[all pieces of this issue of JAUC have been combined into one file for 

this archive



From dfox@fc.net  Wed Jan 18 09:48:08 1995

Date: Wed, 18 Jan 1995 08:45:02 -0600

From: JAUC <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-INDEX



  THERE ARE 13 FILES (INCLUDING THIS TITLE) IN THIS ISSUE... PLEASE ALLOW

  3 DAYS BEFORE COMPLAINING ABOUT NOT RECEIVING THEM.   THANK YOU.



  =======================================================================

 

  THE JOURNAL OF AMERICAN UNDERGROUND COMPUTING / Published Quarterly

  ======================================================================

  ISSN 1074-3111         Volume One, Issue Seven        January 17, 1994

  ======================================================================



   Editor-in-Chief:             Scott Davis      (dfox@fc.net)

   Co-Editor/Technology:        Max Mednick      (kahuna@fc.net)

   Conspiracy Editor:           Gordon Fagan     (flyer@io.com)

   Information Systems:         Carl Guderian    (bjacques@usis.com)

   Legal Editor                 Steve Ryan       (blivion@sccsi.com)

   Computer Security:           George Phillips  (ice9@paranoia.com)

   Graphics/WWW Design          Mario Martinez   (digital@comland.com)



   ** ftp site: etext.archive.umich.edu    /pub/Zines/JAUC

   ** ftp site: ftp.fc.net                 /pub/tjoauc



   U.S. Mail:

   The Journal Of American Underground Computing

   or Fennec Information Systems

   10111 N. Lamar - Suite 25

   Austin, Texas 78753-3601



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



 IMPORTANT ADDRESSES -

 ============================================================================

 To Subscribe to "TJOAUC", send mail to:              sub@fennec.com

 All questions/comments about this publication to:    comments@fennec.com

 Send all articles/info that you want published to:   submit@fennec.com

 Commercial Registration for Profitable Media:        form1@fennec.com

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 "The underground press serves as the only effective counter to a growing

 power, and more sophisticated techniques used by establishment mass media

 to falsify, misrepresent, misquote, rule out of consideration as a priori

 ridiculous, or simply ignore and blot out of existence: data, books,

 discoveries that they consider prejudicial to establishment interest..."



 (William S. Burroughs and Daniel Odier, "The Job", Viking, New York, 1989)



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



 Contents Copyright (C) 1995 The Journal Of American Underground Computing

 and/or the author of the articles presented herein. All rights reserved.

 Nothing may be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission

 of the Editor-In-Chief and/or the author of the article. This publication

 is made available periodically to the amateur computer hobbyist free of

 charge.  Any commercial usage (electronic or otherwise) is strictly

 prohibited without prior consent of the Editor, and is in violation of

 applicable US Copyright laws. To subscribe, send email to sub@fennec.com



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



 DISCLAIMER AND NOTICE TO DISTRIBUTORS -



 NOTE: This electronic publication is to be distributed free of charge

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 This publication is provided without charge to anyone who wants it.

 This includes, but is not limited to lawyers, government officials,

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 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                            TABLE OF CONTENTS



 [File #1:]

 Is There A Santa Claus                               Unknown

 What Do People Think                                 Unknown

 .SIG Heil                                            K. K. Campbell

 WWW - The Junkyard Of The Internet                   Ram Samudrala

 Austin (Tx) Zeen Scene                               Josh Ronsen

 Object Technology In Cyberspace                      Chris Hand



 [File #2]

 Deadkat                                              Deadkat

 EFF Personnel Announcement                           Stanton McCandlish

 Reader Feedback                                      Our Reader(s)

 Call Security / Voice Crypto FAQ                     Neil Johnson

 There's A Body On The Internet                       Uncle Bob's NN #103



 [File #3]

 Windows And TCP/IP For Internet Access               Harry Kriz



 [File #4]

 Windows And TCP/IP For Internet Access (Cont...)     Harry Kriz



 [File #5]

 Say What? Libel And Defamation On The Internet       Eric Eden

 Jacking In From The "Back From The Dead" Port        Brock Meeks

 Announcing Slipknot                                  Felix Kramer



 [File #6]

 Telecommunications Security                          Howard Fuhs



 [File #7]

 Old Freedoms And New Technologies                    Jay Weston

 Information Superhighway: Reality                    Reid Goldsborough

 Internet Tools Summary                               John December

 LOD T-Shirts                                         Chris Goggans



 [File #8]

 Interview With Erik Bloodaxe (Chris Goggans)         Netta Gilboa

 

 [File #9]

 Review Of Slipknot 1.0                               Scott Davis

 cDc GDU #18                                          Swamp Ratte

 My Letter To Wired Magazine                          Scott Davis



 [File #10]

 Caller ID FAQ                                        Padgett Peterson

 The Pentium Bug War Ends As We Know It               James/Ted Barr

 Pentium Non-Disclosure Agreement Of Dr. Nicely       Thomas Nicely

 The Computer Nevermore [A Late Christmas Tale]       Unknown

 Twas The Night Before Star Trek [Another One]        Unknown

 Santa Claus Source Code [The Last Late X-Mas Tale]   Unkown



 [File #11]

 My Life As An International Arms Courier             Matt Blaze

 An Open Letter To Wired Magazine                     Chris Goggans

 When Bigotry Outpaces Technology                     Douglas Welch

 Letter From Steve Case: Child Porn On AOL            Steve Case



 [File #12]

 Lee Harvey Oswald Died For Your Sins                 Gordon Fagan





 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%









Date: Wed, 18 Jan 1995 09:44:40 -0600

From: JAUC <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File1



 

 [Editor's note:  Since we did not come out with an issue anytime near

 Christmas, I am throwing all of our holiday stuff in first.  Have a

 great year]



                        IS THERE A SANTA CLAUS?



 By: Unknown



 As a result of an overwhelming lack of requests, and with research help

 from that renown scientific journal SPY magazine (January, 1990) - I am

 pleased to present the annual scientific inquiry into Santa Claus.



 1) No known species of reindeer can fly.  BUT there are 300,000

 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of

 these are insects and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying

 reindeer which only Santa has ever seen.



 2) There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world.  BUT

 since Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and

 Buddhist children, that reduces the workload up to 15% of the total -

 378 million according to Population Reference Bureau.  At an average

 (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million

 homes.  One presumes there's at least one good child in each.



 3) Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the

 different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he

 travels east to west (which seems logical).  This works out to 822.6

 visits per second.  That is to say that for each Christian household

 with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of

 the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the

 remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left,

 get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the

 next house.  Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly

 distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false

 but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are now

 talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75-1/2 million

 miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once

 every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc.



 This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second,

 3,000 times the speed of sound.  For purposes of comparison, the

 fastest man-made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at

 a poky 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops,

 15 miles per hour.



 4) The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element.

 Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego

 set (2 pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting

 Santa, who is invariably described as overweight.  On land,

 conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds.  Even granting

 that "flying reindeer" (see point #1) could pull TEN TIMES the normal

 amount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even nine.  We need

 214,200 reindeer.  This increases the payload - not even counting the

 weight of the sleigh - to 353,430 tons.  Again, for comparison - this

 is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth.



 5) 353,000 tons travelling at 650 miles per second creates enormous

 air resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as

 spacecrafts re-entering the earth's atmosphere.  The lead pair of

 reindeer will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy.  Per second.

 Each.  In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously,

 exposing the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in

 their wake.  The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26

 thousandths of a second.  Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to

 centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater than gravity.  A 250-pound

 Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of

 his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.



 In conclusion - If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve,

 he's dead now.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                          WHAT DO PEOPLE THINK?



 [Editor's Note:  This was sent to us from a person who thought this

 was funny...and indeed it was.  But I was blown back by trying to

 discover how (or WHAT) this person was thinking... In order not to

 reveal any company or the stupidity of some people, I have deleted

 the name of the author, and removed the name of the computer company

 and replaced their name with [COMPUTER COMPANY].  The

 company is a Fortune 500 company in Texas.



 Subj:      [COMPUTER COMPANY] Suggestion Box

 Date:      94-11-11 18:49:05 EST

 From:      xxxxxxxxx

 To:        [COMPUTER COMPANY] Sysop

 To:        Sysop

 Sent on:   America Online (using WAOL 1.5)



 Field 3 = I would like for [COMPUTER COMPANY] to send me a free

 MultiMedia Computer, Monitor, printer, mouse, and modem.  I need the

 equipment to start my own Charter business, but I am furloughed (pilot)

 and can't afford the equipment.  I'll be happy to pay for it when I am

 able.



 Please send the equipment to:



 [name and address deleted to avoid terminally embarrassing the poor idiot]



 I thank [COMPUTER COMPANY] in advance for its generosity.



     xxxxx



     Here is their response:



     Subj:      Re: [COMPUTER COMPANY] Suggestion Box

     Date:      94-11-11 23:22:00 EST

     From:      xxxxxxxxxx

     To:        AirLnPilot

     CC:        xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

     Sent on:   America Online (using WAOL 2.0)



 While [COMPUTER COMPANY] understands your situation completely,

 certain regulations delineate proper handling of requests of this nature.

 Therefore I am forwarding your message to the appropriate agency. You may

 want to  follow up with them - the address is:



     Mr. S. Claus

     North Pole, Earth



 Please direct any addition requests of this nature directly to this

 department to avoid unnecessary delays, especially here at the end of

 the fiscal year.



 Glad I was able to help,



 Sincerely,



 xxxxxxxxxxx

 [COMPUTER COMPANY]



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                               .SIG HEIL



              Holocaust revisionism goes up in flame wars



 By K.K. Campbell



 It was 56 years ago today that Germans awoke to find the Nazis had

 spent the night terrorizing Jews and destroying property in something

 called "Crystal Night." It was a trial-run pogrom for the Holocaust to

 follow.



 Once upon a time, net.news (the Internet's public discussion forums)

 was swamped with flame wars about the Holocaust. They'd be found

 anywhere -- in newsgroups like alt.conspiracy, soc.history,

 soc.culture.canada, misc.headlines, alt.individualism etc.



 One of the most persistent Nazi-apologists, Dan Gannon

 (dgannon@banished.com), wildly spammed Holocaust-denying material,

 either not understanding or not caring about netiquette -- that is, you

 post appropriate material to appropriate groups. Thousands, from dozens

 of newsgroups, complained. Gannon's posts were bad enough, but they

 always brought rebuttal and endlessly repeated arguments.



 Today, most of these debates are found in one newsgroup:

 alt.revisionism -- dedicated to discussing "Holocaust revisionism," the

 claim that the Nazi extermination of Jews and other distinct peoples is

 a "hoax" exacted upon millions of unwary non-Jews.



 Anti-racist and anti-fascist online activists continue to track Gannon

 and his pals around the 9,000-odd newsgroups. One such hunter is

 Canada's Ken McVay (kmcvay@oneb.almanac.bc.ca). McVay, 53, came to

 Canada in 1967 from the U.S. and is now a Canadian citizen (holds dual

 citizenship). He's Canada's foremost online anti-revisionist warrior.



 I've been reading his stuff for years.



                              TRUE COLORS



 "When I first got started on this, everyone was sort of out there on

 their own," McVay told eye in a phone interview from his Vancouver

 Island home. "Almost by accident, working groups started coordinating

 their efforts." McVay works closely with Danny Keren (dzk@cs.brown.edu)

 and Jamie McCarthy (k044477@hobbes.kzoo.edu), among others.



 The goal is not censorship. "I am absolutely, unequivocally opposed to

 any kind of censorship," McVay says.



 This is a real shift in McVay's thinking. I vividly recall reading

 McVay his posts from about two years ago, where he'd vehemently defend

 Canadian anti-hate speech laws.



 "I don't anymore. I think it's the biggest possible mistake." What

 changed his mind? "Dealing with these guys on a daily basis for over

  two years. Seeing how easy it is to shoot them down. And it is. The

 most intellectual among them are stupid and completely inept when it

 comes to historical research. And, of course, they are liars. That

 being the case, why on Earth would anyone want to shut them up or force

 them underground? I want to know who I'm dealing with. I want to know

 where they are. And I want to know how their minds work."



 To see their true colors, McVay and compatriots badger and prod

 revisionists until they drop the scholarly pretense by, say, calling

 McVay a "Jew-lover" or complaining Hitler unfortunately missed the

 parents of some Jewish netter. It happens regularly.



 "These online discussions are not aimed at getting Gannon and his pals

 to change their minds," McVay says. "That ain't gonna happen. It's to

 reach the rest - - such as the new users that pop up every September in

 universities and stumble on this stuff. Many don't know how Nazis

 operate. Most racists don't go around with a little patch on their

 shoulder proclaiming: `I hate Jews, or blacks, or natives.' But it's

 there. We work to bring it out in the open."



                         A.R. AS TESTING GROUND



 McVay and company are working on putting together a book, a primer on

 Holocaust-denial techniques. (He hasn't approached a publisher yet.)

 You often see the results of this ongoing research in alt.revisionism .

 McVay chuckles about having rabid anti-Semites ever at hand to help

 write it.



 "We throw out a chapter when we think it's done, content-wise. If the

 revisionists ignore it completely, then we know it's finished. If they

 respond, we say, `Ah! We missed that trick, calling a maple tree a

 Porsche.' So we add that argument in." A month later, they upload the

 chapter again.



 McVay says the "classic" revisionist tactic is misrepresentation of

 text. Outright lies.



 "They'll cite a historical text: `K.K. Campbell says on page 82 of his

 famous book that nobody died at Auschwitz.' Then you go to the Library

 of Congress and look up K.K. Campbell, page 82, and what you find he

 really said was, `It was a nice day at Dachau.' They get away with this

 because they know goddamn well most people don't have time to rush off

 to the Library of Congress. But people read that and say to themselves,

 `Who would lie about such a thing when it's so easy to prove them

 wrong? They must be telling the truth.' "



 The years of refutation have resulted in anti-revisionists transcribing

 mass amounts of death camp evidence and testimony into computer text

 files. McVay saved them. Soon netters requested the material. It began

 to take up so much time, he automated the process. You send an email

 request, the computer sends you back the file(s).



 The archive is now maybe 60 megs and may swell to over a gig in 1995.

 Write email to listserv@almanac.bc.ca with the message GET HOLOCAUST/INDEX --

 you'll be sent a huge index of Holocaust files (other files, too, on

 fascist racist-right groups). If you like the convenience of gopher,

 check out jerusalem1.datasrv.co.il .



 Revisionists often assert McVay "secretly" gets operating funds from

 Jews.



 "I don't," McVay says. "The hard-drives are spread out on a table with

 a Canadian Tire fan blowing right at them. I can't afford to replace

 things, if it breaks, it's gone. However, I'm upfront -- if I get

 support money, I'll take it, Jewish or not. The fact that a Jewish

 organization would offer several grand to help wouldn't change the

 value of the historical data." He'd like to put it all on CD-ROM.



 "The Internet has to be a revisionist's worst communications

 nightmare," McVay says. "They can't ignore it, because, as you and I

 know, in 10-15 years everyone in North America is going to read stuff

 through the Internet.



 "And that's the beauty of the Internet: once it's refuted in an honest

 and academic fashion, you can't run away from it," McVay says.



 When the latest revisionist recruit charges in with the same old

 pamphlets, it's almost effortless for anyone to request a file and

 reply: "We covered this two years ago. Here is the massive refutation

 of that so-called scholarly report."



 It's there. For everyone. Forever.



 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 Retransmit freely in cyberspace        Author holds standard copyright

 Full issues of eye in archive                    gopher://interlog.com

 Coupla Mailing lists available             http://www.interlog.com/eye

 eye@interlog.com      "Break the Gutenberg Lock..."       416-971-8421



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



           THE WORLD WIDE WEB - The JUNKYARD OF THE INTERNET



 By Ram Samudrala (ram@mbisgi.umd.edu)



 [Author's Note:]

 I am not completely happy with this, especially the second part,

 because when I started writing this I had a lot of ideas about it and

 now I seem to have run dry.  But I went ahead and finished it anyway,

 before I lost all interest.   Feel free to post this wherever...

 For those of you who are familiar with the workings of the web, you

 can skip to The Junkyard of the Internet.

 ------



     The World Wide Web



 About a year or so ago, there were about 500 HyperText Transfer Protocol

 (HTTP) servers on the World Wide Web (www).  Now, every other person on

 the Internet with some basic computing experience can install their own

 server and provide information (I'm using the world quite liberally here)

 to the web.  I wonder if Tim Berniers-Lee, the person who started the

 www project at CERN, really thought it would become the thing that

 revolutionized the Internet and end-user computing.



 And this issue, the ability to put yourself on a soapbox and be heard by

 the world, and the subsequent consequences, is what I will attempt to

 address here.  First, what does the www give us that we didn't have before?

 By posting on USENET news, for example, you're probably heard by a lot

 more people than having a web server.  Well, the main difference is that

 anything you posted normally was lost within in a few days, so your ideas

 didn't stay around long enough for everyone to assimilate.  On the web,

 your pages are permanent, and you can promote them as much as you want

 and people will continue increasing the accesses made.  But the www

 project would probably be doomed without the software that keeps

 everything working.  Almost every w^3 browser I've used has been of high

 quality (which is absolutely crucial), but one of them, NCSA's Mosaic,

 stands out in terms of availability and accessibility for a variety of

 problems.  Marc Andreessen wrote Mosaic for X and it spread like wildfire

 when NCSA released free versions of mosaic not just for X, but for a

 variety of other platforms, again, about a year ago (September). A friend

 of mine referred to it as "The Program of the Gods".



 I happened to get seriously addicted to the www at the beginning of this

 year, but I got over it soon.  I then realized that all one needed was an

 anonymous FTP server set up and they could serve documents to the www.

 I did this initially, and this is yet another design decision that has been

 crucial---the www incorporates several existing information retrieval

 mechanisms out on the net, primarily gopher and ftp.  I never thought

 gopher would be a big hit, and with the advent of the numerous w^3 browsers

 for almost any imaginable platform, there really is no need for gopher

 clients and why have a gopher server if you can get a http one up running

 just as easily? There is only a small (depending on how aesthetically

 pleasing you want your pages to look like---one can waste hours making

 things look pretty) overhead involved in converting plain documents to the

 HyperText Markup Language (HTML), the language that www browsers understand

 and use to format your text.



 Philosophically, the idea behind the www simply takes Unix philosophy to

 the extreme.  The whole Internet is abstracted as a gigantic file system,

 and HTML allows you to specify any object on the Internet, be it a movie

 of comet Shoemaker colliding with Jupiter, gifs of paintings by Dali, a

 song you recorded on your 4-track that you have a soundfile of, or things

 you should know before you delve into linear and non-linear programming,

 by linking the locations of these objects to an anchor of your choice.

 And like Unix, a link could be anything, including other programs, telnet

 /news/mail/ftp/gopher ports, or just another section of a document.  The

 touch of button that activates the anchor is all you need to access any

 particular link---the software figures out the rest for you---if it's a

 soundfile, it'll play it.  If it's a movie or a picture, it will bring up

 the appropriate viewer, and so on.



        The Junkyard of the Internet



 This is all very nice, but what it lets you do is also access the latest

 porn clip, let you see gifs of Kurt Cobain's shotgunned face, contact your

 favourite astrologer for a consultation on-line, and do on-line shopping.

 I'm not going to pass judgement on whether these things are "wrong", but

 as the web grows, it is clear that it is the entertainment side of the web

 that is thriving.  Megadeth is probably is one of the first groups to

 commercial go all out to advertise a release on the w^3 (the CD comes with

 a sticker saying "check out Megadeth, Arizona at through the www at

 http://bazaar.com or through FTP" (or something like that), and while

 Megadeth, Arizona is a cool place to visit, it is akin to the junk mail

 with colourful pictures that you receive in your postbox. It is propaganda.



 There are a lot of advantages to having entertainment information

 available on the net---but it also results in a lot of spam.  And this

 is evident not only on the w^3, but also in the USENET newsgroups,

 where the commercial Internet provider industry thrives as millions of

 subscribers come on line and run amok.  A few months ago, an advertisement

 on the net would've been flamed to ashes.  Now there is a weak response,

 but the people who opposed this are fighting a losing war.  Advertisers

 continue to spam the net.  Not to mention the increase in the number "job

 wanted" or "items for sale" ads in completely inappropriate newsgroups.

 The number of inane USENET groups created for local objects of worship

 (I am guilty of this) are numerous.  The ease with which computers can

 transmit hypermedia (pictures/movies/sounds) has not only furthered the

 www revolution but is pushing bandwidth to its limits (a state that we

 may perpetually exist in).  All this has contributed to an increase in

 the noise:signal ratio on the net as a whole, but particularly in USENET

 newsgroups and the www.



 As w^3 usage increases, and it becomes more flexible to incorporate

 some sort of a BBS-type system, like USENET, or USENET itself, in www

 browsers, then we will see a exodus from the traditional forms of

 Internet use to w^3 use, just as there is a movement from people typing

 stuff at the prompt to clicking buttons on the mouse to perform local

 tasks.  In fact, I predict that many people simply won't even figure out

 how to FTP or read news from the prompt, just like many people don't

 figure out how to do send mail from the prompt and instead type in a number

 or click on the mail icon for their favourite mailer, since they can do

 this at the click of a button.  Again, this isn't necessarily A Bad Thing.



 What this means, however, is that there will be a dichotomy that will

 exist on the Internet.  There will be people who can navigate the

 Internet only with help of the www and there will be those who can do

 both, i.e., use the prompt to do stuff.  The advantages that the

 people who do have access to the internal workings of the system is

 left to your imagination.  But what this is also leading to is the

 concentration of all the spam on the several networks that compose the

 Internet to the w^3, and hopefully it will leave the traditional forms

 of Internet use as it were.  Commercial advertisers are more likely to

 find the w^3 a more viable medium to display their wares than making

 ephemeral postings on USENET newsgroups, especially given the

 capability for multimedia plugs.  People, visionaries and otherwise,

 can put forth their agenda with ease.  Real information will be much

 harder to find even with tools like the Web Crawler.  All this will

 result in The Program of the Gods becoming a metal detector.



 Not everything has to be negative: the ability to reach the masses in

 an unprecedented way will also hopefully lead to an information

 revolution, where information will be made available free (this is

 evident in the www pages of the two camps of the San Francisco

 newspaper strike).  It will lead to independent reporting of events,

 and even though these will be biased, the perceiver, facing many

 alternatives, can discern the relevant bits themselves.  The www, more

 than anything else, will lead to a society where information is free.

 While I have always been for this, I just realized it comes with a

 price---lots of noise.  But this might push us to developing better

 software that will allow one to filter signal from noise in a

 efficient manner.



 And then of course, there's the issue of speed---there is nothing like

 the net for receiving the latest information on the fly.  Sure, it

 might be tainted, but when one's working and if, for example, one

 wants to check what the latest election results are (why one would

 want to do this is another issue), just get on your local newsgroup

 and post a message, if there isn't already a continuous thread going

 on.  And of course, we all know how the www let us view the pictures

 of Shoemaker/Jupiter collision almost as it happened.  This is

 probably the greatest advantage of maintaining a net-lifestyle.  No

 longer do we have to rely on one or two view points---you can select

 among several and information is made available as soon as it is

 disseminated.



 And what about the incorporation of computers and networking into our

 lifestyle?  We're holding the First Protein Folding Competition in

 Asilomar, CA, and the top priority is making sure we have access to

 the Internet.  We would be basically lost without this access, i.e.,

 without being "plugged in".  It is interesting how life has changed

 for some of us.  5 years ago, I hated computers and now I cannot go

 for a few hours without having access to one.  Visions of cyberspace

 as portrayed in the cyberpunk genre are still far away in reality, but

 a similar affect seems to have been achieved by the people who exist

 on the net.



 Disclaimers: the Internet isn't just about the USENET or the w^3.  I'm

 addressing only certain aspects of it.



 ram@elan1.carb.nist.gov    ...because you believe that science is the

                         greatest achievement so far of the human race

           and its long term best hope for survival and enlightenment.

                                                         ---John Moult



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                              AUSTIN ZEEN SCENE



 By Josh Ronsen (rons@quads.uchicago.edu)



 Here are some Austin zeens I've read recently. I am somewhat surprised

 on how good so many of these are, considering the somewhat stale

 nature of Austin's music scene. I've recently posted to alt.zines the

 Austin Zine Guild's "Scratch Paper" #2, which is more of an overall

 commentary on Austin Publications rather than reviews of individual

 zeens as this is. Email me if you missed SP #2, and I will send it to

 you.



 PEEK-A-BOO #10: This marks the recovery of Peek-A-Boo from a

 flirtation with blandness in recent issues, the sex issue, the

 Halloween issue, back to the glory of it's first bunch of issues. Lots

 of personality and personalities in here. An interview with Blast Off

 Country Style, a "scene girl" report (hopefully to become a regular

 column) on cute boys at a Jon Spencer show (which I missed, damnit!),

 and a page of stuff from the women who do the wonderful zeen MTM (see

 below), including a dream featuring Joan Jett, are my faves in this

 ish. Plus cool comic and xerox artwork. P-A-B is free in Austin, so I

 guess send them a dollar at 305 W. 39th St #107, Austin, TX 78751.

 They also claim to have email at boo-key@mail.utexas.edu



 SAD #1: I just picked this up today, and I like it lots. It's kinda

 tiny and is all about (surprise) sadness: people who are sad, music

 that is sad, and three pages of the sadder entries in Kafka's diaries

 (really!). Very well done. The four music reviews, Joy Division,

 Idaho, Bedhead and Timco, are rated by how likely their members are to

 off themselves. Nice touch. Cheer up the sad publisher and send 2

 stamps to 704 W. North Loop, Austin, TX 78751



 MTM #3: Another really fine Austin zeen! What's going on here? Is it

 something in the water? I missed #'s 1 and 2, and deeply regret it. A

 number of interviews here, with 7 Year Bitch, Glorium and two guys

 from Ken's Donuts. I love the witty, irrelevant questions and answers

 in the interviews. The other stuff has some very humorous and spirited

 writing, including the two editors, Lula and Alabama, trading stories

 of weird incidents in their lives, a page of "Uppity Women" you might

 not be aware of, but should (I didn't, but now I do), and an expose on

 a local strip club. This is another freebie, so sent $1 or stamps for

 this or a future issue to 2834 Salado B, Austin, TX 78705.



 RETICENCE AND ANXIETY #3: I think #4 just came out, but this is the

 first one that I've gotten (for the somewhat slimy reason that it was

 the cheapest). Written by lesbian lovers (is that really important for

 me to mention? They refer to the two interviews in #3 as being with

 "queer men", so I can call them "lesbians", can't I? Well, I will and

 there's nothing you can do about it!) who write under the pseudonyms

 R. and A. (this *is* Texas, you know, not that there is any bigotry or

 intolerance around these parts, not here!) This is very well written,

 with moving and interesting accounts of their first days after moving

 to Austin, coming out to one's grandmother, dealing with unsympathetic

 (and downright hostile!) parents and... Having two wonderful,

 intelligent, loving parents, I am always surprised to hear how shitty

 other parents can be. Anyways, interviews with film-maker Todd Haynes

 (after reading this I really want to see his film "Poison") and David

 Wojnarowicz (whose interview I have not read yet). Some political

 articles, A.'s liking for some Heavy Metal, and a photo and commentary

 of Chris Carter of Throbbing Gristle round everything up. All in all,

 an interesting look into two people's lives. Sometimes it is difficult

 to separate writing like this from fiction (I read a lot of fiction).

 After all, what is the difference between writing from someone you do

 not know and a first-person fictional narrative? R&A makes clear this

 difference. $2 and 2 stamps to PO Box 2552, Austin, TX 78768. The

 other issues have differing prices, so just send them lots of cash,

 that's all I'm saying.



 ALCOHOL, DRUGS, AND DRIVING #1: There are more issues, but I haven't

 read any, and I'm not very thrilled with this, and not just because of

 the multi-page feature on the guy who gunned down 40 people from the

 UT Tower years and years ago. I think this is unequivocally inferior

 to my zeen, unlike everything mentioned above and probably below, and

 I have a problem with anyone who does something worse than me. I mean,

 if I can do something, surely you can do it better. Also they guy's

 address is not in the issue, so I have to look it up in Scratch Paper

 #2: oops, it's not in their either, so if you really want this, you

 have to come down to Austin and get it for yourself.



 MONK MINK PINK PUNK #2: This is my zeen, and it is not out yet despite

 rumors to the contrary. When it does come out (don't hold your

 breath), expect interviews with prolific punkers God Is My Co-Pilot,

 and story-teller Juliana Leuking. Also expect a unique and exciting

 format, which is under secret development in what is only known as

 "Josh's Bedroom" (it's worth spending a night there) (anyone who gets

 this reference I'll send you a prize). Email me for details on #1, of

 which I am quite proud of, and of which I have, well, more than a few

 copies left. I have been getting a lot of promo stuff in the mail from

 MMPP's not unfavorable Factsheet 5 review, including anti-rock

 Christian literature (wow, those arguments were really convincing; I'm

 burning my record collection tomorrow!), lollipops from Atlantic

 records to entice me to go see a Melvins show, and a few actually good

 records!



 ASIAN GIRLS ARE RAD #'s 1-10: A very amusing fetish zeen on the beauty

 and wonder of Asian chicks. Sounds disgusting and perverted? Well,

 it's actually quite cute and endearing. I always enjoy this...as an

 anthropological study into intercultural relations, not because

 I'm...you know...you're not buying this, are you? Anyways, Dave writes

 a lot about his life, cool moms, astronomy, taking classes,

 dishwashing, washing dishes with Asian girls and... Like an old

 friend, but only $1 a back issue. #7 has a Shonen Knife review, and a

 picture of them reading AGAR...wow! (When God Is My Co-Pilot read my

 zeen, they verbally harassed me for not liking Elliott Sharp, really!)

 AGAR c/o David O'Dell, 707 W. 21st St, Austin, TX 78705



 LAZY WAYS #1 (?): Marc just sent me his zeen as a trade for mine, so

 right off the bat you know he is cool, although he does not live in

 Austin. Lots of gloriously positive admiration for many indie-pop

 bands that don't seem to get mentioned very often, something which I

 really admire. One more article on Sebadoh and I will barf! Stuff here

 on Allen Clapp, Bomb Pops, Musical Chairs and many more bands I have

 never even heard of (and I read every issue of the Indie-(Music

 Mailing)-List). Hurrah! Marc really likes this stuff and his

 enthusiasm only infects me with the same, despite the fact that I've

 probably listened to too much of this kind of music already. $2 to

 Lazy Ways, PO Box 17861, Plantation, FL 33318.



 BLIND STUMBLING AFTERLIFE by Elisabeth Belile: This is not a zine and

 is not from Texas, but is so marvelously wonderful that I must rant

 and rave about it. Belile writes/produces some of the best and most

 rewarding poetry that I've read in years, if not ever. Her stuff is

 very dada/surreal, and seems to be the product of some cut-up process

 that is not explained. Not stream-of-consciousness, but cut-up. I

 would quote the entire thing if I could, but my fave (since getting

 this just today):



 "These are the politics of my dream:

 1. Crush Beauty

 2. Spit It Out!

 3. Plagiarize -- go naked for a sign!

 4. Appropriate when appropriate

 5. Follow and run on angel's clocks

 6. Command them to call you, *now*."



 The book is one long four-part poem, with a (not meaning to make it

 sound trite) a strong feminist bent to it, esp the last two parts. I

 really have not pondered on it's meaning yet, just enjoyed the

 beautifully powerful juxtapositions of words and phrases. This is

 must-read stuff. $4 -> Broad Press, 2816 Avenel St, LA, CA 90039.



 While on the subject, BSAL, good as it is, no where near approaches

 the power, the emotional malaise, the surrealness of the other book

 I've read from Belile, called "AFTER WITH HOPE", which is a chap book,

 and quite an amazing one at that. I do not have the words to describe

 how great this , so just trust me or email me for more info. $4 ->

 We Press, PO Box 1503, Santa Cruz, CA 95061



 Thanks to anyone who has read any or all of this. I wrote this not

 only because I really like most of these publications, and want to see

 them thrive and prosper, but also because I am generally too shy to

 write to these people myself to praise their efforts. I figure if I

 can turn anyone on to any of these, and they send letters of praise,

 well, that's just about the same, right?



 Peace,

 Josh Ronsen

 rons@midway.uchicago.edu

 ps: I am in Austin despite the email address...



  %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



              PRESS RELEASE: Object Technology in Cyberspace



 By Chris Hand (cph@dmu.ac.uk)



 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE



 Contact: Chris Hand, De Montfort University. Fax +44 116 254-1891.

 e-mail: cph@dmu.ac.uk



 ** A Hypertext version of this Press Release is on the World-Wide Web **

 **     at http://www.cms.dmu.ac.uk/Research/OTG/Online/pr1.html       **

 ________________________________________________________________________





 OBJECT TECHNOLOGY MOVES INTO CYBERSPACE



 Leicester, England -- 28th November 1994.



 De Montfort University's TaTTOO'95 conference to be held in January will

 feature the world's first commercial exhibition held in Cyberspace.



 A number of companies world-wide have already expressed an interest in

 sponsoring a stand in the Virtual Exhibition Hall, where anyone on the

 Internet will be able to browse on-line product information and chat in

 real time with company representatives.



 "This will be just like a `real-life' trade exhibition, but without the

 hassles of travelling long distances or struggling through the crowds",

 says Chris Hand, organizer of the Virtual Conference. "Exhibitors will

 benefit since they won't have to worry about travelling costs or time

 away from HQ. In fact, it will be possible for one exhibitor to work on

 several stands simultaneously. The potential for events of this kind is

 enormous."



 Advertising space will be available both in the Virtual Exhibition hall

 and on an integrated World-Wide Web server.  Other on-line events planned

 to run alongside the real-life conference include a Virtual Press

 Conference and Discussion to be chaired by Eric Leach of the Object

 Management Group, and tutorials on working within object-oriented

 virtual environments. Internet users will be free to mingle on-line with

 the TaTTOO'95 delegates and speakers.



 Alan O'Callaghan, conference organizer, adds: "With the recent

 investments in Object Technology by giants such as IBM, it's now more

 important than ever that we bring the message to as many people as

 possible. The Virtual Conference will allow us to do this. OT is moving

 so quickly now that if you're not on-line to it you could easily miss

 the wave."



 More details on the on-line events are available from Chris Hand

 (e-mail: cph@dmu.ac.uk) and Mark Skipper (mcs@dmu.ac.uk), fax. +44 116

 254-1891.  WWW: http://www.cms.dmu.ac.uk/Research/OTG/tattoo-online.html





 Background



 TaTTOO (Teaching and Training in The Technology of Objects) is an

   international conference which in 1995 will be held in the Queens

   Building, De Montfort University, Leicester on 4-6 January. TaTTOO'95

   follows the highly successful inaugural event in 1994 which was attended

   by 185 delegates from academia and industry in the UK, USA, Sweden,

   France, Holland and Germany.



 More information:



   e-mail: tattoo@dmu.ac.uk

      WWW: http://www.cms.dmu.ac.uk/Research/OTG/tattoo.html





 De Montfort University is recognized by the World Bank as the fastest

   growing university in Western Europe. A distributed university with

   sites in Leicester, Milton Keynes, Bedford and Lincoln, DMU is

   pioneering the use of Video-Conferencing and Internet services by staff

   and students. The School of Computing Sciences, well-known for its

   expertise in Object Technology, has been operating a World-Wide Web

   server since 1993.



Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 06:33:41 -0600

From: JAUC <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File2



 

                              DEADKAT



 [Editor's note:  This stuff here is published to humor you.  We do not

 in any way condone cruelty to any animal.  This was found when one of

 our editors randomly fingered an account.  If you've been into the

 hacking/phreaking scene for a while (at least since the 80's) like

 us (the editors) you will understand all of this...if not, just read it.]



 [GeeK-Speak mode: ON]



 (#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)

 (#)                                                                     (#)

 (#)              /|narkiztik /<nightz uv $mokeBombz                     (#)

 (#)                       -=- [ANuS] -=-                                (#)

 (#)                  */* T-PHiLE DiViSiON */*                           (#)

 (#)                          PrEsEnTs                                   (#)

 (#)                                                                     (#)

 (#)            [KAT KiLLERZ HANDBooK TO THE BLACK ARTz]                 (#)

 (#)                    [THE FeLiS-MoRTiSiKoN]                           (#)

 (#)                  bY:  D-CeLLeRaTiON TRaUMA                          (#)

 (#)                                                                     (#)

 (#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)(#)



 PHuCK YEW !@#   EYE GOT GROUNDED TODAY FER PUTTiNG THERMiTE iN THE

 FiSH TANK AT SKEWL SEW HERE EYE AM WRiTiNG ANoTHER QUaLiTY T-PHiLE FOR

 ALL YEW @!#  OH SHiT EYE FORGOT THAT DiSKLAiMER THiNG, OK:



 DiSKLAiMER:  iF YEW GO AND KiLL KATz B-KUZ OF THiS T-PHiLE, EYE AM NOT

          RESPONSiBLE, THiS iS FOR iNPHORMATION PURPOSES ONLY #@!#

          IN FACT IM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANYTHING AND BY REaDING

          THIS YER AGREEING TO NOT SUE ME AND STUFF...







                    ======================================================

            /\__/\  WELKUM TO THE FELiS-MoRTiSiKON, THE SEKRUT BLACK BOOK

 DEWMED    | x x /  OF KAT KiLLiNG, iF YEW HAVE A WEAK STOMACH OR YOU ARE

  KaT -->   \ ^ /   ONE OF THOSE GREENPEACE OR SPCA FAGGOTZ THEN PHuCK YEW

             | |    PANZIE, GO WATCH 101 DALMATIONS OR SUMTHING @!!@#

            /   \   ======================================================

           | . . |

            (" "

             )



  ONE OF MY FAVOURiTE METHODZ OF KAT EXTERMINTATION IS A PLAY ON THE

  OLD HOCKEY KARD IN THE SPOKES OF YER BICYCLE TO MAKE A KEWL SOUND

  THING, IF YEW HAVE NEVER DONE THIS BEFORE WHAT ESSENTIALLY YOU DO

  IS AFFIX A HOCKEY KARD TO YER SPOKES AND AS YOU PEDAL IT MAKES A

  KEWL KLICKING SOUND..  WELL THIS IZ FOR PANZIE FAGGOTZ #@!@  IF YER

  KEWL WHAT YEW DO IZ TAKE A LiVE KAT aND AFFIX IT TO THE SPOKES OF

  YER BIKE AND PEDAL AROUND TOWN VIGOROUSLY, NOT ONLY DOEZ IT SOUND

  KEWL BUT ALSO YOU GET SUM CHOICE LOOKZ FROM ANYONE YOU HAPPEN TO

  PASS BY !@#@!



  [NoTe: Thiz method will not work on bikes without spokes,

  ie: big wheels, if you own a big wheel: get some skipping

  rope and tie one end to the kat and the other end to the back of

  your big wheel, position yourself at the top of a big hill and

  pedal downward vigorously]



  ANOTHER FAVOURITE OF MINE REQUIREZ ACCESS TO YER SCIENCE TEACHERS

  STOREROOM OR SOMEPLACE WHERE YOU KAN AQUIRE LARGE AMOUNTS OF PURE

  POTASSIUM.  BASICALLY WHAT YOU DO IS SHOVE LARGE AMOUNTS OF PURE

  POTASSIUM DOWN THE CATS THROAT AND THEN ONCE IT IS SUFFICIENTLY

  STUFFED WHIP IT INTO THE BATHTUB WHEN YER MOTHER IS HAViNG A BATH

  OR EVEN INTO A PUBLIC SWIMMING POOL.  YOU WILL REVEL IN THE XPLOSION

  OF KAT FUR AND INTESTINES THAT WILL RESULT FROM SUCH ELEETNEZZ..

  IN KASE YOU DONT KNOW, POTASSIUM + h2o (water) kauses a minor xplosion.

  THE MORE PURE POTASSIUM YEW STUFF THE KAT WITH THE BETTER THE BOOM.



  [NoTe: Another play on this method iz to stuff the kat with the

  potassium and then remark to your mom that the kat looks like it

  needz a bath, when yer mom immerses the kat in water *B00M*.. hehe

  If you want to be elaborate, talk to your mom alot about spontaneous

  combustion, fill her head with lotz of horror stories about it then

  proceed with the plan...  it will take her weekz to recover from

  the shock when FeFe goez BooM-BooM]

  [NoTe#2: ThiZ meth0d iz loadz of fun when you employ one of th0se

  panzie 'throw in yer quarterz' publik fountainz as yer detonator]



  DEW YEW HAVE A MIKROWAVE ?!?!?  iF SO THiS NEXT MeTHOD IZ DEFINITELY

  THE THiNG TEW DEW ON THoZE RAiNY SUMMER DAZE WHEN YEW R BORED OUT OF

  YER MIND @!#@!  EYE AM SURE BY NOW YEW R BORED OF MERELY JAMMiNG YER

  FAVOURiTE FELiNE iNTO THE MiCROWAVE ON HIGH FOR 10 MiNUTES, WELL HERE

  iZ A METHOD WHICH ADDZ SUM EXCiTEMENT !@#!@ WHAT YEW WiLL NEED BESiDES

  THE OBViOUS KAT AND MiCROWAVE iZ:  a) YER MOTHERZ FAVOURiTE PEARL

  NECKLACE.  b) A SHiTLOAD OF POPKORN KERNELZ !@#!@  STRiNG THE PEARLZ

  AROUND THE KAT, THROW IT IN THE MiCROWAVE AND THEN FiLL THE MiCROWAVE

  WiTH POPKORN...  KLOSE THE DOOR, CRANK IT ON HIGH AND RUN LiKE HELL #@!#

  THiS METHoD iZ VERY MESSY #!@#  THE RESULTANT EXPLOSION WiLL B MAMMOTH

  SEW MAKE SURE NOONE IZ AROUND BuT YEW WHEN YEW DEW THiS ONE !@#@!



  THiZ ENDZ PART ONE oF THE FELiS-MoRTiSiKON #@!#  PHUCK YEW !@#@!

  WATCH FER MORE QUALiTY [ANuS] PHiLeZ KUMMING YER WAY SooN !@#

  GREETZ GOEZ OUT TEW:  SKAR-TiSSUE, MuTiLaTeD-KaT [FEaR]

  SPECIAL GREETZ GOEZ OUT TEW ALL [FEaR] MEMBERZ @!#@!

