From: Karl Lui Barrus <klbarrus@owlnet.rice.edu>
Date: Tue, 5 Oct 93 22:50:08 PDT
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Standard Headers for Anonymous Remailers
In-Reply-To: <9310052336.AA04757@illuminati.IO.COM>
Message-ID: <9310060549.AA24434@flammulated.owlnet.rice.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Douglas Barnes wrote:

>Actually, I think you're missing Loyd's point here. Basically, we 
>really wanted to set up an anonymous remailer here at Illuminati
>Online. We encountered opposition from a certain individual on the
>grounds that "anonymous posts can destroy civil conversation" and
>individuals, groups and lists "should have the right to easily 
>filter out posts from anonymous remailers."

Hey Doug,

Well, as I mentioned in an earlier post, I'm one who doesn't favor
labelling anonymous mail - I'd rather work on positive reputation
schemes, cash accepting remailers, etc.  An anonymous remailer that
charges will discourage people from using it for frivolous purposes;
digital signature combined with positive filters will let people
filter out posters they consider stupid.

After all, you are more interested in who sent the mail than where it
originated from.

(I've been working on a script that checks elm mail folders for pgp
signed messages and reports the signature instead of From: address;
and a cash accepting remailer).

The attitude expressed by the individual on io.com shows a problem we
will have in educating others - "anonymous posts CAN destroy a civil
conversation".  Yes, maybe so, but in my experience on mailing lists,
bbses, etc. I've noticed that "flame wars" and "anonymous posts" have
NO correlation, and are quite independent of one another.  

Since I've seen "flame wars" on systems with absolutely no anonymous
posting facilities (or none that were used), I conclude that civil
conversation is destroyed by strongly held differences in opinions (or
some other factor I can't pin down).

However, I would be interested in hearing if filtering anonymous
mail/posts does significantly cut down on or eliminate the destruction
of civil conversation.

-- 
Karl L. Barrus: klbarrus@owlnet.rice.edu         
keyID: 5AD633 hash: D1 59 9D 48 72 E9 19 D5  3D F3 93 7E 81 B5 CC 32 

"One man's mnemonic is another man's cryptography" 
  - my compilers prof discussing file naming in public directories