From bb615 at scn.org  Wed Mar  1 06:32:46 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2000 06:32:46 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: SCN Board Election Results
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000224211416.14013A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000301055927.5675B-100000@scn>

Ken Applegate wrote:
> The SCN message of the day had the results from last night's election:
> ... [names of new directors]
> If you go to the SCNA page, the only details of the meeting are a
> repeat of the above. I'm not sure we need to see the "gory details"
> of last night's meeting, but I *would* like to see an actual tally of
> the vote broken down by candidate and also total vote relative to
> total SCNA membership eligible to vote, and maybe a breakdown as to
> total votes at the meeting versus mailed in ballots. Hey, they do it
> for state and national elections, why not for SCNA? I for one would
> like to get a sense of how well our little slice of democracy is or
> isn't working.
> 
> What do the SCNA bylaws state about making the results of elections
> known?

Ken, 

   The vote totals are now up on the scna/election00 page, the
one that's linked from the SCN home page. There's an update flag
on the home page about it, and another on the SCNA page.

   The number of members who cast votes, the total number of
votes cast, and the number of votes for each candidate are
there. Sharma mentioned that she didn't record the number of
mailed-in ballots separately before counting all of the ballots
together, and that it would be inaccurate now to count only
those ballot cards with postmarks, because some came back in
envelopes and didn't have postmarks on the ballots themselves.
The bylaws don't go into detail about it.

Rod Clark

Following is the official text from Mel:

-----
ELECTION RESULTS

In response to the mailing and email to our membership (~800) we
received 126 total ballots (from mail in, meeting and proxy). With up
to 3 votes each we had up to 378 votes. Several of those ballots came
in with less than three votes, for a total of 366 votes all together,
broken down as follows:

  Tyler C. Folsom - 34
  Randy Hayhurst  - 37
  Rich Littleton  - 20
  Tim McCormack   - 73
  Janos Szablya   - 42
  Joel Ware, IV   - 68
  Liz White       - 92 

The count was performed immediately following the annual meeting, in
a private office up the street, with 5 board members and 2 nonboard
member volunters helping. The count was double checked for accuracy,
and the numbers balanced.

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From brian at happygardening.com  Wed Mar  1 10:30:49 2000
From: brian at happygardening.com (Brian High)
Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2000 10:30:49 -0800
Subject: SCN: What They Do Know Can Hurt You 
Message-ID: <001701bf83ac$44d7cc30$0200005a@happygardening.com>

X-No-Archive: Yes

============================================================================
         From the writer of "PGP: Pretty Good Privacy" (O'Reilly)
============================================================================

http://www.thenation.com/issue/000228/0228garfinkel.shtml

February 28, 2000
PRIVACY AND THE NEW TECHNOLOGY
What They Do Know Can Hurt You
by SIMSON GARFINKEL

<snip>

The most important contribution of the Richardson report was a bill of
rights for the computer age, which it called the Code of Fair Information
Practices. The code is based on five principles:

§ There must be no personal-data record-keeping system whose very existence
is secret.

§ There must be a way for a person to find out what information about the
person is in a record and how it is used.

§ There must be a way for a person to prevent information about the person
that was obtained for one purpose from being used or made available for
other purposes without the person's consent.

§ There must be a way for a person to correct or amend a record of
identifiable information about the person.

§ Any organization creating, maintaining, using or disseminating records of
identifiable personal data must assure the reliability of the data for their
intended use and must take precautions to prevent misuse of the data.


<snip>

One important step toward reversing the current direction of government
would be to create a permanent federal oversight agency charged with
protecting privacy. Such an agency would:

§ Watch over the government's tendency to sacrifice people's privacy for
other goals and perform governmentwide reviews of new federal programs for
privacy violations before they're launched.

§ Enforce the government's few existing privacy laws.

§ Be a guardian for individual privacy and liberty in the business world,
showing businesses how they can protect privacy and profits at the same
time.

§ Be an ombudsman for the American public and rein in the worst excesses
that our society has created.

Evan Hendricks, editor of the Washington-based newsletter Privacy Times,
estimates that a fifty-person privacy-protection agency could be created
with an annual budget of less than $5 million--a tiny drop in the federal
budget.

<snip>

============================================================================
============
This article is adapted by permission from Database Nation: The Death of
Privacy in the 21st Century (O'Reilly). Simson Garfinkel is a columnist for
the Boston Globe and a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society
at Harvard Law School.

Copyright ©2000 The Nation Company, L.P. All rights reserved. Unauthorized
redistribution is prohibited.

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From spt at scn.org  Wed Mar  1 17:26:05 2000
From: spt at scn.org (Seattle Public Theater)
Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2000 17:26:05 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Info request
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000301171413.7311A-100000@scn>

Hi,
We are using the Microsoft donaiton program to get software we need--but I
need some advice.  Can you please advise me:
--Windows 2000 Professional is available.  Can we use this on our little
pentiums?  
--If we choose Windows 98, we choose the upgrade from 95, right?

--MS BackOffice/MS Windows 2000Server
BackOffice says they have NT Server 4,0, IIS 4,0, Exhange Server 5,5,
Proxy Server 2.0, SNA Server 4.0, SQL serverr 7.0, Site server 3,0, SMS
2.0.  This all sounds likes I'm setting up an ISP if I get it.  I don't
know what these are, but I do know that we need to have adequate
compatibility with an ISP that will be doing ticketing for us.  Do I need
these to create an interface with an ISP/database?

Or, will that MS Windows 2000 server do that?

Or, where can I go to find out enough to make these decisions myself?

Thanks so much,
Barb


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From bb156 at scn.org  Wed Mar  1 17:31:37 2000
From: bb156 at scn.org (Andrew Higgins)
Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2000 17:31:37 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: OPS: A Preliminary Review of SSL
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003011634530.26576@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003011635400.26635-100000@scn>


2� 
2�    This may be true. But quite a number of responsibly run sites
2� do use LynxSSL. What exact steps would SCN have to undertake
2� before it could run LynxSSL with good results?
2� 
2� Rod
2� 


 JJ,

 First I'd like to thank you for the research into the question of SSL. I
 appreciate very much the time you spent looking into it. 

 I too wonder if there is something inherently unique or different about
 SCN's platform or structure that precludes implementation of SSL. If so
 what is it and how can we move beyond it.

 Rod mentions other systems that are using LynxSSL, perhaps some of them
 on a Unix platform. We might consult with them on how they are doing it.

 Or is it necessary to move to Linux or FreeBSD? There are plans afoot to
 do just that I believe. In the interim, why is a widely used and accepted
 standard for encryption unequivocally unsuitable for SCN?

 -Andrew

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From jj at scn.org  Thu Mar  2 00:38:40 2000
From: jj at scn.org (J. Johnson)
Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 00:38:40 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: OPS: A Preliminary Review of SSL
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003011635400.26635-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000301220426.15922A-100000@scn>

Taking Andrew's comment first, there is nothing about SCN's "platform"--
meaning hardware or operating system--that precludes encryption services
such as SSL.  The reason such services are "unsuitable for SCN" (at least
at the current time) can be taken from Rod's comment:  "responsibly run". 

As I pointed out in the original post to the 'hardware' list, it is ill
advised to run any kind of encryption service on a multi-user networked
host.  Not that it cannot be done, for nearly any fool can fire up a web
server, call it "secure", and offer services.  But to do so responsibly
(to not cruelly deceive people with a parody of security)  requires an
attentiveness to security that SCN has just not been able to attain.

Rod asks, "What exact steps would SCN have to undertake before it could
run LynxSSL with good results?"  I don't know.  The best approach might be
to just do PPP, and let the users do SSL on their own machines (with SCN
being just a conduit).  As to PPP:  well, I think I could turn it on in
about twenty minutes.  But Rod did say, "with good results", and that
depends on a lot of other work, so again:  I don't know.  I wanted to work
on a key element of that tonight, but once again the several hours I had
for SCN have just slipped away.

What's to be done?  I don't know.  While technical work is involved, the
failure to get it done seems to be non-technical.  There are certainly
problems in Operations--even if we are upaid volunteers I think we should
be doing better.  I would very much like someone (Andrew? Rod?) to
"consult"  with some other freenets and see how they get work done with
unpaid staff.  But I think we also have organizational problems
(especially when I consider how much time I put into non-technical issues
here).  And that is a Board issue--which the Board refuses to address. 

So what can I tell you?  That I'm working on it, go bug someone else?
That your expectations outreach our capabilities?  Or go find out how
how other freenets do and tell me?  Or that we will have grown-up services
when we grow up?  After several hours of cogitation:  I still don't know.

(And I hope the rest of you can carry this discussion without me because I
really would like to do the technical stuff instead.) 

=== JJ =================================================================

On Wed, 1 Mar 2000, Rod Clark wrote:

> [....]
>    This may be true. But quite a number of responsibly run sites
> do use LynxSSL. What exact steps would SCN have to undertake
> before it could run LynxSSL with good results?
> 
> Rod

On Wed, 1 Mar 2000, Andrew Higgins wrote:

>  [....]
>  I too wonder if there is something inherently unique or different about
>  SCN's platform or structure that precludes implementation of SSL. If so
>  what is it and how can we move beyond it.
> 
>  Rod mentions other systems that are using LynxSSL, perhaps some of them
>  on a Unix platform. We might consult with them on how they are doing it.
> 
>  Or is it necessary to move to Linux or FreeBSD? There are plans afoot to
>  do just that I believe. In the interim, why is a widely used and accepted
>  standard for encryption unequivocally unsuitable for SCN?
> 
>  -Andrew
> 




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From randy at scn.org  Thu Mar  2 09:43:46 2000
From: randy at scn.org (Randy Groves)
Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 09:43:46 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: OPS: A Preliminary Review of SSL
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000301220426.15922A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003020940360.12959-100000@scn>


I think we're getting off track here.  There is NO NEED to worry about
user certificates here.  The ONLY thing that we need to do is enable Lynx
to verify a site's SSL certificate to establish an encrypted session.
This is what is known as an 'anonymous' SSL connection.  The host is the
only part of the connection that is supplying a certificate.  Typically,
there isn't even a request to the browser user to verify that they want to
accept the certificate.

If we get into CLIENT authentication, then we start to worry about
security of certificates, but not before.

-randy


On Thu, 2 Mar 2000, J. Johnson wrote:

> Taking Andrew's comment first, there is nothing about SCN's "platform"--
> meaning hardware or operating system--that precludes encryption services
> such as SSL.  The reason such services are "unsuitable for SCN" (at least
> at the current time) can be taken from Rod's comment:  "responsibly run". 
> 
> As I pointed out in the original post to the 'hardware' list, it is ill
> advised to run any kind of encryption service on a multi-user networked
> host.  Not that it cannot be done, for nearly any fool can fire up a web
> server, call it "secure", and offer services.  But to do so responsibly
> (to not cruelly deceive people with a parody of security)  requires an
> attentiveness to security that SCN has just not been able to attain.
> 
> Rod asks, "What exact steps would SCN have to undertake before it could
> run LynxSSL with good results?"  I don't know.  The best approach might be
> to just do PPP, and let the users do SSL on their own machines (with SCN
> being just a conduit).  As to PPP:  well, I think I could turn it on in
> about twenty minutes.  But Rod did say, "with good results", and that
> depends on a lot of other work, so again:  I don't know.  I wanted to work
> on a key element of that tonight, but once again the several hours I had
> for SCN have just slipped away.
> 
> What's to be done?  I don't know.  While technical work is involved, the
> failure to get it done seems to be non-technical.  There are certainly
> problems in Operations--even if we are upaid volunteers I think we should
> be doing better.  I would very much like someone (Andrew? Rod?) to
> "consult"  with some other freenets and see how they get work done with
> unpaid staff.  But I think we also have organizational problems
> (especially when I consider how much time I put into non-technical issues
> here).  And that is a Board issue--which the Board refuses to address. 
> 
> So what can I tell you?  That I'm working on it, go bug someone else?
> That your expectations outreach our capabilities?  Or go find out how
> how other freenets do and tell me?  Or that we will have grown-up services
> when we grow up?  After several hours of cogitation:  I still don't know.
> 
> (And I hope the rest of you can carry this discussion without me because I
> really would like to do the technical stuff instead.) 
> 
> === JJ =================================================================

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From randy at scn.org  Thu Mar  2 09:51:28 2000
From: randy at scn.org (Randy Groves)
Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 09:51:28 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: Info request
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000301171413.7311A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003020947420.12959-100000@scn>


What are you trying to do?  If all you want to do is set up a web site and
drive a fairly small database, then all you need would be Windows 2000
server and Access 2000.  All the other stuff in BackOffice is overkill -
and BackOffice won't run on Windows 2000 for some months.

I would definitely start out with Windows 2000.  It is much more stable,
and the support of additional drivers and other devices is fairly
automatic.

There is a concern, however as to the size of your machine.  I have run
Windows 2000 on a Pentium 133 with success.  It is somewhat slow, but runs
just fine.  You will need at LEAST 128 MB of memory, more if you can get
it.

If you are going to try ANY Windows variant on a slower machine with less
memory - you will be disappointed.

-randy


On Wed, 1 Mar 2000, Seattle Public Theater wrote:

> Hi,
> We are using the Microsoft donaiton program to get software we need--but I
> need some advice.  Can you please advise me:
> --Windows 2000 Professional is available.  Can we use this on our little
> pentiums?  
> --If we choose Windows 98, we choose the upgrade from 95, right?
> 
> --MS BackOffice/MS Windows 2000Server
> BackOffice says they have NT Server 4,0, IIS 4,0, Exhange Server 5,5,
> Proxy Server 2.0, SNA Server 4.0, SQL serverr 7.0, Site server 3,0, SMS
> 2.0.  This all sounds likes I'm setting up an ISP if I get it.  I don't
> know what these are, but I do know that we need to have adequate
> compatibility with an ISP that will be doing ticketing for us.  Do I need
> these to create an interface with an ISP/database?
> 
> Or, will that MS Windows 2000 server do that?
> 
> Or, where can I go to find out enough to make these decisions myself?
> 
> Thanks so much,
> Barb
> 
> 
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From kurt at grogatch.seaslug.org  Thu Mar  2 12:02:01 2000
From: kurt at grogatch.seaslug.org (Kurt Cockrum)
Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 12:02:01 -0800
Subject: SCN: Re: OPS: A Preliminary Review of SSL
Message-ID: <200003022002.MAA20648@grogatch.seaslug.org>

jj said:
>Taking Andrew's comment first, there is nothing about SCN's "platform"--
>meaning hardware or operating system--that precludes encryption services
>such as SSL.  The reason such services are "unsuitable for SCN" (at least
>at the current time) can be taken from Rod's comment:  "responsibly run". 

Don't *anybody* get the impression from the above that OPS is "irresponsibly
run".  We do the best we can under the circumstances, which are basically
the same as somebody who's homeless and trying to be a responsible citizen
at the same time.

>What's to be done?  I don't know.  While technical work is involved, the
>failure to get it done seems to be non-technical.  There are certainly
>problems in Operations--even if we are upaid volunteers I think we should
>be doing better.

For sure, we seem to be stuck.
If we had some decent *support* we could do *lots* better.
If we could identify barriers to us doing a better job (besides
examining our own inadequacies, which we are doing), and had
the services of *facilitators* who could understand what we are
talking about, and who could actually *help* us overcome them,
instead of just *sympathize*, we could do lots better.
OPS basically supports the rest of SCN,
but if there is reciprocal support (more significant than just
"atta boy", and "there, there, that's OK"), it's below *my* radar screen.

>                  I would very much like someone (Andrew? Rod?) to
>"consult"  with some other freenets and see how they get work done with
>unpaid staff.

A start would be finding out if there is a technical freenet list,
and somebody getting on it.
Another is to find out what the relationships are between other OPS
groups and their BODs are.  This might be kind of hard to do.

>               But I think we also have organizational problems
>(especially when I consider how much time I put into non-technical issues
>here).  And that is a Board issue--which the Board refuses to address. 

And unfortunately, they can now trot out the excuse that they have to
devote all their energy to the lawsuit.
True or not, I expect they will get a *lot* of mileage out of that one!

IMO at this particular point in time, for us to "grow up" in terms
of what we offer to our users, and how we respond to their legitimate
demands, we have to have "grown-up" access to the physical plant.
Improving security remotely over a wire has its *limits*, which we have
reached.  But basically, making the *wire* *itself* secure requires 24/7
access to the hardware and physical plant.  A lot of the low-level stuff,
like tripwire installation and the like, *require* *lots* of low-level
and sustained hands-on access to the hardware, which requires decent
access to the physical plant.  It can't be faked or "virtualized".

And it can't be done under the near battle-conditions we currently have
to operate under, with gate-keepers, non-negotiable agreements,
cinderalla-style time-limits, telnet access over unsecured links, and
all the other time-sinks and hurdles every inch of the way.

For years we've been making do without it, and it's obvious to the
whole world.  We gotta get past "making do".

OPS has camped out in the rain for 8 years *before* the lawsuit, and and
all we have to show for that is a shaky, fragile, distant relationship
with SPL that is liable to fall apart any moment, considering the
transitions they are making, and our place on their priority list.
Not only that, I hear that *their* OPS is getting screwed in the battle
for space, too.  This is like the homeless shelter losing its lease.

I think I've identified the main show-stopper that keeps OPS from delivering
the goods.  Change or mitigate *that* and we could really get moving...
But I'm not holding my breath; instead, I'm getting ready for another
8 years in the rain :( :(

Maybe we should've invited *Slade* *Gorton* to be on the BOD.  He may
be totally evil, but he's the most effective politician in the PNW
and he sure can deliver the goods!  (just a little gallows humor there :)
--kurt
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From bb156 at scn.org  Thu Mar  2 14:32:06 2000
From: bb156 at scn.org (Andrew Higgins)
Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 14:32:06 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re:
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003021425540.13904@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003021428160.14566-100000@scn>


On Thu, 2 Mar 2000, Kurt Cockrum wrote:

2� 
2� A start would be finding out if there is a technical freenet list,
2� and somebody getting on it.
2� 

Found one. Don't know how active it is...

-Andrew

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To subscribe to the Freenet-Tech List, send a message to the address
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From jj at scn.org  Thu Mar  2 21:27:46 2000
From: jj at scn.org (J. Johnson)
Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 21:27:46 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Responsibility (was: Re: A Preliminary Review of SSL)
In-Reply-To: <200003022002.MAA20648@grogatch.seaslug.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000302202809.5215C-100000@scn>

Is Operations "irresponsible"?  Kurt's comment is very profound.  Keep in
mind that "irresponsible" does _not_ mean (as is popularly misconceived) 
to fail in or avoid responsibility.  It means (primarily) not being liable
to be called to account or held answerable.  

For example, suppose that one of our disk partitions keeps filling up
(let's call it '/home0'), and that when it does sendmail starts crashing
when it attempts delivery to users on /home0.  Who's responsible for
fixing this?  Surprise--no one!  Because we have never fixed any
responsibility.  So how can _anyone_ be irresponsible in not attending to
it?  (Hey, not me--I didn't cause it!  I'm not responsible!!!)

That is the point of the quote from J. S. Mill I posted last fall:  every
function needs to be "the appointed the duty of some individual. ...
Responsibility is null when nobody knows who is responsible."

As to who _should_ be responsible for various matters:  well, who should
be responsible for determining that?  And why would anyone voluntarily
sign up to be nailed to a door? 

