max@trinity.uucp (Max Hauser) (03/07/88)
In article <1120@athos.rutgers.edu>, webber@athos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) writes: > The commitment to free speech in this country is rather thin. ... > > The sad thing is the way it gets presented. People argue over > whether or not so and so has a right to post (or any less right than > anyone else) whereas the real issue is whether the rest of the net, > with all of its investment of time and effort, has not yet earned the > right to have these postings available to it. In article <308@nvuxk.UUCP>, perseus@nvuxk.UUCP (A D Domaratius) writes: > In article <68@rolls.UUCP>, news@rolls.UUCP writes: > > ... > > scrooge@rolls will not be posting until he improves his posting style. > > I guess I haven't read many articles from scrooge@rolls. What is > wrong with his style.? Is he a fascist? If that is the reason that > you disagree with his style, isn't that censorship. ...this cannot > be a reason for failing to give access to this person. What is going on here? Are these authors competent adults? The Usenet site in question is a private operation under the control of local administration. How could it possibly be anyone's business but the local administrators' what is the site's policy for granting the privilege of a computer account or the further privilege of posting to Usenet? Have computer hackers so lost touch with reality that, not content to stipulate Usenet access as a job precondition (!), they now regard it as a "right," and its denial as "censorship" or as impairment of "free speech"? If webber@athos or perseus@nvuxk object to the internal operations at site rolls because these deny the Usenet a welcome author, why have they not immediately taken the obvious and reasonable step of providing the author an account on their own systems, and therefore taking some actual responsibility in the matter? Or is it more sensible to presume to tell distant SAs, indignantly no less, how to run their own systems? Oh, and I have a lot of friends whose postings would be welcome and widely read on the Usenet. By the argument that computer access should be determined by the value of the postings to the rest of the net, I insist on obtaining accounts and disk space on athos and nvuxk. By webber's argument, this should be up to the rest of the net, not athos and nvuxk, to decide. For all of the net's investment of time and effort, you know. M. Hauser, incredulous
bzs@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Barry Shein) (03/09/88)
>What is going on here? Are these authors competent adults? The Usenet >site in question is a private operation under the control of local >administration. How could it possibly be anyone's business but the local >administrators' what is the site's policy for granting the privilege of >a computer account or the further privilege of posting to Usenet? >Have computer hackers so lost touch with reality that, not content to >stipulate Usenet access as a job precondition (!), they now regard it >as a "right," and its denial as "censorship" or as impairment of "free >speech"? >M. Hauser, incredulous It seems well within the scope of reason that even a private organization should use some consistent and fair rules for allowing or denying access to their facilities. If a person who normally has access to such facilities is singled out from their peers and denied that merely because of a disagreement in political focus I think that's grounds for complaint. What level of complaint is another issue, I don't think anyone was talking legal complaint (although it's plausible), more likely just some appeal to a sense of fair play somewhere up the line. The issue really is fair treatment when compared with peers more than fundamental rights (although, as I said, one can enter that realm fairly easily if the rule used is based on mere political scope.) -Barry Shein, Boston University
webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (03/11/88)
In article <1288@pasteur.Berkeley.Edu>, max@trinity.uucp (Max Hauser) writes: > ... > What is going on here? Are these authors competent adults? The Usenet I can understand why, having found nothing that can seriously be objected to in our postings, you have chosen to attack our person instead. Doubtless most people just flushed your posting as soon as they saw your approach and missed the few things you said that had some content. > site in question is a private operation under the control of local > administration. No system that has a phone line (or other net connection) can truly be said to be ``under the control of local administration.'' > Have computer hackers so lost touch with reality that, not content to > stipulate Usenet access as a job precondition (!), they now regard it > as a "right," and its denial as "censorship" or as impairment of "free > speech"? There is no more or less a ``right to Usenet Access'' than there is a right to ``life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'' > If webber@athos or perseus@nvuxk object to the internal operations at > site rolls because these deny the Usenet a welcome author, why have they > not immediately taken the obvious and reasonable step of providing the > author an account on their own systems, and therefore taking some actual > responsibility in the matter? The availability of public access unix systems plus the ease with which facist mode can be bypassed indicate that there is little point in offering an account on a distant system. What the site admin has done is ultimately mere harassment (both of a specific local user at their site and of the net in general). I suppose we can tolerate such site admins as easily as we tolerate forged news articles. > Oh, and I have a