  FeLiNe Exterminatorz/Anarkistik R0dentz  0H SHiT!@#  THAT REMiNDZ

  ME, EYE FORGOT TO MENTION ANARKYKON @!# OK:



  ==========================

  =      ANARKYKON '94     =

  ==========================



  EYE ARRiVED AT THE CONVENTION CENTER AROUND 5PM JUST AS SEVERED LiMB AND

  DEMONiKiZT WERE HEADiNG OUT TO GO TRASHiNG AT SMITH AND WESSON, LUCKiLY

  THEY HAD ROOM FOR ME, SO OFF WE WENT..  THE THREE OF US SPED OFF

  TOWARDZ THE SMITH AND WESSON BUILDING IN DEMONiKiZT's VAN AT QUITE

  A FRANTiC PACE ONLY STOPPING AT A RED LiGHT ONCE TO PuLL OVER AND MaCE

  AN OLD LADY WHO WUZ STaNDiNG ON A KURB.. OK, WE ARRiVED AT SMiTH AND

  WESSON JUST AZ THEY WERE KLOSING SO WE WAiTED OUTSIDE IN THE VAN UNTIL

  THE LAST EMPLOYEE HAD LEFT, AT WHICH POINT DEMONIKiZT LEAPED OUT WiTH

  SEVERED LiMB AND EYE IN TOW, WE MADE A QUIK B LiNE TO THE DUMPSTER AND

  EYE LEAPED iN..  SEVERED LiMB LiT A SMOKE BOMB TO PROViDE US WITH SUM

  DEGREE OF COVER AND QUICKLY JOINED ME iN THE DUMPZTER @!#  WE SiFTED

  THROUGH THE MEZZ AND ALL WE GOT WERE A FEW SHELL CAZINGZ AND EYE FOUND

  SUM PRiNTOUTZ FER A LAZERSKOPE PLANS OR SUMTHiNG #@!#  OK BACK TO THA

  KONVENTION CENTER #!@#  WHEN WE ARRiVED WE WERE GiVEN OUR NAMETAGZ AND

  SHuFFLED OFF TEW A ROOM WHERE A FEW TALKZ WERE GIVEN ON TERRORIZM AND A

  FEW BORING LEKTUREZ ON SNEAKING INTO BUILDINGZ AND LOCK PICKING #!@

  EYE RAN INTO RANCiD MEAT AT THE LEKTUREZ AND HE INVITED ME UP TO HIZ

  ROOM TO LOOK AT HIZ CHEMICAL WEAPONS, WHEN WE GOT UP THERE HE SUGGEZTED

  WE TEAR GAZ THE LOBBY, WHICH WE DID... NEEDLEZZ TO SAY THE POLIZE

  SHOWED AND THA KONVENTION ENDED EaRLY @!#!@  PHUCK YEW !@#@! EYE GOTTa

  GO NOW..



                                  D-CeLLeRaTiON TRaUMA

                                  [ANuS] '94

                                  $@#!$#@$@$^M



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%





                      EFF PERSONNEL ANNOUNCEMENTS



 By Stanton McCandlish (mech@eff.org)



 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE



 Personnel Announcements at EFF.

 Contact: EFF: Andrew Taubman <drew@eff.org>, +1 202 861 7700



 The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) announced today several

 significant personnel changes. EFF is a non-profit, public interest

 organization that seeks to protect and enhance the growth of "Cyberspace"

 (the Global Information Infrastructure) as a diverse, free, responsible

 and empowering environment.



 David Johnson has been named Chair of the EFF Board of Directors and

 Senior Policy Fellow of EFF. Johnson, an EFF Board member since 1993,

 has been practicing computer law with the Washington, DC, law firm of

 Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering. He has direct experience with computer networks

 as Chairman of LEXIS Counsel Connect (an on-line system for lawyers).

 He joins Andrew Taubman, Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer,

 who began at EFF in September  of 1994.



 Esther Dyson has been named Vice-Chair and will serve on the EFF Executive

 Committee. Dyson is President of EDventure Holdings Inc., a venture

 capital firm focused on emerging  information technologies, particularly in

 Eastern Europe. Dyson is a member of the US National Information

 Infrastructure Advisory Council, has board memberships at the Global

 Business Network, Perot Systems, the Santa Fe Institute, and is a founding

 member of the Software  Publishers Association.



 Johnson and Dyson join David J. Farber and Rob Glaser on the EFF

 Executive Committee. Farber holds the Alfred Fitler Moore Professorship

 of Telecommunications at the University of Pennsylvania, is a fellow at the

 Annenberg School for Public Policy and at the Glocom Institute in Japan and

 was one of the creators of many of the parts that evolved into the modern

 Internet - such as CSNet, CREN, and NSFNet.  Glaser is President and CEO of

 Progressive Networks, an interactive media and services company and serves

 on such boards as the Foundation for National Programs and the Washington

 Public Affairs Network.



 EFF co-founders Mitchell Kapor (immediate past Chair) and John Perry Barlow

 (immediate past Vice-Chair) remain Directors and will continue to

 participate actively in the development and implementation of EFF policy

 programs.



 Also announced, Jerry Berman, who held the position of Policy Director, has

 left EFF. Janlori Goldman and Daniel Weitzner, who have worked closely

 with Mr. Berman over the years, and other policy staff members, also have

 left to establish with Mr. Berman a new organization to be called the

 Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT). EFF wishes CDT success in its

 new venture and thanks Jerry and his colleagues for their substantial

 contributions over the past three years.



 In 1995, EFF will continue to pursue its policy mission of protecting the

 health and growth of the global computer networks. The 1995 policy agenda

 includes such projects as an innovative new "State of the Net" report;

 studies of the implications of the global nature of the net for

 jurisdictional and governance questions; a study of the protection of

 intellectual property on networks; and efforts to preserve the free

 flow of information across the Global Information Infrastructure. EFF

 expects to continue to intervene actively to counter threats to

 computer-mediated communications networks, and virtual communities, such

 as limitations on the use of cryptography and intrusions into personal

 privacy, as it has in previous years.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                            READER FEEDBACK



 [Editor's note:  This is a response form one of our readers in reply

 to the 'Porn On The Net' article we ran in the last issue]



 By Michael Stutz (at118@po.cwru.edu)



 Hello--



 I didn't see a Letters section in this issue [vol i, issue 6] and I really

 hadn't intended on writing one, but that article -- Paul Pihichyn's rant

 on porn -- was so stupid I had to say *something*.



 Calling it all those names ("filth," "slime," etc) made it immediately

 suspect. What are these things he's talking about?  Naked people.  People

 without their clothes on.  What's so filthy and slimy about that?  Nothing.



 His fears about exposing porn to children are silly; what children know

 how to uudecode, assemble and view an image?  None that *I* know.  Besides,

 what would happen if a child saw a picture of a naked woman?



 What would happen?



 Probably nothing much.  Maybe (s)he'd laugh, I don't know.  While I'd

 hardly recommend throwing porn into the laps of kids, we have to remember

 that it doesn't do much for them, either.  We're all naked and we all have

 sex.  That this guy suggested that we don't 'need' groups like alt.sex

 is more than ridiculous -- it tells me that there's a lot of people out

 there (like him) who need help.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



           CALL SECURITY, PUBLIC KEY VOICE CRYPTOGRAPHY FAQ



 By Neil Johnson (njj@pokey.mc.com)



 Call Security, Public Key Voice Cryptography FAQ

 ------------------------------------------------



 Call Security is a shareware program which provides public key

 cryptography for voice telephone conversations. In other words private

 phone conversations. Like as in voice scrambling. All you need is a

 modem, a sound card, PC, and someone to talk to (with the same).



 This my first version of the Call Security FAQ. Its very brief but

 should get you going if you plan to use it. If you have suggestions,

 comments, or criticism, please let the current editors know by sending

 e-mail to njj@mc.com. Things like, bugs, sound card how to, modem

 init. strings etc... are especially welcome.



 Many thanks to David Colston, Charlie Merritt the authors of Call

 Security. These guys have been sharing info with me regarding this

 program in the many months prior to its release.



 This is the very first & rough draft version of this faq. Some things

 are sure to be missing, just plain wrong, etc... Your get the

 point. Trust only what can you verify yourself. This faq is actually

 bound to create more questions than it answers. Hopefully it gets you

 to use Call Security.



 Call Security FAQ Author Neil J. Johnson, email njj@mc.com



 Table of Contents

 -----------------



 1. Overview, what is Call Security?

 2. How well does it sound?

 3. What kind of hardware do I need?

 4. Where do I Get Call Security?

 5. Quick, can you tell me how to run it step by step?

 5.1 Ok how do I stop talking now?

 6. How Does It Work?

 7. What public key algorithm does it use?

 8. Is it really secure?, You, decide!

 9. Is it safe to give them my public key when i upgrade from shareware

    (512 bit key) to the registered version (1024 bit key)?, Yes,

    its only the public key!

 10. How do I set up my sound card?

 10.1 How do I set up my Gravis Ultrasound?

 11. My modem is full duplex why isn't Call Security?

 12. Are there any bugs in the program?

 13. Where do I get DSZ or GSZ for doing Zmodem transfers with Call Security?



 Answers to Questions

 --------------------

 1. Overview



 Well Call Security (CS) turns your ordinary PC into a very secure

 voice telephone.  CS also works as a general purpose data

 comm. program with zmodem support, ansi/vt100 terminal, & regular

 unencrypted digital voice. Call Security is also a general purpose

 public key cryptography program for encrypting/decrypting any computer

 file (like email).



 2. How well does it sound?



 The sound quality varies depending upon how many (compressed) samples

 per second your hardware can do. Here is a little chart.



 Sample rates:

         7600  Acceptable

        10000  sounds like good CB Radio (486 with 14.4bps modem)

        16000  Real sweet



 3. What kind of hardware do I need?



 The minimum recommended system is a 386sx with a 9600bps modem & a

 sound blaster compatible sound card. A 486 system with a 14.4bps modem

 is recommended. A 28.8bps modem is still even better! You should also have

 a copy of pkunzip to uncompress the program if you get a zipped copy off

 the Call Security BBS.



 4. Where do I Get Call Security?

 Right now the only place to get it is at the following BBS phone number.

 Note I didn't see any support for kermit transfers. I recommend using zmodem

 protocol.



   Call Security BBS

   1 (501) 839 - 8579



   - Give your full name.

   - The password is "security"

   - Use the "d" command to download

   - select transfer type like "z" for zmodem (sorry no kermit support)

   - enter file name "callsec1.zip"

   - put your comm program in zmodem mode (automatic for most comm programs)



 5. Quick, can you tell me how to run it step by step?



 - DOS stuff

    >mkdir callsec1

    >pkunzip callsec1

    >pkunzip software

 - I recommend printing the documents, readme.1st, security.doc,

   svterm.doc.



 - If your in windows exit now.



 - determine which comm port your modem is on & determine the address &

   IRQ. The DOS command msd.exe (Microsoft Diagnostic) can help with this

   task. Write this down for later.



 - determine the address of your sound card. Write down for later use.



 - If you don't have a sound blaster then put you sound card in sound

   blaster emulation mode.



 - type "security" at the dos prompt.



 - Your now in the security program.  Select option A. Make My Own

   Secret & Public Keys (cursor to & hit return)



 - Now unfortunately CS makes public key exchange a hassle. You need to

   extract your public key from your key list it (& uu encode it

   optionally), and give it to the person you wish to talk to with

   CS. The first 2 steps can be done with the menu picks. The last part

   can be done with CS zmodem, if you happen to have the DSZ shareware

   program.



   Since this is a quick start guide lets skip this for now and use password

   encryption instead. If you don't want to skip the public key stuff read the

   documentation.



 - Use menu pick J. Go To Secure Voice Terminal

   You will be prompted for info on you modem set up & sound card setup.

   Just enter the info as it comes up. For sample rate select 10,000 samples

   per sec. for a 14.4 modem, 16,0000 for a 28.8, & 7,600 for a 9,600. Note:

   if you have a 386 16/SX machine don't go over 8,000 samples per second.



 - When your done setting the modem  & sound card you will be a menu for

   where to go next. Hit the return key. You will be popped into the comm.

   program/terminal emulator.



 - Now it time for one person using CS select auto answer mode & the other CS

   to dial.



 - the auto answer person/side presses function key F8



 - the caller does the following:

   press function key F6. Enter name & number of person you plan to dial.

   Note: field are separated with spaces, tab keys won't work. Now dial,

   directions are on the screen to do this (I think you just hit the return

   key).



 - The machines will now connect. Anything you type will go on their screen.

   Anything they type will go on your screen. Note, this text is not

   encrypted.



 - When your ready to talk hit alt-s on you key board. Then select

   password mode (or public key if you've done public key exchange).

   Each side now enters the same secret password (like hello).



 - On your screen it will either indicate that your listening or talking.

   to toggle listening/talking hit the space bar. To end the session hit

   the esc key. Note: it helps if you use it like a CB & say over while

   you hit the space key (when your done talking).



 5.1 Ok how do I stop talking now?

 Well If your talking you must hit the space key to become the listener.

 To end a voice session & go back to the terminal chat mode, you must hit

 the <esc> key while you are in talk mode.



 6. How Does It Work?



 In laymans terms, each person who uses CS has two keys, a matched

 pair. One is public & the other is private. The way program works is

 public key are used to encrypt voice (or computer

 files/email). Private keys are used to decrypt the voice. Hence know

 one can listen in on a conversation (or computer file/email) that was

 meant for you (encrypted with your public key).  However you still have

 to trust the person you are talking to!



 7. What public key algorithm does it use?



 No CS doesn't use the RSA [Rivest, Shamir, and Adleman] public key

 cryposystem as featured in PGP. A bonus feature of not using RSA is

 the avoidance of RSA patent restrictions.



 CS uses QPK Quick Public Keys by David Colston. This

 public key system has been reviewed by Whit Diffee, Gus Simmons

 (Sandia Labs), and posted on sci.crypt.



 On the plus side QPK is fast. On the down side the CS implementation

 of QPK does not support digital signatures. FYI, Digital signatures are

 signed with private keys & verified with public keys.



 Like virtually all public key systems CS uses QPK to encrypt a random

 (private) session key, The session key is then used to encrypt the voice

 conversation.  This is because public key systems are too slow for

 realtime voice.



 The private (session) key encryption algorithm uses a very long many

 bit linear feedback shift register LFSR pattern which is xored with

 the voice data. To greatly increase the security, only short (many

 times less than the LSFR total length) sequences of this LFSR are used

 between transmission of a new (really) random seed for the LFSR. Hence

 a random seed constantly restarts the LFSR at truly random points in

 the sequence.



 Well I'm sure I didn't do justice to the crypto stuff, but its a start.

 If you want to know more general info read the cryptography-faq. It

 can be found in news groups sci.crypt, talk.politics.crypto,

 sci.answers, news.answers, talk.answers.  Another good faq is pgp-faq

 found in news groups alt.security.pgp, alt.answers. Once you have read

 these faqs you will have to consult the authors of CS for more

 specific info on the various crypto features of CS and QPK.



 8. Is it really secure?, You, decide!



 Well the public keys system used by Call Security, QPK ( Quick Public

 Keys) by Dave Colston has survived peer review. This is good.



 Charlie Merritt did the single private key stuff. I described this

 algorithm briefly (from a phone conversation) in question 7. Maybe

 this needs further public review?



 Also we don't have the source code so its hard to check for trap doors.

 I don't know what their motivation for a trap door is however. They want

 to make money off this thing.



 Plus all the normal stuff needs to be considered, like did some one

 put a bug (transmitter) in you sound card microphone, did they break in

 and steal the private key off your harddrive/ floppy drive, etc...



 Well you decide if you think call security is secure. I think it is

 but what do I know? Only time will tell how secure CS really is.



 9. Is it safe to give them my public key when i upgrade from shareware

    (512 bit key) to the registered version (1024 bit key)?, Yes,

    its only the public key!



 Yes, the authors only want half of your public key. This public key is

 then used to create a file which enables receiving encrypted voice

 with your larger key. Note: Non-registered versions work just fine

 with registered users with large keys.



 10. How do I set up my sound card?



 Well if you have an original mono 8 bit sound blaster you do nothing.

 If you don't have a classic sound blaster then you should put you sound card

 in sound blaster (8 bit mono) emulation. Please send me email njj@mc.com on

 how you set up your sound card to work with CS. I will add the info to this

 faq.



 10.1 How do I set up my Gravis Ultrasound?



 Ultrasound cards have two sound blaster emulators. Only the SBOS emulator

 works with Call Security. Don't use MEGAEM.



 Before you run Call Security "SECURITY.EXE" Just exit windows & type

 SBOS at the DOS prompt. You should here the words SBOS installed on

 your sound card speakers, plus you will see confirmation of SBOS

 loading on your computer screen.



 If SBOS doesn't work consult your ultrasound documentation. Or read

 the gravis faq found on the news group

 comp.sys.ibm.pc.soundcard. Other sights for gravis sound card info

 include:



                      FTP Sites                     Archive Directories

                      ---------                     -------------------

 Main N.American.Site: archive.orst.edu             pub/packages/gravis

                       wuarchive.wustl.edu     systems/ibmpc/ultrasound

 Main Asian Site:      nctuccca.edu.tw                    PC/ultrasound

 Main European Site:   src.doc.ic.ac.uk            /packages/ultrasound

 Main Australian Site: ftp.mpx.com.au               /ultrasound/general

                                                     /ultrasound/submit

 South African Site: ftp.sun.ac.za              pub/packages/ultrasound

 Submissions:        archive.epas.utoronto.ca  pub/pc/ultrasound/submit

 Newly Validated Files: archive.epas.utoronto.ca      pub/pc/ultrasound



 Mirrors:               garbo.uwasa.fi                mirror/ultrasound

                        ftp.st.nepean.uws.edu.au      pc/ultrasound

                        ftp.luth.se                pub/msdos/ultrasound



                        Gopher Sites                  Menu directory

                        ------------                  --------------

 Main Site:             src.doc.ic.ac.uk            packages/ultrasound



                        WWW Pages

                        ---------

 Main Site:             http://www.cs.utah.edu/~debry/gus.html



 Main European Site:    http://src.doc.ic.ac.uk/packages/ultrasound/

 Main Australian Site:  http://ftp.mpx.com.au/archive/ultrasound/general/

                        http://ftp.mpx.com.au/archive/ultrasound/submit/

                        http://ftp.mpx.com.au/gravis.html



 Mirrors:

 http://www.st.nepean.uws.edu.au/pub/pc/ultrasound/



 11. My modem is full duplex why isn't Call Security?



 The simple answer is sound blasters (and virtually every other sound

 card known to the program authors) are not full duplex. You can't

 sample digital sound at the same time you are playing digital sound!



 But if the authors, Dave & Charlie start making money off Call Security

 maybe they will be motivated to do a version with 2 sound cards, one

 for record the other for playback.



 12. Are there any bugs in the program?



 Well one very minor bug is the wrong help file (security.doc) pops up

 when you request help in the terminal session of the program. What you

 really want to see is the svterm.doc file when trying to figure out

 how to send/receive voice messages. As I stated before print the

 documentation files svterm.doc, securty.doc, & readme.1st before

 running the program. Remember the Call Security is not windows

 compatible, so you can't have help in one window and call security in

 the other window!



 Another feature I find annoying is that public key exchange is not

 built in to the voice session. Okay maybe public key exchange is not

 something you want to do for every call (to prevent forgery) but at

 least make it a non-default menu pick! The best work around is to pull

 a copy of DSZ or GSZ off one of the shareware sights. This will allow

 Secure Voice to perform file exchange. Then use DSZ to exchange public

 keys prior to running a voice session.



 13. Where do I get DSZ or GSZ for doing Zmodem transfers with Call Security?



 I haven't tried personally tried DSZ or GSZ yet. But here is one FTP

 sight (the SIMTEL primary mirror sight) I downloaded DSZ from while

 writing this faq:



 FTP Location: oak.oakland.edu: /pub/msdos/zmodem

 dsz-read.me A  516    890115  Explains what DSZ program is

 dsz0920.zip B  91253  940930  X/Y/Zmodem protocol file transfer pgm

 txzm241.zip B  42734  941005  Texas Zmodem: Fast/free Zmodem prot. driver

 gsz0920.zip B  112428 940930  X/Y/ZMODEM driver with graphic file xfer



 For more info on shareware sights read the news group

 comp.archives.msdos.announce. Other SIMTEL mirror sights include:



      St. Louis, MO:  wuarchive.wustl.edu (128.252.135.4)

                          /systems/ibmpc/msdos

      Corvallis, OR:  archive.orst.edu (128.193.2.13)

                          /pub/mirrors/simtel/msdos

          Australia:  archie.au (139.130.4.6)

                          /micros/pc/oak

            England:  src.doc.ic.ac.uk (146.169.2.10)

                          /pub/packages/simtel

            Finland:  ftp.funet.fi (128.214.248.6)

                          /pub/msdos/SimTel

             France:  ftp.ibp.fr (132.227.60.2)

                          /pub/pc/SimTel/msdos

            Germany:  ftp.uni-paderborn.de (131.234.2.32)

                          /SimTel/msdos

          Hong Kong:  ftp.cs.cuhk.hk (137.189.4.57)

                          /pub/simtel/msdos

             Israel:  ftp.technion.ac.il (132.68.1.10)

                          /pub/unsupported/dos/simtel

             Poland:  ftp.cyf-kr.edu.pl (149.156.1.8)

                          /pub/mirror/msdos

       South Africa:  ftp.sun.ac.za (146.232.212.21)

                          /pub/simtel/msdos

             Sweden:  ftp.sunet.se (130.238.127.3)

                          /pub/pc/mirror/SimTel/msdos

        Switzerland:  ftp.switch.ch (130.59.1.40)

                          /mirror/msdos

             Taiwan:  NCTUCCCA.edu.tw (140.111.1.10)

                          /PC/simtel

           Thailand:  ftp.nectec.or.th (192.150.251.33)

                          /pub/mirrors/SimTel/msdos



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                    THERE IS A BODY ON THE INTERNET



 From Uncle Bob's Network News #103



 There is a body on the Internet!



 At the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of America in Chicago

 on November 18, 1994, the National Library of Medicine unveiled its

 "Visible Man," a three-dimensional, computer-generated cybernetic body,

 which is now available on the Internet.  "Visible Man" is an atlas of

 the human body, assembled digitally from thousands of x-ray, magnetic,

 and photographic images of cross sections of the body of Joseph Paul

 Jernigan, who was executed in Texas for murder, and who had willed his

 body to medical science.



 Using digitalized radiological data from the cadaver, researchers at the

 Heath Science Center of the University of Colorado, under a project funded

 by the NLM, compiled a virtual human body that can be viewed on a screen

 from any angle, dissected and reassembled by anatomy students, or used as

 a model to study the growth of cancer cells, for example.



 First, the real body was photographed with CT scans, magnetic resonance

 imaging, and conventional x-rays.  Then it was embedded in gelatin,

 frozen, and sliced with a laser knife into more than 1,800 cardboard-thin

 cross-sections.  One by one, the cross-sections were removed from the

 cadaver and digitally photographed.  Thousands of pictures were entered

 into the computer.



 The main users are expected to be medical schools and researchers at large

 medical centers.  There is no charge for the access but users must sign

 a licensing agreement with the NLM.  The library has already heard from

 about 300 applicants, including brain surgeons, clothing designers, and

 traffic safety crash testers.  According to NLM director Donald A. B.

 Lindburg, "People are awestruck by how detailed and good the images are."



 Don't expect to download "Visible Man" at home: the program is so complex

 it will require up to two weeks of Internet time to download and a

 capacity on the receiving computer of 15 gigabytes--or 15,000 megabytes.



 The project, costing $1.4 million, will continue next year with phase two:

 "Visible Woman."



 (compiled from news reports in The Richmond Times-Dispatch, The

 Washington Post, and The New York Times)



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%









































 



Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 06:55:18 -0600

From: JAUC <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File3



 

                 WINDOWS AND TCP/IP FOR INTERNET ACCESS



 By Harry M. Kriz (hmkriz@vt.edu)

 University Libraries

 Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University

 Blacksburg, VA   24061-0434

 http://learning.lib.vt.edu/authors/hmkriz.html



 In response to popular demand, I am publishing a new release of my paper

 on using Microsoft Windows to access Internet resources. Thanks to

 everyone who has e-mailed me and called me over the past year. I am

 delighted that the paper has been useful. I have been even more delighted

 to give permission for distributing copies at Internet workshops, and for

 copies to be posted on Internet servers. Perhaps this new release will

 find it's way into the hands of all those folks who are getting their

 first computers this Christmas. I hope this paper can play some small

 part in getting them over the rough spots.



 A plain text version of this complete document is available by anonymous

 ftp from:  nebula.lib.vt.edu in directory /pub/windows/winsock

 under filename wtcpip06.asc



 A hypertext version is available at:

 http://learning.lib.vt.edu/wintcpip/wintcpip.html



 --------

 ABSTRACT



 Internet, the global network of computer networks, is arousing enormous

 popular interest. In part this interest is being driven by the

 availability of free or inexpensive shareware software for Microsoft

 Windows. It is now technically simple for a personal computer to become

 a host on the Internet. The casual user can find, retrieve, and view

 information gathered from around the world without having to learn

 complicated computer commands. In this paper I describe the principal

 functions and services available via the Internet. Then I outline the

 technical background and terminology needed by the beginner who wants to

 make his PC a host on the Internet. Finally, I describe several Windows

 software packages and programs that facilitate using Internet services.

 All the software is freely available over the Internet.



 -------------------

 PUBLICATION HISTORY



 The most recent plain text (ascii) version of this paper is always

 available by anonymous FTP from nebula.lib.vt.edu in directory

 /pub/windows/winsock under the name wtcpip**.asc. For example, this

 version is available as wtcpip06.asc. A hypertext version of this paper

 that is maintained on a more regular basis is available through the

 World Wide Web at:  http://learning.lib.vt.edu/wintcpip/wintcpip.html



 The first version of this paper was released via Internet news and BITNET

 listserv on November 15, 1993. Revised and expanded versions were released

 on January 16, February 9, and March 21, 1994. A version was published

 by O'Reilly Associates in the March 14, 1994 issue of the "Global Network

 Navigator Toolkit," which was then accessible at:

 http://nearnet.gnn.com/GNN-ORA.html.



 Release 05 (June 21, 1994) was a major revision that was published by the

 Virginia Tech College of Engineering on the CD-ROM "1994-95 VT Engineering

 Tools." A print copy of Release 05 was also published by the Computing and

 Systems Technology Division of the American Institute of Chemical

 Engineers in "CAST Communications," Vol. 17, No. 2, pp. 6-14 (Summer 1994).



 ------------

 INTRODUCTION



 Internet, the world-wide network of computer networks, has captured the

 imagination of the general public. Eighteen months ago, the Internet was

 barely mentioned in the popular computing magazines. Now it is the topic

 of articles in national news magazines, local newspapers, and grocery-store

 tabloids.



 Awareness of the Internet has spread primarily by word of mouth.  Computer

 pundits were not discussing the Internet in Spring 1993 when I first began

 investigating the Internet in my work as a librarian. Indeed, most pundits

 seem to have acquired Internet access only in the Spring of 1994. Thus,

 computer magazines have not been helpful for those wishing to learn about

 the Internet.



 Now, in December 1994, there is something of a feeding frenzy of interest

 in the Internet. Bookstores are flooded with guides to the Internet.

 Software vendors are rushing to market with collections of software

 designed for navigating the resources on the Internet. It is almost as if

 the crest of the Internet wave has passed. Pundits who did not have access

 to the Internet last year are already writing negative opinions about the

 difficulties of navigating Internet resources, and about the uselessness

 of those resources.



 Complaints about the Internet are many. Certainly it can be difficult to

 find information and resources on the Internet. A great deal of

 information is unvalidated, non-authoritative, or otherwise questionable.

 Some resources should not be available to children. Some would argue that

 some of the information should not be distributed even to adults.



 It is important to remember that the Internet is not a service.  Rather,

 it is a means of gaining access to services and of retrieving information

 and other objects that can be represented electronically. In considering

 complaints about the Internet, one might draw an analogy between the

 Internet and New York City.



 New York is big, complicated, and disorganized. The city's myriad resources

 can be hard to find. Some of what happens or what is available in New York

 should not be seen by children. For those wishing to navigate the

 complexity of New York, there are guidebooks, phone directories, magazine

 articles, and individuals with expert knowledge about areas of particular

 interest. One can navigate the complexity of the city by subway, taxi,

 and bus. One can even hire a private guide to conduct a tour of the city.



 The Internet can be compared to the streets of New York City. The services

 available on the Internet have their analogies in the city's libraries,

 department stores, bookshops, art galleries, street vendors, and street-

 corner zealots passing out literature or lecturing the passing crowds. It

 is safe to assume that somewhere on the streets of the city there will be

 found information and services of interest to almost anyone. However,

 finding that information might take some time for someone who is new to

 the city and its resources. Similarly, somewhere on the Internet there

 also will be found information and services of interest to almost anyone.



 Traveling on the Internet requires only a few basic tools. First is a

 computer with a network connection to the Internet. A direct connection

 using a PC equipped with a network interface card that interfaces with a

 local area network linked to the Internet is common at universities, and

 becoming more common in businesses.  If a direct network connection is not

 available, an alternative is to connect to the Internet through the

 computer's serial port.  This involves a telephone connection to a terminal

 server that offers SLIP (Serial Line Internet Protocol) or PPP (Point

 to Point Protocol) service. Any of these connections can be used with a

 variety of commercial or shareware software to make your personal computer

 a host on the Internet and to access services and information from the

 entire earth. This paper will emphasize the use of freeware and shareware

 versions of software running under Microsoft Windows.



 -----------------

 INTERNET SERVICES



 The Internet services of interest to most people consist of four basic

 functions. These are electronic mail (e-mail), Internet news, file

 transfer between computers (FTP), and remote login to another computer

 (telnet). Access systems like Gopher and World Wide Web now supplement

 these basic Internet functions by assisting the user in searching for

 and retrieving relevant information in a user-friendly manner.



 Until recently, Internet functions were accessible primarily through

 character-based interfaces using a variety of complex command sets. Thus,

 until recently, best-selling books on the Internet contained page after

 page of screen displays or command sequences captured from UNIX-based

 systems executing basic Internet functions.



 Affordable Internet software for Windows first became available in Spring

 1993. Prior to that time, Windows users were dependent for Internet access

 on expensive, proprietary, commercial products in which each vendor's

 offerings were mutually incompatible with every other vendor's offerings.

 Publication of the Winsock applications programming interface provided a

 way for individual client software (such as a telnet or FTP client) to be

 compatible with every vendor's networking products. As a result, beginning

 in 1993 there was a blossoming of freeware, shareware, and commercial

 Internet software for Windows.



 Of special interest has been the development of Windows interfaces to the

 World Wide Web. Mosaic is the best known Web browser. Other choices

 include Cello, Netscape, and WinWeb. The Web was developed by the high

 energy physics community to distribute technical papers and other forms

 of data. WWW is now widely viewed as a means for educators, businesses,

 and hobbyists to distribute multimedia information to a world-wide

 audience.  Graphical WWW clients enable publication of data over the

 Internet in a manner which allows the user to view text, color graphics,

 sound, and video in a manner that approaches the usability, and surpasses

 the functionality, of a printed magazine. Those interested in publishing

 WWW documents may find it useful to read my paper "Teaching and

 Publishing in the World Wide Web." A plain text version is available by

 anonymous FTP from:  nebula.lib.vt.edu in directory /pub/www under the

 name websrv01.asc.   A hypertext version is available through the Web at

 http:/learning.lib.vt.edu/webserv/webserv.html.



 ******

 E-MAIL

 Electronic mail is probably the most widely used Internet function. A

 commonly used configuration requires that a user have an account on a

 POP (Post Office Protocol) mail server. The e-mail client software

 accesses the server and downloads any incoming messages to the user's

 PC. Mail composed at the user's PC is transmitted to the Internet through

 the mail server.



 *************

 INTERNET NEWS

 Internet news, also referred to as USENET news, is a conferencing system

 made up of thousands of topical conferences known as news groups. Those

 familiar with electronic bulletin board systems will compare Internet

 news to echo conferences. Others will draw an analogy to mailing lists

 such as listserv on BITNET. The user reads the news by using client

 software to subscribe to a selection of news groups. When the client

 software accesses an NNTP (Network News Transfer Protocol) server, the

 server downloads to the client a list of subjects for all unread messages

 stored on the server for the selected news group. The user can then select

 any message for reading, post a response to the message to the group, or

 reply directly to the original poster of the message. The client software

 maintains on the user's PC a list of all available groups on the server,

 along with records of which messages have been read or skipped over.

 Only the messages selected for reading are actually downloaded to the

 user's PC.



 ***

 FTP

 FTP (File Transfer Protocol) allows the transfer of files between any two

 computers of any type. Files can be transferred from PC to PC, PC to

 mainframe, PC to Mac, PC to UNIX machine, and vice versa. Any kind of

 computer file, whether it be a text file or a binary file representing

 software, graphics images, or sounds, can be transferred. Of course,

 whether the file is usable on the receiving machine depends on the nature

 of the file and the availability of software to make use of the file.



 ******

 TELNET

 Telnet enables the user of a PC to login to a host computer at another

 site on the Internet. The user's PC then acts as a dumb terminal attached

 to the remote host. Such access usually requires that the user have an

 account on the remote host. For instance, a student or faculty member at

 one university might have an account on a computer located at another

 university. An increasing number of commercial services are becoming

 available via telnet, including services such as the Dow Jones News

 Service and the Lexis/Nexis service. In addition, some services are

 available without charge. For example, hundreds of libraries in all parts

 of the world allow free remote access to their computerized catalogs and

 to some specialized databases.



 ******

 GOPHER

 Gopher is a system that enables the user to find files and other Internet

 services by navigating a system of text menus and submenus. As a corollary,

 it provides a means for information providers to publish information on

 the Internet in a discoverable manner. Prior to the development of Gopher

 at the University of Minnesota, information on the Internet was located

 by asking friends and strangers where to look.



 The first step in using a Gopher client is to "point" the client at the

 address of a known Gopher server. The client then retrieves that Gopher's

 menu of topics. Typically, many of the topics on a Gopher menu are

 pointers to yet other menu items on other Gopher servers. The fact that

 items in the sequence of selections might come from different Gopher

 servers in widely scattered parts of the world is transparent to the user.

 The Gopher client software presents the many different Gopher servers

 as if they represented a single application on a single machine.

 Navigating such menus can lead the user to skip from one Gopher server to

 another, literally retrieving information from servers scattered around

 the world in just a few minutes.



 Items on Gopher menus can be of many different data types in addition to

 menus listing choices of topics. When an item such as a text, graphics,

 or sound file is selected, the Gopher client transfers the file to the

 user's PC. Then, as an option, it may load the file into an appropriate

 "viewer" selected by the user.  A simple text file could be loaded into

 Windows Notepad. A graphics file in GIF or JPEG format might be loaded

 into LVIEW, a popular freeware graphics viewer for Windows. A binary

 program file would simply be downloaded into a designated directory for

 use at some other time. Finding relevant Gopher menu items is facilitated

 through the use of Veronica, which is a database of the text of Gopher

 menus. Most Gopher servers will include Veronica access as a menu

 selection.



 **************

 WORLD WIDE WEB

 World Wide Web (WWW) is a system that enables users to find and retrieve

 information by navigating a system of hypertext documents. In a hypertext

 document, selecting a highlighted word or phrase causes a new document to

 be retrieved and displayed.  Thus, WWW leads the user to skip from one

 document to another, retrieving information from servers scattered around

 the world.



 Viewing a WWW document with a Windows graphical client such as Cello,

 Mosaic, Netscape, or WinWeb is similar to reading a magazine. Information

 is displayed with typographic fonts and color graphics. Unlike a magazine,

 the static display can be supplemented by sound and video clips that are

 played by clicking an icon embedded in the document. Clicking on a

 highlighted word or phrase in the document may cause the reader to skip to

 another part of the displayed document, or it may cause yet another

 document to be retrieved.





 -----------------

 TECHNICAL DETAILS



 It is helpful to know some Internet terminology when working with your

 local network specialist or Internet service provider to make your PC a

 host on the Internet. The two common modes of Internet access are through a

 direct network connection or through a serial connection to a SLIP or PPP

 server.



 A direct network connection involves installing a network interface card

 (NIC) in your PC. Most likely this will be an ethernet card. This card

 in turn is connected to your organization's local area network. Wiring

 usually consists of coaxial cable (as in thin-wire ethernet) or twisted

 pair telephone wiring (as in 10Base-T ethernet). The local network in

 turn must be connected to the Internet, and it must be capable of handling

 TCP/IP data packets.



 TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) is the method by

 which data on the Internet is divided into packets of bytes. Each packet

 is delimited with header information that includes the destination address

 where the packet is to be routed when it is transmitted over the Internet.

 The local network and your PC may also be using other network protocols

 simultaneously with TCP/IP. For instance, your PC may already be connected

 to a network using Novell, LANtastic, or Windows for Workgroups network

 protocols.



 ***************

 SOFTWARE LAYERS

 Several layers of software are involved in implementing a direct network

 connection. A commonly used method is to first install a piece of software

 called a packet driver that deals directly with the network interface

 card. This is loaded under DOS from the AUTOEXEC.BAT file as a TSR

 (terminate and stay resident) program.  A packet driver should be included

 with the software that comes with the card. If the manufacturer of the card

 does not supply a packet driver, free packet drivers are available in the

 Crynwr Packet Driver Collection as described at the end of this document.



 The next layer of software is the TCP/IP driver, which can be implemented

 in a variety of ways. Until recently, this was often another DOS TSR

 program loaded from the AUTOEXEC.BAT file.  Increasingly this layer of

 software is implemented as a Windows dynamic link library (DLL) or virtual

 device driver (VxD). The DLL and VxD implementations do not require any

 modification of the boot files on the PC.



 The TCP/IP driver that implements TCP/IP functionality for the system is

 referred to as the TCP/IP protocol stack. The driver may be written to work

 with a specific network card, or it may be written to interface with a

 packet driver. In the latter case, a single TCP/IP driver can be used with

 any network card for which an associated packet driver is available. Thus,

 the packet driver specification eliminates the need for software vendors

 to customize their TCP/IP protocol stack for every network card with which

 it is used. When using a packet driver with Windows applications, another

 DOS TSR referred to as a virtual packet driver may be required to

 interface between the Windows-based TCP/IP protocol stack and the

 DOS-based packet driver.



 When a direct network connection is not available, Internet TCP/IP software

 can be used over serial lines to connect to a SLIP (Serial Line Internet

 Protocol) or PPP (Point to Point Protocol) server that provides a

 connection to the Internet. SLIP and PPP do not require the software

 drivers that are necessary with a direct network connection. The Trumpet

 Winsock shareware package to be described later has all SLIP and PPP

 functions included in the TCP/IP driver, which is configured through a

 Windows dialog box.



 SLIP and PPP are less transparent to the user than a direct network

 connection. The user first obtains an account on a SLIP or PPP server.

 Connecting to the Internet involves dialing the server using normal

 serial communications software and establishing a SLIP or PPP session.

 Once the session is established, TCP/IP software running on the PC can be

 used just as if the PC was connected directly to the Internet through a

 network card. SLIP and PPP users are well advised to settle for nothing

 less than transmission at 14,400 bits per second. World Wide Web

 especially transmits a great deal of data when images or sound are

 involved. Slow modems and slow connections will discourage anyone but the

 most dedicated user from exploring the possibilities of the Internet.



 TCP/IP client applications work at the top of the layers of software so

 far described. Client software runs independently of the type of connection

 to the Internet. TCP/IP applications frequently are referred to as clients

 because they access a corresponding server (a daemon in UNIX terminology)

 on another machine. An FTP client, for instance, is the application on the

 user's machine that accesses the FTP server running on a host computer

 located elsewhere on the Internet.



 Until recently, each TCP/IP client had to be written to interface with a

 particular vendor's TCP/IP protocol stack. Clients that worked with one

 vendor's TCP/IP driver would not work with a driver from another vendor.

 This restriction was eliminated with the development of the Windows

 Sockets Application Programming Interface, otherwise known as the Winsock

 API, or more simply Winsock. Winsock works in the layer between the

 TCP/IP client and the TCP/IP protocol stack.



Date: Fri, 20 Jan 1995 06:38:14 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File4



 

 -------

 WINSOCK



 "Winsock" is the buzzword that dominates discussion about TCP/IPand Windows.

 All of the software to be described here is based on Winsock. The

 implementation of Winsock is transparent to the user, but it is helpful

 for the end-user to know how it supports Windows applications.



 Winsock (short for Windows sockets) is a technical specification that

 defines a standard interface between a Windows TCP/IP client application

 (such as an FTP client or a Gopher client) and the underlying TCP/IP

 protocol stack. The nomenclature is based on the Sockets applications

 programming interface model used in Berkeley UNIX for communications

 between programs.



 When you launch a Winsock compliant client like WSGopher, it calls

 procedures from the WINSOCK.DLL dynamic link library. These procedures in

 turn invoke procedures in the drivers supplied with the TCP/IP protocol

 stack. As described earlier, the TCP/IP driver communicates with the

 computer's ethernet card through the packet driver.



 The WINSOCK.DLL file is not a generic file that can be used on any system.

 Each vendor of a TCP/IP protocol stack supplies a proprietary WINSOCK.DLL

 that works only with that vendor's TCP/IP stack.



 The advantage of Winsock to the developer of a client is that the

 application will work with any vendor's Winsock implementation.  Thus, the

 developer of an application such as a Gopher client has to understand the

 Winsock interface, but he does not have to know the details of each

 vendor's TCP/IP protocol stack in order to make his client application

 compatible with that stack. Winsock also eliminates the need for an

 application developer to include a custom TCP/IP protocol stack within the

 application program itself. This was a common means of implementing TCP/IP

 clients under DOS, and some early Windows TCP/IP clients also used this

 method. The use of protocol stacks internal to the client results in

 conflicts when two clients try to access the single packet driver that is

 communicating with the network card. The ability to create applications

 compatible with any vendor's Winsock compliant protocol stack resulted

 in a blossoming of Winsock compliant shareware applications beginning in

 Summer 1993.



 The Winsock standard also offers advantages to the end-user. One advantage

 is that several Winsock applications from different vendors can be used

 simultaneously. This is a marked improvement over earlier packet driver

 applications in which each application contained a built-in TCP/IP stack.

 Such applications cannot share the packet driver except through the added

 complexity of a packet multiplexer such as PKTMUX. A second advantage to

 the user is that any Winsock compliant application will run with any

 vendor's TCP/IP protocol stack and accompanying WINSOCK.DLL.



 Unfortunately, some commercial vendors of TCP/IP clients are not yet

 taking advantage of Winsock capabilities. There are still TCP/IP clients

 that require dedicated access to the packet driver, and there are clients

 that will run only with the TCP/IP protocol stack supplied by one

 particular vendor. Fortunately, the trend is for all commercial vendors

 to make their applications more usable and portable through the use of the

 Winsock standard.



 ---------------------

 SOFTWARE DESCRIPTIONS



 Once the required networking hardware is installed and an IP address is

 assigned, or once an account is obtained on a SLIP or PPP server, the user

 needs to install a TCP/IP protocol stack and a selection of TCP/IP clients.

 The remainder of this paper describes such software.



 For each application, I briefly outline the installation procedures. I do

 this primarily to illustrate the simplicity of using Windows for Internet

 access. Please be sure to read any text files included with each package

 in order to complete the configuration and to learn about all functions

 of the software.



 I have installed all the software described here for many of my colleagues

 in the Virginia Tech Libraries. With some practice I have found that I can

 install a complete suite of TCP/IP applications in about half an hour.

 Some individuals who read the previous versions of this document were up

 and running in less than an hour after obtaining the software. They

 expressed their delight at the ease of networking with Windows.



 **********************************

 DISCLAIMERS AND LIMITED WARRANTIES



 I am not an expert on anything. I am just an enthusiastic end-user of these

 products in my daily work. I have used all of the client software with a

 direct connection to an ethernet network using a Western Digital or SMC

 ethernet card with the Trumpet Winsock shareware TCP/IP protocol stack

 and WINSOCK.DLL.  In addition, I have used most of the clients with FTP

 Software's commercial package PC/TCP version 2.2. In the latter case I

 obtained the most recent version of FTP Software's WINSOCK.DLL file by

 anonymous FTP from ftp.ftp.com in directory /support/ftpsoft/winsock under

 the name winsock.exe (a self-extracting ZIP file)(November 16, 1994

 | 46,375 bytes). The Trumpet and FTP products both use a packet driver

 interface to the network card. I have also used most of the clients on a

 Windows for Workgroups network using Microsoft's add-on TCP/IP package.