=== JJ =================================================================

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From steve at advocate.net  Thu Mar  2 23:16:32 2000
From: steve at advocate.net (Steve)
Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 23:16:32 -0800
Subject: SCN: ICANN
Message-ID: <200003030717.XAA24384@scn.org>

x-no-archive: yes

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

Report Sees Major Hurdles for Internet Election  

by Jeri Clausing   

(NY Times)---An international plan to create the Internet's first 
democracy is plagued by skepticism, conflicting goals and a lack of 
accountability, which will make it nearly impossible for the Internet's 
new oversight organization to hold a fair election in September, 
according to a report to be released on Friday.  

The report stops short of recommending that the organization, the 
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), 
postpone its September election, which will ultimately determine the 
final 9 members on its 18-seat board. But it clearly states that major 
improvements should be made before the group proceeds with its 
plan to let individual computer users around the world vote, and 
before the group can earn the legitimacy that it needs to move 
forward.  

"This plan is clearly not ready for prime time," said Jerry Berman, 
executive director of the Center for Democracy and Technology, 
which wrote the report with Common Cause, both public interests 
groups based in Washington.  

Esther Dyson, interim chairwoman of ICANN, called the report 
sensible but said the board would not postpone the election.  

"The basic message from them is, go slow," she said. "And our 
basic message is we have got to move forward. We agree with you 
that it is experimental and we are putting in as many checks and 
balances as we can."  

Dyson, who made her comments in a telephone interview from 
Britain, added: "Let's stop fooling around. This has been going on 
long enough. We need to make mistakes to correct them. There is 
no way to avoid mistakes because we are moving into new turf. But 
we can work to minimize them."  

ICANN's proposal would allow any Internet user over the age of 16 
who has an e-mail and postal address to participate in the 
international election of a special council, which in turn would 
appoint the nine board members.  

The key problems with that plan are a lack of understanding about 
what ICANN's mission is and the absence of controls to keep the 
election council from being captured by special interests.  

"Until these fundamental concerns are fully addressed, this election 
will not be able to confer the consent of the governed onto ICANN," 
the report states. "Instead, the initial election can only be viewed as 
an experiment in democracy that must be re-evaluated if it is ever to 
confer legitimacy."  

The report recommends that ICANN change its rules to allow for 
direct elections. But Dyson said that would not happen.  

"That decision has been made," she said. "I think the board is very 
open to iterative improvements as we go along. But we are moving 
forward."  

The groups will officially present their findings to ICANN at its board 
meeting next week in Cairo. Although the report details widespread 
skepticism and problems with the election plan, Berman said it is 
intended to be a resource that will help ICANN and other interested 
parties debate the issues and reach a consensus on how to improve 
them.  

Their main message, the reports authors say, is to place the goal of 
holding effective elections ahead of the goal of completing them by 
September.  

"There is a way to do these elections in a way that would be fair and 
efficient," said Scott Harshbarger, president of Common Cause. "We 
are urging them to take some time and take the opportunity to use 
Cairo to really discuss this."  

The study was commission through a grant from the Markle 
Foundation last year. Markle officials, who have committed a $1 
million in grants to help advance public interest in Internet 
governance issues, said they would not take a position on the 
report, although the group was pleased with its depth.  

"In a short time they not only thought through some very difficult 
issues, but they really succeeded in getting input from key 
constituencies, including nonprofits, academics and industry 
groups, international advocates and experts in democracy and 
voting systems," said Andrew Shapiro, a senior advisor at the 
foundation.  

ICANN was selected by the Clinton administration in late 1998 to 
administer the Internet's addressing, or domain name system, 
which was previously run by federal contractors.  

Initially operating under the direction of an interim board appointed 
by a small group of Internet founders and insiders, ICANN's main 
charge was to introduce competition into the business of registering 
domain names and to build a membership that represents the global 
Internet community.  

For the past year and a half, however, most of its organizational 
energy has focused on creating three so-called "supporting 
organizations" of business groups that will provide the bulk of 
financing for the nonprofit group. Those constituencies were 
officially recognized last year and their board members installed 
last fall.  

So the last big task for ICANN's initial board is to create the at-large 
constituency to elect the board members who will replace them. And 
that is no small feat. With a limited budget and just a few 
employees, the organization has been the victim of constant tension 
between groups pushing it move faster and others urging it to slow 
down.  

The at-large election debate in Cairo will likely be no different. Under 
pressure by both its own bylaws and those who have in the past 
criticized its lack of official representation of noncommercial 
interests, ICANN last week launched a Web site where computer 
users can register to become members. Those registrations, 
however, are tentative, with the understanding that final details 
about exactly who qualifies, whether they will be required to pay a 
fee and how their voices will be counted -- through a direct election 
or a council -- will be resolved in Cairo.  

And while the report recommends specific changes like those 
involving election procedures, Berman and Harshbarger said even 
more fundamental questions need to be answered by ICANN before 
such a vote should proceed.  

Specifically, they said, ICANN needs to more clearly define what its 
mission is and adopt language that limits its scope of power.  

While ICANN's official mission is to oversee the operations of the 
domain name system, one of its first policy decisions last year was 
to lay down rules for resolving "cybersquatting" cases, which 
involve disputes over the use of trademarks in domain names.  

That has caused widespread confusion about the scope of ICANN's 
power, Berman said. "They've got a mission problem," Berman 
said. "There are millions of potential voters. They are saying, 'Join 
our bottoms-up organization,' which is fine. But they have not 
clarified for the world what ICANN's mission is. And it is very difficult 
to have an election without knowing what the mission is and very 
difficult to govern without knowing what their mission is."

Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company 





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From bb615 at scn.org  Thu Mar  2 23:31:34 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2000 23:31:34 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Responsibility (was: Re: A Preliminary Review of SSL)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000302202809.5215C-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000302224038.16389B-100000@scn>

> For example, suppose that one of our disk partitions keeps filling
> up (let's call it '/home0'), and that when it does sendmail starts
> crashing when it attempts delivery to users on /home0. Who's
> responsible for fixing this? Surprise--no one!

JJ, 

   That sure rings a bell. I untarred a file in home0/webadm the
other day, and it filled up all available space, so I had to
delete the whole thing and punt.

   /dev/sd5g             963223  818630   48271    94%    /home0
   /dev/sd0e            1849982       9 1664975     0%    /home8
   /dev/sd0f            1849982       9 1664975     0%    /home9
   /dev/sd1a            1849982       9 1664975     0%    /home10
   /dev/sd1d            1849982       9 1664975     0%    /home11

   How can I or others here help and support you in doing this,
since you made it clear in your note that you weren't able to do
this as a typical routine part of normal everyday maintenance?

   What was the reason for the lack of success when you tried
doing this earlier, before sending the message requesting our
help? 

   Can you move /home0 to one of the larger empty partitions
listed above, without disrupting or rebooting the system? If the
machine needs to be rebooted, when have you scheduled this?

   Thanks for anything that you can do about this, or have
already done. 

Rod

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From jj at scn.org  Fri Mar  3 18:42:39 2000
From: jj at scn.org (J. Johnson)
Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 18:42:39 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Responsibility (was: Re: A Preliminary Review of SSL)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000302224038.16389B-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000303165003.15829F-100000@scn>

The question is:  who has _responsibility_?  I wrote:
> > For example, suppose that one of our disk partitions keeps filling
> > up (let's call it '/home0') ....
> > Who's responsible for fixing this?

And then Rod wrote:
>    That sure rings a bell. I untarred a file in home0/webadm the
> other day, and it filled up all available space, so I had to
> delete the whole thing and punt.

  You have to give Rod credit--he's not shy of stepping up and possibly
catching a bullet. 

  However, the _fault_ (and any inferred duty of fixing the problem) is
not Rod's. There's some 130 users on /home0.  One has some 270 MB
allocated, another has 90 MB, and some half-dozen others (all old-time SCN
volunteers) have over 20 MB.  Rod isn't even in the running.

So what to do?  Well, that biggest user is majordomo, with its archives of
all the SCN mailing lists.  Do we tell people to send less list mail?  Or
do we dump some archives?  ("Whoaa", someone says, "that's a policy
issue!".  So what is policy, and who determines it?)  The second biggest
user says he's saving a lot of files of historical importance to SCN--and
who am I to say different to him?  Or to anyone else?  

I would not feel shy about deleting a particular file whose presence was
obviously (??) impairing system performance.  But how can any one of the
900+ MB of files on /home0 be held more at fault that any other?  

Rod asks how he can support me "in doing this".  Thanks, but doing what? 
Enforcing disk quotas?  The shell users don't have any!  And why me?  I've
taken on some system administration tasks, but does that stick me with
the rest?  

My point is:  _no one_ is required to do anything about this, or is
answerable for the problem, because that responsibility has never been
assigned.  (And the problem doesn't overly concern me much as my files are
on a different partition.) 

(I believe Rod was looking at having /home0 moved to a larger partition. 
Well, that's a possible solution, albeit temporary, and I believe Randy
has been considering that.  But my point remains:  neither Randy, nor I,
nor anyone else is required to do anything about this problem.)

As to the 130 some users on /home0, I would offer the same response that
the Board gave me when I tried to get some responsibilities assigned:
work it out amongst yourselves.  You've all got a stake in a shared
resource, you have a language in common, so with liberal democratic
theory and the latest in economic thinking, surely you can come up
with a plan so cogent that some of you will voluntarily delete files to
make room for everyone.  It's a piece of cake, right?

=== JJ =================================================================



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From bb615 at scn.org  Fri Mar  3 19:06:06 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 19:06:06 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Responsibility (was: Re: A Preliminary Review of SSL)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000303165003.15829F-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000303185027.18772A-100000@scn>

> (I believe Rod was looking at having /home0 moved to a larger
> partition. Well, that's a possible solution, albeit temporary, and
> I believe Randy has been considering that. But my point remains:
> neither Randy, nor I, nor anyone else is required to do anything
> about this problem.)

JJ, 

   Several of the empty homeN partitions are each twice as large
as the current home0/ parition. It's taken six years to fill up
the current one, mostly with with all the mailing list archives.
I'd be happy enough if a "temporary" doubling of the available
space would last for another two years, or even one year.

   The point is that this is an immediate problem that is
impacting mail service. Randy is on vacation in the San Juans or
somewhere until next week. This is obviously something that
Randy would do, on a normal day. And I can see from your message
that you would like to fix it if you could. But I can also see
(or guess) that you consider this a job for someone more
knowledgeable about how this particular machine is set up, and
that you're asking for someone who is more of an SCN guru to do
it, likely because of some possible difficulties or dangers
involved.

   So who would you suggest, as your first and second choices
among people who you believe could do it safely? Then can you
contact those people and work it out, or are we really and truly
stuck until Randy gets back? Hope that isn't the case, and you
can work with some people to repair this. In the process, some
knowledge transfer to a wider range of Ops people would be good
too. Thanks for your concern and efforts about this.

Rod

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From jj at scn.org  Fri Mar  3 20:20:04 2000
From: jj at scn.org (J. Johnson)
Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 20:20:04 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Responsibility (was: Re: A Preliminary Review of SSL)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000303185027.18772A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000303191915.15829K-100000@scn>

On Fri, 3 Mar 2000, Rod Clark wrote:

> > (I believe Rod was looking at having /home0 moved to a larger
> > partition. Well, that's a possible solution, albeit temporary, and
> > I believe Randy has been considering that. But my point remains:
> > neither Randy, nor I, nor anyone else is required to do anything
> > about this problem.)
> 

> ... that you would like to fix it if you could. ....

  Sure.  But this is just one piddling problem, and you are missing my
point.  Why should _I_ have to "fix" this, or any other, particular
problem?  I am not obliged to do so (and am quite overbooked with the
obligations I have undertaken regarding our many other problems).  Why not
jump on Kurt? (He was the last person to touch majordomo.)  Why not the
biggest users of /home0?  (I have already urged them to delete or compress
files.)  Where does it say that I, or anyone else, is obligated to fix
this?  

If the users on /home0 are pinched for space, why don't they just delete
(or compress) a few files?  Why can't these users just work matters out
themselves?  

(Mind that this one particular problem stands proxy to how to deal with
problems in general on SCN.)

(Also [**Rod! please note!**] I have just deleted a few files that no one
is likely to miss, freeing up another one percent of space, so this is
_not_ an immediate problem.)

=== JJ =================================================================

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From bb615 at scn.org  Sat Mar  4 03:58:44 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Sat, 4 Mar 2000 03:58:44 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Responsibility (was: Re: A Preliminary Review of SSL)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000303191915.15829K-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000304030825.27990A-100000@scn>

> If the users on /home0 are pinched for space, why don't they just
> delete (or compress) a few files? Why can't these users just work
> matters out themselves?

JJ, 

   The users as an amorphous group of people can't do system
administration. We actually have gobs of space. It just isn't
being allocated as usefully as it could be, if we had more
system administration going on to keep things well maintained.

   It mostly comes down to not having enough sysadmin time,
which on a system this size means not enough people. You've said
that you're overbooked, and everyone knows that's true, and
sympathizes with that. So there's a stopgap fix on this now,
when a more long-term answer like moving the partition to a
partition that is twice as large would have taken more time.

   This is typical of the kind of system administration that has
accumulated on SCN for years. It has got us into the situation
that not long ago, some very good people (Cere and Steve) who
are used to working on standard well maintained systems, had to
spend about 100 hours fighting all the hundreds of little
problems that prevented them from installing some software that
would have been of great benefit to SCN to install, if they
could have completed doing it. It should have been quick and
easy, but instead it was a nightmare for them, and both of them
were burned out by the experience to the extent that they took a
six month hiatus from trying to work with this on SCN's system
again.

> (Mind that this one particular problem stands proxy to how to deal
> with problems in general on SCN.)

   That's a pithy and relevant observation. Because of not ever
having time to do it right, we have taken years now to build one
of the most band-aid ridden and nonsensically accreted together
systems that I've ever seen.

   And this is coming home to roost. It means that we can't find
volunteers now who can step in and install on SCN complex
software that they're familiar with, because of a myriad of
issues that aren't right with our system. It means that in the
rush of many different people getting many, many things
hurriedly patched up in the short run, there has been a lack of
overall system administration of the kind that always keeps in
mind the need to maintain standardization and adherence to best
practices over time, and along with it enough people management
so that various people don't keep doing stuff that doesn't
accord with that.
   
   So with Randy stepping down, and a new system to design and
keep in good order, we need a new head system administrator, and
some planning. You can help a great deal, but I believe you
haven't been responsible for a large system before where these
issues become very important over time, and because of that your
comments in this thread reflect good intentions combined with a
lesser amount of supervisory experience. At this point we need
someone who has that. So we need to recruit someone, unless one
of the more experienced commercial or university sysadmins here
(Troy, Bob H., Scot, Steve G., - it's 3:30 AM and I must have
forgotten some others) magically has enough time to devote to
this.

   Rhodes is working on this and many other things, and
commented at Excomm that he wished he could clone himself. So
could some of you consult with Rhodes and help with whatever
particular recruiting plan he is drawing up?

> (Also [**Rod! please note!**] I have just deleted a few files that no one
> is likely to miss, freeing up another one percent of space, so this is
> _not_ an immediate problem.)

   It will be as soon as webadm tries to untar that file again.
I still can't do that without filling all available space on
home0. This is now back to exactly where it was a few days ago
when we were having the initial problems with it.

   /dev/sd5g             963223  811169   55732    94%    /home0

   Do whatever makes most sense in the short run. But as you
noted above, in a wider perspective this is not a short run
problem, and we do need Operations management who has (or have)
a coherent plan to take SCN's systems from this kind of
situation to a well managed one.

Rod

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From steve at advocate.net  Sun Mar  5 09:17:30 2000
From: steve at advocate.net (Steve)
Date: Sun, 5 Mar 2000 09:17:30 -0800
Subject: SCN: Dropouts
Message-ID: <38C2262A.10325.566A93@localhost>

x-no-archive: yes

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

Who Needs a Diploma? Why the high-tech industry wants dropouts.

by Mark Wallace

(NY Times)---A couple of years ago, just before Dan Hammans 
dropped out of high school, his guidance counselor told him that he 
would never earn more than $15,000 a year, that he would never 
hold a job for more than six months at a time and that, to put it 
plainly, he would never amount to anything. "He pretty much told me 
I was a loser," Dan says. He is sitting in his 1999 Mitsubishi 
Eclipse, which is fire-engine red, cost $23,000 and boasts 210 
horsepower off the factory floor -- though with Dan's modifications, 
that's up to 260. Dan is on his way home from a job at which he 
earns roughly $1,600 every two weeks, or about $25,000 more each 
year than a certain Mr. Sternberg of Gilbert High School in Iowa 
would have thought possible.   

"What the heck?" Dan mutters at a passing car. "That's a real 
interesting body kit. It's got Ferrari side skirts or something." When 
traffic is light (and the Eclipse running well), the drive to Richardson, 
where Dan lives, just outside of Dallas, takes about 15 minutes door 
to door, though on bad days it can take more than an hour. 
Commuting is one of the small annoyances Dan has learned to put 
up with in his new life as a computer networking engineer, though it 
is clearly not as frustrating as walking a mile through subzero Iowa 
winters to grade school. Such experiences, Dan says, help explain 
his preoccupation with fast cars. There is that, of course, and then 
there is the fact that he is 19. "I'm also fascinated by traffic 
patterns," he says after being cut off by another driver. "It reminds 
me of fluid dynamics."   

Mr. Sternberg can perhaps be forgiven his pessimism: in the United 
States, 25-year-old male high school dropouts make less than 
$25,000 a year, on average. Their compatriots with high-school 
diplomas make only about $31,000, the same starting salary as 
college graduates with engineering degrees.   

The Department of Education does not compile data for 19-year-old 
high school dropouts with a natural working knowledge of computer 
systems who teach themselves fluid dynamics in order to design 
airflow parts for their new cars. But perhaps they should: more and 
more American teenagers are forgoing college educations or even 
dropping out of high schools to "drop in" to jobs created by the 
technological revolution. "I've talked to some people who go to 
college," says Anthony Yarbrough, 19, a network engineer who 
graduated from high school last year. "They say, 'O.K., we read this 
book all day; we get to do a little of this.' From what they're telling 
me, I'm learning a lot more just working than I would've in the 
college system."   

Bonnie Halper, whose high-tech placement firm, Sendresume.com, 
occasionally finds jobs for such young people, says: "When I look 
at some of the resumes that I get from people right out of college, I 
think, Why are they teaching you these useless technologies?" Dan 
and Anthony, by contrast, learned their skills not in classrooms but 
in pursuit of the passions that grip so many teenagers these days: 
computer games, digital music, video editing, computer animation 
and film. They are hobbyists whose hobby just happens to be part of 
the fastest-growing industry on the planet, and they are learning to 
take advantage of it.   

Though Dan wouldn't like to admit it, we are lost. It is early 
afternoon, and a brief stretch of President George Bush Turnpike 
(estimated completion date: 2004) stands weirdly overhead to the 
left, connecting one patch of flat Texas sky to another. Orange 
detour cones have left us well north of the customer we are to see, 
but Verio, the company for which Dan works, gives him 31 cents a 
mile to take the Eclipse on site visits, and we've skipped lunch to 
arrive on time.   

At the site, a long, low concrete commercial block that houses a 
telecoms company, we are led through an open-plan cubicle warren 
so vast that the paths between cubes have been given street 
names. Just off Crowley Avenue, between Colleyville Road and 
Clyde Boulevard, sits the "electrical room," where Dan is to test 
three network lines. To do this, he has brought a small device known 
as a router, with which he will "ping" a similar device back at the 
office, some 15 miles away.   

