Re: Internet Privacy Guaranteed ad (POTP Jr.)

["Perry E. Metzger" <perry@piermont.com>]

Dear IPG Sales (May I call you "I", or would that be too familiar?)

1) There is no such organization as "Cypherpunks". "Cypherpunks" is a
   mailing list, not an organization. Using the name of the mailing
   list as though it were an organization is anti-social. There is no
   one who has the authority to speak for "Cypherpunks" because there
   is no such beast.
2) I see no reason to "trade" with you folks whatsoever. Any honest
   company would simply publish the technical specifications of their
   work and allow independent evaluation of the quality of your
   algorithms. I don't know about other people, but from my point of
   view, no deals (Other people are free, of course, to come to an
   arrangement with you). Submit your algorithms for peer review
   honestly or find yourself ridiculed anyway. I will not even look at
   a non-public specification. 
3) I warn you -- if you sell a system that you know to be potentially
   defective, and fail to take measures to evaluate its security using
   common industry standards (i.e. open peer review) you can and will
   be liable to any number of legal actions, all of which you will
   richly deserve, and no number of silly disclaimers on your
   packaging will save you. I'll happily give expert testimony for the
   plaintiffs and or prosecution, depending on whether it goes criminal.

> "He who laces himself into the straight jacket of what he knows and 
> understands, imprisions his mind" - Willian Friedman memoirs - spoken 
> to JVN, and Norbert Weiner, of MIT, at Princeton -

They laughed at Fulton, but they also laughed at Bozo the clown. All
indications are that you are in the latter, not the former set.


Perry