Slashdot Mirror

An anonymous reader writes: While climate change talks progress on how to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, an interdisciplinary team of scientists have worked out a way to reduce carbon dioxide already existing in the atmosphere. The focus is on the batteries used by electric automobiles. Researchers have found out that the graphite electrodes in the lithium-ion batteries could be replaced with carbon electrodes sourced from atmospheric carbon dioxide. The experiment started with the use of a solar-thermal electrochemical process (STEP) to convert carbon dioxide into carbon. STEP uses solar energy as the source of the thermal and electrical energy required for the dissolution of the atmospheric carbon dioxide to its constituent elements -- carbon and oxygen. The team then used the carbon generated to create carbon nanotubes/nanofibers. They then incorporated these carbon nanotubes into lithium-ion batteries by using them as the positive electrode or anode. While the carbon is used in the manufacture of carbon nanotubes, the oxygen is channeled back to the generator to boost the combustion efficiency of the generator. The increased efficiency will balance the electricity consumption of STEP. In the end, the fossil fuel electrical power plant could have zero net carbon dioxide emissions.

HughPickens.com writes: Scott Shane writes in the NY Times that the National Archives and Records Administration has released a detailed list of the United States' potential targets for atomic bombers in the event of war with the Soviet Union, showing the number and the variety of targets on its territory, as well as in Eastern Europe and China. The Strategic Air Command study includes chilling details. According to its authors, their target priorities and nuclear bombing tactics would expose nearby civilians and "friendly forces and people" to high levels of deadly radioactive fallout. Moreover, the authors developed a plan for the "systematic destruction" of Soviet bloc urban-industrial targets that specifically and explicitly targeted "population" in all cities, including Beijing, Moscow, Leningrad, East Berlin, and Warsaw.

The target list was produced at a time before intercontinental or submarine-launched missiles, when piloted bombers were essentially the only means of delivering nuclear weapons. The United States then had a huge advantage over the Soviet Union, with a nuclear arsenal about 10 times as big. "We've known the general contours of nuclear war planning for a few decades," says Stephen I. Schwartz. "But it's great that the details are coming out. These are extraordinary weapons, capable of incredible destruction. And this document may be history, but unfortunately the weapons are not yet history."

An anonymous reader writes: Who here remembers WarGames? As it turns out, the film was a lot closer to reality than we knew. Newly-released documents show that the Soviet Union's KGB developed software to predict sneak attacks from the U.S. and other nations in the early 1980s. During a NATO wargame in November, 1983, that software met all conditions necessary to forecast the beginning of a nuclear war. "Many of these procedures and tactics were things the Soviets had never seen, and the whole exercise came after a series of feints by U.S. and NATO forces to size up Soviet defenses and the downing of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 on September 1, 1983. So as Soviet leaders monitored the exercise and considered the current climate, they put one and one together. Able Archer, according to Soviet leadership at least, must have been a cover for a genuine surprise attack planned by the U.S., then led by a president possibly insane enough to do it." Fortunately, when the military exercise ended, so did Soviet fears that an attack was imminent.

theodp writes: In Why My MOOC is Not Built on Video, GWU's Lorena Barba explains why the Practical Numerical Methods with Python course she and colleagues put together has but one video: "Why didn't we have more video? The short answer is budget and time: making good-quality videos is expensive & making simple yet effective educational videos is time consuming, if not necessarily costly. #NumericalMOOC was created on-the-fly, with little budget. But here's my point: expensive, high-production-value videos are not necessary to achieve a quality learning experience." When the cost of producing an MOOC can exceed $100,000 per course, Barba suggests educators pay heed to Donald Bligh's 1971 observation that "dazzling presentations do not necessarily result in learning." So what would Barba do? "We designed the central learning experience [of #NumericalMOOC] around a set of IPython Notebooks," she explains, "and meaningful yet achievable mini-projects for students. I guarantee learning results to any student that fully engages with these!"

