RE: [projectvrm] Does this list welcome natural law/rights wonks?

["Crosbie Fitch" < >]

> From: Brian Behlendorf
> Crosbie, I think people here respond poorly to your emails (when they 
> bother to respond at all) for two reasons:

Thanks for bothering to respond - much appreciated. :)


> 1) It doesn't come across like you're here for a conversation, or to build

> something, or help someone else build something.

I'm here, since 2007, in a last ditch attempt to see if there's any point in
further conversation.

Cluetrain strongly resonated with me.

VRM is a fundamentally sound proposition, and when implemented (if ever)
will be revolutionary.

I'm beginning to realise I don't have time for an apparent majority of
participants to eventually learn from their mistakes, and my gentle nudges
to avert the necessity of such learning ain't cutting it.


> You're here to give us a 
> lecture, like a stern professor who is disappointed when the class dares 
> to think about what's possible

No, when the class embark upon the misadventure of pursuing the impossible.

VRM need only facilitate the ability of the individual to communicate and
trade.

Unfortunately, optimism has overflowed into a naïve presumption of being
able to create new powers (unnecessary ones, even if they weren't
impossible) and a fruitless pursuit thereof.

And yes, as you observe, the misadventure is 'DRM for personal data'.


> Or just to win an argument rather than share and enlighten.

It is difficult to argue with those with unshakeable faith in the
impossible, that I can be told Fred's favourite colour and be subsequently
constrained by Fred (or some system) as to who I can or cannot disclose it
to, moreover that even those to whom I am authorised to disclose it, are
similarly constrained.

Computers are great things, but optimism, sloppy thinking, and poor
education are combining to  create a cargo cult of the credulous that
believe computers can do anything (limited only by one's imagination - as
opposed to the laws of nature).


> Likewise, 
> the rise of "the right to be forgotten" brings along a lot of thorny 
> questions and edge cases which scream for first principles - and the first

> principle that if I possess information in my personal hands/devices 
> there's nothing you should be able to do to delete it, is very persuasive.

If the understanding of what a right was hadn't been forgotten people would
readily recognise that there is no such thing as a 'right to be forgotten'.

This is simply a reframing of censorship - insinuated as a right of the
individual in order to make it popular (everyone likes new powers), but with
an ulterior motive of establishing Orwell's 'memory hole' censorship.

The legislature cannot create rights. It instead annuls the corresponding
natural right from the majority - to memorise and keep notes. The right may
be annulled in law, but this still does not affect the individual's natural
rights, their memory or liberty to keep notes.

All that ends up happening is that search engines are degraded to return
only the results the state will tolerate (for purposes of national security
and the interests of the powerful - corporations).


> Some better solutions, like strong crypto properly implemented,
> will solve a problem with mathematical rigor 
> and provable security, so strongly you can bet your life on 
> it.

Unfortunately, in practice this is only available to adept mathematicians.


> But many 
> solutions unavoidably will be mixtures of software, policy, 
> and business 
> rules, imperfectly implemented but still valuable, where 
> violations are 
> not impossible but are discoverable and correctable, and where the 
> costs/risks will be tolerable for the value created.  These 
> are likely worth doing, if the alternative is nothing.

VRM facilities can be produced entirely with software alone.

A sign that things have gone astray is a claim that something else is
needed, e.g. a law.

Thus DRM couldn't work, and it still couldn't work even when the DMCA law
was made to say DRM did work, and that people who realised it didn't work
could be prosecuted.

VRM should attempt to make it easier for people to communicate, to trade, to
collect and share data as a consequence of their trades, not to make it
harder.

Unfortunately, it looks like the latter is the more popular direction.