 This package is available by anonymous FTP from ftp.microsoft.com in the

 directory /peropsys/windows/public/tcpip under the filename WFWT32.EXE

 (November 29, 1994 | 680,621 bytes), a self-extracting archive file.

 I also have used most of the client software through a SLIP server using

 the Trumpet Winsock. Both a dialup connection to the SLIP server and a

 modemless connection through an IBM/ROLM digital switch were used at

 various times.



 I have no experience with PPP connections.



 As discussed above, the client software described here should run with any

 TCP/IP protocol stack that offers Winsock support. If your PC is already

 using a network operating system that does not include Winsock support,

 you should check with your vendor to find out if Winsock support is

 available. If Winsock support is not available from your vendor, then it

 may be possible to install the Trumpet Winsock TCP/IP protocol stack over

 your existing network drivers using a small program known as a packet

 driver shim. Instructions for this configuration are included in the

 Trumpet Winsock documentation.



 In the following descriptions, information about version numbers, file

 sizes, and dates was verified on December 20, 1994.





 ***************

 TRUMPET WINSOCK  (TCP/IP protocol stack and basic clients, )

                  (including telnet, ping, and Archie       )



 Comment:  You need this package (or some other TCP/IP protocol stack that

 supports Winsock) before you can use any of the client software described

 later. Trumpet Winsock does not require any additional network software.

 Its TCP/IP functions can be installed over other network software such as

 Novell or Windows for Workgroups using a packet driver shim. Instructions

 for such installations are included in the ZIP file.



 Author:     Peter Tattam, Trumpet Software International

 Fee:        $25 shareware fee.

 Version:    2.0 Revision B

 File name:  twsk20b.zip    (November 3, 1994 | 179,015 bytes)

             (includes the TCP/IP protocol stack)

             winapps2.zip   (November 29, 1994 | 162,023 bytes)

             (includes basic clients)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 ftp.trumpet.com.au in directory /ftp/pub/winsock

 or by Gopher from

 gopher.trumpet.com.au under menu item winsock.



 The Australian hosts can be slow. An alternative gopher site is

 biochemistry.bioc.cwru.edu under the menu item CWRU Biochemistry FTP

 Archive/trumpwsk. You can also FTP to this address and access the

 directory /gopher/pub/trumpwsk.  However, only one anonymous FTP user is

 permitted weekdays during normal working hours from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM

 local time. Note that this site may not contain the latest version of the

 files. For example, at this writing it did not contain the most recent

 winapps2.zip file.



 Installation:



   1.) Create directory C:\TRUMPWSK and unzip TWSK20B.ZIP and

       WINAPPS2.ZIP into this directory.



   2.) Install software drivers.



       Ethernet network:



       a.) Install packet driver for your ethernet card.

           The entry in my AUTOEXEC.BAT file is:

           C:\ETHERNET\8003PKDR.EXE /B:240 /R:D000 /I:10 /E:61

       b.) Install WINPKT.COM virtual packet driver included in

           TWSK20B.ZIP. The entry in my AUTOEXEC.BAT file is:

           C:\TRUMPWSK\WINPKT.COM 0x61



       SLIP or PPP:



       No special drivers are needed because SLIP and PPP support

       are built into the Trumpet Winsock TCPMAN.EXE program.



   3.) In Program Manager, create a program group named Network.

       Use File Manager to drag and drop the EXE files in

       C:\TRUMPWSK into the Network program group.



   4.) Edit the PATH statement in AUTOEXEC.BAT to include

       C:\TRUMPWSK. This enables Winsock applications to find

       WINSOCK.DLL when they are launched.



   5.) Reboot the computer and start Windows.



   6.) Launch TCPMAN from the Network program group.

       Select Setup on the menu bar. Enter your IP address,

       gateway address, and nameserver address as assigned by

       your local network administrator. (Some SLIP and PPP

       servers, as well as some direct network connections, do

       not use permanent IP addresses. Instead, the server

       assigns a temporary IP address at the start of each

       session. If the server provides a bootp service, then

       enter the text "bootp" (without the quotes) in place of

       the IP address. On some servers it may be necessary to

       enter the dummy IP address 0.0.0.0. Some servers report

       the assigned IP address during session startup, requiring

       the user to manually enter the assigned address in the

       Setup dialog box before proceeding into SLIP mode.) If you

       are using ethernet, enter the software interrupt used by

       the packet driver. If you are using SLIP or PPP, check the

       appropriate box and enter the appropriate COM port number

       in the SLIP port box. Exit from TCPMAN. The file

       TRUMPWSK.INI will be created in the C:\TRUMPWSK directory.



   7.) Launch any Winsock compliant application. TCPMAN.EXE will

       start automatically if it is not already running. (If you

       are using SLIP or PPP, you must first connect to the

       server and start a session. This can be done with the

       dialing function in TCPMAN.) Several clients are included

       with the Trumpet Winsock, including TRMPTEL.EXE version

       0.07 for telnet, WINARCH.EXE for searching Archie

       databases, and PINGW.EXE to ping another machine on the

       network. PINGW provides the simplest means of verifying

       that you have a network connection. Launch PINGW and enter

       the name of an Internet host at the prompt. For example,

       you might try to PING ftp.trumpet.com.au. If your

       connection is working, and if the host is operating, you

       will receive a response from the remote host.



 Note:  The WINSOCK.DLL file for the Trumpet Winsock remains in the

 C:\TRUMPWSK directory. Some vendors may require that their WINSOCK.DLL be

 copied to the C:\WINDOWS directory. If you have used Winsock software

 from another vendor, but now want to try the Trumpet Winsock, be sure to

 remove the other vendor's WINSOCK.DLL so that it will not interfere with

 the Trumpet Winsock implementation.



 Tip:  The WINARCH client for Archie searching that is supplied in

 WINAPPS2.ZIP defaults to searching the Archie server at archie.au. You can

 access a different Archie server by using a command line argument. For

 instance, to use the Archie server run by AT&T, use the command line

 winarch.exe -archie=ds.internic.net.



 SLIP or PPP usage:  Trumpet Winsock includes a simple dialing function.

 You can connect to your server by manually issuing the dialing commands.

 You can also write a script that will dial and start your session

 automatically.



 PITFALL:  After dialing with TCPMAN.EXE and establishing the SLIP or PPP

 session, you must press the <ESC> key to escape from dialing mode and to

 re-enable the TCP/IP mode in TCPMAN.EXE.



 You may want to dial your server automatically without writing a custom

 dialing script for TCPMAN.EXE. A utility named DIALER can be set up to

 automatically issue the commands and passwords needed to start a session

 on your server. DIALER version 2.0A is available by anonymous FTP from:



      ftp.demon.co.uk

      /pub/ibmpc/windows/utilities/dialexe.zip

      (May 27, 1994 | 31,072 bytes)





 *******

 WSGOPHER (Gopher client)



 Comment:  A fast client with a useful system for saving bookmarks

 in a subject classified arrangement and a good help system.



 Author:     Dave Brooks

 License:    Free

 Version:    1.2

 File name:  wsg-12.exe  (December 13, 1994 | 367,860 bytes)

 Available by anonymous FTP from:

    dewey.tis.inel.gov in directory /pub/wsgopher



 Installation:



   1.) Create the directory C:\WSGOPHER and copy the file

       WSG-12.EXE to this directory. This file is a self-

       extracting ZIP file.

   2.) Execute WSG-12.EXE. The files will be extracted to the

       directory.

   3.) Create a new program item in the Network program group for

       the program C:\WSGOPHER\WSGOPHER.EXE.

   4.) Launch WSGopher and read the Help file.

   5.) Select the Configuration menu and set the various

       parameters and options as desired. The WSGOPHER.INI file

       and bookmark files are kept in the C:\WSGOPHER directory.



 *******************

 TRUMPET FOR WINDOWS  (Internet news reader and POP mail client)



 Comment:  To read Internet news, you need access to an NNTP(Network News

 Transfer Protocol) server. To use the mail functions, you need an account

 on a POP (Post Office Protocol) mail server. (I have not tested the mail

 functions in this application because I prefer to use PC Eudora for mail.)



 Author:     Peter Tattam, Trumpet Software International

 Fee:        $40.00 shareware fee. TSI has extended the free

             trial period until the final release of version

             1.0B, which is in beta testing at this time.

 Version:    1.0 Revision A

 File name:  wtwsk10a.zip   (August 28, 1993 | 167,601 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 ftp.trumpet.com.au in directory /ftp/pub/wintrump

 or by Gopher from gopher.trumpet.com.au under menu item wintrump.



 Installation:

   1.) Create the directory C:\WINTRUMP and unzip WTWSK10A.ZIP

       into this directory.

   2.) Create a new program item in the Network program group for

       the program C:\WINTRUMP\WT_WSK.EXE.

   3.) Launch the program.

   4.) Supply the address and other information in the dialog

       boxes for the menu selections File Setup and File Network

       Setup. NEWS.PRM and other configuration files will be

       created and stored in C:\WINTRUMP.



 PITFALL:  The list of available news groups on your news server is stored

 by Trumpet in the file NEWS.GRP. At times, Trumpet fails to fully update

 this file as new groups become available from the news server. You can

 force Trumpet to create a new and complete list of available groups by

 erasing NEWS.GRP before starting Trumpet.





 ******************

 EUDORA FOR WINDOWS (full featured mail client)



 Comment:  You will need an account on a POP mail server to send and receive

 mail at your PC. QUALCOMM sells a commercial version of Eudora for both

 Windows and the Macintosh.



 Author:     Jeff Beckley, Jeff Gehlhaar, and Mark Erikson,

             QUALCOMM, Inc.

 License:    Shareware version is free. The author, Jeff Beckley,

             requests that you send him a postcard at QUALCOMM,

             Inc., 6455 Lusk Blvd., San Diego, CA  92121-2779 USA

             if you find the program useful. Information about

             the commercial version is available through

             QUALCOMM's QUEST group World Wide Web page at

             http://www.qualcomm.com/quest/QuestMain.html or from

             QUALCOMM's FTP server at ftp.qualcomm.com in

             directory /quest/eudora/windows. Questions about

             Eudora can be sent by e-mail to

             eudora-sales@qualcomm.com

 Version:    Shareware: 1.4.4

 File name:  eudor144.exe   (December 7, 1994 | 292,942 bytes)

             (self extracting archive file)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 ftp.qualcomm.com in directory /quest/windows/eudora/1.4



 Installation:

   1.) Copy the file EUDOR144.EXE to the directory C:\EUDORA.

   2.) Execute EUDOR144.EXE to unarchive the program files.

   3.) Create a new program item in the Network program group for

       the program C:\EUDORA\WEUDORA.EXE.

   4.) Launch the program.

   5.) Select Special Configuration from the menu bar and supply

       the required information.

   6.) Select Special Switches and set characteristics as

       desired.

   7.) Create mailboxes and nicknames to taste.

   8.) The file EUDORA.INI and other configuration files will be

       created in the C:\EDUORA directory.



 *******

 WS_FTP    (FTP client)

 WS_PING   (ping client)



 Author:     John Junod



 License:    Free to individuals for any non-commercial use and

             for any U. S. Government Organization. Others should

             contact Ipswitch, Inc., 669 Main Street, Wakefield,

             MA, 01880, (617)246-1150, info@ipswitch.com.



 Version:    94.10.18  (WS_FTP)

             94.10.20  (WS_PING)



 File names: ws_ftp.zip     (October 20, 1994 | 113,252 bytes)

             ws_ping.zip    (October 21, 1994 |  60,496 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

   ftp.usma.edu in directory /pub/msdos/winsock.files



 Installation:

   1.) Create the directory C:\WS_.

   2.) Unzip WS_FTP.ZIP into this directory.

   3.) Unzip the file WS_PING.EXE from its ZIP file into this

       directory also. (Full source code for WS_PING is included

       in the ZIP file with the name WSPI_SRC.ZIP. Source code

       for the current version of WS_FTP is not distributed.

       However, source code for the 93-12-05 version of WS_FTP

       can be downloaded from directory /pub/msdos/winsock.files

       under the name ws_ftp_s.zip.)

   4.) Create new program items in the Network program group for

       the programs C:\WS_\WS_FTP.EXE and C:\WS_\WS_PING.EXE.

   5.) Launch the programs.

   6.) The WS_FTP.INI file remains in the C:\WS_ directory. A

       file named WINSOCK.INI is created by WS_PING in the

       C:\WINDOWS directory.





 *****

 CELLO  (World Wide Web browser)



 Comment:  Despite its age, Cello version 1.01a performs well. It continues

 to be more stable than Mosaic, and it is the best client for printing.

 It includes a useful Help system.  Configuration is done from within the

 application, not by directly editing the CELLO.INI file. Unfortunately,

 Cello does not understand forms. Users of Diamond Stealth video cards

 report problems with the mouse cursor, which virtually disappears while

 the mouse is moving. The listserv CELLO-L is busy with messages about

 CELLO development and about shareware for creating HTML documents for use

 on Web servers. Instructions for subscribing to CELLO-L are included in

 the Cello Help file. Version 2.0 is now in the hands of alpha testers.



 Author:     Thomas R. Bruce

 License:    Free

 Version:    1.01a

 File name:  cello.zip      (March 17, 1994 | 328,429 bytes)

 Available by anonymous FTP from:

   ftp.law.cornell.edu in directory /pub/LII/Cello



 Installation:

   1.) Create the directory C:\CELLO and unzip CELLO.ZIP into

       this directory.

   2.) Create a new program item in the Network program group for

       the program C:\CELLO\CELLO.EXE.

   3.) Launch the program.





 ***********

 NCSA MOSAIC for Microsoft Windows  (World Wide Web browser)



 Comment:  Users should note the alpha version designation and use caution

 about saving work in any other running applications before launching

 Mosaic. As in previous versions over the past year, simply launching and

 then exiting from Mosaic permanently reduces by some 3 percentage points

 the Windows user.exe resources on my machine. Launching Mosaic and exiting

 several times can lead to conditions that require you to restart Windows.

 However, Mosaic's previous problem of overwriting text when displaying

 large files seems to be fixed in this version.



 Mosaic is a 32-bit application that will run under Windows NT, Microsoft's

 advanced workstation operating system. Most users will be using Windows 3.1

 or Windows for Workgroups, which are 16-bit applications. To use Mosaic

 with these systems, you must first install Win32s version 1.20 with OLE or

 later. This addition to the Windows operating system enables current

 versions of Windows to run 32-bit code that is not Windows NT specific.



 NCSA recommends a 33MHz 486 with 8MB of RAM for running this version.



 Authors:    NCSA (National Center for SuperComputing

             Applications)

 License:    Free

 Version:    2.0.0a8

 File name:  mos20a8.exe (December 20, 1994 |   955,546 bytes)

             w32sole.exe (December 20, 1994 | 2,240,650 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu in directory /Web/Mosaic/Windows



 Installation:

   1.) Copy W32SOLE.EXE to a temporary directory and execute the

       program. This will extract the two component files

       INSTALL.BAT and WIN32DSK.EXE. The latter is another self

       extracting archive file.

   2.) Execute INSTALL.BAT.

       (This batch file issues the command

       WIN32DSK.EXE -d

       to extract the component files into the subdirectories

       DISK1, DISK2, and DISK3. These subdirectories will be

       created below the temporary directory containing

       INSTALL.BAT.)

   3.) Change to the DISK1 subdirectory and execute SETUP.EXE.

       This will install Win32s version 1.20 with OLE. Many of

       the files will be installed in the directory

       C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\WIN32S. If you have an older version of

       WIN32S already installed, it will be removed. You should

       allow installation of the game FreeCell in order to test

       that Win32s is properly installed on your machine. Once

       this is verified, you can erase the files and directories

       in the temporary installation directory.

   4.) Copy MOS20A8.EXE to the temporary installation directory.

       Remember to erase any files and subdirectories left in the

       temporary directory from the installation of Win32s.

   5.) Execute MOS20A8.EXE to extract the component files,

       including SETUP.EXE.

   6.) Execute SETUP.EXE to install Mosaic version 2.0 alpha 8 in

       the directory of your choice. MOSAIC.INI will be copied to

       the C:\WINDOWS directory.

   7.) Launch the program. Read the files README.WRI and

       RELNOTES.HTM to learn how to fully configure Mosaic to

       your needs.

   8.) When installation is complete, you can remove the

       temporary installation directory.



 NOTE: You can avoid the added complexity of installing Win32s and

 the substantial demands it places on your PC by using the older

 Mosaic version 2.0 alpha 2 (June 27, 1994 | 243,749 bytes).





 ********

 NETSCAPE  (World Wide Web browser)



 Comment:  Netscape Navigator is generating enormous interest at this

 writing as the logical successor to Mosaic. FTP sites designated as

 sources for Netscape frequently are inaccessible.



 Author:     Netscape Communications Corporation

 License:    Free for academic or not-for-profit use. Others,

             including government users, should contact Netscape

             Communications Corporation.

 Version:    1.0N

 File name:  ns16-100.exe   (December 17, 1994 | 706,929 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 ftp.mcom.com in directory /netscape/windows or

 ftp2.mcom.com in directory /netscape/windows.

 Frequently it is impossible to connect by anonymous FTP to

 servers distributing Netscape. The best mode of access is to

 use a World Wide Web browser and load the URL

 http://home.mcom.com/info/how-to-get-it.html.



 Installation:

   1.) Copy the file NW16-100.EXE to a temporary directory and

       run it. This will extract the component files, including

       SETUP.EXE.

   2.) Run the program SETUP.EXE by selecting the file in File

       Manager or by using the menu selection File Run in Program

       Manager. SETUP will install Netscape in a directory of

       your choice, and it will create a program icon in the

       group you designate.

   3.) Launch the program. Configure Options and Preferences to

       taste. The file NETSCAPE.INI is kept in the Netscape

       program directory.





 ******

 WINWEB  (World Wide Web browser)

 Comment:    A fast and easy browser from EINet.

 Author:     MCC-EINet (Microelectronics and Computer Technology

             Corporation)

 License:    Free

 Version:    1.0 Alpha 2.2

 File name:  winweb.zip     (December 19, 1994 |  598,873 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 ftp.einet.net in directory /einet/pc



 Installation:

   1.) Create the directory C:\WINWEB and unzip WINWEB.ZIP into

       this directory.

   2.) Move the included file VBRUN300.DLL to the windows system

       directory, usually C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM. (This file is a

       runtime library for Microsoft Visual Basic. If you already

       have a copy installed from some other application, you can

       simply delete it from the \WINWEB directory.

   2.) Create a new program item in the Network program group for

       the program C:\WINWEB\WINWEB.EXE.

   3.) Launch the program and configure to taste. The file

       WINWEB.INI will be created in the C:\WINDOWS directory.



 *****

 WFTPD  (FTP server)



 Comment:  I had not imagined I would want or need to use my PC as an FTP

 server. However, I have found this product useful on a couple of occasions

 to transfer files from an IBM mainframe to my PC. This is far easier than

 trying to FTP to the mainframe from my PC. Note that WinQVT/Net, which is

 described later, has an FTP server function also. However, the server in

 WinQVT/Net would not work when I tried to use Fetch on my PowerMac to

 retrieve a file from my Windows machine. WFTPD had no problems serving

 files to Fetch.



 Author:     Alun Jones

 License:    $15.00. The unregistered shareware version displays

             a message to anyone accessing the server that the

             owner is unable or unwilling to pay the shareware

             fee. The shareware version is limited to five file

             transfers per session.

 Version:    1.95

 File name:  wftpd195.zip   (October 20, 1994 | 147,612 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 ftp.cica.indiana.edu in /pub/pc/win3/winsock

 or by gopher from:

 ftp.cica.indiana.edu under menu item PC and CICA Windows Files/

 CICA Windows Files/Winsock Compliant Apps



 Installation:

   1.) Create the directory C:\WFTPD and unzip WFTPD195.ZIP into

       this directory.

   2.) Create a new program item in the Network program group for

       the program C:\WFTPD\WFTPD.EXE.

   3.) Launch the program.

   4.) Complete the information in the Security dialog box to

       establish security control using access passwords and

       restricted home directories for those you authorize to

       access your PC. The file WFTPD.INI will be created in the

       C:\WINDOWS directory.



 ------

 TELNET



 The glaring deficiency in the Winsock pantheon of Internet clients is the

 absence of a good stand-alone telnet client. Here is a brief description

 of some alternatives I have tried.



 **********

 WinQVT/Net



 Comment:  WinQVT/Net is an integrated package that includes telnet, FTP,

 FTP server, mail, and news reader functions. These separate client and

 server functions are normally launched from a console window. The telnet

 client is probably the best shareware Winsock telnet client available.

 You can select terminal emulations and customize the keyboard. The

 resizable telnet window includes scrollback and session logging. A

 deficiency is that telnet cannot be launched independently of the console

 window. However, if WinQVT/Net is already running, then an instance of the

 telnet client can be launched from another application by invoking the

 TNSTART.EXE program that comes with WinQVT/Net. This makes it possible to

 use this telnet client as the telnet viewer or helper with Gopher or

 World wide Web clients.



 Author:     QPC Software

 License:    Shareware registration is $40 ($20 for students).

             There has been discussion in alt.winsock and other

             news groups about the difficulty of getting any

             response to e-mail and fax messages from the author

             of WinQVT/Net. Paying the license fee may be

             difficult as a result.

 Version:    3.98

 File name:  qvtws398.zip   (December 16, 1994 | 390,960 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 biochemistry.bioc.cwru.edu in directory /gopher/pub/qvtnet

 or by Gopher from

 biochemistry.cwru.edu under the menu selection

 CWRU Biochemistry FTP Archive/qvtnet.

 Gopher access is preferable as only one anonymous user is

 permitted weekdays during normal working hours from 9:00 AM to

 5:00 PM local time.





 **************

 TRUMPET TELNET



 Comment:  This simple client is my favorite for use as a telnet viewer or

 helper with Gopher or World Wide Web clients.  Unfortunately, it lacks

 sophisticated features needed by heavy users of telnet.



 Author:     Peter Tattam

 License:    Free beta version

 Version:    0.07

 File name:  trmptel.exe    (October 13, 1994 | 71,168 bytes)



 This file is included in the WINAPPS2.ZIP file distributed as part of the

 Trumpet Winsock package.



 ****

 EWAN



 Comment:  EWAN (Emulator Without a Good Name) is a more complete Winsock

 telnet client than Trumpet Telnet. It allows printing the screen, printing

 the scrollback buffer, and logging a session to a file. It can be used as

 a telnet viewer with Gopher or World Wide Web clients.



 Author:     Peter Zander

 License:    Free

 Version:    1.04

 File name:  ewan104.zip    (November 23, 1994 | 221,051 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

    ftp.lysator.liu.se in directory /pub/msdos/windows



 *******

 QWS3270



 Comment:  Telnet clients usually emulate a VT100 terminal or one of its

 variations, the standard for connecting to a UNIX host.  However,

 telneting to an IBM mainframe requires emulation of an IBM 3270 terminal.

 QWS3270 provides this functionality. I was especially pleased with the

 easily-configured, four-color capability that makes it easier to

 distinguish protected, unprotected, and highlighted text on a VM screen.



 Author:     Jim Rymerson

 License:    Free

 Version:    3.2e

 File name:  qws3270.zip    (November 14, 1994 | 73,365 bytes)



 Available by anonymous FTP from:

 ftp.ccs.queensu.ca in directory /pub/msdos/tcpip





 -------------------------------------

 OTHER SOURCES FOR WINSOCK INFORMATION



 It remains true that the best guide to the Internet is the Internet itself.

 The best software for navigating the Internet is freely available on the

 Internet.



 Considerable information about the Winsock API, along with some application

 programs, is available by anonymous FTP at sunsite.unc.edu in directory

 /pub/micro/pc-stuff/ms-windows/winsock.



 The anonymous FTP sites that I list throughout this paper as sources for

 programs are the sites designated by the software authors as their home

 sites. These sites will always have the latest version of the software.



 In addition, copies of the software may usually be obtained by anonymous

 FTP from CICA (Center for Innovative Computer Applications) at

 ftp.cica.indiana.edu in directory /pub/pc/win3/winsock. Files are also

 available from this same address using a Gopher client. Gopher access is

 preferable because the CICA FTP server is the main Internet site for

 Windows applications. It is usually busy, and you may have difficulty

 establishing an FTP connection.



 It is the case that the collection at CICA will NOT always contain the

 latest version of software, even if a newer version has been uploaded to

 CICA by the author. CICA does not allow anonymous users to view or

 download program files from the uploads directory, where the newest

 version might still be in the holding pattern. Also, the versions at

 CICA may not have the same file dates as those at the home sites.



 There is a listserv that provides a daily listing of new uploads to CICA.

 Included in the mailing are the content of any text files accompanying

 those uploads and a list of files that have been moved from the uploads

 directory to the public directories so as to be available for downloading.

 You can subscribe to CICA-L by sending e-mail with no subject and the

 message sub CICA-L Your Name to listserv@ubvm.cc.buffalo.edu.



 There are several other Internet sites that provide mirror copies of the

 Windows collection at CICA. These are listed in the message displayed if

 you are denied access to CICA. The list of mirror sites also is included

 in the file README in CICA's directory /pub/pc/win3. These mirrors can be

 just as busy as CICA. As an example, the mirror at polecat.law.indiana.edu

 was recently removed due to overload on the server.



 When using CICA, it is helpful to download the file INDEX (ascii, about

 285,000 bytes) or INDEX.ZIP (about 122,000 bytes) from the directory

 /pub/pc/win3. INDEX contains one-line descriptions of each file in the

 collection.



 The news groups alt.winsock, and comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc carry

 discussions of the Winsock specification and Winsock compliant

 applications, as do the groups in the comp.os.ms-windows.networking

 hierarchy. Trumpet Winsock and related clients are discussed in several

 news groups in the trumpet hierarchy.



 Information about specific clients may be found in groups devoted to that

 class of client. For instance, WSGopher is discussed in alt.gopher and

 in comp.infosystems.gopher. Cello, Mosaic, Netscape, and WinWeb are

 discussed in the sections of the comp.infosystems.www hierarchy.



 The BITNET listserv WIN3-L@UICVM carries discussions about all topics

 relating to Windows, including Winsock applications. Some news servers

 carry this listserv under the news group name bit.listserv.win3-l.



 A comprehensive list of FTP'able Winsock applications is available from

 Larsen Consulting and Sales, Phoenix, Arizona, USA. To get a copy of the

 list, send an e-mail message to info@lcs.com with the Subject: FAQ.

 Nothing else should be in the message. The list is also available on the

 World Wide Web at http://www.lcs.com/.



 Frequently Asked Questions about TCP/IP on PC-compatible computers are

 answered in a FAQ written by Bernard D. Adoba. The text is posted monthly

 on the news group comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc. A copy of the newsgroup

 posting is available as three separate files from rtfm.mit.edu in the

 directory /pub/usenet-by-hierarchy/comp/protocols/tcp-ip/ibmpc.  The

 complete text of the files dated November 3, 1994 contains over 214,000

 bytes. The filenames are decidedly non-DOS, so you will want to assign

 filenames if you download from this source.  The FAQ is also available

 as a single ZIP file named ibmtcp.zip (79,454 bytes | October 29, 1994)

 from ftp.netcom.com in the directory /pub/mailcom/IBMTCP. Each of these

 sites can be troublesome. They frequently are busy or unresponsive to

 commands.



 Finally, the FAQ, and other publications about Internet software for the

 PC, can be accessed on the World Wide Web page maintained by Bernard Adoba.

 The page entitled "Internaut:  The PC-Internet Connection Update Page" is

 located at http://www.zilker.net/users/internaut/update.html.



 The Crynwr packet drivers collection is available by anonymous FTP in the

 well-known Simtel20 collection, as well as through a variety of other

 methods. The primary publicly available site for Simtel20 files is at

 oak.oakland.edu. The packet drivers are in directory SimTel/msdos/pktdrvr

 pktd11.zip       (November 23, 1993 | 435420 bytes)

 pktd11a.zip      (November 23, 1993 | 326152 bytes)

 pktd11b.zip      (November 23, 1993 | 344847 bytes)

 pktd11c.zip      (December 14, 1993 |  81834 bytes).





 An early version of this document (dated February 9, 1994) was published in

 the "Toolkit" section of the March 14, 1994 issue of "Global Network News."

 GNN is part of the "Global Network Navigator," a World Wide Web publication

 of O'Reilly Associates.  Articles in GNN are aimed at the reader with a

 general interest in the Internet and networked information. You can read

 GNN by pointing Mosaic or Cello at http://www.wimsey.com/gnn/gnn.html.



 The most recent plain text version of "Windows and TCP/IP for Internet

 access" is available by anonymous FTP from nebula.lib.vt.edu in the

 directory /pub/windows/winsock under the name wtcpip**.asc. For instance,

 this version has the name wtcpip06.asc. A more frequently revised hypertext

 version is available at http://learning.lib.vt.edu/wintcpip/wintcpip.html.





 ================================================================

 I thank each of you who sent me personal messages following the postings

 of earlier versions of this evolving document. I have now received e-mail

 about this document from individuals on seven continents. Thanks to AJO

 at McMurdo Station for sending me a message from Antarctica.



 I am grateful that I have been able to help many of you, and I appreciate

 the suggestions and information you have sent me. My efforts in producing

 this document can be only a small and indirect repayment of the debt I owe

 to the developers who produce this software and to the many Internet users

 who are so willing to share information and expertise.



 Please send error reports to me at hmkriz@vt.edu. I would be grateful for

 suggestions for improvements and additions to this document. Thanks again

 to everyone who replied to my beginner's questions over the past eighteen

 months. I greatly appreciate your patience, and your willingness to share

 your knowledge.



 --Harry

 =================================================================



Date: Fri, 20 Jan 1995 07:03:19 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File5



 

            SAY WHAT?  LIBEL & DEFAMATION ON THE INTERNET



 By Eric Eden (r3eje@vm1.cc.uakron.edu)



 On the Internet, where abnormal behavior is the status quo, tempers

 can flare in the heat of debate and word wars can last for days or even

 weeks.  It's not uncommon for users to ridicule, harass or insult those

 who disagree with them.



 But if you damage someone's reputation by trying to embarrass them in

 a public forum, you could be sued for libel or defamation.  After all,

 there's no reason to assume that the messages you send through

 cyberspace are immune from lawsuits.



 "The Internet culture right now is for users to refute speech with

 speech," says Dave Marburger, the attorney who represented Brock

 Meeks in one of the first defamation lawsuits in the United States

 involving the Internet.  "But as the Internet culture gets more diverse,

 users will start refuting speech with lawsuits."



 There have only been a handful of libel and defamation lawsuits filed

 involving the Internet so far, but as the Net grows, the number of

 lawsuits will probably increase.   If the few court battles that have been

 decided involving libel and defamation on the Net are any indication of

 how the law will be applied to the Internet in the future, it's worth your

 time to learn what's libelous or defamatory on the Internet and what's

 not.



 Other users have the right to sue you for defamation if they can prove

 you damaged their reputation or good name with false information.

 You can be sued for libel if another user can prove you have distributed

 defamatory statements about them in a public area -- such as a news

 group or mailing list.



 In April of 1993 Gil Hardwick, an anthropologist in Australia, was

 ordered by the Australian Supreme Court to pay David Rindos $40,000

 in damages because he defamed Rindos on an international mailing list.



 After Rindos lost his job at the University of West Australia, Hardwick

 posted a message in a discussion group for anthropologists that suggested

 Rindos was fired because he was a bully and had sexually molested a

 local boy.



 Rindos filed a defamation lawsuit against Hardwick because he felt the

 message had hurt his chances of finding a new job.  In a letter to

 Rindos's attorney, Hardwick wrote "Let this matter be expedited and

 done with....I can do nothing to prevent it, lacking any resources

 whatsoever to defend myself."  Like most people, Hardwick didn't have

 the money to hire a lawyer or finance an expensive legal battle.



 "He (Rindos) suffered a great deal of personal hurt because of the

 message," said Supreme Court Justice David Ipp in the West

 Australian. "The damages award must compensate him and vindicate

 his reputation to the public."



 The Internet is an informal forum and people often write personal things

 about other users, but you can be held accountable in court for making

 libelous or defamatory remarks in public forums just like Hardwick was.



 "We know that as the Internet grows, there will be more and more

 lawsuits involving libel and defamation," says attorney David H.

 Donaldson, editor of Legal Bytes, an electronic magazine that

 discusses legal issues involving computers and networking.   "The only

 question is if the number of cases will grow steadily or if there will be

 an explosion of lawsuits all at once."



 Anybody can sue you for libel or defamation if they think you damaged

 their reputation, but if you can prove what you say is true, chances are

 that you won't end up in court.



 "Make it clear when you are stating your opinion," says  Donaldson,

 "Always state the facts that your opinions are based on just to be safe.

 You probably won't lose a libel or defamation lawsuit if you can back up

 what you write with solid facts."



 For example, Brock Meeks, a full-time journalist who also distributes his

 own electronic magazine, avoided losing a defamation lawsuit largely

 because he could prove an article that he sent over the Net was true.



 Meeks was sued by Suarez Corporation Industries in April of 1994 for

 writing an investigative story about the company and its services in his

 electronic newsletter -- the CyberWire Dispatch.  Meeks had no libel

 insurance, no publishing company backing him up and a lot of legal

 fees to cover.  (His lawyer charged him $200 an hour.)  The only thing

 Meeks had was his house -- and he didn't want to sell it to pay off a

 lawsuit.



 Meeks defended his article in numerous posts on the Net, "All of my

 facts were rock solid.  Although the article was delivered with a fair

 amount of attitude, I don't believe that I'm in dangerous waters," he

 wrote.



 Benjamin Suarez, owner of Suarez Corp., filed the suit because he felt

 that Meeks had damaged his reputation and hurt his business by

 saying he was "infamous for his questionable direct marketing scams,"

 and saying "he (Suarez) has a mean streak."  To back up his opinion,

 Meeks cited accusations made by the Washington state attorney

 general's office concerning Suarez's direct marketing practices.



 In August of 1994 Suarez Corp. made Meeks an offer he couldn't

 refuse.  They agreed to settle the case for $64 -- to cover

 administrative court costs.   The company refused to comment on why

 they agreed to settle the lawsuit.



 If the case had gone to trial, Meeks's lawyer thinks Meeks would have

 been able to win anyway.  "The defendants in libel or defamation suits

 involving the Internet have enhanced First Amendment rights," says

 Marburger.  "The plaintiff has to prove actual malice.  In other words,

 the plaintiff has to show that the defendant made false statements or

 was negligent."  Marburger's only regret is that they didn't get to set

 that precedent in court.



 Although the Meeks case doesn't really mean anything in the law

 books, it does show that if you're responsible and can prove what you

 write on the Net is true, people will be less likely to take you to court.

 If

 you just make something up and your sources aren't reliable, you could

 lose big like Hardwick did.



 "You have to follow the same rules that journalists do if your going to

 write and distribute controversial material about other people," says

 Donaldson.



 The increasingly common phenomenon of online forums creates the

 possibility for you to reach large audiences, but it also creates the

 ability for you to commit defamation or libel -- something that an

 ordinary citizen didn't have to worry about in the past.  before the

 growth of online communication, people who didn't work in the media

 usually didn't have to worry about libel or defamation. "Libel laws apply

 to the Internet the same way they do to newspapers and TV stations,"

 explains former Federal Communications Commissioner Nicholas

 Johnson, a professor at the Iowa University school of law. "The same

 technology that gives you the power to share your opinion with

 thousands of people also qualifies you to be a defendant in a lawsuit."



 Like a newspaper or TV station, you are responsible for making sure

 the material you distribute -- or broadcast -- over the Internet is not

 libelous or defamatory.  Lani Teshia-Miller never meant to defame

 anyone, but when she took over the distribution of a tattoo FAQ she

 almost ended up in court.  The rec.arts.bodyart FAQ she inherited

 contained a lot of generalizations based on contributions from

 unattributed sources.  Although she listed her name on the FAQ, she

 didn't edit out several defamatory statements.  One review of a San

 Francisco tattoo artist in the FAQ said, "He's getting old and having

 problems with his eyesight.  His quality is really bad and he hurts

 people."



 After the artist hired a lawyer and threatened to sue, Teshia- Miller

 changed the FAQ's wording to reflect a more factually-based and

 less-hysterical view.   The review now says, "His eyesight is not what it

 used to be."



 After the FAQ was changed and Teshia-Miller apologized, the artist

 dropped the lawsuit.  "It turned out to be a good experience for me,"

 said Teshia- Miller.  "I'm  a lot more careful about what I allow on the

 artist list, and I now have a very long disclaimer at the beginning of the

 FAQ."



 Every person you write something negative about won't sue you for

 defamation or libel, they might flame you or just try to set the record

 straight by replying to the message.  But if you post false information

 about another user and disgrace them in public, they have the right to

 take you to court -- and they could win a big settlement if they can

 prove you were negligent.



 Medphone, a Fortune 500 company that manufactures medical

 instruments, has filed a $200 million lawsuit against Prodigy user Peter

 DeNigis.  Medphone filed a "systematic program for defamation and

 trade disparagement" lawsuit against DeNigis after a stockholder

 reported that he was making several negative posts about Medphone a

 day on Prodigy's Money Talk Forum. DeNigis, a former Medphone

 stockholder, lost more than $9,000 last year by selling off his

 investment in the company. In one post DeNigis wrote, "My research

 indicated the company is really having a difficult time.  No case, no

 sales, no profits and terrible management. This company appears to be

 a fraud.  Probably will cease operations soon."



 Although the accusation that Medphone is a "fraud" is very serious --

 and potentially defamatory -- DeNigis might be able to win the lawsuit if

 he can prove what he wrote is true in court.



 "The Medphone case is a clear indication that libel and defamation is

 something for Internet users to think about," says Johnson.



 There are court cases in progress right now that will decide if access

 providers such as Prodigy, America Online and Compuserve are

 responsible for defamatory remarks broadcast over their services, but

 there is no legal ambiguity about whether individual users can be sued

 for making defamatory or libelous statements. Individual users are

 responsible for making sure the information they distribute is not

 libelous or defamatory.



 The Internet has made world wide, instantaneous communication easy.

 The average user now has the power to be heard by hundreds or even

 thousands of other users, but in terms of libel and defamation, the Net

 is not a new world of freedom. The reality is that libel and defamation

 laws are enforceable in the virtual world just like they are in the real

 world.



                          # # #



 You may distribute this article freely for non-profit purposes.  Otherwise

 contact the author (Eric Eden -- R3eje@vm1.cc.uakron.edu) for reprint

 permission.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



           JACKING IN FROM THE "BACK FROM THE DEAD" PORT



 By Brock N. Meeks (brock@well.sf.ca.us)

 CyberWire Dispatch Copyright (c) 1994



 Washington, DC -- Nothing chills -- or inflames -- the Net faster than

 when word of the dreaded "FCC Modem Tax" begins ooze through Cyberspace.



 Well... it's back.  Sort of.



 Ruth Milkman, legal advisor to Federal Communications Commission Chairman

 Reed Hundt, said during a recent question and answer session that the

 agency might again take up the issue of the so-called modem tax.



 "Some years down the road I can see access fees [for enhanced service

 providers] being considered by the FCC," Milkman said during a phone

 interview. "But only under the scenario when access charges are reformed."



 These access charges are a kind of trip wire phrase which online activists

 have dubbed a "modem tax" when applied to enhanced service providers,

 which is another catch phrase meaning services like America Online and

 CompuServe.



 Milkman said the FCC would only consider an access charge under a very

 narrow scenario which would play out only  if "enhanced service providers

 felt that by paying the access charges they weren't contributing to a

 subsidy scheme set up for (long distance phone companies)," Milkman said.



 So, what the hell is an "access charge"?  Take a deep breath. Here goes:



 Access charges are paid by long distance companies to local telephone

 companies. Every time a company such as AT&T connects a caller in Des

 Moines with Uncle Bert in New York, it has to pay Nynex, the local

 telephone company, a fee for the privilege of carrying that long distance

 call over their facilities, commonly known as the "local loop."



 Long distance companies pay up to 40% of their entire revenues to local

 telephone companies.  That's billions and billions of dollars each year

 that flow into the hands of the Baby Bells, just for completing the calls.



 The access fees are set at artificially high rates because they contain a

 mind numbing set of complex subsidies, the most obvious one is that which

 underwrites the public policy known as "Universal Service."



 Back in the days when the FCC only had rotary dial phones (circa 1987)

 someone came up with the brilliant idea that because modem use was

 increasing at such a rapid pace, that maybe services such as Sprintlink

 (then known as telenet) and CompuServe should have to pay these access

 charges, too.



 After all, the FCC wonks postured, they carry long distance (modem)

 traffic over the phone lines?  It would only be fair to have these

 "enhanced service providers" as they are known in FCC-speak, also help

 out the impoverished long distance phone companies underwrite Universal

 Service.



 Bingo.  The hue and cry that went up from the online community (it wasn't

 yet called "the Net") was enormous.  The major players -- Telenet and

 CompuServe -- quickly branded the plan as a "tax" and thus the phrase

 "modem tax" was born.



 Dire warnings went out:  If the FCC succeeded in making enhanced service

 providers chip in for access fees, it would increase the cost of each hour

 of online time by at least $6 per hour.



 And remember, this was in the days when a 2,400-bps modem was the hottest

 thing going.  Six bucks an hour would have demolished the struggling

 online industry.



 The fallout among the nascent online community was astounding. For the

 first time in history, the "net" community rose up with a single voice and

 FLOODED the FCC with protests.



 FCC official "filing kits" made the rounds, teaching people how to file

 official comments of protest.



 The ground swell of opposition worked.  The FCC was buried in responses.

 At the time, the FCC said it was the hottest item in its history, garnering

 more response than any issue in history.



 The FCC eventually backed off.  The reason:  It was persuaded that enhanced

 service providers were still entrepreneurial companies and couldn't afford

 the burden of access fees.



 The proposal was officially dropped.  It was the first major victory for

 the Net.  And it was empowering.  The online community became educated and

 enlightened almost over night to the ways of an arcane governmental agency.

 And this community was drunk with a heady kind of power:  It could

 sufficiently affect the outcome of governmental regulation.



 Small catch:  The damn "modem tax" issue wouldn't die.



 Someone with the brains of a trout began to circulate the now infamous

 "modem tax" file.  The file claims that Jim Eason, a San Francisco radio

 talk show host had aired a segment in which he claimed to have inside

 information that the FCC was about to relaunch its "modem tax" proposal.



 The message was and is a HOAX.



 But it also has never died.  It's the Net's first "urban myth" and like

 Freddie, it refuses to die, even to this day.



 Milkman, who was on-board at the FCC during the 1987 modem tax firefight,

 sighed when explaining the complex issue:  "Part of the problem is that

 nobody is exactly sure what all the subsidies are.  Most people agree that

 there are subsidies in the access charges, but you can't break out those

 subsidies exactly."



 Another factor in play:  Sometimes enhanced service providers are really

 just reselling long distance transport after having bought large blocks of

 time from a major carrier like AT&T.  Thus, to have these enhanced service

 providers also pay an access fee amounts to a kind of double-dipping,

 Milkman said.



 As it turns out, Congress might have as much to say about a future "modem

 tax" as the FCC.  This twisted scenario turns on the tenuous grasp that

 everyone from the Vice President to Commerce Department to the FCC has on

 exactly what constitutes "Universal Service," in the era of the Information

 Superhighway.



 Revamping the 60 year old Communications Act of 1934 will be up to Congress

 this year.  And they will likely do it.  But how universal service is

 defined remains a big mystery.  And who ends up paying for and maintaining

 that public policy (which isn't about to be abolished) also remains a

 mystery.