AHuxley writes "With the U.S. trying to understand the domestic role of their foreign intelligence and counterintelligence services in 2013, what can a declassified look back into the 1960s and 1970s add to the ongoing legal debate? Welcome to the world of Interagency Security Classification Appeals Panel and the work done by the National Security Archive at George Washington University. Read how prominent anti-war critics and U.S. senators were tracked, and who was on the late-1960s NSA watch list, from Rev. Martin Luther King to civil rights leader Whitney Young, boxer Muhammad Ali, Tom Wicker, the Washington bureau chief and Washington Post columnist Art Buchwald, and Sen. Howard Baker (R-Tenn.). The NSA was aware of the legality of its work and removed all logos or classification markings, using the term 'For Background Use Only.' Even back then, NSA director at the time, Lew Allen noted: "appeared to be a possible violation of constitutional guarantees" (from page 86 of this PDF). What did the NSA think about signals intelligence sites in your country? See if your country makes the 'indefinite' list on page 392."

AHuxley writes "With the U.S. trying to understand the domestic role of their foreign intelligence and counterintelligence services in 2013, what can a declassified look back into the 1960s and 1970s add to the ongoing legal debate? Welcome to the world of Interagency Security Classification Appeals Panel and the work done by the National Security Archive at George Washington University. Read how prominent anti-war critics and U.S. senators were tracked, and who was on the late-1960s NSA watch list, from Rev. Martin Luther King to civil rights leader Whitney Young, boxer Muhammad Ali, Tom Wicker, the Washington bureau chief and Washington Post columnist Art Buchwald, and Sen. Howard Baker (R-Tenn.). The NSA was aware of the legality of its work and removed all logos or classification markings, using the term 'For Background Use Only.' Even back then, NSA director at the time, Lew Allen noted: "appeared to be a possible violation of constitutional guarantees" (from page 86 of this PDF). What did the NSA think about signals intelligence sites in your country? See if your country makes the 'indefinite' list on page 392."

schnell writes "The first-ever declassified story of Area 51's origin is now available, thanks to a Freedom of Information Act filed years ago by George Washington University's National Security Archive. The (only lightly redacted) document is actually primarily a history of the U-2 and A-12 ("Oxcart") spy plane programs from the Cold War, but is remarkable for being the first-ever official unclassified acknowledgment of Area 51's purpose and its role in the program. Interesting tidbits include that the U-2 program was kicked off with a CIA check mailed personally to Lockheed Skunk Works chief Kelly Johnson for $1.25M; a U-2 was launched off an aircraft carrier to spy on French nuclear tests; and the U-2 delivery program itself was actually done under budget, a rarity for secret government programs then or now."

krou writes "The National Security Archive at George Washington University has awarded its 2009 Rosemary Award to the FBI for worst freedom of information performance (PDF of the award). Previous winners have been the CIA and the Treasury. The NSA notes that 'The FBI's reports to Congress show that the Bureau is unable to find any records in response to two-thirds of its incoming FOIA requests on average over the past four years, when the other major government agencies averaged only a 13% "no records" response to public requests.' The FBI's explanation, according to the NSA, is that 'files are indexed only by reference terms that have to be manually applied by individual agents,' and even then, 'agents don't always index all relevant terms.' Furthermore, 'unless a requester specifically asks for a broader search, the FBI will only look in a central database of electronic file names at FBI headquarters in Washington.' Any search will therefore 'miss any internal or cross-references to people who are not the subject of an investigation, any records stored at other FBI offices around the country, and any records created before 1970.'"

krou writes "The National Security Archive at George Washington University has awarded its 2009 Rosemary Award to the FBI for worst freedom of information performance (PDF of the award). Previous winners have been the CIA and the Treasury. The NSA notes that 'The FBI's reports to Congress show that the Bureau is unable to find any records in response to two-thirds of its incoming FOIA requests on average over the past four years, when the other major government agencies averaged only a 13% "no records" response to public requests.' The FBI's explanation, according to the NSA, is that 'files are indexed only by reference terms that have to be manually applied by individual agents,' and even then, 'agents don't always index all relevant terms.' Furthermore, 'unless a requester specifically asks for a broader search, the FBI will only look in a central database of electronic file names at FBI headquarters in Washington.' Any search will therefore 'miss any internal or cross-references to people who are not the subject of an investigation, any records stored at other FBI offices around the country, and any records created before 1970.'"

