2 Message 2: From exi@panix.com Wed Jul 28 02:34:57 1993 Return-Path: Received: from usc.edu by chaph.usc.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1+ucs-3.0) id AA06453; Wed, 28 Jul 93 02:34:55 PDT Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: from panix.com by usc.edu (4.1/SMI-3.0DEV3-USC+3.1) id AA15435; Wed, 28 Jul 93 02:34:46 PDT Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: by panix.com id AA28772 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for more@usc.edu); Wed, 28 Jul 1993 05:30:37 -0400 Date: Wed, 28 Jul 1993 05:30:37 -0400 Message-Id: <199307280930.AA28772@panix.com> To: Exi@panix.com From: Exi@panix.com Subject: Extropians Digest X-Extropian-Date: July 28, 373 P.N.O. [09:30:31 UTC] Reply-To: extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Status: RO Extropians Digest Wed, 28 Jul 93 Volume 93 : Issue 208 Today's Topics: ADMIN: Bug, sort of [1 msgs] Admin requests delay [1 msgs] DNA: fun and profit [1 msgs] FSF: InfoProp [1 msgs] FSF: InfoProp, etc. [1 msgs] FSF: InfoProp, etc. [1 msgs] FSF: Some Useful Software, No Useful Politics [4 msgs] FSF: Some Useful Software, No Useful Politics [1 msgs] Further News On the Intellectual Property Front [1 msgs] Homosexuality & Genetic Engineering [1 msgs] Intellectual Property, ppl, etc. [1 msgs] Michael Friedman [1 msgs] Nightly Market Report [1 msgs] Who is signed up for cryonics [2 msgs] software rental surprise [1 msgs] Administrivia: No admin msg. Approximate Size: 51326 bytes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 20:19:51 WET DST From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: FSF: Some Useful Software, No Useful Politics Tony Hamilton - FES ERG~ () writes: > How about a book? I write a book. Let's just say that now I draw up a > copyright contract (which I believe is what you are talking about) with > each person I sell the book to. Fine. Let us say Fred (any resemblance to > any Freds out there is unintentional) bought my book, and signed a contract > which requires Fred to never copy or sell copies of my book. What happens > when Fred's friend Olaf reads the book, borrows it, copies it, and sells > it? Do I go after Fred? Okay, maybe the contract specifically stated that > Fred was not allowed to let others read or copy/sell the book. What if > Olaf is a thief and steals the book? Olaf then mass-distributes copies of Simple. Don't trade with Fred anymore. Let me give you a better example, one that happens all the time. You work at a software company and decide to let Fred have a beta copy of your software. Fred distributes this software on thousands of BBSs leading people to use buggy, even dangerous software. Either you get fired, or you tell Fred that he has lost his privelege of beta testing. What you need to do is forget about your traditional notion of the self contained book. Imagine a book which is dynamic and ever changing; a book written perhaps by hundreds of people who might not even know each other very well. What am I babbling about? Distributed hypertext publishing. If the books of the future are distributed on a network, stored at publisher archive sites, and contain audio and video, which is frequently updated, it's pretty useless to try to "copy" these books by local caching all the data and constructing the entire book. Reading books would consist of paying usage fees for retrieving information from hypertext links. I'm not just suggesting you imagine this for copy protection purposes, but for the market forces it would unleash on publishing. This is particularly exciting for software objects. Imagine that there is a market on the network for "compression objects" or maybe "expert system objects". With traditional software, you'd have to purchase these objects, install them, and relink your application. But what if your application would automatically buy and sell access to objects based on their price and quality? Each time you ran your application it could seek out the "best" code deals on the market. Your application would improve in performance without you even lifting a finger! Moreover, you could make up the cost of using these objects by selling idle cpu cycles to other people on the net. Perhaps the NSA would buy them to crack a particularly infamous PGP key. Or maybe the local school's computer lab would buy them for a computer graphics demonstration they needed. The main point is, in the future, information will be more distributed and dynamic. The cost of collecting it and distributing it freely (especially paying for network charges) would be prohibitive. People who "steal" information would be ostracized just like net.idiots are now (e.g. having their net connection removed, not by force, but by suppliers simply refusing to deal with them) -Ray -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- EE/Math Student | politics is the implementation of faith. -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | - Zetetic Commentaries -- ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 1993 17:21:11 -0700 From: dkrieger@Synopsys.COM (Dave Krieger) Subject: Michael Friedman At 7:23 PM 7/27/93 -0400, Perry E. Metzger wrote: >They are trained to look for Medic Alert tags, you see. One >particularly tragic case where they did not pay attention was the >lawyer that got shot in the head in the law library a while back, >who's tag was only noticed once he got the morgue, but he was not a >terribly promising