 Don't be surprised if, when the legislative smoke clears, not only do

 enhanced service providers -- America Online, CompuServe and Prodigy, et al

 -- have to pay access fees, but also your Internet provider and your cable

 company.



 And who do you think will end up catching those cost increases?? Right.

 Your wallet.



 But for now?  Rest easy, Milkman says:  "I want to make this very clear:

 There is NO docket [open] in which the Commission is proposing making

 enhanced service providers pay access charges.  And I don't anticipate it

 coming up."



 Meeks out...



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



       ANNOUNCING SLIPKNOT: Shareware dialup Web browser for Windows



 By Felix Kramer (felixk@panix.com)



 Dear Electronic Journalist



 How long will the World Wide Web be accessible to only a small fraction

 of dial-up users?



 I'm writing to tell you about a new and important application for Internet

 users that's was released last week, and that I think should be of

 interest to you (and perhaps to your readers.)



 In one sentence, it's a graphical Windows-based browser for the World

 Wide Web, for users with dial-up UNIX accounts -- but one that doesn't

 require SLIP, PPP or TCP/IP access. (You'll find a longer description

 below.)



 It's intended to expand and democratize access to the WWW to those with

 ordinary dial-up accounts -- at a time when TCP/IP access is available

 only to a small fraction of the online population.



 Until now, access to the hypermedia-based Web has been limited to those

 with SLIP, PPP or TCP/IP access, using Mosaic and similar browsers. That's

 only a small fraction of the online population--a few million at most,

 worldwide. Unless they were willing to go through considerable technical

 acrobatics, most people with dial-up UNIX accounts were locked out of the

 Web. Many of these people are accustomed to their UNIX tools for reading

 mail and news, and don't want to switch to SLIP even if their systems offer

 the option. (We may be talking about something over 20 million people

 worldwide, with service through their companies, schools, universities,

 or Internet Service providers.)



 In journalistic terms, there are several stories here:



 1) As discussed above, SlipKnot will expand the population of users who

 can use the Web.



 2) SlipKnot is pioneering in its distribution/sale policy. SlipKnot is

 restricted shareware in its first version from MicroMind, Inc. Until now,

 shareware has generally been distributed with a simple request for users to

 register; SlipKnot takes that one step further. It is restricted

 shareware.  That means it is free for evaluation but with strong

 incentives to frequent users to register. After a period of frequent

 reminders, the software eventually turns itself off for nonregistering

 users.



 3) Registration fees or on a sliding scale. For most, the cost is $29.95.

 But individuals outside Northern America, Europe and Japan will pay $20 to

 register. A portion of the receipts will go to support refugee

 organizations (Peter Brooks, the developer, came to the U.S. as a

 refugee).





 4) SlipKnot is a case study in the new technology of virtual commerce. All

 promotion, distribution, and registration is being done online. No physical

 shrink-wrapped disk or manual is produced: users download the product with

 documentation. There is no paid advertising or direct mail: potential

 purchasers learn about it through online newsgroups, user groups, mailing

 lists, and through the press. There is no printed and mailed press kit:

 the media hears about it through electronic means -- e-mailed press

 materials and announcements. Registrants send in their addresses and

 payments through fax or encrypted e-mail, and their personal codes are

 returned to them by e-mail. All this is rapid, efficient, and economical.



 Below you'll find info on where to get it. If you want to see what others

 are saying about SlipKnot, we've attached some early reactions.



 **NOTE** This press kit is incomplete. To keep down the size of this

 message, and ensure that you get the most recent information, AT ANY TIME,

 you can automatically retrieve SlipKnot's features, list of limitations,

 and technical specifications for what SlipKnot requires on the user's

 computer and at the service provider, by sending a blank e-mail message to

 our autoreplying infobot:

 slipknot@micromind.com



 I'm a consultant to institutions interested in publishing on the net, and

 author of a book on electronic publishing as a business. I'm doing

 promotion for the release of SlipKnot.



 Feel free to forward this message to other journalists, movers and shakers

 on the net.



 If possible, please let me know if you're planning to run a story; if it's

 in online form, I'd be very grateful to get an e-mail copy; if in printed

 form, I'd appreciate getting a tear sheet mailed to me at 310 Riverside

 Drive, Suite 1519, New York, NY 10025. Please contact me or Peter Brooks

 (the developer, pbrooks@micromind.com) if you have any questions. In any

 stories, please do not publish my phone number; you can give out my e-mail

 address and fax number.



 Thanks in advance--Felix Kramer



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 HOW TO GET SLIPKNOT

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 SlipKnot 1.0, the World Wide Web browser for Windows dial-up users from

 MicroMind,Inc., is now available (right on schedule!) for anonymous ftp

 download at:



 ftp://oak.oakland.edu/SimTel/win3/internet/slnot100.zip



 or, if it's not too busy, from:



 ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/pbrooks/slipknot/slnot100.zip



 oak.oakland.edu has numerous mirror sites, so if you have any trouble

 getting it directly from there, please try the mirror sites.



 One mirror site is:

 ftp.uoknor.edu/mirrors/SimTel/win3/internet/slnot100.zip



 In the U.K. try:

 src.doc.ic.ac.uk/computing/systems/ibmpc/simtel-win3/internet/slnot100.zip



 In Australia try:



 ftp.bf.rmit.edu.au  /pub/pc/www/slnot100.zip



 (If you don't get to it for a while, please look at the distribution site

 for the latest version file, that is, slnotxxx.zip -- where "xxx" indicates

 the Version of SlipKnot. So, for instance, Version 1.0 is slnot100.zip,

 and Version 1.35 will be slnot135.zip.)



 You can also get a FAQ, focusing primarily on common installation problems,

 at:  ftp://interport.net/pub/pbrooks/slipknot/sntfaq1.txt





 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 WHAT PEOPLE HAVE SAID ABOUT SLIPKNOT

 SINCE ITS RELEASE IN LATE NOVEMBER

 (INDIVIDUALS FOLLOWED BY PRESS)

 (AFFILIATIONS FOR IDENTIFICATION ONLY)

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 UNSOLICITED COMMENTS FROM BETA TESTERS

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 "SlipKnot is a godsend for those without slip."--Walter Rice, 11th grade

 student at Central High School, Philadelphia



 "I have really enjoyed SlipKnot. After trying for over a year to get

 Mosaic to work on my PC at home, I found SlipKnot easy to install and use.

 "--Mike McKee



 "This is a fun program. A LOT of magazines lately have been talking about

 Internet and the world wide web - and almost all of them say something like

 "To really delve into Internet - you'll need a SLIP or PPP connection."

 Get the word out about SlipKnot.. cause they're dead wrong. I have a shell

 account and it's got everything most people could want. I can read

 newsgroups, send/receive email, use telnet/ftp, download files, and (with

 SlipKnot) browse the World Wide Web! To be honest.. what else is

 there?"--Steve Crawford, MIS Manager for SpectraLink, Inc., Boulder,

 Colorado



 "I can use it with my dial-up and the price is certainly right--so I'm no

 longer lusting for a SLIP/PPP connection....If *I* can use this program so

 easily, anybody can....."--Kristi Olesen, author and parent



 "SlipKnot is simple to install, use and configure and wonderful in the

 sense that the wonders of the Internet are now truly available to me. As

 you can tell, I love this product. Thanks!"--Tami Duggan, Commonwealth

 Clinical Systems, Inc., Virginia



 "Keep up the good work. You've got a winner."--Steven Pitzl



 "Real slick....In general, the look and feel of SlipKnot is well-integrated

 & tight....Very cool setup....After looking at many web browsers, I must

 say y'all have a very unique browser, with a gorgeous interface,

 well-thought out and tightly integrated. And smooth. SlipKnot. I'm

 certainly telling everyone I know about it...."--Mark Garland, Civil

 Engineering Office, Santa Fe National Forest



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 REVIEWS FROM USENET AND MAIL TO MICROMIND

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 "Excellent software got it running with almost no problems.

 Congratulations."--Alan from United Kingdom



 "For a first release, Slipknot is amazing. It installed easily and worked

 first time."--Will from netcom



 "Overall, a really cool program, and quite clever."--SteveG from neosoft



 "This is exactly the program I've been searching for these past few

 months....While I loved the web browsing, I found I much preferred the

 Unix programs on my shell account. Now you've given me the best of both

 worlds.  Thank you!"--Nelia from netcom



 "Solid as a rock."--Rajesh from Temple University



 "A really neat program! Saves me time charges on my SLIP account."--Larry

 from netcom

 "--

 "Great Job Mr. Brooks ! well done !"--Amir from Bremen University, Germany



 "You've done an amazing job, without requiring the usual add-ons. I have

 spent hours with SlipKnot in many Web adventures and love the ability to

 toggle it when I want it and to use 'trn' and 'lynx' (the latter for form

 searches and for fastest text-response) and pine. So I'll get a check in

 the mail this week. Absolutely no GPF's, and your keyboard unfreeze

 resolved my one freeze in terminal."--Andrys from netcom



 ">One of the most exciting software programs I have seen lately."--Harald

 from Univ of Cincinnati



 "A major thumbs up!"--Darren from digex



 "Bravo!! What can I say? Seems to be a very stable, and actually pretty

 quick little program."--Mark from Pipeline



 "Wow! I've been spreading the word about Slipknot--I don't know when I've

 been more impressed with software in terms of the ease of use. Thanks

 again. I really think you've got a winner on your hands."--Steve from

 netcom



 "It worked! This is fantastic! I'm registering my copy ASAP. NOW I can see

 what everyone's so excited about."--Chris from tenet.edu



 "We are working on our Internet CD-ROM disc and would include your program

 as the user interface."--Stefan from Germany



 "Terrific work and a real contribution to the Internet community."--William

 from George Washington University



 "I've been using your software for the past five days and I just wanted to

 say how much I enjoy using it. BTW, I sent in my

 registration/check"--Warren from ncsc.mil



 "I think it's terrific,  especially the ability to download WWW pages and

 group in folders for future reference off-line!"--Deb from digex



 "I'm very happy with SlipKnot and am enjoying seeing for the first time

 what all the fuss is about regarding the WWW."--Phil from panix



 "I can't say whether it's better than Mozilla, TIA, etc., but it sure turns

 a shell account into a multimedia banquet!"--Daniel Dern from world.std.com



 "I want to roundly condemn you for making and distributing this program. It

 is so simple and easy to use, has so many useful functions and works so

 flawlessly that I will probably spend many more hours in front of my

 computer than I should :-). Anyway, thank you for a superb web browser.

 Give yourself a gold star."--Mark  from netcom



 "This is so cool, you could get frostbite from it."--William from Denver





 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 EARLY COMMENTS IN THE PRESS

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 "Pure, unadulterated magic"--Daniel Dern, noted Internet analyst and

 author, "The Internet Guide For New Users" (McGraw-Hill, 1993)



 "Will SlipKnot cause a Web traffic explosion? SlipKnot is a MS-Windows Web

 browser that can be used with a dial-up shell account. Could this be the

 answer for those without a direct or Slip/PPP connection? SlipKnot is a

 very welcome addition to the Web tool box. It will make available the Web's

 graphical displays to a whole new group of Internet users.--Bob Stewart,

 The Virtual Mirror -- http://mirror.wwa.com/mirror/



 "Its chief author, Peter Brooks...plans to sell SlipKnot as shareware. That

 means you download it free from an on-line service, try it out and if you

 decide to keep it, mail the programmer a check. Brooks plans to ask for

 $29.95. It's a steal....At the touch of a button, SlipKnot turned into a

 World Wide Web browser that in some ways worked better than Mosaic. It ran

 a little slower than Mosaic, but not much. And it works without the expense

 and trouble of a PPP account....SlipKnot is going to be a strong

 competitor."--Hiawatha Bray, Detroit Free Press, DFP Forum on Compuserve



 "Spurred by a desire to share the wonders of the Web with the vast

 dial-up population, developer Peter Brooks created SlipKnot....'We have a

 small lifetime worth of work in terms of features to include in the

 product,' Brooks confided. 'We will continue to improve it as time goes

 on.' "--Dianna Husum, WEBster, the Cyberspace Surfer



 "...A major technological breakthrough. SlipKnot is, as people used to say,

 'for the manor woman on the street,' and it, and its successor software,

 will invite millions more people to the Web's vibrant new culture."--Joyce

 Lain Kennedy, LA Times Syndicate author, in Hookup/Get Hired, forthcoming

 from John Wiley & Sons in 1995



 "One of the best features of this browser is its ability to retrieve

 documents in the background. According to MicroMind, SlipKnot is more than

 just a Web browser. This program allows for complete navigation of the Net

 and promises to bring Web access to almost all Internet users."--Patrick

 McKenna, Newsbytes



 "...for those trapped with terminal-emulation access to the Internet and

 salivating at the new stuff they hear is on the Web, this product is simply

 miraculous.--Richard Seltzer, Internet-on-a-Disk



 "One advantage is that whatever Web pages it gets, it keeps them until you

 decide to delete them. Once you're offline, you can go back and review

 pages you had browsed while online. You can keep as many pages as your

 available computer memory allows. SlipKnot is amazing. When it was first

 announced on Internet, I was skeptical whether such a program could work.

 Now, I'm a beiever."--John Fisher, Bucks County Times Courier



 SlipKnot has appeared in the National Center for Supercomputing

 Applications (NCSA) "What's New Page", Computer Underground Digest, and the

 Usenet moderated newsgroups comp.newprod & comp.internet.net-happenings



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 SLIPKNOT AS SHAREWARE

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 SlipKnot is published as restricted shareware, free for evaluation but with

 strong incentives to frequent users to register at a cost of $29.95 to most

 people. Individuals outside Northern America, Europe and Japan will be

 asked to pay $20 to register. And 10% of the receipts will go to support

 refugee organizations.



 Our shareware evaluation policy is that users who have displayed/retrieved

 over 300 documents are no longer evaluating the software (this should take

 about 2 months of typical usage) and will be asked to register within 30

 days  -- with an additional 21-day grace period if they start the

 registration process.  We hope that few users will object to the policy,

 given the price of the software.



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 NOTE FROM PETER BROOKS, SLIPKNOT DEVELOPER

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 SlipKnot was created because there was, at that time, no other alternative

 to accessing the World Wide Web graphically if you did not have SLIP or PPP

 or TCP/IP access. Having analyzed Mosaic and some of its competitors, I

 concluded that all of these browsers were designed for people with very

 rapid communications channels into the Internet, not modem users. Even if

 you have SLIP access, most of these browsers do not allow you to save

 entire documents (with the included pictures), forcing you to retrieve the

 documents again whenever you wish to take a full look at them --

 eliminating the possibility of demonstrating WWW without being online.

 It takes a while to retrieve any document by modem with any browser, and

 you shouldn't have to do this more than once.



 The Web is a remarkable human construct and a truly a wondrous place.  I

 hope that SlipKnot brings you the magic of the Web, and that you become

 as astounded by it as I am.





 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 ABOUT MICROMIND

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 MicroMind, Inc. is a New York City-based software development company with

 six major products developed and released for the international market,

 including:



 * RUN/C  -- the world's first interpreter for the C language -- sold in the

 U.S. and Japan. 20,000 copies sold at $250.



 * OL2 -- a product to duplicate the functionality of Sharp Electronics'

 Wizard Electronic Organizer on a desktop computer -- marketed by Sharp

 worldwide. Over 150,000 copies sold at $100.



 PETER BROOKS, President of MicroMind and author of SlipKnot, has over 25

 years of software development experience.



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 FEEDBACK

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 To facilitate communication and support, we are asking users to post

 comments and responses about SlipKnot only to the following Usenet

 newsgroup: comp.infosystems.www.users.



 At any time, for the latest SlipKnot information and a list of features,

 either point your WWW browser (lynx is fine) to:



 http://www.interport.net/slipknot/slipknot.html



 or send a blank e-mail message to:



 slipknot@micromind.com.



 Please direct any press or distribution questions to

 felixk@panix.com.

 vox: 212/866-4864. fax: 212/866-5527



 Please direct any technical questions to: slpstaff@micromind.com



 Mail to Peter Brooks can be sent to: pbrooks@micromind.com

 fax: 212/864-0436



 SlipKnot is Trademarked by MicroMind, Inc.

 This document (c) 1994 by MicroMind, Inc.



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 Felix Kramer/Kramer Communications

 NYC-based electronic publishing & journalism

 Online promotion & marketing

 e-mail: felixk@panix.com or felixkramr@aol.com

 voice: 212/866-4864    fax: 212/866-5527

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



Date: Sat, 21 Jan 1995 01:10:45 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File6



 

            SAY WHAT?  LIBEL & DEFAMATION ON THE INTERNET



 By Eric Eden (r3eje@vm1.cc.uakron.edu)



 On the Internet, where abnormal behavior is the status quo, tempers

 can flare in the heat of debate and word wars can last for days or even

 weeks.  It's not uncommon for users to ridicule, harass or insult those

 who disagree with them.



 But if you damage someone's reputation by trying to embarrass them in

 a public forum, you could be sued for libel or defamation.  After all,

 there's no reason to assume that the messages you send through

 cyberspace are immune from lawsuits.



 "The Internet culture right now is for users to refute speech with

 speech," says Dave Marburger, the attorney who represented Brock

 Meeks in one of the first defamation lawsuits in the United States

 involving the Internet.  "But as the Internet culture gets more diverse,

 users will start refuting speech with lawsuits."



 There have only been a handful of libel and defamation lawsuits filed

 involving the Internet so far, but as the Net grows, the number of

 lawsuits will probably increase.   If the few court battles that have been

 decided involving libel and defamation on the Net are any indication of

 how the law will be applied to the Internet in the future, it's worth your

 time to learn what's libelous or defamatory on the Internet and what's

 not.



 Other users have the right to sue you for defamation if they can prove

 you damaged their reputation or good name with false information.

 You can be sued for libel if another user can prove you have distributed

 defamatory statements about them in a public area -- such as a news

 group or mailing list.



 In April of 1993 Gil Hardwick, an anthropologist in Australia, was

 ordered by the Australian Supreme Court to pay David Rindos $40,000

 in damages because he defamed Rindos on an international mailing list.



 After Rindos lost his job at the University of West Australia, Hardwick

 posted a message in a discussion group for anthropologists that suggested

 Rindos was fired because he was a bully and had sexually molested a

 local boy.



 Rindos filed a defamation lawsuit against Hardwick because he felt the

 message had hurt his chances of finding a new job.  In a letter to

 Rindos's attorney, Hardwick wrote "Let this matter be expedited and

 done with....I can do nothing to prevent it, lacking any resources

 whatsoever to defend myself."  Like most people, Hardwick didn't have

 the money to hire a lawyer or finance an expensive legal battle.



 "He (Rindos) suffered a great deal of personal hurt because of the

 message," said Supreme Court Justice David Ipp in the West

 Australian. "The damages award must compensate him and vindicate

 his reputation to the public."



 The Internet is an informal forum and people often write personal things

 about other users, but you can be held accountable in court for making

 libelous or defamatory remarks in public forums just like Hardwick was.



 "We know that as the Internet grows, there will be more and more

 lawsuits involving libel and defamation," says attorney David H.

 Donaldson, editor of Legal Bytes, an electronic magazine that

 discusses legal issues involving computers and networking.   "The only

 question is if the number of cases will grow steadily or if there will be

 an explosion of lawsuits all at once."



 Anybody can sue you for libel or defamation if they think you damaged

 their reputation, but if you can prove what you say is true, chances are

 that you won't end up in court.



 "Make it clear when you are stating your opinion," says  Donaldson,

 "Always state the facts that your opinions are based on just to be safe.

 You probably won't lose a libel or defamation lawsuit if you can back up

 what you write with solid facts."



 For example, Brock Meeks, a full-time journalist who also distributes his

 own electronic magazine, avoided losing a defamation lawsuit largely

 because he could prove an article that he sent over the Net was true.



 Meeks was sued by Suarez Corporation Industries in April of 1994 for

 writing an investigative story about the company and its services in his

 electronic newsletter -- the CyberWire Dispatch.  Meeks had no libel

 insurance, no publishing company backing him up and a lot of legal

 fees to cover.  (His lawyer charged him $200 an hour.)  The only thing

 Meeks had was his house -- and he didn't want to sell it to pay off a

 lawsuit.



 Meeks defended his article in numerous posts on the Net, "All of my

 facts were rock solid.  Although the article was delivered with a fair

 amount of attitude, I don't believe that I'm in dangerous waters," he

 wrote.



 Benjamin Suarez, owner of Suarez Corp., filed the suit because he felt

 that Meeks had damaged his reputation and hurt his business by

 saying he was "infamous for his questionable direct marketing scams,"

 and saying "he (Suarez) has a mean streak."  To back up his opinion,

 Meeks cited accusations made by the Washington state attorney

 general's office concerning Suarez's direct marketing practices.



 In August of 1994 Suarez Corp. made Meeks an offer he couldn't

 refuse.  They agreed to settle the case for $64 -- to cover

 administrative court costs.   The company refused to comment on why

 they agreed to settle the lawsuit.



 If the case had gone to trial, Meeks's lawyer thinks Meeks would have

 been able to win anyway.  "The defendants in libel or defamation suits

 involving the Internet have enhanced First Amendment rights," says

 Marburger.  "The plaintiff has to prove actual malice.  In other words,

 the plaintiff has to show that the defendant made false statements or

 was negligent."  Marburger's only regret is that they didn't get to set

 that precedent in court.



 Although the Meeks case doesn't really mean anything in the law

 books, it does show that if you're responsible and can prove what you

 write on the Net is true, people will be less likely to take you to court.

 If

 you just make something up and your sources aren't reliable, you could

 lose big like Hardwick did.



 "You have to follow the same rules that journalists do if your going to

 write and distribute controversial material about other people," says

 Donaldson.



 The increasingly common phenomenon of online forums creates the

 possibility for you to reach large audiences, but it also creates the

 ability for you to commit defamation or libel -- something that an

 ordinary citizen didn't have to worry about in the past.  before the

 growth of online communication, people who didn't work in the media

 usually didn't have to worry about libel or defamation. "Libel laws apply

 to the Internet the same way they do to newspapers and TV stations,"

 explains former Federal Communications Commissioner Nicholas

 Johnson, a professor at the Iowa University school of law. "The same

 technology that gives you the power to share your opinion with

 thousands of people also qualifies you to be a defendant in a lawsuit."



 Like a newspaper or TV station, you are responsible for making sure

 the material you distribute -- or broadcast -- over the Internet is not

 libelous or defamatory.  Lani Teshia-Miller never meant to defame

 anyone, but when she took over the distribution of a tattoo FAQ she

 almost ended up in court.  The rec.arts.bodyart FAQ she inherited

 contained a lot of generalizations based on contributions from

 unattributed sources.  Although she listed her name on the FAQ, she

 didn't edit out several defamatory statements.  One review of a San

 Francisco tattoo artist in the FAQ said, "He's getting old and having

 problems with his eyesight.  His quality is really bad and he hurts

 people."



 After the artist hired a lawyer and threatened to sue, Teshia- Miller

 changed the FAQ's wording to reflect a more factually-based and

 less-hysterical view.   The review now says, "His eyesight is not what it

 used to be."



 After the FAQ was changed and Teshia-Miller apologized, the artist

 dropped the lawsuit.  "It turned out to be a good experience for me,"

 said Teshia- Miller.  "I'm  a lot more careful about what I allow on the

 artist list, and I now have a very long disclaimer at the beginning of the

 FAQ."



 Every person you write something negative about won't sue you for

 defamation or libel, they might flame you or just try to set the record

 straight by replying to the message.  But if you post false information

 about another user and disgrace them in public, they have the right to

 take you to court -- and they could win a big settlement if they can

 prove you were negligent.



 Medphone, a Fortune 500 company that manufactures medical

 instruments, has filed a $200 million lawsuit against Prodigy user Peter

 DeNigis.  Medphone filed a "systematic program for defamation and

 trade disparagement" lawsuit against DeNigis after a stockholder

 reported that he was making several negative posts about Medphone a

 day on Prodigy's Money Talk Forum. DeNigis, a former Medphone

 stockholder, lost more than $9,000 last year by selling off his

 investment in the company. In one post DeNigis wrote, "My research

 indicated the company is really having a difficult time.  No case, no

 sales, no profits and terrible management. This company appears to be

 a fraud.  Probably will cease operations soon."



 Although the accusation that Medphone is a "fraud" is very serious --

 and potentially defamatory -- DeNigis might be able to win the lawsuit if

 he can prove what he wrote is true in court.



 "The Medphone case is a clear indication that libel and defamation is

 something for Internet users to think about," says Johnson.



 There are court cases in progress right now that will decide if access

 providers such as Prodigy, America Online and Compuserve are

 responsible for defamatory remarks broadcast over their services, but

 there is no legal ambiguity about whether individual users can be sued

 for making defamatory or libelous statements. Individual users are

 responsible for making sure the information they distribute is not

 libelous or defamatory.



 The Internet has made world wide, instantaneous communication easy.

 The average user now has the power to be heard by hundreds or even

 thousands of other users, but in terms of libel and defamation, the Net

 is not a new world of freedom. The reality is that libel and defamation

 laws are enforceable in the virtual world just like they are in the real

 world.



                          # # #



 You may distribute this article freely for non-profit purposes.  Otherwise

 contact the author (Eric Eden -- R3eje@vm1.cc.uakron.edu) for reprint

 permission.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



           JACKING IN FROM THE "BACK FROM THE DEAD" PORT



 By Brock N. Meeks (brock@well.sf.ca.us)

 CyberWire Dispatch Copyright (c) 1994



 Washington, DC -- Nothing chills -- or inflames -- the Net faster than

 when word of the dreaded "FCC Modem Tax" begins ooze through Cyberspace.



 Well... it's back.  Sort of.



 Ruth Milkman, legal advisor to Federal Communications Commission Chairman

 Reed Hundt, said during a recent question and answer session that the

 agency might again take up the issue of the so-called modem tax.



 "Some years down the road I can see access fees [for enhanced service

 providers] being considered by the FCC," Milkman said during a phone

 interview. "But only under the scenario when access charges are reformed."



 These access charges are a kind of trip wire phrase which online activists

 have dubbed a "modem tax" when applied to enhanced service providers,

 which is another catch phrase meaning services like America Online and

 CompuServe.



 Milkman said the FCC would only consider an access charge under a very

 narrow scenario which would play out only  if "enhanced service providers

 felt that by paying the access charges they weren't contributing to a

 subsidy scheme set up for (long distance phone companies)," Milkman said.



 So, what the hell is an "access charge"?  Take a deep breath. Here goes:



 Access charges are paid by long distance companies to local telephone

 companies. Every time a company such as AT&T connects a caller in Des

 Moines with Uncle Bert in New York, it has to pay Nynex, the local

 telephone company, a fee for the privilege of carrying that long distance

 call over their facilities, commonly known as the "local loop."



 Long distance companies pay up to 40% of their entire revenues to local

 telephone companies.  That's billions and billions of dollars each year

 that flow into the hands of the Baby Bells, just for completing the calls.



 The access fees are set at artificially high rates because they contain a

 mind numbing set of complex subsidies, the most obvious one is that which

 underwrites the public policy known as "Universal Service."



 Back in the days when the FCC only had rotary dial phones (circa 1987)

 someone came up with the brilliant idea that because modem use was

 increasing at such a rapid pace, that maybe services such as Sprintlink

 (then known as telenet) and CompuServe should have to pay these access

 charges, too.



 After all, the FCC wonks postured, they carry long distance (modem)

 traffic over the phone lines?  It would only be fair to have these

 "enhanced service providers" as they are known in FCC-speak, also help

 out the impoverished long distance phone companies underwrite Universal

 Service.



 Bingo.  The hue and cry that went up from the online community (it wasn't

 yet called "the Net") was enormous.  The major players -- Telenet and

 CompuServe -- quickly branded the plan as a "tax" and thus the phrase

 "modem tax" was born.



 Dire warnings went out:  If the FCC succeeded in making enhanced service

 providers chip in for access fees, it would increase the cost of each hour

 of online time by at least $6 per hour.



 And remember, this was in the days when a 2,400-bps modem was the hottest

 thing going.  Six bucks an hour would have demolished the struggling

 online industry.



 The fallout among the nascent online community was astounding. For the

 first time in history, the "net" community rose up with a single voice and

 FLOODED the FCC with protests.



 FCC official "filing kits" made the rounds, teaching people how to file

 official comments of protest.



 The ground swell of opposition worked.  The FCC was buried in responses.

 At the time, the FCC said it was the hottest item in its history, garnering

 more response than any issue in history.



 The FCC eventually backed off.  The reason:  It was persuaded that enhanced

 service providers were still entrepreneurial companies and couldn't afford

 the burden of access fees.



 The proposal was officially dropped.  It was the first major victory for

 the Net.  And it was empowering.  The online community became educated and

 enlightened almost over night to the ways of an arcane governmental agency.

 And this community was drunk with a heady kind of power:  It could

 sufficiently affect the outcome of governmental regulation.



 Small catch:  The damn "modem tax" issue wouldn't die.



 Someone with the brains of a trout began to circulate the now infamous

 "modem tax" file.  The file claims that Jim Eason, a San Francisco radio

 talk show host had aired a segment in which he claimed to have inside

 information that the FCC was about to relaunch its "modem tax" proposal.



 The message was and is a HOAX.



 But it also has never died.  It's the Net's first "urban myth" and like

 Freddie, it refuses to die, even to this day.



 Milkman, who was on-board at the FCC during the 1987 modem tax firefight,

 sighed when explaining the complex issue:  "Part of the problem is that

 nobody is exactly sure what all the subsidies are.  Most people agree that

 there are subsidies in the access charges, but you can't break out those

 subsidies exactly."



 Another factor in play:  Sometimes enhanced service providers are really

 just reselling long distance transport after having bought large blocks of

 time from a major carrier like AT&T.  Thus, to have these enhanced service

 providers also pay an access fee amounts to a kind of double-dipping,

 Milkman said.



 As it turns out, Congress might have as much to say about a future "modem

 tax" as the FCC.  This twisted scenario turns on the tenuous grasp that

 everyone from the Vice President to Commerce Department to the FCC has on

 exactly what constitutes "Universal Service," in the era of the Information

 Superhighway.



 Revamping the 60 year old Communications Act of 1934 will be up to Congress

 this year.  And they will likely do it.  But how universal service is

 defined remains a big mystery.  And who ends up paying for and maintaining

 that public policy (which isn't about to be abolished) also remains a

 mystery.



 Don't be surprised if, when the legislative smoke clears, not only do

 enhanced service providers -- America Online, CompuServe and Prodigy, et al

 -- have to pay access fees, but also your Internet provider and your cable

 company.



 And who do you think will end up catching those cost increases?? Right.

 Your wallet.



 But for now?  Rest easy, Milkman says:  "I want to make this very clear:

 There is NO docket [open] in which the Commission is proposing making

 enhanced service providers pay access charges.  And I don't anticipate it

 coming up."



 Meeks out...



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



       ANNOUNCING SLIPKNOT: Shareware dialup Web browser for Windows



 By Felix Kramer (felixk@panix.com)



 Dear Electronic Journalist



 How long will the World Wide Web be accessible to only a small fraction

 of dial-up users?



 I'm writing to tell you about a new and important application for Internet

 users that's was released last week, and that I think should be of

 interest to you (and perhaps to your readers.)



 In one sentence, it's a graphical Windows-based browser for the World

 Wide Web, for users with dial-up UNIX accounts -- but one that doesn't

 require SLIP, PPP or TCP/IP access. (You'll find a longer description

 below.)



 It's intended to expand and democratize access to the WWW to those with

 ordinary dial-up accounts -- at a time when TCP/IP access is available

 only to a small fraction of the online population.



 Until now, access to the hypermedia-based Web has been limited to those

 with SLIP, PPP or TCP/IP access, using Mosaic and similar browsers. That's

 only a small fraction of the online population--a few million at most,

 worldwide. Unless they were willing to go through considerable technical

 acrobatics, most people with dial-up UNIX accounts were locked out of the

 Web. Many of these people are accustomed to their UNIX tools for reading

 mail and news, and don't want to switch to SLIP even if their systems offer

 the option. (We may be talking about something over 20 million people

 worldwide, with service through their companies, schools, universities,

 or Internet Service providers.)



 In journalistic terms, there are several stories here:



 1) As discussed above, SlipKnot will expand the population of users who

 can use the Web.



 2) SlipKnot is pioneering in its distribution/sale policy. SlipKnot is

 restricted shareware in its first version from MicroMind, Inc. Until now,

 shareware has generally been distributed with a simple request for users to

 register; SlipKnot takes that one step further. It is restricted

 shareware.  That means it is free for evaluation but with strong

 incentives to frequent users to register. After a period of frequent

 reminders, the software eventually turns itself off for nonregistering

 users.



 3) Registration fees or on a sliding scale. For most, the cost is $29.95.

 But individuals outside Northern America, Europe and Japan will pay $20 to

 register. A portion of the receipts will go to support refugee

 organizations (Peter Brooks, the developer, came to the U.S. as a

 refugee).





 4) SlipKnot is a case study in the new technology of virtual commerce. All

 promotion, distribution, and registration is being done online. No physical

 shrink-wrapped disk or manual is produced: users download the product with

 documentation. There is no paid advertising or direct mail: potential

 purchasers learn about it through online newsgroups, user groups, mailing

 lists, and through the press. There is no printed and mailed press kit:

 the media hears about it through electronic means -- e-mailed press

 materials and announcements. Registrants send in their addresses and

 payments through fax or encrypted e-mail, and their personal codes are

 returned to them by e-mail. All this is rapid, efficient, and economical.



 Below you'll find info on where to get it. If you want to see what others

 are saying about SlipKnot, we've attached some early reactions.



 **NOTE** This press kit is incomplete. To keep down the size of this

 message, and ensure that you get the most recent information, AT ANY TIME,

 you can automatically retrieve SlipKnot's features, list of limitations,

 and technical specifications for what SlipKnot requires on the user's

 computer and at the service provider, by sending a blank e-mail message to

 our autoreplying infobot:

 slipknot@micromind.com



 I'm a consultant to institutions interested in publishing on the net, and

 author of a book on electronic publishing as a business. I'm doing

 promotion for the release of SlipKnot.



 Feel free to forward this message to other journalists, movers and shakers

 on the net.



 If possible, please let me know if you're planning to run a story; if it's

 in online form, I'd be very grateful to get an e-mail copy; if in printed

 form, I'd appreciate getting a tear sheet mailed to me at 310 Riverside

 Drive, Suite 1519, New York, NY 10025. Please contact me or Peter Brooks

 (the developer, pbrooks@micromind.com) if you have any questions. In any

 stories, please do not publish my phone number; you can give out my e-mail

 address and fax number.



 Thanks in advance--Felix Kramer



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 HOW TO GET SLIPKNOT

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 SlipKnot 1.0, the World Wide Web browser for Windows dial-up users from

 MicroMind,Inc., is now available (right on schedule!) for anonymous ftp

 download at:



 ftp://oak.oakland.edu/SimTel/win3/internet/slnot100.zip



 or, if it's not too busy, from:



 ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/pbrooks/slipknot/slnot100.zip



 oak.oakland.edu has numerous mirror sites, so if you have any trouble

 getting it directly from there, please try the mirror sites.



 One mirror site is:

 ftp.uoknor.edu/mirrors/SimTel/win3/internet/slnot100.zip



 In the U.K. try:

 src.doc.ic.ac.uk/computing/systems/ibmpc/simtel-win3/internet/slnot100.zip



 In Australia try:



 ftp.bf.rmit.edu.au  /pub/pc/www/slnot100.zip



 (If you don't get to it for a while, please look at the distribution site

 for the latest version file, that is, slnotxxx.zip -- where "xxx" indicates

 the Version of SlipKnot. So, for instance, Version 1.0 is slnot100.zip,

 and Version 1.35 will be slnot135.zip.)



 You can also get a FAQ, focusing primarily on common installation problems,

 at:  ftp://interport.net/pub/pbrooks/slipknot/sntfaq1.txt





 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 WHAT PEOPLE HAVE SAID ABOUT SLIPKNOT

 SINCE ITS RELEASE IN LATE NOVEMBER

 (INDIVIDUALS FOLLOWED BY PRESS)

 (AFFILIATIONS FOR IDENTIFICATION ONLY)

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 UNSOLICITED COMMENTS FROM BETA TESTERS

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 "SlipKnot is a godsend for those without slip."--Walter Rice, 11th grade

 student at Central High School, Philadelphia



 "I have really enjoyed SlipKnot. After trying for over a year to get

 Mosaic to work on my PC at home, I found SlipKnot easy to install and use.

 "--Mike McKee



 "This is a fun program. A LOT of magazines lately have been talking about

 Internet and the world wide web - and almost all of them say something like

 "To really delve into Internet - you'll need a SLIP or PPP connection."

 Get the word out about SlipKnot.. cause they're dead wrong. I have a shell

 account and it's got everything most people could want. I can read

 newsgroups, send/receive email, use telnet/ftp, download files, and (with

 SlipKnot) browse the World Wide Web! To be honest.. what else is

 there?"--Steve Crawford, MIS Manager for SpectraLink, Inc., Boulder,

 Colorado



 "I can use it with my dial-up and the price is certainly right--so I'm no

 longer lusting for a SLIP/PPP connection....If *I* can use this program so

 easily, anybody can....."--Kristi Olesen, author and parent



 "SlipKnot is simple to install, use and configure and wonderful in the

 sense that the wonders of the Internet are now truly available to me. As

 you can tell, I love this product. Thanks!"--Tami Duggan, Commonwealth

 Clinical Systems, Inc., Virginia



 "Keep up the good work. You've got a winner."--Steven Pitzl



 "Real slick....In general, the look and feel of SlipKnot is well-integrated

 & tight....Very cool setup....After looking at many web browsers, I must

 say y'all have a very unique browser, with a gorgeous interface,

 well-thought out and tightly integrated. And smooth. SlipKnot. I'm

 certainly telling everyone I know about it...."--Mark Garland, Civil

 Engineering Office, Santa Fe National Forest



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 REVIEWS FROM USENET AND MAIL TO MICROMIND

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 "Excellent software got it running with almost no problems.

 Congratulations."--Alan from United Kingdom



 "For a first release, Slipknot is amazing. It installed easily and worked

 first time."--Will from netcom



 "Overall, a really cool program, and quite clever."--SteveG from neosoft



 "This is exactly the program I've been searching for these past few

 months....While I loved the web browsing, I found I much preferred the

 Unix programs on my shell account. Now you've given me the best of both

 worlds.  Thank you!"--Nelia from netcom



 "Solid as a rock."--Rajesh from Temple University



 "A really neat program! Saves me time charges on my SLIP account."--Larry

 from netcom

 "--

 "Great Job Mr. Brooks ! well done !"--Amir from Bremen University, Germany



 "You've done an amazing job, without requiring the usual add-ons. I have

 spent hours with SlipKnot in many Web adventures and love the ability to

 toggle it when I want it and to use 'trn' and 'lynx' (the latter for form

 searches and for fastest text-response) and pine. So I'll get a check in

 the mail this week. Absolutely no GPF's, and your keyboard unfreeze

 resolved my one freeze in terminal."--Andrys from netcom



 ">One of the most exciting software programs I have seen lately."--Harald

 from Univ of Cincinnati



 "A major thumbs up!"--Darren from digex



 "Bravo!! What can I say? Seems to be a very stable, and actually pretty

 quick little program."--Mark from Pipeline



 "Wow! I've been spreading the word about Slipknot--I don't know when I've

 been more impressed with software in terms of the ease of use. Thanks

 again. I really think you've got a winner on your hands."--Steve from

 netcom



 "It worked! This is fantastic! I'm registering my copy ASAP. NOW I can see

 what everyone's so excited about."--Chris from tenet.edu



 "We are working on our Internet CD-ROM disc and would include your program

 as the user interface."--Stefan from Germany



 "Terrific work and a real contribution to the Internet community."--William

 from George Washington University



 "I've been using your software for the past five days and I just wanted to

 say how much I enjoy using it. BTW, I sent in my

 registration/check"--Warren from ncsc.mil



 "I think it's terrific,  especially the ability to download WWW pages and

 group in folders for future reference off-line!"--Deb from digex



 "I'm very happy with SlipKnot and am enjoying seeing for the first time

 what all the fuss is about regarding the WWW."--Phil from panix



 "I can't say whether it's better than Mozilla, TIA, etc., but it sure turns

 a shell account into a multimedia banquet!"--Daniel Dern from world.std.com



 "I want to roundly condemn you for making and distributing this program. It

 is so simple and easy to use, has so many useful functions and works so

 flawlessly that I will probably spend many more hours in front of my

 computer than I should :-). Anyway, thank you for a superb web browser.

 Give yourself a gold star."--Mark  from netcom



 "This is so cool, you could get frostbite from it."--William from Denver





 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 EARLY COMMENTS IN THE PRESS

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 "Pure, unadulterated magic"--Daniel Dern, noted Internet analyst and

 author, "The Internet Guide For New Users" (McGraw-Hill, 1993)



 "Will SlipKnot cause a Web traffic explosion? SlipKnot is a MS-Windows Web

 browser that can be used with a dial-up shell account. Could this be the

 answer for those without a direct or Slip/PPP connection? SlipKnot is a

 very welcome addition to the Web tool box. It will make available the Web's

 graphical displays to a whole new group of Internet users.--Bob Stewart,

 The Virtual Mirror -- http://mirror.wwa.com/mirror/



 "Its chief author, Peter Brooks...plans to sell SlipKnot as shareware. That

 means you download it free from an on-line service, try it out and if you

 decide to keep it, mail the programmer a check. Brooks plans to ask for

 $29.95. It's a steal....At the touch of a button, SlipKnot turned into a

 World Wide Web browser that in some ways worked better than Mosaic. It ran

 a little slower than Mosaic, but not much. And it works without the expense

 and trouble of a PPP account....SlipKnot is going to be a strong

 competitor."--Hiawatha Bray, Detroit Free Press, DFP Forum on Compuserve



 "Spurred by a desire to share the wonders of the Web with the vast

 dial-up population, developer Peter Brooks created SlipKnot....'We have a

 small lifetime worth of work in terms of features to include in the

 product,' Brooks confided. 'We will continue to improve it as time goes

 on.' "--Dianna Husum, WEBster, the Cyberspace Surfer



 "...A major technological breakthrough. SlipKnot is, as people used to say,

 'for the manor woman on the street,' and it, and its successor software,

 will invite millions more people to the Web's vibrant new culture."--Joyce

 Lain Kennedy, LA Times Syndicate author, in Hookup/Get Hired, forthcoming

 from John Wiley & Sons in 1995



 "One of the best features of this browser is its ability to retrieve

 documents in the background. According to MicroMind, SlipKnot is more than

 just a Web browser. This program allows for complete navigation of the Net

 and promises to bring Web access to almost all Internet users."--Patrick

 McKenna, Newsbytes



 "...for those trapped with terminal-emulation access to the Internet and

 salivating at the new stuff they hear is on the Web, this product is simply

 miraculous.--Richard Seltzer, Internet-on-a-Disk



 "One advantage is that whatever Web pages it gets, it keeps them until you

 decide to delete them. Once you're offline, you can go back and review

 pages you had browsed while online. You can keep as many pages as your

 available computer memory allows. SlipKnot is amazing. When it was first

 announced on Internet, I was skeptical whether such a program could work.

