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Netizens-Digest Volume 1 Number 229
Netizens-Digest Wednesday, December 16 1998 Volume 01 : Number 229
Netizens Association Discussion List Digest
In this issue:
[netz] Benton: Realtime Black Hole
Re: [netz] Re: Voltaire's Bastards
[netz] Re: Electronic constituency
[netz] Goodin's rights preserved
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1998 21:40:49 -0400
From: kerryo@ns.sympatico.ca (Kerry Miller)
Subject: [netz] Benton: Realtime Black Hole
CRUSADER THWARTS INVADERS OF THE E-MAILBOX**
Issue: Security
Paul Vixie created and maintains the Realtime Blackhole List
<http://maps.vix.com/rbl> -- a frequently updates list of Internet Service
Providers that he concludes are being used to send unsolicited bulk e-mail
or "spam." It can be costly to end up on the list since many companies,
universities, and other organizations heed Mr. Vixie's advise and block
email messages to their systems that originate from listed ISPs. "I got
e-mail from some mother who could no longer send e-mail to her son in
college," Vixie said. "But either I cause a lot of uncertainty for people
until their ISP becomes a model network, or the spammers win, and you and
I, and that mother, would have hundreds of messages coming in every day."
Some question Mr. Vixie's power -- comparing him to Joseph McCarthy. But
anti-spam advocates love him: The Realtime Blackhole List "works because
people trust Paul to make ethical, intelligent decisions about who goes on
and who stays off," said John Mozena, co-founder and vice president of the
Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-Mail <http://www.cauce.org>, an
anti-spam lobbying and trade group. "If there is a consensus leader among
the anti-spammers," Mozena said. "it would be Paul." [SOURCE: New York
Times (C6), AUTHOR: Matt Richtel]
<http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/98/12/biztech/articles/14spam.html>
=========
Now suppose that RBL gets to be so big that it's beyond Vixie's personal
capabilities to maintain -- how might it be divided up among multiple
administrators? What if it incorporates? - should it have public user
representation? Will the market for such service support free competition,
and will one choose an ISP according to which blocking referee it patronizes,
and what then, if your provider changes referees and your kid gets into stuff
you thought had been eliminated? Does parental discretion come to mean only
the power to sue?
Alternatively, why not sit back and say Hey, it's only a convenience?
kerry
"Don't mourn, Organize!"
**(c)Benton Foundation, 1998. Redistribution of this email publication --
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<http://www.benton.org/cpphome.html> Communications-related Headline
Service is posted Monday through Friday. The Headlines are highlights of
news articles summarized by staff at the Benton Foundation. They describe
articles of interest to the work of the Foundation -- primarily those
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The Benton Foundation works to realize the social benefits made possible
by the public interest use of communications. Bridging the worlds of
philanthropy, public policy, and community action, Benton seeks to shape
the emerging communications environment and to demonstrate the value of
communications for solving social problems.
------------------------------
Date: 16 Dec 1998 14:32:55 +0100
From: Carsten Laekamp <lakamp@capway.com>
Subject: Re: [netz] Re: Voltaire's Bastards
Hello, all,
Since this has got rather long, and since a general idea can never
emerge from a point-to-point comment, I am starting this with a
general comment first. Of course, this is not a comment on the book,
which I haven't read, but on the impression I got about it from
Kerry's quotes and comments.
The first problem is that "Reason" hasn't been defined here, which is
a bad thing per se, since this word has got several meanings, as every
dictionary shows. However, the use of a capital "R" and what appears
to be the general line of the book (as well as the subject line of
this thread), it seems mainly to refer to Rationalist (in a
philosophical sense) concepts.
Still, I wonder... Reason would then be the capacity of everyone to
think on his own, with his own mind, independently of thoughts imposed
from the outside and of feelings. It also involves the ability to
think in abstract and/or general terms, i.e. the use of concepts, to
understand the World. However, there are contradictions in the text
(and in Kerry's comments ?): Reason is opposed to logics (!), said to be
short sighted and presented as the reason uniformity in thinking and
as the engine of today's political and economical systems
What is left is a strange impression that Reason and Rationalism have
only something to do with technocracy and "rationalising the means of
production". Of course, this is the way Reason is presented today by
those who need to justify their "rationalisations" and their attempts
to increase the power of the technocrats. But this hasn't got anything
to do with Reason. On the contrary, it does mean imposing Thought on
man. It cannot be equated either to the ideas of the rationalists,
since these had a high opinion of Man: a being, according to them, not
only being capable of abstract thinking (which they gave as a
definition of Man, as opposed to animals which were only working
according to stimulus-response mechanisms) but also capable of
*individual* thinking.
