From declanm@netcom.com Sun Sep 10 21:41:35 1995 Return-Path: Received: from po8.andrew.cmu.edu by mail3.netcom.com (8.6.12/Netcom) id SAA08096; Sun, 10 Sep 1995 18:16:46 -0700 Received: (from postman@localhost) by po8.andrew.cmu.edu (8.6.12/8.6.12) id VAA11518; Sun, 10 Sep 1995 21:18:08 -0400 Received: via switchmail for fight-censorship+@andrew.cmu.edu; Sun, 10 Sep 1995 21:18:08 -0400 (EDT) Received: from po3.andrew.cmu.edu via qmail ID ; Sun, 10 Sep 1995 21:16:40 -0400 (EDT) Received: from netcom19.netcom.com (netcom19.netcom.com [192.100.81.132]) by po3.andrew.cmu.edu (8.6.12/8.6.12) with ESMTP id VAA23553 for ; Sun, 10 Sep 1995 21:16:11 -0400 Received: by netcom19.netcom.com (8.6.12/Netcom) id SAA22266; Sun, 10 Sep 1995 18:13:15 -0700 Date: Sun, 10 Sep 1995 18:13:15 -0700 (PDT) From: D B McCullagh Subject: Zephyr Discussions of Sirbu and Rimm To: fight-censorship@andrew.cmu.edu Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Status: RO X-Status: Attached are excerpts from CMU School of Computer Science zephyr discussions about Marty Rimm and Marvin Sirbu. (Zephyr is an instant machine-to-machine message and conference mechanism developed at MIT and used at CMU.) -Declan ----------------------------------------------------------------- [Selected excerpts from discussion of Marvin Sirbu, Rimm's advisor. -Declan] Jonathan R Shewchuk (jrs) (strange.things.whew!) [ 9-Jul-1995, 02:19] (context) Tom Betz (tbetz@cloud9.net) Sat Jul 8 13:01:11 EDT 1995 TPN wrote: >Marvin, you should be ashamed of yourself. (Marvin is one of Marty Rimm's faculty advisors.) He sure should. He came here, ignored all the previous discussion, and simply pimped for his publicity-slut student, without ever identifying his own involvement with the "study". Maybe Marvin is where Marty got his twisted sense of academic responsibility. http://www.pathfinder.com/@@eE0BIDARGgAKAAsA/bbs/time/media/0460.html Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things.d) [19-Jul-1995, 15:41] (context) btw, my prediction that the committee would exonerate Sirbu is now looking shaky, in light of the grant proposal to the Department of Justice. You can claim you were out of the loop in a student paper without your name on it, but it's much tougher for a grant proposal. Brian Noble (bnoble) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 15:42] (context) I think we need context. ML might have had Exon there for entirely different reasons, or because he's on some technology policy subcommittee or whatever. useful regal-minded scholar (ghn) (strange.things.d) [19-Jul-1995, 15:43] (context) When I think about politics, I sometimes find myself wondering what the most politically damaging thing I've ever done is. Can't think of much. Brian Noble (bnoble) (strange.things.d) [19-Jul-1995, 15:43] (context) Heh. I'm probably incapable of being elected to the school board. Scott Draves (spot) (strange.things.d) [19-Jul-1995, 15:43] (context) damaging what? yourself? Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things.d) [19-Jul-1995, 15:43] (context) So my updated prediction is: unless CMU can find some magical spin to put on the whole affair, it's going to need a high-level sacrificial victim, and that's going to be Sirbu. John Mount (jmount) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:29] (context) I used to think Sirbu was going to take a fall for this- but then it hit me. Nobody in the admin gives a rats ass about the "reputation" of this university and Sirbu (via INI) brings in money (which talks) therefore we can all hang. Robert OCallahan (roc) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:30] (context) I'll bite. The INI wouldn't bring in so much money if not for CMU's reputation. Marc Ringuette (mnr) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:31] (context) That's long-term thinking, roc. This is America. Robert OCallahan (roc) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:31] (context) The administration can't be that stupid; there's money at stake. Howard Gobioff (hgobioff) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:31] (context) How naive.. Howard Gobioff (hgobioff) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:33] (context) The inertia and stupidity of an administration are boundless... John Mount (jmount) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:33] (context) No, there isn't money at stake. The university doesn't need the respect of our peers- they just need to toady up to congress for funding. Looking like stupid assholes to every academic in the country doesn't hurt our near term funding (maybe even improves us if congress rewards us with some "go persecute the unbeleivers" grants). And only the near term counts. Robert OCallahan (roc) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:34] (context) I was thinking of the INI program - feepaying students. Howard Gobioff (hgobioff) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:35] (context) Sirbu does more than INI... and Bellcore funds a large part of INI based on a contract for foo # of years and bar # of students/year.. John Mount (jmount) (strange.things) [19-Jul-1995, 17:35] (context) It isn't just inertia and stupidity- it is actual evil. They will find a way to get rid of malcontents Touretzky before they make a "good joe" like Sirbu uncomfortable. Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things.d) [28-Jul-1995, 12:27] (context) The comittee will blame Rimm (there's too much evidence and publicity for them to do otherwise), and exonerate Sirbu (because he brings in too much money to piss off) Karl Kleinpaste (karl) (strange.things.d) [28-Jul-1995, 12:28] (context) it's going to be one heck of a neat trick to exonerate sirbu when it was his responsibility, as rimm's advisor, to teach him how to do research. that's what advisors are _for_, after all. the failure of the student, especially on this scale, rather directly implicates the advisor for either complacency or dereliction of duty. Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things.d) [28-Jul-1995, 12:29] (context) Yes, the verbal gymnastics should be fun to watch Karl Kleinpaste (karl) (strange.things) [ 8-Aug-1995, 17:15] (context) re: luck that it's not in scs. i disagree. i am familiar with sirbu in other venues. i don't like the man, don't agree with how he operates generally, and i am not exactly surprised that he is the advisor under which this occurred. (he's not ece, after all; he's "engineering and public policy," whatever the hell that is.) just watching the man on the com-priv mailing list a couple years ago would be enough to turn one off to him. i think scs (and ece) faculty are, in general, better men and women than sirbu. Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things) [ 8-Sep-1995, 11:32] (context) Sirbu should be pretty peeved as well. Makes it fairly clear that, back then, he was claiming he was deeply involved in the study... Paul W Placeway (pwp) (strange.things) [ 8-Sep-1995, 11:33] (context) Yup. Makes it kind of hard for him to back away now. Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things) [ 8-Sep-1995, 11:34] (context) >From Sirbu's own hand > Rather than putting out the study as a tech report without peer > review, we submitted it to a refereed journal. Whoops. Has someone forwarded this gem to the folks doing the current investigation? Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things) [ 8-Sep-1995, 11:36] (context) Kinda different from: "This was not a report that I would have written: this was Marty Rimm's report" (Marvin Sirbu, NYT, 7/16/95) Paul W Placeway (pwp) (strange.things) [ 8-Sep-1995, 11:38] (context) And: " In any case, having now been published in the refereed literature, I am sure that those who take issue with the study will follow the normal scholarly tradition of seeking to publish--either in the GLJ or in other scholarly journals--their critiques." Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things) [ 8-Sep-1995, 11:39] (context) Maybe I should add Sirbu's Index Paul W Placeway (pwp) (strange.things) [ 8-Sep-1995, 11:42] (context) You are thinking of something like "number of times Sirbu flip-flopped on support of Rimm's study" or some such? Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things) [ 8-Sep-1995, 11:42] (context) Yeah ----------------------------------------------------------------- [Discussion of George Duncan, "ethics expert" and professor of statistics at the Heinz public policy school at CMU. -Declan] John Mount (jmount) (strange.things) [17-Jul-1995, 13:11] (context) George Duncan is a lying piece of shit: Date: Mon, 17 Jul 1995 12:58:27 -0400 (EDT) From: George Duncan To: John.Mount@CS.cmu.edu Subject: Re: how dare you say it is "OK" to read other people's accounts Cc: In-Reply-To: <26649.805993951@MIXING.SP.CS.CMU.EDU> References: <26649.805993951@MIXING.SP.CS.CMU.EDU> Excerpts from mail: 17-Jul-95 how dare you say it is "OK".. by John Mount@MIXING.SP.CS. > How dare you say it is "OK" to read other people's accounts. I > suggest you check the university computer regulations, ACM ethics > papers, human research guidelines and library law before you make > stupid statements the press in the future. I made no such statement. For some perspective on this, I'll forward you a message I just got. George Duncan Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things) [17-Jul-1995, 13:13] (context) ``Dr Duncan, an expert in statistics, specifically in the area of ethics and privacy of data gathering, [...] said he had no substantial concerns about the gathering of private student data because, he said, anyone using the university's computer system ought to have known it was "open".'' NYT 7/16/95. Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things) [17-Jul-1995, 13:14] (context) I sense the sound of a worried faculty member frantically backpedalling... John Mount (jmount) (strange.things) [17-Jul-1995, 13:30] (context) peope haves asked- so here it is. George Duncan's side of the story: we run "finger" therefore we are an "open environment". I NEVER said using "private info" was okay. I could run a study on when YOU read your email by fingering you continuously. Jonathan Hardwick (jch) (strange.things) [17-Jul-1995, 13:32] (context) If this is our "ethics expert", it's time to be Very Afraid. Mark Thomas (mthomas) (strange.things) [17-Jul-1995, 13:33] (context) you walk down the public street, therefore everything you do/own is public, and I am justified in going in to your ``public'' house John Mount (jmount) (strange.things) [17-Jul-1995, 13:33] (context) (warning Dilbert ref) he must have spent all his tuition money on office supplies (ethics is mostly common sense, right?). Sean Levy (snl) (strange.things) [17-Jul-1995, 13:35] (context) of course, i am absolutely not going to write a little program that continuously fingers duncan's account and probes all readable files in his AFS home directory so that i can form a profile of his daily usage habits and post them anonymously to various newsgroups, nor would i think of suggesting such a thing. really. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Thanatos (vs0r@ANDREW) (strange.things) [ 3-Jul-1995, 14:13] (context) hm..interesting..I used to keep complete listings of all files that were publicly readable in andrew user directories... in october 94, he had the following files, among others: ~mr6e/adultbbs1 ~mr6e/adultbbs6 ~mr6e/stats ~mr6e/stats.sex ~mr6e/sortbbs.def ~mr6e/bbs.menus ~mr6e/amateur.pedo.rpt ~mr6e/60days.txt ~mr6e/D ~mr6e/log ~mr6e/dog.guide ~mr6e/#rand.m# ~mr6e/ss ~mr6e/fast heh..and in august he had: (er..of 94 as well) ~mr6e/post ~mr6e/pent10t.gif ~mr6e/pent10t.gif~ ~mr6e/j1.uue ~mr6e/test.uue