At 07:58 PM 6/12/2002 -0400, Derek J. Balling wrote: >At 3:10 PM -0700 6/12/02, Robert L Mathews wrote: >>Nobody has to demonstrate a "need" for privacy. Confidentiality of >>personal information is a fundamental right and a reasonable default >>assumption. > >If you don't try to "own" part of a worldwide-shared-namespace maybe. > >But just as I can walk into the local town clerk's office and get the >name, address, phone-number, of the person who pays the land next door me, >the "right to be anonymous" in this case is NOT the same as the generic >"right to privacy".
And many would make the case that bad law like this makes for lots of death and destruction. Rebecca Schaeffer, anyone? It is appropriate that it should be *possible* to contact one's neighbor in that namespace. It is unnecessary that it be so simple as to ignore their concerns for privacy totally. There is no reason that the information need be public -- only that they be reachable *through* some entity that discloses publicly.
