Vint Cerf and Robert Kahn Awarded Medal of Freedom

3l1za writes ""President Bush on Thursday announced the recipients of this year's Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civil award." Vinton Cerf and Robert Kahn -- for their design of "the software code used to transmit data over the Internet" -- are among those to be honored next Wednesday. "

Comments

Re:The history of the award, and the need.

[Zevon 2000]

You make some good points, but I'm not sure that the idea of the government recognizing public service itself is bad. What's bad is the cronyism, the recognition of questionably deserving recipients (Jack Nicklaus? Is playing golf well and being paid millions for it really constitute distinguished service?), and maybe even a board whose compensation isn't given proper oversight. Although I don't know about that last bit for sure.

What this feels like to me is a mix between Knighthood, the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and political party in the White House any given year sucking each other's lollipops. What would be legitimately cool would be an American Knighthood bestowed only on 1-2 deserving people a year. Keep the bar raised high, have to nominating committee serve for a small stipend and the prestige of serving on such a committee, and give us something we can be proud of. As is, it's just another bit of propaganda to mock, and I think we're all get sick of that (both the propaganda and the mocking).

And of course the real shame is when deserving recipients like Vint Cert and Robert Kahn are overlooked on /. because the merits of the award itself are so questionable. The world needs more Nobel Prizes, and fewer Walk of Fames.

WTF?

[khasim]

A boxer ... an actor ... a singer ... a different actor ... a baseball player ... a radio personality?

The Medal of Freedom?

So the requirements are ... what? It certainly isn't "distinguished service" anymore.

Re:WTF?

[Bogtha]

George Orwell referred to misuse of words like this as "swindles and perversions":

Many political words are similarly abused. The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies "something not desirable." The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another. In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using that word if it were tied down to any one meaning. Words of this kind are often used in a consciously dishonest way. That is, the person who uses them has his own private definition, but allows his hearer to think he means something quite different. Statements like Marshal Petain was a true patriot, The Soviet press is the freest in the world, The Catholic Church is opposed to persecution, are almost always made with intent to deceive.

-- Politics and the English Language

Throwing words like "democracy" and "freedom" around as generic terms of praise is not just poor English, it actively clouds peoples thinking and is often deceitful.

Re:Why is he giving it now? Why not years ago?

[Zevon 2000]

Excellent point. On the other hand, it's certainly possible that no one in the Bush camp had heard of Vint Cerf before Europe started making noises about giving over control of DNS to an international group. Maybe they thought Al Gore really had invented the Internet?

And if they'd patented it....

[rdean400]

we'd still have a bunch of proprietary network islands floating in a sea of mediocrity.

Political Opportunism ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is the reason they are being awarded the medal now a political publicity stunt connected with the ongoing row over who should control the Internet in the future i.e. George Bush saying to the public "Look, we invented it, we should control it !" ?

Vinton Cerf and DARPA?

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean TCP/IP wasn't developed and patented by a private company that invested billions in R&D?

You're not really at "war".

[CyricZ]

Sure it is. Remember, the wars you guys are involved in are taking place on the other side of the world from you! You know, in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Things are very peaceful for you, since you're isolated away from all of the fighting itself. No warring is actually taking place in the United States.

Re:They should turn down the medals.

[s20451]

Firstly, there is nothing wrong with them accepting the prize money, or getting other money from sponsors, and establishing such awards themselves. Alfred Nobel was just a prviate Swedish citizen. For that matter there is nothing preventing you or I from doing the same.

Secondly, unless the money spent is in the neighborhood of $20 million (not likely), there would be no hope of setting up an annuity equivalent to a Nobel prize (which are worth about $1 million each).

Thirdly, rejecting a prize is insulting and generally doesn't make people willing to hear your suggestions as to how the money should be otherwise spent.

Irony?

[Drasil]

The man at the head of the world's largest heirarchical power structure gives out "Freedom" medals.

If you don't find this 'Newsworthy'...

[Mulletproof]

"This is newsworthy?"

Well let's see, these people only helped create a system that has not only impacted millions of people worldwide, but changed the nature of information dissemination and business commerce for you, your kids and their kids. You tell me if this is news worthy. On second thought, let me tell you. It's nothing short of revolutionary. Then you go about discrediting an example of another award, as if it somehow makes this any less newsworthy or deserving of recognition when it really has nothing to do with anything.

Yeah, some people will find the shit in anything if it's labelled Microsoft, Bush or [insertyourfavoritenamebrandehere], regardless of how deserving it is.. I thought we marked crap like this 'trolls'...

Re:The history of the award, and the need.

[fm6]

This is generally cronyism at its worst, and media attention getting at its finest. There is no Constitutional mandate or power. President Harry Truman enacted [medaloffreedom.com] the medal in 1945 and it was virtually ignored until JFK brought it back -- through an Executive Order [wikipedia.org] in 1963.

Dude, get a life. Cronyism is handing out jobs to underqualified friends. Dubya has certainly done his share of that, but it's not the same thing as handing out commerative tchatchkas to people he deems important.

BTW, there was only one president (Eisenhower) between Truman and Kennedy. So every prexy since Truman, with a single exception has done this.

Re:Why is he giving it now? Why not years ago?

[patternjuggler]

I think he's handing out the award now, because Vint Cerf (ICANN director) is backing Bush's proposal for US controlled DNS and taking Google with him.

It's funny because you'd think they would want to distance themselves as much as possible from the administration if they want to convince the rest of the world to maintain the status quo on this issue on technical or economic grounds or whatever (I don't really know what their argument is supposed to be). The more personally interested the US political leaders are, the more it will appear validate the claims of the other countries that something of high political value is at issue and internationalized or localized control is in order, that national sovereignty is at stake, and so on.