Re: Clarification regarding POSSE and "hackfest" cancellation

[Marc Matteo <marcm_(_at_)_lectroid_(_dot_)_net>]

On Wed, 2003-04-23 at 12:58, Fernando Pereira wrote:

> Please do not respond to this message, as I am not able to handle 
> individual questions or comments.

Ok, then to the list it goes...

> According to the applicable cooperative agreement, work must be stopped 
> if the contracting agency so requests. The Air Force Research 
> Laboratory, which is the contracting agency for POSSE, requested that 
> work on the "security-fest" parts of the contract be suspended pending 
> a review of the project.

Fair enough, from a strictly business sense... but my God man, did at
any time you, as an educator, as a representative of a major US
university question the resistance to the "security fest"?

When given the "evolving threat posed by increasingly capable
nation-states" line did you not question how a gathering of security
hackers from around the world (mostly from "friendly" nations as well)
constitutes a threat?

Did the concept of "free exchange of ideas" not enter your mind at
all?!?  Maybe even the idea of "peer review"?

Perhaps it did.  Perhaps there was a glimmer of pride at the developing
of knowlege, at the mix of cultures and languages facilitated by UPENN
through this grant, at maybe the *education* it provided...

... but of course it was immediatly crushed by "reality" wasn't it.  The
reality that "this is the way things work", right?

>  Any other use of funds, including use of the cancellation 
> costs in partial support of conference accommodation, would not be an 
> allowable contract expense.

So the funds could just fall off the planet, but not in any case go into
the hands of the OpenBSD developers?!?!?  This is how things work, eh? 
At no point does the lunacy of this strike you?

>  Contrary to a widespread misconception, the 
> University of Pennsylvania could not have "allowed" that use of US 
> Government funds. The funds belong to the US Government, not to the 
> University.

Seems to me the the University of Pennsylvania could have dealt with
this in a much better way.  Other funds could have been diverted to the
"hackathon", even nominal funds... with a clear explanation... would
have gone a long way to at least preserve UPENNs honor as a university.

You simply chose not to do that.

Benjamin Franklin, would have been sickened...

Marc