4. Goals and Ideology -- Privacy, Freedom, New Approaches
  
  4.1. copyright
            THE  CYPHERNOMICON: Cypherpunks FAQ and More, Version 0.666,
            1994-09-10, Copyright Timothy C. May. All rights reserved.
            See the detailed disclaimer. Use short sections under "fair
            use" provisions, with appropriate credit, but don't put your
            name on my words.
  
  4.2. SUMMARY: Goals and Ideology -- Privacy, Freedom, New Approaches
    4.2.1. Main Points
    4.2.2. Connections to Other Sections
           - Crypto Anarchy is the logical outgrowth of strong crypto.
    4.2.3. Where to Find Additional Information
           - Vernor Vinge's "True Names"
           - David Friedman's "Machinery of Freedom"
    4.2.4. Miscellaneous Comments
           - Most of the list members are libertarians, or leaning in
              that direction, so the bias toward this is apparent.
           - (If there's a coherent _non_-libertarian ideology, that's
              also consistent with supporting strong crypto, I'm not sure
              it's been presented.)
  
  4.3. Why a Statement of Ideology?
    4.3.1. This is perhaps a controversial area. So why include it? The
            main reason is to provide some grounding for the later
            comments on many issues.
    4.3.2. People should not expect a uniform ideology on this list.
            Some of us are anarcho-capitalist radicals (or "crypto
            anarchists"), others of us are staid Republicans, and still
            others are Wobblies and other assored leftists.
  
  4.4. "Welcome to Cypherpunks"
    4.4.1. This is the message each new subscriber to the Cypherpunks
            lists gets, by Eric Hughes:
    4.4.2. "Cypherpunks assume privacy is a good thing and wish there
            were more of it.  Cypherpunks acknowledge that those who want
            privacy must create it for themselves and not expect
            governments, corporations, or other large, faceless
            organizations to grant them privacy out of beneficence.
            Cypherpunks know that people have been creating their own
            privacy for centuries with whispers, envelopes, closed doors,
            and couriers.  Cypherpunks do not seek to prevent other
            people from speaking about their experiences or their
            opinions.
            
            "The most important means to the defense of privacy is
            encryption. To encrypt is to indicate the desire for privacy.
            But to encrypt with weak cryptography is to indicate not too
            much desire for privacy. Cypherpunks hope that all people
            desiring privacy will learn how best to defend it.
            
            "Cypherpunks are therefore devoted to cryptography.
            Cypherpunks wish to learn about it, to teach it, to implement
            it, and to make more of it.  Cypherpunks know that
            cryptographic protocols make social structures.  Cypherpunks
            know how to attack a system and how to defend it.
            Cypherpunks know just how hard it is to make good
            cryptosystems.
            
            "Cypherpunks love to practice.  They love to play with public
            key cryptography.  They love to play with anonymous and
            pseudonymous mail forwarding and delivery.  They love to play
            with DC-nets.  They love to play with secure communications
            of all kinds.
            
            "Cypherpunks write code.  They know that someone has to write
            code to defend privacy, and since it's their privacy, they're
            going to write it.  Cypherpunks publish their code so that
            their fellow cypherpunks may practice and play with it.
            Cypherpunks realize that security is not built in a day and
            are patient with incremental progress.
            
            "Cypherpunks don't care if you don't like the software they
            write. Cypherpunks know that software can't be destroyed.
            Cypherpunks know that a widely dispersed system can't be shut
            down.
            
