uk Mon May 12 07:18:17 2003 From: bbrow07 at students.bbk.ac.uk (ken) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 15:18:17 +0100 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy References: <539D4264-8243-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <3EBFAD29.8090007@students.bbk.ac.uk> Tim May wrote: > This private toll road would be very hard to build in any other place, > as the ownership of the large tract of undeveloped land made it > possible. Private developers rarely are granted eminent domain (seizure > of lands or property for the people's democratic socialist use) and it > is virtually impossible to conceive of a developer acquiring rights of > way for a highway through thousands of farms, houses, ranches, schools, > shops, etc. > > (I know about auctions, but there are some markets that don't "clear." > There are people who simply refuse to sell. Even when The Donald (Trump) > sought to build a casino in Atlantic City there was one parcel owner who > refused to sell. Once the state of NJ refused to condemn the property to > give it to the Donald, he built _around_ it on three sides.) Always fun when this happens. In my home town, Brighton in England, a company with the unfortunate name of "GRIP" bought about 8 or 9 old houses to build an office. One old woman wouldn't sell, she wanted to carry on living in her own house, so until she died it was stuck in the middle of a steel and glass office block, propped up by big wooden beams. As you say, when the government wants to build something, it usually passes a law to kick out such recalcitrant old ladies. Except that somehow railway companies - and before them the canals, this goes back to the 18th century - always managed to get the government on their side. From ptrei at rsasecurity.com Mon May 12 12:21:05 2003 From: ptrei at rsasecurity.com (Trei, Peter) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 15:21:05 -0400 Subject: changes at lne.com Message-ID: I hope you whitelist known regular posters. I subscribe to minder, but often post thru lne. Peter Trei > ---------- > From: Eric Murray[SMTP:ericm at lne.com] > Sent: Monday, May 12, 2003 12:57 PM > To: cypherpunks at lne.com > Subject: changes at lne.com > > The spam load at lne.com is WAY too high. > Last month for example there was an average of 96 spams per day submitted > to cypherpunks at lne.com. "submitted" means that it was the first > time we saw that particular mail. Since the CDR system sends everything > to all nodes, that means we got and passed on about 4x that number. > 800 spams a day is a waste. > > So I have changed the way we deal with CDR mail. We will no longer pass > to other CDRs mail that we would not send to subscribers. Eliminating > outbound spam will cut our cypherpunks spam load in half. > > I am also going to filter the non-subscriber mail more effectively. > Lately I have had to check about 50 spams a day to see if they are > actually posts to the list. I find one real post every two or three days. > Now I will save for human processing only the non-subscriber mail that is > PGP signed or encrypted, or that looks like a reply. > The majority of non-subscriber mails I've forwarded to the list > have been replies. (I'll save everything for a while to make > sure my filtering works). > > As always, other CDR operators and anyone else interested > in running a CDR are welcome to my scripts. > > Eric From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Mon May 12 12:22:43 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 15:22:43 -0400 Subject: community gardens Message-ID: "Yup. Barbed wire definitely spruces up a community..... " I guess you've never been to Brooklyn Neighborhoods such as Red Hook or East New York... -TD >From: Bill Stewart >To: "Tyler Durden" >CC: cypherpunks at minder.net >Subject: Re: community gardens >Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 10:33:01 -0700 > > >>Tim May wrote... >>"I said I saw the same thing in Berkeley and Santa Cruz. Both are said >>to be "progressive" communities, but in both places the so-called >>community garden areas are essentially for hoboes and deadbeats to scratch >>at." > >Minor technical correction - hoboes are migrant workers, >as opposed to tramps, who are migrant non-workers, >or bums, who are non-migrant non-workers, >and hoboes aren't likely to be hanging out in that kind of area, >at least during the times of year there's active gardening going on, >because that's when they're most likely to be working on farms. >That may be different down in Watsonville, where there's a lot of >railroad connectivity and a lot of farms, but up in Santa Cruz and >certainly up in Berkeley, it's much more likely to just be bums. > >>At 10:21 AM 05/12/2003 -0400, Tyler Durden wrote: >>In NYC the phenomenon is entirely different. First of all, the gardens are >>almost always gated and barbwired. For two, its primarily the non-drugged >>members of a community that are working the garden, and a prime reason for >>creating the garden is to pretty up and otherwise crappy looking block. >>The flowers and produce of the garden are almost tertiary. > >Yup. Barbed wire definitely spruces up a community..... > _________________________________________________________________ Add photos to your e-mail with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail From mv at cdc.gov Mon May 12 15:46:03 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 15:46:03 -0700 Subject: New seccure commercial messaging site? Message-ID: <3EC0242B.C666E927@cdc.gov> At 01:05 PM 5/12/03 -0700, barabbus at hushmail.com wrote: >http://www.stealthmessage.com/s/home/index.cfm?re=about Interesting, but: 1. Who clicks on links in unsolicited email? Workaround is for recipient to go to site on their own. 2. Who browses with Javascript enabled? Java is at least safe (rather, much safer) and would do the same. 3. Who believes in 'self-destructing' bits? Merely forgetting your passphrase suffices, IFF your correspondent hasn't screengrabbed your message (FWIW). I do like giving Joe Sixpack traffic-analysis resistance though, without (e.g.) having to scan some usenet list or spend bandwidth with stego. I also realize the answer to 1-3 is most sheeple, but still.. --- If I have nothing to hide, nobody wants to know. -- Steve Schear From sommerfeld at orchard.arlington.ma.us Mon May 12 12:46:05 2003 From: sommerfeld at orchard.arlington.ma.us (Bill Sommerfeld) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 15:46:05 -0400 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 12 May 2003 10:27:21 PDT." Message-ID: <200305121946.h4CJk5Td006733@syn.hamachi.org> So, what's my reason to accept a "payment in cpu time"? As best as I can tell, a "payment in cpu time" means that someone *else* doesn't get a payment in cpu time with their spam. I still get the spam. It seems analagous to a protocol that proves that someone burned a dollar bill. A scheme where I actually get something of value might have a bit more traction.. - Bill --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From mv at cdc.gov Mon May 12 15:54:07 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 15:54:07 -0700 Subject: New seccure commercial messaging site? Message-ID: <3EC0260F.35C28A0F@cdc.gov> At 01:05 PM 5/12/03 -0700, barabbus at hushmail.com wrote: >http://www.stealthmessage.com/s/home/index.cfm?re=about Also: the user MUST trust that that site does not log IP addresses of the sender. (Otherwise traffic analysis is easy.) The workaround here is to send from a netcafe, wearing a mask, with a stone in your shoe. For sending messages to friends from work, their approach suffices. From ashwood at msn.com Mon May 12 16:27:13 2003 From: ashwood at msn.com (Joseph Ashwood) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 16:27:13 -0700 Subject: New seccure commercial messaging site? References: <200305122005.h4CK57KY062275@mailserver2.hushmail.com> Message-ID: <011601c318de$654c4750$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> ----- Original Message ----- From: Subject: New seccure commercial messaging site? > Stealth Message is a secure messaging system designed for communicating > sensitive and confidential information. It protects your privacy, allowing > you to communicate in complete confidence with friends and colleagues. > > http://www.stealthmessage.com/s/home/index.cfm?re=about Try again, this time seriously. I didn't even bother reading most of the front page where it says you support auto-destruct features. Ummm, bull, _your_ implementation may support auto-destruct, but you cannot verify the auto-destruct on the other side. Ok I take it back I did eventually go and read the rest of the page, it's just as laughable, your entire "product" is write a message, upload it to our servers, and we'll tell your friends. Let's assume for now that someone will actually be stupid enough to trust you. Just in case you hadn't noticed very few systems actually attached to the internet remain unhacked for a full year. The direct result of this is most likely someone placing snooping software on your server to read every message. The next problem, your claim "messages are untraceable," completely incorrect. Again let's look at the snooping bug, it sees where the data is coming from, what the data is, and who the data is being sent to, doesn't sound at all like the untracability I know. Even without the snooping bug, let's assume your system can't be hacked for whatever reason. I own a business (Trust Laboratories), we do software assurance, and of course we have a few secrets, if those secrets are being leaked you can bet the first thing I'm gonna do is start digging through all the email, web, phone, ftp, etc. logs I keep on my network, you haven't even begun to address the capabilities of a real system, all you've created is a fun toy that a few AOL (or MSN) users* can use to get themselves in even more trouble. Please do the world a favor and quit wasting bandwidth, oh and BTW your going throu gh hushmail doesn't deceive us into believing that you don't work for the piece of sh*t in question. Joe * side note: While my email address is at msn.com, I don't consider myself a user of MSN, I haven't visited one of their internal sites since the last time I had to change my credit card info. I simply keep it because so many people know this address. From mv at cdc.gov Mon May 12 16:42:35 2003 From: mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola (ret)) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 16:42:35 -0700 Subject: Ames, Hanssen, Stakeknife Message-ID: <3EC0316B.8A6E678@cdc.gov> "If it is true that Stakeknife was the head of [IRA] internal security, then it is a major coup for the British," http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20030512-043253-8646r (Yank megamedia notices what cryptome.org's had for days..) Yep, just like counter intel chiefs Aldrich Ames and Bob Hanssen. Funny how CI/"internal security" attracts double agents... Stakeknife was only an eighth-of-million US$ a year, much cheaper than the CIA & FBI's moles were to the CCCP, but living expenses are probably cheaper in N. Ireland than in D.C. ---- "Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent" -- John Maynard Keynes RNA virii can mutate faster than you can sequence it From jya at pipeline.com Mon May 12 16:49:56 2003 From: jya at pipeline.com (John Young) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 16:49:56 -0700 Subject: Cryptoanarchy: violence or peace? In-Reply-To: <721ab8f312ea357a79e000d7088c9759@dizum.com> Message-ID: Nomen Nescio twisted non-violently: >Neal Stephenson was prophetic in his vision >of Hiro Protagonist living a simple, anonymous, almost barren life in >the physical world while engaging in online activities of superlative >excitement and power. This is the world which cryptoanarchy makes >possible, a world of peace and fulfillment, not the dark, twisted and >violent picture you conjure up in your sickening revenge fantasies. There you go again, inaptly contrasting the soft-hearted duck the draft liberals with the hard-hearted war lovers of the duck the draft Bush persuasion. Aptly, the soft-hearts and hard-hearts are two sides of the same golden butter pat, the first wring their hands at the awfulness of the hard-hearts while lapping up the luxurious benefits paid for by bacon rind predations of mean sonsofbitches, the second snarl at their bete noire faux-cripples and ne'erdowells on the dole ("useless eaters") while reaping the benefits of dirt cheap servitude in the US but mostly offshore safetly distant from the easily penetrable fortresses begging for mob assault by plane, train, careening dodge ram. No, there's no contrast between commies and libertarians, left and right, they're all producing vast lakes of pig shit and blaming the foul odor of bloated self-interest on low-brow non-think chimeras of the government, corporations, the rich, the poor, the opposite, the other, those who are different, those who have more, or less, or get more attention, or fail to show respect, or who make fun of your fundamental beliefs, or insult your morals, ethics, aesthetics, politics, accomplishments, looks, way of talking, writing, joking, and worse, who have a knack for pushing overmuch sacred buttons of your ingrown fearful neurotic cult armed to the teeth with weapons of iron and spleen and inner infant hurt feelings, not understanding or giving a whit what you're deeply serious about, pathologically incapable of escaping the force of. It's not a choice, Nomen, between violence or peace, it's a matter of spreading the golden butter infinitely thin so nobody gets an undue globule. Fat chance in America totally committed to cheating at rigged gambling, call that free market at the end of a gun. From ashwood at msn.com Mon May 12 17:09:55 2003 From: ashwood at msn.com (Joseph Ashwood) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 17:09:55 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> Message-ID: <017f01c318e4$b0ff7e50$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul Walker" Subject: Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? > > I submit that if Joe Lunchbox is not spamming, he is unlikely to > > need to change his habits regarding having his machine available > > Mostly unrelated to this, but something's just occurred to me. Probably I'm > being really stupid, but ... for the receiving MTA to know that the problem > has been processed properly, it would have to know the answer. How does it > know what the answer should be? That one's easy. Use a problem that is not in P but is in NP. To make it clearer to most people, use a problem that can be verified cheaply, but that can't be solved cheaply. Since it's only everyone's computer Minesweeper is an example of such a problem. Once a solution has been found it is easy enough to verify that it is correct (all bombs marked, all non-bomb places revealed), but it can be prohibitively expensive to compute a large grid. Other common examples include jigsaw puzzles, digits of pi, etc. More functional puzzles for this purpose are NP-complete problems; e.g. traveling salesman, Hamiltonian cycle, SAT, etc. Right now another couple of good examples would be discrete logarithm, and integer factoring. In all these cases verifying the solution is cheap (generally travelling the path in the NP-complete problems, or computing the values in the DL and IF). Verifying that the puzzle is valid is only slightly more difficult, but retaining an active list of problems would solve the issue (but open up the possibility of DOS attacks). Basically it's a fairly easily solved problem. Joe From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Mon May 12 15:08:31 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 18:08:31 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <5B3E0E0E-8309-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> References: <5.1.1.6.2.20030510022002.02da5ec0@idiom.com> Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030512173756.044d7ab0@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 10:03 AM 5/10/03 -0700, Tim May wrote: [Talking about government-assisted projects and businesses going broke] >Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not be in >the construction and business development business. (I would go further >and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states and localities >are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to give to businesses. >No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to be. Ditto for governments >running gambling operations, but I digress.) It's very clear that this is bad policy, though I'm not too sure it's actually unconstitutional. Didn't the states finance and run some of the early canals? The big problem is that the state has to have all kinds of coercive powers to do its main jobs, and those powers are awfully handy when the state is trying to protect its state-run businesses from competition, or buy land for its favored new project that the owner doesn't really want to sell, or whatever. A secondary problem is that there's no limit to how much the business can lose, when it simply can't go broke because the state owns and protects it. Just look at AMTRAK. (And as many of us have learned to our cost in the last few years, there's almost no limit other than bankruptcy to how quickly a badly-run business can lose money.) >According to news reports on this area, Sunnyvale is still losing money on >a major indoor mall it built 23-4 years ago ("Sunnyvale Town Center," >which I used to live a mile or so away from when it was being built in the >late 70s. > >IMO, there's something very, very wrong about any level of government >building shopping malls. Yep. Though I think it's a lot more common that a private company builds and operates the shopping malls, but with special incentives given to the company by the government. This is basically patronage, and it's always been a big part of local politics. How does that Huey Long quote go? Something