Routers are the traffic cops of the Internet, guiding countless bits of 
information between computers, e-mail servers and Web sites 
around the globe. An intimate knowledge of routers comes in handy 
at Verio, one of the largest Web-site hosting companies in the world, 
but this is a knowledge Dan has only imperfectly at present. Most of 
his morning was spent back at Verio trying to get the two routers to 
talk to each other -- though at one point there was a break to check 
out a new screen saver, based on "The Matrix" ("awesome," in 
Dan's estimation).   

At the site visit, the problem is solved with a call to Dan's boss, but 
the morning has not been in vain. This is what passes for training in 
an industry that moves too quickly for textbooks and knows precious 
few rules. "When I got this job," Dan says, "they'd ask me, 'Do you 
know how to do this?' And I'd say, 'No, but I will by the time I get it 
done."'   

That Dan came to Verio with gaps in his skill set is fine with his 
boss. "I learned stuff on the job from scratch, which is the way I feel 
people should learn their jobs," Ric Moseley says. "I'm not sure 
Dan's quite as mature as he needs to be -- a lot of that maturity I 
think is learned in college -- but four years anywhere is going to do 
something to you, being out on your own for the first time, meeting 
new people, having to deal with different situations by yourself. 
Which is what he's doing now."   

The network test takes only a few minutes, and Dan is back in the 
office by 4 o'clock. "I'm going to be glad when this day's over," Dan 
says. "I guess I'm always just paranoid about doing things wrong."   

I first met Dan in Manhattan, where he was competing in a 
professional computer gamers' tournament. A past champion, Dan 
estimates he has garnered almost $100,000 in cash, prizes and 
endorsements since he began competing in 1995. Computer games 
have also been Dan's ticket to the job market. He learned his 
networking skills at "LAN parties" in the mid-90's, wiring friends' 
computers into Local Area Networks for all-night sessions of video 
games like Quake. (Ric Moseley, who is 28, learned his trade the 
same way.)   

And even in the Internet age, it is whom you know. Dan landed his 
first job in Dallas, testing computer games, through contacts made 
at Quake tournaments. In March 1999, he moved out of his parents' 
house and joined the skilled labor force. Most of us take much 
longer to reach that point. For Dan, it came when he was barely old 
enough to vote.   

Teenagers, of course, have been dropping out for as long as 
schools have been in session. While most probably still become 
manual laborers or minimum-wage toilers, our fast, new information-
age economy allows some dropouts to move along productive paths 
rather than simply run from age-old conflicts. Like Dan, some even 
seem to be doing both. "It really was hard having a pager in high 
school," says Michael Menefee, a 21-year-old product developer 
who dropped out of college after just a few months. "The principal 
would say, 'I'll just hold this for you, and if you get a page, I'll come 
get you.' Well, that's not the point. The point is, I'm making more 
than my teachers."   

Still, as Dan's mother, Alice Hammans, says, dropping out is no 
guarantee of a good job: "You don't get something for nothing. 
Daniel hasn't just begun in the work world without first acquiring a 
lot of knowledge." His schooling in computers, in fact, began around 
the age of 3, when his father got a Commodore 64, one of the first 
home-computer systems. By 7, Dan was programming in Basic. In 
high school -- just as the World Wide Web was exploding into 
America's consciousness -- Dan got a part-time job at a local 
Internet service provider. Dan describes his childhood as happy, 
sort of, until he got into school. "Dan had a really hard time in grade 
school," his mother says, "so he just chose an alternate path. 
Luckily, because of everything that he has internally, he was able to 
make it."   

Other "drop-ins" echo Dan's frustration. "I was always one of those 
people who sat there and argued with my teachers about why I 
should be in school all the time," says Matt Levine, who, at 18, has 
decided that starting an Internet-based media company is more 
important than college. "I looked at the opportunity and the 
opportunity cost, and sort of went where my heart desired, at least 
for the moment."   

Furthermore, says Peter Pathos, founder and chief executive of 
Theplanet.com, a Dallas start-up specializing in "advanced" Web 
hosting, "Right now, I think there's much more opportunity diving 
into the phenomenon than going to college." Pathos employs both 
Anthony Yarbrough and Michael Menefee, as well as other "drop-in" 
young adults. "There's almost a gap between the ones you catch 
right out of high school and the ones who've been used up and 
burned out by the time they're 21 or 22 by the high-tech jobs," he 
says of his employees. "The younger ones are some of the most 
talented people."   

It's a busy Friday night, and Dan is having dinner at Campisi's 
Egyptian with his girlfriend, Wendy, an 18-year-old pre-med student 
at the University of Texas, and his roommate, Mike, a 23-year-old 
college dropout who works in computer game design, something 
Dan hopes one day to pursue. The place is aclatter with waiters and 
barmen and locals cheering the Dallas Stars, but none of this seems 
to reach Dan, who is lost in a video game on the tiny screen of his 
cellular phone. "Take this away from me," he tells Mike, after we 
have put off ordering a second time. The episode sparks a 
reminiscence of early video games and the Commodore 64's Dan 
and Mike both owned as children. "We had one we actually used for 
a stepping stool," Mike says, "because it was so solid." Dan 
describes with pride loading games onto the Commodore system at 
the age of 4, which involved typing commands his father had printed 
on the disk. Though he couldn't yet read, he was able to copy letters 
well enough to get the computer to play the game.   

"Even back then," Mike says, "even when we didn't know anything 
about computers, I always thought it was silly that it didn't just load 
the game, that you had to type something." It is a small point, but a 
telling one. When the Commodore 64 came along, those of us old 
enough to read followed the instructions. But Dan and Mike are 
unburdened by such received wisdom. They are first-generation 
citizens of the information age, not immigrants to it, and are 
intuitively familiar with its language and its ways. We who 
remember the dawn of the personal computer may feel that the 
future has at long last arrived, but Dan and Mike were born into that 
future. It is nothing more exciting than their present day.   

Though Dan is currently wrapping up his G.E.D., his education is not 
over yet. With Verio's help, he plans to go after a Cisco Certified 
Internetwork Expert certificate, the information-age equivalent of an 
M.B.A. According to Cisco, the starting salary for the 2,000 or so 
C.C.I.E.'s awarded thus far in the United States is roughly $75,000. 
Even without a Cisco certification, it's impossible to tell how far Dan 
could go in the high-tech job market, where brain sweat and elbow 
grease are still the best predictors of long-term earning potential.   

Dan's stormy relationship with school may have cost him little in 
terms of salary and the kind of statistics tracked by the Department 
of Ed., but even at 19, he recognizes that stepping through the door 
to the adult world of work has left other doors to swing shut behind 
him. "The day I realized I would never go to college, I was really 
bummed out," he says. "I wanted to play hockey. In high school, I 
was, like, twice as good at hockey as I am now at Quake, and as 
much as I love Quake, I loved hockey twice as much.   

"That's really the only regret that I have. I watched people that I 
played with go on to play for Iowa State, and they won the national 
championship last year and they were awesome."   

Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company
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From jj at scn.org  Sun Mar  5 12:21:51 2000
From: jj at scn.org (J. Johnson)
Date: Sun, 5 Mar 2000 12:21:51 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Responsibility (was: Re: A Preliminary Review of SSL)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000304030825.27990A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000304232744.10433B-100000@scn>

On Sat, 4 Mar 2000, Rod Clark wrote:

> > If the users on /home0 are pinched for space, why don't they just
> > delete (or compress) a few files? Why can't these users just work
> > matters out themselves?
> 
> JJ, 
> 
>    The users as an amorphous group of people can't do system
> administration. ...

  But they can delete files.  (And the biggest offenders also can compress
files.)  They don't need a system administrator's help on that, do they?

And yes, there are other possible "solutions", like throwing more disk
space at the problem, but I like this one because it is the "sort it out
yourselves" approach recommended by the Board. 


> .... we do need Operations management who has (or have)
> a coherent plan to take SCN's systems from this kind of
> situation to a well managed one.
> 
  I PRESENTED A PLAN!!

It matters not how well Operations plans and self-organizes and
coordinates--without the support of the Board it all falls apart if
anyone opposes it.  

As the Board didn't like what I proposed, let the Board come up with a
better plan.  

=== JJ =================================================================

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From jeffallen at sourcenet.org  Sun Mar  5 17:25:51 2000
From: jeffallen at sourcenet.org (jeffallen at sourcenet.org)
Date: Sun, 5 Mar 2000 17:25:51
Subject: SCN: Save Now
Message-ID: <686.25097.453262@sourcenet.org>

To be removed from this mailing list immediately press reply and 
enter REMOVE on the subject line.

Would you like to be able to buy Computers and Software at 
wholesale?

At below what the stores Pay?

Reply with "MORE INFO" in the subject field

If you are a reseller and would like information on paying what 
the distributors pay then Reply with Reseller in the subject 
field.

If you have computer products you need to sell then email your 
details
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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From steve at advocate.net  Wed Mar  8 15:05:06 2000
From: steve at advocate.net (Steve)
Date: Wed, 8 Mar 2000 15:05:06 -0800
Subject: SCN: Privacy
Message-ID: <38C66C22.3414.1E99EF4@localhost>

x-no-archive: yes

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

Keystroke Loggers Save E-Mail Rants, Raising Workplace Privacy 
Concerns  

by Michael J. McCarthy


(Wall Street Journal)---The American workplace has been put on 
notice that office computers can be monitored. But who could have 
imagined the keystroke cops?  

In a new threat to personal privacy on the job, some companies 
have begun using surveillance software that covertly monitors and 
records each keystroke an employee makes: every letter, every 
comma, every revision, every flick of the fingertip, regardless of 
whether the data is ever saved in a file or transmitted over a 
corporate computer network. As they harvest those bits and bytes, 
the new programs, priced at as little as $99, give employers access 
to workers' unvarnished thoughts -- and the potential to use that 
information for their own ends.  

Say you draft a rant to the boss or a client, and then, thinking better 
of it, delete the whole thing. Too late. One by one, all the keystrokes 
have been sucked up and stored on your computer's hard drive or 
sent as e-mail that a computer-system administrator or manager can 
retrieve at his convenience.  

Last December, Poplar Grove Airport in northern Illinois suspected 
that one of its employees might be running a business of his own 
from his office PC. So the privately run airport bought a "keystroke 
logger" called Silent Watch and a license permitting it to install the 
program on six of the airport's computers. Along the way, however, 
the electronic stakeout snared some other workers.  

Describing her career ambitions, a young office worker seemed to 
have no clue her employer could delve so deeply into her computer. 
Soon after arriving at her desk on Christmas Eve morning -- at 
9:24:09, to be precise-she poured out her soul on a blank page of 
Microsoft Word.  

"I plan to obtain flight time by instructing and/or flying commuter 
planes," she wrote. She then backspaced over "planes," and 
substituted "jets." As she tapped away, it became apparent she was 
drafting a scholarship application for a flight-science program at 
Western Michigan University. "I know this is the career I want to 
pursue and the moen" -- she backspaced over the "en"-and typed 
"ney."  

After correcting that typo, according to the airport's keystroke log, 
she stopped again, backspaced over the word "money" and changed 
it to "scholarship." So the sentence then began, "I know this is the 
career I want to pursue and the scholarship I would receive ..."  

This wasn't an e-mail or a document she sent over the company's 
network. It was a work in progress, a draft, reconstructed letter by 
letter, typos and all.  

"We used to tell our people we could monitor everything -- even 
before we really could -- just as a deterrent," says Chris Pauli, the 
airport's computer-system administrator. "Now we really can."  

"When else can you peer into someone's raw thought process?" 
asks Peter A. Steinmeyer, a lawyer at Epstein Becker & Green in 
Chicago who has studied Internet and privacy issues and who 
represents management clients. Nonetheless, he says, while an 
employee may try to argue that he reasonably expected his "draft" 
thoughts to remain his own, courts have consistently held that 
communications written on company-provided computers aren't 
private under current law.  

"There's no legal qualm about it," says Richard Eaton, who wrote 
and now sells a keystroke-capturing program called Investigator. 
"There may be an ethical one."  

Mr. Eaton says his company, WinWhatWhere Corp., Kennewick, 
Wash., has sold more than 5,000 Investigator software licenses 
since the product was launched in August 1998. Customers, he 
adds, include Exxon Mobil Corp., Delta Air Lines and Ernst & Young 
LLP. Lockheed Martin Corp. says it is considering using the 
software for "ethics investigations."  

For all its sleuthing capabilities, Investigator is nothing more than a 
shiny silver CD-ROM that costs $99 or less with volume discounts. 
Mr. Eaton, who developed the program, burns the CDs right in his 
home, which is also company headquarters.  

"At first, I thought it was controversial," says the 47-year-old 
entrepreneur, who sports close-cropped hair and a diamond-stud 
earring. "Slimy," he adds.  

The keystroke tracker evolved from a program he had been selling 
to help companies measure how much time computer users were 
spending on various projects. But after clients kept asking for 
keystroke surveillance, he says, "I saw there is a legitimate security 
need for it."  

The keystroke software is part of a new "offline" workplace battle. 
Many companies are concluding that they may be missing computer 
mischief that doesn't involve the Internet or the corporate network, 
both of which they can monitor. Right at their desktop PCs, 
employees could be copying sales leads or pornography to or from 
disks or CD-ROMs, or downloading bookkeeping software to run 
their own businesses -- all of which could elude conventional 
surveillance methods.  

But some uses are strictly personal. Many people have bought the 
Investigator program, Mr. Eaton says, to run down suspicions that 
their spouses are being unfaithful in Internet chat rooms. They 
simply download the software, then later see exactly what their 
partners were typing. One mother ordered it to check on her teenage 
children's computer use while she was away on vacation.  

The Investigator program is designed to be covert. It doesn't show 
up as an icon on the screen, and is hard to find among computer 
files even when someone specifically searches for it. It is usually 
installed on a worker's computer after hours, but it can also be 
disguised in an e-mail attachment for an unsuspecting employee to 
download as an "upgrade."  

Recently, however, Mr. Eaton has added an onscreen notice, 
informing the user that the PC could be monitored -- an alert a 
systems manager can choose to have automatically displayed or 
not. "If your purpose is to humiliate them, then don't tell them," Mr. 
Eaton says. "If you want to stop abuse, tell them. Usually the threat 
alone is enough."  

Once Investigator is installed, the computer manager can choose 
"alert" words like "boss" or "union" or specific names. Then any 
time they appear in the text of an e-mail, note or memo, those 
documents will be automatically e-mailed over a company's 
computer network to the employee's supervisor or other designee. 
(On a stand-alone computer, the document would have to be 
retrieved directly from the hard drive.)  

On the WinWhatWhere Web site's "We Get Mail" section is an e-
mail from Michael Nogrady, a computer technician. "Maybe 
someday you will be ashamed," he writes. "Who knows, some 
people will do anything for a dollar. I am not saying this to be cruel, 
just asking if you have looked at this program morally."  

Says Mr. Eaton, "I don't want to violate privacy -- I like my privacy. 
But I don't want to be in a position of deciding who gets it and who 
doesn't."  

Customers generally don't have much to say about Investigator. 
Exxon says it has a long-standing policy of not discussing products 
it uses, lest it seem like an endorsement. Accounting firm Ernst & 
Young confirms that it uses Investigator, but won't say how widely 
or for what purpose. A spokesman for Delta says the airline's 
information-technology division bought one copy of the software last 
year and used it for internal testing "in one tiny area" of the division. 
"We decided it's not something we want to pursue. It died a pretty 
quick death," the spokesman says. "We don't want to be a police 
agency."  

While Mr. Eaton insists Investigator poses no legal problems, he 
says his lawyer suggested he include a disclaimer in the licensing 
agreement: "Any use of this software in conjunction with any 
hardware, device or apparatus to surreptitiously intercept wire, oral 
or electronic communications may violate state and federal laws."  

Mr. Eaton refuses to discuss the specifics of how the software 
intercepts keystrokes, and does so even before they reach the 
author's screen. He does say, however, that Investigator is hooked 
into the system before something called the "keyboard driver."  

When a key is depressed, that action alone doesn't create the 
corresponding letter on the monitor. Rather, pressing the "A" key, 
say, causes a slight surge in the electrical current in a circuit board 
below. Within 0.2 millisecond, a processor embedded in the 
keyboard begins to generate a "scan code" for that key. It is then 
sent to the keyboard driver, which translates it and tells the monitor 
to display an "A." This roundabout route allows for keyboards with 
foreign alphabets.  

For sleuthing purposes, the fraction the route requires is time 
enough to intercept the codes as they travel between the keys and 
the monitor. The tiny time lag is important because sophisticated 
hackers sometimes encrypt messages to outwit computer-system 
administrators. Investigator, though, merely captures each 
keystroke before it can be encoded.  

A similar alphabetic interchange underlay last December's intrigue 
at Poplar Grove Airport. About six months earlier, the airport and an 
affiliate, Emery Air Charter Inc., in nearby Rockford, Ill., had hired a 
programmer to design Web sites and work on special projects for 
both companies at a salary of about $50,000. Both businesses, 
which have about 120 workers combined, were growing rapidly, 
building hangars for private pilots, running charter flights and 
offering refueling and other aviation services.  

But for weeks, says Steve Thomas, the 47-year-old chief executive 
and owner of both businesses, their programmer was missing in 
action. He disappeared into his office and produced almost nothing. 
Mr. Pauli, the chief financial officer who doubles as system 
administrator, would stop by to check on him. But Mr. Pauli says the 
man "would always blank off his screen so I couldn't see what he 
was doing."  

When pressed, they say, the man was vague about his progress. 
"He was always busy, and we couldn't tell on what," says Mr. Pauli, 
30. "But I could see he was storing things on a CD-ROM."  

Worried the man might be "trying to pirate some of our strategies 
and secrets," Mr. Pauli says, he and Mr. Thomas huddled. "We 
couldn't tap the phones -- it's illegal. We explored a camera to 
videotape him," Mr. Thomas recalls.  

One surveillance camera they looked at cost $3,500. But they 
couldn't figure out how to position it to get good computer-screen 
resolution or how to conceal it. Besides, Mr. Thomas adds, "we 
weren't certain about the legality."  

Then Mr. Pauli went on the Internet and found the maker of Silent 
Watch. Adavi Inc., Dunkirk, Md., says it has sold more than 1,000 
copies of the $159 monitoring program, which it started marketing 
last July. Aside from keystroke logging, the desktop-monitoring 
software can be programmed to send to a manager's screen via e-
mail a replica of precisely what is on an employee's screen at any 
given moment -- text, graphics and all. Adavi says it has big 
corporate clients, but that they are adamant in their refusal to be 
identified.  

Shelling out $237 for six licenses to Silent Watch -- "very 
affordable," says Mr. Pauli -- he installed the software on the 
computer of the mysterious programmer and on five others. In no 
time, the keystroke logs revealed the man was making repeated 
visits to pornographic Web sites, and sending and receiving 
numerous sexually explicit e-mails, which he channeled through 
Internet mail servers outside the airport's scrutiny.  

"We were relieved our business wasn't being compromised," says 
Mr. Thomas, but the programmer had to be confronted, and fired. 
Messrs. Thomas and Pauli planned a sting. After monitoring the 
keystroke log for several days, they say, they could see he 
routinely visited the "inappropriate" sites early in the day.  

So early one morning in late December, they prepared to swoop. As 
Mr. Pauli watched the keystrokes spit out on the Toshiba laptop 
computer in the CEO's office, Mr. Thomas grabbed a manila folder 
and posted himself outside the closed door of the man's office, just 
down the hall. When Mr. Pauli was certain the man had a 
pornographic page on display, he gave the CEO the high sign, and 
Mr. Thomas flung the door open. He says the man rapidly opened 
another screen to cover the window he had been viewing.  

