SF Bay Area Cypherpunks (80th Chairborne Regiment)

June 2000 Physical Meeting Announcement

General Info:

DATE:   Saturday 10 June 2000
TIME:   11:00am-3:30pm Pacific Time
PLACE:  LinuxCabal Headquarters (San Francisco)

  Heads-Up for June!

  "HavenCo: Data Fortress on the Edge"

  The June 2000 Physical Meeting of the San Francisco Bay Area Cypherpunks
  will be held at the headquarters of the LinuxCabal and feature a
  discussion about HavenCo. The HavenCo group contends that it's not just
  'neener-neenering the NSA' or playing at 'starting your own country:'
  it's doing serious eBusiness mixed with human privacy rights, and it's
  engaged in a philosophical, political and moral battle for individual
  freedom. The question is not whether HavenCo is a good idea or a model of
  future data freedom (it's both), but whether they can survive in an
  unfriendly environment full of many kinds of threats. Against the backdrop
  of the HavenCo drama, we'll also spend a few minutes raking Microsoft over
  the coals and discuss some topics of general interest.

  As always, this is an Open Meeting on US Soil (and in cipherspace)
  and members of the Public are encouraged to attend.
  
  DO NOT BE LATE!

Meeting Agenda:

      "Our agenda is a widely-held secret."

  11:00-11:30 — Hang out, consume food, obtain caffeinated beverages.

      Pre-Meeting Q&A for accredited members of the professional Press.
      Press members, please click here.

  11:30-1:30 — HavenCo

     HavenCo staff & Sealand citizens.
     
     We'll be crossing the English DataChannel for a *live* 
     telephone conference about living/ working on a Data Fortress 
     with key members of the HavenCo team. It's computationally 
     infeasible to predetermine how many intel agency employees 
     will be listening in on this particular phonecall, so think 
     about it: someday, you'll want to tell your grandchildren you 
     were there on the horn, right?



Sean Hastings (CEO) & Jo Hastings (CMO) of HavenCo, on the HavenCo platform in Sealand in the English Channel, talking on their mobile phones with the attendees of 2000-06-10 Cypherpunks meeting. Technician Terran Melconian is adjusting a HavenCo sat-dish in the background.


     You must be present to win. We don't know what you'll win, 
     but we know you must be present.

     The conference call will begin at aproximately 12 Noon (Pacific).

     You *must* submit questions beforehand: click here.
     Deadline for submissions: 2400 hrs Zulu Time, Fri 09 June.
     We have limited time and lots of questions, so we're 
     going to pre-load questions so the HavenCo group has a
     few days to make sure the Right People are on the call
     to answer the very best of the questions we receive.
     If you do not preload your question for selection, 
     be prepared to present it at the beginning of the 
     meeting on paper and have it chosen (or not) from 
     among others for a last-five-minute cram session.

     HavenCo URLs:
      http://www.havenco.com/  (HavenCo)
      http://www.sealandgov.com  (Sealand, new official site)
      http://www.fruitsofthesea.demon.co.uk/sealand/factfile.html  (old)
     Press Coverage:
      http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,36749,00.html
      http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,36756,00.html
      http://slashdot.org/articles/00/06/04/1742209.shtml
      http://slashdot.org/interviews/00/06/07/0153238.shtml
      http://www.sjmercury.com/premium/world/docs/nethaven04.htm
      http://www.smh.com.au/news/0004/03/features/features2.html
      http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/tech/DailyNews/sealand000606.html
      http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/06/biztech/articles/04have.html
      http://www.independent.co.uk/news/UK/This_Britain/2000-06/digital060600.shtml
      http://www.independent.co.uk/news/UK/This_Britain/2000-06/sealand050600.shtml
      http://www.latimes.com/print/20000607/t000053939.html
      http://www.liberation.fr/quotidien/semaine/20000606mary.html (en Francais)


   1:30-2:00 — "Microsoft: Hercules vs Hydra"

     Q: What's Worse Than One Big Microsoft? A: Two Big Microsofts...
     We'll have a general anti-monopoly discussion about the Wed 07 June
     decision by Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson to trust-bust Microsoft
     into two separate OS and App companies, and how Microsoft 
     suddenly seems so irrelevant and annoying... oddly, this is
     just when their crypto might be getting reasonable. Is it too 
     little and too late?


   2:00-3:30 — General Business
   
     Updates on various topics:
      • "Going Global" with the Cypherpunk Physical Meetings
      • NetSec 2000 Conference is June 12-14 in SF, <http://www.gocsi.com/conf.htm> (Rodney Thayer)
      • PGP 7.0 Beta: "Closed Testing of Open Crypto?" or "How to Popularize GnuPG"
      • Nym-in-a-Bottle: Freedom.net User Group (Rodney Thayer)
      • Cypherpunk Job Faire (got 'em, want 'em)

      • Others: TBD, time allowing
                 

   Dinner at a nearby restaurant usually follows the meeting.


Location Info:
  
  The meeting location will be at the LinuxCabal HQ in San Francisco.
   744 Harrison Street (South of Market Area)
   between 3rd & 4th Streets
   Two (2) blocks south of Moscone Convention Center.
 
  By Muni:
   Routes 15 Third Street, 30 Stockton, and 45 Union go past on 3rd 
    Street, northbound.
   Routes 30 Stockton and 45 Union go past on 4th Street, southbound
    (but it's only a four-block stroll from 3rd and Market, or from
    the Transbay Terminal).

  By BART:
   Exit at Montgomery, walk four blocks south along 3rd Street to a
    right (west) turn onto Harrison.
   It's the purple building in mid-block.

  By CalTrain:
   The San Francisco terminus is at 4th Street and Townsend. Either
    take the 15 Third Street, 30 Stockton, or 45 Union Muni buses
    up 3rd to Harrison, or walk north along 4th, three blocks north
    to a right (east) turn on Harrison, and go 1/2 block.
    Return to CalTrain on routes 30 Stockton or 45 Union from 4th
    St. (or walk the three blocks).

  By car:
   From I-80 west, exit at 5th Street northbound bearing half-right
    onto 5th, go one block to a right (east) turn onto Folsom,
    three blocks to right (south) on 2nd Street, one block to right
    (west) on Harrison, proceed 1 1/2 blocks.
   From I-80 east, take 4th Street exit, bearing half-left (east)
    onto Bryant, one block to left (north) onto 3rd Street, one
    block to left (west) on Harrison, and proceed 1/2 block.
   On-street parking is 2-hour (1-hour in the alleys) during the day;
    there's a pay lot on the right (east) side of 3rd Street, just
    past Harrison.

  Meeting Area:
  
   We'll meet in "the big room" (you'll figure it out).

   744 Harrison has a T1 Internet connection and GNU/Linux boxes.

   The people at the LinuxCabal <http://linuxcabal.org> 
   (esp. Richard Couture), who were so nice about letting us use 
   their space, have their own regular meeting at 4pm, so we have 
   to clean up and move out by 3:30-ish, but if you're interested 
   in Linux, maybe they'll let you hang around.



Location Maps:

  LinuxCabal HQ (San Francisco).
    URL: <http://linuxmafia.com/bale/map-linuxcabal.jpeg>


Additional Meeting Notes:

  The Urban Wasteland Crew will be holding a rave in an 
  as-yet-unspecified East Bay location late Saturday night.
  Get info at the meeting if you're the spontaneous type.