 Now, I'm a beiever."--John Fisher, Bucks County Times Courier



 SlipKnot has appeared in the National Center for Supercomputing

 Applications (NCSA) "What's New Page", Computer Underground Digest, and the

 Usenet moderated newsgroups comp.newprod & comp.internet.net-happenings



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 SLIPKNOT AS SHAREWARE

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 SlipKnot is published as restricted shareware, free for evaluation but with

 strong incentives to frequent users to register at a cost of $29.95 to most

 people. Individuals outside Northern America, Europe and Japan will be

 asked to pay $20 to register. And 10% of the receipts will go to support

 refugee organizations.



 Our shareware evaluation policy is that users who have displayed/retrieved

 over 300 documents are no longer evaluating the software (this should take

 about 2 months of typical usage) and will be asked to register within 30

 days  -- with an additional 21-day grace period if they start the

 registration process.  We hope that few users will object to the policy,

 given the price of the software.



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 NOTE FROM PETER BROOKS, SLIPKNOT DEVELOPER

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 SlipKnot was created because there was, at that time, no other alternative

 to accessing the World Wide Web graphically if you did not have SLIP or PPP

 or TCP/IP access. Having analyzed Mosaic and some of its competitors, I

 concluded that all of these browsers were designed for people with very

 rapid communications channels into the Internet, not modem users. Even if

 you have SLIP access, most of these browsers do not allow you to save

 entire documents (with the included pictures), forcing you to retrieve the

 documents again whenever you wish to take a full look at them --

 eliminating the possibility of demonstrating WWW without being online.

 It takes a while to retrieve any document by modem with any browser, and

 you shouldn't have to do this more than once.



 The Web is a remarkable human construct and a truly a wondrous place.  I

 hope that SlipKnot brings you the magic of the Web, and that you become

 as astounded by it as I am.





 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 ABOUT MICROMIND

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 MicroMind, Inc. is a New York City-based software development company with

 six major products developed and released for the international market,

 including:



 * RUN/C  -- the world's first interpreter for the C language -- sold in the

 U.S. and Japan. 20,000 copies sold at $250.



 * OL2 -- a product to duplicate the functionality of Sharp Electronics'

 Wizard Electronic Organizer on a desktop computer -- marketed by Sharp

 worldwide. Over 150,000 copies sold at $100.



 PETER BROOKS, President of MicroMind and author of SlipKnot, has over 25

 years of software development experience.



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 FEEDBACK

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



 To facilitate communication and support, we are asking users to post

 comments and responses about SlipKnot only to the following Usenet

 newsgroup: comp.infosystems.www.users.



 At any time, for the latest SlipKnot information and a list of features,

 either point your WWW browser (lynx is fine) to:



 http://www.interport.net/slipknot/slipknot.html



 or send a blank e-mail message to:



 slipknot@micromind.com.



 Please direct any press or distribution questions to

 felixk@panix.com.

 vox: 212/866-4864. fax: 212/866-5527



 Please direct any technical questions to: slpstaff@micromind.com



 Mail to Peter Brooks can be sent to: pbrooks@micromind.com

 fax: 212/864-0436



 SlipKnot is Trademarked by MicroMind, Inc.

 This document (c) 1994 by MicroMind, Inc.



 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 Felix Kramer/Kramer Communications

 NYC-based electronic publishing & journalism

 Online promotion & marketing

 e-mail: felixk@panix.com or felixkramr@aol.com

 voice: 212/866-4864    fax: 212/866-5527

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



Date: Sat, 21 Jan 1995 01:39:03 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File7



 

                  OLD FREEDOMS AND NEW TECHNOLOGIES:

                The Evolution of Community Networking



 By Jay Weston (jweston@ccs.carleton.ca)



 This paper, with only minor variations, was delivered as a talk at the

 FREE SPEECH AND PRIVACY IN THE INFORMATION AGE Symposium,

 University of Waterloo, Canada, November 26, 1994.



 ----------------------------------------------------------------------

 Copyright: This text is released to the public domain.  No copyright

            restrictions apply.  J. Weston

 ----------------------------------------------------------------------



 North American society  has had a lot to say on the distributed public

 media that we call the Internet, or simply the Net.  And, in the past

 year or so, we have started to have a lot to say about what we've been

 saying.  However, we haven't quite heard what we've been saying.  We

 haven't heard because we are inexperienced in listening to each other

 this way.  We are listening to the wrong things.   Or, as Karl Popper

 once put it, we have been "like my dog, staring at my finger when I

 point to the door."(1)  But, we can be forgiven for our misplaced

 attention to the Net.



 Since it was first observed that there just was not enough available

 bandwidth to let everybody send smoke signals or bang drums, we've

 been organizing and reorganizing to determine who would, and who would

 not, get their hands on the blankets and the drums -- and the presses,

 the microphones, and the cameras.  As we moved through a few

 millennia, successive public communication technologies either began

 as, or very quickly were made to conform to, the extreme send:receive

 imbalances that, somewhere along the line, we started calling the mass

 media, or simply the media.



 It would be pedantic in the extreme to do more than note that these

 access restrictions now define all of the social relations of modern

 societies.  Whole disciplines are organized around the understanding

 that all public and private institutions, all local and external

 spaces are bent by the constricted and compressed discourses of the

 mass media.  Whether the analyses are celebratory or critical, whether

 their mass media interdependencies are made explicit or not, all

 analyses of modern society take the access constraints of the mass

 media as immutable.  Public access to these media is simply not

 problematical.  On the one hand, there are the media and, on the

 other, there are their audiences, consumers, constituents, and

 publics.



 Until very recently, there was no reason to imagine that questions

 would ever have to be asked about societies with abundant access to

 the means of media production, exhibition, distribution, and

 reproduction of cultural offerings.  Suddenly, it is time to start

 imagining the questions.  That is what the Internet is about.



 Some usually astute observers, among them Internet Society President

 Vinton Cerf and Microsoft CEO Bill Gates, are predicting that the

 twenty million now on the Net is only the beginning.  Cerf predicts

 100 million by 1998 (2) and Gates, in a recent interview, confided

 that his big mistake so far had been in underestimating the importance

 of the Internet (3).  If they are right, if the hordes are going to

 start beating their drums in public, absolutely everything about the

 existing social order is about to be challenged.  Not simply the mass

 media institutions, but all institutions.  Everything is at stake.



 [If they are wrong, if the Internet is only the latest gizmology, then

 there is nothing to get intellectually excited about.  We've been

 there before.  For, as exciting or as terrifying as the prospect of a

 tiny 500 channel universe may be, it is just mass media business as

 usual, albeit new and unusual business.]



 Whether or not there will be 100 million or so people on the Internet

 by 1998 or so, will depend first, upon whether they want to be there

 and secondly, if they do, who will likely be trying to stop them, why

 will they be trying to stop them, and how will they be trying to stop

 them.



 As to the question of whether they will want to be, the Internet

 growth figures are familiar to us all.  Steeply up to the right and

 getting steeper.  This should be more than enough evidence that, given

 a chance, people are eager to be there.  Curiously, this inconceivable

 growth has occurred despite the equally familiar observations that the

 Internet is difficult to access, hard to use, slow to respond and,

 what is mostly to be found there is banal or otherwise offensive, and

 hopelessly disorganized.



 This apparent contradiction of millions actively embracing cyberjunk

 cannot be resolved within the vocabulary of the mass media with their

 well-organized, familiar, marvellously honed content packages, that

 are so quickly and effortlessly available.  Dismissive statements

 about the potential of the Internet that are based on the quality and

 delivery of content, cannot be resolved by debates about whether such

 statements are accurate or inaccurate.  For some, judging the Internet

 by its content, the quality of its information, and the accuracy of

 its databases, is relevant and for others it is not.



 For those for whom it is not, the Internet is less about information

 or content, and more about relations.  For the mass media, it is

 always just the opposite.  The mass media are almost pure content, the

 relationship a rigidly frozen non-transaction, that insulates the few

 content producers or information providers from their audiences. This

 is how we experience and understand the mass media.  If it were not

 so, we would not call them the mass media.  Five hundred or 5,000 more

 unswitched, asymmetrical, "smart" channels will not change that.



 It is, on the other hand, impossible to understand much about the

 Internet's appeal by analyzing its content.  The Internet is mostly

 about people finding their voice, speaking for themselves in a public

 way, and the content that carries this new relationship is of

 separate, even secondary, importance.  The Internet is about people

 saying "Here I am and there you are." Even the expression of

 disagreement and hostility, the "flames" as they are called, at least

 says "You exist.  I may disagree with you, or even dislike you, but

 you do exist."   Mass media do not confirm existence, and cannot.

 The market audience exists, but the reader, listener or viewer does

 not.(4)



 This is not to argue that the content of the Internet is irrelevant.

 The content defines the relationship.  People not only want to

 represent themselves, they ordinarily want to present themselves as

 well as they can.  It would be cynical in the extreme to devalue

 these representations, the texts, the exhibited cultural products of

 tens of millions.  It is rather to argue that the relational aspects

 of the transactions qualify and define the content in ways that need

 to be understood if the Internet it to be comprehended.



 Whatever the reason for millions speaking publicly, this condition was

 not part of the mass media problematic.  It is unreasonable to think

 that merely tinkering with paradigms grounded in technologies of

 restricted access will permit a rich interrogation of the range of

 social relations provided for by technologies of unrestricted access.



 This call for a vocabulary that directly addresses the centrality of

 distributed public media is not a suggestion that paradigms that

 centrally situate mass media are somehow of less importance than they

 once were.  If anything, their questions of access, production and

 representation are more critical, and even more challenging, than they

 were before distributed media raised the complexity of social

 relations.  However, an expanded universe of mass media discourse that

 merely attempts to overlay distributed public networks upon the

 structured relationships of a mass mediated society, will lead us to

 misunderstand a society evolving with distributed public media.



 It is well-understood that, all social institutions have their

 relative certainties made possible by the centralizing power of the

 technologies of mass communication.  The relative certainties that

 accompany attenuated access to the means of symbolic production is

 welded into the fabric of all institutional policies and practices.

 Assuming, then, that access to the means of cultural expression will

 be increasingly distributed, it follows that all of the institutions

 of modern society will be threatened or at least inconvenienced by

 this development.  While expressions like "public involvement", and

 "participative democracy", are imbedded in our rhetorical traditions,

 their unquestionable acceptability has always been conditional upon

 their equally unquestionable non-attainability.  The technologies of

 mass communication always ensured that involvement and participation

 would not be overdone.



 When the institutions that rose to power in the wake of the industrial

 revolution began to speak of the "information revolution", they only

 meant to digitize the modern industrial state.  This non-revolution

 was Phase II of the old boys' operation, another remodeling of the

 modern apparatus.  The "Information Highway" is the updated codeword

 for the modern retrofit.  This was not supposed to be about a

 technological adventure that would reconfigure social relations or

 blur the well-constructed boundaries between the public and the

 private ground.  This was supposed to be about a five hundred, not a

 one hundred million channel universe.



 The becoming Internet, this decentered polity, is an accident that

 happens to expand the locus of direct, self-mediated, daily political

 involvement.  Those who previously had to make themselves presentable

 to the agencies of mass communication technologies in order to be

 represented by the technologies, have begun to publicly represent

 themselves.  What was previously local, domestic, idiosyncratic and

 private can, for the first time, become external and public.  This is

 an abrupt  reversal of the mass media's progressive appropriation of

 the idiosyncratic and private for their own institutional purposes.



 Since this reversal was unimaginable, no contingency plans had been

 imagined for dealing with it.  But, to the extent that the expansion

 of the public ground challenges become identified for any segment of

 the established order, these challenges will be met.  It is axiomatic

 that the Internet and, by extension, public community networks can

 expect massive pressure to diminish or eliminate the identified

 destabalizing influences that these distributed media exert.  If the

 Internet, with its changed relations of production and related

 exigencies, is signaling a coming Accidental Revolution, the contests

 and the casualties will be enormous.



 This symposium is about the skirmishes, battles and wars that have

 already started.  All of these encounters are around the legitimacy of

 public self-expression, assembly, examination and privacy.  These are

 the problematic of distributed public media, not of the mass media.

 Beyond our noting that they were lamentably unimportant, the concerns

 relating to freedom of speech were not central to a mass mediated

 society.  Our familiarity with freedom of speech was almost entirely

 abstracted from the mass media accounts of their own experiences and

 the performances of their own legal departments.  The mass media

 tested the limits of those freedoms for the speechless public.



 We are now in the beginning stages of defining the legitimacy of

 self- expression for ourselves.  This represents a new set of

 concerns about the circumstance and substance of distributed media

 texts in all of their modes, the bases upon how it comes to happen

 that people 'speak' publicly, and what it is that they 'say'.  The

 idea of 'assembly' and how it will happen that groups come to

 occupy territory and how they are distributed globally and locally

 assumes original importance, as decisions get made about what

 'virtual communities' will be, and where they will situate.  The

 privacy puzzles about the availability and use of all those

 sophisticated watching, listening, storing, sifting and intrusive

 devices are a humbling reminder of just how much our reach has

 exceeded our understanding of these technologies.  How these

 matters are resolved will shape the distributed media and decide

 their social relevance.



 Community networks are contributing a broader distribution of voices

 as these puzzles begin to get worked out on the distributed media

 themselves, rather than only in the exclusive enclaves of special

 interests.  This must continue and expand or the awakening of self-

 representation will be short lived.  It would be wise to assume that

 there are not yet any 'rights', or that the old freedoms that were

 often hard won by the mass media, are now enshrined and will

 automatically transfer to distributed public media.





 Situating Community Networks





 If, as Bruce Sterling observed in the Afterward to his earlier work

 The Hacker Crackdown, "Three years in cyberspace is like thirty years

 anyplace real" (5) and, as events from thirty years past are often

 dimmed or forgotten, I hope you can forgive me for reminding

 you this morning that way back in November, 1991 the Canadian public

 had no access to the Internet.  Moreover, there were no signs that the

 public would have any access.



 The steepness, even then, of that now overly familiar Internet growth

 curve was entirely attributable to new users from within their

 formal institutional settings.  The universities, research institutes

 of the telecommunication giants, and a few government departments had

 the Internet as their private preserve and tightly controlled access

 to it, often denying entry to even their own (6).  This control

 existed, even although the administration of these institutions were

 still marvellously unaware of what was going on in their basements.

 Though unintentional, the Internet was still a well-kept secret, its

 threat to the status quo still largely unrecognized.



 The commercial online services were busily avoiding the Internet,

 still building the firewalls around their own proprietary

 networks.  Their fees were so high, and their services so meagre,

 that they were providing little incentive for the general public

 to even begin to experiment with their narrow networking

 offerings.



 The recurring telco dream of local metered service was a constant

 reminder that the Canadian public might never experience the Internet.

 Failure of poorly conceived commercial network services like Bell

 Canada's "Alex" and Australia Telecom's "Discovery" had convinced the

 telcos that not even the business community was ready for network

 services.



 The Canadian Network for the Advancement of Research, Industry and

 Education (CANARIE), as its name implied, betrayed no awareness that

 there might be people in this country.  Even by the end of 1992 when

 CANARIE released its business and marketing plans, the hundreds of

 written pages devoted to its vision made almost no reference to the

 Internet, and carefully avoided the 'public' as serious participants

 in what the partners had in mind for the country.(7)



 These are but a few isolated examples of the evidence that the

 Internet had either not yet penetrated the collective institutional

 consciousness or was enjoying a brief period of benign neglect.  For

 those who had experienced the Internet and begun to internalize even a

 small amount of what was happening, the general inattention seemed

 amazing, even eerie.



 One thing was very clear.  With no public or private restrictive

 policies in place, if there was ever a brief moment when it might be

 possible to unleash the Internet in Canada, to really unconditionally

 distribute this distributed capability to the Canadian public, it was

 1991.  (The National Capital FreeNet and the Victoria Free-Net were

 not actually unleashed until late 1992, but the idea was developing in

 the autumn of 1991.)(8)



 The full stories of how the first Canadian community networks managed

 to uncage the Internet should probably be told some day.  These

 stories need to be told to fill in the historical record, and to

 preempt any misconceptions that the development was simply blind

 luck or simply technology running its inevitable course.  For now, it

 is enough to say that the freenet initiative in Canada was understood

 and intended from the very beginning as political action.  At least,

 it was in the instance of the National Capital FreeNet, the community

 network where I live and, about which I am best able to speak.



 It was understood from the first, for instance, that the relatively

 narrow and concrete act of having electronic mail and Usenet

 newsgroups available, and at their real cost to the community, would

 ensure widespread acceptance, and that the acceptance rate would be

 stunning.  It was also understood that once these were made freely

 available, it would be difficult to take global electronic mail away,

 or to introduce it at the leisurely rate and higher tariffs that are

 customary with market driven services.



 More importantly, it was understood that the inclusionary ideals and

 vocabulary of the Freenet would both protect and sustain the

 initiative after the private sector realized that a public market for

 networked services was being created for them.



 The National Capital FreeNet was an imagined public space, a dumb

 platform where all individuals, groups and organizations could

 represent themselves, where conflict and controversy could occur

 as the manifestation of conflict and controversy already occurring

 within the community.  As a public space, no one, and certainly no

 group or institution, would be held responsible for another's

 ideology, moral standards, expectations or motivations.  On the

 other hand, each person or organization would be accountable for

 themselves.  Such a space could be constructed only by the

 community acting as a community, and not by any public or private

 organization acting on behalf of the community.  At least that was

 the idea in 1991.



 Just three years later, the Net situation has changed dramatically.

 Although still unreasonably expensive, commercial Internet access is

 fairly readily available, and very shortly community networks like the

 National Capital FreeNet will not be needed, or even wanted, as

 Internet access points.  FreeNets will have to become the vital, local

 public spaces they originally promised to be.



 Just calling the facility a community network does not make it

 one.  The label does not ensure an unconditional public terrain

 where the whole community can celebrate its commonalities and

 diversities, and work through its differences.  In 1991, there was

 not much urgency to focus on these ideals.  Access to the existing

 and emerging Internet services, and at no involuntary cost, was

 enough to ensure a community network's success.  It was not then

 understood by the community networks that this powerful Internet

 access lever would slip away so quickly.



 Community networks must now understood that they must be community

 networks.  This means that they cannot be financed or run for the

 community by one or another institution.  Although networks run by

 such organizations as universities, hospitals, telephone

 companies, or governments, often do not charge a fee, and always

 provide an array of valuable services, these are not the criteria

 by which community network can be usefully defined.



 Community networks run by other organizations are always

 conditionally invested with the values, missions, mandates,

 policies and procedures and other constraints necessarily imposed

 by the host institutions and, therefore, cannot ever provide a

 public terrain.  No institution has a primary mandate to provide a

 public space where public opinion can be under construction.  When

 freedom of expression is a secondary add-on, it is just that, and

 will be encouraged only so long as it is not in conflict with what

 the institution is primarily about.



 Today's youthful community networks, are better than they have any

 right to be this soon and are still our best hope, maybe our only

 hope, for a more participative, more self-representative democracy.

 It is too bad that they will have to mature so quickly if they are to

 reach adulthood.  While they are still critical Internet access

 points, still the bridge between the vast diversity of the Internet

 and the more homogeneous organic community, they must take that

 opportunity to learn how to celebrate the vast diversity that is

 also the local community.  The local community is where people live

 their social and political lives and that is where differences must be

 publicly worked through.  This is most important where the differences

 are the most acute and where the latitudes of tolerance are the

 narrowest.  Community networks must be up to letting everyone speak,

 as painful as this will be for some, some of the time.



 Children, and others unequipped to make safe judgments when

 encountering the most extreme clashes of values, opinions and

 advocacy, must be protected from these conflicts, but the community

 network cannot be their guardian.  The family, the school, the place

 of worship and other societal structures are their guardians.



 Finally, and most importantly, the part-time, short-term stewards of

 the community networks, usually called the 'board', must understand

 that the public terrain is not their institution, and not their moral

 preserve.  The construction of Public Sphere, Inc. is a betrayal of

 the promise community networks have for becoming a public terrain.  As

 community networks develop and mature, they are becoming more

 exclusionary, more restrictive, more like any other organization.

 They begin to see themselves as providing something for the community,

 rather than as caretakers of a space created by the community.  This

 needs to be reversed.  A commitment to defending and expanding this

 public ground will determine whether community networks will survive

 more than a few more year and, what is more, whether their survival

 will be a matter of importance.







 Endnotes



 (1) Popper made the statement at a public lecture at Michigan State

     University in the mid-sixties.  Ironically, he was arguing that

     the then popular social science translations of the electrical

     engineering 'information theory' model were misguided attempts

     to understand social communication by what he termed 'bucket

     theories', where the transactions are comprehended only as buckets

     of content, devoid of any human consideration.



 (2) Written testimony to United States House of Representatives,

     Committee on Science, Space and Technology, March 23, 1993.



     When asked what he thought about the reliability of Cerf's

     estimate of 100 million Internet users by 1998, Gerry Miller,

     Chairman of CA*net, the non-profit company that manages and

     operates the Canadian Internet backbone network, responded wryly

     "Try 100 million hosts."  While Miller might not have meant that

     literally, it was clear that he felt Cerf's earlier estimate to

     now be a significant underestimate of expected Internet growth.

     Private conversation, Ottawa, November, 1994.



 (3) PC Magazine, "Bill Gates Ponders the Internet" by Michael Miller,

     October 11, Volume 13, Number 17, 1994 p79.



 (4) An explication of framing human communication as the inevitable

     interplay of content and relational components of symbolic

     transaction was provided by Paul Watzlawick, Janet Beavin and Don

     Jackson in PRAGMATICS OF HUMAN COMMUNICATION.  This 1967 monograph

     has attracted little attention from media scholars and other

     social theorists, probably because the unidirectional

     producer/consumer relationship between the mass media and their

     audiences is fixed, thereby eliminating or greatly inhibiting the

     metacommunication interplay.



 (5) Bruce Sterling, "Afterwards: The Hacker Crackdown Three Years

     Later", January 1, 1994.  Found on the WELLgopher

     URL: gopher://gopher.well.sf.ca.us:70/11/Publications/authors/

          Sterling



 (6) For example, undergraduate students in most programs at most

     Canadian universities could not get computer accounts in 1991.

     Also, many of the first cohort of National Capital FreeNet

     subscribers were federal civil servants from departments and

     ministries where Internet access was available, but only to a

     selected few.



 (7) CANARIE Associates, "CANARIE Business Plan" and "CANARIE Marketing

     Plan", July 15, 1992.



 (8) The National Capital FreeNet was inspired by the Cleveland

     Free-Net, founded in 1986 by Tom Grundner at Case Western Reserve

     University.  "Free-Net" is a registered servicemark of the

     National Public Telecomputing Network.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                    INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY: REALITY



 By Reid Goldsborough (reidgold@netaxs.com)



 Here's some information on the information superhighway you may find

 interesting. These are excerpts from the first chapter of a new book I've

 written, published by Macmillan Publishing/Alpha Books and titled

 "Straight Talk About the Information Superhighway." The book discusses in

 detail how this national network will affect all aspects of our lives,

 from interpersonal relationships to jobs, from health care and education

 to entertainment and shopping.



 In the book I try to present both plusses and minuses, honestly and

 without either hype or cynacism. In addition to covering the likely near-

 and medium- term future, the book also discusses the current state of

 Internet culture.



 ***



 "Information superhighway" is really just a shorthand term for many

 different networks that will be used for the delivery of information,

 communications, and entertainment. Once the kinks get worked out, it's

 expected -- or at least hoped -- that most of these networks will connect

 with one another, leading to a seamless national, or international,

 communications matrix.



 --



 When the movers and shakers talk of the information superhighway, most of

 them think in terms of one of two visions. The first is of a cerebral

 highway, where information and communications are the key commodities

 transferred. The second is of an entertainment highway -- sometimes

 disparagingly referred to as a "couch potato highway" -- where movies,

 TV shows, interactive games, and home shopping offerings are the more

 prevalent content.



 Those who see the information superhighway as an extension of the Internet

 see additional types of information being made available to personal

 computer users -- voice, music, and full-motion video. Those who favor the

 entertainment-based vision see the information superhighway as an extension

 of cable TV. Only instead of waiting for movies or programs to come on,

 you'd be able to watch just about anything you wanted anytime you wished.



 The entertainment vision is favored by those who would profit from it --

 cable TV companies and telephone companies, both of whom will be building

 the broadband pipelines and delivering the multimedia content into homes

 over the coming years. The information vision, on the other hand, is

 favored by the computer industry and particularly by the online community,

 which views the cable TV and telephone companies as threats to the low-cost

 sharing of information that exists today.



 --



 Not everybody is enamored with the idea of the information superhighway.

 The information superhighway, say critics, is a bad metaphor for a

 boondoggle that big business wants to build with your tax dollars. If it's

 ever finished, you'll pay big bucks for ten times more channels to watch

 reruns of The Lucy Show. If it ever is finished. Critics contend the

 technology won't be ready for prime time for years to come.



 --



 The uncertainty surrounding an undertaking as large as the information

 superhighway in many ways *is* frightening. "I guess the scariest part is

 that you don't know where it's going to lead," says John C. Malone,

 president and CEO of Tele-Communications Inc., the country's largest cable

 TV company and a major information superhighway player. "This is a

 technological and business structure revolution. Nobody can sit here today

 and predict where it's going and what its impact is going to be on any

 particular industry, any particular company, or any particular individual."



 Fortunately, fear of change isn't stopping our forward momentum.  As you'll

 see in the following pages, people are using communications technology

 today -- and planning to use enhanced services tomorrow -- in a host of

 fascinating ways. The changes happening now truly represent a revolution,

 a revolution that will transform jobs, education, relationships,

 entertainment, shopping, health care, and politics, a revolution in which

 you can play a part.



 ***



 If you'd like to read more, the following will help you decide if it's

 worth it to you to buy the book. Please note that I mention specifics,

 including price, so if you object to commercialism of any sort, don't read

 the rest of this message.



 In writing the book, I interviewed key industry leaders such as Bell

 Atlantic Chair and CEO Ray Smith and former Apple Chair and CEO John

 Sculley; top government officials such as FCC Chair Reed Hundt; industry

 and government watchdogs such as Ralph Nader; social commentators such as

 Dr. Joyce Brothers (on relationships and sex on the Internet today and

 information superhighway tomorrow); and people like you using today's

 online services.



 I also relied on demonstrations of emerging information superhighway

 technology; important government white papers; key speeches and

 Congressional testimony by politicians, company CEOs, and community

 leaders; and my own explorations of today's online and multimedia worlds.



 "Straight Talk About the Information Superhighway" covers topics

 relevant to online users, including:



 *  The top sources of online information and entertainment today

 *  Online shopping, advertising, and the commercialization of cyberspace

 *  Online job searching

 *  First-hand accounts of love in cyberspace and tips on how to find it

 *  Computer-enhanced sex

 *  The spiritual underpinnings of cyberspace

 *  The psychology of flamewars

 *  Computer nerd jokes

 *  Computer addiction

 *  How interactive TV will differ from today's passive offerings

 *  The combination PC/TVs of tomorrow

 *  The telephone/cable wars

 *  Privacy, access, and freedom of speech

 *  Avoiding infoglut with intelligent agents

 *  The future of multimedia and virtual reality

 *  Distance education

 *  Telemedicine

 *  Personalized news

 *  Direct democracy

 *  Grass-roots organizing over the Internet

 *  New trends in telecommuting



 "Straight Talk About the Information Superhighway" by Reid Goldsborough

 is published by Macmillan Publishing/Alpha Books (ISBN: 1-56761-513-9).

 You should be able to find a copy in your local bookstore. If not, you

 can ask them to order a copy or you can order the book directly from

 Macmillan Publishing by phoning (800) 428-5331. The cost is $19.99.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                         INTERNET TOOLS SUMMARY



 By John Arthur December (decemj@jec310.its.rpi.edu)



 Hello,



 I've updated my list summarizing Internet tools for Network

 Information Retrieval (NIR) and Computer-Mediated Communication

 (CMC).  This list gives definitions and references to

 documentation and demonstrations of these tools.



 The list is available in several formats: text, 80-column text,

 compressed postscript, html, tex, or dvi.



 These files are available via anonymous ftp:



    Anonymous ftp host:  ftp.rpi.edu

    Directory:           pub/communications/

    Files:               internet-tools {.txt .ps.Z .dvi .html}



    See file: internet-tools.readme for more information.



 For Web access, see the "segmented" hypertext version at:



    http://www.rpi.edu/Internet/Guides/decemj/internet-tools.html



 FILES

 =====

    Basically,

       o internet-tools.ps looks best for reading on paper.

       o internet-tools.txt is good if you want the 80-column constraint.

       o internet-tools is great for manipulating with Unix scripts.

       o internet-tools.html is useful in a WWW browser;

         Connect to URL:

         http://www.rpi.edu/Internet/Guides/decemj/internet-tools.html



 CONTENTS:

 =========

  * Section -0- HOW TO USE THIS DOCUMENT

  * Section -1- ABOUT THIS INFORMATION

    o Notes

    o Formats

  * Section -2- NIR = NETWORK INFORMATION RETRIEVAL

    o Utilities

      - Finger

      - Netfind

      - Nslookup

      - Ping

      - Shepherd

      - TIA = The Internet Adapter (tm)

      - WHOIS

      - X.500

    o Tools

      - Alibi = Adaptive Location of Internetworked Bases of Information

      - Archie

      - Astra

      - Bitftp

      - Essence

      - FSP = File Service Protocol

      - FTP = File Transfer Protocol

      - Jughead

      - Knowbot

      - Maltshop

      - Netserv

      - Soft-Pages

      - Spiders

      - Telnet

      - Trickle

      - Veronica

    o Systems

      - Alex

      - GN

      - Gopher

      - Prospero

      - WAIS = Wide Area Information Server

      - WWW = World Wide Web

    o Interfaces

      - Lists

      - Biomix

      - Chimera

      - Cello

      - Compass

      - Emacs-WWW-browser

      - Fred

      - GINA

      - Hyper-G

      - Hytelnet

      - Internet-in-a-box

      - Minuet

      - Mosaic

      - Lynx

      - Netscape

      - Samba

      - SlipKnot

      - Viola

      - Willow

  * Section -3- CMC = COMPUTER-MEDIATED COMMUNICATION

    o Interpersonal

      - Email

      - Talk

      - ZTalk

    o Group

      - Collage

      - CU-SeeMe

      - Haven

      - Lily

      - Listproc

      - LISTSERV

      - Majordomo

      - Maven

      - MU* = Multiple-User Dialogue/Domain/Dungeon

      - Procmail

      - WIT = Web Interactive Talk

      - WW = Web World

      - Yarn

    o Mass

      - ICB = Internet Citizen's Band

      - IW = Interactive Webbing

      - IRC = Internet Relay Chat

      - ITR = Internet Talk Radio

      - Mbone

      - Usenet

    o Interfaces

      - exMOO

      - htMUD

  * Section -4- STANDARDS

    o Collections

    o Internet

    o Other

  * Section -5- REFERENCES

  * Section -6- DESCRIPTION OF ITEMS



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                 LEGION OF DOOM T-SHIRTS!! Get 'em



 By Chris Goggans <phrack@well.sf.ca.us>



 After a complete sellout at HoHo Con 1993 in Austin, TX this past

 December, the official Legion of Doom t-shirts are available

 once again.  Join the net luminaries world-wide in owning one of

 these amazing shirts.  Impress members of the opposite sex, increase

 your IQ, annoy system administrators, get raided by the government and

 lose your wardrobe!



 Can a t-shirt really do all this?  Of course it can!



 "THE HACKER WAR  --  LOD vs MOD"



 This t-shirt chronicles the infamous "Hacker War" between rival

 groups The Legion of Doom and  The Masters of Destruction.  The front

 of the shirt displays a flight map of the various battle-sites

 hit by MOD and tracked by LOD.  The back of the shirt

 has a detailed timeline of the key dates in the conflict, and

 a rather ironic quote from an MOD member.



 (For a limited time, the original is back!)



 "LEGION OF DOOM  --  INTERNET WORLD TOUR"



 The front of this classic shirt displays "Legion of Doom Internet World

 Tour" as well as a sword and telephone intersecting the planet

 earth, skull-and-crossbones style.  The back displays the

 words "Hacking for Jesus" as well as a substantial list of "tour-stops"

 (internet sites) and a quote from Aleister Crowley.



 All t-shirts are sized XL, and are 100% cotton.



 Cost is $15.00 (US) per shirt.  International orders add $5.00 per shirt for

 postage.



 Send checks or money orders.  Please, no credit cards, even if

 it's really your card.





 Name:       __________________________________________________



 Address:    __________________________________________________



 City, State, Zip:   __________________________________________





 I want ____ "Hacker War" shirt(s)



 I want ____ "Internet World Tour" shirt(s)



 Enclosed is $______ for the total cost.



 Mail to:   Chris Goggans

            603 W. 13th #1A-278

            Austin, TX 78701



 These T-shirts are sold only as a novelty items, and are in no way

 attempting to glorify computer crime.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



Date: Sat, 21 Jan 1995 02:13:10 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File8



 

               INTERVIEW WITH ERIK BLOODAXE



 By Netta Gilboa



 Interview with Erik Bloodaxe (GRAY AREAS REPRINT)

 The following are portions of an interview with "Erik Bloodaxe" by Netta

 Gilboa of Gray Areas Magazine.  Gray Areas is an eclectic arts and culture

 magazine that focuses on the fringes of society. It's one of the best

 sources for information on rock and alternative music, controversial

 social issues, computer culture, and other topics that aren't covered

 elsewhere. It's a steal  $18 for four issues, or $50 for three years. For

 information, write:



 Gray Areas

 PO Box 808

 Broomall, PA 19008-0808



 Or, e-mail them at grayarea@well.sf.ca.us



 For those new to computer culture, "erik bloodaxe" was a member of

 the original "Legion of Doom," a modest media celebrity, and

 more recently, the editor of Phrack)).



 ((Excerpts from interview with Chris Goggans at Pumpcon, 1993. From:

 GRAY AREAS, Fall, 1994 (Vol 3, #2): pp 27-50))



 By Netta Gilboa



 Netta Gilboa: What is Phrack magazine?



 Chris Goggans: Phrack is the longest running underground publication.

 I don't really know how to describe Phrack. Phrack just sort of is.

 Phrack is an electronic magazine that deals with topics of interest to

 the computer underground; different types of operating systems,

 weaknesses in system architectures; telephony; anything of any

 relevance to the community in which it was intended for, that being

 the computer underground. It has always tried to paint a picture of

 the social aspects of the computer underground rather than focus

 entirely on technical issues. So in that way it adds a lot of color to

 what's going on.



 GA: How did you get involved with publishing Phrack?



 CG: Well, I got involved when the person who was editing it at the

 time, Dispater, got into a motorcycle accident and as a result of

 this, had a lot of other financial hardships, so he wasn't going to be

 able to do it any longer. Its original editors, Craig Neidorf (Knight

 Lightning) and Taran King, had no interest in doing it themselves any

 longer for, at least in Craig's case, obvious personal reasons, and

 there really was no one else who could take it over.  I was of the

 mind set that Phrack had been around so long that it had almost become

 something of an institution. I, being so ridiculously nostalgic and

 sentimental, didn't want to see it just stop, even though a lot of

 people always complain about the content and say, "Oh, Phrack is lame

 and this issue didn't have enough info, or Phrack was great this

 month, but it really sucked last month." You know, that type of thing.

 Even though some people didn't always agree with it and some people

 had different viewpoints on it, I really thought someone needed to

 continue it and so I kind of volunteered for it.  And there was a

 little bit of discussion amongst some people.



 First Craig was really hesitant to say, "Yeah, well maybe you should

 take it over." A lot of this was being held up by Taran King who said,

 "Well, we just don't want your politics getting involved." Because,

 apparently, I have some hidden political agenda that differed with

 what they thought the role of Phrack should play. Eventually they

 decided that there is really no one else who could do a job well

 enough to continue it in the spirit in which it had been formed and I

 started with issue 42. And I think that one went over very well.  That

 issue was pretty hilarious because it had a lot of stuff about packet

 switching networks, and it was a big slap in the face to B.T. Tymnet.

 I had a whole lot of fun with that issue. Since then, it's gone over

 really well, at least from everyone I've talked to. Of course there'

 have always been a few dissenters that say, Oh, Phrack sucks, but

 these are the same people who won't tell you why.  They're just saying

 it to try to get a rise out of me or something, but everybody seems to

 appreciate the time and effort that goes into putting this out and

 especially since I'm getting nothing out of it.



 There's kind of a funny side to that. After I took it over, I went

 ahead and I registered it with the Library of Congress and I filed a

 DBA as Phrack magazine and for the first issue I put out a license

 agreement, sort of, at the beginning saying that any corporate,

 government or law enforcement use or possession of this magazine

 without prior registration with me was a violation of the Copyright

 Law, blah, blah, blah, this and that and Phrack was free to qualified

 subscribers; however, in order to qualify as a qualified subscriber,

 one must be an amateur computer hobbyist with no ties to such a thing.

 And this really went over like a ton of bricks with some people.  A

 lot of corporate people immediately sent back, "Please remove my name

 from the list." I had a few other people say, well, "We're going to

 pay, but don't tell anybody we're going to pay." Of course, they never

 did. There was only one person who actually did pay, so, you know, I

 used that as wonderful ammunition for the next issue saying that all

 of them are lying, cheating scums and they have no respect for our

 information so why should they think it odd that we have any respect

 for theirs.



 GA: And you actually named a few people.



 CG: Yeah, I named several people who were not only getting the

 magazine but in one case, they were spreading it around and, of

 course, none of them even contacted me for registration.  It was all,

 I had a riot with it. It was a lot of fun. And, I'm still going to

 include that in every issue because I still expect them, if they're

 going to be reading my magazine, to please have some shred of decency

 and pay the registration fee, since it's a lot less than any other

 trade publication that they'd be buying regardless, and certainly a

 lot more voluminous and contains a lot more information than they're

 going to find in any other magazine dealing with computer security.



 GA: Is the agenda for that decision to get publicity, to have grounds

 to sue people who you don't like, or to gain financially?



 CG: Well, I never expected to gain anything financially. You know, a

 lot of the people who are still in the so-called "underground" are

 also working in various fields which might put them in conflict with

 the registration agreements, and we're very liberal about that. I

 mean, if someone just because they're working at, let's say...



 GA: Gray Areas, Inc.



 CG: Yeah, Gray Areas, Inc. or the people who might be independent,

 like LAN consultants, you know, just 'cause someone's working in the

 field, I'm real flexible about that. Then if someone sends me mail,

 and I get a lot like that, which says, "Well, I'm assistant

 administrator here at the university and there's no way they'll pay

 for it." I'm like, "Don't worry about it." You know, "We'll make an

 exemption in your case." But it's the people, the Gene Stafford's of

 the world, the Ed DeHart's of the world.  Those are the people who

 have always pointed the finger at the people who this information is

 intended for and called them bad.  They're the ones who don t register

 their subscriptions and the people of their mind set and the people of

 their ilk, I guess.



 As far as publicity, it didn't gain any publicity. It wasn't any kind

 of stunt. My biggest concern in doing this was to try to protect this

 information and I didn't want to see it being resold. With the prior

 Phracks up 'til 41, there are companies out there, for example Onion

 Press who sells hard copies of Phrack, and I don't want anything that

 I'm putting time and effort into being resold. I don't want it in the

 CD-ROMs. There's are several CD-ROMs out right now with a bunch of

 text files from the computer underground.



 So, I wanted to copyright this information, put it out. It's a

 magazine, I'm doing it, it's my magazine. The DBA is in my name, I

 hold the copyright and no one's going to resell this. If it's going to

 be presented in some other format, I want to be able to control that.

 And, it's not necessarily a kind of power play. It's just I want to

 protect it.  I mean, I don't think you'd appreciate people all of a

 sudden saying, "Now I'm going to put up the electronic version of Gray

 Areas."



                        =======================



 GA: Many years ago, Phrack had a problem with a telephone company

 regarding a document that they printed, and a lot of people have said

 that if it was a paper publication as opposed to an electronic

 publication, that might never have happened.



 CG: Yeah, well, I mean, that's obvious.  You  look at magazines like

 2600 and just because they're black letters on a white page instead of

 white letters on a black screen, they get away with a lot of stuff.

 They get threatening letters from Bell Cores. They like to publish

 them in their magazine, but they haven't been taken to task for any of

 that. You don't see them in any sort of court for this and the mere

 fact that the very document that they are saying was so proprietary

 was available for $19.95 from the Bell Core order line. That sort of

 stands to prove that they were just looking for a scapegoat, a

 figurehead in the underground community to use as an example for the

 rest of the people to say, "Well, we'll take down Phrack.  That'll

 show them. That'll scare them."



 It's the same kind of thing that they tried to do with The Legion of

 Doom.  They said, "Well, we took down the Legion of Doom." I heard it

 from one person, you know, you cut off the head, the body will die.

 It's like, AT&T or somebody had somebody map out the computer

 underground, they had Phrack magazine in the middle of a hub and the

 Legion of Doom above that; arrows going and pointing out how the

 computer underground networks together, and obviously, these people

 think there's a little more structure to it than there is. They don't

 realize that it's complete anarchy. I mean, no one's controlling

 anybody else's actions. To set out one example and hope that everybody

 else is going to learn from that one example is ludicrous.



 GA: What sort of problems do you encounter publishing it?



 CG: It takes up a lot of my time, my spare time, which is growing

 incredibly smaller and, I mean, I've overextended myself on a number

 of projects and since I've definitely got a commitment to Phrack, it's

 one that I can certainly shirk if I decided to since I'm not indebted

 to anybody to do it really. I'm not going to pass it up because I

 really want to make sure it continues to be published. That's the

 biggest problem I face, time.  Then there are people who say, "Oh, I'm

 going to send you a file on this," and they don't. You know, thanks a

 lot. And I always rag on those people.  In fact, in the beginning of

 Phrack 44, I said, "Yeah, and for the people who said they're going to

 send me a file and didn't, you know who you are, and you always have

 to live with your own guilt." I mean, it's typical hacker stuff. "I'm

 going to do this." And they start it and they forget about it.



 GA: It's funny though because I've had incredible cooperation from

 those people; more than I've had from any other community that we deal

 with.  Do you think it's because I'm a girl or because it's on paper?



 CG: Well, it might be a little of both. The kind of files that go in

 Phrack, I don't think Gray Areas is going to publish. You know, how to

 use the Role 9000 CBX, or here's how to hack system 75's, or secret

 sectors and units, or publish C programs. You get a different type of

 thing.  Maybe there are people who feel a lot more comfortable writing

 cultural type pieces or special interest pieces than they would

 writing technical stuff. And to try to compensate for that.  I've put

 in a lot more stuff in the issues that I've been dealing with, to deal

 with the culture. Like I started something last issue trying to get

 people from different countries to write about what it's like in that

 country. And I had a file in from Ireland; I had a file in from

 Germany; I had a file in from Canada. This issue I've got another one

 from a different part of Canada and I've got one from Sweden and I'm

 waiting on a couple of others. Because, as the computer underground

 goes, it's, people like to have this idea that it's this closely knit

 thing of all these hackers working together, and see how they're

 trading information. But it's not. I don't know anything that's going

 on in other countries except for what the few, select people from

 those countries who hang out in the same areas that I do tell me.  But

 there's so many people and so many countries doing things.



 They've got their own little pirate wares, trading scenes, they've got

 their own little virus scenes, they've got their freaking things.

