Computer underground Digest Fri May 10, 1996 Volume 8 : Issue 35 ISSN 1004-042X Editor: Jim Thomas (cudigest@sun.soci.niu.edu) News Editor: Gordon Meyer (gmeyer@sun.soci.niu.edu) Archivist: Brendan Kehoe Shadow Master: Stanton McCandlish Field Agent Extraordinaire: David Smith Shadow-Archivists: Dan Carosone / Paul Southworth Ralph Sims / Jyrki Kuoppala Ian Dickinson Cu Digest Homepage: http://www.soci.niu.edu/~cudigest CONTENTS, #8.35 (Fri, May 10, 1996) File 1--Fight Fiercely (and "vigorously"), Haah-vaahd! File 2--The nail picture File 3--FW: American Reporter v. Reno -- Day 1 File 4--Re: Cyber Projects File 5--Cornell Internet Law Symposium: A Forward (fwd) File 6--Cu Digest Header Info (unchanged since 7 Apr, 1996) CuD ADMINISTRATIVE, EDITORIAL, AND SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION ApPEARS IN THE CONCLUDING FILE AT THE END OF EACH ISSUE. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 7 May 96 15:53 CDT From: Glen L. Roberts Subject: File 4--Re: Cyber Projects ________________________________________________________________ 5/03/96, Fred G. Athearn wrote (to cr-deliberate): > Marilyn> Does anyone have any ideas for projects we can do > Marilyn> together? > >These are a few general areas that seem hot: > > Intellectual Property vs. Fair Use, > Cyber-smut vs. Free Speech, > The War on Crime Terrorism vs. Encryption & Privacy > [ Electronic Freedom March - added by someone else ] ________________________________________________________________ One of my favorite parables is the one about Nasrudin, who looked for his keys where the light was good instead of where he had lost them. I'd say we want to avoid spending time on projects which either: - are being handled adequately by others - aren't getting at the root of the problem Also, I'd favor projects where there is an identifiable constituency who have a self-interest in getting involved. Simply getting masses of socially-concious netizens to agree with us may, unfortunately, result in little more than lots of message massage. For me, the central cyber issues are: (1) Beyond CDA: the Bill of Rights (as a whole) and Cyberspace (2) Cyber economics: the monopolist pirate raid on the wired future. re/ (1) ^^^^^^^ I believe that cyber "rights" are a consequence of how cyberspace is "modelled". The corporatist position, which is all but a fait accompli, is that cyberspace is an info-distribution channel like television, and hence has no inherent rights of access, privacy, free speech, etc. -- concerns of children etc. are supposedly central (although we all know that's bullshit -- what could be more harmful to children than the television trash they're subjected to?). I see the "battle" as making a case that we should look at First Class Mail as the proper precedent for private email, and Public Gatherings as the precedent for email lists & conferences, etc. In other words, we should demand that our standard civil liberties be mapped onto cyberspace appropriately. We're not asking for new rights, simply the proper legal interpretation of existing rights (such as they are). To me, this a "deep cut" at the problem -- if we choose this field of battle, we'd have some hope of coalition with ACLU, Center for Consitutional Rights, small publishers, consumer groups, etc. And if we have any success, that would automatically benefit things like encryption, wiretaps, fair-use, censorship, etc. re/ (2) ^^^^^^^ I believe the so-called Reform bill is a modern Enclosures Act -- the theft of the Public Commons by greedy promoters. And this public commons is a grand one indeed, being essentially the central nervous system and perceptual organs of our future society. The law doth punish man or woman That steals the goose from off the common, But lets the greater felon loose, That steals the common from the goose. Anon, 18th cent., on the enclosures. (courtesy of John Whiting) The main problem here is that the public at large understands neither the wonderful potential of cyberspace for "people's networking" (to give it an inadequate moniker), nor the true consequences of the new telecom regime. The public is saturated with a porn-terrorist-hacker image of Internet -- when possibly a majority of messages sent are day-to-day corporate and governmental inter-department mail. And the public is told the Reform act is only to their benefit, with promises of cyber gadgets and virtual entertainment -- with no discussion of what a digital infrastructure _could_ make available to them if it were open and cheap (which the technology should, by rights, provide). It seems to me the first step here is purely educational -- until there's more general understanding of the real issues, it would be pointless to attempt to rouse any sizable constituency around any actions or agenda. We have some natural allies in this field of battle, and ones with significant economic self-interest involved. These include all the small independent operators in the communications, media, and publication industries, together with everyone in public-sector-related businesses (education, municipal governments, etc.). There are also probably some professional associations who would have an identifiable commonality of interests, plus consumer groups and the like. Again, I see this as a "deep cut" tack on the problem -- one which can attract a wider constituency, and in the long run accomplish more, than shorter-term defensive battles such as trying to defend voice-over-Internet, or decriminalizing PGP -- battles fought while public opinion is hostile or indifferent to our cause. I'm forwarding Craig Johnson's "THE REGULATORS MEET THE INTERNET" to the recipients of this message. My hope would be that those who make submissions to the FCC do so from a "deep-cut" perspective re/ the proper role of regulation over society's communication infrastructure. