HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: jkp@cs.HUT.FI (Jyrki Kuoppala)
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Reply-To: jkp@cs.HUT.FI (Jyrki Kuoppala)
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
Date: Sat, 3 Oct 1992 18:35:25 GMT

In article <92276.093531HANK@BARILVM.BITNET>, Hank Nussbacher <HANK@BARILVM writes:
>of that basic tenet.  How would it look if I came out with a list of
>places that created X.500 databases without user consent that
>infringed on peoples human right to privacy?  Pretty stupid.

Stupid in whose opinion?  I wouldn't think it stupid.

//Jyrki
>What about a person's right to privacy?  Wouldn't you consider this
>a natural right of all people throughout the world?  As the above
>example shows, many sites on the Internet have trampled on that
>right yet no one is making lists of them.

Perhaps it's just that no one who happens to consider it important is
as active and hard-working on the issues as Carl?

>The ideas of free speech and rights to privacy are foreign to certain
>cultures and we must respect that, just as we are not expected to
>believe that committing suicide with a bomb strapped to your chest is
>the best way to get into heaven.  They have their culture and we have
>our culture.  Neither is right or wrong.  Each is right in its own
>country or segment of population.

Hmm.  I'll try to view it from another viewpoint - say news reported
in USA on the count of babies born "out of wedlock" in various
countries.  I think I saw such a list - I didn't think it insulting or
anything even though the majority of Finns seem to think that having a
child unmarried is no big deal.  But I would guess most of these
children are born to couples anyway, they are just not married.  The
news story just got a smile out of me as it was based on incorrect
cultural assumptions.

Similarly, I can think there are many people (many in USA, I would
guess) who could think it somehow "wrong" to house unmarried students
of different sex into the same apartments (student-housing).  They
could perhaps collect lists of countries (or towns) which do this and
circulate them among themselves.  I don't see what harm this would
have - I would think it just silly and pointless, but not offensive or
harmful.

I just fail to see the problem with the list.

//Jyrki
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college
From: twpierce@unix.amherst.edu (Tim Pierce)
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Organization: Amherst College, Amherst MA
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 04:18:24 GMT

In article <1992Oct1.031852.19873@eff.org> mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin) writes:

>It's trivial to choose not to see a user's .plan file, Betsy.

The argument, I think, is that users who finger other accounts are not
normally expecting to see obscene material, and might simply be
looking for something as simple as an office phone number.  One can
choose not to read _Playboy_, but that's because people generally know
what to expect in the pages of _Playboy._  You can't make the same
assumption about .plan files.  If there were a convenient way to warn
people about the content, then I would say this is a better argument.

I am much more convinced by the point that some people are more
offended by various political materials than by obscenity.  I don't
blink twice by seeing pages and pages full of profanity and
godlessness (for heaven's sake, I'm taking the job of rec.arts.erotica
moderator), but I am highly offended by plans and posts with vocal
anti-gay content in them.  Why should the university say, "It's all
right to be offended by obscenity, but not by homophobia?"

-- 
____ Tim Pierce                / "You are just naive and repressed because
\  / twpierce@unix.amherst.edu /  penis envy is here and it's now and it's
 \/ (BITnet: TWPIERCE@AMHERST) /  all around you." -- Neal C. Wickham
From: joslin_paul@ae.ge.com
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Date: 6 Oct 92 12:23:26 GMT
Reply-To: joslin_paul@ae.ge.com
Distribution: na
Organization: GE Aircraft Engines
Originator: news@c0228.ae.ge.com

rickert@mp.cs.niu.edu (Neil Rickert) writes:

>In article <1992Oct1.134706.25819@eff.org> kadie@eff.org (Carl M. Kadie) writes:

>>10. (A student:) I compiled an IRC client and master on a computer at U
>>Wyoming.  I provided access to this software to other users.  Upon
>>receiving complaints, the system administrators removed access for all
>>users who had used IRC.  In order to get their accounts back, the

>You may think this a violation of academic freedom.  I don't.  If the
>situation arose here, I would have no choice but to act quite similarly.

I believe you are missing the point.  