 Stuff that works on their own system, only works in their country; and

 they have their own secret ways of doing things, and their own

 networks that they like to hack, and they all hang out on certain

 deals and they have their own little lore about the busts, or super

 hackers from their country, and that's the kind of stuff that's just

 great to find out. Because, otherwise, you would never know. And it's

 really, really interesting to read what these people are up to and no

 one names names. They're just talking about what it's like to be a

 hacker in their country, and that's the kind of cool stuff that I

 want to continue to do.



                        =======================



 GA: I suppose we should get into your background and how you became

 qualified to run Phrack.



 CG: I don't know if it's a qualification to run Phrack...



 GA: Well, obviously, there are an awful lot of people who could have

 been considered but weren't.



 CG: Yeah, well, I guess so.



 GA: What sort of stages did you go through?  From the time that you

 first discovered computers and so on until today?



 CG: I kind of went through an exponential learning curve from the very

 beginning and it plateaued out for a while and it's just been a steady

 growth since then. At least I tried to maintain that because there's

 so many new developments that come out and I try to stay abreast of

 everything that's going on. I started messing around with computers a

 very long time ago. For any number of reasons, I always have problems

 trying to place the exact date.



 GA: What sort of computers were there?  That dates it a little.



 CG: Well, the very first computer I did anything on with a modem was

 an Apple II, and a micro modem II. It was a friend of mine's dad's.

 He was a lawyer. He got it so he could get on Dialogue,  because it

 was like the brand new service for lawyers. They could go on and look

 up legal briefs and it was all exciting. So, this friend of mine was

 showing it off, I guess maybe 5th grade, 6th grade, somewhere around

 there?  A long time ago. And, in order to get on Dialogue, you had to

 dial this special number. Well, we got on, followed the instructions,

 got on Dialogue, looked at it, said, "This is really cool." And we

 noticed that, "Well, gee, in order to get on Dialogue, you have to

 dial this number" which was 415 something. Well, what happens if you

 type in a different number? So we typed a different number somewhere

 else. And, that was sort of it.



 We spent the vast majority of that night trying different addresses on

 Telenet and actually got into a system. And, this was the first time I

 had ever been on a modem and, I mean, it was just natural. We were

 like, wow! We didn't have any concept of what a network was, we

 couldn't imagine what this  meant. The concept of being able to call

 one little number and connect to computers around the entire country

 was so mind boggling, so strange to us that we were sucked into it.



 As a little bit of background to this, I had already been messing

 around with telephones before this and this is a ridiculous story that

 a lot of people give me a lot of s--- about but, I mean, I don't

 really care. A friend of mine and I had stolen a dirty magazine from a

 convenience store and rifling through it, it was like a High Society

 or something like that.



 GA: Probably not. There were no such things then. They didn't start

 until 1975-76.



 CG: Well, this is back in 1980. I'm not that old. I turned 25 in May,

 so it wasn't that long ago I guess in the grand scheme of things.

 But, to me it was a hell of a long time ago. So anyway, we had stolen

 a High Society from them and in it, it said, "Call this number right

 now." It was 212-976-2626 or 212-976-2727, a brand new service.  I

 said, "We got to call that number. We can't call that number, that's a

 long distance number, we'll get in trouble." It was like, "No, we

 gotta call that." So, we went back over to his house, and his Mom

 works. She was working, it's funny, she was actually working at

 Datapoint. She was at work, it was the summer, so we got there and

 dialed it up, listened to if for, like you know, some phone sex

 recording. Wow! You're a little punk kid, of course, that's just great

 to hear some crazy recording like that.



 We hung up after it was over and were like, "Man, that's great.  We're

 going to have to call that other one.  No we can't call the other

 one.  He says, "Well, actually maybe we can, but if we're going to

 call it, we need to use this thing that my Mom's got." What thing? He

 said, "Well, it's this thing that's supposed to make her phone bill

 cheaper."  And, it was a company that started up way back then called

 LDS. It was a Watts re-seller and they had a local dial-up number, you

 call up and you gave the operator who answered the phone a code, you

 read it out to her and she connected the call. I think at that time it

 was a four or five digit code.  So we called up, gave it to her, gave

 her the number, the call went through. So, next time you call her

 back, give her someone else's number. Goes, "nah."  So we called up,

 added ten to the number we had and placed the call. It was like,

 "Well, that's really cool." And it's funny that I've done that prior

 to doing anything on the computer because shortly thereafter, after

 being on the computer and discovering networks and after that,

 discovering bulletin boards, it became readily apparent to me how the

 marriage of the two was inevitable because there was no way in hell

 I'd be able to call a bulletin board any place other than down the

 street and not get beat to death by my parents for raking up very

 large phone bills. And after that, it kind of just shot up

 exponentially like I said before. From such humble beginnings.



                        =======================



 CG:  Which connected, at the time, I think now they have limits as to

 how many people. At the time, it was basically unlimited.  You could

 take as many people as you wanted on your conference. And they had a

 lot of different features that they don't have now. Like, you could

 transfer control. And we used to do all sorts of ridiculous stuff.

 One of my favorite tricks was to call up Directory Assistance and, at

 the time, I don't think they do this any more, I haven't really

 bothered to check in about five years, but at the time, Western

 Digital who made all the automatic call distribution systems for

 Directory Assistance since they were still the Bell system; they had a

 feature in there that would send it into a test mode.  If you called

 up and just as the ACD system kicked in, it started to cue a call for

 the next available operator if you held down a D tone.  A lot of your

 readers might not know this, but on a standard touch tone phone, there

 are really four rows and four columns and not three rows and four

 columns. There's an extra column that's left out and that's A, B, C,

 and D. Well, I had a phone that had A, B, C, and D on it. There's a

 number of different ways to build a tone generator, they'll do that

 and a lot of modems will make those tones or what have you. But,

 anyway, there was a trick at one time by holding down the D tone, if

 you called Directory Assistance, it'd throw the ACD into its

 maintenance mode. And, one of the features on this was to do a test of

 a circuit by establishing basically a loop so, if someone would call,

 hold down a D, get thrown into the maintenance mode, get the 5 key,

 they'd get onto one side of the mode.  Someone else could call back

 in, hold down the D key, hit 6, get on the other side of loop, and

 then you could talk.



 Well, I used to call Directory Assistance from the conference, hold

 down the D key, hit 5, add that into the conference, the loop,

 transfer control to Directory Assistance and then call back in on the

 other side of the loop and then take control of the conference that

 way.  So, if any of the test people who were working on the software

 for Alliance and working on getting the bugs worked out of everything,

 if any of the engineers would go back to look and see why these

 circuits were active and they'd look to see who was running control of

 this conference, they'd see it was Directory Assistance and it really

 used to confuse the hell out of them.  We got a great deal of mileage

 out of that because, you know, I don't really think they knew how, but

 somehow it kept going. But anyway, on these conferences, I got hooked

 up with a group of really, really, really, really smart people and by

 sitting and talking with these people, and learning what they knew,

 because like I said before, everyone was really open and everybody

 wanted everybody to learn. If more people were working on a project,

 everybody had a better chance of learning and succeeding then if just

 one person decided to hoard it all to themselves.



 >From being on these conferences and talking about to all of these

 people and sharing information with all of these people, I was

 eventually asked to join a group that was being formed at that time

 and it ended up being called The Legion of Doom.



 GA: How did it get called Legion of Doom? Who named it?



 CG: I don't know. The person whose idea it was to start the group, his

 handle was Lex Luther and from the DC Comics, Lex Luther's infamous

 group of anti-heroes was The Legion of Doom, so it was pretty a

 natural choice.  A lot of stuff has been attributed to it lately, such

 as it being a sinister type name. Well, Lex Luther couldn't possibly

 have called his group anything other than the Legion of Doom.  Anybody

 who has every read a Super Friends comic knows that's exactly what it

 was called.



 As The Legion of Doom continued on in its growth and its endless quest

 of knowledge about different operating systems and networking

 technologies and phone systems and everything else, the reps of

 everybody involved in the group sort of kind of sky rocketed because

 everybody by us all working together, we had a better resource of

 knowledge to provide the people and by continuing to do so, everybody,

 I guess, built up a sort of respect for the group and some of it has

 even lasted to today, even though the group is no longer around. A lot

 of things that it affected still linger on in the community.



 GA: There's been a lot of debate about who was in that group. Seems

 like everybody in the world wanted to be. Ha, ha. So many of the

 hackers I meet say they were.



 CG: There are always going to be people who want to run around and

 say, "Yeah, I was in the Legion of Doom."  And I know everybody who

 was in it.  I've got a list of everybody who was in it and written

 about everybody who was in it. We all know who was in it, so it really

 does not make any difference. If some joker off the street  is going

 to come up and say, "I was in The Legion of Doom," who really cares,

 you know, what's it going to get him today? It doesn't mean anything,

 because the group is not around anymore.  Um, if they know something,

 well, their knowledge alone should speak for itself and should not

 have to relay on the name of some group that does not exist to try to

 perpetrate some sort of false image to other people, so it really

 doesn't happen that often. We see people like Ian Murphy, for

 instance. I've still got newspaper articles with him in it saying that

 he was in Legion of Doom, and in fact, he has told some people, and

 some business acquaintances of mine, I guess in some desperate attempt

 to generate revenue, that not only was he in Legion of Doom, but he

 founded it, ha, ha, so, that's nice and he can continue to delude

 himself in a lot of things.  If anybody wants to live in delusion,

 well that's their right, I suppose. It doesn't mean anything to me.



 GA: Isn't there a new Legion of Doom now?



 CG: Well, I really don't want to get into that too much. There was a

 young Canadian fellow who decided that it might be a good idea to

 start the new Legion of Doom and within like say an hour after that

 got posted to the Net, we were on the phone with him, telling him what

 a bad idea that was. It was myself and Scott Chasin who called him up

 first and he said, "Well, I think The Legion of Doom was a real

 important thing for the community and I just want to see it continue"

 and this and that. I said, "Who are you to come out of nowhere and

 think that not only do you have enough knowledge to say that you could

 have been associated with The Legion of Doom, much less to usurp the

 name? The name is dead, we put the group to rest and we want it to

 stay that way. He said, Well I'm not going to change it and as soon as

 you see the type of journal I put out, you will be really impressed."

 I said, "If your magazine is good, it will stand on its own merit and

 you don't need our name." He said, "Well you retired the name and that

 means it's fair game for anybody else." Okay, well so there is no

 talking to this guy, so I said, "Well I want to tell you this Cameron,

 Scott and I are the first to call you, there will be many others. We

 are the nicest. It's not going to be pretty for you and I just want

 you to know that."



 And let's just say there is no more New Legion of Doom. It was kind of

 an interesting experience for everybody because it did get a lot of

 the members back in contact with one another. A lot of us had gone our

 separate ways. The members grew older.  The group was founded in '84 and

 here it is almost '94, I mean that's a long time for, you know, a

 bunch of people to stay in contact, regardless of whether or not it

 was for some silly little computer group to form a net.  So it was

 nice to catch back up with a lot of people.  It's really refreshing to

 see that damn near everybody who was ever involved in the group is

 doing very well for themselves in their chosen careers or professions,

 or graduating with high graduate degrees, Ph.D.s, Master Degrees, and

 things; it's certainly not what one would expect from the world's most

 infamous hacker group, but that certainly is what happened.  But, you

 know, the whole Cameron Smith New Legion of Doom thing, it didn't

 accomplish anything for him, but it certainly did accomplish something

 for us. It got a bunch of us back together again.  I don't want to

 sound grateful to him for it, but it worked out pretty well.



 GA: How did The Legion of Doom originally break up?



 CG: Well, The Legion of Doom kind of went through three different

 waves.  You can kind of chart the history of the computer underground,

 it sort of runs parallel to the history of The Legion of Doom, because

 you can see as the new members came in, that's when all the busts

 happened.  People would either get nervous about the busts and move on

 and go to college and try to get a life, or they would be involved in

 some of the bust and some of them would leave that way. So it kind of

 went through three different membership reorganizations. You can tell

 who came in where because of what was going on.  It finally kind of

 folded. I had talked to a bunch of members somewhat recently, within

 the past three or four years and I said, "Well maybe we ought to try

 to do something, we need to get some more members in and try to work

 towards a different end." At the time, there was still the infant of

 an idea about going into consulting by building together this last

 insurgence of Legion of Doom. I talked to  several people and wanted

 to try to track down newer people, so I talked to the members who were

 still active and asked are you still interested in doing this again,

 because we've got some other things that we want to try to focus on

 and as stuff starts to progress, something might come out of it. I'm

 doing something with some other people, and we got people who are

 experts in different types of fields, and we were talking to people

 who are experts in mainframes, in telephony, in Unix, and all sorts of

 different stuff and as that started to progress, we got a bunch of

 people in the last new membership drive for the group, did a few

 things, and as that started to go on, most of my main focus started

 dealing in with a few people from the last insurgence about trying to

 form this consulting company, which ended up being Comsec.



 We finally decided that's what we were going to do and we were serious

 about it, we said okay well then maybe we should just dissolve the

 group, because if we are going to have Comsec, we don't need Legion of

 Doom, 'cause this is what we want to do. Instead of spreading the

 knowledge around the net in the form of text files free, we were going

 to spread the knowledge around the corporate world for money. It

 really was a logical progression to us, because, you are not going to

 be 35 years old and still trying to break into the systems somewhere;

 the thrill doesn't last that long and if it does, well, you need to

 get a life or a pet or something. There is no reason why someone who

 even has an inkling of maturity, not to say that I do in the least,

 should be wasting away their life gathering up how many university

 systems they broke into.



 So after we finally made the formal decision, we talked to some people

 and said well, we were just going to say goodbye to the group.

 Everybody who was still active or interested from the group was like

 look, you know, when this thing takes off, we want all of you to be

 there. When we need more consultants, you're the best, and everyone

 was all up for it. That's what happened.



 GA: Let's stick with The Legion of Doom for awhile. What was the

 relationship between The Legion of Doom Technical Journals and Phrack

 and Phun?



 CG: Well, it's kind of funny. Originally, I think this was something

 that Craig and Lex had done. Originally, there was going to be a

 Phrack issue that was going to be the Legion of Doom Phrack Issue. It

 was going to be Phrackful, nothing would follow us but Legion of Doom

 members and it went on and on and on.  I guess Lex had collected

 enough files, he was like, "I don't want to give these to Phrack."

 So, he stuck them together in the Legion of Doom Technical Journals,

 since it was all Legion of Doom stuff anyway, might as well go ahead

 and put it out ourselves. And I don't know if that was something

 personal against Craig, I really doubt it because Craig and Lex have

 always been friendly enough. I just think that is something he decided

 to do. From that there were three others published, so there was a

 total of four Tech Journals. They didn't come out in any sort of

 organized order, they just sort of came out when they wanted to come

 out.  It was like they were done when they were done and they appeared

 when we were finished and that's why there were only four for a group

 that was around for so long, but they were fairly timely when they

 were all released and I guess everybody really appreciated the kind of

 knowledge that was in them when they came out.



 Looking back, I don't know how much interest someone is going to get

 on how to hack Tops 20. I d like to find the Tops 20 right now.  It

 doesn't exist. So the knowledge that was in those things is fairly

 dated, but at the time, it was very timely and people appreciated it.



                        =======================



 GA: You were busted in 1990, right?



 CG: Nope.



 GA: How did that go down?



 CG: On March 1 1990, I was raided by the Secret Service, but I wasn't

 busted.  There is a big distinction there. Just because they came in

 my house and dug through my stuff, that doesn't mean anything

 happened.



 Let me give a little preface to that. Several months prior, I received

 notification from the University of Texas that my school records

 (specifically mentioning my computer accounts) were being subpoenaed

 by a federal district court judge in Chicago. I knew very well that

 was the district that William Cook was in, so I trotted on down to the

 Dean's office at the University of Texas and said, "Hi, I understand

 my records have been subpoenaed. I need a copy of that for my lawyer."

 So they ran me off a copy of it and sure enough there's William Cook's

 name. So, okay, I was right, and I went home and vacuumed the house

 and cleaned everything up nice and neat for them, started placing

 little notes in various places. I had little notes that said, "Nope,

 nothing in here," put that in a drawer and a little note that said,

 "Wrong, try again," put that in there and little things everyplace

 that someone might look to try to find the secret hacker notes.  I

 printed out a copy of the 911 document, nice laser printed copy, laid

 that out and fan folded it over my desk. I went down to the Federal

 Building, picked up brochures on how to became an FBI agent and a

 Secret Service Agent, set those out on my desk. I got a printout of

 several different things, laid those out all nice and neat, had some

 Phrack issues, I had some messages off of the Phoenix Project, I had

 all this stuff laid out. It looked like a little alter, a shrine to

 the FBI.



 Well, sure enough a couple months later, there they were. And I also

 put some notes on my computer account at UT. I made some really large

 files, like cordons and named them dot master, dot password, dot zip,

 just stupid names, you know that tack ID's, and left these sitting in

 my account. All this noise. And then I made this one that said,

 "Secret Info." If anybody would have bothered to read that, it was

 like a 10K file of me saying, "Anybody who would take the time to

 search through my files and try to find illegal information is a

 complete scumbag." Sure enough when they came to visit my house that

 morning, I woke up to the sound of people running up my stairs and

 their screaming, "Federal Agents - warrant," then they came in my

 room, "Out of the bed." Leading the pack is Special Agent Tim Foley,

 and he's got his service revolver out, and he's got it pointed at me.

 He's a pretty big guy and I'm me. I don't present a menacing figure to

 most and especially at 6 in the morning in boxer shorts, ha, ha.  It

 just looked like I'm going to jump right out and start ripping

 peoples' heads off, so he quickly put his gun away. Nonetheless, he

 did have it drawn. I like to point that out. Hackers are a notoriously

 violent group of people who are known for their physical prowess, so

 guns are definitely always necessary. (said sarcastically)



 So, they ordered me downstairs and held me in the kitchen. I

 immediately said, "Let me call my lawyer," and they said, "You'll get

 your chance." So, they started going through all my stuff. I heard

 them up in my room, rifling all though my drawers and about an hour or

 so later, one comes down and hands over one of the Secret Service

 Brochures that I had.  He says, "So, thinking about joining up?" I

 said, "Well, I think I could probably do better than some people."  He

 didn't like that remark.  He said, "Well, I think our requirements are

 a little more stringent than to let in the likes of you." I said,

 "Well, it shows."  He didn't like that very much either. I said, "So,

 what's your degree in?"  He said, "Well, I'm not going to tell you."

 I said "I'm just making conversation." So they continued on in the

 search of my house and when they found absolutely nothing having

 anything to do with computers, they started digging through other

 stuff. The found a bag of cable and wire and they decided they better

 take that, because I might be able to hook up my stereo, so they took

 that. I have an arcade size PacMan machine, which of course, one of

 the agents  decided was stolen, because a lot of people slip those

 into their backpacks on the way home from school. So they started

 calling up all the arcade vendors around town trying to see if this

 had indeed been stolen. The thought of me wheeling an arcade size

 PacMan machine down the street, just didn't occur to them. So,

 finally, I said "Look, I bought it, here's the guy, call him."  So

 they finally gave that up, so then they started harassing me about

 some street signs I had in my house. I had a Stop sign.  I had a No

 Dumping sign over the toilet. "You need to get rid of those, it's

 state property, if we come back here and you have those, we are taking

 you downtown." I go like, "Okay."  So then they started looking for

 drugs, and one guy is digging through a big box of, like a jumbo

 family size deal of Tide we bought at Sam's, it was about three feet

 tall and it was one of the monster size things. This guy is just

 digging through it, just scooping it out, his hands are all turning

 blue and sudsy from digging through this detergent and Foley walks

 over to him and says, "Well, I think we can safely assume that that's

 laundry detergent."



 So, Foley comes back in to where I'm sitting in the kitchen and I've

 been freezing my ass off, so they had let me get a jacket, and put on

 some jeans, and he says to me, "Well, I want to show you something."

 He whips out some business cards that I had printed up for SummerCon a

 few years ago, that said, "Erik Bloodaxe, Hacker." It had a little

 treasury logo on it and he says, "Impersonating a Federal official?"

 "Well, it doesn't say anywhere on there, 'Chris Goggans, Special

 Agent.' It says, 'Erik Bloodaxe, Hacker.' Whoever this Erik Bloodaxe

 character is. It might be me, it might not. I'm Chris Goggans and that

 says, Erik Bloodaxe, Hacker. Just because the seals there, it doesn't

 mean anything." He says, "Well, if you don't tell us everything that

 there is to know about all your higher ups, we are going to be

 pressing state, local and federal charges against you." I said, "On

 what grounds?" He goes, "We want to know everything about your higher

 ups." Which I'm thinking, gosh, I'm going to have to turn in the big

 man, which is ludicrous, because there is no such thing as a higher

 up, but apparently they thought we were a part of some big

 organization. So, I said, "Well, I'm not saying anything to you, I'm

 calling my lawyer." And I already had told my lawyer previously that I

 would be raided shortly and that I would be needing to call him. So I

 called him and said, "Hi, this is Chris and the Secret Service is here

 and I'd like you to speak to the agent in charge."  And he said that

 my client declines any sort of interviews until such a time that I can

 arrange to be there to represent him in an official capacity and I'll

 need your name and I need all the information. The agent said, "We

 will be in touch."  And that was it. They gathered the bag of wire and

 the printouts of the 911 document, how to be an FBI agent, the

 printouts of the Phoenix Project messages, and they trotted on off. As

 they were walking out the door, one of the guys kind of looks over at

 my television set and he says, "Hey, why is that video game plugged

 into the phone line?" And it was kind of like a Homer Simpson, cause

 Foley trots over and I had a 300v terminal, which is what I had been

 using to get on bulletin boards with. It was plugged into the phone.

 It was a little membrane keyboard box. All it was was a modem. So they

 bundled that up and stuck that in there, and they went on their merry

 way, and I followed them out to the car, and wished them well, and

 wrote down their license plate, and went back into the house, and got

 into my car, and went driving around calling up everybody else around

 town to see if anybody else had been raided.



 GA: Had they?



 CG: Yeah, at the same time as what was going on in my house, the house

 of Lloyd Blankenship was being raided, The Mentor, as well as the

 office place of Steve Jackson Games, where Lloyd worked, which ran

 into a huge fiasco later on down the road for these hapless agents,

 but that's an entirely different story.



                        =======================



 GA: Did you ever do any malicious hacking?



 CG: No. To be honest, there were a couple of times I actually

 considered such a thing.  At one point in time, we had access to South

 African Government computers, like South African Treasury, things like

 that and we were thinking, should we take it down? Nah, we better not

 do that, can we just change the message of the day to something like

 some anti-apartheid statement, some sort of politically correct thing.

 It was all a big joke to us, we certainly weren't thinking about that,

 we just figured it would really piss them off, but we never did it.

 When the Russian x25 network went up, we were right there on it. They

 can't bust us for hacking Russia, I mean, who would? What were they

 going to say?  It's like, "You should hack them, because they are our

 enemies, well maybe you should hack them," so, we were just going

 after the Russian network pretty hardcore.



 Malicious hacking pretty much stands against everything that I adhere

 to.  You always hear people talking about this so called hacker ethic

 and I really do believe that. I would never wipe anything out. I would

 never take a system down and delete anything off of a system. Any time

 I was ever in a system, I'd look around the system, I'd see how the

 system was architectured, see how the directory structures differed

 from different types of other operating systems, make notes about this

 command being similar to that command on a different type of system,

 so it made it easier for me to learn that operating system. Because

 back then you couldn't just walk down the street to your University

 and jump right on these different computer systems, because they

 didn't have them and if they did have them only several classes would

 allow you access to them. Given the fact that I was certainly not of

 college age, it wasn't really an option. You didn't have public access

 to systems. All you had to do was call up and ask for an account and

 you'd get one. So, the whole idea of doing anything destructive or

 malicious or anything even with malcontents using computer systems to

 track information about people or harass people, that just goes

 against the grain of anything that's me.  I find it pretty repulsive

 and disgusting. I am certainly not blind to the fact that there are

 people out there that do it, but obviously these people have a s---ty

 upbringing or they are just bad people.



                        =======================



 GA: How about books that have come out about hackers?



 CG: Well, I'll take a stab at that. The Hacker Crackdown I found to be

 a very schizophrenic piece of writing. I still to this day have not

 read it completely. I found it very hard to follow and I was there. It

 is very hard for me to read that book and follow the chronology.

 Everything is on the money and he did a very good job of making sure

 the facts were correct, but it's just hard for me to read.  Maybe

 that's just a criticism of his writing style.



 Approaching Zero, I didn't really care for that too much, more

 specifically because they just basically out and out called me a

 traitor and said I was keen on selling secrets to the Soviet Union.

 Maybe you ought to ask the IRS about all that money I got from the

 Soviet Union, because I haven't seen it, but I'm sure I'll be taxed on

 that too. But I found that rather disgusting and after that book, I

 actually had a conversation with one of the people who was writing the

 book. A guy named Brian, actually called us up at Comsec and I talked

 to him for about 30-45 minutes about things and next thing I know,

 nothing we really said ended up in the book. A bunch of people were

 misquoted, left and right. All the stuff about the American hacking

 scenes, off the mark.  People were quoted as saying stuff that they

 never said, things supposedly from bulletin boards that were not on

 bulletin boards. I don't know where this information came from, but

 it's really just off the money.  I guess if you know something so

 intimately, you are always going to be critical of anything someone

 says about it because they don't know it as well as you do, so you are

 always going to find fault in something.  So maybe I'm just being

 overly critical.



                        =======================



 GA: While on the subject of Comsec, you have said that you have gotten

 bad press. From where?



 CG: Well, I think an article saying that I have been arrested in the

 past for breaking into Bell South, or books being published saying

 myself of The Legion of Doom destroyed the 911 Network in nine states

 just to see if we could do it. Things like that which are just out and

 out lies. I'd say that was pretty bad press.



 GA: Did Comsec fold because of personality problems, or a lack of

 business?



 CG: Comsec folded for a number of reasons.  The press aspect weighed

 heavy.  We were basically blacklisted by the security community. They

 wouldn't allow me a forum to publish any of my articles. It

 essentially boiled down to, with the trade magazines, at least, they

 were told by certain members of large accounting firms that they would

 pull their advertising if they associated with us, and when you are a

 trade magazine that is where all of your revenue comes from, because

 no one is paying for subscriptions and they can't afford that loss.

 They were more interested in making money then they were in spreading

 the gospel of truth in security. But hey, it's a business, I guess you

 have to take that. I had speaking engagements pulled. A head of a very

 large security association promised me a speaking engagement and then

 decided to cancel it and didn't bother to tell me until a month before

 the conference. I talked to him and he said, "Oh, well I should have

 called you." This is like one of the largest security associations in

 the country and the second largest. So we had that kind of treatment.



 Some of these conferences, since we were not speaking at them, we

 could not really justify spending thousand of dollars to fly out there

 and attend. We were cut off from a lot of things and since we did not

 have a presence at these conferences, a lot of our competitors used

 this to target the companies that we were marketing. You would have

 these MIS directors from large oil companies out there, and you would

 have other people going up to them and saying, "You're from Houston.

 You are not dealing with those Comsec folks, are you? Well, you know

 that they are nothing but a bunch of crooks out there."  So, one very

 large oil company, we had already had all of our paperwork passed

 though all of their legal departments and it was just waiting to be

 signed; it had already been approved and money was allocated in the

 budget and we were ready to rock. This would have meant a large amount

 of money over a period of several years.  Well from going though all

 of these friendly happy negotiations and papers ready to be signed, to

 XYZ oil company does not do business with criminals, Click! Who talked

 to this guy? Who feed him this nonsense?



 Well, we got a lot of that, certainly that weighed heavy. The fear

 that came from companies like DeLloyd Touche.I will single them out

 especially because some of their larger consultants were very vocal in

 speaking out against us, in the very forums they denied us. They used

 the magazines as a place where one particular consultant said

 something like, "Can we lie down with dogs and be surprised when we

 get up with fleas?" I mean, I don't deserve that type of commentary. I

 don't think anybody does. It is certainly not a mature attitude for

 somebody who is supposed to be an upstanding ethical consultant to use

 a trade publication to vent his frustration against his competition.

 But, hey, it's a free market and if he has a forum and they gave him a

 column, well I think he can write whatever the hell he wants.



 Sure, I was in The Legion of Doom. I have been in everybody's system.

 But I have never been arrested. I have never broken anything, I have

 never done anything really, really, criminally bad. There is a

 difference in doing something illegal, you like walk across the street

 at the wrong place and you are committing a crime, but that does not

 make you a criminal, and there is a big difference between different

 types of behavior. By all these different forces saying so many

 negative things about us, we had our work cut out for us.



 To be honest, they had us beat. They had the deep pockets. They could

 wait us out. They could keep saying bad things about us forever. They

 had hundreds of millions of dollars  so that even if they weren't

 making money they could sit on it. We didn't. Eventually we could not

 do it any more. I had overextended myself. I sold off all my stock,

 all my personal stock. I had a bunch of stock in energy companies and

 things like that, that was in the past supposed to be paying for my

 college education, and I gambled it away on Comsec and I ran out of

 money.  I needed to eat, I needed to get a job, I had to move, I

 couldn't afford it anymore. And everybody was basically saying the

 same thing. Scott didn't have any money, Rob didn't have any money,

 our sales guys were getting really antsy because they were having a

 real hard time closing sales, so we just had to shut down.



                        =======================



 GA: Any thoughts on where technology is going and how hacking might

 change in the next couple of years?



 CG: Well, like I said earlier, the Internet is a very scary place with

 a very, very limited set of knowledge. One person could take down a

 majority of the network and for so much trust and need to be placed in

 a network that is so inherently unstable because of the protocol that

 drives it.  I mean you don't plan a trip across country in a 1957

 jalopy! You go out and get a new car, or you rent a good car, you

 don't put all your trust in something that ain't gonna work. And it

 works well enough for a lot of things, but for people to trust their

 entire enterprise network to stuff over the Internet, they are asking

 for trouble. And as people become more familiar with the entire

 protocol sweep, they are going to find out that there is a world of

 hurt about to happen, and in the next few years, people are going to

 be real surprised when stuff starts going down like crazy. That's

 going to be the biggest thing to happen.



 I would imagine that all the cellular problems are going to disappear

 because the advent of digital caller is going to remove all this

 problem.  A lot of things are going to change. I imagine people,

 hopefully, will once again get more and more into writing software and

 doing more productive stuff. With all the wealth of knowledge that is

 coming out of every community, even in the underground, because people

 are exposing bugs and people are changing things, so eventually people

 are going to be able to make all types of systems, robust enough to

 survive different things. So out of all this turmoil, some good is

 going to come.  And from that, once all the problems have been

 corrected, people will be able to direct their energies into a more

 positive thing, like developing applications, writing software and

 focusing their attention on doing neat, nifty tricks, rather than

 doing neat nifty stupid tricks, ha, ha.



 You are going to see some really, really cool stuff that is going to

 blow your mind and you are going to be able to carry it around in your

 hand.  You are never going to be out of touch anywhere in the world,

 so, I think that will be very cool.



                        =======================



 GA: We should certainly tell people how to subscribe to Phrack, and

 the prices on the LOD disks.



 CG: Yeah, people who want information about Phrack can mail me at:

 Phrack@well.sf.ca.us and for information about the BBS Archive Project

 mail:  LODCOM@Mindvox.Phantom.com



 GA: Thanks Chris!



 G: Thank you.



Date: Sat, 21 Jan 1995 04:39:00 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File9



 

                         REVIEW OF SLIPKNOT 1.0



 By Scott Davis, Editor (dfox@fc.net)



 SLIPKNOT 1.00 By Peter Brooks.

 Tested version 1.00 on a Dell 466/XPS

 16 meg of RAM, Windows for Workgroups

 #9 GXE 64 Pro video card (2 Meg Vram)

 Boca 28.8 Vfast external modem



 On December 23, 1994, I contacted Felix Kramer (felix@panix.com) to let

 him know that I would be happy to run his article/promotion for the

 software called 'SlipKnot'.  At that time, he asked me to ftp the

 software and test it out, and follow up with a review of the software

 in this issue of the magazine.  So, here it is...



 The software was designed by Peter Brooks.  SlipKnot is a graphical

 World-Wide-Web browser for PC users running Windows 3.1+ or a higher level

 of Windows.  It is designed for modem  users with ordinary dial-up UNIX

 shell accounts.  It does NOT require SLIP or PPP or TCP/IP services in any

 form (no TIA or remosock, etc.  if you are familiar with these products).



 The system requirements are Windows 3.1, Windows for Workgroups or

 higher, running in 386 Enhanced Mode (SlipKnot cannot be used on 286

 processors).  Not yet tested with Windows NT. You must have at least

 4 MB of memory, recommended 8MB.  We have noticed memory deficiency

 errors at 4 MB.  Also, at least 2 MB of available hard disk space is

 required.  SlipKnot itself takes approx. 1.5 MB.  When working, SlipKnot's

 job will be to download documents for you from the Internet, and these

 may require plenty of hard disk space.  Mouse or other pointing device

 required (cannot control SlipKnot via only the keyboard).



 Your UNIX system must have either the program "lynx" (version 2.2 or

 later) or the program "www" available.  If in doubt, log in to your

 host, and try to execute either of these programs.  You will then know

 immediately whether they are available.  To find the version of lynx on

 your UNIX host, execute the UNIX command: "lynx -version".



 Your UNIX host must have a program to send files to you via either the

 Xmodem or Ymodem protocol.  The actual name of the programs that perform

 these file transfers changes from system to system, but try the commands

 "sx" (for XModem) or "sb" (for YModem).  If these fail, ask your system

 administrator or some other knowledgeable person.  Likewise, you will

 need to know the name of the UNIX program that will receive files from

 your PC using Xmodem or Ymodem.  Your UNIX system must be able to display

 individual file sizes using the "ls -l filename" command.  If "ls" has

 been renamed or works differently from normal, SlipKnot will fail.



 SlipKnot was created because, at that time, there was no other alternative

 to accessing the World Wide Web graphically if you did not have SLIP or

 PPP or TCP/IP access.  Having analyzed Mosaic and some of its competitors,

 I concluded that all of these browsers were designed for people with very

 rapid communications channels into the Internet, not modem users.  Even if

 you have SLIP access, most of these browsers do not allow you to save

 entire documents (with the included pictures),  forcing you to retrieve the

 documents again whenever you wish to take a full look at them.  It takes a

 while to retrieve any document by modem with any browser, and you shouldn't

 have to do this more than once.



 Now the good stuff:



 First of all, Slipknot is a fantastic idea.  To be able to use the World

 Wide Web and only requiring the end user to maintain a normal account

 on his/her provider is great.  This allows the user to have Web access

 without paying those occasionally high rates for a SLIP or PPP connection.



 I ftp'd the Slipknot software and installed it.  I was very happy that

 it installed without any problems.



 Configuring the software was fairly painless.  The biggest part was

 taking the time to edit the login script for my service provider...

 and that step is not even necessary since Slipknot allows you to

 conduct manual logins of you so choose.



 I was finally ready to dial out. Everything was working like a champ until

 about 10 minutes into my session when my entire system locked up.  I had

 to do a complete shutdown and start over.  No big deal, I thought.

 I attempted again, as the 10 minutes that I did use it was a great

 experience.  I had never seen an application that could do WWW over a

 normal user account.  It connected perfectly and was working fine for

 another few minutes...then it locked up again.  I began to worry.

 I noticed that both times it locked up I was accessing the Federal Bureau

 Of Investigation home page (FBI).  Maybe Slipknot was not compatible with

 sites who promote the Clipper chip...Hahahaha. Not the case, unfortunately.



 During the course of the day, it locked up at random.  I tested my

 computer hardware to see what the issue might be.  There was no hardware

 problem.  My computer has never locked up on my under any circumstances

 before.



 I am not going to give this software a bad review because it locked up

 on my system.  I polled some users on the Internet regarding their

 experiences with the software and here's what some of them said;



 SLIPKNOT version 1.0 really works without a SLIP/PPP acct. In my case it

 installed quite easily, with minimum tweaking (certainly less than to

 install TIA). It opened the WWW to me. Next versions, should have FORMS

 support. That is a must and is urgently needed, because many WWW pages

 contain forms. Other than that, SLIPKNOT is highly recommended for a

 low-budget approach to WWW.   [one@netcom.com]



 =========================================================================



 I find it to be a an incredibly clever idea, and it works quite well

 with direct dial. Some problems with images and sound via telnet/rlogin,

 but not a big problem.  The idea of being able to web-surf without SLIP

 is very attractive, especially for the dial-up user as so many of us are.

 With the "load images" turned off, it is much faster, and you can

 selectively load them. but since it uses Lynx as its engine, why not use

 Lynx for imageless surfing.



 Speed: I compared it to my SLIP account with NCSA Mosaic and Netscape.

 It loads images, etc. a bit slower than Mosaic and a lot slower than

 Netscape.



 Installation and Set up: simple, esp as compared to the fun you can have

 installing say Netscape and all the winsockets stuff, and IP/DNS

 configuring.



 Look and Feel: I'd like a larger document window, but the pulldown menus,

 etc. will make surfing easier for the newbies.



 Overall - a nice, inexpensive alternative to SLIP/PPP, especially for

 those fairly new to the net and like that point and click feel.



 NB: another alternative for an "on the cheap" approach to the Web is The

 Internet Adaptor -- I have it installed in my dial-up unix account, and it

 is slick: it emulates SLIP, and works very well. I'm getting rid of my

 SLIP account because I have TIA. If you have ever set up a SLIP, it is

 pretty easy to install and set-up. If not, you'll spend some time. Cheap

 too.   - Jill Ellsworth <ellswort@tenet.edu>



 =========================================================================



 Very nice and easy to use developmental software.  Web works well and the

 terminal mode is functional and adequate for most users.  everything

 available from your Internet provider can be accessed, just as with a

 full blown commercial package like ProCom, etc.  Some limitations on

 bells and whistles apply.



 Inability to support ftp and gopher from within the html page is a

 bother, but as development continues I hope Peter Brooks will be able to

 add that capability.



 Direct link to obtain upgrades and the automated upgrade installation

 built into Slipknot is a neat touch.



 I am currently using Version 1.00 and have sent in my registration fee

 because I want to encourage continued development.



 I really appreciated the opportunity to evaluate the fully functional

 application.  - Steve Seteroff (seteroff@kendaco.telebyte.com)



 =========================================================================



 You're a brave man to ask for opinions on the Internet!



 I got SlipKnot right after it was released.  It is a wonder.  Last night I

 got the latest version "g".  I am so pleased.  Peter Brooks and Felix

 Kramer (?) have a winner on their hands.  I had tried to install netscape,

 tia, and winsockets about two weeks before I saw the announcement, and

 failed.  The only problems I had in the installation of SlipKnot were ones

 anticipated in the help screens.  (RTFM, dummy!) Peter Brooks was on the

 newsnet answering questions almost 24 hours a day.



 1. Easy to install.

 2. Cheap.

 3. Easy to use.

 4. Fun!



 And all this praise from a DOS command line freak.  I told PBrooks in an

 email that I hate Windoze and had been threatening my son to take it off

 my computer (he uses my printer and MSWord).  I complained to PBrooks that

 now Brendan knew I wouldn't follow through on the threat.  I have an

 indispensable program that needs Windoze.



 Now some cautionary notes.  ...  Sorry I don't have any reservations.

 BTW, I am not Peter's mother, nor do I have any affiliation with anyone

 associated with MicroMind (a moronic name...like, encephalitis, dude!).

 If you have any particular questions, I would be glad to respond.  My

 guess, judging by the activity in WWW newsgroup, is that you'll have more

 response than you can handle.



 Good luck with the story.  Happy holidays.  (BTW I tipped off the LATimes

 computer technology reporter and he just responded that he'd heard about

 it.  Here mosaic applications are bringing the Web to millions and it's

 news, but a shell account enabler is ignored.  Go figure.)  Go SLIP not!



 Mike Howard (mikeh@netcom.com)



 =========================================================================



 I think Peter has a good product. It is still in Beta Version.  For

 example I can not Down Load large files (over 19,456 Bytes).  I am sure

 Peter will find a fix but for now SK is for the experienced user.



 John Hammond (jhammond@unicomp.net)



 =========================================================================



 I found it easy to install; unfortunately it crashes every time I try to

 get something off the web and I must do a hard reboot - thus Dr.Watson

 can save nothing, nor can slipknot's built-in debugger.  I haven't yet

 contacted the authors.



 Bennett Price (bjprice@itsa.ucsf.edu)



 =========================================================================



 I have used SlipKnot for about six weeks and have come to rely on it for

 an easy alternative to mistyped Unix commands. Since I work in a high

 school that does not yet have Internet access, I foresee SlipKnot as a way

 to hook the uninitiated into the 'Net. Teachers and administrators who are

 not already convinced about the utility of the Internet would probably be

 turned off by a Unix command line. Although downloading graphics through

 SlipKnot is slow even at 14.4, for the inexperienced user, this wait time

 is surely preferable to using a straight text-based Web browser.



 While I approve of Version 1.0e as far as it goes, I can certainly suggest

 a number of needed improvements:



 1. gopher support

 2. telnet support

 3. forms support

 4. better resource management (I run SlipKnot on a Pentium with 16 Mb of

    RAM and yet often run low on GDI resources)

 5. improved error handling when the 'Net is busy or a page cannot be found

 6. automatic redial in the terminal mode (Maybe this can be done with a

    script, but I could not see how.)

 7. Z-modem or Y-modem batch transfer support in terminal mode.



 Don't get me wrong. I like SlipKnot. Everything can be improved. I am sure

 at Micromind. they are already at work (at least mentally) on these

 suggestions.



 Jeff Ratliff (tratliff@whale.st.usm.edu)



 =========================================================================



 I have found Slipknot to be a very worthwhile product.  Its ease of

 set-up is a definite plus.  I downloaded Slipknot and had it installed

 and running in a very short time.  The installation instructions

 addressed the few problems I had getting it running and then I was off --

 surfing the Web.  My main dislikes of the software are the small window

 size and the ability to open only five documents at the same time.  I

 understand that these two complaints are being addressed by the next

 version.  If you don't have direct access (i.e. you connect through a

 dial-up shell) and don't have a SLIP or PPP connection, Slipknot is

 definitely worth it.



 Kenyon Jon Michael (mkenyon@jove.acs.unt.edu)



 =========================================================================



 I've been using Slipknot for a while now, and I'm very glad it's

 around. I think it's seriously necessary, because there are a huge

 number of people who get their net.access through shell accounts, and

 this allows you to get a fuller Web experience than with Lynx.



 However, the program has it's problems, and there is a lot of

 advancement that can be made in the future revisions. For example, forms

 are not supported, so your Web use only goes one way; you can't reply

 to things, write mail, make suggestions, etc., or for that matter, be

 verified for logins like on HotWired. That's a huge pain.



 Another problem is the inability to use gopher servers, something

 that's still widely implemented and integrated with the Web. And, of

 course, Slipknot is also a bit buggy; any errors, and the program quits

 rather than moving on, it displays certain dialog boxes more than once in

 a row, etc.



 IOW, it's a good idea and good start for a much-needed program, but it

 still needs work. However, with some more tweaking and advancement, it

 will be a very solid program.



 Bill Pena (billpena@genesis.nred.ma.us)



 =========================================================================



 I got (and paid) for Slipknot, and am currently running v1.0 with the

 "g" patch. My host is a "pay" unix system that I call in to

 get my mail on my "term" account. I am using the program on a

 486 cryix 40mhz system.



 The program is not perfect. It still has some bugs to work out, and

 lots of features to be developed (forms, gopher, etc do not work at

 this time).  But!!! even with though the program is still in its early

 stages of development, I find it VERY useful, and it DOES allow me

 to view http documents with the graphics.