like "Those who give a lot will get a large slice of the pie; those who give a little will get a small slice of the pie, and those who give nothing will get...good government." And of course, you get interesting competition between local governments, with each offering a bigger bag of goodies paid for by the taxpayers, or seized by condemning someone's property, so that the big mall built two years ago goes bankrupt because of the newer, shinier, even more subsidized mall that's just been built a few miles away. The same sort of competition happens for factories. I'm not usually a "there oughta be a law" kind of person, but in this case, a well-thought-out federal law prohibiting this kind of competition would be a major net benefit to taxpayers and local governments throughout the country. >--Tim May --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 From dahonig at cox.net Mon May 12 18:23:53 2003 From: dahonig at cox.net (David Honig) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 18:23:53 -0700 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <20030512214557.A9261480@exeter.ac.uk> References: <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> Message-ID: <3.0.5.32.20030512182353.008048c0@pop.west.cox.net> At 09:45 PM 5/12/03 +0100, Adam Back wrote: >In addition it is expected that there would be a mechanism whereby >regular correspondents would white list each other. (Probably >automatically via their mail clients). > >Whether you think a few seconds is sufficient depends on your views of >the economics of spamming. Ie how close to losing break-even the >spammers are, and whether a few seconds of CPU per message is enough >to significantly increase the cost. Two points. First, Joe Sixpack won't use it if it requires an extra click; but he might if the mail queueing is in the background. Second, spammers use trojans that establish local mail relays (!) You think they won't steal some cycles to pollute? Ok, three points. If you're sending from your PDA, either deal with the battery-life-loss as a cost of emailing from your PDA, or have your net-connected host do the work. Again, transparently, or no one will use it. Personally, I favor an Assasination Politics flavor solution, but that's unlikely to gain widespread favor :-) From kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com Mon May 12 15:39:13 2003 From: kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com (John Kelsey) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 18:39:13 -0400 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <200305121946.h4CJk5Td006733@syn.hamachi.org> References: Message-ID: <5.2.0.9.0.20030512183116.044db8d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> At 03:46 PM 5/12/03 -0400, Bill Sommerfeld wrote: >So, what's my reason to accept a "payment in cpu time"? As best as I >can tell, a "payment in cpu time" means that someone *else* doesn't >get a payment in cpu time with their spam. I still get the spam. The realistic benefit is that you can use something like hashcash as one of your spam filtering rules. Anyone who is spending 1/2 sec on a reasonable machine per e-mail sent isn't likely to be spamming you, because that won't scale up very well for sending out thousands of e-mails at a time. The problem is that until it is widely adopted, it's not a very useful additional filter. There are actually dozens of similar ways to stop nearly all spam, if you can deploy them all over the net at once. But deploying anything all over the net at once isn't practical, so instead, each user or ISP tries to find some workable solution for the problem, typically involving changing his filtering rules every few months and spending a minute or two a day going through his spam folder, making sure he's not throwing away something valuable. > - Bill --John Kelsey, kelsey.j at ix.netcom.com PGP: FA48 3237 9AD5 30AC EEDD BBC8 2A80 6948 4CAA F259 --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From timcmay at got.net Mon May 12 19:40:39 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 19:40:39 -0700 Subject: Ames, Hanssen, Stakeknife In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <485359A6-84EC-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> On Monday, May 12, 2003, at 08:22 PM, John Young wrote: > > Fulton is one of a group of 12 former undercover agents who are > hounding HMG for protection and/or compensation, and are pissed > mightily that active agents are getting superior protection and > treatment. The former agents are being killed one by one while > HMG bides its time. > Please publish their true names, that more of these narcs may be killed. Despite my linguistic differences with you, you have done a good job in accelerating the liquidation of traitors. Killing the supergrasses and their ilk is a Good Thing. Due it for the narcs in the hacker movement and I will be even happier. Only one of them has been discovered and sent to his earthly reward, which is not enough. I think I know the identity of one who lives in Emeryville, mostly, and another who lives in Santa Clara, but it's best to be more certain before they are whacked. --Tim May From ericm at lne.com Mon May 12 20:00:58 2003 From: ericm at lne.com (Eric Murray) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 20:00:58 -0700 Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512211254.A2905@cluebot.com>; from declan@well.com on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 09:12:54PM -0400 References: <20030512095729.A19565@slack.lne.com> <5.1.1.6.2.20030512103557.02e1cae8@idiom.com> <20030512110541.A20160@slack.lne.com> <20030512211254.A2905@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <20030512200058.A18360@slack.lne.com> On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 09:12:54PM -0400, Declan McCullagh wrote: > But I don't understand why an extra 100 messages a day or even 1000 > messages a day would be a big deal for a server with a fast Net connection. > If it's DSL or cable modems, that makes sense. Heh. I'd love DSL. It's a full-time dialup. That's all I can get out here in the woods. But there are advantages to running it here-- Since it's on a machine I own, I can hack up Majordomo all I want, and I don't have to worry about the server's owner getting upset over the list contents (or the ISP either, since I just get straight IP). If someone with a real server with real bandwidth wanted to take over or let me have full reign on their box to run it there, that'd be fine with me. Eric From jya at pipeline.com Mon May 12 20:22:45 2003 From: jya at pipeline.com (John Young) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 20:22:45 -0700 Subject: Ames, Hanssen, Stakeknife In-Reply-To: <3EC0316B.8A6E678@cdc.gov> Message-ID: An odd aspect of the Stakeknife revelation is that the prime candidate for outing Stakeknife, an undercover agent pseudonymed "Kevin Fulton," has had his true name on Cryptome for several months on court claims made against HMG for compensation for years of undercover spying and the death of his stillborn daughter allegedly caused by a security raid: http://cryptome.org/fru-claimant.htm "Kevin Fulton" is known to a number of British and Irish reporters but none have published his true name, although the Scottish Sunday Herald reported on Fulton's court claims without reporting the true name of the claimant. A British court banned publication of one of the claims which name British intelligence officers and handlers of undercover operatives: http://cryptome.org/fru-claimant2.htm On May 4 Fulton was reported in the Guardian to be threatening to reveal the identity of Stakeknife within a week if a broken deal for compensation with HMG was not made good. On May 11 the identity was published -- not first by Cryptome as some newspapers have said but by Scottish and Irish newspapers (Cryptome was alerted and grabbed the stories the night of May 10). Fulton has received several bullets indicating he will be killed for revelations about what he learned during his undercover work, has applied for a gun permit, and the police have refused to grant the permit. Fulton is one of a group of 12 former undercover agents who are hounding HMG for protection and/or compensation, and are pissed mightily that active agents are getting superior protection and treatment. The former agents are being killed one by one while HMG bides its time. There is a slim chance that the former agents will do unto others what is being done to them. From declan at well.com Mon May 12 18:12:54 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:12:54 -0400 Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512110541.A20160@slack.lne.com>; from ericm@lne.com on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 11:05:41AM -0700 References: <20030512095729.A19565@slack.lne.com> <5.1.1.6.2.20030512103557.02e1cae8@idiom.com> <20030512110541.A20160@slack.lne.com> Message-ID: <20030512211254.A2905@cluebot.com> On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 11:05:41AM -0700, Eric Murray wrote, quoting Bill Stewart: > > Could you at least bouncegram the mail that you're not saving, > > or else have SMTP use a reject message that says what it's doing? > > That way the occasional non-whitelisted non-subscriber human > > who sends mail to the list will get some indication that the mail's > > been rejected and what to do about it. > > I'd like to. But bouncing the mail will mean that > I have to send 100 bounces and process 100 bounces back, since > few spammers use real mail addresses and most of those are > already over quota or rejecting mail. So it won't save me > much traffic and I'll have to add a hack for dumping > the bounce bounces... First we should thank Eric for doing an absolutely spectacular job of running his node. I've been running moderated and unmoderated lists since 1994, and, take it from me, dealing with administrative stuff is a thankless task. You're far more likely to deal with people who are angry than thankful. I like Bill's suggestion, and perhaps it's possible to use disposable email addresses (cp-20030512 at lne.com?) for replies? But I don't understand why an extra 100 messages a day or even 1000 messages a day would be a big deal for a server with a fast Net connection. If it's DSL or cable modems, that makes sense. But if it's on a server with bandwidth charges, and that's the issue, does it make sense to take up a collection to offest the cost? (I'm thinking of asking for the same thing with Politech, since server hosting is getting expensive.) -Declan From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Mon May 12 19:13:22 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:13:22 -0500 (CDT) Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512095729.A19565@slack.lne.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 12 May 2003, Eric Murray wrote: > The spam load at lne.com is WAY too high. :) All the bozo's subscribing the list don't help either... > Last month for example there was an average of 96 spams per day submitted > to cypherpunks at lne.com. "submitted" means that it was the first > time we saw that particular mail. Since the CDR system sends everything > to all nodes, that means we got and passed on about 4x that number. > 800 spams a day is a waste. > > So I have changed the way we deal with CDR mail. We will no longer pass > to other CDRs mail that we would not send to subscribers. Eliminating > outbound spam will cut our cypherpunks spam load in half. > I am also going to filter the non-subscriber mail more effectively. Does this mean inbound to lne.com or to the backbone? It seems unclear. In other words you will filter inbound mail that isn't a subscriber to your node list? How will this be applied to mail on the backbone from other nodes? > Lately I have had to check about 50 spams a day to see if they are > actually posts to the list. I find one real post every two or three days. ???? Man, you're dropping a lot of real traffic then. I'd say that I go through a couple hundred a day and there are about 15-20 posts a day. Of course there are days when there are almost zero non-spam mail. > Now I will save for human processing only the non-subscriber mail that is > PGP signed or encrypted, or that looks like a reply. So, if it's not PGP signed (ie has the appropriate ASCII string in it) and it comes from somebody who isn't on your subscriber list then it's headed for the bit bucket? > The majority of non-subscriber mails I've forwarded to the list > have been replies. (I'll save everything for a while to make > sure my filtering works). So this means no anonymous email through lne.com then? Pity. > As always, other CDR operators and anyone else interested > in running a CDR are welcome to my scripts. I"m still not clear on how you're going to filter the backbone traffic. I'd certainly like to put them on the SSZ CDR page for reference. I'll move lne.com from 'non-moderated' to 'moderated' then? Thanks for the explanation and heads up. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From tim at dierks.org Mon May 12 18:18:25 2003 From: tim at dierks.org (Tim Dierks) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:18:25 -0400 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <20030512214557.A9261480@exeter.ac.uk> References: <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> Message-ID: <6.0.0.4.2.20030512210012.0818ee18@127.0.0.1> At 04:45 PM 5/12/2003, Adam Back wrote: >Whether you think a few seconds is sufficient depends on your views of >the economics of spamming. Ie how close to losing break-even the >spammers are, and whether a few seconds of CPU per message is enough >to significantly increase the cost. This article for example >discusses the economics of spam: > >http://www.eprivacygroup.com/article/articlestatic/58/1/6 > >they give an example of a spam campaign with a 0.0023% response rate, >and a yeild of $19 per response. They estimate the cost of sending >the spam was less than 0.01c per message. I've seen significantly >lower estimates for the sending costs. To deter a given spam campaign >we just have to increase the cost to the point of making it >unprofitable given the response rate and profit per responder. The >other side of this equation is what a second of CPU costs in monetary >terms to a spammer. Assuming that a CPU costs $500 and that its value can be amortized over 2 years, CPU costs .0016 cents/second. Based on the numbers enough, the revenue/spam sent is .044 cents. Thus, the breakeven point is 27.6 seconds/message: assuming other costs are minimal, you have to require > 27.6 seconds of CPU calculation from an email submittant to ruin the spamming business model. A few thoughts on this: - You have to adjust the size of the calculation frequently to keep up with Moore's law (although the time/$500 CPU is constant, assuming constant profitability for spam) - If spammers have new technology or economies of scale available to them, it's going to adversely affect everyone else. (That is, if you're using an 18-month-old CPU and CPU-seconds cost you twice what they cost in the volume it costs spammers, your $500 computer will have to spend 2 minutes of time to calculate a token it takes a spammer 30 seconds to calculate). - This is going to dramatically increase the costs of sending bulk e-mail for non-spammers: for example, I get airline specials a few times a week; they must send millions of these. - The CPU time required here is several orders of magnitude larger than the cryptographic costs associated with SSL, and SSL is not broadly accepted at least in part due to the CPU cost associated with with it; this implies to me that there will be substantial resistance. - The CPU costs associated with SSL engendered a substantial market in cryptographic accelerators intended to reduce the cost to do an RSA private key operation. Presumably, a system like this will create such a market for e-mail token accelerators: unfortunately, this is exactly the kind of new tech / economy of scale envisioned above: we may end up with a situation where a calculation which costs a spammer .044 cents will take the average user's CPU 10 minutes or more to calculate. - Tim From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Mon May 12 19:18:32 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:18:32 -0500 (CDT) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Mon, 12 May 2003, Sunder wrote: > And what about people that use something underpowered like a Palm IV to > send email? Does it really make sense to force their little dragonball > powered machines to do a whole lot of math? Tell 'em to get a real PDA, preferably a Zaurus but a PowerPC is acceptable. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From nobody at dizum.com Mon May 12 12:20:02 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:20:02 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Cryptoanarchy: violence or peace? Message-ID: <721ab8f312ea357a79e000d7088c9759@dizum.com> Tim May writes: > I'd take > everyone involved in blocking Wingspread, the project, and have them > hanged for stealing Ry Kelley's property. I figure killing the 50 or 70 > major culprits would send a message. Cryptoanarchy will someday mean > the millions who need to be punished for their crimes will in fact be > punished and converted into fertilizer, soap, lampshades, and other > things which can be sold to partially pay for their crimes.) How exactly will cryptoanarchy accomplish this? Millions will be killed, and their remains used in this way? Please spell out the details. Cryptoanarchy could reduce the revenues available to government (but they could still lay taxes on visible physical property like land - a victory for the Georgeists after all). It could allow people to traffic in forbidden information goods, to make untraceable payments. It's possible there could be an increase in crimes like the ones you support, but those will still involve activity in the physical world. Assuming that human nature remains constant, people will still support the same general policies that we see today. There will not be widespread general support for turning millions into lampshades, any more than there is in the present world. How could a few disaffected cranks cause millions to be murdered? And even supposing that this can be accomplished, what about other people unhappy with the state of things? What will stop radical Greens from using the tools of cryptoanarchy to further their own violent goals, anonymously executing people for developing their own land? Mr. Kelley above might have faced far worse if he had proceeded with "Wingspread" under a framework of widespread cryptoanarcy. Instead of being shut down and harmed financially, he could have been tortured and murdered. But there is no evidence that cryptoanarchy will grant so much power for violence to an angry minority. The physical world will still exist, governments can function there based on taxing physical goods, and they will deter crime and punish criminals just as they do today. The true nature of cryptoanarchy is fundamentally peaceful. It offers an opportunity for people to interact in a world and framework where physical coercion is impossible. It points to a new form of wealth and value, which is built on richness of information and connectivity, rather than physical wealth. Neal Stephenson was prophetic in his vision of Hiro Protagonist living a simple, anonymous, almost barren life in the physical world while engaging in online activities of superlative excitement and power. This is the world which cryptoanarchy makes possible, a world of peace and fulfillment, not the dark, twisted and violent picture you conjure up in your sickening revenge fantasies. From adam at cypherspace.org Mon May 12 13:45:57 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:45:57 +0100 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov>; from crawdad@fnal.gov on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 08:53:25AM -0500 References: <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> Message-ID: <20030512214557.A9261480@exeter.ac.uk> Bear discussed using hashcash-alike tokens as a challenge response from the filtering MTA back to the sender giving the sender a chance to compute a hashcash token. This approach has the problem you identify -- namely that email is store and forward; email can and often does go through multiple MTAs on it's path to delivery, and the MTA doing the filtering may be multiple hops from the sender. Indeed sometimes the filterer is the end-user who is also intermittently connected. It's more convenient and fits better in the store-and-forward setting if all email already includes the token at time of sending. If it turns out to be needed, then there is no interactive challenge-response needed. Then the question is whether computing the token at sending time would be incovenient for the normal sender. This depends on what parameters you choose. A few seconds probably wouldn't be noticed, especially as with deep MUA integration the token can be computed on each recipient address as soon as it is selected for receipt. Depending on MUA usage therefore the token could be computed while the sender is composing the message. In addition it is expected that there would be a mechanism whereby regular correspondents would white list each other. (Probably automatically via their mail clients). Whether you think a few seconds is sufficient depends on your views of the economics of spamming. Ie how close to losing break-even the spammers are, and whether a few seconds of CPU per message is enough to significantly increase the cost. This article for example discusses the economics of spam: http://www.eprivacygroup.com/article/articlestatic/58/1/6 they give an example of a spam campaign with a 0.0023% response rate, and a yeild of $19 per response. They estimate the cost of sending the spam was less than 0.01c per message. I've seen significantly lower estimates for the sending costs. To deter a given spam campaign we just have to increase the cost to the point of making it unprofitable given the response rate and profit per responder. The other side of this equation is what a second of CPU costs in monetary terms to a spammer. (To an end user it is essentially free because his CPU is mostly idle anyway; the limiting factor for the user is his preference for fast mail delivery (and in the dialup case an unwillingness to sit waiting for tokens to be calcluated before his mail can be sent). Adam On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 08:53:25AM -0500, Matt Crawford wrote: > This doesn't fit Joe Lunchbox's current model in which he dumps his > outgoing mail onto his provider's server and turns off his machine. > His provider either has to deliver synchronously and bounce the > computational payment burden back to Joe, pay it for him, or bounce > the message. In the latter case, the receiver who demanded cycles > needs to recognize the problem it set and accept the answer on a > later date. --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From adam at cypherspace.org Mon May 12 13:51:35 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:51:35 +0100 Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512130305.A21283@slack.lne.com>; from ericm@lne.com on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 01:03:05PM -0700 References: <20030512130305.A21283@slack.lne.com> Message-ID: <20030512215135.A9279452@exeter.ac.uk> Do you filter on the same header that you build the white-list from? Ie I forge all of my mail, it's really coming from ABack at ex.ac.uk; but I want replies to adam at cypherspace.org. I've encountered other "subscribers only" situations where my mail gets bounced because they look too deeply at the headers and see the received line or Sender so something is ABack at ex.ac.uk and block it even though the From line is adam at cypherspace.org, and I subscribed as adam at cypherspace.org Adam On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 01:03:05PM -0700, Eric Murray wrote: > On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 03:21:05PM -0400, Trei, Peter wrote: > > I hope you whitelist known regular posters. I subscribe to > > minder, but often post thru lne. > > I guess it's been a while since I set this up, so people > have forgotten. > > There's a "whitelist" that has subscribers to all > the CDRs, anonymous remailers, and anyone that > has ever posted to any CDR (assuming we got the mail). > It's not often that there is a non-spam post from > a sender that isn't on the whitelist-- when there is, I > forward it and put the sender on the list. > > The idea is to filter out the spam without requiring moderation. > > Eric From sommerfeld at orchard.arlington.ma.us Mon May 12 18:52:12 2003 From: sommerfeld at orchard.arlington.ma.us (Bill Sommerfeld) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:52:12 -0400 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 12 May 2003 21:45:57 BST." <20030512214557.A9261480@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <200305130152.h4D1qC1F007097@syn.hamachi.org> > The other side of this equation is what a second of CPU costs in > monetary terms to a spammer. (To an end user it is essentially free > because his CPU is mostly idle anyway; the limiting factor for the > user is his preference for fast mail delivery (and in the dialup > case an unwillingness to sit waiting for tokens to be calcluated > before his mail can be sent). If you believe http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/2988209.stm, spammers are beginning to use viruses to deploy spam relays. If a spammer has a zombie army of a few thousand compromised systems, the spammer's cpu time costs for hashcash will also essentially be free. - Bill --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Mon May 12 19:54:16 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 21:54:16 -0500 (CDT) Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512211254.A2905@cluebot.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 12 May 2003, Declan McCullagh wrote: > But I don't understand why an extra 100 messages a day or even 1000 > messages a day would be a big deal for a server with a fast Net connection. > If it's DSL or cable modems, that makes sense. Even 128kb/s ISDN does not appreciably bog. At current loads I use less than 10% of my bandwidth on average. I do see spikes that hit 100% but they last for minutes. > But if it's on a server with bandwidth charges, and that's the issue, > does it make sense to take up a collection to offest the cost? (I'm > thinking of asking for the same thing with Politech, since server > hosting is getting expensive.) A SDSL commerical feed is around $250 a month and you can host your own name server and such. Why should users pay for that? You're just trying to get a free ride. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From shaddack at ns.arachne.cz Mon May 12 13:17:24 2003 From: shaddack at ns.arachne.cz (Thomas Shaddack) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 22:17:24 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <5.1.1.6.2.20030510022002.02da5ec0@idiom.com> Message-ID: On Sat, 10 May 2003, Bill Stewart wrote: > Eminent domain gets used for all kinds of appalling things - > it's not just governments building roads or military bases, > or even governments taking land for government-run activities. It's apparently a pretty large-scale problem. http://abcnews.go.com/sections/business/US/domain_030512_csm.html From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Mon May 12 20:22:24 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 22:22:24 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Other changes to the CDR Message-ID: Just as an aside, and perhaps a friendly warning :) We expect to complete the authorization issues on the current Hangar 18 cluster project the third week of June. At that point at least the current Hangar 18 lists (~200) and the SSZ lists (ie CDR and a couple of others) will be migrated to that format. We hope to have that migration completed by sometime in July. We currently expect to start with 80G of space and increase as needed. Additionaly we'll be moving from this ISDN to 384k SDSL in the Oct. time frame. At least at the start we will continue to support subscribers in the traditional sense. But once we have enough 9P users (there are drivers for many OS'es now) we can drop the traditional *nix interface (we'll probably do that when 90% of our users are via 9P). It's worth mentioning that we'll also be able to support NFS and SMB as well (though we will not make such resources universal/global in nature because of the various security issues, they also have very! limited support for transitive mounts). The general layout will be to mount the namespace on some local point of your choosing (eg /hangar18) and below that will be all the community resources. To participate in a list for example will be nothing more than editing a text file and dropping it in the appropriate dir (eg /hangar18/cypherpunks/submission) where it will then be moved over to a longer-lived location (eg /hangar18/cypherpunks/). The propogation will be handled via 9P services. To access the resources one must either be a direct participant via tit-for-tat or else a tit-for-tat node will provide some sort of access via their own policies (eg $$ to the public or free to friends). The title will be the filename, the author the owner, and if you want to cc then it will be a cp with multiple targets, and each 'mail list' will not be aware of what other lists it was copied to (though you could certainly create a header like structure to share that info). -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Mon May 12 20:35:52 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 22:35:52 -0500 (CDT) Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512200058.A18360@slack.lne.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 12 May 2003, Eric Murray wrote: > If someone with a real server with real > bandwidth wanted to take over or let me have full > reign on their box to run it there, that'd > be fine with me. Once we get the 9P stuff up and running bandwidth issues will go away. 9P has this cool feature called 'lazy update' which means that when you mount a namespace you can move the data you want to local only when you access it. The rest of the time you just have a dir-like structure that handles namespace access and it sits somewhere on real hardware, but you could really care less where (or even how many 'where's' there are ore the size of the chunks the file is broken into ;). In a very real sense the CDR would stop residing anywhere in particular. It will also significantly blur the distinction between operator and subscriber. The author can protect the reader from MITM attacks via normal hashing by providing their key in a real-only namespace. Some other cool features we'll be able to support 'out of the box' is shared multi-media. So, several of us export our sound cards out via a /dev/sb namespace for example. I take my microphone output and simply pipe it to multiple /dev/sb/* entries and wallah you all hear it. One app here would be for a site to run a text-to-speech converter. Then anyone who wanted to listen to the submissions to the list would mount that dev and pipe it to their local sound board. This highlights a cool feature of Plan 9 in that you put services in only one location in the mesh/blanket/grid and 9P takes care of sharing it out to everyone. -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From ravage at einstein.ssz.com Mon May 12 20:47:39 2003 From: ravage at einstein.ssz.com (Jim Choate) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 22:47:39 -0500 (CDT) Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <6.0.0.4.2.20030512210012.0818ee18@127.0.0.1> Message-ID: Let me say it again... Economics is technology, government is technology. Neither are a 'fact of nature' or a 'natural law'. They are a direct result of the way we look at the cosmos -and how we *interpret* natural law-. To put it another way, they are each -primarily- *ego*. -WE- -make- the world by the -choices- -WE- -make-. Stop acting like a -victim of circumstances-. If other technology changes then economics change. It is not immutable. Don't confuse 'economics' (which is a function of psychology) with 'supply and demand' (which is a function of the 3 laws of thermodynamics). Not the same thing. Use the right technology and the problem is -removed- from 'economic' consideration. You're using the wrong technology. On Mon, 12 May 2003, Tim Dierks wrote: > At 04:45 PM 5/12/2003, Adam Back wrote: > >Whether you think a few seconds is sufficient depends on your views of > >the economics of spamming. Ie how close to losing break-even the > >spammers are, and whether a few seconds of CPU per message is enough > >to significantly increase the cost. This article for example > >discusses the economics of spam: > > > >http://www.eprivacygroup.com/article/articlestatic/58/1/6 > > > >they give an example of a spam campaign with a 0.0023% response rate, > >and a yeild of $19 per response. They estimate the cost of sending > >the spam was less than 0.01c per message. I've seen significantly > >lower estimates for the sending costs. To deter a given spam campaign > >we just have to increase the cost to the point of making it > >unprofitable given the response rate and profit per responder. The > >other side of this equation is what a second of CPU costs in monetary > >terms to a spammer. > > Assuming that a CPU costs $500 and that its value can be amortized over 2 > years, CPU costs .0016 cents/second. > > Based on the numbers enough, the revenue/spam sent is .044 cents. Thus, the > breakeven point is 27.6 seconds/message: assuming other costs are minimal, > you have to require > 27.6 seconds of CPU calculation from an email > submittant to ruin the spamming business model. > > A few thoughts on this: > - You have to adjust the size of the calculation frequently to keep up > with Moore's law (although the time/$500 CPU is constant, assuming constant > profitability for spam) > - If spammers have new technology or economies of scale available to > them, it's going to adversely affect everyone else. (That is, if you're > using an 18-month-old CPU and CPU-seconds cost you twice what they cost in > the volume it costs spammers, your $500 computer will have to spend 2 > minutes of time to calculate a token it takes a spammer 30 seconds to > calculate). > - This is going to dramatically increase the costs of sending bulk e-mail > for non-spammers: for example, I get airline specials a few times a week; > they must send millions of these. > - The CPU time required here is several orders of magnitude larger than > the cryptographic costs associated with SSL, and SSL is not broadly > accepted at least in part due to the CPU cost associated with with it; this > implies to me that there will be substantial resistance. > - The CPU costs associated with SSL engendered a substantial market in > cryptographic accelerators intended to reduce the cost to do an RSA private > key operation. Presumably, a system like this will create such a market for > e-mail token accelerators: unfortunately, this is exactly the kind of new > tech / economy of scale envisioned above: we may end up with a situation > where a calculation which costs a spammer .044 cents will take the average > user's CPU 10 minutes or more to calculate. > > - Tim > -- ____________________________________________________________________ We are all interested in the future for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. Criswell, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" ravage at ssz.com jchoate at open-forge.org www.ssz.com www.open-forge.org -------------------------------------------------------------------- From bill.stewart at pobox.com Mon May 12 22:48:42 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 22:48:42 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030513045258.6B70910F75@rant-central.com> References: <017f01c318e4$b0ff7e50$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> <017f01c318e4$b0ff7e50$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030512223358.02d50050@idiom.com> At 11:52 PM 05/12/2003 -0500, Roy M.Silvernail wrote: >On Monday 12 May 2003 07:09 pm, Joseph Ashwood wrote: > > > That one's easy. Use a problem that is not in P but is in NP. To make it > > clearer to most people, use a problem that can be verified cheaply, but > > that can't be solved cheaply. > >Please permit me to join the dense crowd. Now that I've proved my labor, how >do I attach the proof to the email? Obviously, some parts of the message are >added to a hash, but which parts? If it's the body, is whitespace damage >still an issue? The obvious mechanisms for including it are a header line, X-Hashcash-Version-1212: 0x20A13490B8219048243 which is easy pretty easy for almost anybody to add. You could also do an ESMTP extension of some sort, which is much more annoying to add, but lets you reject non-hashcashed messages before receiving them. (The ESMTP approach also has the problem that it's only useful for direct connections, as opposed to mail relayed through your ISP, so that probably isn't as interesting.) Some of the hashcash proposals have required near-real-time interaction between the sender's client and the recipient's server, to collect the string of the day or string of the moment, which has privacy/anonymity problems, while others either use a fixed or slowly changing parameter set, e.g. find a string that matches the first N bits of the SHA1 of recipient at example.com-YYYYMMDDHH or recipient at example.com-YYYYMMDDHH-KEYPHRASE So the recipient's mail server or client looks for the X-Hashcash string, makes sure it isn't recipient at example.com-YYYYMMDDHH-KEYPHRASE, hashes it and makes sure that the number matches, and you're good to go. From shaddack at ns.arachne.cz Mon May 12 14:21:18 2003 From: shaddack at ns.arachne.cz (Thomas Shaddack) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 23:21:18 +0200 (CEST) Subject: changes at lne.com In-Reply-To: <20030512110541.A20160@slack.lne.