I have no problem with a computer center allocating resources; if UWy
thought that IRC users used too much of a limited resource, I believe
they certainly had the right to limit IRC (up to and including banning
the use of an IRC client or server on UWy computers).  The academic
freedom issues are that UWy acted in an arbitrary manner, that it did
not have a policy which let students know what behavior was proscribed,
and that they (UWy) banned simple possesion of IRC source code. 
-- 
                                  ____________________
     Paul R. Joslin              /  __________________O
joslin@c0223.ae.ge.com          /  /|________________
   +1 513 583 3537             /  /_/________________O
From: morgan@ms.uky.edu (Wes Morgan)
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Date: 2 Oct 92 21:04:10 GMT
Organization: The Puzzle Palace, UKentucky

In article <1992Oct2.140955.22663@eff.org> kadie@eff.org (Carl M. Kadie) writes:
>
>2) I was not, even implicitly, critizing the schools for banning the
>running of IRC and Crack. I was, implicitly, critizing the schools for
>banning the code for IRC and Crack.
>

When a given piece of code can be compiled, executed, and deleted in one
hour (or less, if you've a faster system), how can we effectively control
the execution of a program WITHOUT controlling the source code?

If the source code were available in hardcopy only, would you be satisfied?

If you were a system admin, how would *you* handle it?

--Wes

-- 
MORGAN@UKCC         |       Wes Morgan       |        ...!ukma!ukecc!morgan 
morgan@ms.uky.edu   | Engineering  Computing |   morgan@wuarchive.wustl.edu
morgan@engr.uky.edu | University of Kentucky | JWMorgan@dockmaster.ncsc.mil
  Mailing list for AT&T StarServer S/E  - starserver-request@engr.uky.edu
From: kadie@herodotus.cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
Subject: Re: USENET Readership report for Sep 92
Keywords: arbitron, statistics, full
Date: 3 Oct 92 17:57:54 GMT
Organization: University of Illinois, Dept. of Comp. Sci., Urbana, IL

[Excerpts from the full list. - Carl]

reid@decwrl.DEC.COM (Brian Reid) writes:

>This is the full set of data from the USENET readership report for Sep 92.
>Explanations of the figures are in a companion posting.
>
>        +-- Estimated total number of people who read the group, worldwide.
>        |     +-- Actual number of readers in sampled population
>        |     |     +-- Propagation: how many sites receive this group at all
>        |     |     |      +-- Recent traffic (messages per month)
>        |     |     |      |      +-- Recent traffic (kilobytes per month)
>        |     |     |      |      |      +-- Crossposting percentage
>        |     |     |      |      |      |    +-- Cost ratio: $US/month/rdr
>        |     |     |      |      |      |    |      +-- Share: % of newsrders
>        |     |     |      |      |      |    |      |   who read this group.
>        V     V     V      V      V      V    V      V
>   1 160000  5317   83%   980  1933.6    22%  0.02  11.5%  misc.jobs.offered 
>   2 160000  5142   82%  1568  1909.7    40%  0.02  11.1%  misc.forsale 
>   3 150000  4788   89%    10   157.9   100%  0.00  10.3%  news.announce.newusers 
>   4 120000  3910   68%  2556  6290.4    45%  0.07   8.4%  alt.sex 
>   5 120000  3903   84%     4   101.6    75%  0.00   8.4%  news.answers 
>   6 120000  3808   81%    65   191.8     0%  0.00   8.2%  rec.humor.funny 
>   7  97000  3199   86%   981  1748.5    20%  0.03   6.9%  comp.windows.x 
>   8  96000  3163   80%  2198  4434.5    13%  0.07   6.8%  rec.humor 
>   9  93000  3078   70%    16   187.7     0%  0.00   6.6%  rec.arts.erotica 
>  10  89000  2936   81%  2711  3114.8    17%  0.05   6.3%  misc.forsale.computers 
[...]
> 247  26000   855   78%   301   803.9    36%  0.05   1.8%  comp.org.eff.talk 
[...]
> 576  16000   517   75%     8   130.7   100%  0.01   1.1%  comp.org.eff.news 
[...]
> 708  14000   447   59%   123   499.0    28%  0.04   1.0%  alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk 
[...]
>1321   4900   162   51%    11   539.0     0%  0.11   0.3%  alt.comp.acad-freedom.news 
[...]
>1570   1500    48   19%    92   104.7     0%  0.03   0.1%  k12.lang.francais 
>1571   1500    48   18%    43    72.4     0%  0.02   0.1%  k12.lang.russian 
>1572   1500    48   18%    26    78.6     0%  0.02   0.1%  k12.ed.business 
>1573   1500    48   14%    12    16.7    25%  0.00   0.1%  aus.tex 
>1574   1500    48   10%   175   279.2    16%  0.04   0.1%  de.comp.sys.ibm 
>1575   1500    48   10%    90   137.8    10%  0.02   0.1%  de.etc.misc 
>1576   1500    48   10%    66   128.6    34%  0.02   0.1%  de.admin.archiv 
>1577   1500    48    9%    24    31.7     0%  0.00   0.1%  houston.eats 
--
Carl Kadie -- kadie@cs.uiuc.edu -- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,alt.censorship
From: kadie@eff.org (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: Re: Scanners
Originator: kadie@eff.org
Organization: The Electronic Frontier Foundation
Date: Sat, 3 Oct 1992 14:52:46 GMT

brad@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:

