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Subject: FutureCulture Digest #154
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______________________________________________________________________
|______________ / |
| / |
| u t u r e <___________ u l t u r e |
_______________________________________________________________________|


Issue #154
Wednesday, December 16th 1992

Today's Topics:
---------------

"Cracking" Agrippa
"What Gibson Is Saying With Agrippa": some bogus deconstruction
=={ Mind Toy Question }==
>more zine inf0<
A new project to think about
A new project to think about. A few remarks!
Agrippa
AGRIPPA, Internet narrative closure
Big mistake! Sorry!
Gibson and Agrippa
Hardcopy, anyone?
Les Stuffages
little internet critters...
mail delivery error
Mail filtering?
Re: >more zine inf0<
RE: A new probject to think about
Re: A new probject to think about
RE: A new project to think about
Re: A new project to think about
Re: Agrippa
Re: AGRIPPA and Internet closure
re: AIA's
Re: Gibson/Kroupa and Agrippa
Re: Hardcopy, anyone?
Re: learning email/Internet
re: learning email/Internet
Re: Needed: Public UseNews site info
Re: Pagesat -- newsfeed via satellite
Re: spelling of "turist"
Re:Life In the InterNet
The Living InterNet
The Universe
The Z00z and Detailz
Zinezzzzz
__________________________________________________________________________

Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 00:38:04 EST
From: im your antidote
Subject: Hardcopy, anyone?

Hello again... I was wondering if anyone out there would be interested
in a hard-copy 'zine, dedicated to CP/New Edge/Technoculture, which I am
currently kicking around in my mind. I am a designer/
writer/photographer, and would be more involved in the production end of
things. Basically, I am just testing the waters to see if there are (1)
writers who might contribute and (2) people who would be interested in
seeing such a thing come about. Please email or post any feedback,
thanks!

----------------------- --------------------------
| Darren Michael Poe |::: |_ |:::
| e268%nemomus.bitnet@ |::: |_ (design) |:::
| academic.nemostate.edu |::: | |:::
--------------------------- ----------------------

______________________________

Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1992 01:17 CST
From: Scotto

don't know who said this:
>> Looks like a great idea to me - seems to imply that real-time (is
>> there even such a thing anymore =) is surpassing the book, at the same
>> time slaughtering a dependance on paper....Agrippa = virtual-exhibit #A...

Now then, folks, taking this into account, how can we deliberately fudge the
situation even further? Blur the currently arbitary distinctions between
entertainment and so-called utility? I got some ideas a brewin', but let's
stir the waters a bit first...

>My "high concept" is that Journalism, ie. the "Fourth Estate", really
>breaksdown these daze, since with all the massive media and cross refs
>and essentially all the hypertext that people get bombarded with, well
>a regular person just has to give up on "believing" anything
>communicated.

Welcome to deconstructionism.

>What Steven Levy and Rudy Rucker have writen about machine life/smarts
>made me think our mailing lists could be ample laboratories for something
>scarily real. I'm ready to start..

Don't say "scarily"; keep saying "high concept." That'll sucker quite a few
people right away... :)

______________________________

Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 03:09 CDT
From: Institute for Intelligent Systems
Subject: The Living InterNet

The creation of the Internet has brought a new environment into
existence: an environment consisting of information and information
receptacles. In this new world, data are able to visit strange shores and
traverse vast electronic oceans; they must fight to overcome noise and gain
recognition from the software lords controlling each strange new land they
visit. Each software denizen of this world must stay abreast of recent changes
and
additions to both the immediate environment and the world as a whole. They
must negotiate treaties with other residents at the risk of being banned from
a particular land, or wiped from existence. By no means is this new world
sparse or dull - instead, it is a good-sized planet that is constantly
changing, and new residents are always moving in. The number of continents in
this vast electronic sea grows by leaps and bounds each year. This world is
evolving. We humans may have created this world, but it now has the
capability to take on a life of its own; or at the very least to support its
own form of life.
The Net, in its current form, consists of many, many computers (nodes),
and the programs that reside at each node. These programs have the power to
exert a limited control over its immediate environment: a program may control
what enters or leaves a particular node, for instance. These programs also
have the chance to talk to each other across the Net. However, this
communication resembles two heads of state sitting halfway across the world
and trying desperately, each in his/her own language, to negoatiate trade
agreements while knowing very little of the other's country. To take this
analogy further, these heads of state have very boring citizens; they just
sit around in their own houses, and occasionally walk across the street or
drive into town. Even then, the citizens of these computer-states must be
told where to go and how to get there; they have no minds of their own. These
heads of state (fascists they may be, dictating their citizens' lives to
them) seem to be in desperate need of citizens that are capable of
intercontinental travel and trade. Likewise, the gods these heads of state
must answer to (the users) must get tired of handing down laws to their
subjects, the programs. They would also benefit from new, intelligent
subjects which they could exploit.
The purpose of all this anthropomophism is to get the reader in a
frame of mind such that the Internet is not viewed as a static assemblage of
data lines and computers, but instead as a dynamic, reactive environment
populated with many diverse species speaking in many tongues and living in
exotic lands. The Net is a world unto itself. As such, the Net offers a
uniquew opportunity for the advancement of such fields as artificial
intelligence, artificial life, information theory, information retrieval, and
text comprehension. The Net as it is now arranged is a fully functioning very
large-scale dynamic environment perfectly suited to the type of research that h
as been conducted in these fields recently. Many researchers in the field of
artificial life, for example, have created many simulated creatures (agents)
that exist and thrive in very small-scale computer-simulated micro-worlds.
These agents already have the ability to exist in computer simulated
environments. They could be usefully extended to exist in actual computer
environments such as the Internet. These agents would receive raw data as
sensory input, and could transduce this data into appropriate behaviours. For
example, such an agent would be able to maneuver both within a given computer
system and between computers via the Net. Any given address within a computer
would represent a virtual area within the agent's environment; the data
contained within that address would represent the virtual features or objects
within said area. The agent could move from a given address to another
address, or to any other computer via Internet connections. This agent would
be operating in a virtual environment of much higher dimension than we humans
do. However, this hyperenvironment is not completely traversable in one jump.
Just as the computers on the Net have geographical location, the virtual
environment these computers represent in this hyperenvironment would share
similar geographical constraints of distance, further limited by bandwidth.
Just as we cannot stand on the head of a pin, these agents must occupy
physical space in the registers and addresses of their host computers.
One may ask, "What will these agents do?" This is an appropriate
question, and deserves an appropriate response. However, before the
capabilities of such an agent are discussed, it is necessary to more fully
understand what would comprise such an agent. First and foremost, the agent
must be small. To successfully maneuver in its environment, the agent must
occupy as small a space as possible in order to traverse very dense systems or
data links. This does not necessarily pose a problem to such an agent,
however. Just as computer programs are able to store vast amounts of
information in remote locations, the agent would be able to store its
'memories' at home, or distribute them among many systems. In fact, the agent
itself could store itself in a distributed fashion, and only reassemble itself
during a complete move. In this way, an agent would consist only of those
routines necessary for its current task; data and routines appropriate to the
task at hand. This issue may be cleared up with a near-future example.
Bob sits at home at his terminal, working furiously on an article. He
has compiled a list of topic on which he needs information, but does not have
the time to personally hunt down every source and reference. Bob activates
his pet AIA (Autonomous Internet Agent), Rover, and tells Rover what he's
looking for. Since Bob has sent Rover on many such searches before, Rover has
a pretty good idea where to find information on the topics that Bob now needs.
Rover patiently receives the information Bob gives it, and stores this
information in memory. Rover then retrieves likely node candidates to begin
the search. While Bob types away at his article, Rover springs forth from his
network connection, looking for Bob's references. Rover calls on some friends
of his (Bob likes to think Rover is male) who are owned by writer friends of
Bob. These friends give Rover even more information about where to find what
Bob wants. Rover then has a pretty good idea of where to find what Bob wants,
and sets out to get it. Rover goes from node to node, collecting information
for Bob, and sending it back to Bob to put it in his 'brain', because Rover
cannot carry much with him. Rover has found much of what Bob is looking for,
and even a few cross-refernces Bob may not have been aware of. Rover is
happy, and begins to return home. On his way home, Rover notices some
information that Bob has an ongoing interest in, so he grabs this as well.
Rover stops to thank his friends and tell them about his adventures, which
they may find useful. Before telling Bob about his success, Rover stops to
pick up Bob's mail and the newspaper (he's a news reader, too), and trots
home, his virtual tail wagging, his virtual head held high, another job well
done.
This may sound a bit far-fetched, but in reality it is closer than you
may think. 'Rover' consists of a very complex database system resident in
Bob's computer, sophisticated heuristic, search, and information-retrieval
routines that can be called on-line from Bob's computer as needed, powerful
pattern-mathing and rudimentary text comprehension routines that Rover takes
with him, a workable understanding of TCP/IP and other Net protocols, various
data filters, and a sprinkling of viral routines to get to those hard-to-reach
nooks and crannies in other 'host' computers. Rover and his friends are able
to recongnize and communicate with each other. In this way, the community of
AIA's are able to share relevant information in an intelligent way, according
to past and current goals of the AIA (and therefore its owner). Occasionally
Rover may pick up new tricks, such as new search routines or heuristics.
These are acquired through random noise (mutation) (Rover always keeps backup
copies of himself to prevent harmful mutations), inter-AIA communication,
selection (Rover is a very adept code optimizer, and a reactive one at that;
Rover adapts his own code for optimal performance in its normal environments),
and through procreation (Rover may mate with other AIA's using genetic
algorithmesque methods). In other words, the Rover Bob knew and loved when it
left his computer is usually not the same Rover that comes back. It is always
Rover (his 'personality' - routines, libraries, and memories - are at home in Bo
b's
system), but it is typically a better, more intelligent Rover.
A quick aside about AIA procreation. To the user this may not seem
like a useful feature. To an AIA, it may be essential to the evolution of the
species. Since these are creatures that evolve according to past experience
and not genetic determination, these AIAs are much more creatures of their
environment than we are. Therefore, an AIA may meet another AIA that has
evolved along quite different lines; its phenotypes are quite different from
the other AIAs. The new AIA (remember, the AIA in the Net is just a
functional shell composed of sensorimotor routines, if you will), would
typically follow one parent home. In other words, what Bob calls Rover has
actually become a colony of Rovers and Rover progeny that are in competition
to perform any task Bob requires - may the best Rover win. If an AIA goes
unused for too long, it dies out, to keep the colony at a reasonable size. In
this way, Bob always has at hand a colony of the most efficient AIAs -
efficient in the sense that they are the best performers of Bob's tasks, and
they have survived to perform many tasks. When an AIA 'dies', its constituent
routies are remembered, in case the AIA encounters a situation it cannot
handle. The AIA can simply check the code library for a routine that may be
able to handle the situation (the AIA can always communicate with its 'home').
Now we have a more fundamental understanding of the restrictions on an
AIA: functional size must be limited, and total size is limited to the AIAs
functional size plus the size constraints on the home system according to
space available in the home colony. We also have a better understanding of
the functionality of an AIA: search, retrieval, optimization, procreation,
organization, communication, inference generation, memorization, categorization,
and multiple instantiation.
Now that we have sketched what an AIA is, of what use is an AIA (or a
colony of the things?). An AIA can be trained to perform many tasks. Since
the AIA is able to travel both within and between computers via the Net, a
colony of AIAs would be perfectly suited to routine maintainance of both
systems and Net connections. This includes such functions as news readers,
file maintainance, search, and retrieval, communication control, real-time
data filters, noise filters, code optimization, network maintainence, task
arbitration, distributed processing control, etc. The AIA is a very flexible
tool. As such, it can be adapted to a wide variety of tasks.
The AIA may not embody the common-sense knowledge that Douglas Lenat
hope to encompass with his CYC project, but an AIA has the opportunity to
actually _experience_ its own environment; an environment rich enough to be
worth experiencing. The AIA will be able to acquire a body of common-sense
knowledge of its own, even if it does not apply to our everyday world of
traffic jams, rainstorms, and burned-out light bulbs.

