Re: Thanks for a thoughtful review

[Michael Sims <jellicle@INCH.COM>]

Mike Godwin wrote:

[Cyberians unfamiliar with the situation should note that Godwin has
engaged in a long-lasting smear campaign against people who oppose his
support of PICS and censorware generally.  Roughly, the background is that
Godwin believes more private censorship will lead to less state
censorship, a goal which of course he supports.  My take is that building
a privatized censorship infrastructure based on PICS will lead inevitably
to state usage of that system for censorship, and thus I oppose PICS
strenuously.  Godwin, as I mentioned, has engaged in a campaign to smear
people who believe differently, including lying about events that occurred
on this mailing list.  This message may be viewed as a spillover of that
debate.  Godwin doesn't wish to communicate directly with those he smears;
thus the message to cyberia-l@listserv.aol.com vice jellicle@inch.com.]


> I thought I'd take a moment to thank Michael Sims here for taking the
> time to offer a thoughtful, constructive review of my book CYBER RIGHTS
> on Amazon.com last week. I don't normally see Sims's postings, so it was
> refreshing to be reminded of his evenhanded, generous style.

No problem, Mike.  I should mention that I did *not* find your book shrill
and unpleasant like the New York Times Book Review did.  I was simply
struck by how much of it I had seen before.  I would estimate that over
half, and perhaps over 3/4 of the book was taken from stuff you had
written before, for magazines, for various internet publications,
on mailing lists, etc.  That isn't necessarily a crippling flaw -
especially for net-newbies, who won't have seen the prior material.  But
for non-newbies, especially people who have been involved in the
censorship wars, they're going to feel like they're eating leftovers.  At
a minimum, there should have been some mention that the material had been
published prior.  If there was one, I missed it.  It actually seemed like
a good opportunity to *make* a book out of one's internet writings, and I
was disappointed that you didn't do so.  It felt intellectually dishonest
to me.

I should also point out that Amazon.com allows anonymous reviews.  If I
didn't stand by what I wrote, I wouldn't have written it.  I'm sure that
Amazon would publish a counter-review of yours, Mike, if you feel treated
unjustly.


-- Michael Sims