[15171] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
RE: Walton's Mountain notaries (identity requirements)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Carl Ellison)
Wed Jan 7 09:42:22 2004
X-Original-To: cryptography@metzdowd.com
X-Original-To: cryptography@metzdowd.com
From: "Carl Ellison" <cme@acm.org>
To: "'John Gilmore'" <gnu@toad.com>
Cc: <cryptography@metzdowd.com>
Date: Tue, 6 Jan 2004 13:55:01 -0800
In-Reply-To: <200401052310.i05NAlKD030316@new.toad.com>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: John Gilmore [mailto:gnu@toad.com]
> Sent: Monday, January 05, 2004 3:11 PM
> To: Carl Ellison
> Cc: 'Paul A.S. Ward'; cryptography@metzdowd.com
> Subject: Re: Walton's Mountain notaries (identity requirements)
>
> > ... once again I heard the readings about the
> > edict from Caesar that all people return to their home towns to be
counted
> > in a census. Maybe we can take a lesson from that - and have everyone
> > return to people who have known the person, uninterrupted, from birth to
the
> > present in order to get anything notarized. Anyone who couldn't find
such
> > people just couldn't get anything notarized, I guess.
>
> It's a lot more complicated than that, Carl. Society can't demand
impossible
> conditions from its citizens, as a precondition to existence. (This is
> true even if the condition is possible for 99% of the citizens; the other
> 1% have rights too.)
Hi John.
Of course it shouldn't. I was using that extreme example to drive home the
point that the concept of identity (via notary, in this case) has been
eroded out from under us and we don't have anything to replace it with. My
guess is that a good replacement will not provide traceability but will meet
our needs (for reputation). However, it's up to people like us to design
that replacement.
- Carl
+------------------------------------------------------------------+
|Carl M. Ellison cme@acm.org http://theworld.com/~cme |
| PGP: 75C5 1814 C3E3 AAA7 3F31 47B9 73F1 7E3C 96E7 2B71 |
+---Officer, arrest that man. He's whistling a copyrighted song.---+
>
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