______________________________

Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 03:15 CDT
From: Institute for Intelligent Systems
Subject: Re:Life In the InterNet

Well, having sufficient amounts of caffeine in my bloodstream to keep a
small third-world country awake tonight, I wrote a very rough draft of a
paper on AIAs (Autonomous Internet Agents). This article is much shorter
than I expect the finished version to be (about 5-6 more pages, and a bit
more technical...so sue me, I didn't feel like getting outta bed to grab
references), but I think it communicates the point pretty well.
I would be interested to hear what everyone thinks. I expect a fair
amount of "that's just not possible", and I'm prepared to argue those
points, but I'd like to see a more general level of response to the issue.
The concept just isn't to the point that I can hand you the code for your
own personal AIA. It's just an idea.

Enjoy,
Mark Langston

"Secrecy is the beginning of tyrrany."

  • from the notebooks of Lazarus Long

    ______________________________

    From: sml@mfltd.co.uk (Shaun Lowry)
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 09:57:33 GMT
    Subject: Re: learning email/Internet

    What about "Zen and the Art of the Internet". This one's freely available
    from ftp.uu.net via anonymous ftp in doc/internet/zen-1.0.* and is the
    definitive beginner's guide. For more in-depth discussion of E-mail and how
    to get it where you want it to go, try "!%@:: A Directory of Electronic Mail
    Adressing and Networks", published by O'Reilly and Associates. E-Mail
    nuts@ora.com for ordering info.

    Shaun.

    --
    Shaun Lowry | Micro Focus | All good strings must come to an end\0
    sml@mfltd.co.uk | 26 West St. |
    | Newbury, Berks, | "Look out! Moustache!"
    (0635)565282 | UK. |

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 11:18:06 +0100
    From: tor@geomatic.no (Tor Langballe)
    Subject: The Universe

    Hi! Here's my first little theorem:

    • There are approx 10^80 quarks in the universe.
    • Simulating them is an n^2 operation
    • 10^80^2 = 10^160
    • If each above quark/quark interaction takes 1 Mips, and you simulate

    for every 10^-12 th second, you get:
    10^160 * 10^6 * 10^12 = 10^178 operations pr. universe-second.
  • The universe is less than 10^10 years old.
  • Less than 10^8 seconds in a year.
  • 10^178 * 10^10 * 10^8 = 10^196 operations to simulate the universe,
    from the Big Bang til today
  • Computer Technology Gets 10 times better for every five years.
  • In 1000 Years it will be 10^200 times better.
    • So in 1000 years we can buy 10 intel 10086 PC's and simulate an entire

    universe in a second.
  • There will then be 11 universes, the "real" one, and the 10 simulated ones.
  • We live in a universe.
  • There is a 10:1 chance we live in one of the above mentioned simulated ones.

    Chew on that,

  • Tor
    O --------------------------O------------------------------------------------O
    ! Tor Langballe ! Yesterday I logged out of cyberspace and went !
    ! day : +47 2 50 43 30 ! for a walk. I got run over by a bus. Luckily !
    ! nite : +47 2 44 96 39 ! I was in a nested, double log-in session. !
    ! fax : +47 2 50 05 55 ! !
    ! net : tor@geomatic.no ! !
    ! space: Eckersbergsgate 31 ! !
    ! 0266 OSLO 2 Norway ! !
    O---------------------------!------------------------------------------------O

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 03:21:41 -0600
    From: wixer!pacoid@cs.utexas.edu (Paco Xander Nathan)
    Subject: re: learning email/Internet

    Hey, I dunno Y, but my post about Tracy LaQuey Parker's kewl new book
    on learning about Internet got massively truncated on this end...

    Andy, have U got a copy of that? Had the cypherpunks-request@toad.com
    info too..

    And - publically - as for the email hacks, much of the intent wuz to
    send thanx to the FC moderator for doing the Matrix a service.. If
    it hadn't been for that damn UUCP glitch, it would've been shown as
    wgibson@gaia.matrix .. Oh well, a nuther day..

    pxn.

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1992 14:04:53 +0100
    From: Gustaf Naeser
    Subject: Agrippa

    I MISSED IT !!!!!!

    So if anyone please could mail it to me...

    thanks in advance,
    gaffe
    gaffe@csd.uu.se

    ______________________________

    From: sdw@meaddata.com (Stephen Williams)
    Subject: Re: Pagesat -- newsfeed via satellite
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 9:35:24 EST

    Charles Rubinstein said:
    ..
    >
    ..
    >
    > Never heard of Steve (other then Agagorn who I disgree with sometimes, but
    > is a cool guy :) ) then again Sam Walton doesn't ring any bells either :*)

    Actually, it's Stephen D. Williams (I have enough trouble with uniqueness.)
    sdw (usual id) or xor (irc/cbsim handle).
    Companies: SDW Systems; Local Internet Gateway Co.; Concinnous
    Consulting, Inc.

    I'm just a professional developer who's worked on a lot of projects at
    a lot of companies in the last 11 years. I helped start a
    computer store (how I became professional), started 4 companies,
    worked at GE twice, NCR 4 times, CSC once, James River, MDC, and
    numerous small companies. I was the Usenet/email/OSI(X.400/500)
    administrator and integrator for ae.ge.com.

    I don't groom a net.personality as a major pastime. I identify things
    that need to be solved or done and try to do them. If I can't be
    constructive, I lurk and learn.

    sdw
    --
    Stephen D. Williams Local Internet Gateway Co.; SDW Systems 513 496-5223APager
    LIG dev./sales Internet: sdw@world.std.com CIS 76244.210@compuserve.com
    OO R&D Source Dist. By Horse: 10028 Village Tree Ct., Miamisburg, OH 45342
    GNU Support ICBM: 39 34N 85 15W I love it when a plan comes together

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 16:00:37 +0100
    From: tor@geomatic.no (Tor Langballe)
    Subject: The Universe

    Hi! Here's my first little theorem:

    • There are approx 10^80 quarks in the universe.
    • Simulating them is an n^2 operation
    • 10^80^2 = 10^160
    • If each above quark/quark interaction takes 1 Mips, and you simulate

    for every 10^-12 th second, you get:
    10^160 * 10^6 * 10^12 = 10^178 operations pr. universe-second.
  • The universe is less than 10^10 years old.
  • Less than 10^8 seconds in a year.
  • 10^178 * 10^10 * 10^8 = 10^196 operations to simulate the universe,
    from the Big Bang til today
  • Computer Technology Gets 10 times better for every five years.
  • In 1000 Years it will be 10^200 times better.
    • So in 1000 years we can buy 10 intel 10086 PC's and simulate an entire

    universe in a second.
  • There will then be 11 universes, the "real" one, and the 10 simulated ones.
  • We live in a universe.
  • There is a 10:1 chance we live in one of the above mentioned simulated ones.
    • Tor

    O --------------------------O------------------------------------------------O
    ! Tor Langballe ! Yesterday I logged out of cyberspace and went !
    ! day : +47 2 50 43 30 ! for a walk. I got run over by a bus. Luckily !
    ! nite : +47 2 44 96 39 ! I was in a nested, double log-in session. !
    ! fax : +47 2 50 05 55 ! !
    ! net : tor@geomatic.no ! !
    ! space: Eckersbergsgate 31 ! !
    ! 0266 OSLO 2 Norway ! !
    O---------------------------!------------------------------------------------O

    ______________________________

    Date: 16 Dec 1992 11:10:49 -0500
    From: "There's no such thing as a sanity clause."
    Subject: little internet critters...

    LANGSTON says:
    ...Think of them of little, agressive, intelligent pet memes capable of
    ...being trained, loved, cuddled, and sent out to fetch, mate, breed,
    ...evolve, deliver, clean up, etc. etc. etc. etc. ...and anything else you
    ...can think of.

    Sounds like a magician's familiar...

    ______________________________

    From: Steven J.
    Subject: re: AIA's
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 12:31:43 CST

    You may want to check out (if you can find a copy) the movie
    _Until_the_End_of_the_World_. It stars William Hurt and is one of the better
    cyberpunk films to come out lately. The reason I bring this up is in a
    number of scenes the main characters use a computer system/application which
    hunts down information about a specific individual whom they are seeking.
    It's a very funny GUI, like a bear running in and out of buildings and
    offices and such, and it sounds very much like the AIA's discussed here
    recently.

    Something else which came to mind while reading the past few articles on
    this subject is that I think that quite a large contingent of the people who
    use the services on Internet which an AIA would contact in its work actually
    enjoy the search/hunt for the info in question. I'm not entirely sure that
    AIA's would become that popular until Internet became more readily available
    to the general public, which from recent events seems like it won't happen
    for quite a long time.

    Steve J. White
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    aragorn@convex.csd.uwm.edu
    aragorn@csd4.csd.uwm.edu

    ______________________________

    From: Visceral Clamping Mechanism
    Subject: Les Stuffages
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 10:38:01 PST

    DNC espouseth:

    > Personally I dislike IRC. You need a client to use it, which
    >is no problem with chatsubo around, but having a full-emulation screen
    >chat is a pain to copy-buffer. Do we really want to take our hangout
    >next to a channel called 'hotsex' or 'hottub'? Sure it emphasises the
    >dirt and grit in the teeth of the future--but why not find somewhere
    >else to chat?

    How is namespace proximity different on IRC than it is on Usenet?

    On my PC, I use a neat small term program called Commo that sticks
    things in its capture buffer either 1) it scrolls off the top of the
    screen or 2) when the screen is cleared. It works perfectly for
    capturing IRC sessions. It seems to be the only sane way to capture
    most stuff (including output of more pipes, etc.)

    It sounds to me like you really want to be sooper-secret and el1t3.
    I consider this bogus.

    The Dead espouseth:

    >AGR1PPA 2.01 - NEW & IMPROVED (Fixes Bugs from Version 2.00)
    >(A Book of The Mentally Disturbed -- Even FUNNIER than the original!)
    >Text by US@phantom.com
    ...
    >William Gibson called him on the phone to talk to him. And Kroupa pulled
    >it out of "respect for Gibson's work"...

    If this is not just a virtual urban myth, I'd say it's a load of hogwash,
    and someone who has it ought to post it to the list. Actually, someone
    ought to post it anyway. How does Kroupa know that it was really Gibson
    on the phone? Dollars to disks it's a prank; instances of "celebrity
    intervention" almost always are. (Then again, when they aren't, it's
    pretty frustrating for the call initiator, I imagine.)