lot of friends whose postings would be welcome and > widely read on the Usenet. By the argument that computer access should > be determined by the value of the postings to the rest of the net, I > insist on obtaining accounts and disk space on athos and nvuxk. I can't see why. So far, your postings have indicated no potential for value that would merit access to a Sun 4. I can offer an account on an Apple IIc, though if you would like. You already have diskspace on athos and nvuxk (assuming nvuxk is also recieving news.groups). > By webber's > argument, this should be up to the rest of the net, not athos and nvuxk, > to decide. For all of the net's investment of time and effort, you know. Depending on whether you view the net as a democratic or an anarchistic organization, you may or may not be right in extending my argument to the notion of trying to get the whole net to decide. So far, the net has functioned quite well as a ``tolerant'' organization accepting all postings as being of value, but now that discussion among humans is being drowned out by micro-computer binaries, one wonders how long it will last. > M. Hauser, incredulous Never been in credulous myself, is it near cognito? ------ BOB (webber@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber)
rsalz@bbn.com (Rich Salz) (03/12/88)
[ I took misc.headlines and talk.politics.misc out of the newsgroups line. ] Max Hauser writes: = Have computer hackers so lost touch with reality that, not content to = stipulate Usenet access as a job precondition (!), they now regard it = as a "right," and its denial as "censorship" or as impairment of "free = speech"? And, in an effort to prove that he is either unaware of the fundamental documents of the US,* or to prove that Max is write, Bob Webber writes: >There is no more or less a ``right to Usenet Access'' than there is a >right to ``life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'' There is also a third possibility: Bob shot off his answers so quickly that he didn't the discussion was limited in distribution. Max: = Oh, and I have a lot of friends whose postings would be welcome and = widely read on the Usenet. By the argument that computer access should = be determined by the value of the postings to the rest of the net, I = insist on obtaining accounts and disk space on athos and nvuxk. Webber: >I can't see why. So far, your postings have indicated no potential for >value that would merit access to a Sun 4. I can offer an account on >an Apple IIc, though if you would like. ... It is apparently OK if Webber decides who is worthy of using his resources, but not other sysadmins. The hypocrisy bothers me. However, Webber does close out his screed with a very trenchant observation, and proves that he can occasionally turn a nice phrase. It is unrelated to main topic, but I feel it bears repeating: >... but now that discussion >among humans is being drowned out by micro-computer binaries, one >wonders how long it will last. /r$ ----- * Title stolen from an excellent book by Lawrence Tribe; read it. -- Please send comp.sources.unix-related mail to rsalz@uunet.uu.net.
webber@athos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (03/18/88)
In article <511@fig.bbn.com>, rsalz@bbn.com.UUCP writes: > [ I took misc.headlines and talk.politics.misc out of the newsgroups line. ] As you like, but it is unclear that news admins have any better understanding (or interest) of the nature of human rights than do the people in those groups. > Max Hauser writes: > = Have computer hackers so lost touch with reality that, not content to > = stipulate Usenet access as a job precondition (!), they now regard it > = as a "right," and its denial as "censorship" or as impairment of "free > = speech"? > > And, in an effort to prove that he is either unaware of the fundamental > documents of the US,* or to prove that Max is write, Bob Webber writes: > >There is no more or less a ``right to Usenet Access'' than there is a > >right to ``life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'' I will admit that I have lost touch with Max's reality -- it is not a connection I miss much. Computer technology in general has caused many people to have to re-evaluate the way they view things. In addition to the problems raw technology raises, there is also the problem caused by the fact that Usenet is essentially a ``cooperative venture'' with no defining document nor central controls. As a service from Star Wars (oops, I meant Star Gate), it starts to take on aspects of a classic commercial venture which most people in industry have established models for dealing with. However, as it is, with its roots in bygone days of academia, it requires a rather large amount of original thinking to come up with any position on how things such as ``access rights'' should be interpreted and it is not at all surprising that the number of opinions is the square of the number of people (i.e., not only does X have a different opinion when talking with Y than when talking with Z, but X has a different opinion when Y is talking with X than with X is talking with Y), which is rather large even if you don't believe the arbitron stats. > >I can't see why. So far, your postings have indicated no potential for > >value that would merit access to a Sun 4. I can offer an account on > >an Apple IIc, though if you would like. ... > It is apparently OK if Webber decides who is worthy of using his > resources, but not other sysadmins. The hypocrisy bothers me. Well, your selective quoting bothers me. Recall I also mentioned that he already had disk space on the local machines by virtue of having posted a news message. Needless to say, the same action also consumed cpu time, so for all practical purposes he also has an account. In any event, the arguement rests not so much on whether or not a person should be allowed access to a system as to whether or not a person who is allowed access to a system that connects to Usenet should be given access to Usenet as part of the ``payment'' of that system for what it gets from access to Usenet. > However, Webber does close out his screed with a very trenchant > observation, and proves that he can occasionally turn a nice phrase. It > is unrelated to main topic, but I feel it bears repeating: > > >... but now that discussion > >among humans is being drowned out by micro-computer binaries, one > >wonders how long it will last. Glad you liked it. ------ BOB (webber@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber)