After asking him what he was working on, Mr. Thomas says he 
insisted the man show him what was behind the window 
"maximized" on his screen. After objecting, the man finally 
complied, and Mr. Thomas says, he saw something he will only 
describe as "raunchy."  

Mr. Thomas then launched into a dressing-down. "I have whole logs 
here," he recalls saying, thrusting out the folder, which was filled 
with printouts. "We don't pay you for that. You don't work here 
anymore. Get your things, and get off the property," he remembers 
telling the programmer, whom he refuses to identify, but who he 
says appeared stunned. "His jaw dropped," Mr. Thomas says.  

A few days later, he says, the airport got a fax from the man that 
threatened legal retaliation. "We talked about it, and then ignored it," 
Mr. Thomas says. "We never heard from him again."  

Since then, the company has acquired an additional 19 licenses for 
Silent Watch. Mr. Pauli says he uses them mostly to trouble-shoot 
computer glitches. With them, he adds, he discovered that some 
employees were downloading a video game called Mercenary 
during their weekend work shifts. "I printed out the installing logs, 
and then showed them to their immediate supervisors," he says. 
"There hasn't been a problem since."  

Mr. Pauli says he generally is using Silent Watch to keep an eye on 
computer misuse that hurts productivity, adding, "I don't care if they 
type personal letters."  

Neither does the software. A couple of days after December's sting 
operation, Silent Watch was soaking up the scholarship plea of the 
office worker, who the company declines to name but who it says 
received a verbal reprimand for doing personal chores on company 
time. "In addition to taking lessons," her note said at one point, "I 
worked at an airport to learn the 'behind the scenes' " -- she then 
backspaced over that, changing it to say "to learn the other aspects 
of aviation besides flying."

Copyright 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.





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From steve at advocate.net  Fri Mar 10 08:43:32 2000
From: steve at advocate.net (Steve)
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 08:43:32 -0800
Subject: SCN: ICANN
Message-ID: <38C8B5B4.23897.873BBB@localhost>

x-no-archive: yes

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

(Jeri Clausing, NY Times)---An election that would select half of the 
international board that administers the Internet faced a serious 
challenge on Thursday when a united front of groups representing 
businesses, public interests and ordinary users called for an 
overhaul and possible delay of the voting plan.  

Despite the apparent consensus of the more than 300 people who 
attended a public forum here at the meeting of the Internet 
Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the calls for 
change were met with criticism, and in some cases, hostility, by 
some of ICANN's interim board members.  

The tension spilled into the aisles at the lunch break, where public-
interest groups; the board's interim chairwoman, Esther Dyson; and 
the board's lawyer, Joe Sims, had a heated exchange about exactly 
who the board should represent and whether it has properly clarified 
its role in administering the Internet's addressing, or domain name, 
system.  

The showdown has been brewing since two public-interest groups, 
the Center for Democracy and Technology and Common Cause, last 
week issued a study of ICANN's plan for a letting computer users 
around the world elect nine new board members by Sept. 30.  

That report, financed by the Markle Foundation at the urging of 
Dyson, said ICANN's plan to let any Internet user over 16 with a 
permanent e-mail and postal address elect a special electoral 
council -- which would then select the nine board members -- was 
plagued by conflicting goals, a lack of accountability and the 
absence of safeguards against capture by special-interest groups.  

It urged the group to put aside its deadline pressure for completing 
the election in September and instead focus on improving the 
process to ensure the election is legitimate. The report urged ICANN 
to replace the electoral council system with direct elections, to more 
clearly define the organization's role and to better educate the 
public about its mission.  

Although everyone who lined up to speak on Thursday urged the 
group to put process over deadline, their proposed solutions varied. 
Some voiced support for the report's suggestions; others proposed 
staggering the election or reducing the number of so-called at-large 
board members. Still others wanted to eliminate the general 
membership altogether.  

The criticism comes more than six months after ICANN's interim 
board adopted its election plan, spurring obvious resentment and 
frustration among the interim, appointed board members, who have 
worked as volunteers for the last year and a half to carry out the 
goal of having a fully elected board in place by the end of 
September.  

Nine other board members were elected last fall by three so-called 
supporting organizations, which represent specific groups like 
Internet service providers, domain name registration companies and 
the intellectual property interests concerned about protecting their 
brands in cyberspace.  

Hans Kraaijenbrink, one of the interim members, angrily told the 
crowd Thursday that the report from Common Cause comes "one 
minute before midnight," adding: "We are back to Square 1. I don't 
want to be back to Square 1."  

He and other board members said they were concerned that too 
broad a group was angling for a voice in the process. ICANN's 
charge, Kraaijenbrink and a colleague, Gregory Crew, said, is to 
oversee the narrow, technical functions of the Internet.  

Dyson and Vinton Cerf, an Internet founder and one of the recently 
elected board members, said they were concerned that direct 
elections could result in the selection of people not sufficiently 
knowledgeable about the technical operations of the Internet.  

"I am concerned about capture by people who don't know what they 
are doing," Dyson said. "People who are stupid, individually."  

Public-interest groups, however, are concerned that the current and 
proposed structures of ICANN dilute the voice of Internet users who 
will ultimately be affected by ICANN policy. While some of the board 
members insist ICANN's mission is strictly technical, their policies 
already overlap with broader issues, such as who can and cannot 
register certain words in Internet addresses.  

One of the first decisions the interim ICANN board made was to 
prohibit so-called cybersquatting, or the bad-faith registration of 
domain names containing trademarks with the intent to resell at a 
high price. And the group currently is considering whether to also 
offer special protections to "famous marks," which have never 
before been given international protection.  

ICANN has already began its effort to build the at-large voting body, 
launching a Web site last month where Internet users older than 16 
can complete a form, which will be subject to final rules set here this 
week.  

ICANN's president, Mike Roberts, said that 6,000 people have 
already filled out the online application form. He said that the bulk of 
the applicants were male and that 70 percent were from North 
America, with another 20 percent from Europe. ICANN officials say 
that have already begun an outreach effort to include more women 
and to make the make the pool of applicants more geographically 
diverse.  

Charles Costello, director of the Carter Center, which specializes in 
establishing democratic elections in developing countries, said 
ICANN's plan for an electoral council was problematic. "Electoral 
colleges are top-down filters used to dilute the voting rights" of 
individuals, he said.  

He said that by refusing to improve the election process, ICANN 
risks "having very bad elections which are ultimately seen as 
illegitimate."  

Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company  






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From bb156 at scn.org  Tue Mar 14 10:07:17 2000
From: bb156 at scn.org (Andrew Higgins)
Date: Tue, 14 Mar 2000 10:07:17 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Anti-spam e-mail suit tossed out
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003141004330.23905-100000@scn>


       http://www.seattletimes.com/news/local/html98/altspam_20000314.html
          
          Anti-spam e-mail suit tossed out 
          
          by Peter Lewis
          Seattle Times technology reporter 
          
          In the war of words over unsolicited commercial e-mail, better
          known as spam, an Oregon man has won a victory over the state
          of Washington.
          
          But the battle may not be over, as the attorney general ponders
          an appeal.
          
          The victory came when King County Superior Court Judge Palmer
          Robinson dismissed a case in which the state charged Jason
          Heckel with violating Washington's anti-spam law. Robinson said
          the law, generally regarded as the nation's toughest, violates
          the interstate-commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution.
          
          The case against Heckel was the first filed by the state under
          the 1998 law. The statute was enacted after Internet providers
          and consumers complained to the Attorney General's Office about
          the time and money they spent dealing with unsolicited
          commercial e-mail.
          
          The judge held that the statute is "unduly restrictive and
          burdensome" and places a burden on businesses that outweighs
          its benefits to consumers. The case will not stand as a binding
          precedent unless it is upheld on appeal. The state has until
          April 10 to decide whether to appeal.
          
          The ruling, handed down Friday, is likely to cause a stir in
          the Internet community, where spam frequently is a hot-button
          issue. Opponents contend spam costs computer users and
          Internet-service providers time and money, taking up computer
          memory and forcing users to spend time deleting it from their
          PCs.
          
          Not surprisingly, Heckel's lawyer cheered the ruling, while the
          Attorney General's Office lamented it. A constitutional-law
          expert at the University of Washington School of Law called the
          ruling "highly questionable."
          
          The law bans spam that has misleading information in the
          e-mail's subject line, disguises the path it took across the
          Internet or contains an invalid reply address.
          
          The suit alleged that Heckel, doing business as Natural
          Instincts, committed all three sins when he sent spam to
          Washington residents. Heckel, in his mid-20s, sent between
          100,000 and 1 million pieces of unsolicited e-mail per week,
          the suit asserted. It also alleged that each month he sold 30
          to 50 of his "How to Profit From the Internet" packages,
          charging $39.95 each.
          
          In addition to civil penalties of $2,000 for each violation,
          the complaint sought attorney's fees and a permanent injunction
          barring Heckel from sending spam.
          
          However, Robinson not only dismissed the case against Heckel
          "with prejudice" - meaning it cannot be refiled - but signed an
          order allowing Heckel to present a bill for recovery of his
          costs and legal fees.
          
          Robinson was unavailable for comment yesterday.
          
          Reached in Salem, Ore., Heckel's father, Allen Heckel, said his
          son would have no comment. The younger Heckel now works for a
          computer service and support company in Salem and designs,
          maintains and markets Web sites for individuals and businesses,
          according to court papers.
          
          Dale Crandall, a Salem lawyer who represents Heckel, called the
          judge's ruling correct "in modern-commerce clause analysis." He
          expressed confidence it would hold up on appeal.
          
          He did not deny that his client had sent the 17 pieces of
          unsolicited e-mail the state specifically documented, but he
          resisted characterizing them as spam.
          
          "That's just a derogatory term that's on the other side of the
          table," he said. "Direct-marketing people don't like to hear
          the paper mail called `junk mail.' "
          
          Regina Cullen, an assistant attorney general who argued the
          case, maintained the state should have the right - subject to
          limitations imposed by the Constitution - to redress harm done
          to consumers by out-of-state businesses.
          
          She disagreed with the judge's finding that the state was
          asking too much of businesses by having them check an
          electronic registry of e-mail addresses to determine whether
          intended e-mail recipients were Washington residents and
          therefore protected by the law.
          
          Stewart Jay, a UW professor of constitutional law, said there
          is "no reason why the commerce clause would prevent states from
          regulating spam. ... This is one of those cases where a person
          is accused of using an instrumentality, i.e. the Internet, to
          engage in activities the state has determined are harmful to
          the consumer."
          
          That is not terribly different, Jay said, than "any of a wide
          variety of consumer-protection measures that can apply to
          people out of state," including telephone-solicitation scams
          run out of a boiler room and junk-fax operations. He called the
          ruling "highly questionable."
          
          Jim Kendall, president of the Washington Association of
          Internet Service Providers, a trade group that works with the
          Attorney General's Office to maintain the electronic registry,
          was likewise critical of the judge's ruling.
          
          "If the judge is going to say we're putting too much of a
          burden on someone who is acting unethically, I have to scratch
          my head and say, `Excuse me? That doesn't make sense to me,' "
          Kendall said.
          
          Several other lawsuits have been filed under the state's
          anti-spam statute, including another by the state in behalf of
          consumers. In that case, the defendant, Sam Khuri, owner of
          Benchmark Print Supply in Atlanta, signed a consent decree,
          agreeing to quit sending spam, according to Cullen.
          
          Seattle lawyer Brady Johnson has filed four lawsuits under the
          law, two of which remain active. He said yesterday that in none
          of the cases has the commerce clause raised by Heckel come up.
          Johnson said he hopes the state appeals Robinson's ruling.

          Copyright � 2000 The Seattle Times Company

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From guests at scn.org  Wed Mar 15 22:55:39 2000
From: guests at scn.org (Steve and Melissa Guest)
Date: Wed, 15 Mar 2000 22:55:39 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Need your input for Library presentation
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000315222830.24823J-100000@scn>

We're getting a chance to speak to a group of "Adult Resource" librarians
at SPL on 3/22, and would welcome your input. 

We've got 15 minutes, an overhead projector, and plans to leave them with
a handout or two (including an appropriate Quick Reference Guide).  The
SPL senior mgmt that got us onto this agenda have asked us to cover
something similiar to what we said in our meeting with Deborah Jacobs
(Head Librarian) and Marilyn Sheck (Director of IT) in January:
  - what SCN is doing these days (especially the improvements and
    realistic expectations librarians can now have about our
    responsiveness with registrations and helpdesk questions) 
  - how we fit into the list of community resources available
  - what our plans and hopes are for the coming year(s)

We could especially use some help putting the handouts together - please
let us know if you'd be interested in working on them.

Thanks,
   - Mel & Steve

    -=- -=-=- -=- -=-=- -=- -=-=- -=- -=-=- -=- -=-=- -=- -=-=- -=- 
    Melissa & Steve Guest, Presidents         email: guests at scn.org
    Seattle Community Network Assoc.             ph: (425) 653 7353
    http://www.scn.org/scna                         8am to 11pm PST

    "Supporting People and Communities with Free Internet Services"


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From douglas  Thu Mar 16 17:45:48 2000
From: douglas (Doug Schuler)
Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 17:45:48 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Shaping the Network Society!  Please join us!
Message-ID: <200003170145.RAA29140@scn.org>

As you know we're planning a GALA event for this coming May.
Please pass this note to anybody whom you feel might be
interested.  Also -- I hope that YOU will come also!

Thanks, 

-- Doug



  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  ~ Please forward to interested colleagues and lists.  Thank you! ~
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

                    SHAPING THE NETWORK SOCIETY
          The Future of the Public Sphere in Cyberspace

    A Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility Symposium

                       [ First Announcement ]

                  http://www.scn.org/cpsr/diac-00

               May 20 - May 23, 2000, 9:00 am - 5:00 pm
                    University of Washington HUB
                      Seattle, Washington, USA

 +++   Cultural Policy and the Arts   +++   Understanding the Network
            Society   +++   Bridging   the Digital Divides   +++ Activism
Old and New   +++   Public Cyberspaces   +++   Networking the Networks
     +++        Crossing Borders   +++ Localism /       Globalism    +++
Strengthening the Civic     Sector                    +++ Strategies
for the Network Society         +++ Multimedia     and Interactive Events   
+++      +++      +++   +++  Sociology of Cyberspace             +++

       Cyberspace is likely to become the dominant medium through which 
       people create and share information and ideas in the future.  How 
       these conversations about the environment, culture, leisure, and 
       political decisions, are conducted is everybody's business.

What directions and implications does cyberspace foretell for
community, democracy, education and culture?  

                                         Is e-commerce ALL there is?!?  

This symposium is the seventh in CPSR's "Directions and Implications of
Advanced Computing" (DIAC) symposium series.  This symposium tackles
important public interest issues related to computing and
communications that are often neglected by the news media.

The objective of DIAC-2000 is to integrate many perspectives,
conversations, and people from around the world.  What is the public
sphere in cyberspace?  What should it be?  How can people use it?  What
experiments, projects, and policies should we initiate?

    We need stories, theories, and ideas that can help us 
    discuss, reflect, and take action.

Social and environmental activists, educators, technologists,
government officials, artists, journalists, researchers, and citizens
are coming from all over the world to participate.  15 Russians who are
developing civic networks in six Russian cities will discuss their work
developing new civic institutions.  Prominent researchers and activists
from Europe who are working on issues from human rights to cultural
policy have also been invited to present.  A research thread also runs
through the symposium: How can academia and the civic sector work
together and learn from each other?

Although we are still shaping up the agenda we are expecting the following
eminent participants. 

  + Natasha Bulashova; Friends and Partners; Moscow, Russia
  + Fiorella de Cindio; Milano Rete Civiche; Milan, Italy
  + Penny Goldsmith; Poverty Network; Vancouver, Canada
  + Susana Finquelievich; Buenos Aires, Argentina
  + Cees Hamelink; Human Rights and Communication Rights; University of 
    Amsterdam, The Netherlands 
  + Nancy Kranich, president-elect of the American Library Association
  + Dmitry Latuhkin; Chelyabinsk Civic Network; Chelyabinsk, Russia
  + Geert Lovink; Media Theorist and Activist; Society for Old and New 
    Media (Amsterdam); now in Canberra, Australia
  + Veran Matic; B92 Radio and Internet; Belgrade, Yugoslavia
  + Judy Sparrow; National Telecommunications and Information Agency; 
    Washington, DC.
  + Nicol Turner; Mapping Community Assets; Net Consulting Group, Chicago

Workshops.  As in our 1997 Community Space and Cyberspace symposium
there will be 20 - 35 interactive workshops.  These will cover a
variety of topics including setting up your own community network,
community asset mapping, and many others.

Time and Place. On-site registration opens at 8:00 AM on May 20 and
9:00 on May 21.  The program begins at 9:00 and ends at 5:00 pm.  The
main events will take place in the HUB Auditorium at the University of
Washington.  On Monday and Tuesday (May 22 and 23) we will convene a
variety of smaller, more focused events.  We are assuming that many
participants will not be available for this portion of the symposium.
Therefore we may need to limit attendance to 200 people.  Please let 
us know on your registration if you plan to attend on Monday and Tuesday.

Registration. We are intentionally keeping registration fees
affordable.  Registration fees are $35 for students & low income ($50
after May 1); $65 for CPSR and members of endorsing organizations ($85
after May 1); and $95 ($120 after May 1) for others.  Some scholarships
will be available.  The CPSR benefit is $25.  Proceedings are $20
each.  You may register by mail or on-line on the symposium website.
Please send your check to CPSR, P.O. Box 717, Palo Alto, CA 94301,
USA.

CPSR Benefit. Meet with conference attendees informally while helping
CPSR at the same time!  Enjoy snacks, drinks, art, and demos!  We're
still planning this one but we know you'll enjoy it. $25 is the
suggested donation.  (Please consider an additional contribution to
help CPSR organize programs like this in the future!)

Organizational Support.  We are interested in working with a variety of
organizations on this.  Please contact us if your organization would
like to become a co-sponsor, supporter or endorser.

Welcome to Seattle.  We'd like to help make it easier for you to get to
Seattle, stay in Seattle, and enjoy Seattle while you're here.  We will
be putting helpful information up soon on our web site.

Volunteers Wanted. For registration, workshop coordination, publicity,
and outreach.  (And registration is free for volunteers!)  Please
contact Ti Locke, tlocke at kcts.org, if you are interested.

DIAC-2000 promises to be one of the most timely and significant
conferences on cyberspace themes ever.  We expect an exciting dialogue
between artists, educators, librarians, researchers, government
officials, journalists, and other community members.  Please mark you
calendars to attend and help us make "Shaping the Network Society: The
Future of the Public Sphere in Cyberspace" as important and inspiring
as possible.

                 We hope to see you in Seattle this May!

The Virtual Coalition. We are pleased to be a member of the Global 2000
Virtual Community Coalition.  The Virtual Coalition is a loosely
affiliated group of people, organizations, and events all over the
world who are working together in the year 2000 to help promote
democratic use of communication technology and discourage social
exclusion due to inequitable access to communication.  Please contact
Nancy White, njwhite at halcyon.com, if you'd like your event listed.

DIAC-2000 is sponsored by Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility 

DIAC-2000 is co-sponsored by the Daniel Evans School of Public Affairs
(UW), the Association For Community Networks, Friends and Partners, and
the Seattle Community Network Association.  We'd like to thank the
Morino Institute for their support.

