From: Rich Burroughs <richieb@teleport.com>
Date: Sat, 16 Nov 1996 10:01:32 -0800 (PST)
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Does John Gilmore...
Message-ID: <3.0.32.19961116100146.0074095c@mail.teleport.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 08:37 AM 11/16/96 -0800, Sandy Sandfort <sandfort@crl.com> wrote:

[snip]
>I have a suggestion for "Aga" and others who believe this sort of
>nonsense.  Please do us all a favor and try to sue John.  I'm sure 
>that among all jack-leg and wannabe lawyers on this list that they
>can come up with a viable cause of action.  And John has deep 
>pockets; you could (literally) make out like bandits AND rescue 
>"freedom of speech" on privately maintained mailing lists. 

Such a case would obviously fail.  John has the right to ban anyone he
wants from a list that he is hosting.

I do question, though, whether or not it was the best way to handle the
situation.  As I have argued, the availability of end-user filtering made
banning Dimitri from the list unnecessary, IMHO.  And the list owner giving
people the boot sure doesn't fit with the picture I have had of what
cypherpunks was about.  YMMV.

I think that John is doing a lot of great things for crypto (his
participation in the Bernstein case, S/WAN, etc.) and I agree with at least
90% of the things I see him doing.  I think he made the wrong call with
Dimitri, though.

>You 
>could be heroes (or look ten times as foolish as you already do).

Actually, if John was trying to cut down on the noise by banning the Kook,
I think it's backfired.  It seems like there is even more irrational
chatter now...


Rich

--
Rich Burroughs
richieb@teleport.com
http://www.teleport.com/~richieb/