Regarding a breach of etiquette

Sep 29 07:37 UTC 1996

I was mean to Selena a few minutes ago in Item 115:

>Item 115: Cyberspace Communications, Inc. finances through 8/31/96
>Entered by Mark A. Conger (aruba) on Wed, Sep 25, 1996 (09:40):
>   <linked item>
>
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> 
> Our expenses are about to go up, when we move.  If you've ever thought about 
> becoming a member of Grex, now is a great time because we can really use your
 > help. >       > Dues are still only $6/month or $60/year.  Send cash,
checks, or money orders > (payable to Cyberspace Communications) to: >  >
Cyberspace Communications, Inc. > P.O. Box 4432 > Ann Arbor, MI 48106-4432 >  >
If you pay by cash or money order, *PLEASE* include a photocopy of some form >
of ID.  I can't add you to the membership roll unless I see some ID.  If you >
pay by personal check, that's good enough. >  . . . > >#6 of 7: by S. Barwens
(ladyevil) on Sat, Sep 28, 1996 (23:14): > Gee, too bad about the ID thing. I
have a membership for a year right here, > ready. Oh well.. > >#7 of 7: by
Peter Riley (nestene) on Sun, Sep 29, 1996 (03:21): > Gosh, I'm sorry, Selena,
maybe we're just not willing to BREAK THE LAW > just to give you the chance to
do something you've said you don't want > to do anyway (i.e. telnet out); it's
been explained more than once that > we're legally obligated to know who our
members are, so STOP WHINING. >  > I will open an item to discuss my shocking
attempt to get Selena to stop > poisoning the conferences in the next few
minutes.  My deepest and most > sincere apologies to anyone else I have
offended. >  > Please respond in the other item.  Please allow this item to
remain on-topic.

Please respond in this item.

response 2 of 138:

Sep 29 17:52 UTC 1996

Selena is nothing if not consistent. I do not understand why she complains.
We are not going to drop the ID requirement for membership.
I do not know why she wants to become a member. She can give us money without
ID. If she wants to be able to vote, she will have to tell us who she is so
that we will know that she is not the same person as someone who is already
voting. The law requires that we know who the members are.

She has already said that she can't benefit from member-only services, so that
is certainly not it. I think she thinks we are doing this because we don't
trust her to be a good net citizen. No. That is why we don't permit anonymous
users in general to have member-only services. It is not a statement about
Selena.

response 4 of 138:

Sep 29 19:56 UTC 1996

It has to do with the laws of incorporation.

response 6 of 138:

Sep 29 22:31 UTC 1996

  To clarify further, there are two separate issues.  Voting members must
be identified to adhere to state law (and to Grex's bylaws).  Outbound
telnet access does not legally require identified users, so it is strictly
a Grex policy.

response 8 of 138:

Sep 30 02:32 UTC 1996

The question people are asking, though, is why you want the membership.
Is it

1.  Because you like Grex and want to support it
2.  You would like to be a voting member of the corporation
3.  Because you want to use telnet, ftp, and other member-only services

   If the answer is 1, Grex has no problem with anonymous donations.  What
do you mean Grex sat on it?  They didn't cash it?  If so, I assume that's
rare.  If you mean it was tagged for something they never purchased, the
amount of time they sit on it depends on how desperatly they need whatever
it's tagged for.
   If the answer is 2, I guess you're out of luck.  State law requires
corporations to record the names and some other info about their voting
members.  Grex will not (or at least should not) break the law for anyone.
   If the answer is 3, I guess you're out of luck again.  While not
required by law, Grex is required, as a respectable member of the Internet
community, to know who they are unleashing on the rest of the Internet.
Grex and M-Net have received substantial complaints about just their
anonymous e-mail users.  Last I knew, ISCA would no longer accept M-Net as
a valid e-mail address because of problem users.  If we unleashed
anonymous telnet, ftp, and Usenet users, many sites would probably begin
locking us out.

response 10 of 138:

Sep 30 03:44 UTC 1996

  Contributors can be identified and thanked in the standard agora item
where new and renewing members are thanked.  Special donations can also
be noted in the motd as seems appropriate.  Both of these have happened
in the past.

response 12 of 138:

Sep 30 05:33 UTC 1996

Selena, along with at least one other person, donated money to buy a UPS that
Arbornet was offering to sell us at what seemed like a good price.  It turned
out that the UPS didn't work, so we didn't buy it.  Instead, we kept the money
in a UPS fund, so that if a deal on a UPS that we could afford came along,
we could spend the money on it, or if people donated more money towards buying
a more expensive UPS, we could buy that.  Selena eventually decided she was
tired of waiting, and withdrew her donation.

response 14 of 138:

Sep 30 06:51 UTC 1996

MCA 450.2485 says, among other things "The corporation shall keep at its
registered office, or at the office of its transfer agent within or
without this state, records containing the names and addresses of all
shareholders or members, the number and class of shares held by each
shareholder or the class or classes of membership held by each member and
the dates when they respectively became holders of record thereof or
members." 

response 16 of 138:

Sep 30 11:04 UTC 1996

"I can't understand why Grex doesn't trust me.  It *couldn't* be because I
don't trust Grex".

response 18 of 138:

Sep 30 14:21 UTC 1996

I haven't seen any inconsistancy on the reasons for requring ID.  I haven't
seen anyone say that any law requires us to get ID before giving telnet
access.

There are two things we require ID for: net access and voting.  The reasons
for those are different.

  Voting:  State law (see Rane's quote above) requires us to do this.  That's
      a real good reason, but there are others.  It is reassuring to us to
      have some evidence that each voter is a different person, for example.
      That's probably the reason the state requires us to keep such a list.
      They want us to be able to prove that we really are a real member
      organization with real members, not just a list of names somebody
      made up.

  Net Access:  There are damned few laws about net access.  These days, things
      work by a kind of common law on the net.  When Grex has problems with
      users telnetting in here and trying to crash our system, we report them
      to the administrators of the site they telnetted in from.  We expect
      those people to handle the situation and take whatever steps are
      necessary to ensure it doesn't happen again.  When users from Grex cause
      similar problems on other people's systems, the shoe is on the other
      foot and we have to take responsibility for dealing with the situation.
      This is the way "law enforcement" is done on the "electric frontier".
      We probably deal with four or five such things every month, interacting
      with other system administrators all over the world.  We work very hard
      to do our part, to be good "net citizens."  There is at least one other
      local system that hasn't been as good about these things, and because of
      this some internet site block all access from users there.  That's what
      happens if you are on a site that doesn't maintain a reputation for
      being a "good citizen".  Parts of the net start becoming inaccessible
      to you.  So far, to the best of our knowledge, nobody has blocked
      cyberspace.org anywhere.  Given the kind of operation this is, I think
      this is something to be proud of.  It would be very easy for this to
      turn into an "outlaw site."

      So we have a few very minimal rules.  You don't get full net access
      without giving us ID.  We're willing to risk anonymous people getting
      on our system and causing trouble, but we don't feel we have the
      right to let them out onto other people's systems.

We are willing to promise to be discrete with people's ID, but we can't
promise absolute secrecy.  We collect the ID for reasons, not just for our
entertainment.  There may be circumstances when we have to produce that ID.
That's why we want it.

Grex theoretically could give Selena net access without getting ID from her.
It's not against any law and probably no harm would come of it.  But that
would mean the Grex Board has to sit down and decide "Do we trust Selena?"
Having set that precident, the board would have to start sitting judgement
on other users.  No thanks.  I'd much rather see the board pass up the $60.

But at the same time, I don't think anyone should be criticizing Selena for
not donating money.  After all, you don't know who she is.  How do you know
she isn't donating money?  There are about 100 Grex members.  Are you sure
that none of them is Selena?  If she was a member, she certainly wouldn't
admit it, because she wouldn't want to narrow her identity down to a list of
100 people.  Wouldn't all this harping on Selena for not being a member be
pretty obnoxious if she was a member?  I have no idea who Selena is, and I
have no reasons to suspect that she is a member.  But it's never wise to
criticize people you know nothing about.  Your criticism is all too likely
to be completely misguided.

response 20 of 138:

Sep 30 15:09 UTC 1996

Richard, Selena sent cash.

response 22 of 138:

Sep 30 15:35 UTC 1996

I am Selena! Maybe.

response 24 of 138:

Sep 30 16:07 UTC 1996

Or maybe Selena is a composite of Brighn and BlondeVal, meaning that
they are both Selena at times.