            "Cypherpunks will make the networks safe for privacy." [Eric
            Hughes, 1993-07-21 version]
  
  4.5. "Cypherpunks Write Code"
    4.5.1. "Cypherpunks write code" is almost our mantra.
    4.5.2. This has come to be a defining statement. Eric Hughes used it
            to mean that Cypherpunks place more importance in actually
            changing things, in actually getting working code out, than
            in merely talking about how things "ought" to be.
           - Eric Hughes statement needed here:
           - Karl Kleinpaste, author of one of the early anonymous
              posting services (Charcoal) said this about some proposal
              made: "If you've got serious plans for how to implement
              such a thing, please implement it at least skeletally and
              deploy it.  Proof by example, watching such a system in
              action, is far better than pontification about it."
              [Karl_Kleinpaste@cs.cmu.edu, news.admin.policy, 1994-06-30]
    4.5.3. "The admonition, "Cypherpunks write code," should be taken
            metaphorically.  I think "to write code" means to take
            unilateral effective action as an individual.  That may mean
            writing actual code, but it could also mean dumpster diving
            at Mycrotronx and anonymously releasing the recovered
            information.  It could also mean creating an offshore digital
            bank.  Don't get too literal on us here.  What is important
            is that Cypherpunks take personal responsibility for
            empowering themselves against threats to privacy." [Sandy
            Sandfort, 1994-07-08]
    4.5.4. A Cypherpunks outlook: taking the abstractions of academic
            conferences and making them concrete
           - One thing Eric Hughes and I discussed at length (for 3 days
              of nearly nonstop talk, in May, 1992) was the glacial rate
              of progress in converting the cryptographic primitive
              operations of the academic crypto conferences into actual,
              workable code. The basic RSA algorithm was by then barely
              available, more than 15 years after invention. (This was
              before PGP 2.0, and PGP 1.0 was barely available and was
              disappointing, with RSA Data Security's various products in
              limited niches.) All the neat stuff on digital cash, DC-
              Nets, bit commitment, olivioius transfer, digital mixes,
              and so on, was completely absent, in terms of avialable
              code or "crypto ICs" (to borrow Brad Cox's phrase). If it
              took 10-15 years for RSA to really appear in the real
              world, how long would it take some of the exciting stuff to
              get out?
           - We thought it would be a neat idea to find ways to reify
              these things, to get actual running code. As it happened,
              PGP 2.0 appeared the week of our very first meeting, and
              both the Kleinpaste/Julf and Cypherpunks remailers were
              quick, if incomplete, implementations of David Chaum's 1981
              "digital mixes." (Right on schedule, 11 years later.)
           - Sadly, most of the abstractions of cryptology remain
              residents of academic space, with no (available)
              implementations in the real world. (To be sure, I suspect
              many people have cobbled-together versions of many of these
              things, in C code, whatever. But their work is more like
              building sand castles, to be lost when they graduate or
              move on to other projects. This is of course not a problem
              unique to cryptology.)
           - Today, various toolkits and libraries are under
              development. Henry Strickland (Strick) is working on a
              toolkit based on John Ousterhout's "TCL" system (for Unix),
              and of course RSADSI provides RSAREF. Pr0duct Cypher has
              "PGP Tools." Other projects are underway. (My own longterm
              interest here is in building objects which act as the
              cryptography papers would have them act...building block
              objects. For this, I'm looking at Smalltalk of some
              flavor.)
           - It is still the case that most of the modern crypto papers
              discuss theoretical abstractions that are _not even close_
              to being implemented as reusable, robust objects or
              routines. Closing the gap between theoretical papers and
              practical realization is a major Cypherpunk emphasis.
    4.5.5. Prototypes, even if fatally flawed, allow for evolutionary
            learning and improvement. Think of it as engineering in
            action.
  
  4.6. Technological empowerment
    4.6.1. (more needed here....)
    4.6.2. As Sandy Sandfort notes, "The real point of Cypherpunks is
            that it's better to use strong crypto than weak crypto or no
            crypto at all.  Our use of crypto doesn't have to be totally
            bullet proof to be of value.  Let *them* worry about the
            technicalities while we make sure they have to work harder
            and pay more for our encrypted info than they would if it
            were in plaintext." [S.S. 1994-07-01]
  