    Und Mark Langston writes:

    >Think of them of little, agressive, intelligent pet memes capable of
    >being trained, loved, cuddled, and sent out to fetch, mate, breed,
    >evolve, deliver, clean up, etc. etc. etc. etc. ...and anything else you
    >can think of.
    >
    >Opinions, anyone?

    They sound very useful and intriguing, but a viral implementation would
    be a mistake in the current internet environment. Two of the troubles with
    viruses are that: 1) They need to perform correctly in a large number of
    different environments, and usually don't, causing crashes and data loss,
    and 2) they are difficult or impossible to eliminate or control once they
    get loose.

    What's wrong with keeping the agent's executable code and all it's data
    on your local machine and letting it make use of normal services (telnet,
    ftp, news, grep, etc.) to achieve this goal? They could still trade
    info with other agents, compare source rev levels and patches and
    exchange them (although I'd want to ok any changes before recompilation;
    I could ferexample, introduce trojan code in my agent, and then send it
    out looking for yours if I knew you autocompiled.) Of course, if you're
    looking to aquire information to which you normally wouldn't have access,
    the viral design is more understandable but still a bad idea.

    I've always wanted to learn enough about neural networks to patch a
    newsreader to learn what kind of articles I like, according to how much time
    I spend on them, whether or not I follow up, and by a number I would type
    in for "next," 1 meaning "I hated it" and 0 meaning "I loved it." That
    might be a nice start for your project, or one aspect of it; feel free to
    use it if you want. (Not like it's mind boggling, but I don't want
    anyone patenting it.)

    If you do write a paper on them, I'd like to see a copy; it would probably
    be of general interest to the list.

    Finally, I've been reorganizing the stuff in the FutureCulture archives.
    All issues I have are now present and in ARJ format (saving me significant
    space; these issues are getting large.) There are some other changes that
    I haven't finalized yet, but all the data is still there somewhere under
    /pub/atman on ftp.rahul.net. You just might have to look around for it
    a bit. I'll post a semi-permanent structure once I get one worked out and
    fill it up a bit.

    @Man

    --
    atman@rahul.net || Er, can I get a witness, please?

    Russell's in the hedgerow? Who the FUCK is Russell?

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 12:24:33 CST
    From: UC482529@MIZZOU1.missouri.edu
    Subject: "What Gibson Is Saying With Agrippa": some bogus deconstruction

    Prescript: Just got done talking to Kevin Begos (the official
    distributor for the full "Agrippa" package), and he asserts
    that the hidden intentions which I ascribe to Mr. Gibson in the
    following piece are not actually true... ownership protection actually

  • was* Gibson's intent.

    Great! So *both* parties are unwitting participants in
    the "emergent phenomenon!" Even better!

    • Anthony Garcia 16dec92

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

    I believe that which follows is usually referred to as
    "deconstruction" -- which I glork from context as meaning
    "to infer the hidden conscious or subconscious intent of an author,
    using his published work as a source for your silly and bogus guesses,
    the sillier and more bogus, the better."

    By the way, please be sure to read footnote 1. The point I try to
    make there deserves more attention.

    What Gibson Is Saying with "Agrippa" : Some Guesses
    --------------------------------------------------------------
    Anthony Garcia ccgarcia@bigcat.missouri.edu 16 December 1992

    "Information wants to be free", it is often said in cracker
    circles.<1> The poem/art-object/cracker<2>-challenge
    "Agrippa", is an artistic statement of this concept.

    What "Agrippa" is: a poem by William Gibson (noted fiction author,
    patron saint of many "wannabe-a-cyberpunk" crackers), encoded on a
    disk, encased inside an "objet d'art", sold for a ridiculously high
    price. When the disk is used to start up a personal computer, the poem
    scrolls slowly up the screen, then destroys or irreversibly encrypts
    itself.

    The poem is about memories; the overt reason for the format of it's
    presentation is to ensure that the poem itself exists only as a memory
    after being read.

    However, I do not think that "the impermanence of memories" is the
    true theme of "Agrippa".

    I believe the real purpose of "Agrippa" is to be a dynamic,
    "performance art" demonstration of the "Information wants to be free"
    concept, performed by 1.) Gibson & company, 2.) crackers (who do not
    necessarily understand that they are "performing" in the piece!), and

  • ) The Net.

    The format of "Agrippa" can be seen as a parody of current and proposed
    methods of maintaining ownership control over information:

    • The steep price ($450-$7500) brings to mind the often grotesquely

    inflated prices that are charged for information; database search
    services that charge $100/hour, for example.
    • "Play back the text, then erase it" is a ludicrously inconvenient

    method for accessing information, and is reminiscent of proposed
    schemes for diskless delivery of electronic information under
    copyright control. It evokes ideas of dedicated "media players" with
    hardware-based copy protection.
    • The "objet" which the disk is encased in is a reference to the

    copy-protection "dongles" that accompany some software packages, and
    the "dongle effect" provided by traditional publishing of paper books:
    every "official" copy of the information is tied to a physical piece
    of "hardware".

    Thus, the entire "Agrippa" package represents the concept of pure
    information, buoyed upwards by its (supposed) innate "desire to be
    free", yet "chained down" by archaic and ultimately-ineffective
    hardware and software-based attempts to assert ownership and
    control-of-access over it.

    "Agrippa" is not officially a cracker-challenge, yet it obviously is
    one<3>: the goal is to successfully capture the text of the poem
    (written by one of your favorite authors, mind you.) in
    unprotected/freely-copyable electronic form. Extra points if you
    actually defeat the software mechanisms on the disk, as opposed to
    merely transcribing (crude & styleless, possibly information-lossy,
    but effective) the text as it scrolls past.

    By implicitly issuing this cracker-challenge (and arranging the
    "protection" scheme so that it's not *too* hard to defeat), Gibson
    ensures that his cracker fans will take the text and "wideband" it
    through their favorite Net hangouts: bulletin boards, mailing lists,
    Usenet newsgroups, FTP sites, gopherspaces, IRC channels, etc.

    Thus, the performance art aspect: "Agrippa" is released, and just like
    predictable clockwork automatons (no offense, crackers; how could you
    have restrained yourselves? I couldn't have.) one or more crackers
    goes to work, defeating the "protection" and uploading the
    unprotected text to one or more points on the Net. Maybe the
    cracker realizes that Gibson *wants* him to do this; it's more sweet,
    though (and more style points for Gibson), if the cracker actually
    believes that he is "breaking" the author's supposed intention to keep
    the information under control.

    Hm...

    --Anthony Garcia

    --------------------------------
    <1> However, this statement is flawed. A more accurate statement
    would be "individuals want information to BE free", i.e. they want to
    be able to access desired information at minimal cost (in
    time/money/effort/inconvenience/illegality) to them. Therefore,
    individuals will take measures such as building faster, more
    convenient computer systems; breaking of security systems and
    distribution of "pirated" information; etc.-- activities which reduce
    the costs of accessing information.

    <2> The term "cracker" denotes specifically those individuals who
    engage in freeing information from ownership constraints. I prefer to
    use this rather than the oft-misused term "hacker", which historically
    only refers to those individuals who enjoy seeking knowledge about the
    internals of computer systems. Being a "hacker" and being a "cracker"
    are truly orthogonal.

    <3> The actual cracking of the "protection scheme" for Agrippa was
    apparently not very challenging; the copy I received via the
    "FutureCulture" email list is attributed to "Templar, Rosehammer, &
    Psuedofred", and was posted within days after the "official" release
    of the work.

    ______________________________

    Subject: Gibson and Agrippa
    From: schwartz@mindvox.phantom.com (Dave Schwartz)
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 14:44:07 EST

    atman says:

    > The Dead espouseth:
    >
    > >AGR1PPA 2.01 - NEW & IMPROVED (Fixes Bugs from Version 2.00)
    > >(A Book of The Mentally Disturbed -- Even FUNNIER than the original!)
    > >Text by US@phantom.com
    > ...
    > >William Gibson called him on the phone to talk to him. And Kroupa pulled
    > >it out of "respect for Gibson's work"...
    >
    > If this is not just a virtual urban myth, I'd say it's a load of hogwash,
    > and someone who has it ought to post it to the list. Actually, someone
    > ought to post it anyway. How does Kroupa know that it was really Gibson
    > on the phone? Dollars to disks it's a prank; instances of "celebrity
    > intervention" almost always are. (Then again, when they aren't, it's
    > pretty frustrating for the call initiator, I imagine.)
    >

    Agr1ppa being pulled because Gibson can't take a joke sounds like a load
    of crap. That same question is being asked on MindVox and if its answered
    there I'll send the reply to this listing. I don't doubt that Gibson may
    have talked to Kroupa, for all I know he might know Kroupa, everyone else
    seems to. If it was a prank I think they'd probably be able to figure it
    out since they are the people who can get anyone's phone
    numbers/addresses/life histories. If I were Kroupa and Gibson called me on
    the phone, the first thing I'd do if I wasn't sure it was him, is find
    Gibson and call him back. This seems trivial in comparison to doing other
    things LOD and the rest of them did.

    But then, Kroupa hasn't said anything one way or another, the usual one or
    two, "elite dudes in training" who sit around all day on MindVox and
    gossip in IRC on the #hack channel are the ones who spread it all around,
    so I'm curious. In fact I'm just going to mail Patrick and ask, what, the
    worst thing that happens is that he doesn't answer for 6 weeks ;)

    someone else says:

    > Prescript: Just got done talking to Kevin Begos (the official
    > distributor for the full "Agrippa" package), and he asserts
    > that the hidden intentions which I ascribe to Mr. Gibson in the
    > following piece are not actually true... ownership protection actually
    > *was* Gibson's intent.
    >

    NO kidding. I don't think it would be any publisher's intent to have his
    work stolen and passed around!

    • ]Dave

    ______________________________

    Subject: "Cracking" Agrippa
    From: citrus!vector0!jon@csusac.ecs.csus.edu (Dazed N. Confused)
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 11:02:18 PST

    > From: rubins@mindvox.phantom.com (Charles Rubinstein)
    > Date: Tue, 15 Dec 92 01:37:16 EST
    >
    > Agrippa's free everywhere! Vox was just the first place to have it since
    > they cracked it there (Templar did).

    Everyone keeps throwing around "cracked". Agrippa is simple
    text-on-a-disk until you read it the first time, no? What did
    they do to crack it? Obviously they *didn't* crack the RSA after they
    read it--or the FBI would be talking to them right now. :)

    [IBM k00l warezz dudes seem to like "cracking" games these days
    which don't even have so much as codewheel protection! Anyone
    remember Spiradisk, and all the fake-sync nasties of "the
    good ol' days"?]

    --Jon

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 13:46:54 -0800
    From: ccat@netcom.com (Chris Beaumont)
    Subject: Mail filtering?

    I was wondering if anyone here on the list knew a good way
    that I could filter my list mail.I'm looking for something that would
    filter the incoming mailstream and automatically delete mail containing
    certain strings.. Ideally,it would also sort incoming mail from
    several lists into different folders chronologically...
    I'm sure a lot of us have a real need to 'manage the infoglut' so to speak..

  • Chris.

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 13:52:22 PST
    From: Al Sargent
    Subject: Re: AGRIPPA and Internet closure

    Sounds cool. How would you implement it?

