Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!ucsd!ucbvax!ucbarpa.Berkeley.EDU!haynes
From: haynes@ucbarpa.Berkeley.EDU (Jim Haynes)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: GNU, security, and RMS
Message-ID: <29457@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 3 Jun 89 18:55:25 GMT
References: <106326@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> <422@ladcgw.ladc.bull.com> <13688@ncoast.ORG> <15812@vail.ICO.ISC.COM> <2322@thor.acc.stolaf.edu>
Sender: usenet@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: haynes@ucbarpa.Berkeley.EDU.UUCP (Jim Haynes)
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
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In article <2322@thor.acc.stolaf.edu> mike@stolaf.edu writes:
>
>(2) There should not be security among the users of a computer system.
>    The principal use I have seen security put to has been the self-
>    aggrandizement of system administrators at the expense of the
>    user community.  (I agree that in some situations it is reasonable
>    to have security to keep out outsiders, though.)

Well, you have a right to your opinion; but a corollary of this belief
is that all the users of a computer system have to be mutually friendly
and responsible and trust one another.  Which sounds like the mythical
home town where people don't need to lock the doors when they leave home.

I claim the right to remain highly skeptical when the user community is
a collection of college students of widely varying backgrounds, political
beliefs, sexual orientations, maturities, academic abilities, etc.

I'm sorry you have had such negative experiences with system administrators.
Perhaps if the users of a computer system are paying out of their own pockets
for the services they can choose an administrator who will run it to
please them.

haynes@ucscc.ucsc.edu haynes@ucscc.bitnet ...ucbvax!ucscc!haynes

"Any clod can have the facts, but having opinions is an Art."
        Charles McCabe, San Francisco Chronicle