Fun_People Archive
9 Jun
NTK Bits, 2000-06-0

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From: Peter Langston <psl>
Date: Fri,  9 Jun 100 20:49:51 -0700
To: Fun_People
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Subject: NTK Bits, 2000-06-0

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Excerpted-from: NTK now, 2000-06-0
From: "Danny O'Brien" <danny@spesh.com>

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                                >> HARD NEWS <<
                                divide by twos

	Splitters! The inevitable occurred, and following the distinct lack
	of either apologies or kool-aid drinking in Washington state, the
	assumption is that Bill and Steve are just waiting for Al or George
	to come to power, re-install the DOJ staff with friends of Redmond,
	and quietly forget about the whole thing. But given the company's
	blithe demeanour to political shenanigans (at the time of the
	announcement, Steve was in Europe, and Bill was failing to get a
	decent haircut), do they even care about creating a political
	solution? What Penfield Jackson spotted about MS was that they were
	"untrustworthy" types, happy to ignore the spirit of any suggestion
	if they can comply with the wording. And that means that given a
	legal division, they'll hack a technical workaround. At the end of
	this month, Microsoft will announce the details of its Next
	Generation Web Services. It'll spec out an API framework, using
	that ole industry standard, XML. It'll be a public API, just like
	the lawyers want. But you can bet that that API will be so driven
	by the way that Windows works, that it doesn't matter if you're
	working with the Microsoft App company or the Microsoft Window
	company, if they use NGWS, you'll be buying it from them, or a
	bunch of wannabe's desperately playing catch up with their specs.
	Doesn't matter who's leading the Microsoft twins when the appeals
	end: if they're given enough momentum, they'll follow a trajectory
	of exclusionary methods that'll keep them both lock-step in
	technological lock-in. Microsoft isn't fighting the legal damage:
	it's planning to route right around it.
	http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2581842,00.html
                     - Windows services? Web services? NT Technology?
	http://monkeyfist.com/articles/514
                                           - RPC's considered harmful
	http://www.ntk.net/2000/06/09/dohcompton.jpg
                                             - straight outa Redmond!


	Like good entropian cynics, we were wont to disregard the SEALAND
	DATA HAVEN story as another fantasy invented by people who get
	their business plans from back issues of Interzone. But is there
	more to it than a Freedom Ship without a rudder? On the con side:
	the Sealand fortress, while appealing to far-off dreamers, has as
	much chance of surviving a concerted assault by international law
	and order as Radio Caroline had of developing a independent nuclear
	deterrent. On the pro: long-time Anguilla cypher-exile Sean Hastings
	does seem to have collected a Who's Who of Can-Do cypherpunks to
	assist, including Sameer "C2Net" Parekh, and Avi
	"AboveNet/BoardWatch" Freedman, and there's talk of satellite links
	and connections not just with tetchy Albion, but the continental
	mainland. And while we think it's going to be a little hard to
	construct a viable turnover from strong ideals and an AUP that bans
	anything illegal in customer's country of origin, we can bet that
	they'll be some useful publicity from when that RIP bill hits -
	not to mention when they host a Freedom Server, a FreeNet node,
	and a tax-free casino over there. But will the prospective
	libertarian clientele be too objectivistically correct to trust
	any state, let alone a decadent principality? Maybe what the deep
	cypherpunks say is true: you don't want a data heaven in meatspace,
	you want it distributed throught the Network. Tim May, he say:
	don't trust the laws of men. Trust the laws of mathematics.
	http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/06/04/1742209
                           - and carry a big boom-stick, we'd imagine
	http://www.havenco.com/about_havenco/theteam.html
                                          - ooh ooh! brits with guns!


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