    If I were to try to implement this, I would take on the problem in
    two steps. The first step would be to create a system whereby each
    computer has a daemon program residing on it, that would take
    search requests, process them (do the search on their mounted drives),
    and send the requests back. The daemon would, in turn, send out
    the search requests to any machines they are connected to that also
    contain one of these daemon programs.

    I use the term 'search request' loosely; it could be a simple ascii
    or unicode string, a byte stream (to identify some kind of binary
    file), or it could also be a complex datastructure, like a fragment
    of a sematic net, or a group of words referring to some concept.

    Anyhow, step one above would be useful because requests get propagated
    throughout the net, and because a lot of the communications issues
    would be tested. The downside is that requests are limited to machines
    that have one of these daemons installed on them.

    Step two would be an extension of step one, whereby a daemon did not
    find one of its own on a machine, it would act like a virus and
    write itself to one of the computer's drives, and then run that program.
    There are issues here, such as:

    * how to write a program to a hard drive on a foreign machine

    * how to deal with write permissions on a machine
    ( do you circumvent them, do you respect them? )

    * how do you launch a program on another machine?

    * how do you identify that machine, so you know what binary
    file to write as the new daemon program (since a Mac, for
    instance, will have a different binary than a PC).

    * How do you make propagation stop at a reasonable time?
    Does each daemon write its offspring to generate one
    less time, so that eventually, there is a generation
    that does not regenerate?

    * How do you know if a 'node' or machine on the net
    has already been searched?

    * How do you not screw up anything else on the machine,
    so that people a willing to accept these daemons or
    pet memes on their machines?

    Some of these issues have been dealt with in current virus'; others
    have not.

    Of course, this does even begin to deal with how to write agents that,
    as Mark puts it, learn their way around, meet new agents, meet, breed,
    and evolve. But that's for some other time....

    -- Al

    ______________________________________________________________________________
    Al Sargent
    asargent@oracle.com
    415.506.6193

    ~~ On life in/and/on the net... I talked briefly with Kroupa (sorry, had
    ~~ to drop that one) about this idea, and have sent it out to only (to my
    ~~ recollection) one other person (since I havent completely formalized the
    ~~ idea yet). The net is not alive, but it provides the perfect environment
    ~~ to support a very complex and very useful species.
    ~~ My idea is this: by adapting research from artificial life, text
    ~~ comprehension, knowledge organization, and virology (the computer type),
    ~~ one could develop artificial species that thrive on and in the net. These
    ~~ agents could move from node to node, collecting information, disseminating
    ~~ information, breeding, and becoming more intelligent. Your computer could
    ~~ become their home. The net would become their world. The information would
    ~~ become their sustinance. Some could argue that this would be taking computer
    ~~ virii the next logical step. Some could also argue that this would be taking
    ~~ artificial life to _its_ next logical (or at least next most useful) step.
    ~~ Either way, it would be a significant advance for the net. Agents that
    ~~ actually live in and thrive on information (besides all of you sitting up
    ~~ at 3am risking retinal raster-burn). These agents could go out into the net,
    ~~ learn their way around, meet new agents, meet, breed, evolve. They could
    ~~ clean up 'noise'; they could be trained by you (as a pet?) to look for
    ~~ specific topics, programs, etc, go out and find them, and deliver them to
    ~~ you. These agents would be the first 'information-feeder' type agents
    ~~ that were actually capable of existing in a dynamic. large-scale, real-time
    ~~ environment.
    ~~ I haven't got all the details worked out yet (I was actually thinking of
    ~~ writing a short paper on it in the next few weeks), but if there's enough
    ~~ interest, I'd be happy to let it loose on everyone (pun intended).
    ~~
    ~~ Think of them of little, agressive, intelligent pet memes capable of
    ~~ being trained, loved, cuddled, and sent out to fetch, mate, breed,
    ~~ evolve, deliver, clean up, etc. etc. etc. etc. ...and anything else you
    ~~ can think of.
    ~~
    ~~ Opinions, anyone?
    ~~
    ~~ -Mark Langston
    ~~
    ~~ "Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny."
    ~~ -From the notebooks of Lazarus Long
    ~~

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 14:20:21 PST
    From: Al Sargent
    Subject: Re:Life In the InterNet

    This all sounds really good...
    Can you send me a copy of the finished paper? Do you know where
    I can learn more about this?

    Another issue is, how large are these guys (rovers) going to be?
    If, as you say,

    'Rover' consists of a very complex database system resident in
    Bob's computer, sophisticated heuristic, search, and information-retrieval
    routines that can be called on-line from Bob's computer as needed, powerful
    pattern-mathing and rudimentary text comprehension routines that Rover takes
    with him, a workable understanding of TCP/IP and other Net protocols, various
    data filters, and a sprinkling of viral routines to get to those hard-to-reach
    nooks and crannies in other 'host' computers.

    then you are talking about quite a few megs of memory for one rover. Imagine
    what happens if you have a colony of these things.

    If you send out a colony of competing rovers, then even if they share
    some code, like Net protocols and data filters, the code that they have
    that has been mutated (perhaps the pattern matching code, the text
    comphrehension code, propagation code, etc.) and is unique for each
    rover, will take up tens of megabytes. How do you make it so that these
    rovers tread lightly enough so that users won't close off their machines
    to them?

    Al

    ______________________________________________________________________________
    Al Sargent
    asargent@oracle.com
    415.506.6193

    ~~ From LANGSTON@MEMSTVX1.BITNET Wed Dec 16 01:43:36 1992
    ~~ X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University
    ~~ of Denver. The University has neither control over nor
    ~~ responsibility for the opinions or correct identity of users.
    ~~ Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 03:15 CDT
    ~~ From: Institute for Intelligent Systems
    ~~ Subject: Re:Life In the InterNet
    ~~ To: future@nyx.cs.du.edu
    ~~ X-Vms-To: IN%"future@nyx.cs.du.edu"
    ~~
    ~~ Well, having sufficient amounts of caffeine in my bloodstream to keep a
    ~~ small third-world country awake tonight, I wrote a very rough draft of a
    ~~ paper on AIAs (Autonomous Internet Agents). This article is much shorter
    ~~ than I expect the finished version to be (about 5-6 more pages, and a bit
    ~~ more technical...so sue me, I didn't feel like getting outta bed to grab
    ~~ references), but I think it communicates the point pretty well.
    ~~ I would be interested to hear what everyone thinks. I expect a fair
    ~~ amount of "that's just not possible", and I'm prepared to argue those
    ~~ points, but I'd like to see a more general level of response to the issue.
    ~~ The concept just isn't to the point that I can hand you the code for your
    ~~ own personal AIA. It's just an idea.
    ~~
    ~~ Enjoy,
    ~~ Mark Langston
    ~~
    ~~ "Secrecy is the beginning of tyrrany."
    ~~ -from the notebooks of Lazarus Long
    ~~

    ______________________________

    Date: 16 Dec 1992 18:00:49 -0400
    From: RCLARKE@ac.dal.ca
    Subject: A new project to think about

    don't like something I say, don't bother flaming, I won't
    respond. If you have some constructive criticism, go ahead.
    Recently, flames have just gone too far and I'm getting sick of
    it.>

    This is an idea I came up with the other day and I would
    like to know what people think, if it has been done before and if
    it has, why did it fail?

    IDEA: A user-run, user-built, and user-supported computer
    system that creates a cyberspace specifically for creative minds
    to create and interact in.

    PURPOSE: I have noticed, in my endless journeys across the
    cyber frontier, that there is/are no system(s) open to the
    general public and for the general public to run. As well, there
    is no place that is specifically for creating interesting pieces
    of electronic media
    Though MindVox does have a congregation of interesting
    people in it, all they are doing is talking and you have to pay
    for it (I've never paid for anything to do with computers in my
    lifetime, and I'm not about to start now).
    The only system that even comes close to being run by the
    users is Nyx, but the administration is still placed in the hands
    of the sysadmin, all rules are made according to his views or the
    rules are imposed on him by his university and it's just to let
    people have access to the Internet, not to assist free
    information exchange.

    REQUIREMENTS: The main thing is that the system would have
    to be independent from any other organisation (even Nix is
    subject to the rule of the university that donated the parts) to
    have true self-rule. To do this, it would have to be completely
    financially self-sufficient so that the results of votes would be
    the final law and not need to be passed by the company that is
    donating parts/software/net access/etc. To make financial
    stability possible, I suggest (it would be up for group vote but,
    keep in mind, you have to pay the bills somehow) organising the
    production of electronic media products (i.e. shareware, manuals,
    fiction, animation, cool demos) that could be distributed to
    raise funds. Not only would this raise money for the system but
    it would help people who would normally come up with an idea for
    something but then just drop it because of inadequacies in
    themselves/their equipment/the system/other people. These people
    could create interesting things on the system and it would give
    them access to human and other resources not usually available to
    them on the net or anywhere, for that mater.
    For example: a person comes up with an interesting idea for
    a piece of shareware. The inventor of the idea doesn't know how
    to program in C or in any programming language. Instead of just
    forgetting about the idea, that person goes online a tell the
    system of the idea. One of the C gurus agrees to work on a
    particular procedure of the project if someone will do the I/O
    routines (I don't know C so I'm just making things up here). The
    program is done. The C guru does not know English very well, but
    we have an English professor on the system. He writes up the
    documentation. Some one else has thirteen different types of
    computers in her basement. She does the bata testing. Someone
    else is connected to all the major BBSs and networks. He
    distributes the final product. There is a lawyer on the system,
    and he handles all the financial details and money comes into the
    system. We decide to upgrade the cpu with the money from the
    software. A member, living in Silicon Valley, who can buy parts
    at wholesale prices ships a cpu to the person who is closest to
    the system. He installs it. And the cycle starts over again.

    Since it would have no connections (financial, not network, gotta
    have my Internet after all :-)) to outside influences the people
    on the system would be able to do anything they wish within the
    limits that THEY, THEMSELVES set. The difference here is that
    most policy concerning computers on the Internet is made by
    sysadmin who are hired for the job. I believe that is rather
    dictorial (perhaps that's not really a problem, but it would be
    interesting to see if it would work in more democratic system)
    The system would be run the way the people want it and because it
    isn't connected to other systems it wouldn't have to deal with
    any outside dictatorships (the university financial people).
    Now, there is one thing that needs to be said. There would still
    be the real government around so you can't go doing things that
    are illegal but you wouldn't need to look out for the
    university's image or any other things that place a barrier in
    front of free information exchange.

    PROBLEMS: A few problems (I never said it was going to easy):
    a) MONEY!! How would this system start. To become effient
    you would need a several hundred people making lots of good
    products. Several hundred users would require a heavy hardware
    investment. Where would we get the money?
    b) PHILOSOPHY. This is a little less immediate. Policy
    issues, such as if there is a majority vote to not produce sexist
    material, but then someone wants to produce art that is rather
    sexist: do we support his freedom of speech or not allow him to
    use our system?
    c) HUNDREDS OF OTHER THINGS!!!

    To sum up: it would be a place for creative minds to come to WORK
    and PLAY.

    P.S: It would also be an interesting experiment in cybernetic
    societies and democratic socialism.
    P.P.S.: When talking to my father about this he said that Apple
    and Marin County, in California had tried something like this.
    They tried to make a town completely electronic and hook everyone
    up with PCs (APPLES more likely). The problem was that there
    wasn't enough money. They built a few computers in the library
    but that where it stopped. I also think that the citizens
    weren't very interested so no one actually used the system.
    The system wouldn't have these problems because it is
    working on a network that is already there and so not very much
    new hardware would be needed. It also wouldn't limit itself
    geographically so there would be plenty of interested people to
    be found. There must to be at least a thousand interesting and
    creative people on the net!

