Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uwm.edu!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!aplcen!haven!udel!princeton!phoenix!stealth!brnstnd
From: brnstnd@stealth.acf.nyu.edu (Dan Bernstein)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: Pilot Project: Hosts Table To Be Available Over Internet
Message-ID: <11134@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Date: 28 Oct 89 03:19:02 GMT
References: <47302@bbn.COM>
Sender: news@phoenix.Princeton.EDU
Reply-To: brnstnd@stealth.acf.nyu.edu (Dan Bernstein)
Distribution: usa
Lines: 46

So that nobody is misled by Mr. Placeway's comments, *I* will point out
that *we* are a small group, consisting of a few data communications
experts, several programmers, and me.

It should be patently obvious why we will go to some lengths to preserve
anonymity. One member would even lose professional status if he were known
to have contributed ideas to our projects. As I am the organizer and (so
far) prime mover of this group, and as I'm relatively flame-resistant, 
I am the natural choice for spokesperson; but for safety, the rest don't
even know each other's names.

As for Mr. Placeway's article:
> As a service to the SOA of Ohio-State.edu (among others), I feel
> obliged to point out that the "we" in this series of statements is the
> _Royal_ "We", rather than one indicating any offical part of the Ohio
> State University.

I don't understand how Mr. Placeway could have missed our disclaimer at
the top of each announcement: ``This project is not an official project
of The Ohio State University.'' Most people read the second sentence of
an article before responding to it.

> The people in charge there really do understand why this is, in
> general, a Bad Thing.

Perhaps so; the only ``merit'' comment that OSU IRCC has made is that
they feel that the user list could be a valuable service. But whatever
your alma mater thinks: how about the hundreds of users (plus however
many more at various anonymous ftp sites) who've picked up the user
list? How about the several articles of support in c.p.tcp-ip and in
c.p.tcp-ip.domains giving reasons that it is a Good Thing?

And, Mr. Placeway, how would you respond to the letter I received from
CERT (you have heard of CERT, I hope) asking for a copy of our hosts
table?

> In other words:
> 	g/We/s//I/g
> 	g/Our/s//My/g

I suppose, Mr. Placeway, that just because the only name on the Internet
Crucible is Geoff Goodfellow's, you assume that it was solely written by
him in his spare time. (Maybe it was---but I'm not going to run off and
post an uninformed article making such an accusation.)

---Dan Bernstein