case to begin with. > >Perry Actually, Perry, that's not quite right. They did notice the tag, and they even phoned Alcor -- it's just that the L.A. county coroner's office, in its infinite wisdom, chose to take Michael Friedman for an all-day ride in a warm meat wagon _before_ taking him to the morgue (where Max More and I were waiting on the doorstep with ice on the off-chance that the coroner might DTRT); then they autopsied him (though, mercifully, they only removed the bullets and did not section the brain); then they turned him over to Alcor. BTW, if you are a cryonicist, and you think you might catch a case of what Michael Friedman had (acute lead poisoning :-) or otherwise end up in the hands of the coroner, take Hydergine daily... it helps cushion the brain against ischemia, and in Europe is given to patients before major surgery (in case they stop breathing under anesthesia). It just might protect you from that long drive around the park while the coroner decides what to do with you. dV/dt ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 20:24:45 EDT From: eisrael@suneast.east.sun.com (Elias Israel - SunSelect Engineering) Subject: FSF: InfoProp, etc. >Certainly -- he can use something like trade secret protection if he >feels like it. However, this is VERY different from the patent notion, >which gives you ownership of an idea regardless of how someone else >got that idea. For the last time: In none of my messages have I specifically defended patent law. In fact, near the start of this thread I blamed the law for our current problems in adminstering and exploiting intellectual property. In virtually every message I have argued for no more than what you've agreed with above: that an individual ought at least be able to use trade secret-style protections in the defense of their intellectual property -- a position with which the FSF appears to me to disagree. And you can spare me the lecture, Perry. I know perfectly well where patents came from. >No, I believe you are confusing coming up with an invention first with >the right to control an invention for some number of years. Rather, I think you are confusing your inability to admit to a misapprehension on your part with real debate. Elias Israel eisrael@east.sun.com HEx: E ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 1993 17:28:10 -0700 From: dkrieger@Synopsys.COM (Dave Krieger) Subject: Homosexuality & Genetic Engineering At 7:51 PM 7/27/93 -0400, FutureNerd Steve Witham wrote: >> >From _The Age_ 26/7/93: >> >> Jews to study controversial genetics plan >> London, Monday. >> >> The advisory cabinet of the Chief Rabbi of Britain, Dr. >> Jonathan Sacks, will be urged this spring to allow Jews to > >*THE* Dr. Jonathan Sacks!? > >> undergo voluntary genetic engineering to remove homosexual >> tendencies if this becomes scientifically possible. You may be thinking of Oliver Sacks (_The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat_, _Awakenings_). I've never heard of Jonathan Sacks before. dV/dt ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 1993 20:29:48 -0400 From: Alexander Chislenko Subject: Further News On the Intellectual Property Front I wonder if David Letterman can get away with "Top 9 lists" instead of 10. ;-) And Silly Pet Tricks instead of Stupid. These 'problem's seem stupid indeed. sasha@cs.umb.edu ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 17:35:16 -0700 From: tribble@netcom.com (E. Dean Tribble) Subject: software rental surprise Is there any logical reason for MS Word for Windows to cost $450? Yes. People will buy it at that price. Beyond that, marketing and pricing issues are a black art: if they lower the price, they discredit the product, if they raise, they piss off customers, etc. As for renting, people have tried that. For who-knows-what reason, companies don't want to rent software if they can buy it. They just don't do it. And on the cost side, software is already sort-of rented today. If you amortize the cost of production of a product, most companies make very little money from the first sale of a product: they have to amortize cost of sales, cost of advertising, support, all the rather expensive manual production, licensing spelling checkers, grammar checkers, fonts, etc. packaging, delivery, etc. All that adds up surprisingly quickly. Where companies make their serious money is on upgrades: extendoing an existing product takes much less development effort, many fewer extra licenses, much less support burden, and much less cost of sales (because they've got a mailing list and a bunch of committed customers). The $60 upgrade to Windows 3.1 (I think that was the price). Made several million dollars the first day. Advertising was straightforward, all the dealers wanted it, all the magazines wrote it up beforehand, most of the customers wanted it, etc. Because it was an upgrade, the dealer margins were *much* lower. That means that MicroSoft might well have realized $30 of the price (these numbers are just my vague memories, be warned). With 3 million units sold in the first month, that's 90 *million* dollars in the first month. Since most of the users were already familiar with Windows, they didn't much in the way of support (like first time users do). So uSoft got to keep much of that money. When people buy a product, they don't buy a single thing, they buy into an upgrade path. That's what customers tend to value, and that's what makes