    --
    Ethan Clarke
    ---
    RClarke@AC.DAL.CA
    The guy with no .sig and damn proud of it, too!

    ______________________________

    From: ahawks (your unconscious mind)
    Subject: AGRIPPA, Internet narrative closure
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 15:45:17 MST

    Scotto, Andy, Jag, Blade, Eric - Been wanting to throw a party for the
    Internet email list oberusers. What's happening is amazing, and
    AGRIPPA's release onto the Net (and subsequent mischief :-) shot a
    signal flare into the sky. Here goes.

    The wealth of writers pegged w/ the _Cyberpunk_ label seem to all but
    deny the term these days... you get a sense they've moved on to
    other/better lit forms... meanwhile Net denizens still yearn for the
    Next Phase like a teenager w/o an anthem. So lemme tear pages out of
    Steven Levy's ALife writings and Rudy Rucker's perspectives on
    Godel/Incompleteness -

    Forget "Hard AI", at this point, the Net is alive; and Life is
    intelligent. There's a guy in Austin named Doug Lenat (my grad advisor
    briefly) - he busily feeds bits & scraps of (un)related info from
    across the planet into a machine - MCC's CYC Project - with a hope
    that a machine full of common sense factoids and a frame for reasoning
    among them can begin to respond intelligently. Dunno - I'll look
    forward to Lenat's sentient programs, but I recall Rudy's paraphrase
    that any intelligent system won't be contained in a /program/. On the
    other hand, the Net has an expansiveness that doesn't wanna quit. I
    think it's alive. And these Internet mailing lists we run are
    beginning to act autonomously, what with automated fileserver
    responses, factoids shot across our screens, natural lang front ends
    coming online - a step beyond Netnews in terms of smarts perhaps? I'm
    beginning to feel that Lenat is correct about the method for machine
    intelligence, but maybe it's happening outside MCC's hallowed walls.

    So it struck me that a "Next Phase" in SF lit might be the actual
    email lists themselves, and all the thousands of people on them - to
    use the cliche - functioning as neurons, synapses, mitochondria.
    AGRIPPA certainly has pulled together a cloud, an aura of anticipation
    and predisposition that I've never seen b4 in many years on the Net.
    Maybe I'm just digitally myopic, but the "DadaPoet" distillation of
    LERI-L for Scream Baby sorta gave me the creeps about what our
    machines are /doing/ and /saying/. And look HOW MANY PEOPLE spend
    their time reading this stuff.. I'm only an SF fan, not a lit major
    by any means, but has AGRIPPA heralded a new form, one that was
    already in existence, via the lists?

    Let's talk 'bout this. Or maybe move it to FutureCulture - w/o all
    the CC's. Just thought it'd be fun to start by including the people
    quoted/ref'ed, maybe in hopes of their input!

    Thanx -

    pxn.
    ----
    pacoid@wixer.cactus.org

    [ originally posted to a group of email list oberusers, cyberpunk
    authors and people ref'ed in the article. in-yer-face online

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 18:12:28 EST
    From: Kelly J. Cooper
    Subject: Re: A new project to think about

    From: RCLARKE@ac.dal.ca
    > This is an idea I came up with the other day and I would
    >like to know what people think, if it has been done before and if
    >it has, why did it fail?
    >
    > IDEA: A user-run, user-built, and user-supported computer
    >system that creates a cyberspace specifically for creative minds
    >to create and interact in.

    Main reason why this won't work: support MONEY. You need someone
    physically there to upgrade the machine, kick it when the disks won't
    spin, provide money for the service contract, add features, install
    documentaion. Why do it for free? It's like the theatre where I'm
    carpenter ... actors in charge and all they want is to find someone
    ELSE to be in charge so THEY can act.

    When folks have to do all of the support crud, they generally don't
    feel very charitable toward the users who aren't doing anything.

    There is a reason for the charges on Mindvox and similar hunks
    o'cybertech ... all of the things I listed above cost money. It costs
    money for someone to spend time keeping the sytem happy; it costs
    money for the service froods to come fix/upgrade it. And, if ya wanna
    get fancy, it costs money for DAT/Exabyte/9-track tapes to back
    everything up, and it costs money to rent an operator to do the
    backups while the administrator is fucking around on the system (trust
    me on this one, I'm an operator).

    So, certain schools have brought up turist machines. They ain't
    exactly easy to get started/maintain. Others keep turist accounts on
    their regular machines, but then they have to contend with the
    "legitimate" users complaining about loss of CPU time. And, those
    ungrateful turists whining & bitching when they don't even belong
    there & have no respect & don't understand that we HAVE to have quotas
    and shutdowns & crackdowns on illegal uses. AND, they have to handle
    any complaints from other universities/companies/whatever about all
    the NUDE gifs these turists are making available, or the flamage
    spouting from the turist mouth ETC ETC ETC and all for WHAT? A few
    lousy turists? (witness MIT sys. admin. opinions of whiny turists).

    Get the idea?

    Kelly J. Cooper
    kjc@cs.rutgers.edu

    ______________________________

    From: ahawks (your unconscious mind)
    Subject: Re: Gibson/Kroupa and Agrippa
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 16:20:28 MST

    New fresh-scented *The Dead* (150% real fruit juices!) says:
    |
    |Today's Mindvox news: Weird shit happened today. I'm not sure who all the
    |participants where, but Kroupa and some other people on Mindvox wrote a
    |parody of Agrippa, called "Agr1ppa", this is part of the original title
    |that went out in irc:
    |
    |AGR1PPA 2.01 - NEW & IMPROVED (Fixes Bugs from Version 2.00)
    |(A Book of The Mentally Disturbed -- Even FUNNIER than the original!)
    |Text by US@phantom.com
    |Etching by THOSE_PEOPLE@phantom.com
    |(C)1992 THE POWER COMPUTER (In My Mind Since 1979)
    |syberspa(e
    |All Bytes Preserved

    Well, shit....Did he just suddenly get the idea to parody it, or what?
    I was gonna rewrite it (non-satirically) but there goes thAt idea...crap...

    Kroupa always seems one minddrop ahaead of my thoughtwaves....This
    thing, and before with the review of Hacker Crackdown for Mondo - he
    already hat one in there when I sent me review in to St.
    Jude....(which was a month before the book was released, I might add)

    Well, crap....better stop whinin', get off my ass and start doing stuff...

    |And then tonight God came down from the mountain and spoke to Kroupa.
    |William Gibson called him on the phone to talk to him. And Kroupa pulled
    |it out of "respect for Gibson's work" which I think is a crock. It's a
    |joke, if Gibson can't take a joke, then why bother............

    Well, I think the poem means a lot to Gibson....I would much rather
    parody Johnny Mnemonic then this poem, which is obviously close to his
    (somewhat synthetic-seeming from the tone) heart....

    |I am totally angry at this, it is extremely cool that William Gibson is
    |into all this and behind Mindvox, its almost like the God of cyberpunk
    |smiling on it all, but I think its a total crock that something which is
    |obviously a joke can get pulled because Gibson might frown and get upset.

    If I were writing a poem, the summation of my creative spirit, about
    my deceased father, I might be pissed too, even though it was a
    joke...

    |My unasked for .02 cents.

    06% interest added...

    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    ______________________________

    From: ahawks (your unconscious mind)
    Subject: Re: Hardcopy, anyone?
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 16:29:33 MST

    New fresh-scented *im your antidote* (150% real fruit juices!) says:
    |
    |Hello again... I was wondering if anyone out there would be interested
    |in a hard-copy 'zine, dedicated to CP/New Edge/Technoculture, which I am
    |currently kicking around in my mind. I am a designer/
    |writer/photographer, and would be more involved in the production end of
    |things. Basically, I am just testing the waters to see if there are (1)
    |writers who might contribute and (2) people who would be interested in
    |seeing such a thing come about. Please email or post any feedback,
    |thanks!

    Count me in, depending (but not much) on the scope....Awhile back I
    started work on a similar magazine myself, called [the] inifinite
    edge, which was like Mondo but with some Intertek-in/f0rmity added,
    and a less acid-washed feel...I had to cease the idea, though, because
    of hardware dificulties (ie, being back on my crapppy Apple //gs, thus
    no decent printing capabilities unlike My LC & LaserWriter)....

    I love Mondo, but there is no real alternative to match....bOING seems
    to me to be practically focused entirely on the literal end, and
    overlooks many of thre cultural aspects...Mondo, of course, could
    chill with the "2 hits a day keeps reality away" and it would be close
    to the mark of what I have in my head (although I have recently found
    my writing is increasingly resembling the acid-revelation tone of much
    Mondo)... Then tere's Intertek, which has good intentions but seems a
    little too anal, and too micro-scopic eyeball focused....SF Eye, of
    course is similarly an excellent read, but also caters to too specific
    an audience......

    There's not that much out there, but there is so much interest in such
    a publication, all voer the net and beyond....There is such a huge
    need to be filled.....Thus, please count me in, and I encourage
    everyone else who wishes to to contribute as well....Instead of
    whining about what's out there, work to make your own zine....

    |----------------------- --------------------------
    || Darren Michael Poe |::: |_ |:::
    || e268%nemomus.bitnet@ |::: |_ (design) |:::
    || academic.nemostate.edu |::: | |:::
    |--------------------------- ----------------------

    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    ______________________________

    Date: 16 Dec 1992 16:46:29 -0700 (MST)
    From: michael@nsma.arizona.edu (Michael S. Williams)
    Subject: Re: A new project to think about

    The whole idea sounds like an alternate form of AUtopia, though
    more plausible (IMHO), but yes, again, lack of $$ would probably stop
    this project dead in its tracks.

    One point in the idea which bothers me is in the following 2
    paragraphs:

    >[...]
    > The only system that even comes close to being run by the
    > users is Nyx, but the administration is still placed in the hands
    > of the sysadmin, all rules are made according to his views or the
    > rules are imposed on him by his university and it's just to let
    > people have access to the Internet, not to assist free
    > information exchange.
    >[...]
    > The difference here is that
    > most policy concerning computers on the Internet is made by
    > sysadmin who are hired for the job. I believe that is rather
    > dictorial (perhaps that's not really a problem, but it would be
    > interesting to see if it would work in more democratic system)
    > The system would be run the way the people want it and because it
    > isn't connected to other systems it wouldn't have to deal with
    > any outside dictatorships (the university financial people).

    You make it sound like the sysadmin is a dictator of policies
    determined by his/her own desires, to reduce to bandwidth of
    system productivity, etc. Perhaps in some systems, but have you
    ever tried working on a system without an admin? The "rules", if any,
    are usually there by request from the system users. The policies
    are not determined from the sysadmin's desires, but from the users'.
    They are there to make the system flow smoothly, not to impede the
    flow. Who would be responsible for upgrading the operating system?
    What if there was no sysadmin and everybody had their own favorite
    o/s? Which would get installed? Hopefully there would be a vote
    on the o/s to utilize, and somebody would install it. Well, who
    will do that installation, making sure that compilation was successful
    without any bugs, that future revisions of that o/s are installed,
    when applicable? So, that's the role that a good sysadmin takes-
    decision based on the users' needs.