[...]
>Well, if you scan in pictures from playboy and put them up on your BBS
>you will get sued by Playboy and, as is reported for the recent suit
>against the Event Horizons BBS, you will have to settle out of court
>for $500,000.   (And you thought the issue of copyrighted GIFs wasn't
>a serious one.)
[...]

Didn't Event Horizon ignore warnings from Playboy?

- Carl
-- 
Carl Kadie -- I do not represent EFF; this is just me.
 =kadie@eff.org, kadie@cs.uiuc.edu =
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college
From: twpierce@unix.amherst.edu (Tim Pierce)
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Organization: Amherst College, Amherst MA
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 18:27:01 GMT

In article <BETSYS.92Sep30104251@ra.cs.umb.edu> betsys@cs.umb.edu (Elizabeth Schwartz) writes:

>   There's a BIG DIFFERENCE. You are allowed to own, advertise, and 
>distribute any speech you like. For example, any user may post in
>their .plan file or on our bulletin board  "for sexually explicit
>lyrics, see my publicly readable file dirty.txt" 

What if users include sexually explicit text in their .plans, preceded
by a sequence of form feeds (^L) and the statement "Sexually explicit
material follows; press ^C now if it is likely to offend you?"  Users
would be amply warned in advance, and there would not be no need even
for any restrictions based on the location of such material.

-- 
____ Tim Pierce                / "You are just naive and repressed because
\  / twpierce@unix.amherst.edu /  penis envy is here and it's now and it's
 \/ (BITnet: TWPIERCE@AMHERST) /  all around you." -- Neal C. Wickham
Xref: sparky alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk:3031 comp.org.eff.talk:6222 comp.admin.policy:1186 alt.censorship:7823 soc.college:4110
From: betsys@cs.umb.edu (Elizabeth Schwartz)
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Date: 3 Oct 92 18:03:25 GMT
Article-I.D.: ra.BETSYS.92Oct3130325
	<BETSYS.92Oct2114308@ra.cs.umb.edu>
	<1992Oct2.231202.17287@CSD-NewsHost.Stanford.EDU>
Organization: University of Massachusetts at Boston

What are the consequences if a student doesn't change a .plan file?
**NONE**

Lemme repeat for the last time: We are a community, not a legal board.
We are engaged in teaching. Perhaps one of the things we are teaching
is working together in a group. When someone is very disruptive, or
offensive, by our community standards, we ask them to change.
  WE HAVE NO AUTHORITY EXCEPT FOR THE RESPECT WHICH THE STUDENTS HERE 
STILL HAVE FOR US. WE FEEL THAT ASKING STUDENTS TO BEHAVE WITH SOME
DIGNITY DOESN'T DETRACT FROM THEIR EDUCATION BUT HELPS IT.
  Students we've asked have changed with NO threats, NO hidden
consequences, NO nasty undertones. We've never taken an account away
so I don't think there are any hidden fears. Students seem to feel
free to debate policy, so I don't think there is hidden authoritarian
crackdowns. 
  I'm outa this argument. If you like, come to UMass and see how much
we are trying to do with so little, and you'll see a department that
is still working as a community. 

Betsy

PS for the record: we are NOT the "library computer," the VAX/VMS
people are. We're a department lab belonging to the Math and CS dept
and  earmarked for research and teaching ONLY. Every other service we 
provide is an "extra" done because we want to provide it, and
UNFUNDED. This includes Usenet.
--
System Administrator                  Internet: betsys@cs.umb.edu
MACS Dept, UMass/Boston               BITNET:ESCHWARTZ%UMBSKY.DNET@NS.UMB.EDU
100 Morrissy Blvd                     Staccato signals
Boston, MA 02125-3393                      of constant information....
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: whitbeck@EAGLE.MIT.EDU (Caroline Whitbeck)
Subject: Information, please
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1992 15:49:48 GMT

Hi,
Hal Abelson forwarded materials to me on academic freedom 
and computers which had this address.  Please send me more 
information about the group/list/whatever.  I would like to 
stay informed if I can do so without choking my electronic 
mail.