money for software companies. The high price of the initial buy-in is mostly to cover costs and fund the development of the rest of the market. This structure is much better for the end-user than renting is because they can opt out of the upgrade path (stop 'renting') at any time with losing their current ability to operate. This also simplifies the structure of capital, but the analysis of that is beyond my brain's current ability to articulate. I think a further simplification is the strategy that I intend to take with Joule (a network programming and envuironment I and others are working on): essentially take the GNu model and drop the more-expensive-than-money part. The only requirement is that the copyright stay with the software that tells you how to get a support contract, books, training, etc. from us.... OTher than that, the code can be used in commercial products just fine. I dislike the GNU copyright, so we're going to compete with a less restrictive one :-) dean ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 1993 20:45:01 -0400 From: "Perry E. Metzger" Subject: FSF: InfoProp, etc. Elias Israel - SunSelect Engineering says: > In virtually every message I have argued for no more than what you've > agreed with above: that an individual ought at least be able to use > trade secret-style protections in the defense of their intellectual > property I believe you argued that the first person who developed the Xor cursor idea deserved money for it. It was a trivial concept that was reinvented a number of times -- its hard to see how anyone could have managed to protect it with a trade secret style system. > a position with which the FSF appears to me to disagree. I've never heard Richard Stallman disagree with people fulfilling voluntary committements, which are all that Trade Secret agreements are. I think he would argue that people should not enter into those committments, but he's not, in this case, an advocate of coercion. His employees are even more pragmatic than he is, by the way. Perry ------------------------------ Date: 27 Jul 93 17:56:49 U From: "Kent Hastings" Subject: FSF: InfoProp FSF: InfoProp#000# Ray Cromwell wrote: > I see no real difference between intellectual property rights > and normal property rights. Information is easy to copy, so > what? The nanotech/robot revolution will make material goods > just as easy to copy, but that doesn't mean you should be > able exploit the mental work of a designer for free. MS > probably spent millions on Word development, probably even > more on Windows->NT development. I own my car. If you take it from me without my consent, you would violate my property right. Then I'd have to ride RTD... Anyway, if you make a COPY of my car - GREAT, have fun, as long as you didn't trespass, or otherwise get in my way. If all I have to do to copy something is tell my nanobot: "Get me a sandwich, build me a house, make a copy of yourself and give it to that poor person," I don't see where "exploiting the mental work" of someone is any big shakes. With mature nanotech, information will be the dominant factor of production, and we will be able to seize the means of consumption and overthrow the historic chains of statist oppression, comrade. I doubt MicroSloth, I-BM, or any other corporate fascist bloodsucking enemies of freedom would continue to exist after the State contracts and special privileges vanished. Kent - kent_hastings@qmail2.aero.org. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 18:00:18 PDT From: Robin Hanson Subject: Admin requests delay I'll be on travel till Monday 8/1, so new list administration requests won't be dealt with till then. Robin Hanson ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 19:03:31 PDT From: thamilto@pcocd2.intel.com (Tony Hamilton - FES ERG~) Subject: FSF: Some Useful Software, No Useful Politics Perry, First, you keep focusing on the legality/illegality of certain acts. I haven't been discussing that issue. Not that what you have to say is meaningless, it just isn't addressing the issue of enforcement. Which brings me to point number two. You state that, in my example of Olaf the thief stealing from Fred, he can be sued for damages. Again, how is this carried out? What does a "suit" entail in extropian society? How is it processed, who arbitrates, and how is the judgement enforced? And then of course there is the case of the other 3rd parties who bought the bootlegged versions of the book, to which you don't seem to have an answer, and neither do I. That is my point. Ray, I honestly never realized that my examples were based upon today's paradigms. You've obviously thought this out a bit more. Still, I have trouble believing that all information will be of such a dynamic nature, and that the infrastructure supporting information exchange will be so static! Just as today, there are various markets for products and information, some legal, others not, why would there not be different markets in the future? Let us take the example of being charged for downloading various objects, texts, or whatever, from information services. Rather than recover the cost of the download by loaning out CPU cycles (which I may covet), why not just take what I have downloaded legally from you (or some information brokerage of sorts I suppose), and offer it to others for a significantly lower charge, perhaps over a different information exchange? I could turn a profit by