Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!UCBARPA.BERKELEY.EDU!keshav
From: keshav@UCBARPA.BERKELEY.EDU (Keshav Srinivasan)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Electronic Newspapers
Message-ID: <8905092201.AA05791@ucbarpa.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: 9 May 89 22:01:33 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 22

G. L. Sicherman writes
>  the basic assumptions (standardization, uniformity,
>  stability, authority) fail miserably with the new technology

This points out the need for authentication of news. Standard
public key schemes for digital signatures should be enough.

Two other points
	o Reputation effects are very important for news
providers. When the number of providers is small, users
will not have too much trouble assigning reputations to players
(for example, I would believe a headline in the NY Times more
readily than one in the National Enquirer). When the number
of players grows large, this is difficult - which leads me to 
predict that users who require reliable news will be forced to 
subscribe to a `well-known' provider.

	o Wading through the news is something that Natural
Language researchers have been trying for years. Are there
any intelligent systems out there that people are aware of ?

keshav