[936] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Text of chron-internet
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Joe Abernathy)
Thu Jul 11 16:26:48 1991
Date: Thu, 11 Jul 91 14:43:03 CDT
From: edtjda@magic322.chron.com (Joe Abernathy)
To: com-priv@psi.com
Cc: nren-discuss@psi.com
Since so many of you asked, and since the previous excerpt was not
what I wrote ...
By JOE ABERNATHY
Copyright 1990, Houston Chronicle
Westbury High School student Jeff Noxon's homework was rudely
interrupted recently when he stumbled across the world's most sophisticated
pornography ring.
He investigated briefly for the novelty, then went on to other studies. But
the catalog of erotic art and literature grows daily, offering titles such
as Cindy's Torment and The Education of Rachel.
It's supported by taxes and brought into town by the brightest
lights of higher education.
Half an hour or half a world away from the personal computer in Jeff's
bedroom, an isolated, historically black university is propelled to the
cutting edge of high-energy physics by the world's most capable research
and communications tool. This institution is becoming a role model for
the brightest young black people, along with all the citizens of Texas.
Somewhere between the extremes, you will find a grand undertaking referred
to as the Internet. It's revolutionizing research and education at a giddy
pace, while raising fundamental issues of free speech and social responsibility
in the age of the global village.
The Chronicle actively monitored Internet for four months through various
access points. Material found on the network during that period included
hundreds of sexually explicit stories and pictures, heated discussions
about freedom of expression, and details of underground political
strategy ^- in addition to the scientific exchange that is Internet's
stated purpose.
The material is accessible to any reasonably experienced computer
user with equipment common to most personal computers.
"When the entire country learns about alt.sex.bestiality, people are
going to make known their disapproval,'' Noxon predicted, referring to one
interactive news group published on the network. "There are a lot of
12-year-olds getting their heads filled with a lot of ideas they're probably
not ready for yet.''
Massachusetts Institute of Technology scientist David Clark, one of
Internet's founding fathers, has described the network as "anarchic
democracy at its best.''
It is hailed by policymakers as the most significant technological
innovation since the telephone.
An example can be found about 60 miles from Houston -- a distance that was
once an unbridgable chasm in the scientific mainstream.
Prairie View A&M University is working on a crucial element of the
Superconducting Super Collider. All it took was one man's vision ^- along
with Internet to bring it alive.
"Prairie View has a real role in the SSC in the future, simply because of
that network,'' said Dennis Judd, the human catalyst for Prairie View's
ascent. "Few people know how much we really use this.''
Using Internet, Prairie View researchers browse the library at the
Stanford Linear Collider in California. They interact with Fermilab in
Chicago; Beijing University; and the Houston Advanced Research Center
in The Woodlands.
Prairie View's new research partner is Rice University ^- one of
seven Internet outreach collaborations matching historically black
universities with traditional rsearch giants.
The network arose from the shared desire of the research, military
and education communities to better communicate.
It works like this: The computers at a given institution are wired
together in a network, allowing individual users to share information
and expensive resources. Each such network in turn is connected via
phone lines, fiber optics or satellite to other networks, ultimately allow
ing the users at scattered locations to work together almost as if they
were in the same room.
Baylor College of Medicine offers an example. Researchers there are
working on an image management system that will let specialists in
Houston consult electronically with patients' hometown doctors, giving
them instant access to the scans and tests performed in Houston.
Medical students will soon be granted regular access to Internet ^- once
they've received an education about Internet.
"We need to be sure that the students are cognizant of the respon
sibilities they have,'' said Stan Barber, director of networking. "We
don't want some of the problems students have caused in the past to
be caused by Baylor College of Medicine students.''
These problems ^- created by other users as well as students ^-
include hacking and the use of valuable computer facilities to circulate
pornography. In both cases, Internet emerges as a key battleground of
free speech and social responsibility.
People are encouraged to experiment,'' allowed Rice University's
Guy Almes, who has become a national figure as primary director of
Internet operations in Texas. There's no Gestapo watching over
this thing.''
Since there are virtually no rules, the catalog of information includes
voluminous pornography, along with advice on recreational drugs, satan
ism, paganism, and sex slaves.
Some users find such material offensive. "Someone is paying for the
computers that this filth is stored in. Someone is paying for the phone
time so that this trash can piggyback in with the useful communications,''
said Rick Miller, a student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
"Am I asking for censorship when I ask that my money not be spent to
bring this harmful material to my community?''
When Miller protested to university officials, his electronic mailbox was
barraged with pornography from other users objecting to what they viewed as
Miller's intrusion into their freedom of expression.