 I get good 14400/v42bis connections via the automatic log-in script (that

 must be user customized) and acceptable download speed of the http. With

 the program running under Windows 3.1, it does take a moment to analyze

 the downloaded text to "find" the embedded graphics, then download the

 graphics, plot the series of files, then display the document.



 With the program currently costing $30, the difference in the cost of my

 term account and a slip/ppp account is a lot more than the cost of

 Slipknot.



 I use the internet for e-mail and netnews more than a place to surf just

 to look at images. As such, my primary access to the net is via term with

 a text editor for mail/news replies.  When I want to check out some

 http/url, I just hang up and call back via Slipknot. I don't use it all

 the time, so when I need it, it is there for me.



 Being shareware, it is perfect for the user to "play" with to determine

 if he/she wants to continue to use it, prior to paying for the program...

 and even with its limitations, it is still a deal at $30. and with the

 authors still working on it, it is sure to get better and better.



 Tom Stangler (stangle@infi.net)



 =========================================================================



 It works as advertised.  Last I checked, it doesn't do forms or telnet

 connection links It has trouble handling some inline images.



 Just like TIA, your provider can tell if you are using SlipKnot, and if

 they wanted to, could ban it's use as going beyond the services provided

 with your class of account.  RCI doesn't have any restrictions on TIA or

 SlipKnot...



 Kevin Kadow (kadokev@rci.ripco.com)



 =========================================================================



 (Slipknot review continued...)



 As you see, we have a wide range of comments here.  I believe that most

 people realize that it still a very young project and has not yet

 attained it's full potential.  If you will note, there was one other

 person who replied to my request for comments who is having the same

 problem I am having with system lock ups.  I mailed the author of the

 program and they are getting right on the issue.



 The bottom line is that Slipknot is a great idea and a nice software

 package.  And with end users submitting comments, complaints, and other

 information directly to the author or the press, the issues will be

 worked out.  I suggest that you keep an eye on Slipknot.  It's really

 going somewhere!



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                              cDc GDU #18



 By Swamp Ratte (sratte@phantom.com)

   _   _

  ((___))

  [ x x ] cDc communications

   \   /  Global Domination Update #18

   (' ')  November 1st, 1994

    (U)

 Est. 1986



 NEW gnU new GnU nEW gNu neW gnu nEw GNU releases for November, 1994:



  _________________________________/Text

 Files\_________________________________



 281: "Official cDc Press Release Concerning President Reagan" by Reid

 Fleming. The Cult influences the international political climate of

 opinion!  We just want what we've got coming to us, mister.



 282: "Argument" by Markian Gooley.  Positivity and happy sunshine and

 neato stuff.



 283: "Possibilities" by Obscure Images.  Once again, Oi brings the

 linguistics for the nine deuce deuce.  This one's got crazy subliminal

 tapes and a hippy chick.



 284: "Sanford's Calico" by James Cazamias.  It's just like Disney's

 _That Darn Cat!_, but different.



 285: "Concise Guide to Forgetting How Much You Suck" by Jason Farnon.

 Courtesy

 of the cool _I Bleed For This?_ 'zine, here we go with a cDc edit/

 distribution.  Lots of practical advice to improve your standard of living.



 286: "The Divine Masters" by Shriek Broomstraw.  Particle physics and alien

 overlords and why you should be concerned with all this.  You should.

 Really.



 287: "Shotgun" by Swamp Ratte'.  Never mind _Where's Waldo?_, where's the

 shotgun?  Oh my.  Fills out this release's angst quota.



 288: "Rejection Letter Blues" by Jeff Swanson.  Some people just can't

 appreciate good literature.  Fun-eeEe.



 289: "Can There Be Artificial Intelligence?" by Tequila Willy.  Another

 scholarly scab for you to pick at.  That Willsie, what a smart guy.



 290: "Bob Takes a Trip" by Special Agent Finerty.  Bob's a mechanical dog

 and he's NUTS.  CRAZY.  Watch out.  Zany hi-jinx.



  __________________________________/cDc

 Gnuz\__________________________________

                                            _       _

                 |\                        /^\     /^\

                 / /                     /  @ )^ -| @ )^ - _

               / /           666        (  \/-^-^^|  /--^-^-~

              \o \                       \ o \   /  /@ )^ - _

               | o|         _  -  _        \  / o /|  /--^-^-~

              /  /      /     O    o ^ -  /  ( O |/  / /\

             | o \__ _/   O   o  O   o   ( o  \ o \ /_/@ |

              \   o  o             o          /    |__ _ \\

                \   o    O   \   O     ( o  -   o /  .  ^ \S

                   - - \   o  )        \ (    ) /(_ / /^

                        |    / - _  -  -   \   \ -_ -- -

                        |  /    \  /         \  |   \ \.

                       /  |      | \         |  \

                     /_    \    / |  \      / _   \

                        | \  -                  | \ -



 "This low-go you've received is the image of the be east.  Whatever

 you do, do not hold this image in your write hand or receive its image by

 foe-ton trance Miss-shun through your I balls into your mined full crane

 he um or you've received the mark of the bee east.  Stung, by buy bull

 revel lay shun.  Keep your clothes on and don't follow the be eastly bare

 whoreds."

                                                    -Philip Heggie



                                    --x X x--



 New things?  Yep.  There's now a Usenet newsgroup for you to discuss the

 All-Powerfulness of cDc.  It's "alt.fan.cult-dead-cow" and if your

 newsfeed isn't getting it, mail news@yersite and say, "GET WITH THE

 PROGRAM, PAL!  HUP HUP!"



 Tell me about the time you were in the 7th grade and had to do a #2 really

 bad and those blind special ed. kids were in the bathroom swinging their

 canes around and saying bad words.  You were SCARED, weren't you.  HA!



 The world is filled with WIMPS.  You go to a large public restroom, into a

 stall.  All the other people in the stalls, you can see their feet.  They

 make no noise.  They sit and wait and clutch their tiny little genitals in

 FEAR.  But I am NOT LIKE THEM.  I MAKE MY DISGUSTING NOISES AS I PLEASE.

 I clean up, I exit my stall, I wash my hands and I LEAVE.  I AM DONE.

 I AM RELIEVED. They remain, cowering, wishing they had the GUTS to CRAP

 but they do not and their bowels TREMBLE with gasses.  They are but

 INSECTS because they cannot CRAP FREELY.  LEARN FROM MY ACTIONS and you

 too can be POWERFUL.



 Lady Carolin is now running the Official cDc Internet Dumpster: ftp or

 gopher to cascade.net for all the cDc stuff, all the time.  Cascade.net

 gets 'em first and fast.  The secondary site is ftp.eff.org as usual.



 The other day I finally got The Beatles' _Abbey Road_ album and this

 "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" song is amazing.  So I'm thinking, why

 should I be concerned with this week's indie-certified alterna-wonder-

 weenie when I DON'T EVEN HAVE A GOOD COPY OF BARRY MANILLOW'S "MANDY"?

 MY 8-TRACK SUFFERS FROM EXTREME WOW AND FLUTTER.



 HOW CAN I EVEN _THINK_ ABOUT JAWBREAKER WHEN MY JACKSON 5 COLLECTION IS

 SADLY INCOMPLETE!!??



 If your writings have CLASS and STYLE, we want 'em.  Dig the address at the

 bottom of this file, daddy-o.





 "What's good for cDc is good for America." - President Calvin Coolidge



 S. Ratte'

 cDc/Editor and P|-|Ear13zz |_3@DeRrr

 "We're into t-files for the groupies and money."

 Middle finger for all.



 Write to: cDc communications, P.O. Box 53011, Lubbock, TX  79453.

 Internet: sratte@phantom.com.



 cDc Global Domination Update #18-by Swamp Ratte'-"Hyperbole is our

 business"  Copyright (c) 1994 cDc communications.  All Rights Reserved.



  ALL FILES LEECHABLE *NOW* BY WWW/GOPHER/FTP FROM CASCADE.NET: pub/cDc/New

   _   _

  ((___))

  [ x x ] cDc communications

   \   /  Global Domination Update #19

   (' ')  December 1st, 1994

    (U)

 Est. 1986



 NEW gnU new GnU nEW gNu neW gnu nEw GNU releases for December, 1994:



  _________________________________/Text

 Files\_________________________________



 291-299: Nine Christmas/Holiday/Cold Arctic Wasteland-related stories.

 Some are funny, some are disturbing, and some will make you VERY AWARE of

 every single PORE on your NOSE.



 * cDc - DOWN HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS (1994).  Dolly Parton, Kenny Rogers,

 Olivia Newton-John, Clint Black.  Gather 'round the tree and enjoy a

 rousing duet of Kenny and Olivia singing "Jingle Bell Rock" while Ms.

 Parton gets drunk and embarrasses herself.  Directed by Martin Scorsese.

 (Drug Use, Adult Language, Graphic Violence, Strong Sexual Content).



  __________________________________/cDc

 Gnuz\__________________________________



 "In their workshops, the elves toil under the oppressive eyes of the

 redshirts.  The Eskimos are all but extinct, and the dentists pull tooth

 after whalebone tooth from the charred skulls of their remnants.



 Oh, the twinkling blue Aryan eyes!  There is blood on his cheeks!



 He trains mighty legions in his impregnable northern fortress.  The Lapps

 have come to fear the sound of marching boots and jingling bells.



 With his newest sleigh, he can strike any European city in under twenty

 minutes.



 Good children get a switch in their stocking.  The bad ones disappear.



 LONG LIVE THE FOURTH REICH!"

                                              -Andrew Solberg



                                    - x X x -





 Conspicuous consumption of cDc products will fill the empty, gnawing

 voids you may or may not feel in your life... which become all the more

 apparent at ridiculous hours of the night as carbonated beverages

 gradually wear away your stomach lining and ulcers work their own little

 brand of magic.



 Things to look forward to in 1995:



 cDc #300 - Cow Beat #3: "Teen Idling on the Inphomashun Hi-Mom-I'm-on-TV-

 way"



 cDc FACK: "Frequently Anointed Cows are K-rad."  Or something.





 I could give you promises of Twinkies and a cool, like, Yaga t-shirt.

 Will you be happy then?  From here to eternity we will shop.  We will shop

 at The Mall and buy only the finest in fashions and Rage Against the

 Toaster will provide the aural motivation.  "Fuck you, Mom, I won't clean

 my room like you tell me."



 Go to HoHoCon and it'll be cool.  Ramada Inn South.  1212 West Ben White

 Blvd. Austin, Texas.  Friday, December 30th through Sunday the 1st.



 Shop!  Shop!  Do the booty hop!  The leather store has a sale on biker

 jackets,  Harley accessories optional and in-stock.  New tats shine with

 gleaming disinfectant.  Bright red-skinned jolly pierceings, and sparkling

 sterling silver!  On the tongue, through the lip.  Susy's got a charming

 new necklace, and Little Johnny has a delightful new nose ring!  "Come over

 here, Johnny, so Aunty Emma can see your newest hole."



 Make new holes and fill 'em up.



 As cDc stalks around, hunting the logical conclusions.  Ho.





 S. Ratte'

 cDc/Editor and P|-|Ear13zz |_3@DeRrr

 "We're into t-files for the groupies and money."

 Middle finger for all.



 Write to: cDc communications, P.O. Box 53011, Lubbock, TX  79453.

 Internet: sratte@phantom.com.

  _____________________________________________________________________________



 cDc Global Domination Update #19-by Swamp Ratte'-"Hyperbole is our

 business"  Copyright (c) 1994 cDc communications.  All Rights Reserved.



 ALL FILES LEECHABLE *NOW* BY WWW/GOPHER/FTP FROM CASCADE.NET: pub/cDc/New



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                 MY LETTER TO WIRED  RE: WWW PAGE



 [Editor's note:  I mailed this to Wired...and they said that they would

 print it in the February 1995 issue.  We'll see]



 By Scott Davis (dfox@fc.net)



 Dear Wired,



 I have taken it upon myself to do an informal poll regarding your

 new WWW page on the Internet.  I recall that not so long ago, the

 Wired WWW page was a great thing.  It was easy to use and contained

 a wealth of information.  Now, it appears that one must have some

 type of psudo-government security clearance to get into this WWW page.

 It is my guess that the purpose for having to enter one's name,

 e-mail address, special-secret-multi-digit-code, and other requested

 information is for the purpose of demographics.  No matter the reason

 behind all of this...IS IT WORTH IT?  Please allow me to explain the

 frustrations of some of the net-community.



 In announcing my informal poll, I stated my opinion on the new WWW

 page.  It was not favorable to Wired.  I asked others to mail me their

 opinions also. I will edit some of these for brevity only.  I assure

 you that I did not receive a single good comment about the new page.



 And from what I understand, it seems like that there was some debate

 regarding the creation and operation of the HotWired page.  One

 net-denizen replied to me, "Three weeks ago Jane Metcalfe came to

 UCDavis to talk about Hotwired and to give the first public demo of

 it. She told us that they had debated for quite some time about how

 to set it up--wanting a balance between looking 'friendly' and 'not

 allowing anonymous logins'. Sounds like the balance has tipped a bit

 further than she wanted, given commentary on the net."



 Another frustrated user says, "I gave up after 2 go arounds with the

 login problems. To bad as I liked to read the old hotwired. Oh well, at

 least the magazine is still easy to open!"



 Other comments from disgruntled users include "I am getting nowhere with

 this new interface. Requiring usernames,  passwords, verification codes,

 etc, ad nauseum has not yet induced me to like this new Web page." and

 "Everytime I try to send my Hotwired Account Verification, it goes into

 an endless loop, with the Mosaic icon spinning endlessly.  If this is a

 problem with using the Windows Mosaic 2.0a7 browser, I suggest that Wired

 get rid of the verification, because I'm not getting rid of Mosaic."



 More graphic comments include "Looks like HotWired has become the living,

 throbbing, thrashing (whatever other adverbs they like) pulse of a

 self-important, jargon-speaking, head-up-someplace-where-it-is-very-dark

 entity." and "...not to mention one that has security measures like NORAD!

 People go to www.wired.com for one thing: BACK ISSUES OF WIRED. End of

 story."  And the be-all-end-all comment that fits this WWW page perfectly

 came from an avid reader. He says "I'd have to say this new setup has

 become TIRED before it was ever WIRED..."



 In running a large operation such as Wired, you are going to get

 complaints about "something" all the time.  And as the best publications

 of it's kind, I am sure that you address the issues as much as possible

 ...just as you have this one.  And many of the complaints you receive

 probably carry "less priority" than others.  However I certainly hope

 this does not fall into that category of "less priority".  I could

 understand if maybe 50 or 100 people complained.  But over the past

 several months, I have seen numerous people complain about the

 procedures required to gain access to your WWW page.



 When I first sent my rough draft of this article into Wired, I received

 a polite response from Andrew Anker of Wired Magazine.  He was very

 informative and perhaps his response seemed 'typical' to me because I

 failed to provide him with much of the necessary information that I had

 collected in order to do this article.  I certainly do appreciate his

 response to our concerns. Mr. Anker replied, "...over 20,000 people have

 logged into the HotWired since we launched last Thursday, so it's very

 possible that the people you polled didn't read the text of the intro

 pages into HotWired that explain that certain browsers don't work with

 HotWired."



 Giving Wired the benefit of the doubt and assuming that some browsers may

 not work or could be outdated (which I now know to be true), my next step

 was to get the latest copy of one of the more popular browsers and try

 again. And once again, I ran into more problems.  I was not about to

 attempt to troubleshoot more problems with this WWW page.  I had obtained

 the proper hardware and software to accomplish the task.  It was no longer

 my problem. It's Wired's problem.



 After this last-ditch attempt to prove ourselves wrong in theory and

 technique, one of my close friends stated, "Why the hell are they trying

 to make it so hard to get at? Are they experimenting with someone's

 cockamamie scheme for the Web equivalent of pay-TV?"



 It appears that many people are getting TIRED of this WWW page.

 Many end users do not see the purpose of having to enter all this

 information, and in the end, it causes nothing more than a headache

 when it does not work.  I certainly do not want people to think that

 I am some 'Privacy Hound' who disagrees with the concept of entering

 my personal information on some WWW page.  My name, number and address

 are of public record to anyone who wishes to dial 512-555-1212.

 The fact is that I have spoken to several people who cannot seem

 to get the interface to work.  And I seriously doubt that each of them

 have an ill-configured Moasic.



 Of all the people and companies on the net with Web pages, I would

 venture to assume that Wired, of all people would promote accessibility

 and ease before subjecting it's users to a verification procedure that many

 feel is lacking, to say the least.  I might go so far as to suggest that

 Wired might want to resort back to the good 'ole days and have a WWW page

 that is easily accessible and easy to use.  Including the page where you

 are requesting that the user input information can still remain on the

 WWW site, but make it optional, and don't make it the home page.  You

 can ask people to fill out the requested information.  I am sure that

 many, if not most would comply.  And by switching back, you are opening

 doors for people who may not want to update their software, or just want

 access for a short time obtain specific information.



 As far as updating browsing software, my theory is "if it's not broken,

 don't fix it", and just because somebody can't get on Wired's page, does

 not mean that their software is broken and should be updated.



 I must be honest and admit that I did FINALLY gain access to HotWired.

 Nut not until I had tried every "compatible" version of Mosaic and

 finally was forced to upgrade to NetScape for the sole purpose of

 getting on HotWired.  Was all that necessary?



 Please fix this problem by making Wired easier to access.  We end users

 have to jump through enough obstacles as it is, and there is no point

 in having to do this to get our favorite magazine on our screen.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



Date: Sat, 21 Jan 1995 05:34:47 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File10



 

                              CALLER ID FAQ



 By Padgett Peterson (padgett@tccslr.dnet.mmc.com)



 Frequently Asked Questions About Caller-ID v1.1 Mar. 1994



 1) What is Caller-ID ?



    First ask "What is ANI"



 2) OK, What is ANI ?



 ANI or Automatic Number Identification is a mechanism by  which the

 different telephone companies determine what account is to be charged for

 a call, This information is passed between Telcos and was originally

 for  billing  purposes and predated both SS7 (Signaling  System 7)

 and (C)LASS (Local Area Signaling  Services was the original AT&T

 designations, the "C" was added by Bellcore after divesture) services

 which make CNID or Calling  Number IDentification as Caller-ID is more

 properly known, possible.



 Since the Telcos had ANI, the decision was made to make it available

 to authorized parties such as 911 service and law enforcement agencies.

 ANI is also used to let a Telco operator know who is calling.



 More recently, ANI is used to report to 800 and 900  subscribers,

 who made the calls they have received, in the first case so that

 the  800 subscriber knows who the charge is for, and so that 900

 number subscribers know who to charge.



 Thus while ANI is similar to CALLER-ID and may provide the same

 information, they are actually two different services and ANI information

 is not necessarily the same as what will appear on a CALLER-ID display.



 3) Now (maybe) what is Caller-ID ?



 Caller-ID is a Telco offering that is a byproduct of (C)LASS services.

 In this case, only those numbers reported by participating exchanges are

 returned, exactly which are and which are not is currently (March 1994)

 at the Telco's discretion.



 The Federal Government has stated that it is their intent that nationwide

 CNID be available by mid-1995. The full text of this decision may be

 found FCC Report No. DC-2571 issued on March  8, 1994.



 The biggest effect of the ruling is to mandate transport of CPN (customer

 provided number) information between interconnecting networks eliminating

 the effective inter-LATA-only limitation that exists today in most areas.



 Currently there are two types of Caller-ID.  The first (often referred

 to as "basic" service) just returns the calling number or an error

 message and the date/time of the call.



 The second ("enhanced" Caller-ID) also may return the directory

 information about the calling number. At a minimum, the name of the

 subscriber is returned (the subscriber is not the same as the caller,

 the phone company has no way to determine who is actually on the line).



 4) How is the Caller-ID information provided ?



 As a 1200 baud, 7 data bits, 1 stop bit data stream usually transmitted

 following the first and before the second ring signal on the line. Note

 that this is not a standard Bell 212 or CCITT v22 data format so a

 standard modem will probably not be able to receive it. Further, the

 serial information exists as such only from the recipient's switch to

 the callee's location.  Between carriers the signal exists as data packets.



 The signal is provided before the circuit is complete: picking up the

 receiver before the data stream is finished will stop/corrupt the

 transmission.



 Currently there are two types of information returned: a  "short form"

 which contains the date/time (telco and not local) of the call and the

 calling number or error message. The "long form" will also contain the

 name and possibly the address (directory information) of the calling phone.



 The  "short  form"  stream  consists of a  set  of  null  values, followed

 by a two byte prefix, followed by the DATE (Month/Day), TIME (24 hour

 format), and number including area code in  ASCII, followed by a 2s

 compliment checksum.  Most modems/caller id devices will format the data

 but the raw stream looks like this :

 0412303232383134333434303735353537373737xx

 or (prefix)02281334407555777(checksum)



 A formatted output would look like this:

 Date -   Feb 28

 Time -   1:34 pm

 Number - (407)555-7777



 5) Can a Caller-ID signal be forged/altered ?



 Since the signal is provided by the local Telco switch and the calling

 party's line is not connected until after the phone is answered, generally

 the signal cannot be altered from the distant end.  Manipulation would

 have to take place either at the switch or on the called party's line.



 However, the foregoing applies only to a properly designed CNID unit.

 For instance the Motorola M145447 chip has a "power down" option that

 wakes the Chip up when the phone rings for just long enough to receive,

 process, and deliver the CNID signal after which it shuts down until the

 next call.



 Should this option be disabled, the chip will be in a "listen always"

 state and it is theoretically possible to "flood" a line making a

 vulnerable box record successive erroneous numbers.



 I have received a report of a device called "Presto Chango" that

 can transmit an extra ADSI modem tone after the call has been picked up

 that will cause a susceptible box to display the later information. It

 was also reported to me that CNID boxes marketed by US-West as their

 brand and made by CIDCO have been used to demonstrate the "Presto Chango"

 box.



 6) What is "ID Blocking" ?



 Most Telco's providing Caller-ID have been required to also provide the

 ability for a calling party to suppress the Caller-ID signal. Generally

 this is done by pressing star-six-seven before making the call. In most

 cases this will block the next call only however some Telcos have decided

 to implement this in a bewildering array of methods. The best answer is

 to contact the service provider and get an answer in writing.



 Currently this is supplied as either by-call or by-line blocking.  By-Call

 is preferred since the caller must consciously block the transmission

 on each call.  By-Line blocking as currently implemented has the

 disadvantage that the caller, without having a second caller-id equipped

 line to use for checking, has no way of knowing if the last star-six-seven

 toggled blocking on or off.



 Note that blocking is provided by a "privacy" bit that is transmitted

 along with the CNID information and so is still available to the Telco

 switch, just not to the subscriber as a CNID  signal. Consequently related

 services such as call trace, call return, & call block may still work.



 7) What happens if a call is forwarded ?



 Generally, the number reported is that of the last phone to forward the

 call. Again there are some Telco differences so use the same precaution

 as in (6). If the forwarding is done by customer owned equipment there

 is no way of telling but will probably be the last calling number.



 Note that as specified, CNID is *supposed* to return the number of the

 originating caller but this is at the mercy of all forwarding devices,

 some of which may not be compliant.



 8)  What happens if I have two phone lines and a black box to do

 the forwarding ?



 If you have two phone lines or use a PBX with outdialing features, the

 reported number will be that of the last line to dial. Currently there

 is no way to tell a black box from a  human holding two handsets together.



 9)  I called somebody from a company phone (555-1234) but their Caller-ID

 device reported 555-1000.



 Often a company with multiple trunks from the Telco and their own

 switch will report a generic number for all of the trunks.



 There is a defined protocol for PBXs to pass true CNID information on

 outgoing lines but it will be a long time before all existing COT

 (Customer Owned Telephone) equipment is upgraded to meet this standard

 unless they have a reason to do so.



 10) I  run a BBS. How can I use Caller-ID to authenticate/log callers ?



 There are two ways. The first utilizes a separate Caller-ID box

 with  a  serial  cable  or an internal card. This sends the information

 back to a PC which can then decide whether to answer the phone and what

 device should respond. Some of these are available which can handle

 multiple phone lines per card and multiple cards per PC.



 The second (and most common) is for the capability to be built in a modem

 or FAX/modem. While limited to a single line per modem, the information

 can be transmitted through the normal COM port to a program that again

 can decide whether or not  to  answer the phone and how. There is a

 FreeWare Caller-ID ASP script for Procomm Plus v2.x available for FTP

 from the Telecom archive.  Most such software packages will also log each

 call as it is received and the action taken.



 Of course for true wizards, there are chips available (one of the first

 was the Motorola MC145447) that can recognize the CNID signal and

 transform it into a proper RS-232 (serial) signal.



 11) How is security enhanced by using Caller-ID over a Call-Back

 service or one-time-passwords for dial-up access ?



 Caller-ID has one great advantage over any other mechanism for telephone

 lines. It allows the customer to decide *before* picking up the receiver,

 whether to answer the call.



 Consider hackers, crackers, and phreaks. Their goal in life is to forcibly

 penetrate electronic systems without permission (sounds like rape doesn't

 it ?). They employ demon dialers and "finger hacking" to discover

 responsive numbers, often checking every number in a 10,000 number

 exchange.



 If they get a response such as a modem tone, they have a target and

 will often spend days or weeks trying every possible combination of codes

 to get in. With Caller-ID answer selection, the  miscreant will never

 get to the modem tone in the first place, yet for an authorized number,

 the tone will appear on the second ring. Previously the best solution

 for dial-ups was to set the modem to answer on the sixth ring (ats0=6).

 Few hackers will wait that long but it can also irritate customers.



 12) What error messages will Caller-ID return ?



 a) "Out of Area" - (Telco) the call came from outside the Telco's

 service area and the Telco either has no available information or

 has chosen not to return what information it has.



 b)  "Blocked" or "Private" - (Telco) the caller either has permanent

 call blocking enabled or has dialed star-six-seven for this call. You do

 not have to answer either.



 c) "Buffer Full" - (device manufacturer) there are many Caller-ID devices

 on the market and exactly how they have chosen to implement storage is up

 to the manufacturer. This probably means that the divide has a limited

 buffer space and the device is either losing the earliest call records or

 has stopped recording new calls.



 d)  "Data  Error" or "Data Error #x" - (device  manufacturer) signal was

 received that was substandard in some way or for which the checksum did

 not match the contents.



 e)  "No  Data Sent" - (device manufacturer) Signal was received consisting

 entirely of nulls or with missing information but a proper checksum.



 13) Why are so many people against Caller-ID ?



 FUD - Fear, Uncertainty, & Doubt or 10,000,000 lemmings can't be wrong.

 There were some justifiable concerns that some people (battered wives,

 undercover policemen) might be endangered or subject to harassment

 (doctors, lawyers, celebrities) by Caller-ID.  As mentioned above there

 are several legitimate ways to either block Caller-ID or to have it return

 a different number.  It is up to the caller. The advantage is that with

 Caller-ID, for the first time, the called party has the same "right of

 refusal".



 Expect yet another Telco service (at a slight additional charge) to be

 offered to return an office number for calls made from home. Crisis

 centers could return the number of the local police station.





 Compiled by Padgett Peterson. Constructive comments to:

 padgett@tccslr.dnet.mmc.com  Brickbats >nul.



 Thanks for additional material to:



 David J. Kovan

 Robert Krten

 John Levine

 David G. Lewis

 Karl Voss



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                THE PENTIUM BUG WAR ENDS AS WE KNOW IT



 By James Baar and Theodore Baar



 The  real long-term significance of the Great Intel Pentium Flaw

 Imbroglio is the imminent demise of the current practice of public

 relations and corporate and government communications as we know them.



 Ironically caught unaware of the communications world it helped create,

 Intel suffered a public relations near-disaster.  Intel's arch competitor,

 IBM, wandered bubba-like into a public relations bog the future depths

 of which are still to be determined.



 Clearly we soon will see on the boneyard of history such communications

 artifacts as:



       --The lengthy, well-spun news release or official statement

 explaining what "really" happened or why a product "really" is a

 breakthrough for all mankind.



       --The news conference where the news is that what the media said

 yesterday or last week is "really" not the news at all.



       --The  necessity to convince rushed and often ill-informed

 journalists and beautiful and much more ill-informed TV anchors that your

 truth is "really" true.



       The Internet is doing to public relations what CSPAN,  CNN Forums

 and talk radio are doing to news coverage:  When you are there, the

 messenger is extraneous.  And, on the Internet, you are there and you are

 the messenger as well..



       The Pentium Flaw War was the first major corporate war to be fought

 primarily in cyberspace. The initial, very scattered shots were fired

 more than five months ago on the Internet; major engagements got underway

 in October; and a worldwide battle raged through November and early

 December.



      Little of this was noted particularly in the general or trade media

 until near the end.  And then it was reported as a highly technical

 problem of limited general interest.  Only when IBM found it convenient

 to drop the equivalent of a small nuclear weapon did most of the major

 national media take note that something much more than an academic,

 technically obscure brawl was underway.



 Only then did the WALL STREET JOURNAL shout from it's front page:



       Chip Shot

       Computer Giants' War

       Over Flaw in Pentium

       Jolts the PC Industry



 And, on the same day, the NEW YORK TIMES shouted from it's front page:



       I.B.M. HALTS SALES

       OF IT'S COMPUTERS

       WITH FLAWED CHIP



 Both  stories were inspired belatedly by an IBM announcement that it was

 suspending sales (sort of) of any of it's personal computers that included

 the Intel Pentium chip because the chip had a flaw.



 Well,  ho-hum:  Except for the IBM announcement, this was old news along

 the Information Highway.  And the IBM announcement was immediately

 discounted by many of the veteran cyberspace combatants of the Pentium

 War as highly suspect: something similar to Parliament coming out against

 slavery in America after Lexington and Concord.



 Most great military engagements begin quite casually if not accidentally:

 A sniper picks off a poacher stealing a chicken.  A nervous platoon leader

 calls in a little artillery fire on a bunker.  A lost company stumbles

 on a tank column.



 Back in June, Intel and some of it's customers already knew about the bug

 that was preventing the new Pentium microprocessors to divide accurately

 out to more than nine or 10 decimal places in some cases.  Intel did not

 publish the information. If any messages about the bug appeared here and

 there in various newsgroups on the Internet for the next few months,

 they initially attracted little attention.



 This was not the kind of consumer problem that causes a lot of excitement

 at your neighborhood 24-hour store.  But this bug was of interest -- and

 in some cases importance to parts of the world technical community

 engaged in major mathematical calculations: This is a community that also

 appreciates that such a flaw is not the first nor will be the last in

 the increasing complexity of computer components and software; exalts

 technical openness; recognizes quickly when it is being stonewalled; and

 has a biting specialized sense of outrage and humor.



 Prof. Thomas Nicely of Lynchburg College reports that when he began

 running into a potential flaw in the Pentium in June he started a three

 month effort to determine whether the problem was the Pentium or something

 else.  For example, his own calculations; or possibly known bugs in other

 hardware such as the Borland C Compiler.  And in Copenhagen mathematicians

 developed a T-shirt satirizing the Intel chip logo "Intel Inside" as "No

 Intelligence Inside" and published memos saying "We knew about it  early

 in June..."



 Intel managed to downplay and contain word of the bug for the most part

 through the next three months.  Any callers were told at first that a fix

 was underway and that the bug affected only very special situations.



 Then, on Oct. 30, Dr. Nicely posted a message to "whom it may concern"

 on the Internet,  reporting his findings and his frustrations with getting

 Intel to pay serious attention to him. In the succeeding weeks, the war

 between Intel and it's users exploded.  Each day there were more reports

 about the bug and Intel's truculence.



 The number of the strings of messages on the Internet increased and grew

 longer as users at universities, laboratories and corporations around the

 world reported the same bug and it's potential variations;  discussed

 their research for possibly more bugs; and reported on their

 unsatisfactory and frustrating phone calls to Intel.



      And here was where the war was really fought.



 Intel treated each caller as an individual, linear event to be dealt with

 in isolation; turned around or at least mollified.  Intel's position was

 that this was a routine bug that was being taken care of and was of no

 major importance to most of it's customers. The Intel position essentially

 remained that there was no need for a general replacement on demand; that

 the problem was relatively minor;  that if a user was engaged in the kind

 of heavy mathematics that could be affected by the bug then Intel, if

 it agreed, would replace a Pentium.



 Meantime, Intel and it's commercial allies continued to promote and sell

 Pentiums.  More than four million Pentiums were reported sold.



 The words "greedy" and  "arrogance" became popular on the Internet among

 customers describing Intel's position.  The Internet discussion was highly

 technical and  profane.  It also included useful suggestions for

 broadening the discussion.   For example, participants were provided

 with the Fax number of the New York Times.  And more and more of the

 callers to Intel shared their mostly frustrating experiences on the

 Internet with a worldwide audience of customers.   An angry mob -- slowly

 recognized as a major threat by Intel --  began to assemble in cyberspace



 Intel CEO Andrew Grove issued a statement on the Internet Nov. 27 seeking

 to quiet the mob.  Instead the roar in cyberspace increased.  Intel's

 Software Lab Technology Lab Director Richard Wirt on Dec. 8 issued a

 statement on the Internet describing Intel plans to provide a fix for the

 flaw.  The roar continued and spread and Intel's weakening protests were

 increasingly drowned out as the users reinforced each other with new data

 and complaints around the clock around the world.



 It was at this point on Dec.12 that IBM -- a reported minor player in the

 sale of Pentiums,  but the developer of a competitive chip, the PowerPC --

 decided to announce both on the Internet and to the major national media

 the halting of it's shipments of Pentium-based IBM PCs.



 The war was now spread to the major national media where the problem was

 easily confused with various consumer product recalls and the Internet

 where IBM's move was both discounted as self-serving and used

 simultaneously to pummel Intel further.



 By Dec. 20 Intel had had enough.  It agreed to a general recall and

 apologized for not doing so sooner.



    The public relations lessons are clear.



 People  --  particularly customers --  are no longer isolated waiting to

 learn sooner or later what is happening through the third party media

 screen and, in turn,  relying on  the  third  party media to screen and

 sooner or later report their reaction.  Even when the third party media

 is accurate this process can take many days.



 Through the Internet, people -- particularly customers --  can tell a

 corporation or organization exactly what they think and why and share that

 simultaneously and instantaneously with all concerned around the world.

 The Internet returns the world to the agora where everyone hears what was

 said; and everyone hears all comments and reactions;  everyone knows who

 is talking and can make credibility judgments.



 The first Intel error was not to spot the issue stirring on the Internet

 months ago when the commentary was helpful and understanding.  At that

 time and for several months later, Internet commentators could have been

 embraced and thanked for their efforts; immediate plans for a work-around

 fix could have been disclosed;  and work on a permanent fix could have

 been described:  all in cyberspace among sophisticated customers who well

 understand the complex nature of the technology.



 Intel's second error was not to recognize that because of the Internet it

 no longer could reason at least semi-privately with customers and advance

 rational technical arguments.  In pre-cyberspace days, that could be

 effective:  the customer is grudgingly mollified until the issue is

 eventually resolved.  But in this case,  as it's customers shared both

 their problems and experiences  with each other in real time, they fed

 each others frustrations; were empowered as a group to demand better

 treatment;  and built mutual strength with each day for new battles to

 come.



 Intel's third error was not to go directly on line with it's customers and

 deal with the issue interactively.  Instead, Intel pursued the classic

 static public relations mode of issuing statements and news releases.

 These were turned into blackened ruins by Internet flame messages in a

 matter of hours.



 Meantime, IBM by it's announcement, uncorked the Law of Unanticipated

 Consequences.  The Internet mob really understood the issue; the general

 public for the most part did not.  IBM, with motives already under

 suspicion, opened the bottle labeled "Doubt about Technology" to the

 overall potential future detriment of the Information Technology Industry

 in general.



 As  more people around the world join the millions already using the

 Internet for communications,  corporations and government will be forced

 if they wish to succeed to function within the new realities of cyberspace:

 information is shared and sifted by thousands of knowledgeable people;

 time is collapsed; facts are quickly checked; loss of credibility can be

 instantaneous;  second chances are rare and harder to effect;  grandstand

 plays better be perfect;  and the playing off of one audience against

 another is far more easily detected.



 Above all else, a smattering of obscure messages or even a random one or

 two can no longer be automatically disregarded as mere technical mumbling.

 For example, is anyone following up on a recent Internet potential bug

 message regarding AMD DX-80 chips or another regarding "something about a

 conditional loop" in the Pentium?



 One final cyberspace reality of note:  instant corrosive humor is abundant

 and effective.  (If they really are laughing about you, you can't be taken

 seriously anymore.)  This was ably demonstrated by the Internet author

 who wrote for the delectation of Intel customers and potential customers

 everywhere a Star Trek parody.  He called it:  "BBUUGGS IINN

 SSPPAACCEE!!".



 (This article is from a forthcoming issue of Knowledge Tools News, an

 electronic newsletter of Omegacom, Inc. James Baar (jimbar@omegacom.com)

 is president/managing consultant.  Theodore Baar (tedbar@omegacom.com.)

 is vice president/chief technologist.)



 -----------

 Copyright (c) 1994 Omegacom, Inc., all rights reserved.  This article may

 be posted to any USENET newsgroup,  on-line service, or BBS as long as it

 is posted in it's entirety and includes this copyright statement. All

 other rights reserved. This article may not be included in commercial

 collections or compilations without express permission from Omegacom,

 Inc.  jimbar@omegacom.com.  For all other uses you must seek permission

 of Omegacom, Inc.  jimbar@omegacom.com



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                 NON-DISCLOSURE AGREEMENT OF DR. NICELY



 The following message was posted to the Internet by Dr. Thomas Nicely,

 discover of the Pentium Floating Point Unit Flaw. The first part deals

 with a question regarding Dr. Nicely's signing of a non-disclosure

 agreement with Intel.



 TO:     Whomever It May Concern

 FROM:   Dr. Thomas R. Nicely, Lynchburg College, Lynchburg, Virginia

         (nicely@acavax.lynchburg.edu)

 RE:     Pentium Bug and Intel NDA

 DATE:   94.11.25.1400 EST



 This is in reply to Paul Rubin's (phr@netcom.com) inquiry of 23 November.



 * I signed a temporary nondisclosure agreement with Intel on 10 November.



 * There was no coercion or threat of any kind, by either party.



 * The NDA was signed in the course of discussions to determine

   whether or not an agreement (such as a consultancy) could be reached

   which would prove beneficial in the long term to myself, to the Intel

   Corporation, and to my employer, Lynchburg College.



 * From 10 November until 22 November, I deflected all inquiries regarding

   the Pentium FPU to Intel's representatives.  This was a consequence of

   my own mistaken interpretation of the NDA; I was treating it in the

   manner of a security clearance; I once held a clearance for secret

   restricted data in X-division (nuclear weapon design and analysis)

   at Los Alamos National Laboratory, and that clearance treated most

   information concerned as "born secret," even if the information was

   acquired prior to the clearance and/or independently.  In the same

   spirit, I removed from the College's VAX anonymous FTP directory

   copies of the codes used to analyze the Pentium chip for the bug.



 * After receiving some complaints in this regard, Intel (on its own

   initiative) informed me on 22 November that I was free to discuss

   publicly the discovery and nature of the Pentium FPU bug, since this was

   my own work, accomplished prior to signing the NDA and without

   assistance from Intel; and that the primary purpose of the NDA was to

   insure confidentiality of information exchanged in the course of any

   consulting I might do for Intel in the future.



 * To this date, Intel has been most cooperative in alleviating difficulties

   caused for my own research (computational number theory; distribution of

   twin primes and other constellations, and the sums of their reciprocals)

   by the presence of the bug.  They have shipped replacement chips for the

   CPUs in the machines I am using, and I have verified that the new chips

   are free of the bug (zero errors in > 1e15 simulated random divisions).



 * I cannot speak for Intel regarding its policies on CPU replacement for

   Pentium systems having the bug; that is a management decision which

   obviously must take into account the constraints of supply, inventory,

   logistics, expense, and public relations.  To date, I believe Intel has

   handled the affair in essentially the manner that could usually be

   expected of most businesses operating in a highly competitive, low-margin

   capitalistic economy.  Any Pentium owner who feels the need for a

   replacement CPU should contact Intel Customer Service and Tech

   Support at 800-628-8686, or Intel representative John Thompson at

   408-765-1279.



 * I probably have a somewhat different perspective on the bug than most

   users.  It is my opinion that the current generation of microprocessors

   (and possibly all of them since, say, the 8080) has become so complex

   that it is no longer possible to completely debug them, or even to

   determine every bug that exists in one.  Thus, the discovery of this

   particular bug should not be any great surprise.  There have been many

   well-publicized bugs in the past (e.g., the 32-bit multiply bug in the

   early 80386s, the arctangent bug in the early 80486s, the stack-handling

   bug in the early 8088s, and the Motorola 68K revision F bug).

   Furthermore, in view of this, all mission-critical computations should

   be performed multiple times, in settings as independent as possible---

   preferably with different CPUs, operating systems, and software

   algorithms.  Where different platforms are not available, the same

   computation should be performed using algorithms as independent as

   possible; this was in fact how I pinpointed the Pentium bug---the

   sums of the reciprocals of the twin primes were being done in both

   long double floating point (64 significant bits) and in extended

   precision using arrays of integers (26 decimal digits at that time,

   53 decimal digits currently).  Dual calculations were also being run

   on 486 and Pentium systems.



 * Note that the bug can be temporarily circumvented by locking out

   the FPU.  For most DOS applications, this can be done by means of the

   DOS commands SET 87=NO (for executables created by Borland compilers)

   and SET NO87=NO87 (for executables created by Microsoft compilers).

   Of course, this is at best a performance-killing band-aid; some

   applications require an FPU, while Windows and most DOS extenders

   ignore these environmental variables.  In theory, it should be

   possible to write a fairly short (100 lines?) utility code which

   enters protected mode (ring 0), sets up a valid global descriptor table

   (and perhaps a valid interrupt descriptor table), resets the emulation

   bit in the machine status word of control register 0, and then re-enters

   real mode.  Running such a code at boot time should lock out the FPU

   even for Windows and DOS extended applications; a similar code could

   reactivate the FPU at will.  Unfortunately, I haven't had the time to

   write the code yet!



 * To date, my analysis indicates that the bug will appear in about 1 in

   31 billion random divisions and 1 in 1.26 billion random reciprocals.

   These figures are similar to the rate of 1 in 9.5 billion attributed to

   Intel.  In my own application (distribution of twin primes and the sum

   of their reciprocals) no error appeared for values < 824e9.  Most users

   will find these values reassuring; those of us doing computational

   number theory, chaos theory, or analysis of ill-conditioned matrices

   may still want a new, bug-free CPU.



 * To date, the worst-case error of which I am aware is an example

   apparently posted by Tim Coe of Vitesse Semiconductors on 14 November,

   indicating that the quotient 4195835.0/3145727.0 is returned correctly

   to only 14 significant bits (5 significant decimal digits).  I have not

   yet had a chance to verify this example.



 * Copies of some of the codes I have used to analyze the bug (updated to

   reflect later developments) will be restored to the anonymous FTP

   directory [anonymous.nicely.pentbug] of Lynchburg College's VAX server

   (machine ID acavax.lynchburg.edu) as soon as I get time to update and

   post them.



 * Feel free to transmit this communication as you wish.



 Sincerely,



 Dr. Thomas R. Nicely



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                 THE COMPUTER NEVERMORE (The Raven)



 By Unknown



 Once upon a midnight dreary, fingers cramped and vision bleary,

 System manuals piled high and wasted paper on the floor

 Longing for the warmth of bedsheets,

 Still I sat there, doing spreadsheets;

 Having reached the bottom line,

 I took a floppy from the drawer.

