Re: On Killing Blaster
Then what are you doing here? This list is for discussing and implementing cypherpunk concepts. If you deny them, you should go elsewhere to pursue your goals. Tsk tsk...this sounds like Orthodoxy to me. Part of the benefit of an anarchy is to support otherwise-suppressed forms of existence and states of mind. If Variola can't at least suggest these ideas here, then Cypherpunks has become Cypherfacist. While I personally still believe that Crypto and other technologies will be enough (The meek shall inherit the earth), that's by no means obvious yet. Variola and May and others are the little nagging voices that force one to consider whether physical measures will be necessary and/or called for. -TD From: An Metet [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: On Killing Blaster Date: Tue, 13 Apr 2004 17:29:06 -0400 Major Variola writes: Language is how you manipulate people from a distance. Much more convenient than hitting them. Crypto *can* keep bits free. And so maybe language. But Men with Guns control physical reality, which limits what those bits can do. Read the archives on the problems with linking credits to dollars or physical merchandise. Fine; you are questioning the feasibility of the cypherpunk model for achieving freedom through cryptographic anonymity. It is true that power in the physical world can, in principle, prevent the operation of the information infrastructure necessary for the cypherpunk dream to be realized. Whether it can do so without also impairing good information transfers to an unacceptable level remains to be seen. But suppose you're right; suppose men with guns keep crypto anarchy from working, and the only recourse is to use force of your own. Then what are you doing here? This list is for discussing and implementing cypherpunk concepts. If you deny them, you should go elsewhere to pursue your goals. The practical problem with using force is that people will fight back. And there are far more of them than you. In a democratic system, government policies have widespread support. If you start knocking off California legislators you will soon find the massive might of the State directed against your health and well being. Your goals of anarchy and freedom are never going to be popular enough to let you win by using force in this way. Some have said they want to use cypherpunk technology to facilitate their plans for using force to fight the oppressors. They can set up assassination markets; or more simply, hire hitmen anonymously using ecash. In this way they can bring force to bear without risk. But this reasoning is self-contradictory. If force is necessary, it is because cypherpunk technology has failed. As you predict, Men with Guns will be controlling the bits via their control of physical reality. There will be no anonymous assassination markets to help you pursue your violent goals. But the reverse is true as well: if and when such markets come to exist, it can only be because the cypherpunk dream has succeeded beyond our wildest hopes. A world in which such applications exist despite the most stringent efforts on the part of the State to eradicate them is one in which cypherpunks have truly succeeded in burrowing so deep into the information infrastructure that they can never be stopped. It is a world in which anonymity is preserved, one where contracts and payment systems have been developed for even the most risky and uncertain enterprises. If cypherpunk technology works to this degree, then it will open up tremendous new opportunities for people to evade the power of government. The one overwhelming trend as we move into the 21st century is the power of information. This is why governments more and more are trying to crack down and limit its propagation. If cypherpunk technologies are able to transcend these restrictions, as is implied by the potential existence of assassination markets, there is essentially no limit to what they can do. The physical world is going to be increasingly less important as we go forward. What counts is the flow of information. That is what needs to be protected and made free from interference. If we can achieve that, the physical world won't much matter. You won't need your guns, and assassination markets, if they exist, won't be a force for freedom, but merely another hazard of the physical world, that most people avoid as much as possible. _ Get rid of annoying pop-up ads with the new MSN Toolbar FREE! http://toolbar.msn.com/go/onm00200414ave/direct/01/
Re: On Killing Blaster