distributing your works to people who would otherwise be your customers. They may not support my ostracization because they might engage in the same kinds of activites. Much like the pirated software market of today. If you assume instead that we're all communicating and trading over a single, monitored information network of sorts, then we're looking at the future differently. How can a single network exist in a world of competition? Surely even the means of echanging property, physical or otherwise, would be a competitive market. Monitors, "laws" if you will, governing exchanges on each network would be a function of what features were offered by each service. Networks connecting networks would be other markets with compeition. My point? Where is the control over information flow? Where is it guaranteed that everyone is motivated to ostracize those who go against the grain (and what grain?). People usually need personal motivations for observering others' rights. In other words, if I generate valuable products (information or otherwise) and sell those, I have a vested interest in supporting a system which deters property theft. But will everyone be in that situation? Society at large basically treats criminals with contempt today, and yet they still exist, even though being a criminal generally significantly lowers your survival potential. I'm asking - what stops all this in the future? I know this touches upon fundamental concepts that have already been discussed, but it seem germaine to the copyright discussion as well. It seems to me that you have to make an awful lot of assumptions in order to support the idea of intellectual property rights in the future. Tony Hamilton thamilto@pcocd2.intel.com HAM on HEX ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 22:12:27 WET DST From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: ADMIN: Bug, sort of The current list administration utility did not default to setting notify mode on for new users. Notify mode keeps track of a list of messages that have been filtered for each user and tells you every night what messages you have missed. (filtered) I wrote a program to turn everyone's notify mode on. If you filter messages and do not wish to receive this list, send a message to the list wish the first line of the body as ::notify off Some of you will be getting some long filter lists that have been accumulating since you've been added to the list. Sorry, but I had to do this to flush out the database. -ray -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- EE/Math Student | politics is the implementation of faith. -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | - Zetetic Commentaries -- ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 28 Jul 93 03:35:41 +0100 From: Rich Walker Subject: FSF: Some Useful Software, No Useful Politics If the trading model that Ray's been referring to is what I think it is, then the lab here has been using a similar system for a while. The features of the model that need to be noted are: it's a co-operative system it's designed to ensure optimum pooling of a set of finite resources. Look on it as the scheduling algorithm of the 90's: instead of scheduling time on the big mainframe amongst 500 people, you schedule time on the many machines in the network by bartering cycles. If I suddenly want to run a huge job very fast, I bid premium prices for cycles. Then I suddenly find I've spent my resources and have to type very slowly into vi for a week until I've got some credit back :-> The distributed bit: This sounds similar to what Gelernter was proposing with Linda: I scatter around some processing things and some data things, and people grab them and execute them, possibly bunging out others. If I bung out a `sort xxx' and you grab it, and you're machine has a really efficient sort, more so than Joe's then you get the payment for doing the sorting, but have used fewer of your machine cycles to do so. Suddenly, it becomes worth tweaking every bit of code in sight, so your machine can _make a profit_ out of your super-efficient code... Sounds quite amusing (is any of this right?) I can forsee difficulties: using it in a non-friendly environment. Sure, if someone trashes your stuff, everyone else will ostracise you, but that doesn't help much when your 4000-machine-week calculation you've saved credits for for 3 years dies with it... No doubt people will think of ways of getting round it, but still... Rich! ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 22:46:15 WET DST From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: FSF: Some Useful Software, No Useful Politics Tony Hamilton - FES ERG~ () writes: > Ray, > > I honestly never realized that my examples were based upon today's paradigms. > You've obviously thought this out a bit more. Still, I have trouble believing > that all information will be of such a dynamic nature, and that the > infrastructure supporting information exchange will be so static! Just as > today, there are various markets for products and information, some legal, > others not, why would there not be different markets in the future? Let us > take the example of being charged for downloading various objects, texts, > or whatever, from information services. Rather than recover the cost of the > download by loaning out CPU cycles (which I may covet), why not just take > what I have downloaded legally from you (or some information brokerage