Caroline Whitbeck
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college
From: kadie@eff.org (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Originator: kadie@eff.org
Organization: The Electronic Frontier Foundation
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 14:06:55 GMT

RE: Banned Material in German, Ireland, Switzerland, Turkey, and the U.K.

Hank Nussbacher <HANK@BARILVM.BITNET> writes:

[...]
>Unless I am mistaken, the US Bill of Rights which include the right to
>free speech, etc. has not been accepted as the Bill of Rights to the World.
>Have you checked that each of these countries (Ireland, Turkey, etc.) have
>a law of free speech as the US does?

You are correct, the U.S. Bill of Rights does not apply to any of the
countries. Indeed, it does not even apply to private universities in
the U.S. I would not be surprised if the bans were legal in at least
some of the countries.

>  Or are you merely applying your own
>form of geocentricism which dictates that the entire world has to follow
>what the USA says and does?

If believing in the importance of academic freedom and freedom of
expression is just USA-centered point of view, then I am USA-centered.
I hope the belief is held by many outside the U.S, too.

I am encouraged in this hope because I know the U.S. tradition of
academic freedom was adapted from Germany and that the U.S. tradition
of freedom of expression was adapted from the United Kingdom (with
influences from other centers of the Enlightenment). I am also
encouraged that the U.N. recognizes that at least some freedom of
expression is needed has part of basic human rights (e.g. Charter 19)
and that a Swiss-based organization, the World University Service,
meet in Lima, Peru, four years ago and drafted an international
statement on academic freedom.

- Carl

ANNOTATED REFERENCES

(All these documents are available on-line. Access information follows.)

=================
academic/academic-freedom.wus
=================
The Lima Declaration on Academic Freedom and Autonomy of Institutions
of Higher Education, an international declaration by the World
University Service.

Source: _World University Service Academic Freedom 1990: A Human
Rights Report_ by Laksiri Fernando, et al.


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

These document(s) are available by anonymous ftp (the preferred
method) and by email. To get the file(s) via ftp, do an anonymous ftp
to ftp.eff.org (192.88.144.4), and get file(s):

  pub/academic/academic/academic-freedom.wus

To get the file(s) by email, send email to archive-server@eff.org.
Include the line(s) (be sure to include the space before the file
name):

send acad-freedom/academic academic-freedom.wus
-- 
Carl Kadie -- I do not represent EFF; this is just me.
 =kadie@eff.org, kadie@cs.uiuc.edu =
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: twpierce@unix.amherst.edu (Tim Pierce)
Subject: Re: System security versus censorship
Organization: Amherst College, Amherst MA
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 21:50:25 GMT

In article <1992Oct1.141116.10025@bsu-ucs.uucp> 00hfstahlke@bsu-ucs.uucp writes:

>Personally, I view the distinction between storing and using such a program as
>rather like the distinction between possessing and using burglary tools

What are "burglary tools?"  Putty knives?  Glass cutters?  You know,
burglars don't put on a little black mask and send away to ACME for
"Burglar's Kits."

I could see a perfectly legitimate use for owning even a small set of
lockpicks: my lock is such that I cannot *leave* it unlocked, but must
always have my key if I wish to open the door.  If I accidentally lock
my keys in my room, I don't really want to have to pay Amherst College
$10 so that campus security can come and open my door.  At BSU,
however, I suppose this personal safeguard is Right Out.

>or an
>unlicensed concealed weapon.  

There is no "license" for owning a password cracking program.  The
analogy fails.

-- 
____ Tim Pierce                / "You are just naive and repressed because
\  / twpierce@unix.amherst.edu /  penis envy is here and it's now and it's
 \/ (BITnet: TWPIERCE@AMHERST) /  all around you." -- Neal C. Wickham
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: kadie@herodotus.cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: [comp.society.privacy] Re: SSN in login ids
Followup-To: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.society.privacy
Organization: University of Illinois, Dept. of Comp. Sci., Urbana, IL
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 02:00:01 GMT

[A repost - Carl]

Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 00:02:04 GMT
From: Dave Grabowski <dcg5662@hertz.njit.edu>
Newsgroups: comp.society.privacy
Subject: Re: SSN in login ids

In article <comp-privacy1.84.8@pica.army.mil> bsc835!ehunt@uunet.uu.net (Eric Hunt) writes:
>The University of Alabama/Birmingham's Engineering dept uses a student's 
>full SSN as a part of their computer login ids. This machine in Internet
>reachable. 
>
>I was wondering what relevant laws, if any, applied to this situation? I found
>out about it through a friend who told me what his Internet address was. I
>was shocked, and told him not to give that address to ANYONE because it 
>contained his SSN.