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 12 May 2003, Eric Murray wrote: > I don't think I can do an SMTP error message since its > getting handled in procmail, after the body is accepted. You can fake it. lne.com forwarding all mail to eg. internal.lne.com and only the internal.lne.com doing the rejections is a valid setup. You can use procmail to feed the body of the rejected mail to some script that will "forge" the bounce message and send it back. From roy at rant-central.com Mon May 12 21:52:57 2003 From: roy at rant-central.com (Roy M.Silvernail) Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 23:52:57 -0500 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <017f01c318e4$b0ff7e50$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> <017f01c318e4$b0ff7e50$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> Message-ID: <20030513045258.6B70910F75@rant-central.com> On Monday 12 May 2003 07:09 pm, Joseph Ashwood wrote: > That one's easy. Use a problem that is not in P but is in NP. To make it > clearer to most people, use a problem that can be verified cheaply, but > that can't be solved cheaply. Please permit me to join the dense crowd. Now that I've proved my labor, how do I attach the proof to the email? Obviously, some parts of the message are added to a hash, but which parts? If it's the body, is whitespace damage still an issue? From bob.cat at snet.net Mon May 12 22:25:51 2003 From: bob.cat at snet.net (BobCat) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 01:25:51 -0400 Subject: Ames, Hanssen, Stakeknife References: <485359A6-84EC-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> Message-ID: <034401c31910$3ce53010$70eafc40@Leopard> From: "Tim May" > Due it for the narcs in the hacker movement and I will be even happier. > Only one of them has been discovered and sent to his earthly reward, > which is not enough. I think I know the identity of one who lives in > Emeryville, mostly, and another who lives in Santa Clara, but it's best > to be more certain before they are whacked. Nah. Let $DEITY quicksort them out. From nobody at dizum.com Mon May 12 20:40:04 2003 From: nobody at dizum.com (Nomen Nescio) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 05:40:04 +0200 (CEST) Subject: Trusted Computing at WEIS2003 Message-ID: The 2nd annual workshop on "Economics and Information Security" will be held May 29-30 at the University of Maryland. Unfortunately the website at http://www.cpppe.umd.edu/rhsmith3/index.html is woefully out of date. At least two of the papers will focus on Trusted Computing as exemplified in the TCG (formerly TCPA) and NGSCB (former Palladium) proposals. Ross Anderson himself, co-chair and founder of the conference, has a new paper at http://www.ftp.cl.cam.ac.uk/ftp/users/rja14/tcpa.pdf. Another one, by Stuart Schechter et al, is discussed at an EWeek article, http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,1053555,00.asp. The Schechter paper is online at http://www.eecs.harvard.edu/~stuart/papers/eis03.pdf. EWeek talks about the role of TC in limiting which applications get access to protected content: "This kind of protection is seen as central to the types of advanced digital rights management systems sought by content owners as a countermeasure against piracy. However, this chain of trust can be turned around and used by the people doing the illegal copying and distribution, according to the paper's authors." The authors are quoted, "Though this technology was envisioned to thwart pirates, it is exactly what a peer-to-peer system needs to ensure that no client application can enter the network unless that application, and the hardware and operating system it is running on, has been certified by an authority trusted by the existing clients..." A similar point was made here last summer during our extensive debate about the potential threat of Trusted Computing. It would be fair to say that it was not well received, however. Perhaps now that the ideas are being aired in an academic environment, people will take a closer look at TC and gain a fuller understanding of the technology. Even Ross Anderson recognizes that TC can help the pirates as well as the protectors: "There is also a significant risk - that if TC machines become pervasive, they can be used by the other side just as easily. Users can create `blacknets' for swapping prohibited material of various kinds, and it will become easier to create peer-to-peer systems like gnutella or mojonation but which are very much more resistant to attack by the music industry - as only genuine clients will be able to participate. The current methods used to attack such systems, involving service denial attacks undertaken by Trojanned clients, will not work any more [23]. So when TC is implemented, the law of unintended consequences could well make the music industry a victim rather than a beneficiary." Anderson's paper is a significant improvement on his bizarrely paranoid and error-filled FAQ. He's had to back down on a number of his claims. For example, Windows Server 2003 implements some DRM and document-locking features which he attributed to Palladium. He also seems to back away from claims that Microsoft will censor your data. He has to squirm to deal with the work on TC Linux and try to explain how this fits into his model of the monopolizing influence of these technologies. Anderson now has to admit that his claims of a software blacklist are mistaken as well: "Among early TCPA developers, there was an assumption that blacklist mechanisms would extend as far as disabling all documents created using a machine whose software licence fees weren't paid. Having strong mechanisms that embedded machine identifiers in all files they had created or modified would create huge leverage. Following the initial public outcry, Microsoft now denies that such blacklist mechanisms will be introduced - at least at the NGSCB level [18]." Notice the claim that Microsoft has perhaps removed this feature based on public outcry - an outcry for which Ross Anderson can no doubt take credit. This fulfils a prediction made here last year, that when their apocalyptic scenarios failed to arrive, the critics would take credit for having prevented them! What a racket - if you're right, you're right, and if you're wrong, you're even more right. While this newer paper is better than the abysmal FAQ (which unfortunately is still spreading its lies and misinformation, even though Anderson now admits that he knows it is wrong), it has significant flaws as well. All the analysis is presented from the perspective that businesses can do whatever they like and consumers have no choice but to go along helplessly. Not once does he consider that the discipline of the marketplace applies to sellers as well as buyers. Any paper claiming to be relevant to the topic of "Economics and Information Security" should not be content with such a one-sided view. All too often the text degenerates into the kind of anti-Microsoft conspiracy theories which can be found in the sleaziest corners of the net. He never really explains why Intel, IBM and HP are going along with these nefarious schemes. Intel, we are told is behaving "strategically". What is the strategy? Why will TC help Intel? Anderson mumbles something about "lock-in" but that doesn't apply to the hardware vendors. He doesn't want to admit the obvious, that Intel thinks this will sell more computers, because people will like their computers better when they can access more content. This is what happens when you ignore the demand side in your analysis. Anderson also presents a number of scenarios of Microsoft dominance in the application demain as if they are new. Why, law firms might feel obligated to buy Microsoft Office in order to communicate with their clients! Imagine that. Who could conceive of such a twisted, backwards, upside down world as one in which companies felt stuck with buying Microsoft for compatibility? If he really thinks this is a new threat, I'd suggest Anderson visit the real world occasionally. I dunno, maybe things are different over there in the Unreal Kingdom. Despite these problems, I do want to emphasize that Anderson's paper is a step forward. And the paper by Schechter is also encouraging in that it is willing to reject the anti-TC paranoia and take a clear-eyed look at the technology. Still, both of these papers express their results in somewhat negative terms: look, you guys at the RIAA and MPAA, you better not push for TC because it might benefit the pirates too. None of these authors has quite been able to take accept the logical conclusion of their analysis, which is that this is a technology which can enable a whole host of powerful new applications, many of which have probably not even been invented yet. Then it should be up to the marketplace to decide which will succeed and which will fail. Everyone wants to short-circuit that messy final step and decide for themselves which are the "good" applications and which are evil. I suggest that we not reject out of hand the principle of allowing people to make decisions for themselves about what they want to do with their computers, and that includes utilizing TC technology. From nneul at umr.edu Tue May 13 05:23:23 2003 From: nneul at umr.edu (Nathan Neulinger) Date: 13 May 2003 07:23:23 -0500 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> Message-ID: <1052828603.14633.5.camel@cessna.rollanet.org> On Sun, 2003-05-11 at 16:05, Paul Walker wrote: > > I submit that if Joe Lunchbox is not spamming, he is unlikely to > > need to change his habits regarding having his machine available > > Mostly unrelated to this, but something's just occurred to me. Probably I'm > being really stupid, but ... for the receiving MTA to know that the problem > has been processed properly, it would have to know the answer. How does it > know what the answer should be? I believe the usual approach to this is to have it be a asymmetrictry hard problem - i.e. factor some primes to do the work (hard), multiply them to validate answer (easy). -- Nathan ------------------------------------------------------------ Nathan Neulinger EMail: nneul at umr.edu University of Missouri - Rolla Phone: (573) 341-4841 Computing Services Fax: (573) 341-4216 --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From hseaver at cybershamanix.com Tue May 13 07:02:21 2003 From: hseaver at cybershamanix.com (Harmon Seaver) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 09:02:21 -0500 Subject: Collectivism in "community gardens" In-Reply-To: <20030511090552.A12840@cluebot.com> References: <20030509125934.GA30621@cybershamanix.com> <98A948CA-8293-11D7-80A1-000A956B4C74@got.net> <20030511033203.GB1140@cybershamanix.com> <20030511090552.A12840@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <3EC0FAED.2080107@cybershamanix.com> Declan McCullagh wrote: > On Sat, May 10, 2003 at 10:32:03PM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: > >> Sounds like a very poorly administered community garden. The >>only big city gardens I've seen were in Portland, OR, and they were >>fenced and gated and locked at night. The gardens themselves looked >>very productive and well tended. As are all the ones I've ever seen > > > I don't claim that all community gardens are decrepit, of course. If > a city chooses to spend enough money on high fences, security guards, > and locks on gates, they can pull it off. It depends a lot on the size of the city, of course. For most smaller cities, none of that is needed. In the smaller cities around here, for example (50K-100K) the gardens are on the outskirts and there are no fences, etc. And the fees *should* be adequate to cover any admin costs. The Oshkosh community garden, for instance, is located on the grounds of the county work-farm, the plowing (which isn't needed, and, in fact, is counter-productive) and other minimal maintenance is done by prisoners. > > The gardener-activists have every incentive to lobby for that because > of the standard public choice reasons: distributed costs and > centralized benefits -- hundreds of thousands or millions of people > have their taxes raised by perhaps a dollar, even though only a few > dozen or a few hundred at most people benefit from the garden. I think as Tyler has pointed out in NYC, it is the local people who do this themselves, it's not the gov't. > > And when that happens, because the small number of gardeners are > getting the garden plot at below market cost, they do have an > incentive to take advantage of it. Getting the government involved > interferes with the price signals that a market approach would have. > Because it's not their money, governments tend to funnel money > into politically-connected friends -- the fence-building contractor > will turn out to be the mayor's brother-in-law's son. > Yes, but it doesn't have to be this way. > Once the garden is established, though, the municipality does not have > the same incentive to take care of it as a private property owner > does. The same with my muddy, dirt soccer field that's become an > illegal dog run (I can see three dogs there right now). Also, as the > political supporters of the garden move out of the city or retire from > activism, or their friends in government move on to cushy private > sector jobs, the garden tends to receive fewer resources. Politicians > prefer to campaign on bold platforms like "creating more community > gardens" as opposed to "maintaining status quo." > > At the very least, it's reasonable to weigh the costs against the > benefits of community gardens. Where I grew up, my family had an acre > of land, more than enough for a garden, but for whatever reason one > year we used a community garden that was set up by a local large > manufacturing company on its own land. Worked out well, and was a nice > gesture. Yes, there are many ways these can be set up, there's no reason it has to cost tax monies. OTOH, public parks and gardens are one of the few things that gov't does that is worthwhile, along with libraries and museums. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com From derek at ihtfp.com Tue May 13 06:06:18 2003 From: derek at ihtfp.com (Derek Atkins) Date: 13 May 2003 09:06:18 -0400 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> Message-ID: "Paul Walker" writes: > > I submit that if Joe Lunchbox is not spamming, he is unlikely to > > need to change his habits regarding having his machine available > > Mostly unrelated to this, but something's just occurred to me. Probably I'm > being really stupid, but ... for the receiving MTA to know that the problem > has been processed properly, it would have to know the answer. How does it > know what the answer should be? The same way you know you have the right answer with certain other hard problems -- you choose a problem that's one-way hard. For example: factoring. Factoring a large number is hard. Verifying you have the right answer is easy (you just multiply the factors and see if you've got the right answer). So, just choose from the class of self-verifying problems. OTOH, I still think a micro-payment postage system is a better idea. The sender puts a micro-payment into the mail header to pay the recipient to accept/read the message. For non-spam, the receipient doesn't need to cash the payment (or can just return it to the sander). For spam, the receipient collects the money (thereby costing the spammer real $$$ to send spam, if most receipients actually collect). The only remaining architectural problem is how to handle mailing lits. -derek -- Derek Atkins Computer and Internet Security Consultant derek at ihtfp.com www.ihtfp.com --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From jr0280 at albany.edu Tue May 13 06:31:31 2003 From: jr0280 at albany.edu (Jack Reed) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 09:31:31 -0400 Subject: Court will decide if police need warrant for GPS 'tracking' In-Reply-To: <3EBFF232.2D5B8208@cdc.gov> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030513090148.00b79820@mail.albany.edu> At 12:12 PM 5/12/2003 -0700, you wrote: >I read somewhere that the original wiretap laws were motivated when >police >bugged a phone booth (fishing), and snared someone placing a bet. The >court >held that there was an expectation of privacy. The original laws and cases concerning wiretapping predate the case your talking about by quite a bit. California's law concerning intercepting telegraph communications, passed in 1862, made wiretapping illegal before the advent of the telephone. The first Supreme Court case dealing explicitly with wiretapping is Olmstead v. U.S. (1928) where the Court decided that wiretapping was not a trespass. (The reasons for this are to convoluted to go into here.) This precedent held until the late 60's when the Warren Court made two decisions that forced the Feds to implement an actual law that dealt with wiretapping. The case you're talking about is Katz V. U.S. (1967) where the FBI put a tap on a phone booth without obtaining a court order. This precedent was important because it held that the Fourth Amendment protected people, rather than places, and that wherever someone has a reasonable expectation of privacy, such as in a closed phone booth, is protected. >Interesting to see what >they say now. Segues nicely with the CALEA/cellphone locator tech too. The Court decided on essentially the same facts in U.S. v. Knotts when they held that placing a beeper in a drum containing chloroform used in the manufacture of illegal drugs was constitutional because it only extended the legal practice of physically following someone. I doubt that the Rehnquist court is going to overturn that precedent. There was a case decided in 2001 which held that using a thermal imaging device to detect patterns of heat consistent with growing marijuana indoors was a search and needed a warrant. They do have some qualms about the cops using technology that's not available to the general public but I doubt they'll come up in this case. The cell phone locator is getting shoved through the back door in the E911 specs to save those people who get stranded in the East River while their drunk or drive off a cliff. It's all for the good of the people of course. Jack Reed >http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/121572_gps12.html > > Monday, May 12, 2003 > > Court will decide if police need warrant for GPS >'tracking' > > By KATHY GEORGE > SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER > > William Bradley Jackson worried that he hadn't properly >concealed his victim's > shallow grave. So he snuck away one quiet fall day to >finish the job, unaware > that sheriff's deputies had secretly attached a >satellite tracking device to his > truck. > > Police trickery triumphed over his treachery. > > Spokane County sheriff's investigators used the hidden > device to retrace Jackson's path to the gravesite, where >they > found crucial evidence that would lead to his murder > conviction in 2000. > > But what if the same secret technology, called global > positioning satellite tracking, could track anyone at >any > time? > > The Washington Supreme Court will decide soon whether >police agencies > throughout the state may use the device freely -- >without a warrant. The > Jackson case is the first in the state dealing with the >issue. > > "Do we really want the ability to track everybody all >the time, without any > suspicion, or without probable cause?" asked Doug >Klunder, a Seattle > attorney who wrote an amicus brief, or friend of the >court, in the case on > behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union of >Washington. "How close are > we to Big Brother?" > > Many law enforcement agencies, including the King County >Sheriff's Office > and King County Prosecutor's Office, believe no warrant >is needed for the > tracking devices. > > That's because they simply record electronically what >anyone could see by > following a vehicle on the public streets. > > "We'd be shocked if the court said otherwise," said King >County sheriff's > spokesman Kevin Fagerstrom. > > In Jackson's case, the state Court of Appeals in Spokane >agreed no warrant > was needed. > > The court's opinion last year said, "A law officer could >legally follow Mr. > Jackson's vehicles on public thoroughfares .... The GPS >devices made Mr. > Jackson's vehicles visible or identifiable as though the >officers had merely > cleaned his license plates, or unobtrusively marked his >vehicles and made them > plain to see." > > Critics of the Spokane court's opinion say there's a big >difference between > following someone's real-time movements and recording >them for computer > analysis later. "There's just something that feels more >underhanded about it," > said Klunder. > > It's not just government abuse the ACLU fears. Stalkers >could use GPS to > find their victims, and jealous husbands could use it to >spy on their wives. "If > the police can do it without a warrant, then presumably >a private citizen can, > too," Klunder said. > From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Tue May 13 06:47:54 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 09:47:54 -0400 Subject: Cryptoanarchy: violence or peace? Message-ID: John Young wrote... "No, there's no contrast between commies and libertarians, left and right, they're all producing vast lakes of pig shit and blaming the foul odor of bloated self-interest on low-brow non-think chimeras of the government, corporations, the rich, the poor, the opposite, the other, those who are different, those who have more, or less, or get more attention, or fail to show respect, or who make fun of your fundamental beliefs, or insult your morals, ethics, aesthetics, politics, accomplishments, looks, way of talking, writing, joking, and worse, who have a knack for pushing overmuch sacred buttons of your ingrown fearful neurotic cult armed to the teeth with weapons of iron and spleen and inner infant hurt feelings, not understanding or giving a whit what you're deeply serious about, pathologically incapable of escaping the force of." Holy shit, Young. That was a grade-A rant, verging on the poetic. Kinda the Finnegans Wake of Cypherpunk posts. Needless to say, I didn't fully understand it, but that's no matter. -TD _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From eresrch at eskimo.com Tue May 13 10:10:29 2003 From: eresrch at eskimo.com (Mike Rosing) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 10:10:29 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Hunting spam Message-ID: The following was posted on comp.dsp today. Maybe someone on this list would like to pay them a visit? Patience, persistence, truth, Dr. mike ------------------------Forwarded post------------------------- So who are the honourable gentlemen in the bulk e-mail business? This gentleman is one of the greatest spammers ever: Alan Ralsky Alan Murray Ralsky 6747 Minnow Pond Dr, MI 48322 Telephone: 248-926-0688 E-mail: amr777 at comcast.net >From Detroit Free Press: "The computers in Ralsky's basement control 190 e-mail servers -- 110 located in Southfield, 50 in Dallas and 30 more in Canada, China, Russia and India. Each computer, he said, is capable of sending out 650,000 messages every hour -- more than a billion a day -- routed through overseas Internet companies Ralsky said are eager to sell him bandwidth." and here is his lawyer: Robert Harrison (248) 253-1800 2550 S Telegraph Rd Bloomfield Hills, MI 48302 he must be a busy man defending this very successful businessman. Here is another interesting person: Mark Felstein FELSTEIN & ASSOCIATES, P.A. Attorneys for EMarketersAmerica.org, Inc. 555 South Federal Highway, Suite 450 Boca Raton, Florida 33432 (561) 367-7990 Phone (561) 367-7980 Facsimile E-mail: mark at EMarketersAmerica.org E-mail: mfels at aol.com Here is some e-mail spider fodder, addressed back to my favourite spammers: mailto:amr777 at comcast.net mailto:mfels at aol.com mailto:mark at EMarketersAmerica.org mailto:info at linkgift.com mailto:sales at linkgift.com mailto:abuse at linkgift.com mailto:jdoe at pointmarketing.net mailto:jdoe at demosondemand.com mailto:jdoe at www.demosondemand.com mailto:jdoe at mail.only-optin.com mailto:jdoe at www.only-optin.com mailto:jdoe at www.glbcom.net mailto:jdoe at chinese.net.my mailto:jdoe at marketingontarget.net mailto:jdoe at image.marketingontarget.net mailto:jdoe at track.marketingontarget.net mailto:jdoe at opt-out.marketingontarget.net mailto:jdoe at www.esijang.net mailto:jdoe at kali.com.cn mailto:jdoe at mail1.kali.com.cn mailto:jdoe at quote.morningstar.com mailto:jdoe at exchangemail.iodesign.com mailto:jdoe at rd.yahoo.com mailto:jdoe at www.kookmincard.co.kr mailto:jdoe at wwp.icq.com mailto:jdoe at sanangel.cdg.com.mx mailto:jdoe at email-4-prizes.com mailto:jdoe at www.email-4-prizes.com mailto:jdoe at ofr.mb00.net mailto:jdoe at click.memolink.com mailto:jdoe at i.mb00.net mailto:jdoe at www.memolink.com mailto:jdoe at r.mb00.net mailto:jdoe at smtp4.cyberecschange.com mailto:jdoe at m10.grp.snv.yahui.com mailto:jdoe at internetdrive.com mailto:jdoe at www.netbizplace.com mailto:jdoe at images.temd.net mailto:jdoe at opt-in.emailsvc.net mailto:jdoe at emailsvc.net mailto:jdoe at m3m2.emailsvc.net mailto:jdoe at track.emailsvc.net mailto:jdoe at i.coopt.com mailto:jdoe at track.coopt.com mailto:jdoe at tracker.coopt.com mailto:jdoe at test.hobbyheroes.com mailto:jdoe at www.qves.com mailto:jdoe at wireless.freeze.com mailto:jdoe at images.inphonic.com mailto:jdoe at messenger.netscape.com mailto:jdoe at ombramarketing.com mailto:jdoe at www.oneshare.com mailto:jdoe at 0mbra.com mailto:jdoe at maktoob.com mailto:jdoe at www.sex4people.com mailto:jdoe at direct.coza.com mailto:jdoe at clicks.virtuagirl.com mailto:jdoe at b03.x0z.net mailto:jdoe at ssads.osdn.com mailto:jdoe at ssads.osdv.com mailto:jdoe at www.macromedia.com --- such nice people, these bulk mailers. From lynn at garlic.com Tue May 13 10:12:53 2003 From: lynn at garlic.com (Anne & Lynn Wheeler) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 11:12:53 -0600 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <6.0.0.4.2.20030512210012.0818ee18@127.0.0.1> References: <20030512214557.A9261480@exeter.ac.uk> <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> Message-ID: <4.2.2.20030513110849.02c2ac68@mail.earthlink.net> ... but i would contend that the infrastructure costs associated with a billion or two spams per day are significantly higher than the costs that are currently being incurred by the spammers .... in effect the industry as a whole is underwriting a significant percentage of the actual costs, which makes spamming such an attractive economic activity. one of the issues is to reflect the fully loaded costs of a billion or two spams per day back to the spammers. -- Anne & Lynn Wheeler http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/ Internet trivia 20th anv http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/rfcietff.htm From smb at research.att.com Tue May 13 08:30:31 2003 From: smb at research.att.com (Steven M. Bellovin) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 11:30:31 -0400 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) Message-ID: <20030513153031.11E2D7B4D@berkshire.research.att.com> In message <200305130152.h4D1qC1F007097 at syn.hamachi.org>, Bill Sommerfeld write s: >> The other side of this equation is what a second of CPU costs in >> monetary terms to a spammer. (To an end user it is essentially free >> because his CPU is mostly idle anyway; the limiting factor for the >> user is his preference for fast mail delivery (and in the dialup >> case an unwillingness to sit waiting for tokens to be calcluated >> before his mail can be sent). > >If you believe http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/2988209.stm, >spammers are beginning to use viruses to deploy spam relays. > >If a spammer has a zombie army of a few thousand compromised systems, >the spammer's cpu time costs for hashcash will also essentially be >free. The spammers are doing that and more. For example, recent traffic on the NANOG list suggests that they are using false BGP advertisements on stolen address blocks to shoot and run. (There is a proposal to stop that via cryptographic authentication of BGP advertisements, but SBGP hasn't gotten any traction with most of the operator community yet. Just why is a subject for a separate thread.) --Steve Bellovin, http://www.research.att.com/~smb (me) http://www.wilyhacker.com (2nd edition of "Firewalls" book) From ashwood at msn.com Tue May 13 12:09:56 2003 From: ashwood at msn.com (Joseph Ashwood) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 12:09:56 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> Message-ID: <00b001c31985$51f8f200$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Derek Atkins" Subject: Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? > OTOH, I still think a micro-payment postage system is a better idea. > The sender puts a micro-payment into the mail header to pay the > recipient to accept/read the message. For non-spam, the receipient > doesn't need to cash the payment (or can just return it to the > sander). For spam, the receipient collects the money (thereby costing > the spammer real $$$ to send spam, if most receipients actually > collect). The only remaining architectural problem is how to handle > mailing lits. So you're expecting that everyone will be honest about cashing micropayments? That seems rather silly, if such a mechanism were to become required on the internet I'd simply retire today, sign my email accounts (all except 1) up on every spam list, every mailing list, everything that would get me thousands of tokens a day, have an automated script cash all the tokens for me, and I'm generally considered fairly scrupulous. Additionally there is one major flaw in your design, what's to stop the spammers from using fake micropayments? The fact that people who believe it is spam will be unable to cash them? Like they really care about the people who delete their email. Or were you planning on every intermediate mail forwarder (all 14 of them between your sending and my recieving on this list) taking the time out of their busy schedule to verify the micropayments. It won't work, the micropayment will be widely reused anyway, the spammers depending on the bulk of the sends reaching their targets before the micropayment is cashed. This will in turn increase the burden on the intermediate servers; because the spammers obviously have to send out far more now (because so many of their messages never reach the servers), and the servers need to verify the payments (otherwise the payments mean nothing). The entire solution only raises the backlog of spam, raises the requirements for intermediate servers, raises the requriements for end servers, and introduces new methods of mass abuse. Doesn't exactly sound like something I want sitting on my network. Joe From gbroiles at bivens.parrhesia.com Tue May 13 13:11:29 2003 From: gbroiles at bivens.parrhesia.com (Greg Broiles) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 13:11:29 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: ; from derek@ihtfp.com on Tue, May 13, 2003 at 09:06:18AM -0400 References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> Message-ID: <20030513131129.A26891@bivens.parrhesia.com> On Tue, May 13, 2003 at 09:06:18AM -0400, Derek Atkins wrote: > > OTOH, I still think a micro-payment postage system is a better idea. > The sender puts a micro-payment into the mail header to pay the > recipient to accept/read the message. For non-spam, the receipient > doesn't need to cash the payment (or can just return it to the > sander). For spam, the receipient collects the money (thereby costing > the spammer real $$$ to send spam, if most receipients actually > collect). The only remaining architectural problem is how to handle > mailing lits. If we assume an environment where a payor/spender can later check to see if their payment was cashed, this also creates a relatively cheap way for spammers to create or validate a list of working email addresses. Hash-based lists of spam messages have this property, too - a recipient of a unique message implicitly validates their email address by reporting the message or its hash to a public database of known spams, if the sender of the message cares to go back and check to see which of their sent messages have been reported. Exploits of those features may be a few steps down the road in the spam arms race, but it's not unthinkable ... -- Greg Broiles gbroiles at parrhesia.com From sunder at sunder.net Tue May 13 10:15:23 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 13:15:23 -0400 (edt) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: That's not the fucking point. What about people sending emails from two way pagers such as blackberries? cell phones? danger hiptop's? other such devices? handsprings with the cell phone plug in, cell phones that are also pilots? something sitting in an embedded controller that has a tiny tcp stack and sends status emails? Not every object capable of sending email is going to be reprogrammable, nor will it have the proper CPU power to sit there and crunch a problem. Further, what about anonymous mail from remailers? no return address there. This is a lame way to get rid of spam and puts strain on the sender to prove he's not a spammer. Do you really think someone is going to sit there and do a puzzle in her head just so she can send you an email from her blackberry just because RIM or whatever network hasn't adopted your pet anti-spam authentication project? No, she'll give up and not send you the email. If something is a suspected spam, it's not necessarily correct to have it prove itself by replying to a challenge. It may not be possible to do so, or may be a hassle to the sender. It's upto you to set your filters correctly or make sure that things that aren't spams aren't marked as such. Either way, this is not going to work. It sounds good in theory, sure, but in real life, who's going to bother going through the hassles? How many millions of ISP's are you going to have to convince? How many thousands of SMTP servers and mail clients are going to need to change? And even if you do succeede in making the above happen, which you won't, what makes you think the spammers won't just pool their resources together and buy clusters of machines to authenticate themselves past such schemes? Intel hardware is very cheap these days and getting cheaper. They'll just raise their costs and charge their clients more for "Super duper guaranteed to be delivered past the spam filters spams." $1 for a million spams, $100 for a thousand guaranteed to be delivered past the filter spams. Think like they do. Thinking like a geek is great. But if you want real people to use your stuff, the hassle factor is a huge thing to overcome. And if the spammers simply get around the problem, then what? Pass laws? Ok, how are your CA or TX anti-spam laws going to apply to some shithole ISP in Afghanistan? So you find their IP's, so what? Sue them? Go ahead. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ From crawdad at fnal.gov Tue May 13 11:20:02 2003 From: crawdad at fnal.gov (Matt Crawford) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 13:20:02 -0500 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: Your message of Tue, 13 May 2003 09:06:18 EDT. Message-ID: <200305131820.h4DIK32Y029949@gungnir.fnal.gov> > The only remaining architectural problem is how to handle > mailing lists. To keep my subscription active, I have to deposit some postal credits with the list server. --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From frantz at pwpconsult.com Tue May 13 14:24:08 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 14:24:08 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030513131129.A26891@bivens.parrhesia.com> References: ; from derek@ihtfp.com on Tue, May 13, 2003 at 09:06:18AM -0400 <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> Message-ID: At 1:11 PM -0700 5/13/03, Greg Broiles wrote: >If we assume an environment where a payor/spender can later check to see >if their payment was cashed, this also creates a relatively cheap >way for spammers to create or validate a list of working email >addresses. This problem could be eliminated if the ISP(s) collected the money, regardless of whether the mail could be delivered or not. It's sounding more and more like the postal system. Perhaps we can get spam-stamps to subsidize regular email. Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From rah at shipwright.com Tue May 13 15:01:26 2003 From: rah at shipwright.com (R. A. Hettinga) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 15:01:26 -0700 Subject: Why are there so many statists and communists here on this list now? In-Reply-To: <3EB3A80A.11219.23A8502D@localhost> References: <20030502181706.B11960@cluebot.com> <3EB3A80A.11219.23A8502D@localhost> Message-ID: At 11:29 AM -0700 5/3/03, James A. Donald wrote: >An anarcho capitalist >america, while it would have trouble fielding big armies, would >probably do special forces operations considerably better than >big government bureacracies do. They used to be called "privateers". Bring back the letter of marque! :-). Cheers, RAH -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' From hadmut at danisch.de Tue May 13 06:18:21 2003 From: hadmut at danisch.de (Hadmut Danisch) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 15:18:21 +0200 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> References: <0ac3a2f2dc678e1551bcf8fc1c76fac1@dizum.com> Message-ID: <20030513131820.GA9783@danisch.de> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 03:50:02AM +0200, Nomen Nescio wrote: > Lauren Weinstein, founder of People for Internet Responsibility, has > come out with a new spam solution at http://www.pfir.org/tripoli-overview. > > According to this proposal, the Internet email architecture would be > revamped. Each piece of mail would include a PIT, a Payload Identity > Token, emphasis on Identity. This would be a token certifying that you > were an Authorized Email User as judged by the authorities. Based on > your PIT, the receiving email software could decide to reject your > email. I doubt that any kind of anti-spam mechanism which requires such a certification will be widely accepted. And I do not believe that any cryptographical method can be deployed widely enough to provide security against spam. Cryptography is simply too complicated and too error/theft-of-secret prone to be used in common. (If anyone is interested, I've made an alternative proposal based on non-cryptographic DNS-based lightweight authentication/authorization, available at http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-danisch-dns-rr-smtp-01.txt ) regards Hadmut --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From roy at rant-central.com Tue May 13 16:00:27 2003 From: roy at rant-central.com (Roy M.Silvernail) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 18:00:27 -0500 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <3.0.5.32.20030512182353.008048c0@pop.west.cox.net> References: <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> <3.0.5.32.20030512182353.008048c0@pop.west.cox.net> Message-ID: <20030513230027.D2536111A1@rant-central.com> On Monday 12 May 2003 08:23 pm, David Honig wrote: > Personally, I favor an Assasination Politics flavor solution, > but that's unlikely to gain widespread favor :-) Unless, of course, all the jurors have email. From justin at soze.net Tue May 13 11:02:28 2003 From: justin at soze.net (Justin) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 18:02:28 +0000 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030513045258.6B70910F75@rant-central.com> References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> <017f01c318e4$b0ff7e50$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> <20030513045258.6B70910F75@rant-central.com> Message-ID: <20030513180228.GA16362@dreams.soze.net> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Roy M.Silvernail (2003-05-13 04:52Z) wrote: > On Monday 12 May 2003 07:09 pm, Joseph Ashwood wrote: > > > That one's easy. Use a problem that is not in P but is in NP. To > > make it clearer to most people, use a problem that can be verified > > cheaply, but that can't be solved cheaply. > > Please permit me to join the dense crowd. Now that I've proved my > labor, how do I attach the proof to the email? Obviously, some parts > of the message are added to a hash, but which parts? If it's the body, > is whitespace damage still an issue? The message-id would need to be included. Lots of people filter duplicate messages, and those who don't probably should. If spammers try to replay, their duplicates get dropped. If they don't reply using the same message id, they're forced to regenerate hashcash tokens. Using duplicate message ids is an RFC violation, and just using those in the hash avoids the complication of mangled message bodies. It also gets rid of idiot MUAs which don't include message ids. The mess seems to occur when considering how to verify that that particular message, with a particular message id, wasn't bcc'd to) to 10 billion other people. How do you determine whether a Delivered-To header, if a mail server was even nice enough to indicate which envelope to: address it used in the history of a message instance, indicates a mailing list or an individual? How do you know whether any hashcash token that may have been generated based on a particular envelop to: address is valid or corresponds to a delivery list with so many people that the hashcash should be invalidated and whitelisting required? If envelope to: addresses are not each required to have separate hashcash tokens, doesn't the whole scheme fall apart? I don't know that including a Date: header in the hash improves the situation. - -- Freedom's untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. --Rumsfeld, 2003-04-11 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.2rc2 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAj7BMzQACgkQnH0ZJUVoUkPPcwCgyznLWmSJjLLjqc+N8QTRkahx NIQAn2EtKQE32V5XfS6sXWtu0JeegZll =nBxD -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- From roy at rant-central.com Tue May 13 16:53:32 2003 From: roy at rant-central.com (Roy M.Silvernail) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 18:53:32 -0500 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030513180228.GA16362@dreams.soze.net> References: <20030513045258.6B70910F75@rant-central.com> <20030513180228.GA16362@dreams.soze.net> Message-ID: <20030513235333.5DDF3111A1@rant-central.com> On Tuesday 13 May 2003 01:02 pm, Justin wrote: > The message-id would need to be included. Lots of people filter > duplicate messages, and those who don't probably should. If spammers > try to replay, their duplicates get dropped. If they don't reply using > the same message id, they're forced to regenerate hashcash tokens. > Using duplicate message ids is an RFC violation, and just using those in > the hash avoids the complication of mangled message bodies. It also > gets rid of idiot MUAs which don't include message ids. > > The mess seems to occur when considering how to verify that that > particular message, with a particular message id, wasn't bcc'd to) to 10 > billion other people. Right you are, unless the tokens are centrally cleared. Dupe message-ids are only a violation if you get caught by the same server, so power spamers will sort their lists into bombing runs of one address per victim SMTP server and only need one token per run. Doesn't eliminate their work factor, but it does reduce it. > I don't know that including a Date: header in the hash improves the > situation. Don't think so. Dates can be duped along with message-ids and they still get one trip around the servers on the same token. I don't see this working without some kind of online clearing. Hey, you DBC guys... how do you stiffen up an offline clearing protocol like this? From ashwood at msn.com Tue May 13 19:01:40 2003 From: ashwood at msn.com (Joseph Ashwood) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 19:01:40 -0700 Subject: Email send References: <200305140147.h4E1laP23865@einstein.ssz.com> Message-ID: <01ea01c319be$54946d80$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> ----- Original Message ----- From: Subject: Email send > We have 1,700,000,000 email address list.for all database (300$USD) Well I guess that settles the debate over how much spammers pay for their list of emails doesn't it. Joe From paul at black-sun.demon.co.uk Tue May 13 11:39:19 2003 From: paul at black-sun.demon.co.uk (Paul Walker) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 19:39:19 +0100 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <1052828603.14633.5.camel@cessna.rollanet.org> References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> <1052828603.14633.5.camel@cessna.rollanet.org> Message-ID: <20030513183919.GA3647@black-sun.demon.co.uk> On Tue, May 13, 2003 at 07:23:23AM -0500, Nathan Neulinger wrote: > I believe the usual approach to this is to have it be a asymmetrictry hard > problem - i.e. factor some primes to do the work (hard), multiply them to > validate answer (easy). Okay, so it was me being stupid. :-) Thanks both. -- Paul From ashwood at msn.com Tue May 13 20:21:16 2003 From: ashwood at msn.com (Joseph Ashwood) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 20:21:16 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030512183116.044db8d0@pop.ix.netcom.com> Message-ID: <021501c319ca$39747ed0$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> ----- Original Message ----- From: "John Kelsey" Subject: Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? > At 03:46 PM 5/12/03 -0400, Bill Sommerfeld wrote: > >So, what's my reason to accept a "payment in cpu time"? As best as I > >can tell, a "payment in cpu time" means that someone *else* doesn't > >get a payment in cpu time with their spam. I still get the spam. > > The realistic benefit is that you can use something like hashcash as one of > your spam filtering rules. Anyone who is spending 1/2 sec on a reasonable > machine per e-mail sent isn't likely to be spamming you, because that won't > scale up very well for sending out thousands of e-mails at a time. The > problem is that until it is widely adopted, it's not a very useful > additional filter. > > There are actually dozens of similar ways to stop nearly all spam, if you > can deploy them all over the net at once. But deploying anything all over > the net at once isn't practical, so instead, each user or ISP tries to find > some workable solution for the problem, typically involving changing his > filtering rules every few months and spending a minute or two a day going > through his spam folder, making sure he's not throwing away something > valuable. I disagree. If you assume that the entire internet will eventually take up on the process, start with a rule that says "if it has a hashcash token don't process the other rules." Obviously at first this rule would be hit rarely, but a big PR campaign surrounding it would get to people, as would implementing it in Outlook. Eventually your other rules would be rarely hit, and you could change them to simply discard. Once it's everywhere you can begin culling the bad ones. I just don't see where the necessary overhead bult into the servers will take place, or be justified. Joe Trust Laboratories Changing Software Development http://www.trustlaboratories.com From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Tue May 13 17:41:16 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 20:41:16 -0400 Subject: What Happened???? Message-ID: Apparently, some pilings smashed a Boston megaPOP in Allegiance terrritory earlier today. Lots of 'sites were pretty much unreachable today. -TD >From: JR >To: (Recipient list suppressed) >Subject: What Happened???? >Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 13:36:48 -0700 > >Due to technical difficulties (where technical difficulties are broadly >defined as employing hillbilly system administrators) Pighaven, home to all >pigdog lists, is experiencing some much need rest. > >We anticipate that service will be restore sometime this evening... unless >of course, the hillbillies decide to get drunk instead. > >JR > >PS. If you are not subscribed to any pigdog email lists, I apologize for >bothering you. Nothing to see here, now move along. > > > _________________________________________________________________ Protect your PC - get McAfee.com VirusScan Online http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=3963 From adam at cypherspace.org Tue May 13 12:50:17 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 20:50:17 +0100 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <6.0.0.4.2.20030512210012.0818ee18@127.0.0.1>; from tim@dierks.org on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 09:18:25PM -0400 References: <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> <200305121353.h4CDrP2Y022329@gungnir.fnal.gov> <20030512214557.A9261480@exeter.ac.uk> <6.0.0.4.2.20030512210012.0818ee18@127.0.0.1> Message-ID: <20030513205017.A8090204@exeter.ac.uk> To respond on the comments on costs of spamming and costs of CPU, the figures one can draw from various papers and articles are highly variable, one suspects they are variously including operator time, electricity, spam software purchase, and email address list purchase. To bring it back to just the raw computational costs (equipment amortized plus electricity) lets do some rough estimates for this. To take Tim's estimate $500 machine amortized over 2 years seems entirely reasonable, say this machine has a 1Ghz CPU. I'll add ADSL line $500/year for a 1Mbit uplink, and say $200/year in electricity for a total of $950/year. For spamming without hashcash let's say that it can send customized mail messages of size 1KB each, and by pipelining it manages to max the link and send 64 messages/second. (Divide by 2 to account for unreachable addresses, etc). I make that 0.00005c / message. Presuming the same machine is mostly unloaded, and the spammer wants to send the same number of mails he needs a bank of 63 additional CPUs each at a cost of 450/year (amortized cost+electricity) for a total of $29300/year, so now his spamming costs 0.0015 / message, and the purely computational costs have increased by a factor of 30. On could imagine this would reduce the amount of untargetted spam a lot. Clearly you will still receive spam, just less of it, or more targetted to be likely to interest you etc. Other issues include that perhaps the spammer can get bandwidth cheaper per Mbit if he needs more than 1Mbit, which would tend to reduce purely computational cost of spamming (without tokens). A 1 second CPU cost on a 1Ghz machine should be negligible and acceptable to an email user even if the computation happens while he waits after he clicks the send button. If he is on a DSL or similar it could be backgrounded. On dialup delivery is slow anyway and a second probably wouldn't be noticed. Dialup users also often batch their mail sending (deliver later from a local MUA maintained queue). An additional cost for spammers is acquiring the email lists. However this cost can be amortized across multiple spamming campaigns on behalf of different spam clients, and mostly seems to consist of emails gathered from a web spider if one takes the claims of the CDT spam report, so is itself just a bandwidth cost. We could probably as was previously noted get away with a marginally larger delay if tokens are only required to recipients who have never replied to us in the past. If one accepts these figures, at 1 second CPU per sent mail for new recipients, perhaps it may even be economical for ISPs to do the computation as part of mail service. If we could think of a distributed way to precompute the token and yet still have distributed verification without infrastructure, we could increase the cost to 5 mins without normal users noticing. It is not obvious how one would do this however as unless the entire computation is tailored to the recipient, parts of the computation could be re-used across multiple recipients. As Tim notes' Moore's law requires that we increase the collision cost over time. (But this is not so hard to do -- I can think of a simple fully scalable mechanisms to achieve this slowly increasing distribution of a minimum bit collision). The possibility for accelerator hardware is definitely a limiting factor. Counter-measures to this which have been suggested include (a) changing the algorithm over time with an authenticated code update mechanism; (b) defining a cost function which makes use of features of general purpose computers -- eg. IEEE floating point hardware, memory, cache, larger code footprint algorithm etc. This could in theory mean that absent sufficient market general purpose CPUs remain the most cost effective approach; (c) memory bound functions such as [1] which are limited by memory latency rather than CPU speed. Memory bound functions have their own economic arguments (see conclusions section of the paper): perhaps accelerator hardware is also a problem because all you need is a memory chip, plus a really cheap CPU; they mean the most cost effective hardware to buy is the cheapest CPU and so perhaps 2 or 3 times cheaper than best Mhz/$; plus they intentionally consume memory data footprint which can interfere with applications. Another possibility with accelerator hardware; if ISPs were the primary deployers, then they are better positioned to buy accelerator hardware to compete head on with spammers. Adam [1] http://research.microsoft.com/research/sv/PennyBlack/demo/lbdgn.pdf C. Dwork, A. Goldberg, and M. Naor, "On Memory-Bound Functions for Fighting Spam", Proceedings of CRYPTO 2003, to appear. On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 09:18:25PM -0400, Tim Dierks wrote: > At 04:45 PM 5/12/2003, Adam Back wrote: > >Whether you think a few seconds is sufficient depends on your views of > >the economics of spamming. Ie how close to losing break-even the > >spammers are, and whether a few seconds of CPU per message is enough > >to significantly increase the cost. This article for example > >discusses the economics of spam: > > > >http://www.eprivacygroup.com/article/articlestatic/58/1/6 > > > >they give an example of a spam campaign with a 0.0023% response rate, > >and a yeild of $19 per response. They estimate the cost of sending > >the spam was less than 0.01c per message. I've seen significantly > >lower estimates for the sending costs. To deter a given spam campaign > >we just have to increase the cost to the point of making it > >unprofitable given the response rate and profit per responder. The > >other side of this equation is what a second of CPU costs in monetary > >terms to a spammer. > > Assuming that a CPU costs $500 and that its value can be amortized over 2 > years, CPU costs .0016 cents/second. > > Based on the numbers enough, the revenue/spam sent is .044 cents. Thus, the > breakeven point is 27.6 seconds/message: assuming other costs are minimal, > you have to require > 27.6 seconds of CPU calculation from an email > submittant to ruin the spamming business model. > > A few thoughts on this: > - You have to adjust the size of the calculation frequently to keep up > with Moore's law (although the time/$500 CPU is constant, assuming constant > profitability for spam) > - If spammers have new technology or economies of scale available to > them, it's going to adversely affect everyone else. (That is, if you're > using an 18-month-old CPU and CPU-seconds cost you twice what they cost in > the volume it costs spammers, your $500 computer will have to spend 2 > minutes of time to calculate a token it takes a spammer 30 seconds to > calculate). > - This is going to dramatically increase the costs of sending bulk e-mail > for non-spammers: for example, I get airline specials a few times a week; > they must send millions of these. > - The CPU time required here is several orders of magnitude larger than > the cryptographic costs associated with SSL, and SSL is not broadly > accepted at least in part due to the CPU cost associated with with it; this > implies to me that there will be substantial resistance. > - The CPU costs associated with SSL engendered a substantial market in > cryptographic accelerators intended to reduce the cost to do an RSA private > key operation. Presumably, a system like this will create such a market for > e-mail token accelerators: unfortunately, this is exactly the kind of new > tech / economy of scale envisioned above: we may end up with a situation > where a calculation which costs a spammer .044 cents will take the average > user's CPU 10 minutes or more to calculate. --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From bill.stewart at pobox.com Tue May 13 21:45:24 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 21:45:24 -0700 Subject: Blue Windscreen of Death Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030513214327.02e3baa8@idiom.com> A different kind of car crash ------ Forwarded Message From: "Robert J. Berger" Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 17:31:11 -0700 Subject: MS Windows Crash Traps Thai Politician in Car Crashed Computer Traps Thai Politician Updated 14 May 2003 http://aardvark.co.nz/daily/2003/n051301.shtml Thailand's Finance Minister Suchart Jaovisidha had to be rescued today from inside his expensive BMW limousine after the onboard computer crashed, leaving the vehicle immobilized. Once the computer failed, neither the door locks, power windows nor air conditioning systems would function, leaving the Minister and his driver trapped inside the rapidly heating vehicle. Despite the pair's best efforts, it took a full ten minutes before they were able to summon the attention of a nearby guard who freed the two men by smashing one of the vehicle's windows with a sledgehammer. A report (http://www.bangkokpost.com/Business/13May2003_biz12.html) published in the Bangkok Post indicates that the vehicle was Mr Jaovisidha's own BMW 520 which was being used while his state-supplied Mercedes, was being repaired. BMW's more up-market 7-series range uses a computer system called i-drive which has Microsoft's WindowsCE at its core (http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2002/Mar02/03-04BMWpr.asp). Did Mr Jaovisidha narrowly miss being killed by the blue windscreen of death? -- Robert J. Berger - Internet Bandwidth Development, LLC. Voice: 408-882-4755 eFax: +1-408-490-2868 http://www.ibd.com ------ End of Forwarded Message From timcmay at got.net Tue May 13 22:00:25 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 22:00:25 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.0.20030512173756.044d7ab0@pop.ix.netcom.com> Message-ID: On Monday, May 12, 2003, at 03:08 PM, John Kelsey wrote: > At 10:03 AM 5/10/03 -0700, Tim May wrote: > [Talking about government-assisted projects and businesses going broke] >> Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not >> be in the construction and business development business. (I would go >> further and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states >> and localities are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to >> give to businesses. No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to >> be. Ditto for governments running gambling operations, but I >> digress.) > > It's very clear that this is bad policy, though I'm not too sure it's > actually unconstitutional. Didn't the states finance and run some of > the early canals? The states also established state religions and banned books, in the century or so for it to shake out in the Supreme Court that when the states agreed to support the Constitution as a condition for joining the Union it meant that they really did have to support the Constitution. The Bill of Rights is quite clear that powers not specifically granted to government by the Constitution don't exist. While building canals is arguably related to national defense and the common good (though I think private actors are better suited to build canals, and railroads, etc.), running gambling operations while declaring gambling immoral and illegal is clearly nonsensical and (I think) unconstitutional. Regrettably, the political stooges who sit on the Supreme Court have put considering this business of government running gambling dens about #131 on the list of probably unconstitutional things to look at. (I think the courts should hold personally liable those who pass unconstitutional measures. Imprisoning those who commit acts later declared to be unconstitutional might disincentivize them to blithely pass unconstitutional bills.) To repeat, government cannot declare gambling a social evil which must be banned and then turn around and set up its own gambling operations. Everyone involved in the many state gambling operations should receive sentences no less harsh than those imprisoned on gambling charges. This would mean most would die in prison. Except for those who ought to be killed for their other substantial crimes, this would be a good thing. "I was just following orders" is, of course, not a defense. The lowliest lottery clerk should receive the same multi-year prison sentence that a Mob numbers runner would receive. The kingpins in the Republicrat parties will, of course, receive effective death sentences, gang-raped by the lifers they sent to prison for competing with the JFL/LBJ/Nixon/Ollie North/Bill Clinton/Mena, Arkansas drug pipeline set up decades ago by corrupt-on-earth Washington politicians like John F. Kennedy. At least he got whacked. --Tim May, Occupied America "They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin, 1759. From bill.stewart at pobox.com Tue May 13 22:00:44 2003 From: bill.stewart at pobox.com (Bill Stewart) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 22:00:44 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <00b001c31985$51f8f200$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> Message-ID: <5.1.1.6.2.20030513215510.02e05c20@idiom.com> At 12:09 PM 05/13/2003 -0700, Joseph Ashwood wrote: >----- Original Message ----- >From: "Derek Atkins" >Subject: Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? > [Micropayment, sender pays recipient, refund for non-spam] >So you're expecting that everyone will be honest about cashing >micropayments? That seems rather silly, if such a mechanism were to become >required on the internet I'd simply retire today, sign my email accounts >(all except 1) up on every spam list, every mailing list, everything that >would get me thousands of tokens a day, have an automated script cash all >the tokens for me, and I'm generally considered fairly scrupulous. I can see the advertising campaign for this now: > You, yes YOU!! Can M4K3 M0N3Y FA$T! Just By READING EMAIL!!! > FIND OUT HOW BY SENDING US $9.95 or 10.2Euros or 1 Gram of e-Gold! It's frustrating, because just about any set of who-pays-whom-for-email fails badly other than sender-pays-recipient-somehow. From declan at well.com Tue May 13 20:29:45 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 23:29:45 -0400 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030513131129.A26891@bivens.parrhesia.com>; from gbroiles@bivens.parrhesia.com on Tue, May 13, 2003 at 01:11:29PM -0700 References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> <20030513131129.A26891@bivens.parrhesia.com> Message-ID: <20030513232944.A19967@cluebot.com> On Tue, May 13, 2003 at 01:11:29PM -0700, Greg Broiles wrote: > If we assume an environment where a payor/spender can later check to see > if their payment was cashed, this also creates a relatively cheap > way for spammers to create or validate a list of working email > addresses. Greg is right, and raises a point I hadn't considered before. But then again if I charge $.25 to send me mail in a hypothetical micropayment system (and I'd hope a social custom would arise making it tacky to retain the money if the mail were not spam), I'd be happy to let everyone know I have a working email address. -Declan --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From jamesd at echeque.com Wed May 14 00:24:42 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 00:24:42 -0700 Subject: economics of spam (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <6.0.0.4.2.20030512210012.0818ee18@127.0.0.1> References: <20030512214557.A9261480@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: <3EC18CCA.5217.6808B83@localhost> -- On 12 May 2003 at 21:18, Tim Dierks wrote: Assuming that a CPU costs $500 and that its value can be amortized over 2 years, CPU costs .0016 cents/second. To say the same thing in different words, the spammer's unattended computer costs 0.0016cents per second, the non spammer's computer is worth about 0.5cents per second, because there is an impatient user sitting there waiting for the mail to complete. Thus the non spammer's computer time costs approximately four hundred times as much as the spammer's computer time. >From this, I conclude that hashcash is not economically viable. We have to use a form of cash that is similarly valuable for spammers and non spammers. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG QLQau7uADLb/zG+C/w+cIuiW5I9NSD4m6LNPbwYK 4zNtefDWUbC4Pp6JJTh53TS6UPtqXu/hY1EPp5PPv --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From jamesd at echeque.com Wed May 14 00:24:42 2003 From: jamesd at echeque.com (James A. Donald) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 00:24:42 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> Message-ID: <3EC18CCA.26005.6808BC9@localhost> -- On 13 May 2003 at 9:06, Derek Atkins wrote: > OTOH, I still think a micro-payment postage system is a > better idea. The sender puts a micro-payment into the mail > header to pay the recipient to accept/read the message. For > non-spam, the receipient doesn't need to cash the payment (or > can just return it to the sander). For spam, the receipient > collects the money (thereby costing the spammer real $$$ to > send spam, if most receipients actually collect). The only > remaining architectural problem is how to handle mailing > lits. Recipients whitelist the mailing list, or better still its digital signature. Mailing list operator collects the micropayments on submissions. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG Xk9R3hEjL27Vh4JwzxHMmoB1TfEiftAXvdhzpKyb 4fEwddb+ZTQFP9ep7mGzY5moueUOD0FeCIlksgaM6 --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From adam at cypherspace.org Tue May 13 22:27:43 2003 From: adam at cypherspace.org (Adam Back) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 06:27:43 +0100 Subject: what fields to hash with hashcash (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <20030513045258.6B70910F75@rant-central.com>; from roy@rant-central.com on Mon, May 12, 2003 at 11:52:57PM -0500 References: <018801c31807$1f991670$0b01a8c0@whitestar> <017f01c318e4$b0ff7e50$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> <20030513045258.6B70910F75@rant-central.com> Message-ID: <20030514062743.A9342491@exeter.ac.uk> Well there are different things you could hash. This simplest is just to hash the recipient address and the current time (to a day resolution). The recipient looks at the token and knows it is addressed to him because it's his address. He stores it in his double spend database and won't accept the same token twice. After the validity period of a token has expired he can remove it from his double-psend database to avoid the database growing indefinately. (He can reject out-of-date mail based purely on it's date). Hashing the message body is generally a bad idea because of minor transformations that happen as mail traverses MTAs and gateways. In fact I don't see a need to hash anything else if you're happy keeping a double-spend database. Adam On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 11:52:57PM -0500, Roy M.Silvernail wrote: > On Monday 12 May 2003 07:09 pm, Joseph Ashwood wrote: > > > That one's easy. Use a problem that is not in P but is in NP. To make it > > clearer to most people, use a problem that can be verified cheaply, but > > that can't be solved cheaply. > > Please permit me to join the dense crowd. Now that I've proved my labor, how > do I attach the proof to the email? Obviously, some parts of the message are > added to a hash, but which parts? If it's the body, is whitespace damage > still an issue? From sunder at sunder.net Wed May 14 06:40:36 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 09:40:36 -0400 (edt) Subject: Email send In-Reply-To: <01ea01c319be$54946d80$6701a8c0@JOSEPHAS> Message-ID: Yeah, and half of those are root@ postmaster@ webmaster@ hostmaster@ all@ info@ nobody@ bin@ sys@ daemon@ administrator@, and so on... ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Tue, 13 May 2003, Joseph Ashwood wrote: > ----- Original Message ----- > From: > Subject: Email send > > > > We have 1,700,000,000 email address list.for all database (300$USD) > > Well I guess that settles the debate over how much spammers pay for their > list of emails doesn't it. > Joe From sunder at sunder.net Wed May 14 06:57:28 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 09:57:28 -0400 (edt) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <20030513232944.A19967@cluebot.com> Message-ID: Yes, but how will you stop the spammer from double spending the same $0.25 micropayment on all of his 170,000 email addresses? Depending on whether you check that there is a payment attached or not, and also check it with the bank before delivering it, you'd have already wasted your bandwith and possibly have accepted a spam into your mail spool. At that point you have: 1. already had a slice of your bandwidth eaten by the spammer, plus some cpu cycles verifying that there exists a coin. Spammer +1, you -1. 