of > sorts I suppose), and offer it to others for a significantly lower charge, > perhaps over a different information exchange? I could turn a profit by > distributing your works to people who would otherwise be your customers. > They may not support my ostracization because they might engage in the same > kinds of activites. Much like the pirated software market of today. The point is as soon as you were discovered to be participating in this activity, you would be blacklisted on the net. Tit-for-tat, reputation and all that. People who sell information on the net would band together because they have a common interested in preventing your sort of behavior. Consider what would happen if I could "copy" your hex shares and sell everyone short. I could put you out of business, but not only that, the ability to copy hex shares would lead to collapse of the market as hyperinflation would cause your value to plummet to zero. > If you assume instead that we're all communicating and trading over a single, > monitored information network of sorts, then we're looking at the future > differently. How can a single network exist in a world of competition? Surely > even the means of echanging property, physical or otherwise, would be a > competitive market. Monitors, "laws" if you will, governing exchanges on A single network wouldn't exist, but it doesn't matter. What will happen is you will get a reputation of being an information stealer. Anyone on any network who wants to protect themselves will refuse to deal with you. > each network would be a function of what features were offered by each > service. Networks connecting networks would be other markets with > compeition. My point? Where is the control over information flow? Where > is it guaranteed that everyone is motivated to ostracize those who go > against the grain (and what grain?). People usually need personal motivations > for observering others' rights. In other words, if I generate valuable > products (information or otherwise) and sell those, I have a vested interest > in supporting a system which deters property theft. But will everyone be > in that situation? Society at large basically treats criminals with contempt Once again, it doesn't matter. There are far more non-pirates then not so excluding you from their customer list isn't going to hurt them. Imagine this: sh$ ftp software.market.ibm.com Host: permission denied. you are a software theief sh$ ftp software.microsoft.com Host: permission denied. you are a software theif sh$ ftp software.apple.com Host: permission denied. you are a software theief Admittedly, today's net can't do verified authentication like that, but a future software market like AMIX could. > today, and yet they still exist, even though being a criminal generally > significantly lowers your survival potential. I'm asking - what stops all > this in the future? I know this touches upon fundamental concepts that have > already been discussed, but it seem germaine to the copyright discussion > as well. It seems to me that you have to make an awful lot of assumptions > in order to support the idea of intellectual property rights in the future. What stops it is you lose friends and potential business partners. If information is power and software is forced into the hands of the few because of a majority of pirates, then a minority will benefit more than you. if that information happens to be technology for life-extension, count yourself extinct. Summing it up: Information markets will not disappear and they will protect themselves by blacklisting those who violate their rules. This same kind of technique can be used to stop insider trading or con-artistry without requiring government intervention. Parasite techniques of leaving one community you are blacklisted from and preying on another won't work so well in a supernetworked world. Sure, once in a while, you'll find a sucker, but you won't be able to secure a lasting relationship with anyone nor will you be able to get timely updates or support. -Ray -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- EE/Math Student | politics is the implementation of faith. -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | - Zetetic Commentaries -- ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 20:00:09 PDT From: martino@gomez.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (Martin R. Olah) Subject: DNA: fun and profit Re: several posts about DNA ownership,cloning etc.: It is quite possible that particular DNA will be a usefull commodity in the future. I've already started a collection for my own hobby use. I don't have any fameous people yet, but I'm more interested in visual attributes at this point. Of course if I get the chance I'll take it. It shouldn't be too hard to get a few skin cells from a handshake, letter, or local dust. I've collected some hair, since last time I checked it was cellular, not just extruded protein (I haven't checked into fingernails). As for the moral implications, I have plenty of time to figure that out before actually doing anything. -O Martin ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 28 Jul 93 00:00:15 EDT From: The Hawthorne Exchange Subject: Nightly Market Report The Hawthorne Exchange - HEx Nightly Market Report For more information on HEx, send email to HEx@sea.east.sun.com with the Subject info. --------------------------------------------------------------- News Summary