  4.7. Free Speech Issues
    4.7.1. Speech
           - "Public speech is not a series of public speeches, but
              rather one's own
              words spoken openly and without shame....I desire a society
              where all may speak freely about whatever topic they will.
              I desire that all people might be able to choose to whom
              they wish to speak and to whom they do not wish to speak.
              I desire a society where all people may have an assurance
              that their words are directed only at those to whom they
              wish.  Therefore I oppose all efforts by governments to
              eavesdrop and to become unwanted listeners." [Eric Hughes,
              1994-02-22]
           - "The government has no right to restrict my use of
              cryptography in any way.  They may not forbid me to use
              whatever ciphers I may like, nor may they require me to use
              any that I do not like." [Eric Hughes, 1993-06-01]
    4.7.2. "Should there be _any_ limits whatsoever on a person's use of
            cryptography?"
           - No. Using the mathematics of cryptography is merely the
              manipulation of symbols. No crime is involved, ipso facto.
           - Also, as Eric Hughes has pointed out, this is another of
              those questions where the normative "should" or "shouldn't"
              invokes "the policeman inside." A better way to look at is
              to see what steps people can take to make any question of
              "should" this be allowed just moot.
           - The "crimes" are actual physical acts like murder and
              kidnapping. The fact that crypto may be used by plotters
              and planners, thus making detection more difficult, is in
              no way different from the possibility that plotters may
              speak in an unusual language to each other (ciphers), or
              meet in a private home (security), or speak in a soft voice
              when in public (steganography). None of these things should
              be illegal, and *none of them would be enforceable* except
              in the most rigid of police states (and probably not even
              there).
           - "Crypto is thoughtcrime" is the effect of restricting
              cryptography use.
    4.7.3. Democracy and censorship
           - Does a community have the right to decide what newsgroups
              or magazines it allows in its community? Does a nation have
              the right to do the same? (Tennessee, Iraq, Iran, France.
              Utah?)
           - This is what bypasses with crypto are all about: taking
              these majoritarian morality decisions out of the hands of
              the bluenoses. Direct action to secure freedoms.
  