DesScorp writes "The AP reports that the Obama administration has picked up where the Bush administration left off on the missing White House email issue by trying to have a lawsuit dismissed that would have kept investigating whether or not email was still missing. Two advocacy groups suing the Executive Office of the President expressed disappointment with the Obama administration's actions. Tom Blanton, director of the National Security Archive, noted that President Barack Obama on his first full day in office called for greater transparency in government. The Justice Department 'apparently never got the message' from Obama, Blanton said."

Ian Lamont writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation and the National Security Archive are praising President Obama's executive orders to make the federal government more open. Yesterday, Obama issued two memos and one executive order instructing government agencies to err on the side of making information public and not to look for reasons to legally withhold it. The moves are expected to make it easier for people to file Freedom of Information Act requests, and should also boost the amount of information that agencies place on their websites. The general counsel for the National Security Archive (an NGO that publishes declassified documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act) even predicts that agencies will use blogs to share information. Obama's directives reverse a 2001 memo from former US Attorney General John Ashcroft instructing federal agencies to generally withhold information from citizens filing FOIA requests."

daveschroeder writes "George Washington University has today released a three-volume history of NSA activities during the Cold War (major highlights). Written by agency historian Thomas R. Johnson, the 1,000-page report, 'Cryptology During the Cold War, 1945-1989,' details some of the agency's successes and failures, its conflict with other intelligence agencies, and the questionable legal ground on which early American cryptologists worked. The report remained classified for years, until Johnson mentioned it to Matthew Aid, an intelligence historian, at an intelligence conference. Two years later, an abstract and the three current volumes of the report are now available (PDF) from GWU and the National Security Archive. Aid, author of the forthcoming history 'The Secret Sentry: The Top Secret History of the National Security Agency,' says Johnson's study shows 'refreshing openness and honesty, acknowledging both the NSA's impressive successes and abject failures during the Cold War.' A fourth volume remains classified. Johnson says in an audio interview: 'If you are performing an operation that violates a statute like FISA, it's going to come out. It always comes out.'" And reader sampas zooms in on a section in Document 6 about the growth of NSA's IT: their first Cray purchase in 1976, the growth of circuits between facilities, and internal feuds over centralized IT development vs. programmers-in-departments. "A young systems engineer named [redacted] was urging NSA to look at some technology that had been developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). In 1969 DARPA had developed a computer internetting system called ARPANET... NSA quickly adopted the DARPA solution. The project was called platform."

daveschroeder writes "George Washington University has today released a three-volume history of NSA activities during the Cold War (major highlights). Written by agency historian Thomas R. Johnson, the 1,000-page report, 'Cryptology During the Cold War, 1945-1989,' details some of the agency's successes and failures, its conflict with other intelligence agencies, and the questionable legal ground on which early American cryptologists worked. The report remained classified for years, until Johnson mentioned it to Matthew Aid, an intelligence historian, at an intelligence conference. Two years later, an abstract and the three current volumes of the report are now available (PDF) from GWU and the National Security Archive. Aid, author of the forthcoming history 'The Secret Sentry: The Top Secret History of the National Security Agency,' says Johnson's study shows 'refreshing openness and honesty, acknowledging both the NSA's impressive successes and abject failures during the Cold War.' A fourth volume remains classified. Johnson says in an audio interview: 'If you are performing an operation that violates a statute like FISA, it's going to come out. It always comes out.'" And reader sampas zooms in on a section in Document 6 about the growth of NSA's IT: their first Cray purchase in 1976, the growth of circuits between facilities, and internal feuds over centralized IT development vs. programmers-in-departments. "A young systems engineer named [redacted] was urging NSA to look at some technology that had been developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). In 1969 DARPA had developed a computer internetting system called ARPANET... NSA quickly adopted the DARPA solution. The project was called platform."

sgt_doom writes "The C.I.A. announced it was going to reveal "skeletons" by declassifying hundreds of pages of documents detailing illegal abuses over the years. As a preamble, the National Security Archive at George Washington University released a separate set of documents covering internal government deliberations of the abuses from January 1975. Mandatory reading for all those history-challenged individuals who believe government knows best!"