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 19 Apr 1996 19:42:32 -0500 (CDT) From: David Smith Subject: File 5--Cornell Internet Law Symposium: A Forward (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From--Mark Eckenwiler Subject--Cornell Internet Law Symposium Date--Tue, 16 Apr 1996 13:20:21 -0400 (EDT) Mike, here's my quick summary of the Internet Law Symposium sponsored by the Cornell Journal of Law & Public Policy, 4/12-4/13/96: Friday night (4/12), Bruce Taylor of the National Law Center for Families and Children gave a predictable keynote speech explaining why the CDA is constitutional & A Good Idea. Among his observations and arguments: - The S Ct says we can regulate obscenity because the courts can enforce morality. (Oops -- try "valueless speech".) - "Patent offensiveness" under the CDA requires not only offense, but also an intent to offend. BT claimed that an image put up on the WWW might or might violate the law depending on whether a U Penn Law Student (as part of a safe-sex page) or Al Goldstein did it. - The CDA doesn't apply to speech with lit/art/politcal merit. - He heavily conflated smut/porn/indecency/kidporn/obscenity. Heavily, as in using the terms interchangeably. - He urged acceptance of the CDA as the expression of the will of the majority, them folks what ain't bin to kollidj like us but who still love (and want to protect) their kids. - As Bruce does in every speech he ever gives, he made reference to the famous GIF (at issue in the Robert & Carleen Thomas case) of a woman's genitals nailed to a board. He didn't bother mentioning that this image was deemed obscene, or that the CDA is superfluous as to obscenity. In the rather odd position of giving a rebuttal to the keynote address, I tried to accomplish some basic things to start: explaining the contours of the obscene/indecent/HTM/kid-porn classifications; taking Bruce & Co. to task for working so hard to blur those distinctions and to treat "indecent" material as if it's all "smut" or "porn"; and explaining just how big the sweep of indecency/patent offensiveness is. I made a point of calling Bruce on his repeated claims that the third Miller prong (art/literature/etc.) is also a part of the indecency standard. [On Saturday, he even claimed that indecency also includes a prurience prong -- as if the Carlin monologue ever got anybody all hot'n'bothered.] I spent a good deal of time focussing on the narrow basis for Pacifica (pervasisveness/accessibility to kiddies/time channeling) and how those things don't apply to the net. Following in the Godwin tradition, I moralized as a parent in my own right -- quoting Brandeis (from Olmstead) and Frankfurter (Butler v. Michigan) on the limits of well-intentioned legislation designed to protect children. I also beat Bruce over the head with the 4/11 NYT story about Patrick Trueman & the AFA going after CompuServe over the "adults-only" area -- so much for the good-faith defenses meaning anything. My closer was an example of a book that could easily be viewed as "patently offensive" under the standards of many communities: a book about a bunch of men getting drunk and discussing homosexual love (and/or slicing people in half), including one young reveler's account of his night in bed with one of the older men present. (Payoff: it's _The Symposium_, from which the Cornell Symposium & all others get their name. While we at this Symposium can engage in robust/indecent speech, the CDA denies that same right to those in the online world &c. &c.) I used exactly one Dirty Word in my speech, and that in summarizing _Cohen_. Bruce would only call it "the F word" (and/or spell it out!) duirng the Q&A that followed (and this after saying "bullshit" at CFP). I did manage to work in "shit" and "cunt" on Saturday as examples of how Chaucer could fail the CDA's standard. Saturday (in brief): Morning panel was Bob Peters, Llew Gibbons from Temple Law, Marjorie Hodges from the Cornell OIT, & Adam Lehman of AOL. Bob hogged the floor and told many of the same legal lies BT had peddled the night before. (Best one: fn. 18 of Pacifica is good law, and means the CDA is constitutional.) Llew talked about alternative models like the private market and a contract model between customer-wanting-kid- friendly-service and ISPs (which sounds as if it's what Judge Dalzell grasped on Friday). Margie Hodges talked about the specific problems faced by universitiess under the CDA. Adam talked about role of ISPs who can't know how to comply with the CDA. Best a.m. moment: Bob Peters admitting "I have never been on the Internet." 2d best: Margie Hodges incredulously asking him to repeat it to make sure she heard right. P.M. panel: Alan Davidson of CDT (on crypto policy), Pam Samuelson (guess), Llew (more crypto -- specifics of Leahy bill), and BT & me on the CDA once again. More BT gems from the panel discussion: - making "indecent" speakers go into a special area is like making smokers go outside. - the CDA is like a sex harassment law - Pacifica fn. 18 ("banning indecency merely regulates form, not content"), cited in the committee report, is good law. My response was pretty predictable: - First Amendment protects *un*popular speech, and bars forcing it into more palatable forms (see Texas v. Johnson) - Smoking isn't speech -- duh - Indecency is *broad* (with numerous examples from literature) During Q&A I asked Bruce if he thought a "click here only if you're 18" intermediate page on a web site is a valid CDA defense. He gave a non-answer about "in context". Bruce asked me if I would oppose the CDA if the standard were the variable obscenity std. (Answer: since adults have a right to receive such stuff, a blanket ban is no more acceptable as to it than as to indecency.) Jeez, I could smell that Q coming a mile away. Much else was said. The above is merely a representative sample, mostly WRT the CDA debate. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 7 Apr 1996 22:51:01 CST From: CuD Moderators Subject: File 6--Cu Digest Header Info (unchanged since 7 Apr, 1996) Cu-Digest is a weekly electronic journal/newsletter. Subscriptions are available at no cost electronically. CuD is available as a Usenet newsgroup: comp.society.cu-digest Or, to subscribe, send post with this in the "Subject:: line: SUBSCRIBE CU-DIGEST Send the message to: cu-digest-request@weber.ucsd.edu DO NOT SEND SUBSCRIPTIONS TO THE MODERATORS. 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