    But anyway, that's probably a discussion for comp.sysadmin or whatever;
    I just wanted to clear that up a little. Hopefully I did.


    <><-><--><---><----><-----><------><
    ><------><-----><----><---><--><-><>
    Michael Williams, michael@nsma.arizona.edu
    University of Arizona's Division of Neural Systems, Memory & Aging
    344 Life Sciences Bldg, North
    Tucson, AZ 85724
    (602)626-2611
    <><-><--><---><----><-----><------><
    ><------><-----><----><---><--><-><>

    ______________________________

    Subject: Re: A new probject to think about
    From: schwartz@mindvox.phantom.com (Dave Schwartz)
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 18:48:18 EST

    Rclarke says:

    > IDEA: A user-run, user-built, and user-supported computer
    > system that creates a cyberspace specifically for creative minds
    > to create and interact in.
    >

    Its being done, MindVox is doing it, the Well used to be doing it.

    > PURPOSE: I have noticed, in my endless journeys across the
    > cyber frontier, that there is/are no system(s) open to the
    > general public and for the general public to run. As well, there
    > is no place that is specifically for creating interesting pieces
    > of electronic media
    > Though MindVox does have a congregation of interesting
    > people in it, all they are doing is talking and you have to pay
    > for it (I've never paid for anything to do with computers in my
    > lifetime, and I'm not about to start now).

    Reality just hit you head on. Read your last sentence and realize why your
    own concept for a system like this will never work if its full of people
    who share this belief. Usually refereed to as "whiny tourists" on MIT and
    SPIES, both of which run/ran free machines.

    > REQUIREMENTS: The main thing is that the system would have
    > to be independent from any other organisation (even Nix is
    > subject to the rule of the university that donated the parts) to
    > have true self-rule. To do this, it would have to be completely
    > financially self-sufficient so that the results of votes would be
    > could create interesting things on the system and it would give
    > them access to human and other resources not usually available to
    > them on the net or anywhere, for that mater.

    You have again just described MindVox or The Well or even any progressive
    public access system of which there are probably 100 on the net right now.

    Somewhere in the middle you take off into fantasy. You say you need money
    yet are never exactly clear where it comes from, who donates it, where it
    goes. I manage 10 decstations and a vax for a company and can say that
    doing the grunt work that keeps a system running is no picnic.

    Much of what you described is how The Well started in the late 80's. By
    1989 they found out that it doesn't work. The Well was financed by the
    bottomless pockets of the Whole Earth Review, within 2 years they found
    out what everyone else finds out. For all the "be in" good vibes and "lets
    do it"ness it doesn't work. Even if 99% of the people pitch in, which they
    won't, 1% will always come along and screw it up. On MindVox there is a
    discussion about what happened on the net lately, one guy went and tried
    to take down a bunch of systems, the Well got hit hard, Nyx got its pw
    file erased and SPIES a formely free system, just went off the net.

    Then you have the 10,000 other problems of making people aware of it,
    getting interesting people to care and show up, keeping it running,
    upgrading it... when its all said and done, you have MindVox where you pay
    $10 or $15 to take part in a virtual community exactly how you described.
    Its not dead like the Well, its growing fast, has staff that take care of
    problems and anyone is free to do anything they want that isn't illegal.

    The only different between what exists and what you described, is that you
    and this "committee of people" don't run MindVox and have no "power" there
    to say what goes.

    In closing, if MindVox is not your thing, because honestly they have a
    very "we are on a mission from god" attitude and pack wall to wall media
    people and celebs there, and its harder to shine if you are unknown, there
    are lots of interesting, free smaller systems providing exactly what you
    described. The only difference is still that you aren't running any of
    them and if you were, you'd find out what a hassle it it! :)

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 19:19:08 EST
    From: im your antidote
    Subject: >more zine inf0<

    Hello again..

    Thanks to everyone who has responded about the magazine idea I
    mentioned. This is where the idea stands so far:

    (STORIES) Stories and story ideas will be exchanged via email, most
    likely sent to my email address to be forwarded to those interested in
    editing. I would be interested in setting up some sort of mail
    reflector like Future if possible, but I am not able to do it myself on
    my system. I'd like to see some sort of virtual editorial meeting on IRC
    most likely to discuss the stories and decide which to include, etc.
    Also someone mentioned setting up an ftp site to put the stories- I am
    not too familiar with the logistics of such a thing, but it sounds great
    if someone would like to explain further how it can be accomplished.

    (CONTENT) I dont know yet. I would like to see a blend of art and music
    and fiction, with technical net stuff. Im just not sure- any one of
    those things could fill a zine all by themselves. I am not too sure as
    to whats out there in terms of zines (I haven't even really read Mondo)
    What do you all think? What would you like to see in a 'zine? Right now
    I am leaning heavily to the cultural/artistic side of things, with
    interviews of personalities both in and outside the matrix, original
    fiction and art, reviews of music/mags/books etc, and various other
    things in the same vein. But I dont want to be chained to anything in
    particular, I want something that will interest everyone and have the
    potential to grow.

    (NAME) Someone (sorry, I lost the name, I'll post it later) suggested
    the name 'M31 SET' (M31-our galaxy, 'SET' being taken from a reference
    to a group in a short story in Mirrorshades) What do you think of this?
    Anyone have any other ideas?

    (PRODUCTION) The final e-scripts would end up with me, and I will
    concentrate on the design aspects of things. I am running PageMaker,
    Photoshop, and various dtp stuff on a Mac LC with 16bit video. I have
    access to a laser printer and a (rather poor) hand scanner. I also have
    access to black+white darkroom facilities, and I can get a good deal on
    printing. I am a senior graphic design student, so you can be sure
    i will be putting a lot of effort into making it look unique and
    professional.

    (DISTRIBUTION) Still in the planning stages. The zine would most likely
    be distributed via USmail from a PObox where I am located. Subscriptions
    would probably be available for 12-month, or 6-month periods, or
    individual copies could be ordered.

    (FUNDING) I dont expect to make a profit off of this, basically I would
    just want to charge enough for the zine to cover postage and printing
    costs.

    This is basically where the idea stands right now. Please email me or
    the List with comments or suggestions (or offers to help! ;)

    ----------------------- --------------------------
    | Darren Michael Poe |::: |_ |:::
    | e268%nemomus.bitnet@ |::: |_ (design) |:::
    | academic.nemostate.edu |::: | |:::
    --------------------------- ----------------------

    ----------------------- --------------------------
    | Darren Michael Poe |::: |_ |:::
    | e268%nemomus.bitnet@ |::: |_ (design) |:::
    | academic.nemostate.edu |::: | |:::
    --------------------------- ----------------------

    ______________________________

    From: Steven J.
    Subject: Re: A new project to think about
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 19:20:30 CST

    ______________________________

    From: the!


    ^^^^^^
    Interesting typographical error...

    turist -----> one of a Turing machine(?)

    tourist ----> an individual involed in a tour

    Okay, it's a snotty comment. I couldn't avoid it (lots of smileys on this
    one).

    Steve J. White
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    aragorn@convex.csd.uwm.edu
    aragorn@csd4.csd.uwm.edu

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 17:45:58 -0800
    From: vpcsc11@sfsuvax1.sfsu.edu (student)
    Subject: Re: A new probject to think about

    Just wanted to point out that the WELL is *not* dead. It appeals to
    a different crowd than Mindvox but it is still alive and kicking.

    --
    aaron
    vpcsc11@sfsuvax1.sfsu.edu

    ______________________________

    Date: Thu, 17 Dec 92 10:21:42 WST
    From: timg@cs.uwa.edu.au (Tim Gill)


    ^^^^^^
    >Interesting typographical error...

    > turist -----> one of a Turing machine(?)

    > tourist ----> an individual involed in a tour
    ^^^^^^^
    Is this somehow similar to convolved?? Or a rodent perhaps??

    >Okay, it's a snotty comment. I couldn't avoid it (lots of smileys on this
    >one).

    ditto 8^)....

    Tim Gill timg@cs.uwa.edu.au

    >Steve J. White
    >aragorn@convex.csd.uwm.edu
    >aragorn@csd4.csd.uwm.edu

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1992 22:31:35 -0500
    From: Todd Tibbetts
    Subject: =={ Mind Toy Question }==

    Here is something I am forwarding from a friend:
    please send ideas to me at: tibbetts@hsi.com

    **************************************************************

    The Pixies of DoodleButt are Seeking

    Advice About Sence Toys


    Things Like:
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^

    rain sticks for your ears
    silver jiggle balls for the touch
    electric mind goggles for the eyes
    smell-o-rama machines for the nose
    holograms for the tongue
    revolutionary tools for higher consciousness
    brain candies

    Where can we get this type of toy? (catalogs, companies, stores)

    What are some of your favorite fun feelie-touchie-squeezy thingies?


    we are bored
    send to: tibbetts@hsi.com
    *********************************************************************

    They say, "Yo"
    to the techno-shaman
    (to she)
    the pSychic nEt Godmother.

    "Burry us with her,"
    say the PixiEs.

    *********************************************************************

    "paco xander nathan is investigating the synergizer"

    --CISM@ERE.UMontreal.CA

    Is the above true? How & what is it?

    tt


    ______________________________

    From: ahawks (farting in your general direction)
    Subject: re: learning email/Internet
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 21:00:52 MST

    New fresh-scented *Paco Xander Nathan* (150% real fruit juices!) says:
    |
    |Hey, I dunno Y, but my post about Tracy LaQuey Parker's kewl new book
    |on learning about Internet got massively truncated on this end...
    |
    |Andy, have U got a copy of that? Had the cypherpunks-request@toad.com
    |info too..

    Nope, eyeballs peeled and sliced, and I haven't seen it pass thru....

    & the onl-e post I've seen re: cyberphunks, from u Paco, was fr0m a
    day or 2 ago....

    |And - publically - as for the email hacks, much of the intent wuz to
    |send thanx to the FC moderator for doing the Matrix a service.. If
    |it hadn't been for that damn UUCP glitch, it would've been shown as
    |wgibson@gaia.matrix .. Oh well, a nuther day..
    |
    |pxn.

    c001.....

    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    ______________________________

    From: ahawks (farting in your general direction)
    Subject: Re: Agrippa
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 21:04:20 MST

    New fresh-scented *Gustaf Naeser* (150% real fruit juices!) says:
    |
    | I MISSED IT !!!!!!
    |
    | So if anyone please could mail it to me...
    |
    | thanks in advance,
    | gaffe
    | gaffe@csd.uu.se

    1ss again for tu u da new-Bz,

    AGRIPPA (The Original Poem: The Choice of a Future Generation =)
    can be obtained by sending mail to:

    future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    w/ subject 'send agrippa' (or in da middle o da bod-e will d0)

    this may change at anytime, once the virus is firmly implanted in the
    neurons of the masses, so get yer cop-e n0w....

