🚀 go-pugleaf

Date Entered: 12-18-92 02:15
strnlght@netcom.com (David Sternlight) writes (lines adjusted for screen)

S(> Now a word to my colleagues all over the world. Though you may be 
S(> able to (or think you may be able to) use PGP with impunity, why 
S(> not voluntarily send RSA a reasonable contribution for their invention
S(> --think of it as a shareinvention fee analogous to a shareware fee. 
S(> Say $20. A large number of such gestures might change the context of 
S(> the situation overnight. Note that this is my personal suggestion, and 
S(> I have not discussed it with anyone.

I do not believe that an previously published algorythm can be patented, 
nor that use of prime number factoring is anything other than use of 
mathematics, which I feel to be in the public domain. 

I for one would NEVER, under any circustances, permit a US company to 
blackmail me into paying for the 'right' to use public key, if I am 
outside the US, and I also do not believe that a 'shareware' type fee 
should be given as a reward to a company that has been doing such a 
disservice to the world-wide community.  The US and its citizens have to 
accept that we now live in an interconnected international society, and 
that rules that are unacceptable outside the US can only hurt the US and 
its interests world-wide if this type of suggestion, which amounts to 
extortion (itself illegal, David, and even extraditable in some cases) is 
supported by anyone sending money to RSA. [BTW, Canada too has some silly
rules, not to put too fine a point on it.  I am NOT a US basher.]

Bob Heuman <robert.heuman@rose.com>
---
   RoseReader 1.70 P001886: This Canadian has an Opinion...His Own!
   RM 2.00 : RoseNet<=>Usenet Gateway : Rose Media 416-733-2285