Throtex writes "Orin Kerr, Associate Professor of Law at George Washington University writes at The Volokh Conspiracy that the Department of Justice is having trouble finding abuses of the USA PATRIOT Act. This follows from the fact that what the media originally aired as abuses were merely allegations of abuse at the time. Could it be that there has just been a lot of fuss over nothing?"

Lally Singh writes "Posted yesterday on the National Security Archives was the NSA's "Transition 2001" report, prepared as an introductory report for President Bush (II)'s incoming administration. "The largest U.S. spy agency warned the incoming Bush administration in its 'Transition 2001' report that the Information Age required rethinking the policies and authorities that kept the National Security Agency in compliance with the Constitution's 4th Amendment prohibition on 'unreasonable searches and seizures' without warrant and 'probable cause,' according to an updated briefing book of declassified NSA documents posted today on the World Wide Web.""

Lally Singh writes "Posted yesterday on the National Security Archives was the NSA's "Transition 2001" report, prepared as an introductory report for President Bush (II)'s incoming administration. "The largest U.S. spy agency warned the incoming Bush administration in its 'Transition 2001' report that the Information Age required rethinking the policies and authorities that kept the National Security Agency in compliance with the Constitution's 4th Amendment prohibition on 'unreasonable searches and seizures' without warrant and 'probable cause,' according to an updated briefing book of declassified NSA documents posted today on the World Wide Web.""

We posted earlier this week that the FBI has officially dropped Carnivore, its "privacy respecting" eavesdropping program. Now reader Throtex writes "Professor Orin Kerr at the George Washington University Law School, a member of the Volokh Conspiracy discusses why Carnivore came to be in the first place and why it really was terminated (about two years ago). Essentially, the media (as usual) got a bit carried away with a non-story: Carnivore was designed to protect your rights from being invaded while sniffing only suspect data. Carnivore was dropped because, as of two years ago, the available tools met the necessary privacy standards, as Prof. Kerr noted in his article about the PATRIOT Act published at the time."

ParticleMan911 writes "In an attempt to thwart illegal music downloads, GWU has struck a deal with Napster to allow every student living on campus a free subscription to Napster's streaming audio service. Every one of the 700,000 songs on Napster will be available to stream on each students' computer. GWU is not disclosing how much the streaming service, available to all users at $9.95/Month, is costing them, but the first year trial of the service has been donated by an anonymous donor. Will this method help get rid of illegal music downloads, or simply be a handy tool to use while your real mp3s are downloading?"

An anonymous reader writes "The Guardian Website is running a story on Cybersyn. An experimental computer network based on cybernetic principles that was used by Chile's revolutionary government between 1971 and 1973 to provide a real-time, decentralized form of economic analysis in the nationalized sector of the Chilean economy. The network has been described as Chile's Internet. There is a photo of the control room which looks something like the deck of the Starship Enterprise. The whole thing was the brainchild of Stafford Beer, a sort of British Buckminster Fuller. All very Orwellian and Big Brother, the whole experiment was brought to an end by the CIA sponsored coup d'etat on the September 11th, 1973."

hcetSJ writes "CNN.com has an article about a glove that reads sign language and can translate to spoken English. Although it's only one-handed now, and can only handle about 200 words, the inventor has further plans for a second hand and wider vocabulary. I wonder if this could be linked with the Rosetta Stone idea, to quickly expand the vocabulary. Also mentioned in the article is the possibility of military use...gaming control can't be far off." grvsmth points to a more detailed article on GWU's website.

