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Re: Censorship on cypherpunks?, from The Netly News
Declan's done an excellent journalistic job. I understand that because of the
space limitations he couldn't quote everything that everyone told him, so one
small point in his article might be misinterpreted by a casual reader:
Declan McCullagh <[email protected]> writes:
> though, he's almost notorious. His .sig file, for instance, proudly
Why "almost"? :-)
> points out that he's a former Kook of the Month; Vulis was also a
There's no such thing as "former" KOTM, Declan. That's a lifetime achievement!
> Net-legend and even has the alt.fan.dimitri-vulis newsgroup named
> after him.
(I newgrouped a.f.d-v myself, actually. But it does get traffic :-)
> daily messages that came from Vulis's keyboard. The list is on
> Gilmore's machine and he can do what he wants with it; he can moderate
> the postings, he can censor material, he can shut the whole thing
> down. By kicking off an offending user, a list owner merely exercises
> his property right. There's no government involvement, so the First
> Amendment doesn't apply.
I told Declan that agree 100% - John Gilmore has the right to do anything
he likes with his private mailing list. The 1st Amendment does not apply.
However censorship needn't be government-imposed.
> For his part, Gilmore calls removing the Russian mathematician "an
> act of leadership." He says: "It said we've all been putting up with
An act of censorship, an act of cowardice, an act of Hitler-like leadership...
> this guy and it's time to stop. You're not welcome here... It seemed
> to me that a lot of the posts on cypherpunks were missing the mark.
> They seemed to have an idea that their ability to speak through my
> machine was guaranteed by the Constitution."
If John Gilmore ascribes this opinion to me, then he's lying outright.
---
<a href="mailto:[email protected]">Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM</a>
Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps