From: qwerty@netcom.com (Xenon)
Date: Wed, 16 Feb 94 12:10:23 PST
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Misc replies
Message-ID: <199402162006.MAA13821@mail.netcom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


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Greg Broiles wrote,

>I second Hal's suggestion to route Detweiler's traffic through Xenon's
>remailer.

>(Xenon - the point isn't to keep Detweiler off the net. We all know
>that's impossible. The point is to keep Detweiler from getting remailers
>shut down by abusing them. That's why this is particularly unlike
>censorship; Detweiler's goal is to keep all people from using remailers.)

Sure, send me YOUR garbage. Why isn't Larry abusing MY remailer? This
peer pressure is childish. I no longer really need qwerty as a remailer,
and will happily shut it down as soon as YOU people start abusing it.

I admit I created a lot of negative feelings out there with my statement
that I didn't want to block Larry's addresses. However, say I retract
that statement, and say I do not want to block him, but that I AM
willing to give into such peer pressure and try TO block him? I now
ask you to, with compassion, educate me about how the arguments I
express against the MEANS you tell me to use, are not valid.

I don't mind blocking the address of some undergrad who is sending silly
stuff to Usenet, but must I always have to demonstrate to you things
that I cannot seem to convey in words? OK. I shall write a script to
telnet to port 25 of a given remailer, and forge mail from various
non-existent addresses at Netcom. They will include names like
"S.Boxx@netcom.com", "Executioner@netcom.com", and
"Fuckyou@netcom.com". What will you do then, block incoming from
netcom.com? Yeah right ;-) ! I sent myself mail this way via Hal's
remailer. It WORKED.

Larry knew how to do this when I was still trying to work my
newsreader. Again, as I have said before, it is my feeling that
all of our trying to block Larry's current known addresses will
only fuel the fire, and next time he will REALLY cause problems.
He isn't a stupid guy. And he IS the type of person who if you
fight him, he will fight back with more energy than before. So far
I am not impressed with the level of sophistication in the words
I hear coming from the remailer operators and other interested
parties out here. We need an ABUSE filter, not a Detweiler filter,
for with current sendmail, we CANNOT block a determined
person from abusing the remailers. And it is my belief that trying
to do so will renew their fanaticism and dedication to upsetting
the remailers. He already seems to have a new anon.penet.fi
address. He can have as many more as he wants, brand spanking
new, by telnetting to anon.penet.fi 25 and faking his address. I
have tried this and it too WORKS.

Give me a real solution, one that will not make the problem
WORSE. Many of you out here remind me of government
bureaucrats, in how you want to try quick very short term
fixes, which in the end only backfire and make the problems 
worse. You think Larry isn't willing to fork over $20 to get a
Netcom account and then spend another $50 to buy e-postage,
then send out much MORE damning abuses (since you made it
harder for him to do damage by quantity alone), this time