Re: Hoax: A ban on cryptography?

At 2:37 AM 8/13/96, David Kennedy wrote:
>My mailer thinks the e$pam list pulled this from cypherpunks:
>

And I'll bet you're still looking for "Oceania" in your atlas?

This is one of the main reasons I hate it when my articles get "spammed" to
other lists, lists where people have no idea of who I am and no idea of my
sense of humor.

For the clueless, I simply took the "Defense Authorization" bill which had
been posted to Cypherpunks by geeman@best.com and replaced a few of the
words involving "explosives" with "cryptography." Oh, and I twiddled the
number of the bill to include "666." Finally, I even said "This may not be
real, but it could be" at the end.

Jeesh.

The worst part of having my stuff spammed, e-spammed, gurgitated, and
regurgitated is that I get letters from people saying "I saw this thing you
wrote on the Kangaroo Hopping List. What is "crypto"? Thanks a bunch,
dude."

Wake up.

And for those who forward my stuff, please include appropriate disclaimers
to your "spammees" that a) one should read things with an appreciation that
a post may be tongue in cheek, b) that back-spamming to another list is not
cool, and c) that I don't want to be bothered.


>>>                                             S.1666
>
> Department of Commerce Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1997 (Passed by the
> Senate) <<
>
>And this is bogus, and as far as I can tell not a typo, it's complete hokum.
>
>S.1666 is an obscure bill about courts in Utah.
>
>A search of http://thomas.loc.gov on "encryption" reveals the expected bills,
>PRO-CODE etc.
>
>A search for the DoC Authorization Act reveals nothing, as far as I can tell
>this bill has not been drafted let alone passed. I don't know enough about how
>the DoC is funded to know if they get their own Authorization Act or receive
>authorizations piecemeal and by the reconciliation.
>
>Again, this is bogus.
>
>!^NavFont02F02350014QGHHG|MG~HG85QG87HI}2126

Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software!
We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Licensed Ontologist         | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

At 5:01 PM -0400 8/12/96, Timothy C. May wrote:
> At 2:37 AM 8/13/96, David Kennedy wrote:
> >My mailer thinks the e$pam list pulled this from cypherpunks:
<snip>

> Wake up.
>
> And for those who forward my stuff, please include appropriate disclaimers
> to your "spammees" that a) one should read things with an appreciation that
> a post may be tongue in cheek, b) that back-spamming to another list is not
> cool, and c) that I don't want to be bothered.

Yeah. What he said. I hope the cypherpunks list will accept my apologies.


There are firm rules about this to e$pam subscribers, and, while I haven't
had much occasion to enforce it lately, I might have to, which means
kicking the offenders off e$pam.

Strike one, Mr. Kennedy.

The rule is, if you're on a list with derivative content, particularly one
with as large a source-base as e$pam, do NOT reply directly to the source
list, in this case cypherpunks.

In the case of e$pam, there's a subsidiary discussion list, e$, which was
set up for this purpose. Use it. e$ has even gotten to the point where it's
generating its own traffic, now, which is nice.

To e$pam readers, if you want to talk on cypherpunks, or cyberia,
austrianecon, or any or the other 100 or so lists and newsgroups e$pam is
filtered from, sign on to the source list itself, read the traffic there
for a while, and *then* post something. In other words, become a *member*
of the list, and have some manners.

Again, I apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused to the
cypherpunks list.

BTW, I thought Tim's hoax was a good one, but, given that it hadn't shown
up anywhere else on the net, (and congress isn't in session :-)), it was
pretty easy to spot. It *did* give one pause, though.

Cheers,
Bob Hettinga


-----------------
Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com)
e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"'Bart Bucks' are not legal tender."
                -- Punishment, 100 times on a chalkboard,
                       for Bart Simpson
The e$ Home Page: http://www.vmeng.com/rah/