2. You now have to verify that the coin is a coin and not just some random junk - you waste some cpu cycles here. If you don't validate that the coin hasn't been doubly spent, you haven't made that $0.25 and have accepted a spam - not that you will personally read it, but your system did (cpu, bandwith and some disk storage until it throws it to the hungry maw of /dev/null.) spammer +1, you -2. 3. Presumably you'll want to validate/cash the coin. If you do, you'll need to talk to the bank in order to prevent the spammer from double spending and to actually collect your quarter v-cash. By doing that on a spam, you're taking part of a DDoS against the bank as only the 1st guy on the spammer's list to talk to the bank will get the coin - because everyone presumably will chose to cash the coin. If you don't cash nor validate the coin with the bank, you haven't made your vquarted, spammer +10 point, you -1, bank -10,000. The spammer doesn't give a shit, he just wants to get as many emails out there as possible. In fact, he mostly doesn't care whether you filter or not - he makes his money when he sends the spam, not when you read it. Of course, he can charge more for "real, verified" email addresses, but that's less important. What's the score again? Oh yeah, game over, insert quarter to play again. A beautiful example of creating a cryptographic solution that doesn't quite work in real life. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Tue, 13 May 2003, Declan McCullagh wrote: > Greg is right, and raises a point I hadn't considered before. But then > again if I charge $.25 to send me mail in a hypothetical micropayment > system (and I'd hope a social custom would arise making it tacky to > retain the money if the mail were not spam), I'd be happy to let > everyone know I have a working email address. From sunder at sunder.net Wed May 14 07:02:42 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 10:02:42 -0400 (edt) Subject: what fields to hash with hashcash (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <20030514062743.A9342491@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: And what happens when there's a network outage and a message gets stuck in the queue for a day on another server? You know a backup MX server when yours is hosed? Do you not accept the mail because the current day doesn't match what's in the message? Or do you accept mails from a day ago? a week ago? a year ago? 1922? 2nd, why wouldn't the spammer just adjust and send an email to each recipient with a random, but properly hashed token to match the target address + today's date? More work for sure, but if enough targets start adopting it, the spammer will adapt. The token doesn't have to contain an actual valid coin, and you'll only find out when you try to cash it. ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_ at _sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Wed, 14 May 2003, Adam Back wrote: > Well there are different things you could hash. This simplest is just > to hash the recipient address and the current time (to a day > resolution). > > The recipient looks at the token and knows it is addressed to him > because it's his address. He stores it in his double spend database > and won't accept the same token twice. > > After the validity period of a token has expired he can remove it from > his double-psend database to avoid the database growing indefinately. > (He can reject out-of-date mail based purely on it's date). From camera_lumina at hotmail.com Wed May 14 07:53:42 2003 From: camera_lumina at hotmail.com (Tyler Durden) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 10:53:42 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy Message-ID: "running gambling operations while declaring gambling immoral and illegal is clearly nonsensical and (I think) unconstitutional" Not to mention the CIA running crack into inner-city neighborhoods and tipping off the local dealers prior to a big DEA bust, all the while declaring all things non-Alchohol to be "drugs", and illegal/immoral. -TD >From: Tim May >To: cypherpunks at lne.com >Subject: Re: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy >Date: Tue, 13 May 2003 22:00:25 -0700 > >On Monday, May 12, 2003, at 03:08 PM, John Kelsey wrote: > >>At 10:03 AM 5/10/03 -0700, Tim May wrote: >>[Talking about government-assisted projects and businesses going broke] >>>Which is all evolution in action, except that government should not be in >>>the construction and business development business. (I would go further >>>and say that nothing in the U.S. Constitution, which states and >>>localities are bound by, justifies taking money from citizens to give to >>>businesses. No matter "how smart an investment" it looks to be. Ditto for >>>governments running gambling operations, but I >> digress.) >> >>It's very clear that this is bad policy, though I'm not too sure it's >>actually unconstitutional. Didn't the states finance and run some of the >>early canals? > >The states also established state religions and banned books, in the >century or so for it to shake out in the Supreme Court that when the states >agreed to support the Constitution as a condition for joining the Union it >meant that they really did have to support the Constitution. > >The Bill of Rights is quite clear that powers not specifically granted to >government by the Constitution don't exist. > >While building canals is arguably related to national defense and the >common good (though I think private actors are better suited to build >canals, and railroads, etc.), running gambling operations while declaring >gambling immoral and illegal is clearly nonsensical and (I think) >unconstitutional. Regrettably, the political stooges who sit on the Supreme >Court have put considering this business of government running gambling >dens about #131 on the list of probably unconstitutional things to look at. > >(I think the courts should hold personally liable those who pass >unconstitutional measures. Imprisoning those who commit acts later declared >to be unconstitutional might disincentivize them to blithely pass >unconstitutional bills.) > >To repeat, government cannot declare gambling a social evil which must be >banned and then turn around and set up its own gambling operations. > >Everyone involved in the many state gambling operations should receive >sentences no less harsh than those imprisoned on gambling charges. This >would mean most would die in prison. Except for those who ought to be >killed for their other substantial crimes, this would be a good thing. > >"I was just following orders" is, of course, not a defense. The lowliest >lottery clerk should receive the same multi-year prison sentence that a Mob >numbers runner would receive. > >The kingpins in the Republicrat parties will, of course, receive effective >death sentences, gang-raped by the lifers they sent to prison for competing >with the JFL/LBJ/Nixon/Ollie North/Bill Clinton/Mena, Arkansas drug >pipeline set up decades ago by corrupt-on-earth Washington politicians like >John F. Kennedy. At least he got whacked. > > >--Tim May, Occupied America >"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety >deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin, 1759. _________________________________________________________________ STOP MORE SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail From declan at well.com Wed May 14 07:59:25 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 10:59:25 -0400 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: References: <20030513232944.A19967@cluebot.com> Message-ID: <5.2.1.1.0.20030514102219.03968110@mail.well.com> At 09:57 AM 5/14/2003 -0400, Sunder wrote: >Yes, but how will you stop the spammer from double spending the same $0.25 >micropayment on all of his 170,000 email addresses? Depending on whether >you check that there is a payment attached or not, and also check it with >the bank before delivering it, you'd have already wasted your bandwith and >possibly have accepted a spam into your mail spool. It is true that the notions of micropayments as applied to spam (that I'm familiar with, at least) would require that the email recipient check with the bank to detect doublespending. This would introduce an additional delay before delivery from unknown senders, yes, but I fail to see how it would impose an unacceptable cost in bandwidth or CPU usage. Spammers could still try the same-micropayment-a-million-times route, just as they could try to spam without micropayments, but if their email is rejected in sufficient quantities, the cost to the spammer would outweigh the benefits. The key is achieving sufficient quantities. -Declan From timcmay at got.net Wed May 14 11:05:26 2003 From: timcmay at got.net (Tim May) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 11:05:26 -0700 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: <20030514114011.B21188@cluebot.com> Message-ID: On Wednesday, May 14, 2003, at 08:40 AM, Declan McCullagh wrote: > On Tue, May 13, 2003 at 10:00:25PM -0700, Tim May wrote: >> (I think the courts should hold personally liable those who pass >> unconstitutional measures. Imprisoning those who commit acts later >> declared to be unconstitutional might disincentivize them to blithely >> pass unconstitutional bills.) > > Liability is an interesting idea, but then you'd have judges under a > tremendous amount of pressure never to declare anything > unconstitutional. ("Want a paycheck anymore, chief justice?" Or just > wet squads assigned to take care of the problem of recalcitrant > judges.) We hold corporate employees liable for criminal acts. Why should government employees be exempt from the same standard? And why should a judge who is able to withstand pressures not to sentence corporate employees to prison be unable to withstand similar pressures when it comes to government employees? There are issues of separation of powers, what with the judiciary thus having some power to imprison legislative members, but this is not a new issue. Judges have sentenced members of the legislature and the executive branch to prison for various offenses, including bribery, corruption, perjury, etc. The business of legislators passing new laws when other essentially identical laws were struck down, just to show their constituents that they are "doing something" or "helping to save the children," has got to stop. "You knew that passing a law restricting freedom of speech would be struck down eventually. You did it anyway. You have been found guilty of violations of the civil rights of the 3 million residents of Colorado in this class action case. The 73 defendants in this case are each sentenced to the statutory minimum of 6 months for each violation, sentences to run consecutively." --Tim May --Tim May, Corralitos, California Quote of the Month: "It is said that there are no atheists in foxholes; perhaps there are no true libertarians in times of terrorist attacks." --Cathy Young, "Reason Magazine," both enemies of liberty. From frantz at pwpconsult.com Wed May 14 11:14:09 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 11:14:09 -0700 Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: References: <20030513232944.A19967@cluebot.com> Message-ID: If you go to an ISP collects model, see how this changes the picture. At 6:57 AM -0700 5/14/03, Sunder wrote: >Yes, but how will you stop the spammer from double spending the same $0.25 >micropayment on all of his 170,000 email addresses? Depending on whether >you check that there is a payment attached or not, and also check it with >the bank before delivering it, you'd have already wasted your bandwith and >possibly have accepted a spam into your mail spool. ISP receives mail header. As soon as the coin appears, it: (1) Check it against the in-memory Bloom filter of already seen coins. If it passes, goto collect. (2) Check it against the local database of already seen coins. (Because Bloom filters can give false positives.) If it is in the database, drop the mail and the connection. Result: no mail in the spool, and minimum bandwidth lost. (collect) Add the coin to the Bloom filter and to the database. Collect the money from the bank. If the bank says, "double spent", drop the connection and the mail as above. Note that this system will work well against spammers who blast out identical coins to a lot of addresses at an ISP. Now spammers can engage in a DOS attack against this system by using junk coins. It won't help them get the spam thru, and it will be detected when there is a TCP connection between their machine/open relay/etc. and the ISP machine. That will go a long way toward locating them in meat space, so fraud charges can be brought. Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com From frantz at pwpconsult.com Wed May 14 11:14:56 2003 From: frantz at pwpconsult.com (Bill Frantz) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 11:14:56 -0700 Subject: what fields to hash with hashcash (Re: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email?) In-Reply-To: <20030514155618.B9326809@exeter.ac.uk> References: ; from sunder@sunder.net on Wed, May 14, 2003 at 10:02:42AM -0400 <20030514062743.A9342491@exeter.ac.uk> Message-ID: At 7:56 AM -0700 5/14/03, Adam Back wrote: >I was suggesting 30 days. You could up that if you want -- the >database won't be that big at say 32 bytes per recieved mail. > >The day is matched against the day in the token, as Bill said the >tokens contain the date and the email address, in fact they look like >this: > >0:030514:foo at bar.com:482d3c37d5b5c112 > >where the first field is a version number, 2nd field is date >(year,month,day), 3rd field is resource name (for email the >recipient's email address) and last field is random junk to make it >hash to trailing zeros. > >if you hash that with sha1: > >% echo -n 0:030514:foo at bar.com:482d3c37d5b5c112 | sha1 >00000bea531c1edbcee4fbb69e094026cd83ed75 > >You can see that this one has 20 leadings 0s (in binary -- 5x4bit hex >digits). This approach seems like a good direction. However, it does limit me to email per address per day. :-) Cheers - Bill ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bill Frantz | Due process for all | Periwinkle -- Consulting (408)356-8506 | used to be the | 16345 Englewood Ave. frantz at pwpconsult.com | American way. | Los Gatos, CA 95032, USA From declan at well.com Wed May 14 08:40:11 2003 From: declan at well.com (Declan McCullagh) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 11:40:11 -0400 Subject: Underestimating long-term consequences of cryptoanarchy In-Reply-To: ; from timcmay@got.net on Tue, May 13, 2003 at 10:00:25PM -0700 References: <5.2.0.9.0.20030512173756.044d7ab0@pop.ix.netcom.com> Message-ID: <20030514114011.B21188@cluebot.com> On Tue, May 13, 2003 at 10:00:25PM -0700, Tim May wrote: > (I think the courts should hold personally liable those who pass > unconstitutional measures. Imprisoning those who commit acts later > declared to be unconstitutional might disincentivize them to blithely > pass unconstitutional bills.) Liability is an interesting idea, but then you'd have judges under a tremendous amount of pressure never to declare anything unconstitutional. ("Want a paycheck anymore, chief justice?" Or just wet squads assigned to take care of the problem of recalcitrant judges.) -Declan From sunder at sunder.net Wed May 14 09:11:50 2003 From: sunder at sunder.net (Sunder) Date: Wed, 14 May 2003 12:11:50 -0400 (edt) Subject: A Trial Balloon to Ban Email? In-Reply-To: <5.2.1.1.0.20030514102219.03968110@mail.well.com> Message-ID: The current cost to the spammer is currently nearly zero. To add hash generation for each email might slow things down a bit, but throwing more hardware at it gets around this. Hardware is cheap, and old out of date PC's are plentiful. The bandwidth cost is the same, the CPU cost and time is a bit higher, but not much. 170,000 email addresses is what one CD offered. Assume that spammer bob sends emails to that many from lots of servers, say it takes one or two hours. Most spams are small, some are over 20-30K (gif attachments, and other crap.) Each time this happens - (from my point of view I get about 50-60 spams/day that I filter) each of those recipients turns around and sends some traffic attempting to auth the micropayments via the micropayment bank. That's a DDoS from the point of view of the bank. Even if it can handle the traffic it has to do lots of CPU intensive work and send the error back to each of those requests, which will result in rejection of 169,999 requests and 1 acceptance (assuming the spammer is using a valid coin in the 1st place.) It becomes expensive to run the mint. The 1st time a significant number of users start using this scheme, the spammers will adapt to get around to it. Just like they've already adapted against keyword searches by using text such as e'n'l'ar'g'e' 'y,o,u,r, `pe`n`i`s__n_o_w. Again, from the spammer's point of view, they don't necessarily care that you recieved the email. They sell advertisements for a price. Say you have an ad, you go to the spammer, he spams 170,000 emails with it for $10. He doesn't give a shit if less than 1% of those will get the spam - he charges his client the same. Say, things get harder and he has to adapt, well, he'll just charge his clients more for the trouble and advertise it as a value add that it's garanteed that x% will be read (never mind that idiot client hasn't got a way to prove it one way or another.) You have to think about it from their point of view to find out what they could do to get around it. Then you have to think about it from the bank or mint's point of view, and the traffic and CPU operations, it will have to deal with. Does this solution make it exponentially harder for spammer to deliver the spam? Does this incur cost to the recipient? Does it incur cost to the mint? and so on. Looking at this problem from the spam recipient's point of view isn't enough. >From my point of view, if my MTA has already spooled the spam, I've already lost my bandwidth, and thus lost some value. Doesn't matter that I