Coopski;

-=> Chris H wrote to Brian Rogers <=-

 CH> There *are* no Others.  My sysop types all this in.

Not your BBS sysop I hope! 

 CH> The Internet was a few disparate things before The Money
 CH> got wind of it, and began reshaping what it meant (not
 CH> what it 'was' since that didn't change enough to quite
 CH> matter).

Money is a part of it. You also have to consider power and empowerment.
Power - crackers installing ransomware and taking over a good chunk of
the USA's petroleum feed. Yes they got paid but think of the power they
had and over how many MILLIONS of people in the interim were people were
doing idiotic things like hauling little plastic gas cans that ended up
exploding in their vehicles! AAA always suggest doing that. AAA Funeral
Home that is :)

Empowerment - all these groups that use it for fake news spews (nice rhyme eh?)
Now we have certain types of people who have an open door policy to commit
crimes and no punishments (jail etc) will be handed down for them. If Lizzy
Bordon was alive today imagine her trial?
Liz: "Your honor I'm a member of the XYZ community and if you sentence me
      for any sort of murder you will be doing a disservice to our group!"
Judge: *facepalm* you're free to commit more murders this time sharpen your
       blade with this device first it'll make it more effective"

;-) Ok so that was a bit extreme for humor sake... but you get my "just" 
jist 

 CH> We all know what this is: it's the untrained (and largely)
 CH> uninterested .. consumer.  That's the target.  That's the
 CH> demographic of interest.  /USA_centric_POV_dotcom

The consumer is always the target - or victim in most true cases. This is why
people need to research things more before stepping into the quicksand of 
life. Unfortunately they only get a helping hand when it benefits the 
political group that's extending said appendage.

 CH> I think Heinlein's basic suggestion was: People of (let's
 CH> just shorten this to) 'intensive thought and discussion'
 CH> will be found to resort to a 'piggyback' method of making
 CH> use of infrastructure, for (so-called) 'betterment'
 CH> purposes.

I can't see that though in the realm of packet radio. Case in point:
I received a message I refuse to answer from a guy in Pennsylvania.
He could easily send it to me 100% on RF but he sent it to me from
Pennsylvania, on a brand new virtual server he's renting in Florida
that gates through Europe all on the internet. I wasn't aware we as hams
studied and took tests so that we can use the internet. IMHO it's very
conter-productive... but what do I know.


... Blood is too precious a commodity.-Bram Stoker's Dracula
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