Elon University

Topic: Communication

Computers Beware! New Type of Virus is Loose on the Net

There are criminals in the world, and some of them are programmers. With computer networks, they have an amplifying effect that they’ve never had before. If I were a criminal with a gun, I might attack one person. But with a computer network, I can attack a million people at a time. It’s like an atomic bomb.

Howdy, Neighbours

In five years, everyone who is reading these words will have an e-mail address, other than the determined Luddities who also eschew the telephone and electricity. When we are all together in cyberspace we will see what the human spirit, and the basic desire to connect, can create there.

CMC Characteristics

The discourse in these computer-mediated forums exhibits many qualities of an oral culture. The existence of this text-based orality may imply that discourse need not be based upon sound in order to have oral characteristics. Rather … oral characteristics grow out of computer-mediated communication which gives participants greater independence over time and space than paper-based text communication … Just as the earlier technologies (the Greek alphabet, the printing press) changed the way people communicated and thought, so, too, does CMC.

Interview with Berners-Lee

The interesting thing is that while on the one hand I would like a single-user interface metaphor for all these things, on the other hand one sees that at the lower levels of NNTTP, SMTP and HTTP the protocols also will grow to look more like others, as HTTP uses caching to distribute much-read documents in a self-organizing way which if taken to the limit becomes the flooding of NNTP. So the boundaries will I suspect disappear at all levels.

A Plain Text on Cryto Policy

In secret, they are making for us what may be the most important choice that has ever faced American democracy, that is, whether our descendants will lead their private lives with unprecedented mobility and safety from coercion, or whether every move they make, geographic, economic, or amorous, will be visible to anyone who possesses whatever may then constitute “lawful authority.”

A Plain Text on Crypto Policy

No one would be driven to use [The Clipper Chip] by anything but convenience. In fact, no one with any brains would use it if he were trying to get away with anything.

A Plain Text on Crypto Policy

If passed, [the Digital Telephony policy] would have essentially called a halt to most American progress in telecommunncations.

IP Next Generation Overview

Another market which could use the next-generation IP is device control. This consists of the control of everyday devices such as lighting equipment, heating and cooling equipment, motors, and other types of equipment which are currently controlled via analog switches and in aggregate consume considerable amounts of electrical power. The size of this market is enormous and requires solutions which are simple, robust, easy to use, and very low cost.

Harley Hahn: Author

I think what you will find is that the kids who are using the Net will learn how to use the stuff without any problem at all, and they’ll feel right at home, and when they’re 25 they won’t understand why a 25-year-old would think that anonymous FTP is a difficult thing to learn how to use any more than, at your age, you think how anybody could think that driving is difficult to use.