as of: Tue Jul 27 23:59:01 EDT 1993 Newly Registered Reputations: RWHIT Russell Earl Whitaker New Share Issues: Symbol Shares Issued TRADE withdrawn from Exchange by request of owner and sole shareholder. Share Splits: (None) --------------------------------------------------------------- Market Summary as of: Wed Jul 28 00:00:05 EDT 1993 Total Shares Symbol Bid Ask Last Issued Outstanding Market Value 1000 .10 .20 .10 10000 2000 200.00 110 - .10 - 10000 - - 150 - .10 - 10000 - - 1E6 - .10 - 10000 - - 1E9 - .10 - 10000 - - TIM 1.00 2.00 1.00 10000 100 100.00 TRANS - .05 .40 10000 1511 604.40 VINGE .20 .50 .20 10000 1000 200.00 WILKEN 1.00 10.00 10.00 10000 101 1010.00 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Total 417430.63 ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 21:04:33 PDT From: thamilto@pcocd2.intel.com (Tony Hamilton - FES ERG~) Subject: FSF: Some Useful Software, No Useful Politics > Summing it up: Information markets will not disappear and they will protect > themselves by blacklisting those who violate their rules. This same > kind of technique can be used to stop insider trading or con-artistry without > requiring government intervention. Parasite techniques of leaving one > community you are blacklisted from and preying on another won't work so > well in a supernetworked world. Sure, once in a while, you'll find > a sucker, but you won't be able to secure a lasting relationship > with anyone nor will you be able to get timely updates or support. But again, (and thank you for the summary, it makes it easier to respond), you seem to be assuming many things. First, the big assumption seems to be that everyone is motivitated to participate in this ostracization. If they were all brilliant contributors with something to protect, than maybe, but if this future world of people are at all like today's (and I stress "at all" because I know the ratios won't be the same), there will be different _classes_ of indiduals. Those with little to contribute might very well be in the "lower classes". If they are not capable of surviving by contributing, they would resort to thievery, whether its theft of CPU cycles, information, or whatever. Today, this group of individuals is no small group. When you are talking software alone, most of the international market seems to be comprised primarily of illegal transactions. Also, there is an assumptions that criminals (using the term for lack of a better one) would be caught. Today's criminals seem quite adept at avoiding detection (ones of any talent, anyway). Why would that trend change? And what about organized crime? You seem to keep dancing around the possbility of networks devoted entirely to the covert distribution of information. So what if a single person gets caught? It only takes one to cause a great deal of damage. Like I say, too many assumptions. Take also the example you gave of FTPing (and I understand this particular example was designed to put things in a perspective we can all understand) and being locked out. This implies a global method of "black-listing". How is this maintained? And again, what if you are not caught? And if you are, what if someone else with a clean record takes your place? Explain the logic behind the assumptions, please. One final concern: I am always concerned when I hear of such things as "black-listing" and so forth. Justice as dealt by the hand of many is no less arbitrary than justice dealt by a single individual. That's why the concept of Democracy is a faled one, and why "Majority Rule" is invalid. What happens when someone is black-listed unjustly? What keeps someone from unjustly accusing another? Network logs? Who maintains these logs? Who set them up? It almost sounds like Big Brother to me, except it isn't your brother, its your species which is watching. What happens to privacy? Where does the automated tracking end and the privacy begin? Who decides? Where is the appeal, and how is it managed? None of this sounds very anarchist to me. In a truly anarchist, or Extropian, (or whatever other similar concept) society, wherever one concept is questioned, competition will spring up. If people don't like the black lists of one network, networks without black lists will be formed. Hell, if Extropians really _are_ posessing of this anti-establishment gene, then our very nature will require us to question anything that becomes the norm for too long. Is it really assumed that in this future society somewhere a balance will be struck and everything will become stable? That is only possible if we stop learning, stop discovering, stop growing - stop being extropian. I can't imagine thinking that the emergining technologies and trends will solve our problems. They will create new ones, and likely provide new venues for old problems. In summary, Ray (I owe you a summary, you gave me one): I see your views as being highly idealistic. And I know it isn't just you. If I seem overly pessimistic, than I will accept that characterization. It's just my nature to question rather than accept. We both have our place, I suppose. I just happen to believe that by questioning these ideas, I'll be better prepared no matter which is more correct. Tony Hamilton thamilto@pcocd2.intel.com HAM on HEX ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 93 21:23:23 -0700 From: Inigo Montoya Subject: Intellectual Property, ppl, etc. First, a quick suggestion prompted by this discussion