"There was over 1.27 megabytes of article dumps from alt.sex.bond
age,'' recalled Miller, whose private mail from the Chronicle also was
answered by a UWM consultant who
had intercepted the letter.
"It's an open network,'' said William Bard, director of Internet operations
for the University of Texas system. "That's one of the things that makes it
as useful as it is.''
It can link a researcher with a supercomputer nearly anywhere in
the world. This can reduce the time between research and publication
from years to days.
The fundamental questions of science can be addressed by the world's
best minds working in collaboration. Students may join the process, gain
ing unique experience and insight.
"I want this country to have the most capable network to support
higher education and research that we can possibly get,'' said Stephen
Wolff, who oversees Internet for the National Science Foundation, the
network's primary federal funding agency. "We already do. We have the
best in the world, and I aim to keep it that way and make it better.''
Congress and President Bush share Wolff's goal. Tenn. Sen. Albert
Gore's $2 billion Federal High-Performance Computing Act, due for
funding consideration this week, would make Internet the centerpiece
of the nation's drive for technological pre-eminence, using it as the
launching point for a more widely available successor to Internet, to be
called the National Research and Education Network.
"The administration supports the National Research and Education
Network, and, obviously ,does not think that pornography is an appropriate
incorporation into this network,'' said Alixe Glen, deputy White
House press secretary. No direct administration action is planned against the
pornography.
The bill seeks to multiply direct federal spending by a factor of 20, to
$400 million. Under the National Science Foundation's funding poli
cies, this will trigger several billion more in spending on the local level.
The bill would include another $1.5 billion for related endeavors.
The money would benefit a maze of Internet connections that has
grown up piecemeal in 35 nations over the past two decades. Up to 10
million people now have access to the network. Experts no longer know
the full extent of Internet, its value, or who is using it for what.
Texas has more than 60 distinct Internet sites, including Johnson
Space Center, businesses, and educational institutions. Each may
provide direct service to anyone associated with it, and may also
propagate the network further into the community.
Two of the nation's 13 regional Internet backbones are in Texas ^-
the Texas Sesquicentennial Network maintained by Rice, and the Texas
Higher Education Network.
Recent legislation will provide the state's secondary schools with net
working ^- likely with Internet.
The volume of network activity doubles every two months, while the
number of participating universities doubles every 13 months, Almes said.
"Part of the good and the bad of this is that people are going to be
using the network in ways I never hear about,'' he added.
Electronic mail is the great innovation of the network. E-mail works
just like U.S. Mail ^- prepare the materials to send, type the address
of the recipient, post the package.
Since computers do the sending, however, it's possible to address a
single package to a mailing list of recipients with a shared interest in
the subject matter ^- be it cold fusion or hot pornography.
When a mailing list becomes popular enough, it can become a public
newsgroup, readily available to everyone on the network.
Those reading and contributing to mailing lists and newsgroups range
from teen-agers to the world's leading scientists.
The popularity of individual newsgroups is not officially monitored, but one
unofficial survey conducted recently by Digital Equipment Corp. indicated that
alt.sex was the second most popular newsgroup, with an estimated audience of
100,000. (Rec.humor.funny ^- a controversial humor digest ^- was the most
popular.)
Some of the activity on Internet probably violates state and federal
obscenity laws, said Russel Turbeville, chief of the economic crimes-
consumer fraud division of the Harris County district attorney's office.
But as a practical matter, prosecution would be difficult or impossible.
"Where you start dealing with computer frauds especially, where you have
thousands, tens of thousands, maybe a million victims, how
do you deal with that in the indictment, and how do you prove things in
court?'' Turbeville said.
Clear Lake High School honors students will receive Internet access
beginning this summer. The school knows about the network's explicit
content, but hopes the honor system and the threat of a bad grade will
discourage students from exploring where they shouldn't. They signed a
form saying they would use the tool as intended.
UT's Bard noted that high school students doing research projects could
benefit from online electronic catalogs associated with many research and
education libraries.
"It would provide an indispensable and limitless source of information
that could be used to supplement or even replace that found in the school
libraries,'' said Noxon, a 17-year-old who will be a junior next year.
On the Internet, every controversial story or letter is followed by a
ringing debate ^- often stimulating the interest of hundreds of people
who missed the original article. In the case of Cindy's Torment, a vi
cious tale of rape and torture, this resulted in its being reposted and
privately mailed to a wide audience.
Often, erotic stories are posted in installments. One recent series about
pedophilia and incest turned out to be chapters from a published
novel, and the publisher's lawyers wanted it to stop.
Publicly, it did, after all but three chapters were posted. The entire
book is now distributed privately via E-mail. The publisher has become a
victim of Internet's capacity to support hidden theft of services.