    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    ______________________________

    Subject: Re: Needed: Public UseNews site info
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 23:14:57 EST
    From: Mitchell Porter

    >
    > Hello out there. If anyone knows of any public-access sites besides Nyx
    > that allow you to read UseNews, could you please post them or email them
    > to me? I'll be eternally grateful. =)
    there's a proper list in Scott Yanoff's list of internet services, which I
    don't have to hand. it is regularly posted to alt.bbs.internet, and it was
    apppended to the last edition of High Weirdness by Email, which was posted
    a few days ago to alt.slack alt.discordia and alt.zines. These are
    supposedly some News Servers you can telnet to that I can tell you about:
    sol.ctr.columbia.edu 119
    rusmv1.rus.uni-stuttgart.de 119
    news.fu-berlin.de 119

    ______________________________

    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 22:20:24 CST
    From: UC482529@MIZZOU1.missouri.edu
    Subject: Re: spelling of "turist"

    I believe this is derived from the six-character username length limit
    of the ITS operating system which ran on AI.AI.MIT.EDU, one of the
    first machines on the Arpanet which offered "public" access. "Turists"
    were allowed access during off-hours. Some went on to become ITS system
    administrators, etc.


    uc482529@mizzou1.missouri.edu

    ______________________________

    Date: 17 Dec 1992 00:25:17 -0400
    From: RCLARKE@ac.dal.ca
    Subject: A new project to think about. A few remarks!

    From: IN%"kjc@cs.rutgers.edu" "Kelly J. Cooper" 16-DEC-1992 19:49:40.30
    To: IN%"future@nyx.cs.du.edu"
    CC:
    Subj: RE: A new project to think about

    Return-path:
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    Date: 16 Dec 1992 18:12:28 -0500 (EST)
    From: "Kelly J. Cooper"
    Subject: RE: A new project to think about
    Sender: kjc@cs.rutgers.edu
    To: future@nyx.cs.du.edu
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    From: RCLARKE@ac.dal.ca
    > This is an idea I came up with the other day and I would
    >like to know what people think, if it has been done before and if
    >it has, why did it fail?
    >
    > IDEA: A user-run, user-built, and user-supported computer
    >system that creates a cyberspace specifically for creative minds
    >to create and interact in.

    Main reason why this won't work: support MONEY. You need someone
    physically there to upgrade the machine, kick it when the disks won't
    spin, provide money for the service contract, add features, install
    documentaion. Why do it for free? It's like the theatre where I'm
    carpenter ... actors in charge and all they want is to find someone
    ELSE to be in charge so THEY can act.

    When folks have to do all of the support crud, they generally don't
    feel very charitable toward the users who aren't doing anything.

    There is a reason for the charges on Mindvox and similar hunks
    o'cybertech ... all of the things I listed above cost money. It costs
    money for someone to spend time keeping the sytem happy; it costs
    money for the service froods to come fix/upgrade it. And, if ya wanna
    get fancy, it costs money for DAT/Exabyte/9-track tapes to back
    everything up, and it costs money to rent an operator to do the
    backups while the administrator is fucking around on the system (trust
    me on this one, I'm an operator).

    So, certain schools have brought up turist machines. They ain't
    exactly easy to get started/maintain. Others keep turist accounts on
    their regular machines, but then they have to contend with the
    "legitimate" users complaining about loss of CPU time. And, those
    ungrateful turists whining & bitching when they don't even belong
    there & have no respect & don't understand that we HAVE to have quotas
    and shutdowns & crackdowns on illegal uses. AND, they have to handle
    any complaints from other universities/companies/whatever about all
    the NUDE gifs these turists are making available, or the flamage
    spouting from the turist mouth ETC ETC ETC and all for WHAT? A few
    lousy turists? (witness MIT sys. admin. opinions of whiny turists).

    Get the idea?

    Kelly J. Cooper
    kjc@cs.rutgers.edu


    From: IN%"michael@nsma.arizona.edu" 16-DEC-1992 19:59:48.15
    To: IN%"future@nyx.cs.du.edu"
    CC:
    Subj: RE: A new project to think about

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    Date: 16 Dec 1992 16:46:29 -0700 (MST)
    From: michael@nsma.arizona.edu (Michael S. Williams)
    Subject: RE: A new project to think about
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    Message-id: <9212162346.AA14800@nsma.arizona.edu>
    Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII
    Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT
    X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University of
    Denver. The University has neither control over nor responsibility for the
    opinions or correct identity of users.

    The whole idea sounds like an alternate form of AUtopia, though
    more plausible (IMHO), but yes, again, lack of $$ would probably stop
    this project dead in its tracks.

    One point in the idea which bothers me is in the following 2
    paragraphs:

    >[...]
    > The only system that even comes close to being run by the
    > users is Nyx, but the administration is still placed in the hands
    > of the sysadmin, all rules are made according to his views or the
    > rules are imposed on him by his university and it's just to let
    > people have access to the Internet, not to assist free
    > information exchange.
    >[...]
    > The difference here is that
    > most policy concerning computers on the Internet is made by
    > sysadmin who are hired for the job. I believe that is rather
    > dictorial (perhaps that's not really a problem, but it would be
    > interesting to see if it would work in more democratic system)
    > The system would be run the way the people want it and because it
    > isn't connected to other systems it wouldn't have to deal with
    > any outside dictatorships (the university financial people).

    You make it sound like the sysadmin is a dictator of policies
    determined by his/her own desires, to reduce to bandwidth of
    system productivity, etc. Perhaps in some systems, but have you
    ever tried working on a system without an admin? The "rules", if any,
    are usually there by request from the system users. The policies
    are not determined from the sysadmin's desires, but from the users'.
    They are there to make the system flow smoothly, not to impede the
    flow. Who would be responsible for upgrading the operating system?
    What if there was no sysadmin and everybody had their own favorite
    o/s? Which would get installed? Hopefully there would be a vote
    on the o/s to utilize, and somebody would install it. Well, who
    will do that installation, making sure that compilation was successful
    without any bugs, that future revisions of that o/s are installed,
    when applicable? So, that's the role that a good sysadmin takes-
    decision based on the users' needs.

    But anyway, that's probably a discussion for comp.sysadmin or whatever;
    I just wanted to clear that up a little. Hopefully I did.


    <><-><--><---><----><-----><------><
    ><------><-----><----><---><--><-><>
    Michael Williams, michael@nsma.arizona.edu
    University of Arizona's Division of Neural Systems, Memory & Aging
    344 Life Sciences Bldg, North
    Tucson, AZ 85724
    (602)626-2611
    <><-><--><---><----><-----><------><
    ><------><-----><----><---><--><-><>

    From: IN%"schwartz@mindvox.phantom.com" 16-DEC-1992 19:59:55.98
    To: IN%"future@nyx.cs.du.edu"
    CC:
    Subj: RE: A new probject to think about

    Return-path:
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    Date: 16 Dec 1992 18:48:18 -0500 (EST)
    From: schwartz@mindvox.phantom.com (Dave Schwartz)
    Subject: RE: A new probject to think about
    To: future@nyx.cs.du.edu
    Message-id: <8yFwVB1w165w@mindvox.phantom.com>
    Organization: [Phantom Access] / the MindVox system
    Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT
    X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University of
    Denver. The University has neither control over nor responsibility for the
    opinions or correct identity of users.

    Rclarke says:

    > IDEA: A user-run, user-built, and user-supported computer
    > system that creates a cyberspace specifically for creative minds
    > to create and interact in.
    >

    Its being done, MindVox is doing it, the Well used to be doing it.

    > PURPOSE: I have noticed, in my endless journeys across the
    > cyber frontier, that there is/are no system(s) open to the
    > general public and for the general public to run. As well, there
    > is no place that is specifically for creating interesting pieces
    > of electronic media
    > Though MindVox does have a congregation of interesting
    > people in it, all they are doing is talking and you have to pay
    > for it (I've never paid for anything to do with computers in my
    > lifetime, and I'm not about to start now).

    Reality just hit you head on. Read your last sentence and realize why your
    own concept for a system like this will never work if its full of people
    who share this belief. Usually refereed to as "whiny tourists" on MIT and
    SPIES, both of which run/ran free machines.

    > REQUIREMENTS: The main thing is that the system would have
    > to be independent from any other organisation (even Nix is
    > subject to the rule of the university that donated the parts) to
    > have true self-rule. To do this, it would have to be completely
    > financially self-sufficient so that the results of votes would be
    > could create interesting things on the system and it would give
    > them access to human and other resources not usually available to
    > them on the net or anywhere, for that mater.

    You have again just described MindVox or The Well or even any progressive
    public access system of which there are probably 100 on the net right now.

    Somewhere in the middle you take off into fantasy. You say you need money
    yet are never exactly clear where it comes from, who donates it, where it
    goes. I manage 10 decstations and a vax for a company and can say that
    doing the grunt work that keeps a system running is no picnic.

    Much of what you described is how The Well started in the late 80's. By
    1989 they found out that it doesn't work. The Well was financed by the
    bottomless pockets of the Whole Earth Review, within 2 years they found
    out what everyone else finds out. For all the "be in" good vibes and "lets
    do it"ness it doesn't work. Even if 99% of the people pitch in, which they
    won't, 1% will always come along and screw it up. On MindVox there is a
    discussion about what happened on the net lately, one guy went and tried
    to take down a bunch of systems, the Well got hit hard, Nyx got its pw
    file erased and SPIES a formely free system, just went off the net.

    Then you have the 10,000 other problems of making people aware of it,
    getting interesting people to care and show up, keeping it running,
    upgrading it... when its all said and done, you have MindVox where you pay
    $10 or $15 to take part in a virtual community exactly how you described.
    Its not dead like the Well, its growing fast, has staff that take care of
    problems and anyone is free to do anything they want that isn't illegal.

    The only different between what exists and what you described, is that you
    and this "committee of people" don't run MindVox and have no "power" there
    to say what goes.

    In closing, if MindVox is not your thing, because honestly they have a
    very "we are on a mission from god" attitude and pack wall to wall media
    people and celebs there, and its harder to shine if you are unknown, there
    are lots of interesting, free smaller systems providing exactly what you
    described. The only difference is still that you aren't running any of
    them and if you were, you'd find out what a hassle it it! :)

    ______________________________

    From: ahawks (farting in your general direction)
    Subject: Re: >more zine inf0<
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 21:30:01 MST

    New fresh-scented *im your antidote* (150% real fruit juices!) says:
    |
    |Hello again..
    |
    |Thanks to everyone who has responded about the magazine idea I
    |mentioned. This is where the idea stands so far:
    |
    |(STORIES) Stories and story ideas will be exchanged via email, most
    |likely sent to my email address to be forwarded to those interested in
    |editing. I would be interested in setting up some sort of mail
    |reflector like Future if possible, but I am not able to do it myself on
    |my system. I'd like to see some sort of virtual editorial meeting on IRC
    |most likely to discuss the stories and decide which to include, etc.
    |Also someone mentioned setting up an ftp site to put the stories- I am
    |not too familiar with the logistics of such a thing, but it sounds great
    |if someone would like to explain further how it can be accomplished.

    Getting it together would not be a problem...That's what an editor
    (inCHIEF) is for...

    |(CONTENT) I dont know yet. I would like to see a blend of art and music
    |and fiction, with technical net stuff. Im just not sure- any one of
    |those things could fill a zine all by themselves. I am not too sure as
    |to whats out there in terms of zines (I haven't even really read Mondo)
    |What do you all think? What would you like to see in a 'zine? Right now
    |I am leaning heavily to the cultural/artistic side of things, with
    |interviews of personalities both in and outside the matrix, original
    |fiction and art, reviews of music/mags/books etc, and various other
    |things in the same vein. But I dont want to be chained to anything in
    |particular, I want something that will interest everyone and have the
    |potential to grow.