We'd also like to thank the following organizations for their
endorsement.  Advancing Women, Association for Women In Computing,
Community & Information Technology, Deep Thought Informatics Pty Ltd,
Edmonds Community College, I*EARN Canada, International Women's
University, Loka Institute, Media Jumpstart, Mid-Peninsula Access
Corporation, Municipal Technology, Oregon Public Networking, Paper
Tiger TV, Rae Consulting, The_Network, TINCAN, UW Computer Science
Department, and the UW chool of Library and Information Sciences.  Let
us know if your organization would like to be added to this list.

Need more information? Contact Doug Schuler, douglas at cpsr.org,
206.634.0752.

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From popeye at speakeasy.org  Mon Mar 20 14:50:02 2000
From: popeye at speakeasy.org (Mike Weisman)
Date: Mon, 20 Mar 2000 14:50:02 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: Help wanted!  This means YOU!  (thanks!)
In-Reply-To: <200003202249.OAA13360@scn.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.10.10003201449460.13368-100000@grace.speakeasy.org>

Its two months Doug. Take a valium. 

Michael J. Weisman

Seattle WA
please respond to popeye at speakeasy.org

On Mon, 20 Mar 2000, Doug Schuler wrote:

> As you all know, CPSR is organizing their seventh "Directions and
> Implications of Advanced Computing" (DIAC) symposium.  This one,
> Shaping the Network Society: The Future of the Public Sphere in
> Cyberspace (http://www.scn.org/cpsr/diac-00) will be held exactly one
> month from today (!) (May 20 - 23) at the HUB at the University of
> Washington.
> 
> We're expecting 500 people from all over the world.
> 
> We need volunteers to make this successful!  We'd love to see
> you this Thursday if at all possible.
> 
>      * March 23, 2000
>      * March 30, 2000
>      * April 20, 2000
> 
> All three volunteer meetings are at 7:00 PM at the Speakeasy Cafe, 2304 
> 2nd Ave in Seattle's Belltown neighborhood.
> 
> We need volunteers in many areas.  Please contact Ti Locke
> (tlocke at kcts.org) if you'd like to help during the symposium  or Doug
> Schuler (douglas at scn.org) if you'd like to help prepare for the
> symposium in other ways.
> 
> We are looking for local arrangements chair or co-chair and publicity
> chair or co-chair as well as others who would like to help but not
> necessarily assume a leadership role.
> 
> Help make this event GREAT!
> 
>    - Ti and Doug
> 
> 

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From starsrus at scn.org  Mon Mar 20 21:47:20 2000
From: starsrus at scn.org (Kenneth Applegate)
Date: Mon, 20 Mar 2000 21:47:20 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Redesigned Web pages
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000320213312.24581A-100000@scn>


I don't usually send out blanket messages to the scn.org list, but I think
this one is important, and I'd like to generate some discussion on it.

I just had my first look at the redesigned SCN web pages. As far as 
functionality goes, I imagine that once I get used to the new arrangement
of things, navigation will be about as easy [or difficult?] as with the
old pages.

However - with respect to the image we present to the world, my initial
response is "Whose home page have I reached?". There is only a minimal
logo on the home page, and nothing but a tiny logo on the "home" button on
subsidiary pages. NOTHING really grabs me in the first two seconds of 
viewing and tells me "This is the Seattle Community Network, and it's
worthwhile hanging around and browsing this site". The old design may have
been a bit hokey, and possibly harder to navigate, and maybe harder to
maintain for technical reasons, BUT AT LEAST IT LET THE WORLD KNOW WHO WE
ARE!

I really, really think the new pages need a more prominent logo again, on
every page, to unify the site.

Ken

Ken Applegate           How do you identify astronomers from Seattle? 
<starsrus at scn.org>      By the windshield wipers on their telescopes!

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From guests at scn.org  Mon Mar 20 22:35:44 2000
From: guests at scn.org (Steve and Melissa Guest)
Date: Mon, 20 Mar 2000 22:35:44 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Ti Locke's Equipment Giveaway
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000320223409.22458D-100000@scn>

Giveaway O'Hardware
Saturday, April 1 (no foolin')
1:00PM-3:00PM
CAMP/ROPE
2615 S. Jackson (corner MLK Way and Jackson)
(Go to warehouse door facing MLK Way.) 

Older and mostly working equipment: 14" VGA monitors (nothing bigger); a
variety of 486 boxes (most boot, but all will need some fussing with); lots
of newer fax machines, small and big; several very large, relatively new HP
laser  printers with their network cards (will need some fussing if you're
not going to use on a network); some small laser printers that need work; a
couple of ribbon printers; several 1-gig HD's (they were networked in their
previous life--they will give you error messages galore when you first
install them, but they're fine); Pentium 80 and 100 motherboards (bare board
only); a Commodore 4000 Toaster (for the antique videophiles among you); a
SGI Iris 4D/220GTX Graphics Generator (3 monitors, two keyborads, 3 BIG
cases); old modems; some laptop hardware; some older software and the usual
array of bits and pieces.

This time around, I do NOT have anything Mac--sorry--all Mac donations have
already gone to new homes. Bring your own tools, and of course, some way to
transport the things you want.  Newbies welcome, but bring a  computer-savvy
buddy with you.

Contact Ti Locke (tlocke at kcts.org) if you have questions. If you're
interested in the SGI or the Commodore, they can be examined and picked up
before April 1 if you wish.




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From jj at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 00:18:27 2000
From: jj at scn.org (J. Johnson)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 00:18:27 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Redesigned Web pages
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000320213312.24581A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321001004.22598C-100000@scn>

I concur with Ken.  In Lynx the new home page looks not just anemic, but
even pathetic.  (It looks like SCN is nothing more than the sponser for
"The Esoterics".)  Have the webmasters forgotten about the last time
radical changes were made without consultation?

=== JJ =================================================================

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From willieb_2 at yahoo.com  Tue Mar 21 07:27:27 2000
From: willieb_2 at yahoo.com (Beth Williams)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 07:27:27 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Earth Day Puget Sound WEB SITE
Message-ID: <20000321152727.8417.qmail@web205.mail.yahoo.com>

The following is a message from Samantha Smith.  She
has compiled an extensive list of things to do for
Earth Day 2000 (April 22-23) and soon after.

Here is the Earth Day Seattle web site.
http://www.earthdayseattle.org/

Sidney Freeman from  Seattle City Light helped me with
this and posted it.  I worked on the content and
Sidney did the programming. She and I will be
continuing to update it once a week or so.  Please
continue to send me more local events and updates at
ssmith at earthday.net or 206-876-2000 x251

http://www.earthdayseattle.org/

Regards,Samantha Smith
Local Organizer
Earth Day Puget Sound/Earth Day Network
91 Marion StreetSeattle, WA 98104
Tel: 206-876-2000 x251
Fax: 206-682-1184
ssmith at earthday.net
web: http://www.earthdayseattle.org

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com
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From allen at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 08:03:39 2000
From: allen at scn.org (allen)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 08:03:39 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: new web home page
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003210755230.16669-100000@scn>

Lose it...it sucks big time!!!

Rod, I do appreciate all the hard work you put in on maintaining/
creating this part of SCN...I really do.  AND...this effort is
not good.  Any radical change like this should have input from 
others before going before the public.  This is not your website,
it is SCN's and a radical change in our public face on the web
(which this is) is totally innappropriate without feedback from
others prior to publishing it!



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From jmabel at saltmine.com  Tue Mar 21 08:37:52 2000
From: jmabel at saltmine.com (Joe Mabel)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 08:37:52 -0800
Subject: SCN: RE: Redesigned Web pages
Message-ID: <01BF9310.BFBDCCB0.jmabel@saltmine.com>

I like the new design a lot better (at least under IE4, which is what I 
browse with).  However:
1) It took over a minute to come up on my machine, and I have a T-1 
connection!
2) I concur that the new SCN logo is awfully small, maybe 25% of the real 
estate I'd give it.  It's barely bigger than the buttons, I'd want it more 
distinct.
3) I don't know about you, but I consider the Crisis Resource Directory 
(which I edit) a reasonably important feature of SCN.  It is now almost 
impossible to find. Even knowing it is there, and looking in half a dozen 
reasonable places I can't find it.  I would assume that guide (or relevant 
pages) should be linked in quite a few places.  What gives?

----------------------------------------------------
Joe Mabel
Saltmine LLC
206.284.7511

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From aki at halcyon.com  Tue Mar 21 09:16:58 2000
From: aki at halcyon.com (Aki Namioka)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 09:16:58 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: New Web Pages
Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.4.21.0003210910540.26708-100000@king.halcyon.com>

Hi All:

After reading all the messages about the new site, I expected something
awful and unusable.  However, I was very pleasantly surprised.  Its much
easier on the eye than the old pages, which were really fussy.  True, the
SCN presence should be more prominent and information about SCNA and how
to join is shunted off to the side, but there are some good things about
it that I would like to keep.  The navigation bar at the top is nice.  The
SCN site of the week looks great - the picture gives a human face we
didn't have before.  

I think with a little work this page could be quite nice.  I agree that
the process of introducing this could be better.  Next time, perhaps there
should be a trial period so people's comments could be accomodated before
going live.

Thanks,
Aki Helen Namioka
aki at cpsr.org

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From bb615 at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 09:18:26 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 09:18:26 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: RE: Redesigned Web pages
In-Reply-To: <01BF9310.BFBDCCB0.jmabel@saltmine.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321085304.1773A-100000@scn>

> 1) It took over a minute to come up on my machine, and I have a T-1 
> connection!

Joe, 

   The pages are individually smaller, so they should be pretty
quick. It even loaded fairly quickly on a 486-25 with a 33.6k
modem when I tried that. But the Web server is also the mail
server, and there are heavy load spikes on it at times. Not long
ago now the load average was near 5.0, which basically kills the
interactive CGI apps like Web mail, and slows Web pages in
general. You can check the load at

        http://www.scn.org/scripts/loadav.cgi

> 2) I concur that the new SCN logo is awfully small, maybe 25% of the real 
> estate I'd give it.  It's barely bigger than the buttons, I'd want it more 
> distinct.

   There's a stamp graphic that's twice as large, that uses more
vertical screen real estate. You can see it at

        http://www.scn.org/test.html

> 3) I don't know about you, but I consider the Crisis Resource
> Directory (which I edit) a reasonably important feature of SCN. It
> is now almost impossible to find. Even knowing it is there, and
> looking in half a dozen reasonable places I can't find it. I would
> assume that guide (or relevant pages) should be linked in quite a
> few places. What gives?

   With the change from one huge long menu for each topic, we do
need to keep the SCN-hosted sites easily findable. Lee is
checking the updated alphabetical list of SCN-hosted sites, and
organizing them by category. The Crisis Resource Directory
probably isn't everywhere it should be yet, on the new menus.

   The lists of SCN-hosted sites could either be the first item
on the menu in each topic area, as a separate page, or they
could simply be listed on the main page of each topic area, when
you scroll down the page past the links to the menus. That's
likely better. The newly checked SCN-hosted sites per category
should be up tomorrow. 

Rod

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From bb615 at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 10:27:46 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 10:27:46 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: New Web Pages
In-Reply-To: <Pine.GSO.4.21.0003210910540.26708-100000@king.halcyon.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321092715.11612A-100000@scn>

> ... the SCN presence should be more prominent and information
> about SCNA and how to join is shunted off to the side,
>... 
> the process of introducing this could be better.  Next time,
> perhaps there should be a trial period so people's comments
> could be accomodated before going live.

Aki,

   How about adding "About SCN" as the first item in the
navigation bar on the right? Several people have mentioned that
a quick general introduction to what SCN is should be easily
findable. For now, it could be the old aboutscn.html page that
was one of the first links on the old home page, with the new
headers and footers wrapped around it. Then later, people could
write up whatever they think should be there.

   There was relatively little feedback about the test site, but
what little there was was very good feedback. Almost none of the
comments that people are making now would ever have surfaced,
though, if it hadn't moved to a live site, because most of the
people giving feedback now couldn't have been expected to take
the time to participate in a test program, and didn't.

   I agree that I didn't manage this very well, but then the
resources just aren't there at SCN to do this ideally well,
either. Switching over a large complicated site with (this is
last weeks' count - it's probably higher by now) 325 menus and
pages, and something like 5,800 menu items isn't exactly a piece
of cake in a volunteer organization where there aren't at least
a few other people on call who can push other things aside to
help with it.

   Let's give it a few days for everyone to respond with what
they want to see changed around, and we can work to address
everyone's viewpoints. Because of the groundwork done to
standardize a lot of things, it's much easier now to make
overall changes to the site.

Rod

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From jmabel at saltmine.com  Tue Mar 21 10:55:39 2000
From: jmabel at saltmine.com (Joe Mabel)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 10:55:39 -0800
Subject: SCN: New Web Pages
Message-ID: <01BF9323.FF92EA60.jmabel@saltmine.com>

Has anyone ever considered the possiblity of "Beta Testing" major 
revisions. We can provide a link from the current site (or page) to a site 
(or page) being tested. This exposes it broadly without "releasing" it and, 
most importantly, without yet getting rid of the old.

This tends to yield much better feedback than handing a semi-secret URL to 
a small number of people.

JM

-----Original Message-----
From:	Rod Clark [SMTP:bb615 at scn.org]
Sent:	Tuesday, March 21, 2000 10:28 AM
To:	Aki Namioka
Cc:	SCN
Subject:	Re: SCN: New Web Pages
[snip]
   There was relatively little feedback about the test site, but
what little there was was very good feedback. Almost none of the
comments that people are making now would ever have surfaced,
though, if it hadn't moved to a live site, because most of the
people giving feedback now couldn't have been expected to take
the time to participate in a test program, and didn't.

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From jmabel at saltmine.com  Tue Mar 21 10:57:39 2000
From: jmabel at saltmine.com (Joe Mabel)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 10:57:39 -0800
Subject: FW: SCN: New Web Pages
Message-ID: <01BF9324.46CF9C20.jmabel@saltmine.com>



-----Original Message-----
From:	Joe Mabel [SMTP:jmabel at saltmine.com]
Sent:	Tuesday, March 21, 2000 10:56 AM
To:	'Rod Clark'; Aki Namioka
Cc:	SCN
Subject:	RE: SCN: New Web Pages

Has anyone ever considered the possiblity of "Beta Testing" major 
revisions. We can provide a link from the current site (or page) to a site 
(or page) being tested. This exposes it broadly without "releasing" it and, 
most importantly, without yet getting rid of the old.

This tends to yield much better feedback than handing a semi-secret URL to 
a small number of people.

JM

-----Original Message-----
From:	Rod Clark [SMTP:bb615 at scn.org]
Sent:	Tuesday, March 21, 2000 10:28 AM
To:	Aki Namioka
Cc:	SCN
Subject:	Re: SCN: New Web Pages
[snip]
   There was relatively little feedback about the test site, but
what little there was was very good feedback. Almost none of the
comments that people are making now would ever have surfaced,
though, if it hadn't moved to a live site, because most of the
people giving feedback now couldn't have been expected to take
the time to participate in a test program, and didn't.

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From alboss at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 11:57:37 2000
From: alboss at scn.org (Al Boss)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 11:57:37 -0800
Subject: SCN: New Web Pages
References: <Pine.GSO.4.21.0003210910540.26708-100000@king.halcyon.com>
Message-ID: <38D7D431.B882BB9@scn.org>

I like the new interface. Sure, it's not done, but the only Websites
that are done are the ones that are dead. I have a bigger concern,
though:

Haven't I seen this movie somewhere before? Like every time we change
the SCN interface (even the Freeport one)? The plot summary goes like
this:

1) The appropriate committee/individuals (as far as they know) takes
on the work and lets everyone know they're doing it (again, they think
they've let everyone know)

2) They put the results where people can see them (as far as they
know), and invite the appropriate people (as far as they know) to have
a look

3) They collect feedback and incorporate it into the site

4) The revisions go public

5) Everybody gets pissed off.  They're fuming because this is the
first they've seen the changes, first they've heard about the changes,
the changes are stupid and ill-considered and didn't include their
feedback and whoever did them meant well but should've done it
differently and can we please have our old comfortable pages back even
though we raised the exact same stink about them three years ago the
last time anyone was brave enough to change anything?

---------

Am I the only person who thinks maybe we have some sort of process
problem here that forces us to undergo the same conflagration every
time we do this? 

Rod is the one of the most careful, considerate, and
process-respectful people I've had the pleasure to work with. He's not
going to admit it unless pushed, but I'll bet he's got an electronic
trail dating back months indicating this set of revisions wasn't the
Big Secret implied by our reactions. Even if I'm wrong and the new
look is the result of a mad hermit sealed in a cave hammering out HTML
unseen by anyone else till it appeared live, I think my point still
stands.

I suggest we take some of the energy we're putting into this reaction
to the new pages and figure out the ideal way we'd like to see the
next interface update happen. Who should be involved, representing
what constituencies, how does beta testing occur, what's the feeback
cycle, blah blah blah. 

I propose we start with YAEL (yet another email list) for everyone who
wants a piece of how new interfaces are done. Spend a month or so
gathering opinions (the one item of which SCN has no shortage),
consolidate them into a draft of how we'll do things, get feedback and
make changes, get consensus, post the process on SCN, and let the list
sit quietly till we decide to bring our interface up to date again.
Then publicize the effort, use the list as a channel for anyone
interested to keep tabs on what's up, get in your two cents' worth,
whatever it takes.

There may be a better solution. That's fine. Let's just address the
problem and try to fix it. The problem is that our usual coping
mechanisms for doing things on SCN don't work when we do global
interface changes. Every single time the folks doing the changes do
their best to do it right and involve the right people and every
single time they get flamed because from the outside looking in it
seems they did it wrong and didn't involve the right people. 

If we keep doing what we're doing, we'll keep getting what we've got.
Except for a couple of new names this thread is identical to the ones
from all our past global changes. Let's write a new ending for this
movie.

If there's anyone I haven't insulted or angered enough in this
broadcast message, please let me know and I'll do my best to recify
the situation on an individual basis.

Al
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From starsrus at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 13:07:19 2000
From: starsrus at scn.org (Kenneth Applegate)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 13:07:19 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: RE: Redesigned Web pages
In-Reply-To: <01BF9310.BFBDCCB0.jmabel@saltmine.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321124737.7063A-100000@scn>

On Tue, 21 Mar 2000, Joe Mabel wrote:

> I like the new design a lot better (at least under IE4, which is what I 
> browse with).  However:
> 1) It took over a minute to come up on my machine, and I have a T-1 
> connection!

I agree - not a minute, but certainly 15-20 seconds to load a new page.
This could just be related to ongoing problems with the SCN4 server. The
previous lag that I observed for any pages stored on SCN4 was 5-8 seconds.
This is probably not a good time to test [noon hour]. However, ALL pages
on SCN seem to be very slow to load right now. 

> 2) I concur that the new SCN logo is awfully small, maybe 25% of the real 
> estate I'd give it.  It's barely bigger than the buttons, I'd want it more 
> distinct.

And it probably needs to be repeated [maybe smaller] on all SCN pages

> 3) I don't know about you, but I consider the Crisis Resource Directory 
> (which I edit) a reasonably important feature of SCN.  It is now almost 
> impossible to find. Even knowing it is there, and looking in half a dozen 
> reasonable places I can't find it.  I would assume that guide (or relevant 
> pages) should be linked in quite a few places.  What gives?