Where are you going to buy your hardware from, that it can't be shut down? How are you going to hide your TX from the DXing white vans? Well, you made some interesting points. Actually, it would seem that some of the Islamic regimes as well as mainland China have been at least partially successful in blocking 'objectionable' content. So in a state where the forces that be have made a fairly complete victory, it just might be possible I guess to close down objectionable physical bits. So I guess that still has to be weighed against the value of human life. My point was that Needs Killing is something that should be considered fairly carefully...acted upon only when there's really no alternative. (But then again, you may have only been talking. You ever kill anyone Variola?) -TD From: Major Variola (ret) [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: On Killing Blaster Date: Mon, 12 Apr 2004 20:03:30 -0700 At 04:26 PM 4/11/04 -0400, Tyler Durden wrote: When faced with force, you reply with force when you can. Nah. This isn't even true in a fistfight, except when the guy you're fighting is a) significantly smaller than you, and b) less trained. More often than not, if someone attacks you, it's because they either have or perceive themselves to have an overwhelmingly superior force. See asymetric warfare Sometimes a stronger adversary decides its not worth it. See Lebanon and a few hundred dead Marines. See Vietnam. (Speaking of which, I heard McCain arguing that if we leave .iq the place becomes a hotbed of 'terrorism'. Anyone remember the Domino theory?) And of course, if it's possible to diarm your opponent without actually killing or maiming him, that's sometimes far more appropriate... No, then he'll sue you. As someone said better than myself, Crypto is one little tool in an aresenal against Men with Guns...in the end Men With Guns will probably try to shoot away bits, but it's not going to work too well. You forget that there are no bits which are not physical. Physical things reside on land leased from the State (try not paying your real estate taxes). All cables make a landing somewhere. Meanwhile, P2P, WiFi, Crypto,and lots of other stuff will slowly start to chip away at things on the edges, until the core is exposed. Where are you going to buy your hardware from, that it can't be shut down? How are you going to hide your TX from the DXing white vans? _ Watch LIVE baseball games on your computer with MLB.TV, included with MSN Premium! http://join.msn.com/?page=features/mlbpgmarket=en-us/go/onm00200439ave/direct/01/
Re: Fornicalia Lawmaker Moves to Block Gmail
Dave Howe (2004-04-13 14:11Z) wrote: Justin wrote: It's not just a private interaction between two consenting parties. It's a contract that grants power to a third party eliminating traditional legal guarantees of quasi-privacy in communication from sender to recipient, one of which is not a party to the contract. There's no guarantee the average sender would know that mail to gmail is intercepted and parsed. And this differs from normal mail how? most free email services add advert footers, and many email servers offer virus and spam filtering via just such a parsing method. the Google I'm not concerned with the advertising itself. My concern is that the Gmail service would provide an unacceptable level of detail on message content to whoever's monitoring the advertisement logs.
Re: On Killing Blaster
At 05:29 PM 4/13/04 -0400, An Metet wrote: Major Variola writes: Crypto *can* keep bits free. And so maybe language. But Men with Guns control physical reality, which limits what those bits can do. Read the archives on the problems with linking credits to dollars or physical merchandise. Fine; you are questioning the feasibility of the cypherpunk model for achieving freedom through cryptographic anonymity. Isn't it within the Official Charter to explore the limits of social crypto? The constraints imposed by possible states? It is true that power in the physical world can, in principle, prevent the operation of the information infrastructure necessary for the cypherpunk dream to be realized. Bingo. Whether it can do so without also impairing good information transfers to an unacceptable level remains to be seen. Why do you think this would stop certain states? Look at the content-filters used in public libraries and schools. (Can't find poultry recipes or oncology info because of mammary glands.) But suppose you're right; suppose men with guns keep crypto anarchy from working, and the only recourse is to use force of your own. They can't control crypto, which is math; and they can't control individual behavior, even if they can control bulk behavior. But they do control commerce and mass production and the physical bit-handlers. The FCC has vans. Your mesh won't work so well when the only meshers are afraid of being caught, and sparse besides. Don't you regard the limits of the (e.g., cypherpunk) model as part of the study? When I say the FCC has vans (etc) it is sometimes only representative of precursors of trends and possibilities, if it isn't obvious. Your goals of anarchy and freedom are never going to be popular enough to let you win by using force in this way. You are projecting. I don't have goals of anarchy. (I'm a lib.) I'm interested in the social implications of, and tech behind, crypto things. I assume most are like this, though some are socialist, and you are a troll. Some have said they want to use cypherpunk technology to facilitate their plans for using force to fight the oppressors. They