From: "Clay Olbon II" <Clay.Olbon@dynetics.com>
Date: Fri, 26 Jul 1996 23:25:08 +0800
To: "cypherpunks" <cypherpunks@toad.com>
Subject: Silliness on cypherpunks
Message-ID: <AE1E3145-4A32A0@193.239.225.200>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



While I don't intend to try to impose my views on what cypherpunks should
discuss, I would like to inject some comments on some recent trends that I
throw into the "silliness" category.  

The first issue is the seemingly sincere attempts at answering questions
that are obviously irrelevant.  IMO cypherpunks are not "Mr. Answer Man"
for every question someone has regarding computers or electrical
engineering.  Sure, most of us are pretty capable of answering these
questions - that doesn't mean that we should.  Whenever I asked a silly
question at home, my dad used to tell me - "look it up".  The process of
finding the answer was actually far more important than the answer itself. 
We should attempt to ignore these kinds of questions.  Maybe eventually
they will go away.

My other "peeve of the day" is the wonderful introduction of the "mee too"
postings to cypherpunks.  I know it makes you feel really great to donate
your old TRS-80 to the cause of brute-forcing DES, but honestly, most of us
don't share your joy.  Nuff said.

For the record, I appreciate good humor (I get a real kick out of the
"Cypherpunk Enquirer").  I think humor absolutely has a place on this list,
I just differentiate humor from some of the "silliness" trends I noted
above.

	Clay  

***************************************************************************
Clay Olbon II       *      Clay.Olbon@dynetics.com
Systems Engineer    *    PGP262 public key on web page
Dynetics, Inc.      * http://www.msen.com/~olbon/olbon.html
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