🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1993Jan07.202702.20110@convex.com> hamrick@convex.com (Ed Hamrick) writes:
> ...
>If you agree that this printed book is exportable, then few would
>disagree that a magnetic tape containing this source code is exportable.
>If you agree that the source code on tape is exportable, then few
>would disagree that the compiled version of this source code is exportable.
>
>Note all of the language in the regulations regarding pre-publication
>review.  When you read the regulations, they clearly indicate that once
>information is publicly available (can be obtained in a library/bookstore),
>then the cat is out of the bag and the information is exportable.  I
>believe that the Commerce Department, State Department, and NSA are
>completely uninterested in preventing the export of anything that's
>available to anybody at B. Dalton's bookstore.
>
>Anonymous ftp is fully equivalent to B. Dalton's bookstore or a
>public library.
>
>Note that this discussion has nothing to do with the exportability
>of integrated hardware/software crypto solutions.  My premise is
>primarily that the book containing the DES source code is freely
>exportable because it is publicly available information.

Sorry, but I agree that the book is exportable, but the mag tape
would not be -- should be, but the Feds do NOT agree.  

I told this before, but...  A friend of my was publishing a public
domain Forth language system (books with full source code and disks).
He was told (perhaps six or eight years ago) that he could NOT ship
the disks to someone in the USSR wanting to buy them.  He could ship
the books.  This was despite:  The books and disks were available at
a variety of bookstores (Stacey's in Palo Alto for one) and was
public domain. 

This real-world experience completely contradicts your position
that it has something to do with being publicly available.  No,
it has to do with an antiquated view from the Feds that books are
ok, but once the code becomes machine readable it becomes a physical
item very different from a book -- and therefore controllable.

It seems to also be a question of: If you ask, they'll tell you NO,
so don't ask.  -- or --  Do it and wait to see if anyone throws you
in jail.  The problem is that if an officer of any corporation did
either of those, the directors and shareholders would likely go after
that officer for having done something VERY wrong.


-- 
Glenn Tenney
voice: (415) 574-3420      fax: (415) 574-0546
tenney@netcom.com          Ham radio: AA6ER