From: feotus@yabbs
To: arachnoi@yabbs
Subject: re: flame
Date: Fri Apr 22 20:12:01 1994

well I sorta deserved that flame, I made the assumption that you didnt 
know what you were talking about, which was a "overjudgment" of sorts.  
But since you mentioned the comm. tech of the military, did you know that 
for awhile they were using a box that was basically nothing more than a 
souped up HAM operators set in a pretty case and upped the price to $500 
8)  Also they had a BANYAN Vines network in their tanks, where
 each(not all actually) were nodes on the network.  The use of civilian 
tech suggests that IMO at least that what we use is not allthat far 
behind.  granted their are somethings we civilians can't do, like measure 
our computing power in acres like the NSA.
 
I have alonger reply to the idea of communication instead of a weapon for 
the RayGun, rational anarchy thing.

    AS I said before, as an individual it would do me little good, simply 
because of the nature of communications itself, it just don't work with 
only one person 8)...  But as a group it can be really powerful, 
particularly a many-to-many network like Inet.  For instance there are 
possibilities for everyone to become a publisher, writer, journalist etc.. 
 and to reach alot of people.  Jsut look at some of the abuses and see how 
many it touches when people flame the abuser.9Greencard, MMFast)
    So as a whole group communication can be IMO just as powerful as a 
weapon, and less threatening to the world(tho don't confuse me as some 
granola eater talking about the spirit of gaia ad nauseum...)  the problem 
is that the communication needs to reach alot of people, not just your 
little group, like your warez group, or your religious cult, etc.. but 
whole nation/states.  Imagine the power of the MEDIA monopolists.  they 
have most of America eating out of their hands.