  4.8. Privacy Issues
    4.8.1. "Is there an agenda here beyond just ensuring privacy?"
           - Definitely! I think I can safely say that for nearly all
              political persuasions on the Cypherpunks list. Left, right,
              libertarian, or anarchist, there's much more to to strong
              crypto than simple privacy. Privacy qua privacy is fairly
              uninteresting. If all one wants is privacy, one can simply
              keep to one's self, stay off high-visibility lists like
              this, and generally stay out of trouble.
           - Many of us see strong crypto as the key enabling technology
              for a new economic and social system, a system which will
              develop as cyberspace becomes more important. A system
              which dispenses with national boundaries, which is based on
              voluntary (even if anonymous) free trade. At issue is the
              end of governments as we know them today. (Look at
              interactions on the Net--on this list, for example--and
              you'll see many so-called nationalities, voluntary
              interaction, and the almost complete absence of any "laws."
              Aside from their being almost no rules per se for the
              Cypherpunks list, there are essentially no national laws
              that are invokable in any way. This is a fast-growing
              trend.)
           + Motivations for Cypherpunks
             - Privacy. If maintaining privacy is the main goal, there's
                not much more to say. Keep a low profile, protect data,
                avoid giving out personal information, limit the number
                of bank loans and credit applications, pay cash often,
                etc.
             - Privacy in activism.
             + New Structures. Using cryptographic constructs to build
                new political, economic, and even social structures.
               - Political: Voting, polling, information access,
                  whistleblowing
               - Economic: Free markets, information markets, increased
                  liquidity, black markets
               - Social: Cyberspatial communities, True Names
           - Publically inspectable algorithms always win out over
              private, secret algorithms
    4.8.2. "What is the American attitude toward privacy and
            encryption?"
           + There are two distinct (and perhaps simultaneously held)
              views that have long been found in the American psyche:
             - "A man's home is his castle." "Mind your own business."
                The frontier and Calvinist sprit of keeping one's
                business to one's self.
             - "What have you got to hide?" The nosiness of busybodies,
                gossiping about what others are doing, and being
                suspicious of those who try too hard to hide what they
                are doing.
           + The American attitude currently seems to favor privacy over
              police powers, as evidenced by a Time-CNN poll:
             - "In a Time/CNN poll of 1,000 Americans conducted last
                week by Yankelovich Partners, two-thirds said it was more
                important to protect the privacy of phone calls than to
                preserve the ability of police to conduct wiretaps. When
                informed about the Clipper Chip, 80% said they opposed
                it." [Philip Elmer-Dewitt, "Who Should Keep the Keys,"
                _TIME_, 1994-03-04.]
           - The answer given is clearly a function of how the question
              is phrased. Ask folks if they favor "unbreakable
              encryption" or "fortress capabilities" for terrorists,
              pedophiles, and other malefactors, and they'll likely give
              a quite different answer. It is this tack now being taken
              by the Clipper folks. Watch out for this!
           - Me, I have no doubts.
           - As Perry Metzger puts it, "I find the recent disclosures
              concerning U.S. Government testing of the effects of
              radiation on unknowing human subjects to be yet more
              evidence that you simply cannot trust the government with
              your own personal safety. Some people, given positions of
              power, will naturally abuse those positions, often even if
              such abuse could cause severe injury or death. I see little
              reason, therefore, to simply "trust" the U.S. government --
              and given that the U.S. government is about as good as they
              get, its obvious that NO government deserves the blind
              trust of its citizens. "Trust us, we will protect you"
              rings quite hollow in the face of historical evidence.
              Citizens must protect and preserve their own privacy -- the
              government and its centralized cryptographic schemes
              emphatically cannot be trusted." [P.M., 1994-01-01]
    4.8.3. "How is 1994 like 1984?"
           - The television ad for Clipper: "Clipper--why 1994 _will_ be
              like 1984"
           + As Mike Ingle puts it:
             - 1994: Wiretapping is privacy
                      Secrecy is openness
                      Obscurity is security
    4.8.4. "We anticipate that computer networks will play a more and
            more important role in many parts of our lives.  But this
            increased computerization brings tremendous dangers for
            infringing privacy.  Cypherpunks seek to put into place
            structures which will allow people to preserve their privacy
            if they choose.  No one will be forced to use pseudonyms or
            post anonymously. But it should be a matter of choice how
            much information a person chooses to reveal about himself
            when he communicates.  Right now, the nets don't give you
            that much choice.  We are trying to give this power to
            people."  [Hal Finney, 1993-02-23]
    4.8.5. "If cypherpunks contribute nothing else we can create a real
            privacy advocacy group, advocating means of real self-
            empowerment, from crypto to nom de guerre credit cards,
            instead of advocating further invasions of our privacy as the
            so-called privacy advocates are now doing!" [Jim Hart, 1994-
            09-08]
  
  4.9. Education Issues
    4.9.1. "How can we get more people to use crypto?"
           - telling them about the themes of Cypherpunks
           - surveillance, wiretapping, Digital Telephony, Clipper, NSA,
              FinCEN, etc....these things tend to scare a lot of folks
           - making PGP easier to use, better integration with mailers,
              etc.
           - (To be frank, convincing others to protect themselves is
              not one of my highest priorities.  Then why have I written
              this megabyte-plus FAQ? Good question. Getting more users
              is a general win, for obvious reasons.)
    4.9.2. "Who needs to encrypt?"
           + Corporations
             - competitors...fax transmissions
             + foreign governments
               - Chobetsu, GCHQ, SDECE, Mossad, KGB
             + their own government
               - NSA intercepts of plans, investments
           + Activist Groups
             - Aryan Nation needs to encrypt, as FBI has announced their
                intent to infiltrate and subvert this group
             - RU-486 networks
             - Amnesty International
           + Terrorists and Drug Dealers
             - clearly are clueless at times (Pablo Escobar using a
                cellphone!)
             - Triads, Russian Mafia, many are becoming crypto-literate
             - (I've been appoached-'nuff said)
           + Doctors, lawyers, psychiatrists, etc.
             - to preserve records against theft, snooping, casual
                examination, etc.
             - in many cases, a legal obligation has been attached to
                this  (notably, medical records)
             - the curious situation that many people are essentially
                _required_ to encrypt (no other way to ensure standards
                are met) and yet various laws exists to limit
                encryption...ITAR, Clipper, EES
             - (Clipper is a partial answer, if unsatisfactory)
    4.9.3. "When should crypto be used?"
           - It's an economic matter. Each person has to decide when to
              use it, and how. Me, I dislike having to download messages
              to my home machine before I can read them. Others use it
              routinely.
 