I suppose I can't complain, since Astronomy lucks out at the beginning of
the alphabet, and Seattle Astro Society is easy to find now at the top of
the Sci/Tech page. However, just considering that Sci/Tech section - it
impresses me as being a real hodge podge mix of Information Provider sites
on SCN, other sites of sci/tech related organizations, local community
resources, random stuff from elsewhere (NASA, for example), etc. 

This is not to say there shouldn't be links somewhere on SCN to such
resources.  But it should be sorted out and classified more logically. And
all the extra links to information shouln't get in the way of finding
sites maintained by IPs on SCN - after all, one of the things we do it
host web sites, and it should be easy to find them.

Along those lines - the alphabetic listing of sites on SCN is good, but
take it a step further, since the list is long - identify each letter
section (B's for example) with an <A NAME="B"> tag, and then provide a bar
at the top ABCDE---- which would be clickable links to the anchors for the
A, B, etc sections.

Ken Applegate


> 
> ----------------------------------------------------
> Joe Mabel
> Saltmine LLC
> 206.284.7511
> 
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Ken Applegate           How do you identify astronomers from Seattle? 
<starsrus at scn.org>      By the windshield wipers on their telescopes!

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From starsrus at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 13:16:40 2000
From: starsrus at scn.org (Kenneth Applegate)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 13:16:40 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: New Web Pages
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321092715.11612A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321130944.7063B-100000@scn>

On Tue, 21 Mar 2000, Rod Clark wrote:

> 
>    There was relatively little feedback about the test site, but
> what little there was was very good feedback. Almost none of the
> comments that people are making now would ever have surfaced,
> though, if it hadn't moved to a live site, because most of the
> people giving feedback now couldn't have been expected to take
> the time to participate in a test program, and didn't.

As in "What test site?" Accessible to what subset of SCN users? Was there
an announcement about it? [Admittedly, it may have been buried somewhere
in with my huge mass of OPS list email :>) ]. I agree that it is hard to
get user comments on test pages, but it seems as if you had put a nice
prominent link on the old SCN main page, like "Click Here to Try Out and
Comment On the New Face of SCN!!!", you probably would have gotten a fair
amount of feedback.

Ken Applegate

> 
> 
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Ken Applegate           How do you identify astronomers from Seattle? 
<starsrus at scn.org>      By the windshield wipers on their telescopes!

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From bb615 at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 13:22:46 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 13:22:46 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: RE: Redesigned Web pages
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321124737.7063A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321131112.17623A-100000@scn>

> I agree - not a minute, but certainly 15-20 seconds to load a new page.
> This could just be related to ongoing problems with the SCN4 server. 

Ken, 

   Here's the current uptime info for SCN4, at 1:11 PM (average
for the last 1 minute, 5 mins, 15 

18.21 8.91 6.52

> ... However, just considering that Sci/Tech section - it
> impresses me as being a real hodge podge mix of Information
> Provider sites on SCN, other sites of sci/tech related
> organizations, local community resources, random stuff from
> elsewhere (NASA, for example), etc.

   There's relatively little lodcal information in the Sci-Tech
section. I'd like to see a stronger effort to list local sites
there, and leave the general science directories to others.
Seattle is a center of research in aerospace, biotechnology,
medicine, software, Internet innovations and many other things.
That and other local info should be more what the Sci-Tech page
is about, if possible. SCN is basically a local directory, and
the effort should go into that. The great majority of the links
in each topic section should be local.

> Along those lines - the alphabetic listing of sites on SCN is good, but
> take it a step further, since the list is long - identify each letter
> section (B's for example) with an <A NAME="B"> tag, and then provide a bar
> at the top ABCDE---- which would be clickable links to the anchors for the
> A, B, etc sections.

   That's a good suggestion. Would you like to copy the page and
add that to it? You could post the URL of your new version here.
Maybe others would have some contributions to make to improve it
too.

Rod

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From bb615 at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 13:47:07 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 13:47:07 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: RE: Redesigned Web pages
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321131112.17623A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321134048.26953A-100000@scn>

>    Here's the current uptime info for SCN4, at 1:11 PM (average
> for the last 1 minute, 5 mins, 15 
> 
> 18.21 8.91 6.52

Ken, 

   It's back down from that peak now, to about twice the usual
average. At 1:39 PM we had:

Load average for the past  1 minute:   1.98 
                           5 minutes:  3.59
                          15 minutes:  4.83

   Could you or someone on Ops suggest a way to prevent other
processes that may be running (mail, etc.) from creating large
peaks like that 18+ one on SCN4? What about 'nice' or something
of that kind? Loads much above 2 or 3 have a very large negative
impact on the usability of Web mail in particular.

Rod

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From er-chan at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 16:51:39 2000
From: er-chan at scn.org (er-chan)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 16:51:39 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: new web home page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003210755230.16669-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003211640460.16906-100000@scn>




###### er-chan ##### at ## scn.org ### at #### usa.net ######


On Tue, 21 Mar 2000, allen wrote:

> Lose it...it sucks big time!!!
> 

> Rod, I do appreciate all the hard work you put in on maintaining/

######### He (Rod) is great at answering email from IPs and others
#########  in a very considerate, informed manner.

> creating this part of SCN...I really do.  AND...this effort is
> not good.  Any radical change like this should have input from 

> others before going before the public.  This is not your website,



########## this is what we were talking about in hardware, who
########## decides who does what and who is in charge of what.
########## My health page has been taken over!

########   maybe it is time we decides who is in charge of what
####### and not leave it up to who knows how to set the permissions.

> it is SCN's and a radical change in our public face on the web
> (which this is) is totally innappropriate without feedback from
> others prior to publishing it!
> 
########## He did start on this about a year or more ago! but because
########## of the length of time, lack of communication, obfuscation
########## with details about colors, icons, etc.  none of the topic
#########  editors believed they would no longer be topic editors
########  and now unpaid underlings of bb615 (Rod Clark).
########   He has changed the ***content*** of the topic pages!!
> 
> 
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From janossz at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 16:54:17 2000
From: janossz at scn.org (Janos Szablya)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 16:54:17 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: RE: Redesigned Web pages
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321134048.26953A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321164435.17718A-100000@scn>


OK....  I think of myself as Mr. J.Q. Public on the web...

I LIKE THE NEW LOOK...   

comments:
Center the logo
Put buttons under it or vertically on the right on the center side of the
"index" 
widen the text margins so the page is not as long. 

Possibly spread the pictures out so they are throughout the text.

I would like it if we had an internal search say I search for "art" I
should get internal (scn) art groups.... there's my bitch... and the old
page didn't do that either.

Well done Rod I can actually find stuff on the page...... 

at 4:45 pm on a t-1 it took less that 8 seconds

Janos

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From bn890 at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 21:02:27 2000
From: bn890 at scn.org (Irene Mogol)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 21:02:27 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: New web pages (fwd)
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321210011.622A-100000@scn>



---------- Forwarded message ----------
Subject: New web pages

Since I am a new user of the web page, having just recently gotten my home
computer, and never having enough time at the library, I am totally and
completely confused and mystified by the new page.
I could find no way to get into Telnet, after trying to use Webmail which
was akin to impossible.  I couldnt read the mail without having to scroll
both directions, I couldnt manage to pull up a whole index listing, and
had a problem logging out.  
Is it me?  I hope not.
In appearance I think it looks great.
See ya,
Irene
 


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From bb615 at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 22:14:25 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 22:14:25 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: New web pages (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321210011.622A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321220819.15263A-100000@scn>

Irene, 

   There used to be a Login (telnet) link on the home page, at
the top of the page. There still is, but now it's a button with
a graphic of an old green screen monitor on it. The Login button
also is on every page now, not just the home page. It's the
first button at the top left of the home page, and it's the
second button from the left on all the other pages (the first
button on the other pages takes you back to the SCN home page).
Hope this helps.

   Webmail is slow whenever SCN4 is slow, which it has been at
times today. We're working on getting a better Web mail program
ready. 

Rod

> ... I could find no way to get into Telnet, after trying to use
> Webmail which was akin to impossible. I couldnt read the mail
> without having to scroll both directions, I couldnt manage to pull
> up a whole index listing, and had a problem logging out.
> Is it me?  I hope not.
> In appearance I think it looks great.
> See ya,
> Irene

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From jj at scn.org  Tue Mar 21 23:57:16 2000
From: jj at scn.org (J. Johnson)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 23:57:16 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Put up or shut up.
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321195125.9426A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000321233345.3178B-100000@scn>

(No such luck, folks:  Rich is back.  He says he hasn't been on the net
in more than a month because none of his computers works.  He also says
"there is a lot to say about the suit", and that he will "do a full
explanation probably within a week".) 

Rich:  no explanation of the suit can be full unless the various
defendants can also present their side of the story.  And they can't do
that--unless you will unqualifiedly waive any right of confidentiality.  
At the annual meeting you publicly stated that you would.  ("In
context"--well, that's what everyone wants, but the _full_ context, and
not just Rich Littleton's highly partisan version.)

So it's very simple:  yes, or no, DO YOU WAIVE CONFIDENTIALITY, so the
Board and Governance can tell us the _full_ story?

=== JJ =================================================================

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From bb615 at scn.org  Wed Mar 22 03:20:35 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2000 03:20:35 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: BD: Re: WEB: new web home page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003211640460.16906-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000322011853.15525B-100000@scn>

Elaine Chan wrote:
> ... none of the topic editors believed they would no longer be
> #########  topic editors
> ########  and now unpaid underlings of bb615 (Rod Clark).
> ########   He has changed the ***content*** of the topic pages!!

Elaine, 

   Here are the several local links that I've added to the new
Health section. A few months ago I counted exactly 13 local
links on the Health menu - the product of four years of work in
building a Seattle community health directory - when the Health
menu at that time consisted of several hundred links. 

   After a years-long series of conversations with you about the
value of including local content, I see that you are still
saying "No!" in a loud voice to featuring local health
information. Would you please explain why? I'm just not willing
to accept this any longer, from a topic editor of what is
clearly supposed to be a local directory.

   Following the list of added sites is a list of the other
recently suggested local sites that neither you nor I nor anyone
else has added to the Health menu. (All are local except for the
teen suicide site that Lee suggested.) These are documented on
the whatsnew/suggest.html page. Maybe some of these, or other
local sites, could be added to the Health menu in upcoming
months. What do you think?

   This next has nothing to do with you or the Health menu, I
believe. But this is the second or third time that I've added
the Aradia and Feminist Women's Health Center links back onto
one or another of the SCN menus, over the past several years. I
don't know why they keep disappearing, but I'd like to see them
remain on the menus somewhere, in Health or another section.

   I sincerely hope that you can find some way to agree this
year to help us build a Seattle area community health directory.
Because frankly we are going to build one.

Rod

Added:
   Alzheimer's Association of Western and Central Washington
   American Cancer Society, Washington State
   American Diabetes Association of Washington
   American Heart Association, Washington Affiliate
   American Lung Association of Washington
   Aradia Women's Health Center
   Children's Hospital and Regional Medical Center
   Feminist Women's Health Center
   Green Cross Patient Co-op
   HIVNet at the UW
   Hall Health Primary Care Center
   King County Sexual Assualt Resource Center
   NW Regional Primary Care Association
   Planned Parenthood of Western Washington
   Seattle Al-Anon
   Seattle Widowed Young Persons' Support Site
   The Rubber Tree
   UW Harborview Stroke Center
   Washington Biotechnology and Biomedical Association

Not added, by date:

March 20, 2000
  <a href="http://www.childrensalliance.org/kidsteeth.htm">KidsTeeth</a> 
  <a href="http://www.safe-passage.org/">Safe Passage Treatment Program</a> 
  <a href="http://www.smh.org/">Seattle Mental Health Institute</a> 
  <A HREF="http://www.shiba.org/">Statewide Health Insurance Benefits Advisors</a> 
  <A HREF="http://vergeance.com/VOX/">Voices for Planned Parenthood, Pierce County</a> 
  <A HREF="http://www.healthsupportcenter.org/">Health Support Center</a> 
  <A HREF="http://www.healthsupportcenter.org/adhdncnc.shtml">AD(H)D Natural Causes/Natural Cures</a> 
  <A HREF="http://www.healthsupportcenter.org/Health-Resources.html">Health Resources in Whatcom County</a> 
  <a href="http://www.geocities.com/ResearchTriangle/Lab/1995/">American Medical Writers Association, Northwest Chapter</a> 
  <a href="http://www.behavenet.com/wsam/">Washington Society of Addiction Medicine</a> 

March 12, 2000
  <a href="http://www.virtualcity.com/youthsuicide/">Youth Suicide</a>

March 6, 2000
  <a href="http://www.nwbf.org/">Northwest Burn Foundation</a> 

February 25, 2000
  <a href="http://www.crystalneon.org/">NEON: Needle and Sex Education Outreach Network</a> 

February 23, 2000
  <a href="http://www.help-for-health.org/">Washington Help for Health</a> 
  <a href="http://www.chita.org/">Community Health Information Technology Alliance</a> 
  <a href="http://www.coap.org/">Clinical Outcomes Assessment Program</a> 
  <a href="http://www.qualityhealth.org/">Foundation for Health Care Quality</a> 
  <a href="http://www.csbps.com/">Community Services for the Blind and Partially Sighted</a> 

February 15, 2000
  <a href="http://www.sccd.ctc.edu/~ccdeafst/">Center for Deaf Students</a> 

February 14, 2000
  <a href="http://www.clams.org/">Computer Literate Advocates for Multiple Sclerosis (CLAMS)</a> 
  <a href="http://wwwdwatcm.wr.usgs.gov/reports/fs.102-97/">Mercury In Lake Roosevelt</a> 

February 11, 2000
  <a href="http://www.picc.net/">Pediatric Interim Care Center</a> 
  <a href="http://www.seattlemidwifery.org/">Seattle Midwifery School</a> 
  <a href="http://www.thebody.com/step/steppage.html">Seattle Treatment Education Project</a> 

February 8, 2000
  <a href="http://www.seattletimes.com/science/state/research_centers.html">Seattle Times: State of Science - Research Centers</a> 
  <a href="http://www.seattletimes.com/science/state/bios.html">Seattle Times: State of Science - Biographies</a> 

February 4, 2000
  <a href="http://members.aa.net/~tgmoore/pregmisc.htm">LeAnn's Pregnancy and Miscarriage Pages</a> 

February 1, 2000
  <a href="http://www.naral.org/choice/community/wa.html">National Abortion Rights Action League of Washington</a> 

January 31, 2000
  <a href="http://www.womens-health-equity.org/">Women for Healthcare Equity through Reform and Education</a> 

January 30, 2000
  <a href="http://www.vmmc.org/bailey-boushay/">Bailey-Boushay House</a> 
  <a href="http://www.seattleshanti.org/">Seattle Shanti</a> 

January 25, 2000
  <a href="http://www.littlebit.org/">Little Bit Therapeutic Riding Center</a> 

December 31, 1999
  <a href="http://www.speakeasy.org/wfp/41/medical.html">WFP: Prison Medical Mayhem</a> 
  <a href="http://www.satori.org/rist/">Seattle Repetitive Injury Support Team</a> 
   
November 25, 1999
  <a href="http://students.washington.edu/radin/">Washington Biotechnology Action Council</a> 

November 20, 1999
  <a href="http://www.wpsr.org/">Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility</a>
  <a href="http://www.washingtonredcross.org/">Washington Red Cross</a>
  <a href="http://www.familyhealthinstitute.org/">Family Health Institute</a>

November 13, 1999
  <a href="http://www.tobaccostinks.org/">Washington SOUL</a> 

November 8, 1999
  <a href="http://www.csbps.com/">Community Services for the Blind and Partially Sighted</a> 


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From starsrus at scn.org  Wed Mar 22 13:42:16 2000
From: starsrus at scn.org (Kenneth Applegate)
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2000 13:42:16 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: RE: Redesigned Web pages
In-Reply-To: <200003221638.IAA05890@scn4.scn.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000322133249.3997A-100000@scn>

On Wed, 22 Mar 2000 ttrim at scn.org wrote:

Terry - 

One good thing about the new Community page is that Rod has a link to
current current SCN Information Providers page (www.scn.org/sites.html). 
That is arranged as a nice alphabetical listing. I made a suggestion for
easier navigation of the list, and Rod said "why don't you work on it?" I
did that last night, sent Rod a copy, and installed a copy under my
personal web page area. It sets up an "A B C D ..." navigation bar, and
clicking on any letter puts you at the listings for that letter. There is
also an easy return to the index letters from each section.

If you or anyone else wants a look at the redesign, you can view it at

http://www.scn.org/~starsrus/sites2.html

[sorry - I haven't grabbed the graphics for all the icons yet, so you just
get the page text].

Ken Applegate

> Hi Ken,
> You are voicing here what I have been TRYING to say to Rod 
> for MONTHS and MONTHS. Every time there is any kind of 
> discussion about the webpage I bring it up, and am 
> ignored. Rod wants to be the new Seattle Sidewalk or 
> something. He wants more content, more links! No one is 
> putting any energy into getting more IP's, and that is the 
> shining star of what SCN does, provide FREE space to IP's!!
> 
> I hate that the IP's we have are no longer featured in a 
> logical manner. But that is just me.  Well, and I guess 
> you.
> 
> I appreciated all your comments!
> Terry T.
> 
>  
> > This is not to say there shouldn't be links somewhere on 
> SCN to such
> > resources.  But it should be sorted out and classified 
> more logically. And
> > all the extra links to information shouln't get in the 
> way of finding
> > sites maintained by IPs on SCN - after all, one of the 
> things we do it
> > host web sites, and it should be easy to find them.
> > 
> 
> 
> 

Ken Applegate           How do you identify astronomers from Seattle? 
<starsrus at scn.org>      By the windshield wipers on their telescopes!

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From douglas  Wed Mar 22 21:40:24 2000
From: douglas (Doug Schuler)
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2000 21:40:24 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: reminder: Volunteer Meeting!  Shaping the Network Society
Message-ID: <200003230540.VAA08880@scn.org>

WE NEED YOU!

In less than two months time we're hosting an exciting symposium -- 
"Shaping the Network Society -- the seventh in CPSR's "Directions 
and Implications of Advanced Computing" (DIAC) series.  

On Thusday March 23 at 7 PM at the Speakeasy we're having our first 
volunteer meeting.

We need people to do publicity, web work, proceedings, registration, 
local arrangements, and many other exciting jobs.

Hope to see you there!

-- Doug

PS.  If you can't make it but would like to help please contact
Ti Locke, lockt at kcts.org.


         ************************************************
         *     Shaping the Network Society              *
         *     An International Symposium               *
	 *     May 20 - 23, 2000                        *
	 *     Seattle, Washington  US                  *
         *     http://www.scn.org/cpsr/diac-00          *
         ************************************************
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From starsrus at scn.org  Wed Mar 22 22:09:02 2000
From: starsrus at scn.org (Kenneth Applegate)
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2000 22:09:02 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: new web home page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.10.10003210755230.16669-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000322220402.14260B-100000@scn>


Has anyone noticed that "improvements" in the last 24 hours have rendered
all the SCN web pages nearly unuseable for anyone viewing them with the
Lynx text browser?

Yesterday, you could still see which link was currently selected under the
cursor, using the reverse video highlighting. Tonight ALL links show up in
reverse video, and you have no visual clue as to where you are on the
page!

Ken

P.S. I am now going to see if our old Icomm browser still knows how to
view SCN pages!

Ken Applegate           How do you identify astronomers from Seattle? 
<starsrus at scn.org>      By the windshield wipers on their telescopes!