The opposite of Reason, according to the context, would be either
obscurantism (religious, ideological, technocratic, ...) or the rule
of feelings (as opposed to thought). If we look at today's political
systems, only Western-type democracy is based on Reason, whereas
dictatorships (as old-style monarchies) are based on
obscurantism. Capitalism, OTOH, is based on feelings (greed), even
reduced to their simplest stimulus-response form, if we take the
financial markets as an example. (I am not saying that capitalism
doesn't work, but only that it cannot be seen as a rational
mechanism).
What worries me is the part on knowledge being rather useless. This
makes me think that the author is happily accepting the lies that say
that technocracy is based on Reason, only to reject Reason as a whole
and to promote some kind of obscurantism (either political or
religious). In that sense, what appears to be the thought of JRS
according to the excerpts posted here, seems to hide some dark design.
Well, now for a more precise reply to Kerry, if anyone still cares to
read it :) (I actually hesitated to post it to the list, since it
is rather off-topic here but will still do so /this time/).
kerryo@ns.sympatico.ca (Kerry Miller) writes:
>. Ralston Saul uses his language
> pretty carefully, and for him the Hero is 'brought foward' by *public
> demand* (not to mention the 'opinion leaders') --
It would have been a good idea to give those definitions here from the
beginning, especially when they differ from the common ones.
> and the humanists
> are not in the running. Martyrs might be a better title, but titles
> of course are not a humanist thing...
Erm, what's your definition of humanism ?
> { > Opposition becomes a refusal to participate in the process. It is
> { >irrational. And this trivialization of those who criticize or say
> { >no from outside the power structure applies not only to politics
> { >but to all organizations.
> { { A good observation but only for cultures which rely on consensus {
> rather than on alternatives. This is true for e.g. the US but not for
> { most of Europe, where the lack of opposition between moderated {
> groups automatically gives more importance to extremists. This has {
> well been demonstrated during the past 15 years. {
> You knew he was Canadian (the land of the moderates)?
Oops, I didn't understand that "the West" was Canada...
And I think that at least Eastern Canada has some very active
extremists. But maybe "the West" refers to BC only ? :)
> { >a confusion over ownership and management in the corporations.
> { { it cannot be blamed on reason, but on greed (the search { for
> immediate profit through speculation). And it is very { short-sighted,
> as the 1929 crash has shown.
>
> You argue well - for JRS! Rationalism *is* short sighted.
Hmmm.... I wonder what your definitions of "rationalism" and "reason"
are. Certainly not those of the rationalist philosophers, which JRS
seems to take as a basis, if we look at the title.
> { If you look closer at the structures, you will also see that mutual
> { ownership of corporations finally gives the real power to a very
> small { number of people (and that's the real *structural*
> problem). Among { these, you will find as many (or even more) owners
> as managers. {
> I'm not sure we (the three of us ;-) are using the terms the same
> way. Does 'mutual ownership' mean stockholders? Or linked boards?
what I meant was companies owning shares of each others. Linked
boards, if I understand the term right, are, in part, a consequence of
this.
> { >These structures make it almost impossible for the law to judge
> { >illegal that which is wrong.
> { { Hmmm... why ?
>
> 'Wrongness' is a moral ('reasonable') concept; 'illegal' is a legal
> (rational) one.
Hmmm, does "Reason" concur with "rational" or with "reasonable" for
you ?
But your quote was about "*structures of power*" that made it "almost
impossible for the law to judge illegal that which is wrong", not
about the dichotomy of the reasonable and the rational.
The fact that law and morals aren't *always* compatible seems to be
self-evident to me. (OTOH, I wouldn't say that the law and
jurisprudence are entirely on the side of the rational).
> (Speaking for myself ;-) thats why the impeachment
> hearings are such a tragi- comedy: the House of Reps is trying to hang
> Clinton on an essentially *moral* issue, as if somewhere they enacted
> legislation defining US morality...
Something we agree on :)
> You make a general observation ('just another sign') in reply to
> JRS' specific hypothesis (' in lieu if taking a real part in the
> evolution of society'), but I don't see any disagreeemnt. Imo, not
> questioning the nature of power remains a profound symptom of
> *something*.
No, it wasn't a general point. "Another" was a reference to what I
said just before. Where I disagree with JRS is when he says that
people were happy with an appearance of freedom but would accept to be
imprisoned in the system at the same time. To be more specific:
- - During the late 60's, 70's, the contestation targetted as much the
system as appearances (even if it went a bit too much for the
latter). Remember that it was the big time for the search of
alternatives in every domain: vestimental, of course, but also
societal (communitarisms of all kinds), moral, religious and
political (the birth of left-wing terrorist groups all over Europe, as
well as the fight against the Viet-Nam war in the US).
