Assassination Politics (1997)
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Assassination Politics (1997)
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Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#2The saga of Jim Bell after the publication of that essay provides an excellent case study in why people like "Satoshi" have an interest in remaining as anonymous as possible.
Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#3another cryptome/internet classic
Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#4The saga of Jim Bell after the publication of that essay provides an excellent case study in why people like "Satoshi" have an interest in remaining as anonymous as possible.
I wasn't familiar with this, but Wikipedia knows of this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Bell
There are many excellent reasons for remaining anonymous or pseudonymous, both online and offline.
That being said, there's a vast difference between inventing a disruptive technology and advocating (even in jest) the killing of government officials.
I'm not taking the position that governments never unjustly harass disruptive technologists. Nor am I taking the position that the treatment of this particular jesting assassination advocate was fair or proportionate. Nor am I taking the position that government officials are incapable of crimes worthy of a death sentence [1] (think of the executions of Nazi war criminals after World War 2).
I'm simply saying that the situations of Satoshi and Jim Bell aren't really comparable.
[1] Although, even for people who really deserve it, I'd really rather not have death sentences recommended and carried out by the totally lawless process Mr. Bell jestingly advocated in a country I have to live in.
Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#5Jim Bell is out of prison after 10 years and remains defiant and is posting again on one of his original fora, cypherpunks. The archives has Jim's recent posts:
http://cpunks.org/pipermail/cypherpunks/
Subscribe to cpunks: https://cpunks.org/mailman/listinfo/cypherpunks
Then there is CJ, Carl Johnson, who was sent to prison for supporting Bell. He is on Twitter among other places, also still promoting AP defiantly: https://twitter.com/pro2rat
Neither are interested in remaining anonymous.
Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#6I first read about "Assassination Markets" in this brilliant book, that delves into the old 90s cypherpunks mailing list (members which included Julian Assange and most likely the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi):
http://www.amazon.com/Machine-Kills-Secrets-EmpowerWhistlebl...
I still haven't read this full article, mostly just a summary, so here are my rough thoughts:
It seems like something straight out of an idealistic anarcho-capitalist society, but it seems to be dangerously crossing the line out of "non-aggression" and from skimming the article, seems full of flaws. For example:
> Satisfying as it might be to declare war on asinine pop singers, Bell has a more civic-minded suggestion: Let's kill all the car thieves. He reasons that a very small number of career criminals are responsible for nearly all car thefts. If one million car owners in a given metropolitan area contributed just four dollars a year, it would create $10,000 a day in "prize money" for the "predictor" of any car thief's death.
Is preventing property theft really worth killing a bunch of petty criminals? I highly doubt it. This tough-love approach to preventing crime (especially to this extreme) has been a complete failure in the USA (see their full prison system or the war on drugs).
I'm all for preventative self-defense, but most of this enforcement bulldozes over root causes of issues (socio-economic, mental illness, etc). The goal should be compensating victims (ala https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restorative_justice) and long-term solutions, not creating some esoteric possibility of safety/morality via threat of violence.
Not only that, and just google "wrongful convictions" or "wrongful convictions death penalty". Accuracy of information needs strong information systems and due process (maybe the article discusses this?) but just having target lists + bets is wildly insufficient.
There has also been a lot of literature against private law enforcement (counter to many anarcho ideologies) such as by Novick in his book "Anarchy, State, and Utopia":
http://www.amazon.com/Anarchy-State-Utopia-Robert-Nozick/dp/...
> TLDR: Protective agencies (judges/police) would be competing against each other. That competitive nature combined with their intended role of protecting us (and themselves) would lead to "an endless series of acts of retaliation and exactation of compensations". Also he demonstrates why the nature of both of the businesses would already create natural monopolies in each local jurisdiction.
So even though I personally lean towards libertarian/decentralized ideas, public courts/judges is likely still the best solution and anonymous assassination marketplaces sounds dangerously flawed.
Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#7I first read about "Assassination Markets" in this brilliant book, that delves into the old 90s cypherpunks mailing list (members which included Julian Assange and most likely the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi): http://www.amazon.com/Machine-Kills-Secrets-EmpowerWhistlebl... I still haven't read this full article, mostly just a summary, so here are my rough thoughts: It seems like something straight out of an idealisti…
The idea of the assassination marketplace as I see it is to provide some means to balance the power of politicians. There's a powerful asymmetry at work in politics. Prosecutors can knowingly wrongly convict people and face no consequences. The President can authorize a temporary (or perhaps not temporary) war possibly resulting in thousand of deaths and the worst outcome he faces for it is not getting a second term.
Given that voting people out of office is not a powerful enough disincentive to cause them to behave morally I welcome new thoughts on providing better incentives. I'm not saying that Assassination Markets are necessarily good but there's an interesting idea there: how to provide the mass of people recourse to politicians in a manner other than voting.
Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#8I first read about "Assassination Markets" in this brilliant book, that delves into the old 90s cypherpunks mailing list (members which included Julian Assange and most likely the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi): http://www.amazon.com/Machine-Kills-Secrets-EmpowerWhistlebl... I still haven't read this full article, mostly just a summary, so here are my rough thoughts: It seems like something straight out of an idealisti…
The idea of the assassination marketplace as I see it is to provide some means to balance the power of politicians. There's a powerful asymmetry at work in politics. Prosecutors can knowingly wrongly convict people and face no consequences. The President can authorize a temporary (or perhaps not temporary) war possibly resulting in thousand of deaths and the worst outcome he faces for it is not getting a second term.…
[deleted]
Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#9I first read about "Assassination Markets" in this brilliant book, that delves into the old 90s cypherpunks mailing list (members which included Julian Assange and most likely the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi): http://www.amazon.com/Machine-Kills-Secrets-EmpowerWhistlebl... I still haven't read this full article, mostly just a summary, so here are my rough thoughts: It seems like something straight out of an idealisti…
The idea of the assassination marketplace as I see it is to provide some means to balance the power of politicians. There's a powerful asymmetry at work in politics. Prosecutors can knowingly wrongly convict people and face no consequences. The President can authorize a temporary (or perhaps not temporary) war possibly resulting in thousand of deaths and the worst outcome he faces for it is not getting a second term.…
Why a marketplace, though? One can already organize resistance against a regime one considers harmful enough to merit violent resistance, via militant groups. They can be right-wing groups like the militia movement or Greece's Golden Dawn, or left-wing groups like the Black Panthers or Germany's Red Army Faction. They do at various times assassinate prosecutors or politicians.
An assassination market seems to change the barrier to entry: rather than personal commitment, it's money. Is that likely to produce better decisions, when it comes to extralegal assassinations? I don't see a strong a priori reason to believe that "people wanted dead by people who have money" is likely to be a good signal. That just seems like a formalization of the classic mob hit: if you've got enough cash, you can get anyone offed.
Re: Assassination Politics (1997)
#10The saga of Jim Bell after the publication of that essay provides an excellent case study in why people like "Satoshi" have an interest in remaining as anonymous as possible.
I wasn't familiar with this, but Wikipedia knows of this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Bell There are many excellent reasons for remaining anonymous or pseudonymous, both online and offline. That being said, there's a vast difference between inventing a disruptive technology and advocating (even in jest) the killing of government officials. I'm not taking the position that governments never unjustly harass disrup…
First of all, based on that essay, it's entirely plausible to believe that Jim Bell is in fact guilty of felony tax evasion (and possibly more).
However, it seems kind of crappy that the government response to a controversial exercise of first-amendment rights is to look really hard at you, dig up some dirt, and get you sent to jail. (Or make some dirt -- or at least trump up the charges if the dirt's not enough.)
(A similar revenge case may have been brought against the CEO of Qwest, for a more 4th-amendment/NSA angle; in this case the charges that may have been trumped up were insider-trading charges, and certain evidence about the government's motives was excluded from the trial by the judge. Here's an article we've discussed in these fora before: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2013/09/30... )