max@trinity.uucp (Max Hauser) (03/19/88)
In his article <with a long message-ID>, webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) writes: >In article <1288@pasteur.Berkeley.Edu>, max@trinity.uucp (Max Hauser) writes: >> ... >> What is going on here? Are these authors competent adults? ... > >I can understand why, having found nothing that can seriously be >objected to in our postings, [he has] chosen to attack our person >instead. ... Not at all. That was not meant to be an attack but a serious question, prompted by the original postings (what the authors actually said: not necessarily what they think they said, which is not my concern). A question that, private mail confirms, occurred to others as well. One that has not yet been answered, by the way, least of all by the principals. >> The Usenet site in question is a private operation under the control >> of local administration. > >No system that has a phone line (or other net connection) can truly be >said to be ``under the control of local administration.'' Perhaps this is the crux of the matter. If I am wildly naive in thinking of the Usenet merely as a communication medium, rather than one that confers implicit contractual powers of use and control over its participant systems to the other participant systems, then I rely on Webber (as always :-) to point up the error of my analysis. In any event I don't agonize in anxiety over this matter since, rhetoric notwithstanding, Webber (whose comments, by the way, often strike me as insightful) has neither the purview to implement his imaginative opinions about computer-system control nor the legal authority to do so. He is welcome to try, in which case he will be cheerfully and forcefully prosecuted not only under the federal fraud-by-wire statutes (in Title 2 USC?), which prevail, when I last heard, even in New Jersey; but also under the felony statutes of this state, as the actual locus of the incursion (we've done that before at this site, successfully; and we have the FBI to help us). Assuming, naturally, that he is adult and competent. BTW, I'm still waiting for those accounts for my friends, based on the value of their postings to the rest of the net (not on mine, which was not what I said, and in any event their merit will be up to the net, not to Webber, to judge -- by his own succinct argument). The joys of the net ... MH
joe@logi-dc.UUCP (Joe Dzikiewicz) (03/31/88)
In article <511@fig.bbn.com>, rsalz@bbn.com (Rich Salz) writes: > > And, in an effort to prove that he is either unaware of the fundamental > documents of the US,* or to prove that Max is write, Bob Webber writes: > >There is no more or less a ``right to Usenet Access'' than there is a > >right to ``life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'' > Hate to tell you this, but there is no legal right to "the pursuit of happiness" in this here USA. That phrase comes from the Declaration of Indiana (or something like that). Said document has no legal weight. The applicable right in the Constitution is, I believe, in the 14th amendment and reads "...right to life, liberty, and property..." Thus, you have the right to property, but not the right to pursue happiness with your property. Thus, Bob Webber is apparently not so unaware of our fundamental documents as may seem at first glance... Joe Dzikiewicz joe@logi-dc
fmayhar@gryphon.CTS.COM (Frank Mayhar) (04/05/88)
In article <173@logi-dc.UUCP> joe@logi-dc.UUCP (Joe Dzikiewicz) writes: >In article <511@fig.bbn.com>, rsalz@bbn.com (Rich Salz) writes: >> >> And, in an effort to prove that he is either unaware of the fundamental >> documents of the US,* or to prove that Max is write, Bob Webber writes: >> >There is no more or less a ``right to Usenet Access'' than there is a >> >right to ``life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.'' >> > >Hate to tell you this, but there is no legal right to "the pursuit of >happiness" in this here USA. That phrase comes from the Declaration of >Indiana (or something like that). Said document has no legal weight. > >The applicable right in the Constitution is, I believe, in the 14th amendment >and reads > > "...right to life, liberty, and property..." >[...] > joe@logi-dc Well, you were close, but you don't get the cigar. The D of I does, indeed, mention an inalienable right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Unfortunately for us Libertarians, though, the Constitution doesn't guarantee life, liberty, and property. The right to property was a Lockeian concept, as I remember it, and narrowly missed being put in both documents. I may be wrong, but it seems like the Federalists, notably Hamilton, were the primary opponents of a "right to property." Now, what is this doing in news.admin? Followups are hereby redirected to talk. politics.misc, or whereever. Frank Mayhar (fmayhar@killer.uucp, when killer is back, until then I'm fmayhar@pnet02.uucp) (or something like that) Frank-Mayhar%ladc@BCO-MULTICS.ARPA indeed, mention a