Gore then, is Isabella?

[David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

To: farber () central cis upenn edu
Subject: Gore then, is Isabella?
From: bill.shefski () pics com (Bill Shefski)
Date: Tue, 26 Oct 93 20:03:00 -0500




Dave,


I came across a recent issue of a periodical called _Computer Reviews_
and just had to write. The cover carries a quote from a 1993 article you
wrote called "Cyberspace, the Constitution, and the Electronic Frontier
Foundation." I just want to go on record that I haven't read the
article, I don't know when it was written, and I can attest that you
haven't seen Chapter 1 of my forthcoming _Free Electronic Networks_,
where I've fashioned a quite similar metaphor. Here's yours:


"Those entering Cyberspace encounter new forms in a new terrain just as
earlier explorers of the New World, the American West, and Outer Space
did before them. Sailing ships, prairie schooners, rocket ships, and
the new technology transported these voyagers into different frontiers,
but they all faced a similar problem. Upon arrival, they found that
civility, ethical practices, individual rights, and the law had been
left behind."


Very nice. I both wish I _had_ seen it before I wrote mine back in...
oh, early May, I believe -- and am glad I didn't. Here's mine:


"The exploration of the globe centuries ago was accomplished by only a
handful of people, a few hundred maybe. The exploration of space around
Earth and the probing of the Solar System involves a few thousand,
perhaps, and you may never get any nearer than watching the launches on
television.


"The exploration of Cyberspace...will be accomplished by millions, and
will eventually be permanently colonized by people from all over Planet
Earth. There is no indigenous population to supplant, unless you count
those computer trailblazers...who staked the ground, and who will look
on, a bit dismayed, as the cybernetic landrush gets underway in
earnest."


Different aspects (I get into the lawlessness in other sections) but very
similar, and mindful of that passage from R. Lucky's _Silicon Dreams_ on
the subject of *non-cybernetic* networking (among colleagues in a field,
and which I also quote in Chapter 1 on the point of technology
origination disputes.):


"Networking plays a dominant role in many human endeavors. Scientists
know that very few discoveries and inventions are made of whole cloth.
The time becomes 'ripe' for a given invention, it is 'in the air,' so to
speak. In fact, the necessary knowledge is assembling itself in the
network, ready to leap out at the first person with sufficient
sensitivity to recognize that it is there, already manufactured by a
process much bigger than any of us alone."


Maybe we were both similarly *leapt* on.


I guess it shows that a lot of people are thinking about the same
sort of things these days. A shame that, in the end, it will all be
controlled by artless cretins from Virtual Hollywood, and fiber-optics
will become another, more modern, method of spoon-feeding inanity to the
masses. It's the only way they'll make back their money. O well.


How's Aurora going?


By the way, the journal that published your article was called
_Educator Tech_ or something. Do they have an e-address maybe?


Thanks.


Bill




* RM 1.2  * Eval Day 25 * Space, the penultimate frontier...


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