theWrkncacnter asks: "I was recently giving some instructions over IRC to a long time QWERTY keyboard user who wanted to switch to the Dvorak layout, mostly because a good majority of the people in channel had made the switch and were all talking it up, myself included, about how our speeds had increased and how its much more comfortable. This made me think, why don't more people use the Dvorak layout? Searching around I found an older topic on the subject, but that didn't answer too many questions, as most people in the comment section seemed to think that Dvorak vs. QWERTY was a hardware issue, when it is really a matter simply changing the layout on your particular OS. I took the time to pry off and remap my powerbook keyboard's keys but I have no problem typing in Dvorak on a physically QWERTY mapped keyboard, and I know many others who don't have a problem doing so either. So given all of this, why don't more people switch? Is it that most people just can't be bothered to make the change, even when its more efficient and more comfortable?" Is it mostly due to the fact that most people learn to type first on QWERTY due to its popularity, and hence don't bother to learn anything else?

An anonymous reader writes "Open source advocate Tony Stanco, of the George Washington University Cyberspace Policy Institute has been getting flamed for allowing Microsoft reps to speak at an Open Source in government conference he's putting on next month. Today, in a commentary on NewsForge, Tony responds to the flamers. He says, "Leave it to the kooks in the community to make Microsoft look sympathetic." Is he right? Should we be willing to listen to what Microsoft has to say? Aren't open minds important to open source?" Newsforge and Slashdot are both part of OSDN.

mgaiman writes "Lucy Dalglish, Executive Director of The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, spoke at my school today. She discussed the state of journalism in the post-9/11 world. She said, among other things, that this administration is the most closed she has seen since Nixon. The organization itself is a non-profit journalist rights group. Their site features such things as Homefront Confidential, a chronicling of changes to the openness of information since 9/11, and a guide to using the Federal FOI Act to get access to information. While most /.ers aren't journalists, I thought it would be of interest nonetheless."

A GW student writes "The George Washington University's School of Engineering and Applied Science along with the Cyberspace Policy Institute are sponsoring some kind (hasn't really been decided yet) of debate between Stanley Pierre-Louis, Vice President Legal Affairs for the Recording Industry Association of America and Professor James Boyle of Duke Law School. Remember, Prof. Boyle just received an anonymous $1 million to fight the DMCA. The event is open to the public. It will take place on Tuesday October 8 in Washington, DC on GW's campus. The abstract and other details are here. Stick around, and the next day you can go to the Supreme Court to see Lawrence Lessig argue Eldred v. Ashcroft."

A GW student writes "The George Washington University's School of Engineering and Applied Science along with the Cyberspace Policy Institute are sponsoring some kind (hasn't really been decided yet) of debate between Stanley Pierre-Louis, Vice President Legal Affairs for the Recording Industry Association of America and Professor James Boyle of Duke Law School. Remember, Prof. Boyle just received an anonymous $1 million to fight the DMCA. The event is open to the public. It will take place on Tuesday October 8 in Washington, DC on GW's campus. The abstract and other details are here. Stick around, and the next day you can go to the Supreme Court to see Lawrence Lessig argue Eldred v. Ashcroft."

A GW student writes "The George Washington University's School of Engineering and Applied Science along with the Cyberspace Policy Institute are sponsoring some kind (hasn't really been decided yet) of debate between Stanley Pierre-Louis, Vice President Legal Affairs for the Recording Industry Association of America and Professor James Boyle of Duke Law School. Remember, Prof. Boyle just received an anonymous $1 million to fight the DMCA. The event is open to the public. It will take place on Tuesday October 8 in Washington, DC on GW's campus. The abstract and other details are here. Stick around, and the next day you can go to the Supreme Court to see Lawrence Lessig argue Eldred v. Ashcroft."