- - Today, we are heading back to a very structured society (I agree on
that), and everyone accepts its constraints. Individualism is just
presented as freedom, but in fact it is just another constraint.
Therefore, what JRS seems to denounce as a plot to keep the masses
quiet (but, then again, it is an impression from an *excerpt*) is,
IMHO, just another swing of the pendulum.
> { > On top of that, the undermining of universal language, in large
> { >part by the dialects of expertise, has meant that we cant turn to
> { >the word to steady ourselves.
> { { There never has been a "universal" language and there have always
> been { dialects of expertise. The appearance of dialects of *ideology*
> and the { greater importance of experts in society are the real
> problems. {
> I think he means *relative to the community*
So was I :) At all times, some words had a different meaning for a
specialist than for the "common man" (i.e. for someone who is not a
specialist in the field where that word has another
meaning). I.e. "pen" refers to something very different for a farmer
or an inmate or someone who is neither.
> - yes, up to a point,
> the gentry might use one 'language' and the hoi polloi another, but
> they could understand one another.
Well, that too, of course. But I doubt that the commoner would have
really understood what his Lord was saying, when speaking to other
members of the gentry :)
> { And common sense is very dangerous, because it very often is
> mistaken { for logics or reason. And I don't understand how
> "reasonable men" can { be opposed to men of "Reason".
>
> Surely you jest! If you trim your rosebush 'reasonably,' do you do
> it on strictly rational lines? (Start at the top, you know, so as you
> tire you'll be able to move lower and lower, and not have to lift the
> pruners so much ;-))
I hope for your back and your legs that you're *not* doing it in a
"rational" way :)
Still, how would you trim a rosebush "reasonably" ?
Seriously now, to be reasonable, you need a certain amount of reason !
> { Yes, Jefferson was a man of common sense... and this led him to say
> { very stupid things as well as very clever ones. {
> Neither reasonableness or Reason predicts either stupidity or
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
That's exactly the problem: the word is "reason" too. And for good
reason (oops ! <g>)
> cleverness, does it?
I said "this lead him to", which means there was an implication:
- - when he wanted to free all slaves, his "common sense" told him that
they could certainly not live in the same society as the whites. This
led him to the project to ship them off to Haiti. But this "common
sense" was the product of his experience (as c.s. always is). Had he
grown up in another society, he might have had different
thoughts.
- - when he commented on Voltaire's theory about some sedimental stone,
his common sense made him find the better explanation (Voltaire's
really seems stupid today), because his empirism was better fit for
that kind of subjects than Voltaire's rationalism.
> { Philosophy has never had any big influence of everyone's "real"
> life.
>
> The entire pattern of schooling was overhauled by pedagogy -- the
> philosophy of education -- just around 1917, as it happened... I would
> guess that has had a big influence on everybody on this list, at any
> rate (I dunno about Usenet ;-)
French teachers are still unspoilt by pedagogy teachings, even today :)
And I'm sorry, pedagogy is in no way philosophy. Or you'd have to
call everything involving ideas in some way or another
"philosophy"... even politics !
> { > And yet, since the beginning of the Age of Reason, there has been
> { >a parallel growth in both knowledge and violence, culminating in
> { >the slaughters of the 20th century.
> { { What knowledge ? The ignorance that leads to fear and then to
> violence { is the ignorance about one's neighbours. In that respect,
> we haven't { learnt a lot since the Renaissance ! {
> Exactly, what knowledge? We not only dont learn anyhting about our
> neighbors, but we 'invent 'social mobility' to make it almost
> impossible to learn anything about them, either -- that is, this
> doesnt even count as knowledge, compared to technological gimmicks of
> one sort and antoher..
Well, thanks for agreeing with me on this, even if I meant
"neighbours" in a more general sense than just the Joneses next
door :)
But technology isn't knowledge. It's just something which *uses* some
kinds of it. Knowledge is about understanding, not about creating. In
that sense, understanding (in every way) your immigrant neighbour has
much more to do with knowledge than designing microprocessors at
Intel... even if Intel would certainly want to make you believe
the opposite !
> { Scientific knowledge, OTOH, can only increase the fear of the use {
> others could make of that knowledge...