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From bb615 at scn.org  Wed Mar 22 22:53:02 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2000 22:53:02 -0800 (PST)
Subject: WEB: Re: SCN: new web home page
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000322224546.1860C-100000@scn>

Ken Applegate wrote:
> Has anyone noticed that "improvements" in the last 24 hours have
> rendered all the SCN web pages nearly unuseable for anyone
> viewing them with the Lynx text browser?
> 
> Yesterday, you could still see which link was currently selected
> under the cursor, using the reverse video highlighting. Tonight
> ALL links show up in reverse video, and you have no visual clue
> as to where you are on the page!
> 
> Ken
> 
> P.S. I am now going to see if our old Icomm browser still knows
> how to view SCN pages!

Ken, 

   The entire site is based on using included header and footer
files. It has been that way since last year. That's why it's so easy
to make global changes to the site now, and why all the pages stay
uniform in navigation. Any time you capture a page from your browser,
you lose all the original page source code, and instead are being fed
the finished output of the Apache include processor. This is
unfortunately what several people have been using for doing "page
maintenance" on the site. 

   The source code, which includes the virtual includes, is easy to
see with any text editor or FTP program. The only program that can
translate the source includes into the finished output that you see
in your browser is the Apache Web server. And anyone who assumes that
the output of a Web server is the original code that the server read
in before it interpreted that source code is not living in the late
1990s.

   When you say that you see things in reverse video, which
terminal emulator are you using? I'm using one that doesn't show
anything in reverse video, and the pages look perfectly fine
with it. You might try setting up your terminal emulator a bit
differently. The links are mostly standard non-bold, non-italic
links. They should show up in a reasonably good terminal
emulator as normal text of a somewhet different color. (This one
presents the links as amber text, and regular text as green
characters on a black background).

   I-Comm doesn't have to understand the include statements. It
never sees them. It's the Apache server that interprets them
into a fully assembled HTML page, not the user's browser. Every
browser sees the same HTML. The HTML that Apache sends to I-Comm
is no different from the HTML that it sends to Netscape or Lynx.

Rod


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From er-chan at scn.org  Wed Mar 22 22:54:38 2000
From: er-chan at scn.org (er-chan)
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2000 22:54:38 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: new web home page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000322011853.15525B-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003222249400.16828-100000@scn>


####### 

Rod (bb615):

The tone of your message confirms it. 

########practice anonymous acts of loving kindness to your community#####



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From bb615 at scn.org  Wed Mar 22 23:19:07 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2000 23:19:07 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: new web home page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003222249400.16828-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000322230327.1860E-100000@scn>

> The tone of your message confirms it. 

Elaine, 

   It would be all right to move your menus of general
information to the Net Guide section, where they would be of use
in the same way that the lists of general Internet starting
points there are of use to SCN users and others. You could build
your pages there to your heart's content, alongside the other
general purpose pages. But the Community Pages have a local
community building purpose that you are not serving.

   If you continue to refuse to include local information on the
Community Pages, I must ask you to resign as a Communmity Pages
topic editor. You are of course welcome to continue to
contribute any local information that you may find to the new
Community pages Health editors, when we choose new editors for
that section.

Rod

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From steve at advocate.net  Thu Mar 23 09:02:21 2000
From: steve at advocate.net (Steve)
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 09:02:21 -0800
Subject: SCN: Need for local info
Message-ID: <38D9DD9D.19535.9D5738@localhost>

x-no-archive: yes

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

(Katie Hafner, NY Times)---The past year has seen no shortage of 
studies that try to describe, explain and propose fixes for the digital 
divide, the gulf that lies between those who have computers and 
access to the Internet and those who do not.  

Two recent additions -- from the Children's Partnership, a nonprofit 
organization based in Santa Monica, Calif., and from the Conference 
Board, a business research group in New York -- make valuable 
contributions to the growing canon.  

The Children's Partnership released a study last week that found 
"severe gaps" in Internet content geared to the needs of low-income 
and immigrant groups in America, although those groups are gaining 
access in increasing numbers to the Internet.  

The report, which analyzed the availability, quality and appeal of 
Internet content for low-income Americans, found a dearth of local 
and community-based information, especially on local jobs and 
housing.  

Wendy Lazarus, co-founder and co-director of the Children's 
Partnership, said her organization set out to answer the following 
questions: "Once more people go online, what is the value to them? 
What content are they looking for? What begins to give them what 
they want, and what needs to be done if two years from now there is 
going to be relevant content that pulls in the 50 million Americans 
who are on the other side of the content gap?"  

Ms. Lazarus said the study done by the Children's Partnership 
found that "low-income folks see the Web as a way for self-
improvement and for job opportunities, which makes the practical 
content all the more important."  

The study is said to be the first systematic look at the kinds of 
things underserved communities want and need online.  

It recommended that several steps be taken, including additional 
investment in community technology centers that can help produce 
content that is relevant to people living in low-income communities, 
as well as technical training for low-income users.  

The Conference Board report, released at the end of January, called 
on the private sector, specifically the computer industry, to make the 
investments necessary to close the gap.  

The report stated that as the percentage of homes with a computer 
steadily rises, an increasing proportion of machines are bought as 
replacements or additional computers. Only 40 percent of sales, 
according to the report, are being made to households purchasing a 
computer for the first time.  

"There's a powerful case for trying to get as much of the population 
hooked into the Internet as possible," said Tom Cavanagh, a senior 
research associate at the conference board and author of the report. 
"You add those two things together and you conclude that business 
will have to reach out to lower-income communities if we're going to 
get anywhere near universal connectivity."  

Mr. Cavanagh said he agreed with findings like those of the 
Children's Partnership -- that content is critical.  

"This is where a lot of the discussion on the digital divide is going to 
head," Mr. Cavanagh said. "In a way, the concentration on the digital 
divide may be peaking and moving into these new issues about 
content.  

"Also, what does connectivity mean as content moves to audio and 
video streaming? It's not just whether you're connected, but the kind 
of connection you have which is going to affect the kind of 
experience you have."  

Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company  



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From jmabel at saltmine.com  Thu Mar 23 08:33:00 2000
From: jmabel at saltmine.com (Joe Mabel)
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 08:33:00 -0800
Subject: SCN: RE: Re: WEB: new web home page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003222249400.16828-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <008101bf94e5$744e3f90$508d6bc6@stockade.saltmine.com>

What is the context of this? If it's some kind of personal pissing match,
could you both please take it off the mailing lists?

Thanks.
JM

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-scn at scn.org [mailto:owner-scn at scn.org]On Behalf Of er-chan
> Sent: Wednesday, March 22, 2000 10:55 PM
> To: webeditors at scn.org
> Cc: scna-board at scn.org; allen; scn at scn.org; webmasters at scn.org
> Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: new web home page
>
>
>
> #######
>
> Rod (bb615):
>
> The tone of your message confirms it.
>
> ########practice anonymous acts of loving kindness to your community#####
>
>
>
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From steve at advocate.net  Thu Mar 23 09:15:17 2000
From: steve at advocate.net (Steve)
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 09:15:17 -0800
Subject: SCN: Web design testing
Message-ID: <38D9E0A5.7675.A92CC5@localhost>

x-no-archive: yes

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

Why You Only Need to Test With 5 Users  

Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox 3/19/00


Some people think that usability is very costly and complex and that 
user tests should be reserved for the rare web design project with a 
huge budget and a lavish time schedule. Not true. Elaborate 
usability tests are a waste of resources. The best results come from 
testing no more than 5 users and running as many small tests as 
you can afford.  

In earlier research, Tom Landauer and I showed that the number of 
usability problems found in a usability test with n users is:  

N(1-(1-L)n)  

where N is the total number of usability problems in the design and 
L is the proportion of usability problems discovered while testing a 
single user. The typical value of L is 31%, averaged across a large 
number of projects we studied.

The most striking truth of the curve is that zero users give zero 
insights.  

As soon as you collect data from a single test user, your insights 
shoot up and you have already learned almost a third of all there is 
to know about the usability of the design. The difference between 
zero and even a little bit of data is astounding.  

When you test the second user, you will discover that this person 
does some of the same things as the first user, so there is some 
overlap in what you learn. People are definitely different, so there 
will also be something new that the second user does that you did 
not observe with the first user. So the second user adds some 
amount of new insight, but not nearly as much as the first user did.  

The third user will do many things that you already observed with 
the first user or with the second user and even some things that you 
have already seen twice. Plus, of course, the third user will generate 
a small amount of new data, even if not as much as the first and the 
second user did.  

As you add more and more users, you learn less and less because 
you will keep seeing the same things again and again. There is no 
real need to keep observing the same thing multiple times, and you 
will be very motivated to go back to the drawing board and redesign 
the site to eliminate the usability problems.  

After the fifth user, you are wasting your time by observing the same 
findings repeatedly but not learning much new.  

The curve clearly shows that you need to test with at least 15 users 
to discover all the usability problems in the design. So why do I 
recommend testing with a much smaller number of users?  

The main reason is that it is better to distribute your budget for user 
testing across many small tests instead of blowing everything on a 
single, elaborate study. Let us say that you do have the funding to 
recruit 15 representative customers and have them test your design. 
Great. Spend this budget on three tests with 5 users each!  

You want to run multiple tests because the real goal of usability 
engineering is to improve the design and not just to document its 
weaknesses. After the first study with 5 users has found 85% of the 
usability problems, you will want to fix these problems in a 
redesign.  

After creating the new design, you need to test again. Even though I 
said that the redesign should "fix" the problems found in the first 
study, the truth is that you think that the new design overcomes the 
problems. But since nobody can design the perfect user interface, 
there is no guarantee that the new design does in fact fix the 
problems. A second test will discover whether the fixes worked or 
whether they didn't. Also, in introducing a new design, there is 
always the risk of introducing a new usability problem, even if the 
old one did get fixed.  

Also, the second test with 5 users will discover most of the 
remaining 15% of the original usability problems that were not found 
in the first test. (There will still be 2% of the original problems left - 
they will have to wait until the third test to be identified.)  

Finally, the second test will be able to probe deeper into the 
usability of the fundamental structure of the site, assessing issues 
like information architecture, task flow, and match with user needs. 
These important issues are often obscured in initial studies where 
the users are stumped by stupid surface-level usability problems 
that prevent them from really digging into the site.  

So the second test will both serve as quality assurance of the 
outcome of the first study and help provide deeper insights as well. 
The second test will always lead to a new (but smaller) list of 
usability problems to fix in a redesign. And the same insight applies 
to this redesign: not all the fixes will work; some deeper issues will 
be uncovered after cleaning up the interface. Thus, a third test is 
needed as well.  

The ultimate user experience is improved much more by three tests 
with 5 users than by a single test with 15 users.  

You might think that fifteen tests with a single user would be even 
better than three tests with 5 users. The curve does show that we 
learn much more from the first user than from any subsequent 
users, so why keep going? Two reasons:  

There is always a risk of being misled by the spurious behavior of a 
single person who may perform certain actions by accident or in an 
unrepresentative manner. Even three users are enough to get an 
idea of the diversity in user behavior and insight into what's unique 
and what can be generalized. The cost-benefit analysis of user 
testing provides the optimal ratio around three or five users, 
depending on the style of testing. There is always a fixed initial cost 
associated with planning and running a test: it is better to depreciate 
this start-up cost across the findings from multiple users.  

You need to test additional users when a website has several highly 
distinct groups of users. The formula only holds for comparable 
users who will be using the site in fairly similar ways.  

If, for example, you have a site that will be used by both children 
and parents, then the two groups of users will have sufficiently 
different behavior that it becomes necessary to test with people from 
both groups. The same would be true for a system aimed at 
connecting purchasing agents with sales staff.  

Even when the groups of users are very different, there will still be 
great similarities between the observations from the two groups. All 
the users are human, after all. Also, many of the usability problems 
are related to the fundamental way people interact with the Web and 
the influence from other sites on user behavior.  

In testing multiple groups of disparate users, you don't need to 
include as many members of each group as you would in a single 
test of a single group of users. The overlap between observations 
will ensure a better outcome from testing a smaller number of 
people in each group. I recommend:  

3-4 users from each category if testing two groups of users 

3 users from each category if testing three or more groups of users 
(you always want at least 3 users to ensure that you have covered 
the diversity of behavior within the group).







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From bn890 at scn.org  Thu Mar 23 20:35:02 2000
From: bn890 at scn.org (Irene Mogol)
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 20:35:02 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Telnet on New Web Page
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000323203113.21169R-100000@scn>

How does one get to Telnet on new web page, or, how does one read mail, or
how does one send mail.  If I am somewhere other than my own computer
there does not seem to be any way for me to do.
		OR (no comments please)
Am I just another Dummy?
Thanx,
Irene

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From ljbeedle at scn.org  Thu Mar 23 12:42:07 2000
From: ljbeedle at scn.org (ljbeedle at scn.org)
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 20:42:07 +0000
Subject: SCN: Telnet on New Web Page
Message-ID: <200003240442.UAA24603@scn4.scn.org>

> How does one get to Telnet on new web page, or, how does 
one read mail, or
> how does one send mail.  If I am somewhere other than my 
own computer
> there does not seem to be any way for me to do.
> 		OR (no comments please)
> Am I just another Dummy?
> Thanx,
> Irene


Irene - I finally managed with a lot of help to figure out 
that the button on the main page http://www.scn.org - 
named login - does log you in to telnet.  And it just 
worked for me.

As to checking your mail - try this
http://www.scn.org/scripts/webmail
It got me in fine - first time I have ever found it and 
had no idea it existed.

Most interesting.

Lois

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From bn890 at scn.org  Thu Mar 23 13:08:53 2000
From: bn890 at scn.org (bn890 at scn.org)
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 21:08:53 +0000
Subject: SCN: Telnet on New Web Page
Message-ID: <200003240508.VAA29172@scn4.scn.org>

Thanx,  I also found the login (greeen) button but this is the most clunky system I have
ever used and I could not find a way to list all older messages, it seems to give me only
the new.  It seems kind of slow and awkward to use.  But, then again, I am also sometimes
kind of slow and awkward.
See ya,
Irene




> > How does one get to Telnet on new web page, or, how does 
> one read mail, or
> > how does one send mail.  If I am somewhere other than my 
> own computer
> > there does not seem to be any way for me to do.
> > 		OR (no comments please)
> > Am I just another Dummy?
> > Thanx,
> > Irene
> 
> 
> Irene - I finally managed with a lot of help to figure out 
> that the button on the main page http://www.scn.org- 
> named login - does log you in to telnet.  And it just 
> worked for me.
> 
> As to checking your mail - try this
> http://www.scn.org/scripts/webmail
> It got me in fine - first time I have ever found it and 
> had no idea it existed.
> 
> Most interesting.
> 
> Lois
> 
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From bn890 at scn.org  Thu Mar 23 21:21:02 2000
From: bn890 at scn.org (Irene Mogol)
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 21:21:02 -0800 (PST)
Subject: EMT: Re: SCN: Telnet on New Web Page
In-Reply-To: <200003240508.VAA29172@scn4.scn.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000323211859.13370A-100000@scn>

I just went back to scn hyper ter..., much easier to use from home.
Thanx, Irene

On Thu, 23 Mar 2000 bn890 at scn.org wrote:

> Thanx,  I also found the login (greeen) button but this is the most clunky system I have
> ever used and I could not find a way to list all older messages, it seems to give me only
> the new.  It seems kind of slow and awkward to use.  But, then again, I am also sometimes
> kind of slow and awkward.
> See ya,
> Irene
> 
> 
> 
> 
> > > How does one get to Telnet on new web page, or, how does 
> > one read mail, or
> > > how does one send mail.  If I am somewhere other than my 
> > own computer
> > > there does not seem to be any way for me to do.
> > > 		OR (no comments please)
> > > Am I just another Dummy?
> > > Thanx,
> > > Irene
> > 
> > 
> > Irene - I finally managed with a lot of help to figure out 
> > that the button on the main page http://www.scn.org- 
> > named login - does log you in to telnet.  And it just 
> > worked for me.
> > 
> > As to checking your mail - try this
> > http://www.scn.org/scripts/webmail
> > It got me in fine - first time I have ever found it and 
> > had no idea it existed.
> > 
> > Most interesting.
> > 
> > Lois
> > 
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> 
> 
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> This list is for communication between SCN e-mail trainers regarding
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From bb615 at scn.org  Thu Mar 23 23:39:22 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2000 23:39:22 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: Telnet on New Web Page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000323203113.21169R-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000323233508.6468B-100000@scn>

> How does one get to Telnet on new web page, 

Irene, 

   Would it help to change the name of the button to "Telnet?" 

   The link on the old home page said "Login (telnet)" and the
new one says "Login" because that's what you first see on the
screen. The screen says "Login: ", and then "Password:". The
Seattle Public Library has a Telnet button on their systems. But
many others don't. How common is an understanding of the Unix
term "telnet" among our users?

Rod

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From ljbeedle at scn.org  Sat Mar 25 10:11:33 2000
From: ljbeedle at scn.org (Lois Beedle)
Date: Sat, 25 Mar 2000 10:11:33 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: Telnet on New Web Page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000323233508.6468B-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000325100925.3949A-100000@scn>


On Thu, 23 Mar 2000, Rod Clark wrote:

> > How does one get to Telnet on new web page, 
> 
> 
>    Would it help to change the name of the button to "Telnet?" 
> 
Rod - I think we will get used to it - it was just that those of us who
telnet in were used to finding it as telnet.  I didn't even see the login
button at first at all. My fault there.

Lois

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From nancyk at scn.org  Sat Mar 25 22:48:27 2000
From: nancyk at scn.org (N Kunitsugu)
Date: Sat, 25 Mar 2000 22:48:27 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: Telnet on New Web Page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000325100925.3949A-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.94.1000325224552.9276B-100000@scn>

Hi,

If I were new at this, I would find it confusing to see a login
button after I thought I'd already reached scn...I like the idea
of using "telnet"  or  adding it to the "login" button.

Nancy

On Sat, 25 Mar 2000, Lois Beedle wrote:

> 
> On Thu, 23 Mar 2000, Rod Clark wrote:
> 
> > > How does one get to Telnet on new web page, 
> > 
> > 
> >    Would it help to change the name of the button to "Telnet?" 
> > 
> Rod - I think we will get used to it - it was just that those of us who
> telnet in were used to finding it as telnet.  I didn't even see the login
> button at first at all. My fault there.
> 
> Lois
> 

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From ljbeedle at scn.org  Sun Mar 26 08:10:59 2000
From: ljbeedle at scn.org (Lois Beedle)
Date: Sun, 26 Mar 2000 08:10:59 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: Telnet on New Web Page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.94.1000325224552.9276B-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000326080710.16438A-100000@scn>

I don't see how this would be different than when I access the internet
and have to log in to a number of other places that I have logins with -
for instance I go to http://www.thirdage.com where I tutor html and then
in order to access my files I must login, and I have to do a second login
for certain other access's.

This is true for most major sites on the web that I have seen.

Lois

On Sat, 25 Mar 2000, N Kunitsugu wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> If I were new at this, I would find it confusing to see a login
> button after I thought I'd already reached scn...I like the idea
> of using "telnet"  or  adding it to the "login" button.
> 
> Nancy
> 

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From bb615 at scn.org  Sun Mar 26 13:57:59 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Sun, 26 Mar 2000 13:57:59 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: Telnet on New Web Page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.94.1000325224552.9276B-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000326135320.5169D-100000@scn>

Nancy K wrote:
> ... I like the idea of using "telnet" or adding it to the
> "login" button.