A GW student writes "The George Washington University's School of Engineering and Applied Science along with the Cyberspace Policy Institute are sponsoring some kind (hasn't really been decided yet) of debate between Stanley Pierre-Louis, Vice President Legal Affairs for the Recording Industry Association of America and Professor James Boyle of Duke Law School. Remember, Prof. Boyle just received an anonymous $1 million to fight the DMCA. The event is open to the public. It will take place on Tuesday October 8 in Washington, DC on GW's campus. The abstract and other details are here. Stick around, and the next day you can go to the Supreme Court to see Lawrence Lessig argue Eldred v. Ashcroft."

Codeine writes "Presentations to the Technical Advisory Council (TAC) of the FCC by Vanu Bose "Software Radio: Enabling Dynamic Spectrum Management" and by David Reed "How wireless networks scale: the illusion of spectrum scarcity." Counterintuitive results from multiuser information theory, network architectures, and physics: Multipath increases capacity, Repeating increases capacity, Motion increases capacity, Repeating reduces energy (safety), Distributed computation increases battery life, Channel sharing decreases latency and jitter. Highly recommended presentation suggesting that the cost of spectrum management by "exclusive property rights" mandated by the State outweighs the advantages we could obtain from a new model that acknowledges physics and the 70 years of receiver development since the regulatory model was adopted at the time of the sinking of the Titanic."

Codeine writes "Presentations to the Technical Advisory Council (TAC) of the FCC by Vanu Bose "Software Radio: Enabling Dynamic Spectrum Management" and by David Reed "How wireless networks scale: the illusion of spectrum scarcity." Counterintuitive results from multiuser information theory, network architectures, and physics: Multipath increases capacity, Repeating increases capacity, Motion increases capacity, Repeating reduces energy (safety), Distributed computation increases battery life, Channel sharing decreases latency and jitter. Highly recommended presentation suggesting that the cost of spectrum management by "exclusive property rights" mandated by the State outweighs the advantages we could obtain from a new model that acknowledges physics and the 70 years of receiver development since the regulatory model was adopted at the time of the sinking of the Titanic."

pongo asks: "My department has a large population of introverts, as confirmed by Meyers-Briggs testing. Somehow I was suckered into planning a holiday party with another department that suffers similiar symptoms. Any suggestions on ways (themes, decorations, food choices, games, etc) to encourage light banter and to get people meeting each other, which would make this party a big success? The party will be during business hours and alcohol is allowed." The key here is making a comfortable atmosphere where everyone can unwind and feel comfortable with meeting each other. What ways do you know of to encourage this kind of atmosphere?

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about "The Last Days of Politics," particularly the surreal, archaic vibes coming off the presidential campaign. I said I'd be posting some responses. Here are a very few excerpts, reprinted with permission, and thanks for them. (Make sure to check out "The Internet Dog" proposal for a virtual George Washington) If you want to keep the e-mail coming, I'll keep the discussion going.

From: Zach

Date: Tuesday, September, 26 2:45 p.m.

"Jon,

"First of all, politics will never "end" as long as there are people with different opinions and agendas, and finite resources. Politics is simply the art of how we all live together in a civil (or uncivil) society. The Internet may affect how it is played out, but it won't change the fact that it happens...

"As for the much-ballyhoed "apathy" of the American public, in some ways it's a rational response. People "know" that we have the best government money can buy, and that our reality field is shaped by corporate media giving us corporate candidates...So politics is not dead. What is dying is widespread, popular participation in politics. What this should be seen as is is not the Triumph of the Internet, but as the disenfranchisement of the average person."

From: Mike

Date: Tuesday, September 26, 2000 3:50 P.M.

"You ask:" Can anybody cite a single interesting or important idea or argument that's emerged from the months of campaigning in the current U.S. presidential race?"

The answer: "Partial privatization of SS, even as feeble as the proposals from either major party candidate are, is both important considering what is at stake (the likely crash and burn of the SS system, or horrific payroll tax hikes) and interesting in that this has always been a taboo topic."