of property rights. It seems quite evident that some here have not read either _Machinery of Freedom_ or _Enterprise of Law_, and would do well to peruse these texts (and the others on the short list, probably, too, but this is where the lack is obvious) before attempting to participate in a discussion of how-to-enforce-anything in a ppl/anarchocapitalist society. I don't mean to attack anyone personally; it just looks to me like the comment needs to be made. Shoe fits. Etc. Second, copyrights etc. I am amused to note that Dean Tribble intends to go for an even looser version of copyright that copylefting. *applause* The fact that GNU exists, and that people like Dean are looking to go them one better leads me to believe that while the future may contain AMEX like markets, and mechanisms for catching people distributing software they were only supposed to use, it will also contain groups of people willing to let their work be used freely, so long as acknowledgment is made of who produced it. An anarchocapitalist society would almost certainly see groups of both, and they would very likely subscribe to different ppl agencies. Or at the least, have different policies. Why should I pay to have someone monitor use of my software and track down thiefs, when I'm giving it away free? Now, my stupid-question-of-the-day: Let's say I have something that can be easily copied. I never let it leave my property. I never invite anyone over to look at it. Some vile person, however, equipped with binox/scope/spy-bot, manages to get enough information to copy this thing without (a) the person at any time trespassing on my property and (b) doing any damage. This person then sells the object for an-exorbitant-amount- of-money (one of those one shot deals, the object is now worth a lot less to me). Assuming, for the moment, that they actually had to go to a fair amount of bother (i.e. I didn't leave it lying about on the front lawn, or even in a window) to "spy" on me, can you imagine a way I could get remuneration (contract with ppl, rights argument, etc.) for this? I figure if the spy-bot trespassed, and the person caused it to trespass, I can probably nail the person for trespass-by-proxy of some sort. But what if it was done with smoke-n-mirrors? Is it all My Fault for not doing my development inside a vault? And on a related (and I think slightly less stupid) note: say the person did trespass, and I can nail the person for that trespass. Does the fact that they did something (copy my prototype) while on my property aggravate the offense, and can I expect to hit them with a harder fine (is this something we might see under ppl)? I think the answer to this last one is a definite yes. Rebecca Crowley standard disclaimers apply rcrowley@zso.dec.com ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 27 Jul 1993 23:43:09 -0500 From: extr@jido.b30.ingr.com (Craig Presson) Subject: Who is signed up for cryonics Lefty writes: |> A woman named Helen Lang died of, I believe, cervical cancer. One of her |> doctors used samples of her cancer cells to produce the first "immortal" |> culture, now know as "Hela cells". Her family sued to recover the |> proceeds, but I don't know how the case turned out. |> I remember experimenting on HeLa cells at MIT. I thought the name was Helen Lane, BTW, FWIW. I'd love to know how it came out. I'd hazard a guess that the case might have been decided similarly to a piss-test case: at least one judge is supposed to have ruled that one's urine is not "private property" in the usual sense because it is routinely flushed away without concern for secure disposal, in the manner of hair and fingernail trimmings. Of course, I immediately thought of a 1st amendment counter to this: "Your honor, I am an Animist and a believer in sympathetic magic. I customarily dispose of all of my bodily effluvia in a secure manner, for example, by flushing them into a sewer where they are so diluted as to be useless to any of my enemies." OK, it wouldn't fly in the US Occupation Government's courts, especially the ones that would rule against Indians having Peyote ceremonies. ^ / ------/---- extropy@jido.b30.ingr.com (Freeman Craig Presson) /AS 5/20/373 PNO FCP: A great buy on HEx! /ExI 4/373 PNO ** E' and E-choice spoken here ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 28 Jul 1993 14:47:46 -0500 (EST) From: X91007@pitvax.xx.rmit.edu.au Subject: Who is signed up for cryonics Perry sez: >You aren't in the wrong country. You can sign up with Alcor in any >country -- all it does is add some expenses that you can pay for with I live in Melbourne, Australia. While I am quite happy to accept that I can join Alcor I am not convinced that they will be able to get to my body before a significant amount of degredation has occured. What does Alcor do for people in non-US countries? How long does it take from point of death to being frozen? Would I have to be flown out to California or freezing occur in Melbourne? Sorry for all the questions but I am a little worried that by the time I reached Alcor there wouldn't be enough of my brain left to make freezing worthwhile. I suspect Arthur C. Clarke (a person mentioned as someone who should sign up for Alcor) would be in a similar - probably worse - situation in Sri Lanka. Best wishes, Patrick Wilken x91007@pitvax.xx.rmit.edu.au ------------------------------ End of Extropians Digest V93 #208 ********************************* &