Following is something received from Dave Farber's IP list which is an article from the New Statesman describing how the ukcrypto mailing list has included the civil servants involved with the policy and that they answer to the criticisms of what they have been doing. That is very far from anything that has happened with the International Forum on the White Paper or the setting up or development of ICANN. Hence this shows the attack on grassroots processes that the Internet makes possible, and which in fact have given birth to and deeloped the Interner, by the creation of ICANN and the International Forum on the White Paper process Ronda >From: "Caspar Bowden" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (by way of Brian Randell) >Subject: New Statesman on ukcrypto, 26/4/99 > >Dave: > >Here's a message from the UK Crypto mailing list with the URL for, and a >quote from, an interesting New Statesman article that mentions the mailing >list and its impact. > >Cheers > >Brian > >=====. > >http://www.newstatesman.co.uk/199904260035.htm > >Editors wanted > >Internet by Andrew Brown > >....(snip) > >Yet there is at least one example of a successful political campaign being >organised on a mailing list; and this is the struggle to keep strong >cryptography legal and widely available in this country. The web has played >a part. The Foundation for Information Policy Research maintains a website >at www.fipr.org which acts as a clearing house for all sorts of documents, >including the texts of all the comments and objections submitted to the >latest proposals for legislation. But most of the thought and co-ordination >has been done on ukcrypto, a mailing list, the lowest form of technological >life. There, for the past two years, the civil servants responsible for >policy have actually been available, more or less, to the people who >disagree with them. They have had to justify their actions not to the >public, but to a small group of geographically dispersed experts, who may >consult among each other between rounds. It's a kind of updated version of >Lions v Christians; as in the original game, the audience is on the side of >the lions, but I think the modern version is rather better for society.