From Robert

Date: Tuesday, September 27, 2000 2:51 PM

"Without meaning to give offense, I think you're far off the mark with your 'Last Days of Politics' essay...politics is not about parties, it's about power. If you have political power, you can have things your way; if you don't, you're stuck at the mercy of those who do. This is why politics is so appealing to so many people; on one level it's basic self-preservation, and an another level, it's a narcotic. "

From: tig

Date: September 26, 2000 4:02 PM

Jon,

I have an idea for a symbolic Presidential campaign. The "campaign" would take place entirely on an Internet Web site. There would be no public appearances by the candidate. This campaign should probably be called an anti-campaign because the point of the Web site would be to highlight a significant problem with the current paradigm used to elect our leader.

The current process causes candidates to focus on making promises in exchange for votes. This vigorous campaign activity has been institutionalized by the party system. It has resulted in candidates giving too much attention to subjects that have nothing to do with what is written in the Constitution. None of the candidates show any interest in carrying on *The Great Experiment* as it was originally envisioned by the founders of this government.

The central premise of the anti-campaign would be to re-elect a virtual George Washington as the next president. The person to be elected would promise to do his or her best to make decisions as they believe George Washington would if he were alive today. The purpose of the symbolic campaign is to remind people of the origins of our political system. George Washington set the standards for behavior for a president. In recent years the presidents have been poor reflections of this noble statesman. He was a singular figure in the history of our country in many ways. I find it notable that he did not seek the office of president, he ran without opposition, he never campaigned for the office, and was not a member of a party. The actual person who would be elected to serve as George Washington would run anonymously under the pseudonym "The Internet Dog". This name is inspired by the 1993 New Yorker cartoon. This cartoon captures the essence of Internet equality. The goal of running completely anonymously is give focus to the ideas of the office, not the person. Critics may claim that electing someone without physically seeing them will not allow the character of the candidate to be viewed, but this is nonsense. The obsession with the physical appearance of the candidate is a 20th century invention. A desire to not let ego or personal traits enter into the vote is a very strong character statement.

From: Mark

Date: Thu, Sep 28, 2000, 12:01 PM

"Jon, ...I do have a comment on the changing political expectations of the generations. I am a computer scientist (26 years old, "gen X" I suppose).

Personally, the level of my political discernment is a direct consequence of my interaction with technology --- namely that as a programmer and mathematician, I approach politics with as much scrutiny and analytics as I do computation. I've come to expect more clarity in the law and I have a strong sense of what American citizenry should mean. I wonder if this critical thought is partially responsible for the change in political expectations. (The remaining cause can probably be attributed to the identity politics of libertarians, but that is an entirely different subject.)

From: "K"

Date: Sat, Sep 30, 2000, 8:37 AM

Katz,

It's late and I'm having difficulty forming even the simplest of sentence structures -- I've been awake over 26 hours now so I'm a little out of it. Before I begin, let me first say that I have a great deal of respect for you... Yet as I much as respect you, I cannot be so bold as to support the statement that politics are losing their place in society altogether. The current state of politics will no doubt remain unchanged so long as the public tolerates it.,..

To say that politics are insignificant is to deny the power of the government. If you wish to reaffirm the power of our government, "forget" to pay your taxes. I assure you the government will take notice and spring into action. The government is, and will always be, in control. We cannot allow ourselves to disregard the ignorance of recent legislation regarding the Internet. We cannot allow ourselves to forget that "they" are in control, not us. The fact that there is such a distinction between "they" and "us" is a problem in itself. The bottom line is, this is not our Internet. As of now, legislation lags behind and the 'net remains, for the most part, lawless; like any frontier. But in order for it to become settled and for communities to flourish, government will step in and laws will be made. Privacy/anonymity will be lost and accountability will be ensured. .. In order to protect technology from restrictive legislation, we have to pay attention to politics.

I believe it is true that politics will have to be reborn to fit into the new culture.

From: Chris

Date: Tuesday, September 28, 2000 2:48 PM

"Jon,

Regarding your "Last Days of Politics" comments: I like this line of thought...I think the future of freedom and the survival of humans is grounded in the notion that "There is no one right way to live." No matter how many programs, band-aids, social policies, financial interventions and celebrity rock-star benefit concerts you throw at the world's problems, they will always just be small sticks trying to slow the flow of a large river.

