From: Robert Rothenburg Walking-Owl <rrothenb@ic.sunysb.edu>
Date: Sat, 11 Feb 95 17:56:25 PST
To: lmccarth@ducie.cs.umass.edu (L. McCarthy)
Subject: Re: law vs technology
In-Reply-To: <199502102253.RAA10658@ducie.cs.umass.edu>
Message-ID: <199502120156.UAA27335@libws4.ic.sunysb.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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L. Futplex McCarthy's reply to Wei Dei:

[ Snip! ]

> As a separate issue, there are quite a few vocal opponents of groups such as
> EFF on the list. I've no idea whether there's a silent majority ;) of lurkers
> who fully support EFF et al., but I suspect a sizable chunk of the list
> population disagrees that there are many people really fighting invasive govt.
> action.

There's an advantage of techies getting politically active, provided they
can explain the systems in an understandable way that is interesting, and
provided that these issues hit home to them (ie, that you're not talking
in technobabble and that they see the need for privacy technologies in
their own lives).

What I find harder to do is to get through to people who have given up on
the government not eroding what little rights remain, or who are already
afriad that the FBI/CIA/NSA/KGB/etc. are already watching their every move.

I'm working on a fax to send to congresspersons as a start. I'd like to
get local political action groups hip to the issues as well to get the ball
rolling in the right direction as well.