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Author Message
25 new of 149 responses total.
keesan
response 95 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 20 15:27 UTC 2006

Most of my spam has international 'from' addresses such as .de and .cn.

Low income residents of our county can qualify for $150/month of food stamps.
I will gladly buy $6/month of food from any of them that can't come up with
$6/month to be a grex member and use outgoing ftp and telnet.
aruba
response 96 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 20 20:24 UTC 2006

Eliminating modems or restricting services to members only is a change to
Grex's basic mission, and could jeopardize our 501(c)3 status with the IRS.
See Grex's 501(c)3 application at
  http://www.cyberspace.org/local/grex/501c3.html
for what they expect of us now.
richard
response 97 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 20 21:09 UTC 2006

but grex already restricts some things to members, like outbound telnet and
ftp right?  
kingjon
response 98 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 20 21:16 UTC 2006

Yes, but for the primary consideration of *bandwidth*. I suggest you read the
precedent-setting vote.

cross
response 99 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 21 00:55 UTC 2006

Regarding #90; Then come up with a way to make it easy; use the technology.

For instance, Grex considers receipt of money from an account that's been
verified on paypal as sufficient verification.  Why wouldn't sending a penny
via PayPal be considered sufficient for verification purposes?  Perhaps we
could consider some sort of vouch-for program where members could verify
the identity of other users (here, I'm thinking specifically of users who
are set up with grex access by, say, Sindi and Jim).  We could consider some
sort of call-back verification for dial-in users, similar to how BBS's used
to operate in the dial-up world back in the day.  Most of this would be
handled electronically with a minimim of manual intervention.

Regarding #96; I don't think you need to make it ``members only.''  But it
is reasonable to impose some level of verification on the process, and I
don't see why members shouldn't be allowed to verify users.  That said, I
don't see why getting rid of dialin access would be a fundamental change
in grex's mission.
wlevak
response 100 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 21 06:13 UTC 2006

It is not necessary to verify the identity of every user.  Users who connect
through a service that requires identification to get the service, are already
identified to a sufficient extent, ie. educational institutions, users who
use their employer's access, etc.  It's the commercial services that sell
access to anyone for money, that is the problem.  Yahoo and Yahoo Korea, are
two that produce a lot of spam.
keesan
response 101 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 21 16:17 UTC 2006

So do we allow access to anyone coming from an .edu?  Is there a list of
trustworthy ISPs somewhere?  Would every applicant for outgoing email have
to be manually checked out?
cross
response 102 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 21 17:37 UTC 2006

Regarding #100; Not true.  There are plenty of public kiosk settings at,
say, universities that don't require any sort of authentication to use.
Blindly applying a regular expression to the connecting hostname is not
a good idea.  You are correct that you don't need to verify every user,
though.
richard
response 103 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 21 19:51 UTC 2006

Listen, if the government becomes more draconian in its attempts to 
regulate the 'net, grex may one day be REQUIRED to verify all users.  
As it is, some terrorist living in the U.S. could log on to grex using 
an anonymizer to hide his location, and using an anonymously generated 
login, and pass along terrorist information to his people back at 
home.  It is safer than calling them on the phone since we all know 
they wiretap international phone records now.  

Also someone who is into child porn and wants an email to use for such 
correspondence, would be far safer using a Grex email than a Yahoo or 
Hotmail email.  Grex doesn't require any verifiable personal info to 
take out a login.  I am sure the Homeland Security Department would 
love to shut a place as open as Grex down, if they were aware of it.
nharmon
response 104 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 21 19:55 UTC 2006

Ok, terrorists using Grex. This conversation has gone too far.
mcnally
response 105 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 21 21:42 UTC 2006

 Won't someone PLEASE think of the children?
naftee
response 106 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 21 21:48 UTC 2006

richard's absolutely nuts !
cross
response 107 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 03:28 UTC 2006

I really doubt grex is on anyone's anti-terrorism radar.
scholar
response 108 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 06:33 UTC 2006

talk to bap.
aruba
response 109 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 10:14 UTC 2006

Re #99: Dan: Dial-up access is an essential part of Grex's chritable mission
for a number of reasons, not least of which is that we told the IRS it was
an essential part of our charitable mission.  If we were to eliminate our
phone lines, we would have to notify the IRS, and they might cancel our
501(c)3 status.
nharmon
response 110 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 16:30 UTC 2006

Does m-net have dialup? Do they have 501(c)3 status?
cross
response 111 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 16:36 UTC 2006

Regarding #109; Huh?  That's a thin argument, I think.  I do see where
dialins are mentioned on the application for 501(c)3 status, but it also
seems to me that that could be amended in light of changes in technology
and undue financial burden that would jeopardize the rest of grex's
mission, etc.  Note that no where in the articles of incorporation are
dialins mentioned; only computer conferencing.  Regardless, I'm not sure
why removing the dialin lines is at issue right now.
nharmon
response 112 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 17:21 UTC 2006

It isn't. Removing dialup access would reduce operating costs, and would
be an option if Grex's income continued to decline.
aruba
response 113 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 18:11 UTC 2006

Re #110: M-Net's application was different than Grex's.  The rules say that
if you change your charitable activities, you must notify the IRS of the
change.

Frankly, I think keeping those dialins open is the most charitable thing
that Grex does, and I'm proud that we do it.
cross
response 114 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 18:36 UTC 2006

Regarding #113; It makes sense as long as people use them.  But keeping
them around if they're not used, or only rarely used, makes little sense.
kingjon
response 115 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 18:40 UTC 2006

Re #114: Charity rarely makes economic sense -- if it did, it wouldn't be
charity. So long as there are users who use the dialins, I think they should be
left open. (If it were between closing the dialins and closing the Internet
link I would be in favor of the latter, personally, but I suspect I'm in the
extreme minority on that point.)

cross
response 116 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 18:50 UTC 2006

So a charity that offered sliderules to the masses would be putting its
resources to good use?

Like I said, as long as they're using them, I don't have a problem with it.
Once they stop, it would be foolish to continue offering the service.
kingjon
response 117 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 19:06 UTC 2006

Re #116: I didn't say that. It *would* be performing a charitable function,
however.

keesan
response 118 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 22 20:06 UTC 2006

I use the dialin lines several times a day.
wlevak
response 119 of 149: Mark Unseen   Jan 23 05:41 UTC 2006

User's from .edu domains can be checked against the institutuion' online
directory.  Public access users would not be listed there.  At the University
of Michigan, public access users cannot e-mail.
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