Re: Cyber-Anarchy

[jim bell <jimbell@pacifier.com>]

At 11:14 PM 5/23/96 -0700, Timothy C. May wrote:

>My point is actually not so much one of claiming credit for something I've
>been involved with since 1988, as being somewhat critical of the
>all-too-common tendency I see of _renaming_ something without adding any
>new content.
>
>Jim Bell calls his set of ideas "cyber-anarchy," and certain journalists
>have picked up on this (as with the Australian article).
>
>But with the exception of the one variant of anonymous markets, namely,
>"assassination politics," most or all of the other ideas of his
>"cyber-anarchy" seem to be encompassed by the already-existing term.

I don't tend to carefully distinguish between "crypto-anarchy" and 
"cyber-anarchy" although the former is a subset of the latter.   Also, one 
big influence on society has nothing to do with encryption at all:  The fact 
that people are beginning to get their news and information from other 
ordinary people (as opposed to newspapers and TV networks) is not dependant 
on encryption, at least in a country that's supposed to be blessed with the 
1st amendment.  

The deathgrip the politicians have on the public as a whole will at least 
start to be weakened by non-crypto "cyberanarchy" effects like this, 
although perhaps it would be better named "cyber-minarchy."   I think we can 
attribute the difficulty the establishment is having passing a Clipper-type 
law to the portion of cyberminarchy that has nothing to do with encryption.   

Jim Bell
jimbell@pacifier.com