Re: Denning's misleading statements

[Alan Olsen <alano@teleport.com>]

At 07:49 PM 1/26/96 -0800, Rich Graves wrote:
>On Fri, 26 Jan 1996, Thomas Grant Edwards wrote:
>
>> I think the big bait-and-switch is her description of the various 
>> companies falling over themselves to get to _VOLUNTARY_ key escrow to 
>> avoid losing data and protecting themselves against employee problems 
>> versus _MANDATORY_GOVERNMENT_ key escrow to ensure that individuals 
>> cannot hide information from the government.
>> 
>> Key escrow is good.  Key escrow against your will is bad.
>
>Yo.
>
>I especially enjoyed this sentence: "Individuals would be allowed to
>develop their own encryption systems for personal or educational use
>without obtaining licenses, though they could not distribute them to
>others."

Why is it that whenever I read Denning's pronouncements I feel like I am
reading something from a villainess in an Ayn Rand novel?  

Denning has become the epitome of the pure authoritarian government world
view.  Analysis of her viewpoints makes me more of an anarchist every time I
read her rants.  It is that smarmy "We know better than you do" with
absolutely no rational argument as to why it is true.  It is people like
this that are generating such distrust in Government by promoting irrational
statism.  (Government by random fiat keeps a high employment for those who
make their living off of political parody, paranoia of the government, the
court system, lawyers and lawmakers, and anarchists everywhere.)

>It's unclear whether it's OK to share books, algorithms, and source code; 
>or if it is, what's the point?

Depends on your ability to challenge the status quo.  A vague law with lots
of harsh but undefined penalties is much more effective than something that
is rigidly defined.  With rigidly defined laws, you can find loopholes and
ways to push the envelope.  With vague rules, people will tend to err on the
side of caution.

>Outlaw cryptography, and only cryptographers and outlaws will have 
>cryptography.

"Hey, we found this Tim May guy down at the school playground selling crypto
to the kids!  Let's throw the book at him!"
Alan Olsen -- alano@teleport.com -- Contract Web Design & Instruction
        `finger -l alano@teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key 
              http://www.teleport.com/~alano/ 
               National Security uber alles!