  A few weeks ago, I posted a msg about how NJIT uses student's SSN's
for Student ID's and for UNIX System ID's as well. It was the custom for
exam grades to be posted by SSN as well, but as I just found out today,
it seems that, at least in the Physics Dept., this is no longer going to
be done. They have now changed it so that the listing is done by >FIRST
NAME< only. This has GOT to be the most ridiculous way to post grades.
The Prof. mentioned that in one of his other classes, there were three
"Mark"'s in a row. Another person (who was checking her grade while I
was) said, "Nobody else has my name, anyway" (it was something obscure,
like Aretha).

  Perhaps it's time for schools to realize that SSN's aren't the way to
go, and some crazy methods like this don't work either.

-Dave

-- 
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kappa Xi Kappa - Over & Above!                         dcg5662@hertz.njit.edu
9 Sussex Ave., Newark, NJ (car theft capital USA)   70721.2222@compuserve.com

--
Carl Kadie -- kadie@cs.uiuc.edu -- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college
From: andy@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (Andy Freeman)
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Organization: Computer Science Department,  Stanford University.
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 1992 23:12:02 GMT

In article <BETSYS.92Oct2114308@ra.cs.umb.edu> betsys@cs.umb.edu (Elizabeth Schwartz) writes:
>In article <1992Oct2.010637.13133@eff.org> mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin) writes:
>>This seems a slender thread on which to hang a policy.
>
>Well, we have to keep this in perspective. THis isn't a formal,
>take-it-to-court sort of policy anyway.

Yes, let's keep it in perspective.  To do that, we have to see more of
the perspective that makes this policy "acceptable" in Schwartz' eyes.

Suppose someone doesn't agree to remove a .plan that Schwartz finds
offensive.  Does "This isn't a formal, take-it-to-court sort of policy
anyway" means that if said violator sues, UMass will back down wrt
said student?  What happens to a violator who doesn't
"take-it-to-court"?

In other words, what happens to violators?  What are the consequences
of refusing to "be reasonable"?

-andy
--
UUCP:    {arpa gateways, sun, decwrl, uunet, rutgers}!cs.stanford.edu!andy
ARPA:    andy@cs.stanford.edu
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college
From: twpierce@unix.amherst.edu (Tim Pierce)
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Organization: Amherst College, Amherst MA
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 19:20:27 GMT

In article <1992Oct1.171600.28282@access.digex.com> holland@access.digex.com (Brian Holland) writes:

>In article <BvFDAp.M9r@unix.amherst.edu> twpierce@unix.amherst.edu (Tim Pierce) writes:
>>
>> . . . but I am highly offended by plans and posts with vocal
>>anti-gay content in them.  Why should the university say, "It's all
>>right to be offended by obscenity, but not by homophobia?"
>
>Tim, I can't tell if you are indicting "hate-speech" regulations or
>are using them to justify censoring .plan files;

What I am saying is that inconsistency pisses me off more than
anything.  Perhaps hate speech regulations are right, perhaps they are
wrong.  But at present, the line where "offense" is drawn by the
administration is obviously arbitrary.

-- 
____ Tim Pierce                / "You are just naive and repressed because
\  / twpierce@unix.amherst.edu /  penis envy is here and it's now and it's
 \/ (BITnet: TWPIERCE@AMHERST) /  all around you." -- Neal C. Wickham
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: waider@glas.rtsg.mot.com (Ronan Waide)
Subject: Re: Banned Computer Material 1992
Organization: Motorola Ireland Ltd., Cork, Ireland.
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 17:32:40 GMT

twpierce@unix.amherst.edu (Tim Pierce) writes:

[Process names restriction]

>Any thoughts?  This seems like a borderline case to me.

In the University of Limerick, Ireland, there was a security incident involving
a user who had the process name "Baader". Subsequent to his "trial" and
expulsion from the college for a year, another student set his process name to
"Baader" and promptly found himself disusered.

A touch rough, no?

>-- 
>____ Tim Pierce                / "You are just naive and repressed because
>\  / twpierce@unix.amherst.edu /  penis envy is here and it's now and it's
> \/ (BITnet: TWPIERCE@AMHERST) /  all around you." -- Neal C. Wickham
-- 
Ronan Waide, Motorola Ireland                        waider@glas.rtsg.mot.com

"You watch a talk show recently?  They're doing one next month on a normal,
happy heterosexual couple, assuming they can find one." - Prof R. Noble @ RPI
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.admin.policy,alt.censorship,soc.college