Government interferes with USENET?

[Donald Whytock]

To a certain degree, I can see their point.  After all, USENET DOES stretch
from Frisco to Australia, going the long way.  It makes a certain amount of
sense that the government would want to restrict some of the flow of research
data, much of which is government-funded, from travelling by word-of-electronic
mouth all around the equator.  There is a sense of it being almost TOO easy
to post information worldwide. ("Hey, Amsterdam, wanna buy a '69 Chevy?")

However, perhaps there are better methods than curtailing the net as a whole.
Things which are not fit for academic exchanges over conventional channels
(tech journals, exchange programs, mail, etc.) are probably not fit for
USENET either; therefore, perhaps, limiting the spread of information can
be performed at the individual net-site (which, after all, is easier than
policing the net).

Alternately, it may be time to lobby for changes to the Department of
Commerce's list, in view of what is now worldwide public knowledge.  Has
anyone got a copy of the list that can be posted?

					Don Whytock
			...!allegra!umcp-cs!eneevax!imsvax!djw