From: Sean Roach <roach_s@alph.swosu.edu>
Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 16:19:41 -0800 (PST)
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: "Technical data" exemptions in new crypto regs
Message-ID: <199701220019.QAA14630@toad.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 04:17 AM 1/21/97 -0500, Richard L. Field wrote:
...
>  I read the new regs as permitting:  (i) publication of source code in
>paper form (including publications reproduced on microfilm or on prerecorded
>phonograph records), or in the form of a motion picture film and soundtrack
>(section 734.3(b)(2)); and, separately, (ii) teaching or discussion of
>information "about" cryptography (section 744.9).  The export of other
>encryption materials (including the distribution to non-US persons of source
>or object code on diskettes) is restricted, even if the materials are
>publicly available "educational information" for release by instruction in
>catalog courses and associated teaching laboratories of academic
>institutions (section 734.9).
...
This has often reminded me of something that occurred around 1776.
I can't remember if it was before or after.
Remember how the colonies got sophisticated spinning gear?
I believe it was spinning gear.
Great Britain had a ban on the export of functional models, diagrams or
manufacturing instructions to one particular class of equipment.  This was
so that they could maintain the monopoly on cheaply made cloth, holding the
outlying colonies in line by maintaining a dependancy.
One man memorized the structure of one of these machines and then came to
the American shores, where he reproduced it workably.

I can't remember the name of the man or the machine, just that it was used
in the manufacture of cloth, the "spinning jenny" i think.  Nor can I
remember the date.