16.8.1. "What is Crypto Anarchy?"
+ "Why the name?"
+ a partial pun on several things"
- "crypto," meaning "hidden," as used in the term "crypto
fascist" (Gore Vidal called William F. Buckley this)
- "crypto anarchy" meaning the anarchy will be hidden,
not necessarily visible
- and of course cryptology is centrally invovled
+ Motivation
- Vernor Vinge's "True Names"
- Ayn Rand was one of the prime motivators of crypto
anarchy. What she wanted to do with material technology
(mirrors over Galt's Gulch) is _much_ more easily done
with mathematical technology.
16.8.2. "Anarchy turns people off...why not a more palatable name?"
- people don't understand the term; if people understood the
term, it might be more acceptable
- some have suggested I call it "digital liberty" or
somesuch, but I prefer to stick with the historical term
16.8.3. Voluntary interactions involve Schelling points, mutually-
agreed upon points of agreement
16.8.4. Crypto anarchy as an ideology rather than as a plan.
- Without false modesty, I think crypto anarchy is one of the
few real contributions to ideology in recent memory. The
notion of individuals becoming independent of states by
bypassing ordinary channels of control is a new one. While
there have been hints of this in the cyberpunk genre of
writing, and related areas (the works of Vinge especially),
the traditional libertarian and anarchist movements have
mostly been oblivious to the ramifications of strong
crypto.
- Interestingly, David Friedman, son of Milton and author of
"The Machinery of Freedom," became a convert to the ideas.
At least enough so as to give a talk in Los Angeles
entitles "Crypto Anarchy and the State."
- Conventional political ideology has failed to realize the
huge changes coming over the next several decades.
Focussing on unwinnable battles at the ballot box, they
fritter away their energies; they join the political
process, but they have nothing to "deal" with, so they
lose. The average American actually _wants_ to pick the
pockets of his neighbors (to pay for "free" health care, to
stop companies from laying-off unneeded workers, to bring
more pork back to the local enonomy), so the average voter
is highly unlikely to ever vote for a prinicpled
Libertarian candidate.
- Fortunately, how people vote has little effect on certain
"ground truths" that emerge out of new technologies and new
economic developments.
By Tim May, see README
HTML by Jonathan Rochkind