>
> Shouldn't we have to distinguish between *how the scientist thinks*
> and how the public thinks of science? 'Sc knowledge' doesnt increase
> the *scientist's* fear, does it? And its been known for years that the
> public understanding of 'science' is dismal (being fixated on
> _results_ (that is, really technology) rather than the method of
> scientific skepticism) -- so we could say its public ignorance of
> science itself that makes 'us' fearful.
Well, there is a certain obscurantist fear of science.
Still, the first ones to warn about the real dangers of science or
technology are always scientists themselves: Oppenheimer was one of
the first opponents of nuclear weapons. The first ones to have really
warned about possible excesses of modern biology were biologists. Of
course, there are some "mad scientists", but not all scientists are
mad (and it seems that they're less so than hi-tech engineers).
> kerry, praying for rain
You should have said so a few days ago, I could have sent you
plenty... <g>
- --
Carsten Läkamp
claekamp@mindless.com
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1998 10:18:29 -0400
From: kerryo@ns.sympatico.ca (Kerry Miller)
Subject: [netz] Re: Electronic constituency
Greg wrote (responding to PA Gantt),
> Ellen and Peter Rony's site promoting their book of the same name.
I found
http://www.domainhandbook.com/genevanotes.html
very enlightening, and
http://www.domainhandbook.com/comp-bylaws.html
(a table outlining 3 of the draft proposals)
much the best way to sense the process behind ICANN.
Other sites:
1.
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/domainname/domainhome.htm
~/proposals/comments/scanned/
lists public responses to the RFC
2.
http://www.efc.ca/pages/doc/efc-crtc.26nov98.html
Canadian EFF
3.
http://www.gtld-mou.org
4.
http://www.open-rsc.org/essays/mueller/
Milton Mueller's ISOC 98 paper
5.
http://www.icann.org
(not very useful yet)
6.
http://ntiaunix2.ntia.doc.gov:70/11s/virtual
7.
http://iitfcat.nist.gov:94/doc/Education.html
8.
http://www.internetpartei.ch
HQ of Swiss Internet Party (worth watching)
9.
http://www.pgmedia.net/law/
The case for open naming
10.
http://dlis.gseis.ucla.edu/pagre/
Phil Agre's home pages, and links, e.g.
http://dlis.gseis.ucla.edu/people/pagre/tno/january-1996.html#wish
http://snyside.sunnyside.com/cpsr/lists/rre/notes.004
TNO 3(4), April 1996.
(" We have been inundated in recent years by
rhetoric that seeks to make democracy literally unthinkable by conflating
all types of government, whether democratic or totalitarian, into a
single stereotype of oppression. This stereotype requires its proponents
to construct themselves as powerless victims, and it licenses all sorts
of whining and complaint by the very people who make a big point of
censuring whining and complaint by others. By treating the institutions
of a democratic society as inherently beyond control, it also licenses
an abdication of personal responsibility -- the responsibility to learn,
practice, and teach the values and skills of a democratic society.")
====
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1998 11:11:08 -0400
From: kerryo@ns.sympatico.ca (Kerry Miller)
Subject: [netz] Goodin's rights preserved
Daniel R. Goodin, a reporter for CNET News.com, was under pressure to reveal
sources as part of Microsoft's attempts to subpoena tape recordings of 44
interviews with executives from Netscape Communications Corp. He was subpoenaed
Oct. 8 by Microsoft, who demanded that the reporter produce documents referred
to in stories published Sept. 23.
====
www.news.com
Microsoft won't get Netscape tapes
By Reuters
Special to CNET News.com
December 15, 1998, 5:15 p.m. PT
A U.S. appeals court today denied Microsoft's bid to get
secret tapes about competitor Netscape from two
business school professors who interviewed top
executives at the browser company.
Microsoft was trying to get copies of tapes and notes that
Harvard University's David Yoffee and the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology's Michael Cusumano made researching
their new book Competing on Internet Time.
But in a unanimous 24-page decision the First U.S. Circuit
Court of Appeals ruled that "compelling the disclosure of such
research materials would infringe the free flow of information to
the public, thus denigrating a fundamental First Amendment
values."
Bingham Dana lawyer Jonathan Albano, who represented
Yoffie and Cusumano, said the decision means "academics
should have the same First Amendment rights as reporters."
In the book, Netscape executives, including company
president James Barksdale, make embarrassing remarks
about management and planning mistakes.
Microsoft maintained that the tapes, as well as the book,
contradict the U.S. Justice Department's (DOJ) argument that
Netscape's problems stem mainly from Microsoft's abuse of its
monopoly power.
Story Copyright © 1998 Reuters Limited All rights reserved.
===
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End of Netizens-Digest V1 #229
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