FITZ@NUHUB.ACS.NORTHEASTERN.EDU.UUCP (02/02/87)
Jim Murawski of Carnegie Mellon University objects to a policy decision made by his university admministration that the contents of the Info-Vax mailing list be available to all members of the University community. Let us ask both "Why would they do such a thing?" and "Why should Mr. Murawski object?" Having worked for the Smithsonian Institution for many years, I have long taken as a personal guideline the words of James Smithson in his 1829 bequest to "the United States of America, to found at Washington under the name of the Smithsonian Institution, an Establishment for the increase & diffusion of knowledge among men." These are words it would do well for everyone responsible for the guidance of a university to keep in mind. In so far as the Info-Vax mailing list can contribute to the "increase and diffusion of knowledge" it is proper, in this light, that it be available as it is at CMU. Murawski is worried about security implications of this action. First, it is at least rare that when security matters appear on the mailing list that the recipe for taking advantage of a weakness is disclosed. Far more important, at least from the perspective of Northeastern, is that many of our best students spend months on coop at DEC. They seem to have access not only to "water cooler scuttlebut", but to company confidential documents and even SPRs. I consider any comfort from keeping this list from them while they are on campus delusiory. I doubt that such attempts at secrecy will help at all. There are, as we see it, much better reasons for publishing than not. -Robert J. FitzPatrick -Academic Computing Services -Northeastern University -Boston MA
tencati@JPL-VLSI.ARPA.UUCP (02/03/87)
I side with Jim Murawski. I don't think that the nature of what is discussed on info-vax should concern university students as a whole. Maybe to a select subset who are in computer science, but not to a biology major who has a vax account for his or her class. I think the issues discussed on info-vax are for the most part system management (or at least system) related and are not relative to a student's day to day studies. Ron Tencati JPL-VLSI.ARPA
sasaki@HARVARD.HARVARD.EDU.UUCP (02/08/87)
University students, as a whole, won't be interested in info-vax. They
will read it for a while, and then just quit. I used to read
info-unix, but when I stopped being responsible for a UNIX system, I
stopped reading it. While some stuff was interesting, there was no
reason, I got bored.
As I communicated privately, readonly access to this mailing list is
probably safe and useful to those students who are interested. The
only problem is that the powers that be in the university hierarchy
don't realize the amount of resources needed to support a large number
of users doing something like reading mail. Info-vax will probably
lead to mail, which will probably lead to word-processing, and then
who knows what else? ("...begins with P which rhymes with T, which
stands for Trouble.")
I've seen fist fights over terminal access (one kid had finished and
was reading news, the other needed access to finish his programming
project), emotions run high during periods of stress (finals,
midterms, etc.).
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Marty Sasaki uucp: harvard!sasaki
Ziff Davis Technical Information Co. arpa: sasaki@harvard.harvard.edu
80 Blanchard Road bitnet: sasaki@harvunxh
Burlington, MA 01803 phone: 617-273-5500yerazuws@CSV.RPI.EDU.UUCP (02/11/87)
Supression and censorship never work. Thinking that it will will lead to a false sense of security. -Bill Yerazunis