 4.10. Libertarian Issues
   4.10.1. A technological approach to freedom and privacy:
           - "Freedom is, practically, given as much (or more) by the
              tools we can build to protect it, as it is by our ability
              to convince others who violently disagree with us not to
              attack us.  On the Internet we have tools like anon
              remailers and PGP that give us a great deal of freedom
              from coercion even in the midst of censors. Thus, these
              tools piss off fans of centralized information control, the
              defenders of the status quo, like nothing else on the
              Internet."  [<an50@desert.hacktic.nl> (Nobody),  libtech-
              l@netcom.com, 1994-06-08]
           + Duncan Frissell, as usual, put it cogently:
             - "If I withhold my capital from some country or enterprise
                I am not  threatening to kill anyone.  When a "Democratic
                State" decides to do something, it does so with armed
                men.  If you don't obey, they tend to shoot....[I]f
                technological change enhances the powers of individuals,
                their power is enhanced no matter what the government
                does.
                
                "If the collective is weakened and the individual
                strengthened by the fact that I have the power of cheap
                guns, cars, computers, telecoms, and crypto then the
                collective has been weakened and we should ease the
                transition to a society based on voluntary rather than
                coerced interaction.
                
                "Unless you can figure out a new, improved way of
                controlling others; you have no choice." [D.F., Decline
                and Fall, 1994-06-19]
   4.10.2.  "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little
            temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
            [Benjamin Franklin]
   4.10.3. a typical view of government
           - "As I see it, it's always a home for bullies masquerading
              as a collective defense.  Sometimes it actually it actually
              has to perform its advertised defense function.  Like naked
              quarks,
              purely defensive governments cannot exist.  They are
              bipolar by nature, with some poles (i.e., the bullying
              part) being "more equal than others." [Sandy Sandfort, 1994-
              09-06]
   4.10.4. Sadly, several of our speculative scenarios for various laws
            have come to pass. Even several of my own, such as:
           - "(Yet Another May Prediction Realized)...The text of a
              "digital stalking bill" was just sent to Cyberia-l." [L.
              Todd Masco, 1994-08-31] (This was a joking prediction I
              made that "digital stalking" would soon be a crime; there
              had been news articles about the horrors of such
              cyberspatial stalkings, regardless of there being no real
              physical threats, so this move is not all that surprising.
              Not surprising in an age when free speech gets outlawed as
              "assault speech.")
   4.10.5. "Don't tread on me."
   4.10.6. However, it's easy to get too negative on the situation, to
            assume that a socialist state is right around the corner. Or
            that a new Hitler will come to power. These are unlikely
            developments, and not only because of strong crypto.
            Financial markets are putting constraints on how fascist a
            government can get...the international bond markets, for
            example, will quickly react to signs like this. (This is the
            theory, at least.)
   4.10.7. Locality of reference, cash, TANSTAAFL, privacy
           - closure, local computation, local benefits
           - no accounting system needed
           - markets clear
           - market distortions like rationing, coupons, quotas, all
              require centralized record-keeping
           - anything that ties economic transactions to identity
              (rationing, entitlements, insurance) implies identity-
              tracking, credentials, etc.
           + Nonlocality also dramatically increases the opportunities
              for fraud, for scams and con jobs
             - because something is being promised for future delivery
                (the essence of many scams) and is not verifiable locally
             - because "trust" is invoked
           - Locality also fixes the "policeman inside" problem: the
              costs of decisions are borne by the decider, not by others.
 