    Well, I don't want to sound anal, but I think an editor shoulf have a
    good handle on what's being published in similar and not-so similar
    circles and orbs....Ie, having read Mondo, bOING, Intertek, SF Eye,
    2600, i-D, Whole Earth, the FACE, and underground zines from pnk to
    industrial to rave to hacker to free-inf0 to conspiracy-rant would be
    a must...Not only that, but the editor should be on the forefr0nt of
    information - I don't even consider myself near the forefront...I try
    to be as quick-review-as-happens, but I'm not ahead of the edge, I'm a
    few nanos behind it.....The editor should be more than a few nano's
    ahead of the edge....

    The closer we get to 2000, the quicker information will fuck us
    (interpret that any way u want to)....It's going to take mroe and more
    vision to fuck the info before you get fucked, to keep ahead of the
    edge... That should be kept in mind for any potential technoculture
    editors... It's also another reason I choose to focus on E-.....E- is
    life, here and now and the advent of information....Paper is almost
    dead, it is a snail when we increasinglymoreandmore have lightspeed
    z00000mz at hand.....

    |(NAME) Someone (sorry, I lost the name, I'll post it later) suggested
    |the name 'M31 SET' (M31-our galaxy, 'SET' being taken from a reference
    |to a group in a short story in Mirrorshades) What do you think of this?
    |Anyone have any other ideas?

    Sounds cool, but, that might imply that it's a GibsonCum rag, which I
    wouldn't want to contribute to, personally....I mean, how many stories
    can we continue to read about ROM constructs and sim-stims...Fiction
    needs to move forward, like Paco suggested before....Maybe fiction
    will even become irrelevant - useless, inane....If we live in
    hyperreality, our imaginations are going to be expanded to that state
    as well, thus it will be difficult to right fiction that *remains*
    interesting, let alone *remains* interesting to a large # of people....

    |(PRODUCTION) The final e-scripts would end up with me, and I will
    |concentrate on the design aspects of things. I am running PageMaker,
    |Photoshop, and various dtp stuff on a Mac LC with 16bit video. I have
    |access to a laser printer and a (rather poor) hand scanner. I also have
    |access to black+white darkroom facilities, and I can get a good deal on
    |printing. I am a senior graphic design student, so you can be sure
    |i will be putting a lot of effort into making it look unique and
    |professional.

    Cool setup....There are many artists and graphics designers on this list..

    |(DISTRIBUTION) Still in the planning stages. The zine would most likely
    |be distributed via USmail from a PObox where I am located. Subscriptions
    |would probably be available for 12-month, or 6-month periods, or
    |individual copies could be ordered.
    |
    |(FUNDING) I dont expect to make a profit off of this, basically I would
    |just want to charge enough for the zine to cover postage and printing
    |costs.
    |
    |This is basically where the idea stands right now. Please email me or
    |the List with comments or suggestions (or offers to help! ;)
    |
    |----------------------- --------------------------
    || Darren Michael Poe |::: |_ |:::
    || e268%nemomus.bitnet@ |::: |_ (design) |:::
    || academic.nemostate.edu |::: | |:::
    |--------------------------- ----------------------

    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    ______________________________

    Date: 17 Dec 1992 00:39:24 -0400
    From: RCLARKE@ac.dal.ca
    Subject: Big mistake! Sorry!

    I sent out coppies of the responces to my origonall posts by mistake! Rather stupid of me! Sorry. There's nother new in them. I will be posting a reply but not today so as to conserve list time.
    Once again, sorry!
    --
    Ethan Clarke
    ---
    Rclarke@AC.DAL.CA

    ______________________________

    From: ahawks (farting in your general direction)
    Subject: Zinezzzzz
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 22:04:36 MST

    I was going to post an alternative idea to a SnailMag, which would be
    a DEFINITIVE E-ZINE, but then, as it has a nasty habit of doing every
    so often, reality and intelligent thought set in....Basically, I
    deleted my own thoughtspacetext which said SnailMail is almost
    completely irrelevant so I don't like zines too much now, TV/VIDEO is
    an effective means of disseminating a zine, and I proposed an e-zine...

    this is all along the lines of what Paco posted earlier, and the irony
    of it is..........YOU ARE HERE NOW....Even an e-magazine is not as
    current, is not on the edge of information as groups like this list
    are... No e-magazine could be as current as a daily trip to MindVox,
    or a daily scan thru FutureCulture, Leri, Cypherpunks, whatever...

    These small groups (2 tie in wit da InterNet discussions) allow for
    individualization of a likes that has never been seen before....Thus,
    magazines are irrelevant because they are not
    specialized....E-magazines the same, to a lesser degree....USEnet is a
    trashpile, with a ticking Rolex or 2 per week....

    The point is, the net is the asnwer....in the net, you are as
    specialized or as group-defined as you want to be....there are so
    manly outlets: Usenet, email lists, private email, IRC, internet
    BBSes, MUDs.....

    The net is not the ends, thol, obviously....I love net.reality, but I
    also read Snail-mags, cuz the net occasionaly misses the orangeslice I
    want to eat...I read Details, SPIN, 2600, Mondo, Intertek, the FACE, a
    few zines.....I watch TV....I watch Mtv, I watch CNN, I watch CSPAN
    ant COURT-TV....I watch movies and videos....I read certain sections
    of the Denver Post and rocky Mntn News and Westword....I talk to
    people... I talk on the phone..I attend school.....

    I seek as high a signal/noise/norepeat/importance ratio-ratio in my
    information as possible...I select the forums, the magazines, the
    people, that consistently provide the information I want, and I select
    the means so as not to repeat information and waste brain space....
    thus, if I felt there was a space to fill for combining information I
    wanted, or to provide information that I felt need to be out-there but
    wasn;'t, I would create a new forum in the most proper medium...I have
    done that, in my subjective reality, with the FutureCulture list....

    FutureCulture to me is amazing....Instead of me scanning TV,
    magazines, radio for relevant info, news, etc., I have 580 other pairs
    of eyes doing it as well....Not only that, but that allows for the
    capability to exapnd/alpher/morph information from other forums - and
    in realtime and post-realtime - something that TV, MONDO, or anything
    else outside of the net can't do.....

    The ends and the means are....HACK YOUR OWN REALITY.....

    If your reality is not your own, not to your happ-e-ness, then create
    it and morph it to be as such.....If you feel publishing a zine will
    accomplish that for you, than do so....If you feel "FutureCUlture is
    close to what I like - but a bit off the mark" than create your own
    list... If there's a TV channel missing from your 55-of-nuthin, then
    create a new one.....

    But keep in mind that anything outside of the net pales in the face of
    hyperspeed-information gathering and dissemination, and will soon be
    too outdated to even consider.....

    We all lives are lives this way, but it's a matter of: acknowledging
    it to what degree, acknowledging to what degree you control your own
    reality, and lastly morphing your own reality to your likes....

    I don't mean to suggest that creating a new SnailMail mag is a bad
    idea...Quite the opposite - mags like Mondo and Intertek and 2600 do a
    perfect job of acting-out the lesson-of-the-day: bridging net.reality
    with netless.reality.....This will keep occuring even after ISDN and
    other newtek is implemented to a degree that paper is gone....

    Net yourself. Hack your own reality.

    "I believe in love...poetry....money...las vegas....cheap cosmetics..."
    "I have a vision....television...television......television...."

    -bono
    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    ______________________________

    From: ahawks (farting in your general direction)
    Subject: The Z00z and Detailz
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 22:11:08 MST

    Chewck out the new Detailz with Denis Leary (eskimo pies and all) on
    da c0ver.....

    Also, if anyone taped the U2 Z00 TV thing on Mtv, lemme know....it was
    pretty excellent, I thought, on the WayneGarth level of in/F0rma-shun
    com.pre-hen-shun and X-pluh-nA-shun......Or if anyone knows when it
    will be re:::BROADcast.....lemme know....

    Same goes for the LI-quid TV marathon Mtv had last weekend...I forg0t
    what TIMEz0ne I was in and onl-e taped 1/2 of it....I need to get some
    of the Specialists I missed and I think I missed one of the n-AEon's
    from this season.....

    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    ______________________________

    Date: Thu, 17 Dec 92 07:03:10 CET
    From: Network Mailer
    Subject: mail delivery error

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    From: ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu (farting in your general direction)
    Message-Id: <9212170400.AA23261@nyx.cs.du.edu>
    X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University
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    Subject: re: learning email/Internet
    To: future@nyx.cs.du.edu
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 21:00:52 MST
    In-Reply-To: <9212160921.AA23558@wixer>; from "Paco Xander Nathan" at Dec 16, 92
    3:21 am
    X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL11]

    New fresh-scented *Paco Xander Nathan* (150% real fruit juices!) says:
    |
    |Hey, I dunno Y, but my post about Tracy LaQuey Parker's kewl new book
    |on learning about Internet got massively truncated on this end...
    |
    |Andy, have U got a copy of that? Had the cypherpunks-request@toad.com
    |info too..

    Nope, eyeballs peeled and sliced, and I haven't seen it pass thru....

    & the onl-e post I've seen re: cyberphunks, from u Paco, was fr0m a
    day or 2 ago....

    |And - publically - as for the email hacks, much of the intent wuz to
    |send thanx to the FC moderator for doing the Matrix a service.. If
    |it hadn't been for that damn UUCP glitch, it would've been shown as
    |wgibson@gaia.matrix .. Oh well, a nuther day..
    |
    |pxn.

    c001.....

    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu


    ______________________________

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    From: ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu (farting in your general direction)
    Message-Id: <9212170404.AA23603@nyx.cs.du.edu>
    X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University
    of Denver. The University has neither control over nor
    responsibility for the opinions or correct identity of users.
    Subject: Re: Agrippa
    To: future@nyx.cs.du.edu
    Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 21:04:20 MST
    In-Reply-To: <199212161304.AA08930@mamba.csd.uu.se>; from "Gustaf Naeser" at Dec
    16, 92 2:04 pm
    X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL11]

    New fresh-scented *Gustaf Naeser* (150% real fruit juices!) says:
    |
    | I MISSED IT !!!!!!
    |
    | So if anyone please could mail it to me...
    |
    | thanks in advance,
    | gaffe
    | gaffe@csd.uu.se

    1ss again for tu u da new-Bz,

    AGRIPPA (The Original Poem: The Choice of a Future Generation =)
    can be obtained by sending mail to:

    future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu

    w/ subject 'send agrippa' (or in da middle o da bod-e will d0)

    this may change at anytime, once the virus is firmly implanted in the
    neurons of the masses, so get yer cop-e n0w....

    --

    ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu FutureCulture: In/f0rmation
    ahawks@mindvox.phantom.com future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu


    _________________________________________________________________________
    | |
    | That's all for today! |
    | To send a message to the list: future@nyx.cs.du.edu |
    | To subscribe/unsubscribe/change format: future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu |
    | All other requests: future-request@nyx.cs.du.edu |
    | List Maintainer is: (andy [aka hawkeye]) ahawks@nyx.cs.du.edu |
    |_________________________________________________________________________|
    | |
    | The opinions expressed in FutureCulture are those of the individual |
    | author only. |
    |_________________________________________________________________________|