The most vivid example of this is digitized pictures. Thousands of X-
rated pictures are available ^- most scanned in from men's magazines in
violation of copyright law.
The pornographic libraries on the network also include political com
mentary. For example, North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms' campaign
against government funding of erotic art inspired the "Jesse Helms
Erotic Literature Contest.'' The object was to produce erotica that
might please the Republican senator ^- keep it reasonably clean, mention
fidelity or the church without ridiculing them.
The contest originated at the University of Iowa. The collected en
tries are now available in the Internet libraries of Tulane University
and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Questionable Legacy
MIT is the leading presence in Internet's cultural heritage.
The heart of this heritage may be found at MIT's
Media Lab, which has variously been called visionary, flaky, and the luna
tic fringe of MIT. They say they're inventing the future of publishing, but you won't find any journalists there. They don't like journalists.
Among the accomplishments the lab touts are an interactive video
disk of the Aspen, Colo., ski resort. It cost the Defense Advanced Research
Projects Agency $300,000, and earned for the Lab former Sen.
William Proxmire's Golden Fleece award dishonoring questionable use
of tax dollars. Another time, DARPA unwittingly funded development at
the Media Lab of an album cover for the eclectic rockers Talking Heads.
This is the intellectual atmosphere that gave electronic life to the
Church of the Subgenius, a Dallas cult ostensibly formed to ridicule
cults. Members, who can be legally ordained, worship a yuppie diety
called Bob.
The Media Lab's Subgenius Digest is an interactive church newsletter.
It provides the phone numbers of practicing Christians, along with tips
on how best to harass them. All in the name of Bob, of course.
Also at MIT, you will find the closely guarded, lesbian-oriented
Sappho mailing list. Sappho was an effective tool in the successful fight
to overturn Mills College's decision to admit males. It motivated the
troops, communicated strategy, and gave progress reports on the battle.
Last but not least is MIT's electronic library. It may be one of the
best research tools around, but at night it becomes one of the world's
most capable instruments of pornography.
"It comes back to free speech,'' said Howard Jares, Internet director
at the University of Houston. "The actual content is secondary. (Intel
lectual freedom) fosters the whole creative process, and that's the kind
of thing we're going to have to do to succeed as educators.''
Turbeville said Internet pornography raises constitutional issues:
"You have the right to speak your mind, but do you have the right to (in
effect) walk into somebody's home and say it? That's interesting.''
In general, according to various legal sources, computer use and
abuse represent developing areas of law, with few issues settled.
Beyond pornography and free speech, the technology raises broad
fears of vulnerability. Even as Internet is finding its way into all walks of
society, society is realizing the network wasn't designed to be secure.
In late May, federal and state agencies intensified a nationwide
sweep of computer hackers. Noting that more than 40 computer systems
and 23,000 data disks had already been seized in the last two years,
network experts launched a counterattack. A legal defense fund is now
being put in place.
The hackers reacted to the crackdown in predictable fashion ^-
they're using the Internet to build support. They published a special
electronic edition of 2600, the hackers' magazine, detailing the govern
ment's two-year-old campaign.
T"here are civil rights and civil liberties issues here that have yet to
be addressed,'' wrote one.
"Every time there is a perceived crisis, law enforcement agencies and
legislators overreact, and usually due process and civil liberties suf
fer,'' said Rep. Don Edwards, D-Calif., reacting to the crackdown.
The most famous hacking case is that of former Cornell University
student Robert Tappan Morris, 25. Last month he was placed on three
years' probation, fined $10,000 and ordered to perform 400 hours of
community service for unleashing a worm program that paralyzed
thousands of Internet-linked computers nationwide in 1988.
He was the first person convicted under the Federal Computer Fraud
and Abuse Act prohibiting interference with the performance of a
government computer.
At least one longtime user thinks answers can be found.
"I think (Internet) is a terrific social experiment from which
there's an enormous amount to learn, but I think it's time somebody
took the lessons and built something of more lasting value,'' said com
puter luminary Mitch Kapor, the founder of Lotus Technology.
He believes the medium must find a sense of social responsibility.
"Regional-based systems like the WELL (Whole Earth 'Lectronic
Link) in San Francisco that draw a constituency and see themselves as
members of an electronic community ... are a much better basis for
beginning this sort of global electronic community,'' he said.
"I don't think it's the government's business to ban (controversial mate
rial), or to take any position on it. I don't know how to solve it without
causing all sorts of First Amendment problems. If there's a paying
market for alt.sex.bestiality, we should tolerate it.
I" just don't think the government ought to fund it.''
