From: tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 95 21:53:33 PDT
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Reducing the Flames, Attacks, and Nit-Pickings
Message-ID: <acaf19a6520210049105@[205.199.118.202]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 2:18 AM 10/22/95, Todd Glassey wrote:

>As an aside - What blows my mind is the number of cycles people spend
>bitching and moaning about Java itself rather than working to create a
>better solution.


The recent flames and attacks are pretty typical of mailing lists,
especially mailing lists having 1200 highly-opinionated subscribers
(gulp!). Not that I like the flames, but they're not the problem I want to
really talk about.

A trend that bothers me--and others too, from comments here--is the intense
"feeding frenzy" that is going on with each and every new product, from
Netscape, to Microsoft Network, to Java, to Digicash.

Don't get me wrong--finding flaws is a useful thing to do. But this list is
becoming _consumed_ by the _process_ of attacking products. Worse, many of
the attacks are by innuendo, by rumors and speculations about what features
a product has.

My comments will likely vanish without a trace, but I urge folks to hold
back a bit on jumping in with attacks and reports of problems. Be sure
something is _really_ a flaw before sounding the alarms.

--Tim May

Views here are not the views of my Internet Service Provider or Government.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
Corralitos, CA              | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^756839      | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."