"The politics of the future will be about "what works." They will no longer be centered around individuals with health care plans and tax cuts, but will highlight the ways of life that are thoroughly, provably successful and sustainable. That applies to everything from education to environmentalism, from economic models of society to social norms of human relationships."

From: Mark

Date: Tuesday, September 26, 2000 2:06 PM

"Sir,

"I spent several hours a day online and watch politics carefully. I do not see the Net worming its way into politics (and thus destroying it as you seem to posit) but rather the other way around -- politics is beginning to worm its way into the Net. The Net, from the earliest stages that I was involved in, has been a very Libertarian place. Largely populated by techies, idealists and college kids, the majority who took the time to go online were not deeply connected to politics in any way. Instead, we tended to be the ones who felt that so long as government was not noticing us, we were the best off.

"Now, however, the Net is the country. And politics is becoming one with the Net...While on the Net we see all thought possible, with the two parties we see only thought acceptable to the majority. The fact is that the Net does not change common sense or the cultural thought of the American populace."

From: Kara

Date: Tuesday, September 26, 2000 1:47 p.m.

"50/50 disagree. Politics as we know it, I think, are definitely out the window. Nobody with half an eye open has much interest in voting...I guess I'd rather things just became more direct. Some honesty in our leadership. (Hello, I'm RJR Nabisco, and I'll be dictating your fiscal policy for the term.)"

From: JoeC

Date: Tuesday, September 26, 2000 11:32 PM

"Look at energy. The harnessing of energy has created modern life, it is the backbone of society. It has grown amazingly powerful institutions, technologies, etc. The political process protests these old technologies and power structures, more accurately they own them. Even though we have the means to completely revolutionize how we use energy using the Net, and other new technoligies, here we are once again in the midst of another fossil fuel crisis -- insane."

From: Marcelo (from Italy)

Date: September 27, 2000 10:43 PM

"The reason politics is not very interesting, is because we are pretty much happy with the current status quo; but, given the complexity of our civilization, it is naive to think that you can live well under bad government. If there was a candidate proposing the banning of all computers (I'm just being ludicrous to make a point) politics would suddenly end. That would be the hacker's top priority."

From: Gordon

Date: Tuesday, September 26, 2000 11:34 PM

"The way you describe it, a revolution is coming, where by doing nothing, something is done. While this may work if we can get people educated, the general populace can still be easily sucked in by personable politicians and leaders. When enough people hold the essential meme of anarchy -- that explicit authority is not necessary for free society to function), we will wake up and find ourselves in a truly free world."

From: Tom

Tuesday, September 26, 2000 6:07 PM

"...Though I disagree that politics is finished, I think you have hit on a legitimate phenomenon. I believe it was Boaz who first observed that more and more people are entering the "grey market," where things not quite illegal but not quite sanctioned exist. he used the examples of homeschool, gated communities and Internet medical advice (IIRC) to show that more and more private citizens, and not just the rich were "seceding" from official society. No public education, no public police, no state-licensed sawbones. As the major parties blend together, descending into the pit of the demagogue, the public is "on its own," finding solutions to the problems they perceive."

From Jake

Date: September, 28, 2000 5:40

"You could be right on this one. I suppose it had to happen. But you still suck, and I intend to block you again after sending this."

skatedork writes: "From a Washington Post article: 'Speaking last night after the annual presentation of the "Orwell Awards," Stephenson challenged the more than 1,000 people who had gathered from around the world to focus their attention less on installing encryption software against the vague threat of snooping by Big Brother, a reassuringly simple fantasy of a totalitarian state, and more on the very real pattern of injustice brought to bear on people through employers and other institutions. Stephenson said he was less worried these days about broad, theoretical privacy issues than about a recent incident in which a stray bullet crashed through a window at a friend's house and narrowly missed a sleeping child.'"