Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!ccplumb From: ccplumb@watmath.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.society.futures Subject: Re: UUCP - USSR Message-ID: <15236@watmath.waterloo.edu> Date: Wed, 21-Oct-87 05:47:12 EDT Article-I.D.: watmath.15236 Posted: Wed Oct 21 05:47:12 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 24-Oct-87 08:46:24 EDT References: <8710200932.AA00888@violet.berkeley.edu> <7213@eddie.MIT.EDU> Reply-To: ccplumb@watmath.waterloo.edu (Colin Plumb) Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario Lines: 63 Confusion: U. of Waterloo, Ontario In article <7213@eddie.MIT.EDU> zrm@eddie.MIT.EDU (Zigurd R. Mednieks) writes: >The posters proposing a UUCP link with the Soviet Union are more than >a little naive about the state of computing and information >interchange in the Soviet Union. ALL means of mass dissemination of >information are tightly controlled. Xerox machines are a bigger threat >to security than any single state secret, and are accordingly >controlled. The same, I expect, would go for computer printers, floppy >disks and floppy media, etc. > >The short of it is that you might be able to get a link to some >research institute set up (if you can get them to acknowledge the >existence of their ill-gotten VAX and Unix system!) but your impact on >the information available to anyone beyond the academicians they trust >to travel in the West will be nil. The net benefit will be to Soviet >intelligence gathering and analysis. > >I would oppose such a link at this time. The proposals I have seen in >this newsgroup have all the marks of amateur diplomacy: an agreement >of any sort is preferable to no agreement even if it gives a dangerous >party an advantage. The goal of wider dissemination of information >should be met before such an intelligence boon is granted to the >Soviets. > >-Zigurd Isn't this a little bit silly? The original proposal (not in the References: line, from imprint@orchid) was more in the "wouldn't it be fun if there was a mail link to U of Moscow?" spirit. USENET is hardly a U.S. state secret (or I wouldn't be getting it!), and I suspect a Soviet consulate could find an agreeable party to give them a feed if they wanted it. Then we could all put "World communist conspiracy" in our .signatures to give kgbvax's supergrep indigestion, just like we already do for nsavax and csisvax. If you want to see how bad a security risk it would be, find out how high a DARPA type jumps after hearing that a connection, however gatewayed and (probably) unreliable is to be made between the ARPANET and kremvax. I doubt it would be measurable. Really now, "intelligence boon"? We'd probably drive a few KGB types insane if they tried to follow Mark Ethan Smith, alt.flame, Matthew Wiener, soc.women, Gene Ward Smith, talk.religion.newage, Tim Maroney, or other well-known sources of content-free grammar [:-)]. As to the problems of getting the Soviets to agree, I do see how that could be difficult. Still, it's probably possible to find someone who has the authority and wants to look good to root@politburo.USSR (also known as gorby@kremvax). If you need to feel anti-socialist (the USSR is *not* communist) about this, consider the rapid growth of USENET (7600 sites a few weeks ago), and the enormous amounts of time spent reading news instead of doing what we "should" be doing. You're introducing a new, highly contagious sin to the Soviet Union, and thereby hastening it's decline. (Although how anything can fall faster than the US economy is beyond me. :-) ) (:-( if you live there, I suppose, although I heard that IBM is off 25% - cause for celebration if true.) -- -Colin (watmath!ccplumb) Zippy says: How many retured bricklayers from FLORIDA are out purchasing PENCIL SHARPENERS right NOW??