> On Sat, 25 Mar 2000, Lois Beedle wrote:
> ... it was just that those of us who telnet in were used to
> > finding it as telnet. I didn't even see the login button at
> > first at all. 

Other people wrote:
[other stuff about this button]

Lois, Nancy, Joe et al.,

   The button now says "Telnet login". If your browser cached
the old button, though, it might take a while before you'll see
the revised one, because some browsers ordinarily cache graphics
for a lengthier time than they do text.

Rod

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From janossz at scn.org  Sun Mar 26 20:03:51 2000
From: janossz at scn.org (Janos Szablya)
Date: Sun, 26 Mar 2000 20:03:51 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: WEB: Telnet on New Web Page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000326135320.5169D-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000326200206.2765A-100000@scn>

For all to note...

if yougo to your cache and delete all the lines (in almost any text
editor) that refer to scn in anyway or simply purge the cache it will
speed up the process.
Janos



This email and any attachment contain information which is private and
confidential and is intended for the addressee only. If you are not an
addressee, you are not authorized to read, copy or use this email or any
attachment. If you have received this email in error, please destroy it
and notify the sender by return email.

On Sun, 26 Mar 2000, Rod Clark wrote:

> Nancy K wrote:
> > ... I like the idea of using "telnet" or adding it to the
> > "login" button.
> 
> > On Sat, 25 Mar 2000, Lois Beedle wrote:
> > ... it was just that those of us who telnet in were used to
> > > finding it as telnet. I didn't even see the login button at
> > > first at all. 
> 
> Other people wrote:
> [other stuff about this button]
> 
> Lois, Nancy, Joe et al.,
> 
>    The button now says "Telnet login". If your browser cached
> the old button, though, it might take a while before you'll see
> the revised one, because some browsers ordinarily cache graphics
> for a lengthier time than they do text.
> 
> Rod
> 
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From steve at advocate.net  Mon Mar 27 05:19:51 2000
From: steve at advocate.net (Steve)
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2000 05:19:51 -0800
Subject: SCN: Distributed systems
Message-ID: <38DEEF77.16985.364BE9@localhost>

x-no-archive: yes

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

Maverick Programmers Prepare To Unleash Anarchy on the Web

by Tom Weber
Wall Street Journal


If you think the Internet is an untamed frontier now, just wait. A new 
technology sweeping through cyberspace promises to unleash an 
entirely new wave of anarchy onto the Web, making it impossible for 
anyone to protect intellectual property online or shut down a rogue 
Web service.   

The early warning came March 14 from a tiny computer program 
called Gnutella. Created by renegade programmers at a unit of 
America Online, Gnutella lets people share computer files -- mainly 
music -- over the Net. AOL yanked the Gnutella Web site within a 
day, but it was too late. Gnutella is humming with hundreds of 
people swapping Pink Floyd cuts, and no one can stop them.   

The technology that makes Gnutella thrive is popping up all over the 
Net, and it goes way beyond just music. Known as a "distributed" or 
"peer-to-peer" approach, it's pretty much the opposite of the way the 
World Wide Web works. On the Web, people get information from 
central repositories, or servers. Shutting down a server cripples a 
Web site, as demonstrated in last month's hacker attacks.   

On a distributed system there is no central brain to attack. So 
there's almost no way to turn it off short of finding and unplugging 
every single machine connected to it. Shutting down one of these 
networks would be like trying to stop every phone conversation on 
the planet.   

"This will make censorship impossible," says Ian Clarke, a young 
programmer in London with grand plans for peer-to-peer technology. 
For the past 18 months, he and a handful of collaborators have 
spent their spare time creating a peer-to-peer alternative to the Web. 
They call their system FreeNet, and they're getting ready to unleash 
their prototype in a matter of days.   

FreeNet abandons the concept of the Web "site." Anyone would be 
able to make their computer a node on FreeNet by installing a piece 
of software. Information posted on FreeNet would be automatically 
replicated and stored on multiple member nodes. If someone wanted 
to search for something -- an academic paper, say, or a photograph --
 the request would move from one computer to the next until it 
encountered and accessed the desired information. The approach 
would foil tracking efforts and make it nearly impossible for 
someone to remove information from the network.   

Mr. Clarke thinks those capabilities add up to a bold new age for the 
Internet. He envisions FreeNet as a way for political dissidents to 
publish their views without fear of being found out. Read his fiery 
manifesto at http://freenet.sourceforge.net. But he admits there's a 
dark side, too. If FreeNet works as advertised, it could easily be 
adapted for unsavory purposes, such as distributing child 
pornography. "This system is, in a sense, above the law," he says.   

FreeNet may be new, but the concept of distributed networks has a 
long history. The Internet itself was constructed as a distributed 
network. Look deep inside the Net and you'll find tiny packets of 
digital information finding their way from one computer to the next, 
largely without any central control. But then the user-friendly Web 
came along and created a new layer on top of the Net, centered 
around the servers that host Web sites. In a sense, FreeNet and 
Gnutella are a return to the Net's roots.   

These fledgling networks are now mutating at warp speed, driven by 
the explosion in online music. A controversial program called 
Napster was designed for college students to trade songs in the 
popular MP3 file format. But last week Napster buffs branched out 
into everything from full-length feature films to copies of Microsoft 
Word thanks to Wrapster, an underground program written to turn 
the music-trading community into an all-purpose bazaar.   

Napster, though largely peer-to-peer, relies on a central server to act 
as a directory. That means someone can pull the plug -- say, a court 
ruling in favor of the music companies now suing Napster. But 
Gnutella is practically invulnerable because it's diffuse. You have to 
find one other computer running the software, then you're 
automatically hooked to all of the other Gnutella machines that 
computer knows about. And by installing the program on your PC, 
you turn your own machine into part of the network's library, too.   

Strangers can tap into your computer at a furious clip. A few nights 
ago I watched as anonymous Gnutella users scanned my laptop for 
the computer game Quake, songs by Fleetwood Mac, and a variety 
of X-rated images. (For the record, they found none of the above.) 
The program lets you decide which portions of your hard drive can 
be searched and which are off-limits, but it's disconcerting 
nonetheless. If you want to give it a try, visit 
http://gnutella.nerdherd.net, one of the growing number of Web sites 
offering Gnutella downloads and information.   

Computer-security expert Avi Rubin warns Net users to be wary. A 
strange file-sharing program might become a hacker's tool for 
looting your entire hard drive. But Mr. Rubin, a researcher at AT&T 
Labs, is working on another distributed network. Called Publius, 
after the pseudonym used in the Federalist Papers, it's designed to 
defeat censorship.   

And Gnutella fans like Bryan Mayland, 26, of Tampa, Fla., are 
already developing new versions aimed at supporting thousands, 
not hundreds, of users. "This is unstoppable," Mr. Mayland says.   

Copyright 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.




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From bb615 at scn.org  Mon Mar 27 07:37:50 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2000 07:37:50 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Distributed systems
In-Reply-To: <38DEEF77.16985.364BE9@localhost>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000327072552.16727A-100000@scn>

> Maverick Programmers Prepare To Unleash Anarchy on the Web
> ...
> If you think the Internet is an untamed frontier now, just wait. A
> new technology sweeping through cyberspace promises to unleash an
> entirely new wave of anarchy onto the Web, ...

Steve, 

   This breathless article is in many ways a pretty good
description of Usenet, even though the writer never mentions it.
Usenet has been around much longer than the Web, and it carries
all kinds of files, including music and photos and video as well
as text. Usenet is "anarchic" and has no central control, but
the world has not come to an end because of it. That some people
are starting to do this same kind of distributed publishing on
their networks of Web sites is interesting, though.

Rod

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From jj at scn.org  Tue Mar 28 01:15:41 2000
From: jj at scn.org (J. Johnson)
Date: Tue, 28 Mar 2000 01:15:41 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Distributed systems
In-Reply-To: <38DEEF77.16985.364BE9@localhost>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000328004242.10162B-100000@scn>

I got as far as: "Created by renegade programmers at a unit of America
Online..."  Renegade programmers at AOL?  Breaking free from their dreary
corporate existence and running wild in the manner of certain piratical
bookkeepers in a Monthy Python film?  Hardly.  (The nature and name
("Gnutella") of this supposedly "revolutionary" program suggests the "Gnu" 
folks.)  This supposed article from the WSJ sounds more like some
journalist has let his imagination run rather free.  Much like the
second-hand purple-prose that brought us "Y2K" and "9/9/99".  Or even the
likes of "Good Times".

=== JJ =================================================================

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From douglas  Tue Mar 28 11:42:47 2000
From: douglas (Doug Schuler)
Date: Tue, 28 Mar 2000 11:42:47 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Volunteers Needed -- Free Registration - Balloons for the kiddies
Message-ID: <200003281942.LAA27215@scn.org>


       WE NEED YOU!  ** STILL **


In less than two months time we're hosting the exciting symposium -- 
"Shaping the Network Society -- the seventh in CPSR's "Directions 
and Implications of Advanced Computing" (DIAC) series.  This is
a follow-up to the "Community Space and Cyberspace" symposium
that we hosted in 1997.  

We're expecting 500 attendees!

On Thusday March 30 at 7 PM at the Speakeasy we're having our second 
volunteer meeting.

Our first meeting went well and we're picking up steam.

We need people to do publicity, web work, proceedings, registration, 
local arrangements, and many other exciting jobs.  (And volunteers
can get free registration!)

Hope to see you there!

-- Doug

PS.  If you can't make it but would like to help please contact
Ti Locke, lockt at kcts.org.

PPS.  Just kidding about the baloons...


         ************************************************
         *     Shaping the Network Society              *
         *     An International Symposium               *
	 *     May 20 - 23, 2000                        *
	 *     Seattle, Washington  US                  *
         *     http://www.scn.org/cpsr/diac-00          *
         ************************************************

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From er-chan at scn.org  Thu Mar 30 10:27:59 2000
From: er-chan at scn.org (er-chan)
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 10:27:59 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Health Topic Pages
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003301024260.15374-100000@scn>


Rod Clark(bb615 and others) continues to modify , create and destroy

files belonging to er-chan.  He also creates new files(bb615 and others)

in the Health Menu Pages.

###### er-chan ##### at ## scn.org ### at #### usa.net ######


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From jmabel at saltmine.com  Thu Mar 30 10:33:55 2000
From: jmabel at saltmine.com (Joe Mabel)
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 10:33:55 -0800
Subject: SCN: RE: Health Topic Pages
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003301024260.15374-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <001901bf9a76$810ec330$508d6bc6@stockade.saltmine.com>

I'm going to put this simply: I don't want to be party to this ongoing
argument. Would the two of you please find some neutral third party (maybe a
board member) to arbitrate your disagreement and keep the rest of us out of
this?

If either of you thinks I'm out of line to say this, I will gladly simply
resign from any involvement in webmasters.

Joe Mabel

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-scn at scn.org [mailto:owner-scn at scn.org]On Behalf Of er-chan
> Sent: Thursday, March 30, 2000 10:28 AM
> To: hardware at scn.org; scn at scn.org; scna-board at scn.org;
> webeditors at scn.org; Rod Clark
> Subject: SCN: Health Topic Pages
>
>
>
> Rod Clark(bb615 and others) continues to modify , create and destroy
>
> files belonging to er-chan.  He also creates new files(bb615 and others)
>
> in the Health Menu Pages.
>
> ###### er-chan ##### at ## scn.org ### at #### usa.net ######
>
>
> * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  From the Listowner  * * * * * * * * * * * *
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From bb615 at scn.org  Thu Mar 30 10:42:31 2000
From: bb615 at scn.org (Rod Clark)
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 10:42:31 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: Re: BD: Health Topic Pages
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003301024260.15374-100000@scn>
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.96.1000330103259.20389A-100000@scn>

> Rod Clark(bb615 and others) continues to modify , create and destroy
> files belonging to er-chan.  He also creates new files(bb615 and others)
> in the Health Menu Pages.

Elaine,

   At the request of Joe Mabel of the Crisis Resource Directory,
I have added links to a number of pages in that directory to the
SCN Health menus. Joe also pointed out his dissatisfaction with
the menu of local AIDS care information not being available in
the Health section, but only in the People section. 

   Given your attitudes about editing the health menus, People
was the only place that much of this information could be put in
the past, without facing a confrontation with you. But it is far
past time to confront this. Not only did you take no action on
the Crisis Resource request when it was sent to the webeditors
list, but now you are causing further problems about it. As of
today at 10:45 AM, you are no longer a topic editor for SCN, and
are no longer a member of the SCN Webmasters Committee. Please
contact the Volunteer Committee for reassignment to a another
volunteer task.

Rod Clark
webmaster at scn.org

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From er-chan at scn.org  Thu Mar 30 11:15:05 2000
From: er-chan at scn.org (er-chan)
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 11:15:05 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCN: mediation request
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.4.20.0003301113150.27982-100000@scn>




###### er-chan ##### at ## scn.org ### at #### usa.net ######


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 10:33:55 -0800
From: Joe Mabel <jmabel at saltmine.com>
To: er-chan at scn.org, hardware at scn.org, scn at scn.org, scna-board at scn.org,
     webeditors at scn.org, Rod Clark <bb615 at scn.org>
Subject: RE: Health Topic Pages

I'm going to put this simply: I don't want to be party to this ongoing
argument. Would the two of you please find some neutral third party (maybe a
board member) to arbitrate your disagreement and keep the rest of us out of
this?

If either of you thinks I'm out of line to say this, I will gladly simply
resign from any involvement in webmasters.

Joe Mabel

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-scn at scn.org [mailto:owner-scn at scn.org]On Behalf Of er-chan
> Sent: Thursday, March 30, 2000 10:28 AM
> To: hardware at scn.org; scn at scn.org; scna-board at scn.org;
> webeditors at scn.org; Rod Clark
> Subject: SCN: Health Topic Pages
>
>
>
> Rod Clark(bb615 and others) continues to modify , create and destroy
>
> files belonging to er-chan.  He also creates new files(bb615 and others)
>
> in the Health Menu Pages.
>
> ###### er-chan ##### at ## scn.org ### at #### usa.net ######
>
>
> * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  From the Listowner  * * * * * * * * * * * *
> .	To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to:
> majordomo at scn.org		In the body of the message, type:
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> ==== Messages posted on this list are also available on the web at: ====
> * * * * * * *     http://www.scn.org/volunteers/scn-l/     * * * * * * *
>





---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 10:42:31 -0800 (PST)
From: Rod Clark <bb615 at scn.org>
To: scna-board at scn.org
Cc: hardware at scn.org, scn at scn.org, webeditors at scn.org
Subject: Re: BD: Health Topic Pages

> Rod Clark(bb615 and others) continues to modify , create and destroy
> files belonging to er-chan.  He also creates new files(bb615 and others)
> in the Health Menu Pages.

Elaine,

   At the request of Joe Mabel of the Crisis Resource Directory,
I have added links to a number of pages in that directory to the
SCN Health menus. Joe also pointed out his dissatisfaction with
the menu of local AIDS care information not being available in
the Health section, but only in the People section. 

   Given your attitudes about editing the health menus, People
was the only place that much of this information could be put in
the past, without facing a confrontation with you. But it is far
past time to confront this. Not only did you take no action on
the Crisis Resource request when it was sent to the webeditors
list, but now you are causing further problems about it. As of
today at 10:45 AM, you are no longer a topic editor for SCN, and
are no longer a member of the SCN Webmasters Committee. Please
contact the Volunteer Committee for reassignment to a another
volunteer task.

Rod Clark
webmaster at scn.org


* * * * * * * * * * * * * *  From the Listowner  * * * * * * * * * * * *
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From steve at GroupWorks.org  Fri Mar 31 02:30:48 2000
From: steve at GroupWorks.org (Steve Guest)
Date: Fri, 31 Mar 2000 05:30:48 -0500 (EST)
Subject: SCN: BD: mediation request (fwd)
Message-ID: <Pine.BSF.3.96.1000331051145.263B-100000@dark.darkweb.com>

Dear friends
Due to another issue, not unlike this one, the Governance Committee has
produced a procedure for dealing with conflict between volunteers.  This
includes some form of mediation in disputes.  I would like to see that
this procedure has been followed before the board takes any action.  I
will forward this procedure to the parties involved and would be happy to
make it available to anyone that wishes to see it. 

Thanks
Steve
(Co-Chair of Governance)
   -=-  -=-=-  -=-  -=-=-  -=-  -=-=-  -=-  -=-=-  -=-  -=-=-  -=-
Melissa & Steve Guest                                  (425) 653 7353
Presidents of Seattle Community Network            http://www.scn.org
   "Supporting People and Communities with Free Internet Services"


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 11:15:05 -0800 (PST)
From: er-chan <er-chan at scn.org>
Reply-To: scna-board at scn.org
To: hardware at scn.org, scn at scn.org, scna-board at scn.org, webeditors at scn.org
Subject: BD: mediation request




###### er-chan ##### at ## scn.org ### at #### usa.net ######


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 10:33:55 -0800
From: Joe Mabel <jmabel at saltmine.com>
To: er-chan at scn.org, hardware at scn.org, scn at scn.org, scna-board at scn.org,
     webeditors at scn.org, Rod Clark <bb615 at scn.org>
Subject: RE: Health Topic Pages

I'm going to put this simply: I don't want to be party to this ongoing
argument. Would the two of you please find some neutral third party (maybe a
board member) to arbitrate your disagreement and keep the rest of us out of
this?

If either of you thinks I'm out of line to say this, I will gladly simply
resign from any involvement in webmasters.

Joe Mabel

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-scn at scn.org [mailto:owner-scn at scn.org]On Behalf Of er-chan
> Sent: Thursday, March 30, 2000 10:28 AM
> To: hardware at scn.org; scn at scn.org; scna-board at scn.org;
> webeditors at scn.org; Rod Clark
> Subject: SCN: Health Topic Pages
>
>
>
> Rod Clark(bb615 and others) continues to modify , create and destroy
>
> files belonging to er-chan.  He also creates new files(bb615 and others)
>
> in the Health Menu Pages.
>
> ###### er-chan ##### at ## scn.org ### at #### usa.net ######
>
>
> * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  From the Listowner  * * * * * * * * * * * *
> .	To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to:
> majordomo at scn.org		In the body of the message, type:
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>





---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 10:42:31 -0800 (PST)
From: Rod Clark <bb615 at scn.org>
To: scna-board at scn.org
Cc: hardware at scn.org, scn at scn.org, webeditors at scn.org
Subject: Re: BD: Health Topic Pages

> Rod Clark(bb615 and others) continues to modify , create and destroy
> files belonging to er-chan.  He also creates new files(bb615 and others)
> in the Health Menu Pages.

Elaine,

   At the request of Joe Mabel of the Crisis Resource Directory,
I have added links to a number of pages in that directory to the
SCN Health menus. Joe also pointed out his dissatisfaction with
the menu of local AIDS care information not being available in
the Health section, but only in the People section. 

   Given your attitudes about editing the health menus, People
was the only place that much of this information could be put in
the past, without facing a confrontation with you. But it is far
past time to confront this. Not only did you take no action on
the Crisis Resource request when it was sent to the webeditors
list, but now you are causing further problems about it. As of
today at 10:45 AM, you are no longer a topic editor for SCN, and
are no longer a member of the SCN Webmasters Committee. Please
contact the Volunteer Committee for reassignment to a another
volunteer task.

Rod Clark
webmaster at scn.org


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
scna-board at scn.org   For communication with members of the SCNA
Board of Directors.  To unsubscribe, send a message to listowner
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