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Aucbvax.1893 fa.works utzoo!duke!decvax!ucbvax!Joe.Newcomer@CMU-10A Tue Jun 23 17:46:32 1981 Re: Arpanet usage Lars, Whether or not people at PARC wear n-piece suits (for various values of n), there is a set of rules which govern ArpaNet usage. If these rules were absolutely strictly enforced, most of the really productive use we make of the ArpaNet would not be possible, because it does not /directly/ bear on line items in Arpa contracts. While DCA is willing to tolerate a lot of the "irrelevant" usage because they recognize what really happens in these conversations (we all are more productive, learn more, etc.), some things cannot be tolerated. One of them is any usage of the ArpaNet which is construable as "commercial". Since, in fact, the pressure would ultimately come from Congress and the media, neither of which is technically qualified to make most evaluations of this nature, it is important that we try to stay as far as possible away from strictly commercial traffic. Discussions of Xerox products, independent of the usage of the ArpaNet, could already cause a lot of problems (you are, I trust, quite familiar with the laws and precedents in this area...starting with the (in)famous Consent Decree between IBM and the Justice Department back around 1956...and if you're not, I suggest you study just exactly how much trouble a company can get into before making unnecessary noises). If, in addition, the problems arise because of usage of the ArpaNet, such nasty things as having Xerox lose their IMP could follow, as well as stricter monitoring of ArpaNet usage, and all sorts of really nasty bureaucratic nonsense which would /really/ destroy the utility of the ArpaNet for all the rest of us. Dave Liddle acted quite responsibly in emphasizing what everyone should already have known...you can't use the ArpaNet for commercial purposes, and that having any Xerox employee discuss the Star system is trivially construable to be precisely that. (And, if keeping Xerox on the ArpaNet is "miserliness" then I say, be miserly). Don't forget...the ArpaNet is not a right, but a privilege, and at many sites the usage of the ArpaNet is severely restricted and monitored (for example, I heard that one ArpaNet site monitors all incoming and outgoing mail!) I do not want to open the "appropriate usages and mission of the ArpaNet" discussion in this group, so I would appreciate if nobody bothered to reply to this message. There was such a discussion about a year ago, and I recommend that anyone who wants to flame about it go back and read the MsgGroup or Human-Nets archives before contributing further to the discussion (and do so on some other discussion group list). joe

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