can set up assassination markets; or more simply, hire hitmen anonymously using ecash. In this way they can bring force to bear without risk. AP is sci-fi (for now) precisely because of the control over the physical implementations of bits and currency. That some here predicted, even advocated that such a technical system would be used to clean up the civil servant population is another matter entirely. Both are valid if orthogonal points. (Civilian-authorities get fragged even without compooters) And IMHO you'd be immoral, for some possible future (and past) civil servant populations, to object to this encouragement, to feel a little hope that one possible future isn't a boot stomping a face, forever (even if that face is reading uncensorable news while being stomped) But the reverse is true as well: if and when such markets come to exist, it can only be because the cypherpunk dream has succeeded beyond our wildest hopes. A world in which such applications exist despite the most stringent efforts on the part of the State to eradicate them is one in which cypherpunks have truly succeeded in burrowing so deep into the information infrastructure that they can never be stopped. It is a world in which anonymity is preserved, one where contracts and payment systems have been developed for even the most risky and uncertain enterprises. I don't think my membership card requires me to believe that there is only one possible future outcome. It requires me to understand how such a system works, including how it might work on a social level. If cypherpunk technology works to this degree, then it will open up tremendous new opportunities for people to evade the power of government. The one overwhelming trend as we move into the 21st century is the power of information. This is why governments more and more are trying to crack down and limit its propagation. If cypherpunk technologies are able to transcend these restrictions, as is implied by the potential existence of assassination markets, there is essentially no limit to what they can do. Get off the assassination thang. Yes, uncensorable news views will be possible. That's not sufficient. The physical world is going to be increasingly less important as we go forward. What counts is the flow of information. Freedom of expression (bits) is one of many rights. Crypto can do the most here. But bits don't exist outside of physical implementations, so they rely on physical rights. Also, most rights are physical rights (the right to be left alone is more general than the right to be free of compelled speech). That is what needs to be protected and made free from interference. If we can achieve that, the physical world won't much matter. You won't need your guns, and assassination markets, if they exist,
Re: Meshing costs (Re: Hierarchy, Force Monopoly, and Geodesic Societies)
Tyler Durden wrote: Someone enlighten me here...I don't see this as obvious. I might certainly be willing to pay to route someone else's message if I understand that to be the real cost of mesh connectivity. In other words, say I'm driving down the FDR receiving telemetry about the road conditions downtown of me by a few miles. Um, just to point out the absolute obvious, if you're DRIVING you already have a power source, even if you have to use an inverter to power your notebook. At that point you're not worried about worrying about spending a few miliamps on transmission here and there. It doesn't matter at all whether or not there's a string of other you's ahead of you. Having already paid for the tank of gas, the juice is free, and so should transmission - even routing of other users' data. If you're in the woods, or at the beach, that's a different story. :) Ok, well, if you're at the beach, you could get a solar cell and geek away. If I'm a router, I'm also sending that info behind me (which is routing I'm paying for basically), but I will understand that the reason I am getting my telemetry is precisely because there's a string of me's in the cars in front of me, routing info down to me. If I insist on getting paid, so will they, and the whole thing breaks down. Actually, this reminds me of the prisoner's dilemma. I remember (I think) Hofstaedter doing an interesting analysis that showed that smart 'criminals' will eventually realize that it pays to cooperate, even if that doesn't optimise one's chances in this particular instance. Yup, can't have a network without nodes. Of course, the battery lifetime acts as the weighting factor here...if only a small % of the traffic I'm routing belongs to me, then I may not be so willing to route it if my battery lifetime is short. As battery time lifetime increases however (though this sorely lags behind Moore's law) then more and more people will be willing to route. In which case, you won't be to willing to transmit either since receiving costs you far less battery than transmitting. In this case you're far more likely to store whatever you want to transmit for later - same as working offline with a mail user agent.
