From: Tim May <tcmay@got.net>
Date: Fri, 19 Dec 1997 05:07:15 +0800
To: David Honig <bd1011@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Can I do Pubkic Domain that -
In-Reply-To: <01bd0b5d$497dfee0$69737018@eudoxus.bc.rogers.wave.ca>
Message-ID: <v03102804b0bf2f0944f7@[207.167.93.63]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



At 12:04 PM -0700 12/18/97, David Honig wrote:
>At 06:33 PM 12/17/97 -0800, Bruce Balden wrote:
>>
>>Those guys just never learn that not only is the barn door open, but that
>>contents were never theirs to begin with.
>>
>
>They blew their chance to regulate *computers* as military tech.
>Computers, after all, were developed by the military for ballistic, bombs,
>and codes.

I can't follow your logic here. Several points:

* The government _has_ regulated the export of computers for a long time,
in the COCOM rules, and still in other rules covering computers. (A famous
benchmark was how fast a computer or other system could compute a
particular FFT--any faster than some threshold and the computer could not
be freely exported, least of all to various Bad Nations.)

* As for "regulate *computers* as military tech," domestically, there are
very, very few technologies the government has the authority to regulate
domestically. Nuclear and biological weapons are one example (with specific
enabling legislation). A few other technologies. (For example, making a gun
in one's machine shop can violate various confusing gun laws.) But the
"regulate *computers* as military tech" line just doesn't make sense.

* Nor is it clear that computers were developed "for" military uses. True,
some earlier computers were used by the military, and the development bill
was paid for by the military. But unless specific patents are involved,
such early uses most definitely do not give the military control over later
developments!

(Nor do I think the military played the dominant role. I have long heard
about how the space program caused the microprocessor to be invented.
Nonsense. I was at Intel from 1974 to 1986, and have also read many
histories of the 1960s developements, and can argue without fear of
correction that neither military nor NASA spending had much if anything to
do with the developments.)

--Tim May

The Feds have shown their hand: they want a ban on domestic cryptography
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
ComSec 3DES:   408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^2,976,221   | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."