no visas for Chinese cryptologists

[Hasan Diwan]

On Aug 16, 2005, at 11:07 PM, Udhay Shankar N wrote:

> The visa snag angered organizers of the annual meeting of the  
> International Cryptology Conference, who argued that restrictions  
> originally created to prevent the transfer of advanced technologies  
> from the United States are now having the opposite effect.

I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that America lives under the  
assumption that progress does not and can not happen anywhere else.  
Furthermore, other countries are forever indebted to the US for  
sharing the fruits of technology that they themselves cannot develop.
Signs of this fantasy are everywhere. Whether it's export controls on  
cryptography or the "exporting of Democracy", Americans think they  
are the only can-do people. It's high time they woke up and realised  
this is no longer, and perhaps never has been, reality.
I was reading an article regarding FreeNet and the newer peer-to-peer  
file sharing systems and was struck that not a single US citizen was  
represented among those interviewed -- there were Irish, Dutch, and  
Japanese experts interviewed. And this was in a US paper to boot.
The mobile phone was not invented here, indeed deployment of wireless  
lags about 20 years behind the rest of the world. Increasingly,  
progress is taking place elsewhere and if the US wants to maintain  
its fantasy, it will need a Ministry of Truth to do so.
Cheers,
Hasan Diwan <hasan.diwan at gmail.com>

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