 4.11. Crypto Anarchy
   4.11.1. The Crypto Anarchy Principle: Strong crypto permits
            unbreakable encrypion, unforgeable signatures, untraceable
            electronic messages, and unlinkable pseudonomous identities.
            This ensures that some transactions and communications can be
            entered into only voluntarily. External force, law, and
            regulation cannot be applied. This is "anarchy," in the sense
            of no outside rulers and laws. Voluntary arrangements, back-
            stopped by voluntarily-arranged institutions like escrow
            services, will be the only form of rule. This is "crypto
            anarchy."
   4.11.2. crypto allows a return to contracts that governments cannot
            breach
           - based on reputation, repeat business
           - example: ordering illegal material untraceably and
              anonymously,,,governments are powerless to do anything
           - private spaces, with the privacy enforced via cryptographic
              permissions (access credentials)
           - escrows (bonds)
   4.11.3. Technological solutions over legalistic regulations
           + Marc Ringuette summarized things nicely:
             - "What we're after is some "community standards" for
                cyberspace, and what I'm suggesting is the fairly
                libertarian standard that goes like this:
                
                "    Prefer technological solutions and self-protection
                solutions
                    over rule-making, where they are feasible.
                
                "This is based on the notion that the more rules there
                are, the more people will call for the "net police" to
                enforce them.  If we can encourage community standards
                which emphasize a prudent level of self-protection, then
                we'll be able to make do with fewer rules and a less
                intrusive level of policing."[Marc Ringuette, 1993-03-14]
           + Hal Finney has made cogent arguments as to why we should
              not become too complacent about the role of technology vis-
              a-vis politics. He warns us not to grow to confident:
             - "Fundamentally, I believe we will have the kind of
                society that most people want.  If we want freedom and
                privacy, we must persuade others that these are worth
                having.  There are no shortcuts.  Withdrawing into
                technology is like pulling the blankets over your head.
                It feels good for a while, until reality catches up.  The
                next Clipper or Digital Telephony proposal will provide a
                rude awakening." [Hal Finney, POLI: Politics vs
                Technology, 1994-01-02]
           - "The idea here is that the ultimate solution to the low
              signal-to-noise ratio on the nets is not a matter of
              forcing people to "stand behind their words".  People can
              stand behind all kinds of idiotic ideas.  Rather, there
              will need to be developed better systems for filtering news
              and mail, for developing "digital reputations" which can be
              stamped on one's postings to pass through these smart
              filters, and even applying these reputations to pseudonyms.
              In such a system, the fact that someone is posting or
              mailing pseudonymously is not a problem, since nuisance
              posters won't be able to get through."  [Hal Finney, 1993-
              02-23]
   4.11.4. Reputations
   4.11.5. I have a moral outlook that many will find unacceptable or
            repugnant. To cut to the chase: I support the killing of
            those who break contracts, who steal in serious enough ways,
            and who otherwise commit what I think of as crimes.
           + I don't mean this abstractly. Here's an example:
             - Someone is carrying drugs. He knows what he's involved
                in. He knows that theft is punishable by death. And yet
                he steals some of the merchandise.
             - Dealers understand that they cannot tolerate this, that
                an example must be made, else all of their employees will
                steal.
           - Understand that I'm not talking about the state doing the
              killing, nor would I do the killing. I'm just saying such
              things are the natural enforcement mechanism for such
              markets. Realpolitik.
           - (A meta point: the drug laws makes things this way.
              Legalize all drugs and the businesses would be more like
              "ordinary" businesses.)
           - In my highly personal opinion, many people, including most
              Congressrodents, have committed crimes that earn them the
              death penalty; I will not be sorry to see anonymous
              assassination markets used to deal with them.
   4.11.6. Increased espionage will help to destroy nation-state-empires
            like the U.S., which has gotten far too bloated and far too
            dependent on throwing its weight around; nuclear "terrorism"
            may knock out a few cities, but this may be a small price to
            pay to undermine totally the socialist welfare states that
            have launched so many wars this century.
 
