Apologies for the long delay, but I have been "disconnected" for the
last ten days.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
[a bunch of straw-man crap about how corporations are voluntarily
implementing privacy-sensitivity in their information collecting
practices, completely missing the point and utterly ignoring the
fact that this thread grew out of HIS post containing this statement:]
[from 00/7/19, scolding Tim May:]
>Nobody ever said "there will be no private databases". What are you, some
>kind of illiterate bimbo?? What the CFIP says is "there should be no SECRET
>databases of PERSONAL information".. for somebody who claims to be versed
>in the arcane art of cryptography, you seem to have problems handling short
>English sentences ...
He has now wandered off into tiresome explanations of how
amazon.com and their ilk are allowing customers to "control" how
amazon uses their personal information.
>Companies are embarking on these projects w/o legal prodding from
>Washington for the simple reasons of building customer acquisition and
>retention through a trusted brand, and to (hopefully) vastly reduce their
>direct marketing expenditures-- (again, for Tim May's clarification, since
>he desparately needs it, this is wholeheartedly capitalist...)
*Secret* databases were the subject under discussion.
> >Your argument simply doesn't hold water. There are
> >only two ways to handle this problem (if indeed it should be
>characterized as
> >a problem"). First, regulate by law the creation and use of such
> >databases. This is the "European solution" and, as a form of property
>theft,
> >is something that should be repugnant to all cypherpunks.
>
>Market forces (together w/ code) are far far stronger (and move far far
>faster) than laws, at least in cyberspace..What is happening w/ CFIP in
>Silicon Valley is just that.. most e-commerce players are trying, in some
>way or other, to build a "web of trust" - one could imagine that in 3 or 4
>years, an e-commerce player that doesn't abide by CFIP would be driven out
>of business by market forces alone (w/o any government regulation)
Again, *secret* databases would not be subject to public scrutiny
and/or discussion. Hence, it is difficult to see what "market
forces" would apply there.
> >This is why we need cash (and e-cash). Corporations
> >will almost always agree to forgo information about you if it might lose
> >them a sale. And, in the absence of law as an obstacle, the market will,
> >over time, get rid of those corporations that don't work this way.
>
>I have a degree in applied math, and I've looked over some of the e-cash
>papers -- they're cool and nifty. There are also lots of problems w/ cash
>in general, and e-cash in particular. If I start buying stuff w/ e-cash
>on the Internet, stuff had better start showing up on my doorstep, which
>means someone somewhere had to have my address, which means something
>somehow wasn't quite anonymous..
You'd think that someone with a degree in applied math would not be
unaware that there are many goods that do not require physical
delivery (music, software, movies, and of course porn). With an
anonymous payment method, all of these can be bought and sold
completely over the net without any personal information being
provided.
>e-cash might be big, or it might not.. many economists are negative on cash
>in general (whatever form it takes), since it has many problems in general
>(far outside the scope of "anonymity" that cypherpunks so crave) that I
>won't get into here..
>
>In general, though, cash is an extremely boring currency to use on the
>Internet. Cash wasn't invented (in the real world) so that people could
>transact "anonymously" (b/c they can't, even w/ cash, which I've pointed
>out in an earlier posting).. it was designed so that we wouldn't have to
>barter.. The Internet has the opposite problem: we haven't even STARTED to
>barter on the Internet yet.. we DON'T know what is currency and what
>isn't..
Degree or no, you clearly haven't thought about this very much and
your blather about the "problems" with cash and what some economists
may or may not think is therefore unlikely to be well-informed.
You are hereby sentenced to read thirty hours of Hettinga-rants on
settlement costs in digital commerce transactions.
>I would also point out that although e-cash + anonymous payments have
>existed since the 60s, profile-based payment schemes like frequent flier
>miles, supermarket rewards, etc, have proven far more popular as alternate
>currencies..
This must have been on that proto-Internet Al Gore invented.
In any case, any and all non-anonymous pseudo-currencies are
irrelevant to the discussion at hand and in general completely
uninteresting to cypherpunks.
>This is my last post for a while - I've got a software company to run,
>board meetings to attend, US senators to meet, etc..etc.. I'll be back in 6
>months or so and we'll see which scheme won - the CFIP of the nyms -- (in
>the meantime I'll see what I can do about having Tim May shipped off to
>northern Siberia,
> so he can learn the pros + cons of communism firsthand...)
Saints be praised! We won't have to listen to your shallow,
uninformed rants anymore. What an arrogant pompous ass you are!
And, BTW, those who cannot understand the differences between
economic and governmentally-imposed coercive forces are not in a
position to lecture others on the pros and cons of communism.
Oh, but I'm sure there are US senators and other Very Important
People who are breathlessly awaiting enlightenment from a genius
like you. I can hardly wait until the six months are up.
- GH
________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com
