From: ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov @ home)
Date: Tue, 11 Feb 1997 10:38:53 -0800 (PST)
To: dthorn@gte.net
Subject: Re: Moderation experiment almost over; "put up or shut up"
In-Reply-To: <33008CCE.28E0@gte.net>
Message-ID: <199702111829.MAA17650@manifold.algebra.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text


Dale, can you set up a mailing list server that will participate in the
distributed listserv network?

thank you

igor

Dale Thorn wrote:
> 
> John Gilmore wrote:
> > Sandy hit a pothole in the moderation experiment when Mr. Nemesis
> > submitted a posting containing nothing but libelous statements about
> > Sandy's employer.  He never anticipated that he wouldn't be able to
> > follow his announced "post it to one list or the other" policy because
> > to do so would make him legally liable (in his opinion; he's a lawyer,
> > I'm not).  His gears jammed, and the whole machine came to a halt for
> > a few days.
> 
> Naturally he hit a pothole.  Censorship has its price, and you
> folks just discovered it.  But censors never give up, do they?
> Especially when there are hidden agendas.
> 
> > Sandy has agreed to continue moderation through the end of the
> > original 1-month experiment (through Feb 19).  And it's a good thing,
> > too, because the "cypherpunks community" had better get off its
> > whining butt in the next ten days, or it will no longer exist.
> 
> John Gilmore is so disrespectful of the human beings on this list
> that he whines and complains about their "attitudes", as though
> he had a right to control them.  What a jerk.
> 
> > I've come to the conclusion that I'm not willing to host the
> > cypherpunks list any more.  It's not the true assholes that brought me
> > to this decision; it's the reaction from the bulk of people on the
> > list: suspicion, flamage, and criticism with every attempt to improve
> > things.  I noticed few people volunteering some of their own time,
> > money, or machines to help out.  Almost all the suggestions were
> > advice for *other* people to implement:
> 
> Not willing because of some additional burden?  No.  It's because you
> were outed as a censor and a jerk, and you can't get back the respect
> you previously had.  The sour grapes you're displaying here are worthy
> of a little child, not an adult.
> 
> > Now each of these posters will get their chance to do it "right" --
> > on their own time and with their own resources.
> 
> Read: I'm gonna take my bat and ball and go home...
> 
> > A large fraction of the list seems to think that "freedom of speech"
> > means that everyone is required to listen to everyone else at all
> > times.  That there can't be focused, topical conversations in a
> > society that has freedom of speech.  I would say the opposite; part of
> > freedom of speech is the freedom to choose to whom we speak and to
> > whom we listen.  This is part of what cryptography does: lets us
> > control who can receive our speech, and lets recievers determine who
> > the speaker is.
> 
> Everything was fine until you decided to screw it up.  Then your
> emotional, denying little brain trys to blame it on everyone else.
> 
> > There also seems to be a misunderstanding that freedom of speech
> > requires that people who want to speak already have a place, set up
> > and maintained by someone else, for them to speak in.
> 
> There are places to speak, and people try to speak in those places.
> When they are cut off, then they complain.  Nobody complained before
> you had an open forum that you weren't providing same.  That's your
> denial kicking up, not mine.
> 
> > If someone
> > who's set up a speech-place decides it isn't being used for its
> > intended purpose, then they are a censor, stopping all possibility of
> > conversations.  Did you forget that there are millions of other places
> > to speak in cyberspace, millions more in realspace, and that you can
> > personally create more if you don't like any of the ones you know about?
> 
> Intended purpose?  Did you really believe that setting up an open
> forum gave you the right (or any option) to control the content?
> Are you so immature that you can't handle complaints?
> 
> > To paraphrase Zappa, you wouldn't know censorship if it bit you on the
> > ass.  You think you're being censored when you're just being excluded
> > from a forum because what you're saying isn't interesting to that forum.
> 
> I know a lot of things, especially after they've bit be in the ass.
> Especially about censors and CIA-related trolls like yourself, who
> set up forums to collect info on unsuspecting American citizens.
> Made any "yeti" expeditions lately?
> 
> > So anyway, I'm tired of it all.  I'd much rather focus on getting my
> > crypto work done than babysitting majordomo, tracking down attempts to
> > subscribe the entire US Congress to the list, and debating the seventy
> > or eighty "obvious right ways" to handle the list.
> 
> Read: I need to find a new troll that's not being sabotaged by
> alert citizens.
> 
> > This is a "put up or shut up" to the cypherpunks community.
> > Either you list denizens will, among yourselves, put in the energy to
> > build a new home for the list (and run it in whatever way your
> > volunteers want) by Feb 20, or the list will cease to exist on Feb 20.
> 
> Jeez, do you have an ego or what?  Who died and made you the king?
> Your only claim to fame is your equipment that's hosting the list.
> Your reputation is in the toilet.  You're nobody.  In fact, you're
> less than nobody.  Your best bet would be to crawl into a hole and
> pull the dirt in over you.
> 
> > The next ten days of moderated discussion, through the end of the
> > original experiment, will give the community a chance to discuss
> > whether and where it plans to host the list after the experiment is
> > over.  My feeling is that the stalkers who have been trying to shut it
> > down (Dimitri, etc) will be out in full force, trying to disrupt the
> > process of finding a new home.  It would be very hard to make progress
> > along that line in an unmoderated list.  Cypherpunks-unedited readers
> > are welcome to try.
> 
> Yet another accusation that Dimitri's purpose is to "shut it down".
> The very fact that it's you who have the com puts the lie to that.
> 
> > Sandy reports that he's changing his criteria for moderation for the
> > remainder of the experiment.  It was his idea, and I approve.  The
> > criteria now are:
> 
> Another experiment run by the same incompetent bozo who screwed up
> the first experiment.  Don't you clowns ever get it?  You do, but
> then again, you have a hidden agenda.
> 
> >         *  The topics of the list are:
> >                 cryptography
> >                 setting up replacements for cypherpunks@toad.com
> >         *  On-topic, legal, posts will go to the list.
> >         *  Postings with any hint of legal liability (in Sandy's opinion)
> >            will be silently ignored.
> >         *  Legal but off-topic posts will go to cypherpunks-flames.
> > 
> > Sandy will apply these criteria retroactively to the backlog (of about
> > 140 messages), which means that most recent criticisms of the
> > moderation (which don't invove someone volunteering to do things for
> > the list) will go straight to the flames list.  If you don't like it,
> > I recommend that you start your own list.  Soon.
> > 
> > For me it's a sad thing that the community's willingness to pull
> > together has degenerated to the point where I feel better off
> > separating from the list.  I hope that others in the community will
> > create one or several alternatives that work better.
> 
> So you think you've fulfilled your obligation?  There's only one
> thing that will ever save you.  Get down on your knees and confess,
> saying to God and the list subscribers what a pathetic sinner you
> are, and beg for their forgiveness.  Then get to work for the people,
> and give up trolling for the feds.
> 



	- Igor.