 4.12. Loose Ends
   4.12.1. "Why take a "no compromise" stance?"
           - Compromise often ends up in the death of a thousand cuts.
              Better to just take a rejectionist stance.
           - The National Rifle Association (NRA) learned this lesson
              the hard way. EFF may eventually learn it; right now they
              appear to be in the "coopted by the power center" mode,
              luxuriating in their inside-the-Beltway access to the Veep,
              their flights on Air Force One, and their general
              schmoozing with the movers and shakers...getting along by
              going along.
           - Let's not compromise on basic issues. Treat censorship as a
              problem to be routed around (as John Gilmore suggests), not
              as something that needs to be compromised on. (This is
              directed at rumblings about how the Net needs to "police
              itself," by the "reasonable" censorship of offensive posts,
              by the "moderation" of newsgroups, etc. What should concern
              us is the accomodation of this view by well-meaning civil
              liberties groups, which are apparently willing to play a
              role in this "self-policing" system. No thanks.)
           - (And since people often misunderstand this point, I'm not
              saying private companies can't set whatever policies they
              wish, that moderated newsgroups can't be formed, etc.
              Private arrangements are just that. The issue is when
              censorship is forced on those who have no other
              obligations. Government usually does this, often aided and
              abetted by corporations and lobbying groups. This is what
              we need to fight. Fight by routing around, via technology.)
   4.12.2. The inherent evils of democracy
           - To be blunt about it, I've come to despise the modern
              version of democracy we have. Every issue is framed in
              terms of popular sentiment, in terms of how the public
              would vote. Mob rule at its worst.
           - Should people be allowed to wear blue jeans? Put it to a
              vote. Can employers have a policy on blue jeans? Pass a
              law. Should health care be provided to all? Put it to a
              vote. And so on, whittling away basic freedoms and rights.
              A travesty. The tyranny of the majority.
           - De Toqueville warned of this when he said that the American
              experiment in democracy would last only until citizens
              discovered they could pick the pockets of their neighbors
              at the ballot box.
           - But maybe we can stop this nonsense. I support strong
              crypto (and its eventual form, crypto anarchy) because it
              undermines this form of democracy. It takes some (and
              perhaps many) transactions out of the realm of popularity
              contests, beyond the reach of will of the herd. (No, I am
              not arguing there will be a complete phase change. As the
              saying goes, "You can't eat cyberspace." But a lot of
              consulting, technical work, programming, etc., can in fact
              be done with crypto anarchic methods, with the money gained
              transferred in a variety of ways into the "real world."
              More on this elsewhere.)
           + Crypto anarchy effectively allows people to pick and choose
              which laws they support, at least in cyberspatial contexts.
              It empowers people to break the local bonds of their
              majoritarian normative systems and decide for themselves
              which laws are moral and which are bullshit.
             - I happen to have faith that most people will settle on a
                relatively small number of laws that they'll (mostly)
                support, a kind of Schelling point in legal space.
   4.12.3. "Is the Cypherpunks agenda _too extreme_?"
           - Bear in mind that most of the "Cypherpunks agenda," to the
              extent we can identify it, is likely to provoke ordinary
              citizens into _outrage_. Talk of anonymous mail, digital
              money, money laundering, information markets, data havens,
              undermining authority, transnationalism, and all the rest
              (insert your favorite idea) is not exactly mainstream.
   4.12.4. "Crypto Anarchy sounds too wild for me."
           - I accept that many people will find the implications of
              crypto anarchy (which follows in turn from the existence of
              strong cryptography, via the Crypto Anarchy Principle) to
              be more than they can accept.
           - This is OK (not that you need my OK!). The house of
              Cypherpunks has many rooms.