 Typing with a steady hand, then invoked the SAVE command

 But I got a reprimand: it read 'Abort, Retry, Ignore.'



 Was this some occult illusion? Some maniacal intrusion?

 These were choices Solomon himself had never faced before.

 Carefully, I weighed my options.

 These three seemed to be the top ones.

 Clearly I must now adopt one:

 Choose 'Abort, Retry, Ignore.'



 With my fingers pale and trembling,

 Slowly toward the keyboard bending,

 Longing for a happy ending, hoping all would be restored,

 Praying for some guarantee

 Finally I pressed a key--

 But on the screen what did I see?

 Again:  'Abort, Retry, Ignore.'



 I tried to catch the chips off-guard--

 I pressed again, but twice as hard.

 Luck was just not in the cards.

 I saw what I had seen before.

 Now I typed in desperation

 Trying random combinations

 Still there came the incantation:

 Choose:  'Abort, Retry, Ignore.'



 There I sat, distraught exhausted, by my own machine accosted

 Getting up I turned away and paced across the office floor.

 And then I saw an awful sight:

 A bold and blinding flash of light--

 A lightning bolt had cut the night and shook me to my very core.

 I saw the screen collapse and die

 'Oh no--my data base,' I cried

 I thought I heard a voice reply,

 'You'll see your data Nevermore!'



 To this day I do not know

 The place to which lost data goes

 I bet it goes to heaven where the angels have it stored

 But as for productivity, well

 I fear that IT goes straight to hell

 And that Us the tale I have to tell

 Your choice:  'Abort, Retry, Ignore.'



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                  TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE STAR TREK...



 'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the ship

 Not a circuit was buzzing, not one microchip;

 The phasers were hung in the armory securely,

 In hope that no alien would get up that early.



 The crewmen were nestled all snug in their bunks

 (Except for the few who were partying drunks);

 And Picard in his nightshirt, and Bev in her lace,

 Had just settled down for a neat face to face...



 When out in the hall there arose such a racket,

 That we leapt from our beds, pulling on pant and jacket.

 Away to the lifts we all shot like a gun,

 Leapt into the cars and yelled loudly "Deck One!"



 The bridge red-alert lights, which flashed through the din,

 Gave a lustre of Hades to objects within.

 When, what on the viewscreen, our eyes should behold,

 But a weird kind of sleigh, and some guy who looked old.



 But the glint in his eyes was so strange and askew,

 That we knew in a moment it had to be Q.

 His sleigh grew much larger as closer he came.

 Then he zapped on the bridge and addressed us by name:



 "It's Riker, It's Data, It's Worf and Jean-Luc!

 It's Geordi, And Wesley, the genetic fluke!

 To the top of the bridge, to the top of the hall!

 Now float away! Float away! Float away all!"



 As leaves in the autumn are whisked off the street,

 So the floor of the bridge came away from our feet,

 And up to the ceiling, our bodies they flew,

 As the captain called out, "What the Hell is this, Q?!"



 The prankster just laughed and expanded his grin,

 And, snapping his fingers, he vanished again.

 As we took in our plight, and were looking around,

 The spell was removed, and we crashed to the ground.



 Then Q, dressed in fur from his head to his toe,

 Appeared once again, to continue the show.

 "That's enough!" cried the captain, "You'll stop this at once!"

 And Riker said, "Worf, take aim at this dunce!"



 "I'm deeply offended, Jean-Luc" replied Q,

 "I just wanted to celebrate Christmas with you."

 As we scoffed at his words, he produced a large sack.

 He dumped out the contents and took a step back.



 "I've brought gifts," he said, "just to show I'm sincere.

 There's something delightful for everyone here."

 He sat on the floor, and dug into his pile,

 And handed out gifts with his most charming smile:



 "For Counselor Troi, there's no need to explain.

 Here's Tylenol-Beta for all of your pain.

 For Worf I've some mints, as his breath's not too great,

 And for Geordi LaForge, an inflatable date."



 For Wesley, some hormones, and Clearasil-plus;

 For Data, a joke book, For Riker a truss.

 For Beverly Crusher, there's sleek lingerie,

 And for Jean-Luc, the thrill of just seeing her that way."



 And he sprang to his feet with that grin on his face

 And, clapping his hands, disappeared into space.

 But we heard him exclaim as he dwindled from sight,

 "Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good flight!"



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                              SANTA SOURCE CODE



 By Unknown



 #bash



 better !pout !cry

 better watchout

 lpr why

 santa claus <north pole >town



 cat /etc/passwd >list

 ncheck list

 ncheck list

 cat list | grep naughty >nogiftlist

 cat list | grep nice >giftlist

 santa claus <north pole >town



 who | grep sleeping

 who | grep awake

 who | egrep 'bag|good'

 for (goodnes sake) {

         be good

         }



 better !pout !cry

 better watchout

 lpr why

 santa claus <north pole >town





 [original source unknown]



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



Date: Sat, 21 Jan 1995 05:37:20 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File11



 

              MY LIFE AS AN INTERNATIONAL ARMS COURIER



 By Matt Blaze (mab@research.att.com)



 Under an obscure provision of US law, devices and computer programs

 that use encryption techniques to hide information from prying eyes

 and ears are considered ``munitions'' and subject to the same rules

 that govern the international arms trade.  In particular, taking such

 items out of this country requires the approval of the State

 Department, which decides whether exporting something might endanger

 national security.  In the past, these restrictions were of little

 concern to the average citizen; encryption found most of its

 application in military and diplomatic communications equipment.

 Today, however, growing concern over electronic fraud and privacy

 means that encryption techniques are starting to find their way into

 more conventional commercial products like laptop computers and

 portable phones.



 Mostly to find out what the process was like, I recently applied for a

 temporary export license for a portable telephone encryption product

 that I wanted to take with me on a business trip to England and

 Belgium.



 The item in question is more properly called a ``telephone security

 device.''  This is a little box that scrambles telephone conversations

 to protect them against eavesdroppers; this sort of protection is

 sometimes important when discussing confidential business matters from

 faraway places.  The particular model I bought was already approved

 for export; it employs a cipher algorithm that the government has

 already decided is not a threat to national security even should it

 fall into the hands of some rogue government.  This model is aimed

 primarily, I presume, at international business travelers who want to

 communicate in a reasonably secure manner with their home offices in

 the states.  In other words, a typical user buys two of them, leaving

 one at the home office and carrying the other when traveling abroad.

 The options that came with my device included a James Bond-ish looking

 acoustic coupler and handset to facilitate its connection to the

 hardwired phones that are still common in European hotel rooms.



 It turns out that there was recently some discussion in the government

 about exempting products like my secure phone from the licensing

 paperwork requirements.  Unfortunately, however, this exemption never

 actually took effect.  So even though the device I had was already

 approved for sale abroad, I still needed to get a temporary export

 license before I could take it with me.  But I was assured that ``this

 is an easy, routine process''.  Well, sure enough, about two weeks

 before I was to leave I got back my official US State Department

 ``license for the temporary export of unclassified defense articles''.

 So far, so good.



 From what I was able to figure out by reading the license (and having

 a few conversations with an export lawyer), I'm required to leave from

 an international airport with a Customs agent present (no problem

 there, although Customs is geared to arriving, rather than departing,

 travelers).  At the airport, I'm supposed to fill out a form called a

 ``shipper's export declaration'' (SED) on which I have to declare that

 ``these commodities are authorized by the US government for export

 only to Belgium and the United Kingdom.  They may not be resold,

 transshipped, or otherwise disposed of in any country, either in their

 original form or incorporated into other end-items without the prior

 written approval of the US Department of State''.  Then I'm to present

 the SED and export license to a Customs official at the airport before

 I leave.  The Customs officer is supposed to take my SED and endorse

 my license to show what I'm actually taking out of the country.



 On the way back in, I'm supposed to ``declare'' my item at Customs

 (even though it was manufactured in the US) and show them my license,

 and they're supposed to endorse the license again as proof that I

 have, in fact, returned the ``defense article'' to the safety of the

 United States.



 The first hitch I ran into was that no one could actually tell me

 where I could get an SED form.  But when I called Customs they assured

 me that this was no big deal.  ``Just come by when you get to the

 airport and we stamp the license.  I guess you can just fill out the

 SED there,'' they said.



 I made sure to get to the airport early anyway.



 Although there was moderately heavy traffic near the airport, I made

 it to JFK two and a half hours before my 10pm flight.  I was flying

 United, which has their own terminal at JFK, so Customs has an office

 right there in the same building from which I was to depart (JFK is

 awful to get around, so I was glad for this).  I checked in for my

 flight (and got upgraded to first class, which bolstered my

 expectation that everything was going to be really easy from here on).

 Then, luggage, license and phone in hand, I made my way downstairs to

 Customs, expecting to fill out the SED form and ``just have my license

 stamped'' as they had assured me earlier on the telephone.  I

 explained my situation to the security guard who controls entry to the

 Customs area, and he led me to ``the back office'' without much

 argument or delay.  The head uniformed Customs guy in the back office

 (which I think is same office where they take the people suspected of

 being ``drug mules'' with cocaine-filled condoms in their stomaches)

 looked approachable enough.  He had a sort of kindly, grandfatherly

 manner, and he was playing a video game on a laptop computer.  I got

 the impression that most of the people he encounters are suspected

 drug smugglers, and he seemed pleased enough to be dealing with

 something a little different from the norm.  When I explained what I

 was doing he looked at me as if I had just announced that I was a

 citizen of Mars who hadn't even bothered to obtain a visa.



 He explained, carefully, that a) I really do need the SED form; b) not

 only that, I should have already filled it out, in duplicate; c) he

 doesn't have blank SED forms; d) he, like everyone else in the entire

 US government that I had spoken to, has no idea where one gets them

 from, but people must get them from somewhere; and e) it doesn't

 really matter, because I'm in the wrong place anyway.



 I asked him where the right place is.  ``The cargo building, of

 course,'' he told me, patiently.  I remembered the cargo building

 because I passed it in the taxi just as the traffic jam began, about

 half an hour before I got to the United terminal.  The airport shuttle

 bus doesn't stop there.  I'd have to call a taxi.  ``But I think

 they're closed now, and even if they were open you'd never make it

 before your flight'' he helpfully added, saving me the trip.  He also

 complemented me for going to the trouble to get the license.



 I must have looked hurt and confused.  Eventually he called in some

 fellow in a suit who I presume to have been his boss.



 ``Are you the guy who wants to export the fancy gun?'' the fellow in

 the suit asked me.



 ``It's not a gun, it's a telephone,'' I responded, with a straight

 face.



 ``Why do you have a license to export a telephone?''  Good question, I

 thought.  I explained about the export law and showed him the thing.

 He agreed that it looked pretty harmless.



 The fellow in the suit reiterated points a through e almost verbatim

 (do they rehearse for these things?) and explained that this isn't

 really their department, since my license was issued by the State

 Department, not Customs, and my situation doesn't come up very often

 because exports usually go via the cargo building.  He'd love to help

 me, but the computer in which these things get entered is over in

 Cargo.  ``That's how the records get made.  But you do have a valid

 license, which is nice.''  He also suggested that I would have had an

 easier time had I shipped the device instead of carrying it with me.



 I asked what I should do, given that my plane was scheduled to leave

 in less than an hour.  Neither was sure, but the fellow in the suit

 seemed willing leave it to the discretion of the uniformed guy.  ``How

 does this thing work, anyway?'' he asked.  I explained as best as I

 could, trying to make it sound as harmless as it is.  ``You mean like

 that Clipper chip?'' he asked.



 At this point, given that he has a computer and knows something about

 the Clipper chip, I figured that maybe there was some hope of making

 my flight.  Or maybe I was about to spend the night in jail.  In my

 mind, I put it at about a 90:10 hope:jail ratio.



 Then he asked, ``Do you know about this stuff?''



 So we chatted about computers and cryptography for a while.  Finally,

 the two of them decided that it wouldn't really hurt for them to just

 sign the form as long as I promised to call my lawyer and get the SED

 situation straightened out ASAP.  They assured me that I won't be

 arrested or have any other trouble upon my return.



 I made my flight, validated license in hand.



 An aside: Throughout my trip, I discovered an interesting thing about

 the phone and the various options I was carrying with it.  Under X-ray

 examination, it looks just like some kind of bomb.  (I suspect it was

 the coiled handset cords).  Every time I went through a security

 checkpoint, I had to dig the thing out of my luggage and show it to

 the guard.  I almost missed the new ``Eurostar'' chunnel train (3hrs

 15mins nonstop from London to Brussels, airport-style check-in and

 security) as the guards were trying to figure out whether my telephone

 was likely to explode.



 Coming back to the US was less eventful, though it did take me an

 extra hour or so to get through Customs.  Expecting a bit of a hassle

 I didn't check any luggage and made sure to be the first person from

 my flight to reach the Customs line.  The inspector was ready to

 wordlessly accept my declaration form and send me on my way when I

 opened my mouth and explained that I needed to get an export license

 stamped.  That was obviously a new one for him.  He finally decided

 that this had to be handled by something called the ``Ships Office''.

 I was sent to an unoccupied back room (a different back room from

 before) and told to wait.  I thought about the recent Customs

 experiences of Phil Zimmermann.  (Zimmermann, the author of a popular

 computer encryption program, was recently detained, questioned and

 searched by Customs officials investigating whether he violated the

 same regulations I was trying so hard to follow.)  After about half an

 hour, an officer came in and asked me what I needed.  I explained

 about my export license that had to be endorsed.  She just shrugged

 and told me that she had to ``process the flight'' first.  As best as

 I could tell, her job was to clear the airplane itself through

 Customs, that being, technically speaking, a very expensive import.

 It would take a little while.  She was pleasant enough, though, and at

 least didn't look at me as if she intended to send me to jail or have

 me strip searched.



 Finally, she finished with the plane and asked me for my form.  She

 studied it carefully, obviously never having seen one before, and

 eventually asked me what, exactly, she was supposed to do.  I

 explained that I had never actually gone through this process before

 but I understood that she's supposed to record the fact that I was

 re-importing the device and stamp my license somewhere.  She told me

 that she didn't know of any place for her to record this.  After some

 discussion, we agreed that the best thing to do was to make a Xerox

 copy of my license and arrange for it to go wherever it had to go

 later.  She stamped the back of the license and sent me on my way.  It

 was a little over an hour after I first reached the Customs desk.



 My conclusion from all this is that it just isn't possible for an

 individual traveler to follow all the rules.  Even having gone through

 the process now, I still have no idea how to obtain, let alone file,

 the proper forms, even for a device that's already been determined to

 be exportable.  The export of export-controlled items is ordinarily

 handled by cargo shipment, not by hand carrying by travelers, and the

 system is simply not geared to deal with exceptions.  Technically

 speaking, everyone with a laptop disk encryption program who travels

 abroad is in violation of the law, but since no one actually knows or

 checks, no mechanism exists to deal with those who want to follow the

 rules.  While (fortunately) everyone I dealt with was sympathetic, no

 one in the government who I spoke with was able to actually help me

 follow the rules.  I was permitted to leave and come back only because

 everyone involved eventually recognized that my telephone was pretty

 harmless, that my intentions were good, and that the best thing to do

 was be flexible.  If anyone had taken a hard line and tried to enforce

 the letter of the law, I simply wouldn't have been able to take the

 thing with me, even with my license.  Had I just put my telephone in

 my suitcase without telling anyone instead of calling attention to

 myself by trying to follow the rules, chances are no one would have

 noticed or cared.



 Unfortunately, however, these absurd rules carry the full force of

 law, and one ignores them only at the risk of being prosecuted for

 international arms trafficking.  While it may seem far-fetched to

 imagine US citizens prosecuted as arms smugglers simply for carrying

 ordinary business products in their luggage, the law as written allows

 the government to do just that.  At the same time, anyone who is aware

 of and who tries to follow the regulations is made to jump through

 pointless hoops that are so obscure that even the people charged with

 enforcing them don't know quite what to make of them.



 Copyright 1995 by Matt Blaze. All rights reserved.



 Electronic redistribution permitted provided this article is reproduced

 in its entirety.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                    OPEN LETTER TO WIRED MAGAZINE



 By Chris Goggans (phrack@well.sf.ca.us)



 To Whom It May Concern:



 I am writing this under the assumption that the editorial staff at

 Wired will "forget" to print it in the upcoming issue, so I am

 also posting it on every relevant newsgroup and online discussion forum

 that I can think of.



 When I first read your piece "Gang War In Cyberspace" I nearly choked on

 my own stomach bile.  The whole tone of this piece was so far removed

 from reality that I found myself questioning what color the sky must be

 in Wired's universe.  Not that I've come to expect any better from Wired.

 Your magazine, which could have had the potential to actually do

 something, has become a parody...a politically correct art-school project

 that consistently falls short of telling the whole story or making a solid

 point.  (Just another example of Kapor-Kash that ends up letting everyone

 down.)



 I did however expect more from Josh Quittner.



 I find it interesting that so much emphasis can be placed on an issue of

 supposed racial slurs as the focus of an imaginary "gang war," especially

 so many years after the fact.



 It's also interesting to me that people keep overlooking the fact that

 one of the first few members of our own little Legion of Doom was black

 (Paul Muad'dib.)  Maybe if he had not died a few years back that wouldn't

 be so quickly forgotten.  (Not that it makes a BIT of difference what color

 a hacker is as long as he or she has a brain and a modem, or these days

 at least a modem.)



 I also find it interesting that a magazine can so easily implicate someone

 as the originator of the so-called "fighting words" that allegedly sparked

 this online-battle, without even giving a second thought as to the damage

 that this may do to the person so named.  One would think that a magazine

 would have more journalistic integrity than that (but then again, this IS

 Wired, and political correctness sells magazines and satisfies

 advertisers.)  Thankfully, I'll only have to endure one month of the

 "Gee Chris, did you know you were a racist redneck?" phone calls.



 It's further odd that someone characterized as so sensitive to insults

 allegedly uttered on a party-line could have kept the company he did.

 Strangely enough, Quittner left out all mention of the MOD member who

 called himself "SuperNigger."  Surely, John Lee must have taken umbrage to

 an upper-middle class man of Hebrew descent so shamefully mocking him and

 his entire race, wouldn't he?   Certainly he wouldn't associate in any way

 with someone like that...especially be in the same group with, hang out

 with, and work on hacking projects with, would he?



 Please, of course he would, and he did.  (And perhaps he still does...)



 The whole "racial issue" was a NON-ISSUE.  However, such things make

 exciting copy and garner many column inches so keep being rehashed.  In

 fact, several years back when the issue first came up, the statement was

 cited as being either "Hang up, you nigger," or "Hey, SuperNigger," but

 no one was sure which was actually said.  Funny how the wording changes

 to fit the slant of the "journalist" over time, isn't it?



 I wish I could say for certain which was actually spoken, but alas, I was

 not privy to such things.  Despite the hobby I supposedly so enjoyed

 according to Quittner, "doing conference bridges," I abhorred the things.

 We used to refer to them as "Multi-Loser Youps" (multi-user loops) and

 called their denizens "Bridge Bunnies."  The bridge referred to in the

 story was popularized by the callers of the 5A BBS in Houston, Texas.

 (A bulletin board, that I never even got the chance to call, as I had

 recently been raided by the Secret Service and had no computer.)  Many

 people from Texas did call the BBS, however, and subsequently used the

 bridge, but so did people from Florida, Arizona, Michigan, New York and

 Louisiana.  And as numbers do in the underground, word of a new place to

 hang out caused it to propagate rapidly.



 To make any implications that such things were strictly a New York versus

 Texas issue is ludicrous, and again simply goes to show that a "journalist"

 was looking for more points to add to his (or her) particular angle.



 This is not to say that I did not have problems with any of the people

 who were in MOD.  At the time I still harbored strong feelings towards

 Phiber Optik for the NYNEX-Infopath swindle, but that was about it.

 And that was YEARS ago.  (Even I don't harbor a grudge that long.)

 Even the dozen or so annoying phone calls I received in late 1990 and

 early 1991 did little to evoke "a declaration of war."  Like many people,

 I know how to forward my calls, or unplug the phone.  Amazing how

 technology works, isn't it?



 Those prank calls also had about as much to do with the formation of

 Comsec as bubble-gum had to do with the discovery of nuclear fission.

 (I'm sure if you really put some brain power to it, and consulted Robert

 Anton Wilson, you could find some relationships.)  At the risk of sounding

 glib, we could have cared less about hackers at Comsec.  If there were no

 hackers, or computer criminals, there would be no need for computer

 security consultants.  Besides, hackers account for so little in the real

 picture of computer crime, that their existence is more annoyance than

 something to actually fear.



 However, when those same hackers crossed the line and began tapping our

 phone lines, we were more than glad to go after them.  This is one of my

 only rules of action:  do whatever you want to anyone else, but mess with

 me and my livelihood and I will devote every ounce of my being to paying

 you back.  That is exactly what we did.



 This is not to say that we were the only people from the computer

 underground who went to various law enforcement agencies with information

 about MOD and their antics.  In fact, the number of hackers who did was

 staggering, especially when you consider the usual anarchy of the

 underground.  None of these other people ever get mentioned and those of

 us at Comsec always take the lead role as the "narks," but we were far

 from alone.  MOD managed to alienate the vast majority of the computer

 underground, and people reacted.



 All in all, both in this piece, and in the book itself, "MOD, The Gang That

 Ruled Cyberspace," Quittner has managed to paint a far too apologetic piece

 about a group of people who cared so very little about the networks they

 played in and the people who live there.  In the last 15 years that I've

 been skulking around online, people in the community have always tended

 to treat each other and the computers systems they voyeured with a great

 deal of care and respect.  MOD was one of the first true examples of a

 groupthink exercise in hacker sociopathy.  Selling long distance codes,

 selling credit card numbers, destroying systems and harassing innocent

 people is not acceptable behavior among ANY group, even the computer

 underground.



 There have always been ego flares and group rivalries in the underground,

 and there always will be.  The Legion of Doom itself was FOUNDED because of

 a spat between its founder (Lex Luthor) and members of a group called The

 Knights of Shadow.  These rivalries keep things interesting, and keep the

 community moving forward, always seeking the newest bit of information in

 a series of healthy one-upsmanship.  MOD was different.  They took things

 too far against everyone, not just against two people in Texas.



 I certainly don't condemn everyone in the group.  I don't even know

 a number of them (electronically or otherwise.)  I honestly believe

 that Mark Abene (Phiber) and Paul Stira (Scorpion) got royally screwed

 while the group's two biggest criminals, Julio Fernandez (Outlaw) and

 Allen Wilson (Wing), rolled over on everyone else and walked away free

 and clear.  This is repulsive when you find out that Wing in particular

 has gone on to be implicated in more damage to the Internet (as Posse and

 ILF) than anyone in the history of the computing.  This I find truly

 disgusting, and hope that the Secret Service are proud of themselves.



 Imagine if I wrote a piece about the terrible treatment of a poor prisoner

 in Wisconsin who was bludgeoned to death by other inmates while guards

 looked away.  Imagine if I tried to explain the fact that poor Jeff Dahmer

 was provoked to murder and cannibalism by the mocking of adolescent boys

 who teased and called him a faggot.  How would you feel if I tried to

 convince you that we should look upon him with pity and think of him as a

 misunderstood political prisoner?  You would probably feel about how I do

 about Quittner's story.



 'Hacker' can just as easily be applied to "journalists" too, and with this

 piece Quittner has joined the Hack Journalist Hall of Fame, taking his

 place right next to Richard Sandza.



 Quittner did get a few things right.  I do have a big cat named Spud, I do

 work at a computer company and I do sell fantastic t-shirts.  Buy some.



 With Love,



 Chris Goggans

 aka Erik Bloodaxe



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                      WHEN BIGOTRY OUTPACES TECHNOLOGY



 By Douglas Welch dewelch@pop.com



 Previously published in the Los Angeles Times, Monday, December 19, 1994.

 Page B15



 Note: Electronic re-posting is ALLOWED but NO PAPER REPRINTS or inclusion

 in online digests without written permission from the author. All postings

 must retain this notice.



 Copyright (c) 1994 Douglas E. Welch

 dewelch@pop.com

 76625,3301



 * Communications: We need to attack the message, not the modem, to ensure

 on-line services are free from censorship.



 As each new technology marches onto the scene, there are some who instantly

 blame all the ills of society on it. Groups calling for the censorship of

 computer networks are forgetting that it is not the technology that is

 causing the problem, but the people using the technology. Instead of

 targeting the authors of hate speech on the computer networks, they are

 targeting the networks themselves. This only reinforces the immediate need

 for on-line computer services to be protected by the federal government

 as "common carriers," like telephone utilities.



 Hatemongers and bigots have always been a part of human society. Through

 ignorance and bullying, they gather their flock, but it is through open

 debate, education and reasoned discourse that they are best confronted.

 Instead, professed anti-hate groups are attacking the providers of on-line

 services in an effort to force them to remove offensive messages or prevent

 their posting. Rather than using the technology to fight back and denounce

 hate speech, they are seeking to remove the freedom of speech altogether.

 Were the situation reversed, I am sure you would hear them decrying the

 evils of censorship as loudly as they call for it now.



 Telephone companies cannot be sued when offensive or illegal calls are

 placed through their systems. On-line services deserve the same kind of

 "common carrier" status. There is no reason on-line services should have to

 be both provider and policeman. This places them in danger of being a

 censor.



 On-line users have several simpler options. They can merely ignore the

 message with the press of a key or set their "kill file" to ignore

 messages of certain content or from a certain user. Ultimately, on-line

 services provide users the chance to engage these hatemongers in a forum

 free of physical threat with hopes of liberating their narrow focus. The

 immediacy of posting a response can only be found in the on-line world.



 On-line services are no passing fad. they are rapidly gaining popularity

 on par with telephone and fax service. We need to stop treating on-line

 services like something new and ensure that they are free from censorship

 pressures.



 Censorship has always been defined as a "slipperly slope" that can easily

 lead to a repression of ideas and a lower quality of life. Whether we

 communicate via paper, phone lines or on-line computer services, our

 freedom of speech should be protected. Hate groups should be targeted for

 their messages, not how they send them.



 Douglas E. Welch is a computer consultant. He can be reached at

 dewelch@pop.com.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



             LETTER FROM STEVE CASE; RE: CHILD PORN ON AOL



 By Steve Case



 Ever since we first launched America Online we've remained committed to

 fostering an electronic community that provides a fun, enjoyable and

 enriching experience for all members.  We've asked our members to honor

 the privilege of interactivity, and we've strictly enforced our Terms of

 Service to help foster the kind of community of which we can all be proud.

 Recently, however, some material has been brought to our attention by some

 of our members which involves illegal activity -- the trading of images in

 electronic mail which appear to be child pornography.  Upon receiving the

 material, and verifying that it was a violation of our Terms of Service,

 and in all likelihood illegal, we immediately contacted the FBI and

 terminated the accounts of the senders.



 While we recognize that any community around the United States with more

 than 1.5 million citizens will have its share of illegal activity, we were

 nonetheless disheartened to find that some members are abusing the

 communications features of AOL in this way.  We simply will not tolerate

 such illegal activity on America Online.  To anyone who may be using

 America Online for illegal purposes, be advised that we will terminate the

 accounts of those participating and we will notify the proper authorities

 of any illegal activity that is brought to our attention.



 Our policy is that all private communications -- including e-mail, instant

 messages, and private chat rooms -- are strictly private.  We do not, will

 not, and legally cannot monitor any private communications.   But if we

 are alerted to a potential offense and we are sent evidence, as we were

 recently, we will vigorously pursue the matter.   In this case, electronic

 mail was forwarded to our attention by our members, and as recipients of

 the mail we were able to turn the material over to the authorities.



 We have over 250 people who help us provide assistance in the public areas

 of the service and give guidance to members who are new or who have

 questions. Of late, we've had a growing problem with member-created rooms

 whose title and discussion violate our Terms of Service.  Member-created

 rooms have always been a unique and much-valued aspect of America Online.

 Often, these rooms provide the seeds for new special interest forums that

 later emerge. But as more members abuse the privilege and establish rooms

 that suggest illegal activity, or detract from the enjoyment of others

 with offensive titles, we are faced with looking at a higher level of

 safeguards as it relates to member-created rooms.  We simply cannot keep

 up with the sheer volume of rooms created, and as a result, from time to

 time rooms that violate TOS remain open for some period of time.  We're

 looking at several alternatives to improve the situation.  We don't want

 to see our members denied the privilege of this fun and creative

 interactive environment due to the abuses of a few, but at the same time

 we do feel some action is warranted to safeguard this popular

 "neighborhood" in our community.



 Unfortunately, this is not the first time we have encountered this

 problem, nor is it unique to AOL.  In 1991, we were faced with a similar

 situation. At that time, we went to our members -- as we're doing now --

 advised them of the situation and asked for their help.  And recently,

 recognizing the potential for abuses in this emerging medium, online

 service providers banded together to sponsor a "child safety" brochure

 that gives parents tips and guidelines to foster a productive and safe

 environment for children online. A copy of this brochure can be found in

 the Parents Information Center, keyword:  Parents.  We encourage parents

 to take the time to review it.  In addition we strongly encourage parents

 to monitor their children's use of this medium, much as they would any

 other medium such as television, magazines, etc.  We've also implemented

 "parental controls" which allow parents to restrict their children's

 online access.



 Each one of us needs to respect and honor the privileges of this

 electronic community.  If you haven't reviewed our Terms of Service, take

 a few minutes now and do so.  If you observe what you believe may be

 illegal activity on AOL, bring it to our attention.  The problem is not

 widespread -- we believe only a mere fraction of this community is

 involved.  Let's work together to insure that America Online remains the

 kind of community that you want your friends and family to enjoy.



 Thanks for your continued support.



 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



Date: Sat, 21 Jan 1995 06:26:32 -0600

From: Malik Al-Rashim <dfox@fc.net>

Subject: JAUC-File12





 

                 LEE HARVEY OSWALD DIED FOR YOUR SINS



 By Gordon Fagan, Conspiracy Editor (flyer@io.com)

 

 

 With all the hubbub over the OJ Simpson trial currently getting

 under way, I thought it would be a good idea to get people to rethink

 their conception of what justice is about in another matter.  Where there

 was no trial, not even real charges - just accusations, a bullet and 30+

 years of government approved postmortem derision as an insane killer. 

 We've all seen the movie JFK which is probably more than most of you want

 to hear on the subject in the first place, so I'll just leave each of you

 - in particular, those who have no interest in the JFK assassination

 conspiracy but can't get enough of that OJ, with the following...

 

 



 It has been said that the American people are the only jury that

 Lee Harvey Oswald will ever have.  It is our responsibility, then, to

 examine with utmost care and objectivity the evidence for and against him,

 and to reach an independent verdict - Sylvia Meagher

 

 

           

        Jim Garrison's closing statement to the jury

 

          State of Louisiana vs. Clay Shaw, 1969



    May it please the court.  Gentlemen of the jury:

  

 I know you're very tired.  You've been very patient.  This final

 day has been a long one, so I'll speak only a few minutes. 

 

 In his argument, Mr. Dymond posed one final issue which raises the

 question of what we do when the need for justice is confronted by power. 

 

 So, let me talk to you about a question of whether or not there

 was government fraud in this case.  A question Mr. Dymond seems to want us

 to answer. 

 

 A government is a great deal like a human being.  It's not

 necessarily all good, and it's not necessarily all bad.  We live in a good

 country.  I love it and you do, too.  Nevertheless, the fact remains that

 we have a government which is not perfect. 

 

 There have been since November the 22nd of 1963, and that was not

 the last, indications that there is an excessive power in some parts of

 our government.  It is plain that the people have not received all of the

 truth about some of the things which have happened, about some of the

 assassinations which have occurred, and more particularly about the

 assassination of John Kennedy. 

 

 Going back to when we were children, I think most of us, probably

 all of us in this courtroom, once thought that justice came into being of

 its own accord, that that virtue was its own regard, that good would

 triumph over evil.  In short, that justice occurred automatically.  Later,

 when we found that this wasn't quite so, most of us still felt hopeful

 that at least occurred frequently of its own accord. 

 

 Today, I think that almost all of us would have to agree that

 there is really no machinery, not on this earth at least, which causes

 justice to occur automatically.  Men still have to make it occur. 

 Individual human beings have to make it occur.  Otherwise, it doesn't come

 into existence.  This is not always easy.  As a matter of fact, it's

 always hard, because justice presents a threat to power.  In order to make

 justice come into being, you often have to fight power. 

 

 Mr. Dymond raised the question; "Why don't we say it's all a fraud

 and charge the government with fraud, if that is the case?" 

 

 Let me be explicit, then, and make myself very clar on this point. 

 The goverment's handling of the investigation of John Kennedy's murder was

 a fraud.  It was the greatest fraud in the history of our country.  It

 probably was the greatest fraud ever perpetrated in the history of

 humankind. 

 

 That doesn't mean that we have to accept the continued existence

 of the kind of government which allows this to happen.  We can do

 something about it.  We're not forced either to leave this country or

 accept the authoritarianism that has developed.  The authoritarianism that

 tells us that in the year 2039 we can see the evidence about what happened

 to John Kennedy. 

 

 Government does not consist only of secret police and domestic

 espionage operations and generals and admirals.  Government consists of

 people.  It also consists of juries.  And in the cases of murder, whether

 the poorest individual or the most distinguished citizen in the land,

 should be looked at openly in a court of law, where juries can pass on

 them and not be hidden, not be buried like the body of the victim beneath

 concrete for countless years. 

 

 You men in recent weeks have heard witnesses that no one else in

 the world has heard.  You've seen the Zapruder film.  You've seen what

 happened to your President.  I suggest to you that you know right now

 that, in that area at least, a fraud has been perpetrated. 

 

 That does not mean that our government is entirely bad - and I

 want to emphasize that.  It does mean, however that in recent years,

 through the development of excessive power because of the Cold War, forces

 have developed in our government over which there is no control and these

 forces have an authoritarian approach to justice; meaning, they will let

 you know what justice is. 

 

 Well, my reply to them is that we already know what justice is. 

 It is the decision of the people passing on the evidence.  It is the jury

 system.  In the issue which is posed by the government's conduct in

 concealing the evidence in this case, in the issue of humanity as opposed

 to power, I have chosen humanity, and I will do it again without

 hesitation.  I hope every one of you will do the same.  I do this because

 I love my country and because I want to communicate to the government that

 we will not accept unexplained assassinations with the casual information

 that if we live seventy-five years longer, we might be given more

 evidence. 

 

 In this particular case, massive power was brought to bear to

 prevent justice from ever coming into the courtroom.  The power to make

 authoritarian pronouncements, the power to manipulate the news media by

 the release of false information, the power to interfere with an honest

 inquiry and the power to provide an endless variety of experts to testify

 in behalf of that power, repeatedly was demonstrated in this case. 

 

 The American people have yet to see the Zapruder film.  Why?  The

 American people have yet to see and hear from real witnesses to the

 assassination.  Why?  Because, today in America too much emphasis is given

 to secrecy, with regard to the assassination of our President, and not

 enough emphasis is given to the question of justice and to the question of

 humanity. 

 

 These dignified deceptions will not suffice.  We have had enough

 of power without truth.  We don't have to accept power without truth or

 else leave the country.  I don't accept power without truth or else leave

 the country.  I don't accept either of these two alternatives.  I don't

 intend to leave the country and I don't intend to accept power without

 truth. 

 

 I intend to fight for the truth.  I suggest that not only is this

 not un-American, but it is the most American thing we can do, because if

 truth does not endure, then our country will not endure. 

 

 In our country the worst of all crimes occurs when the government

 murders truth.  If it can murder truth, it can murder freedom.  If it can

 murder freedom it can murder your own sons, if they should dare to fight

 for freedom, and then it can announce that they were killed in an

 industrial accident, or shot by the "enemy" or God knows what. 

 

 In this case, finally, it has been possible to bring the truth

 about the assassination into a court of law, not before a commission

 composed of important and politically astute men, but before a jury of

 citizens. 

 

 Now, I suggest to you that yours is a hard duty, because in a

 sense what you're passing on is the equivalent to a murder case.  The

 difficult thing about passing on a murder case is that the victim is out

 of your sight and buried a long distance away, and all you can see is the

 defendant.  It's very difficult to identify with someone you can't see,

 and sometimes it's hard not to identify to some extent with the defendant

 and his problems. 

 

 In that regard, every prosecutor who is at all humane is concious

 of feeling sorry for the defendant in every case he prosecutes.  But he is

 not free to forget the victim who lies buried out of sight.  I suggest to

 you that, if you do your duty, you also are not free to forget the victim

 who is buried out of sight. 

 

 Tennyson once said that "authority forgets a dying king."  This

 was never more true than in the murder of John Kennedy.  The strange and

 deceptive conduct of the government after his murder began while his body

 was still warm, and has continued for five years.  You have even seen in

 this courtroom indications of interest of part of the government power

 structure in keeping truth down, in keeping the grave closed. 

 

 We presented a number of eyewitnesses as well as an expert witness

 as well as the Zapruder film, to show that the fatal wound of the

 President came from the front.  A plane landed from Washington and out

 stepped Dr. Finck for the defense, to counter the clear and apparent

 evidence of a shot from the front.  I don't have to go into Dr. Finck's

 testimony in detail for you to show that it simply does not correspond to

 the facts.  He admitted that he did not complete the autopsy because a

 general told him to not complete the autopsy. 

 

 In this conflict between power and justice, to put it that way,

 just where do you think Dr. Finck stands?  A general who is not a

 pathologist, told him not to complete the autopsy, so he didn't complete

 it.  This is not the way I want my country to be.  When our president is

 killed he deserves the kind of autopsy that the ordinary citizens get

 every day in the state of Louisana.  And the people deserve the facts

 about it.  We can't have the government power suddenly interjecting itself

 and preventing the truth from coming to the people. 

 

 Yet, in this case, before the sun rose the next morning, power had

 moved into the situation and the truth was being concealed.  And now, five

 years later in this courtroom the power of the government in concealing

 the truth is continuing in the same way. 

 

 We presented eyewitnesses who told you of the shots coming from

 the grassy knoll.  A plane landed from Washington, and out came ballistics

 expert Frazier for the defense.  Mr. Frazier explanation of the sound of

 the shots coming frm the front, which was heard by eyewitness after

 eyewitness, was that Lee Oswald created a sonic boom in his firing.  Not

 only did Oswald break all of the world's records for marksmanship, but he

 broke the sound barrier as well. 

 

 I suggest to you, that if any of you have shot on a firing range,

 and most of you probably in the service, you were shooting rifles in which

 the bullet travelled faster than the speed of sound.  I ask you to recall

 if you ever heard a sonic boom.  If you remember when you were on the

 firing line, and they would say, "ready on the left - ready on the right -

 ready on the firing line - commence firing," you heard the shots coming

 from the firing line, to the left of you and to the right of you.  If you

 had heard as a result of Mr. Frazier's fictional sonic boom, firing coming

 at you from the pits, you would have had a reaction which you would still

 remember. 

 

 Mr. Frazier's sonic boom simply doesn't exist.  It's a part of the

 fraud, a part of the continuing government fraud. 

 

 The best way to make this country the kind of country it's

 supposed to be is to communicate to the government that no matter how

 powerful it may be, we do not accept these frauds.  We do not accept these

 false announcements.  We do not accept the concealment of evidence with

 regard to the murder of President Kennedy. 

 

 Who is the most believable?  A Richard Randolph Carr, seated here

 in a wheelchair and telling you what he saw and what he heard and how he

 was told to shut his mouth, or Mr. Frazier and his sonic booms? 

 

 Do we really have to actually reject Mr. Newman and Mrs. Newman

 and Mr. Carr and Roger Craig and the testimony of all those honest

 witnesses, reject all this and accept the fraudulent Warren Commission, or

 else leave the country? 

 

 I suggest to you that there are other alternatives.  Once of them

 has been put in practice in the last month in the State of Louisiana, and

 that is to bring out the truth in a proceeding where attorneys can

 cross-examine, where the defendant can be confronted by testimony against

 him, where the rules of evidence are applied and where a jury of citizens

 can pass on it, and where there is no government secrecy.  Above all,

 where you do not have evidence concealed for seventy-five years in the

 name of "national security." 

 

 All we have in this case are the facts.  Facts which show that the

 defendant participated in the conspiracy to kill the President and that

 the President was subsequently killed in an ambush. 

 

 The reply of the defense has been the same as the early reply of

 the government in the Warren Commission.  It has been authority,

 authority, authority.  The President's seal outside of each volume of the

 Warren Commission Report, made necessary because there is nothing inside

 these volumes.  Men of high position and prestige sitting on a board, and

 announcing the results to you, but not telling you what the evidence is,

 because the evidence has to be hidden for seventy-five years. 

 

 You heard in this courtroom in recent weeks, eyewitness after

 eyewitness after eyewitness and, above all, you saw one eyewitness which

 was indifferent to power, the Zapruder film.  The lens of the camera is

 totally indifferent to power and it tells what happened as it saw it

 happen, and that is one of the reasons 200 million Americans have not seen

 the Zapruder film.  They should have seen it many times.  They should know

 exactly what happened.  They all should know what you know now. 

 

 Why hasn't all of this come into being if there hasn't been

 government fraud?  Of course there has been fraud by the government. 

 

 But I'm telling you now that I think we can do something about it. 

 I think that there are still enough Americans left in this country to make

 it continue to be America.  I think that we can still fight

 authoritarianism, the government's insistence on secrecy, government force

 used in counterattacks against an honest inquiry, and when we do that,

 we're not being un-American, we're being American.  It isn't easy.  You're

 sticking your neck out in a rather permanent way, but it has to be done

 because truth does not come into being automatically.  Justice does not

 happen automatically.  Individual men, like the members of my staff here,

 have to work and fight to make it happen, and individual men like you have

 to make justice come into being because otherwise it doesn't happen. 

 

 What I'm trying to tell you is that there are forces in America

 today, unfortunately, which are not in favor of the truth coming out about

 John Kennedy's assassination.  As long as our government continues to be

 like this, as long as such forces can get away with such actions, then

 this is no longer the country in which we were born. 

 

 The murder of John Kennedy was probably the most terrible moment

 in the history of our country.  Yet, circumstances have placed you in the

 position where not only have you seen the hidden evidence but you are

 actually going to have the opportunity to bring justice into the picture

 for the first time. 

 

 Now, you are here sitting in judgement on Clay Shaw.  Yet you, as

 men, represent more than jurors in an ordinary case because the victims in

 this case.  You represent, in a sense, the hope of humanity against

 government power.  You represent humanity, which yet may triumph over

 excessive government power.  If you will cause it to be so, in the course

 of doing your duty in this case. 

 

 I suggest that you ask not what your country can do for you but

 what you can do for your country. 

 

 What can you do for your country?  You can cause justice to happen

 for the first time in this matter.  You can help make our country better

 by showing that this is still a government of the people.  And if you do

 that, as long as you live, nothing will ever be more important. 

 

 ---------------------------

 

  Since you read all the way through, you might be interested in

 more information.  You can check out alt.conspiracy.jfk at your favourite

 USENET site and see the still active coverup covering up.  Now including a

 phoney "Oswald did it alone" FAQ posting from a .mil address.  The

 internet equivalent to Gerald Posner's "Case Closed."  Though less well

 written, it includes about the same amount of real research.  There are

 some good people on the newsgroup as well and they have a large and

 growing body of info on display regularly.  Another excellent source is

 the web site for Fair Play magazine: http://www.kaiwan.com/~ljg/fp.html

 

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