Re: On Killing Blaster
Sorry that I pissed on your orthodoxy by doubting that everything was inevitable in its strongest form. Aside from inevitability there's the road taken...it may have been inevitable that the Nazi's would fall (aside from fighting a 2-front war), but they took out a few folks on their way down. It may be inevitable that crypto and other stuff saves the day, but is that before or after they get me and my family? (According to my shotgun the answer is 'after'...) -TD From: Major Variola (ret) [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: On Killing Blaster Date: Wed, 14 Apr 2004 12:01:26 -0700 At 05:29 PM 4/13/04 -0400, An Metet wrote: Major Variola writes: Crypto *can* keep bits free. And so maybe language. But Men with Guns control physical reality, which limits what those bits can do. Read the archives on the problems with linking credits to dollars or physical merchandise. Fine; you are questioning the feasibility of the cypherpunk model for achieving freedom through cryptographic anonymity. Isn't it within the Official Charter to explore the limits of social crypto? The constraints imposed by possible states? It is true that power in the physical world can, in principle, prevent the operation of the information infrastructure necessary for the cypherpunk dream to be realized. Bingo. Whether it can do so without also impairing good information transfers to an unacceptable level remains to be seen. Why do you think this would stop certain states? Look at the content-filters used in public libraries and schools. (Can't find poultry recipes or oncology info because of mammary glands.) But suppose you're right; suppose men with guns keep crypto anarchy from working, and the only recourse is to use force of your own. They can't control crypto, which is math; and they can't control individual behavior, even if they can control bulk behavior. But they do control commerce and mass production and the physical bit-handlers. The FCC has vans. Your mesh won't work so well when the only meshers are afraid of being caught, and sparse besides. Don't you regard the limits of the (e.g., cypherpunk) model as part of the study? When I say the FCC has vans (etc) it is sometimes only representative of precursors of trends and possibilities, if it isn't obvious. Your goals of anarchy and freedom are never going to be popular enough to let you win by using force in this way. You are projecting. I don't have goals of anarchy. (I'm a lib.) I'm interested in the social implications of, and tech behind, crypto things. I assume most are like this, though some are socialist, and you are a troll. Some have said they want to use cypherpunk technology to facilitate their plans for using force to fight the oppressors. They can set up assassination markets; or more simply, hire hitmen anonymously using ecash. In this way they can bring force to bear without risk. AP is sci-fi (for now) precisely because of the control over the physical implementations of bits and currency. That some here predicted, even advocated that such a technical system would be used to clean up the civil servant population is another matter entirely. Both are valid if orthogonal points. (Civilian-authorities get fragged even without compooters) And IMHO you'd be immoral, for some possible future (and past) civil servant populations, to object to this encouragement, to feel a little hope that one possible future isn't a boot stomping a face, forever (even if that face is reading uncensorable news while being stomped) But the reverse is true as well: if and when such markets come to exist, it can only be because the cypherpunk dream has succeeded beyond our wildest hopes. A world in which such applications exist despite the most stringent efforts on the part of the State to eradicate them is one in which cypherpunks have truly succeeded in burrowing so deep into the information infrastructure that they can never be stopped. It is a world in which anonymity is preserved, one where contracts and payment systems have been developed for even the most risky and uncertain enterprises. I don't think my membership card requires me to believe that there is only one possible future outcome. It requires me to understand how such a system works, including how it might work on a social level. If cypherpunk technology works to this degree, then it will open up tremendous new opportunities for people to evade the power of government. The one overwhelming trend as we move into the 21st century is the power of information. This is why governments more and more are trying to crack down and limit its propagation. If cypherpunk technologies are able to transcend these restrictions, as is implied by the potential existence of assassination markets, there is essentially no limit to what they can do. Get off the assassination thang. Yes, uncensorable news views will be possible. That's not sufficient. The physical world is
