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Re: djbdns: An alternative to BIND

  • From: Dean Anderson
  • Date: Mon Apr 11 12:50:57 2005

On Mon, 11 Apr 2005, Thor Lancelot Simon wrote:

> On Mon, Apr 11, 2005 at 03:03:37AM -0400, Dean Anderson wrote:
> > 
> > Several previous security vulnerabilities in BIND is one strike against. 
> 
> You know perfectly well that BIND9 isn't the same code as BIND4 or BIND8;
> it's a complete rewrite.  It has as much in common with BIND8 as djbdns
> does.  You might just as reasonably claim that security vulnerabilities
> in BIND4 constituted "previous security vulnerabilities in djbdns".

It has in common some of the same people who worked on BIND4 and BIND8.  
Possibly some of the problems of BIND4/8 were systemic.  Djbdns, by
contrast, has no previous security vulnerabities.  This is hardly news, 
and most consider it to be a valid point.

> > These might be fixed. There might still be others.
> 
> And your usual mud-slinging against anyone even vaguely associated with
> anyone who vehemently opposes spam begins!  By the way, I heard that you
> might have stopped beating your wife, but you might still be abusing
> small barnyard animals.

This is rather odd, if you agree that SORBS is a bunch of nutjobs, where's 
the mudslinging?

> > Violation of trust on other projects is another. e.g. Exactis V. MAPS,
> > Several MAPS employees working for well-known spammer Scott Richter
> > described in Spam Kings by Brian McWilliams.
> 
> Yawn.  I've snipped a bunch more of your ranting.  It hangs together
> about as well as djb's "BIND Company" black-helicopters theory.

Most people (even the vehement anti-spammers) agree that MAPS had no
business blocking Exactis, and that Exactis didn't meet the MAPS criteria.
MAPS told its subscribers it would only do certain things. Then it didn't
do that. That's a trust violation. Seems pretty straightforward. Where's 
the irrational ranting in that?

Whats even more stunning is that MAPS employees went to work for a well
known spammer. What would we think if Colin Powell, Rumsfeld, and Rice
left and went to work for Bin Laden?  What would we think of the judgement
of the man who hired them?  Someone really made an error in judgement in
hiring at MAPS.  Do we trust that person again? Or do we show them door, 
so to speak?

> Look, everyone grasps that you got shafted by SORBS.  This is not
> terribly surprising, because SORBS/ORBS are well known to be a bunch
> of nutjobs, and unpleasant nutjobs at that.  But as you expand the
> radius of your attack to include anyone anywhere who ever had
> anything to do with spam prevention, all you're doing, from my
> point of view anyway, is demonstrating that you are quite an
> unpleasant nutjob yourself.

I'm just expanding the radius to include those that have something to do
with SORBS/ORBS.  ISC hosted SORBS after they were booted by XO. That's a
trust violation as well. And I'll note that I left that off my post above,
and included only non-SORBS trust violations. And there are a few of 
those.

There are a lot of people who actually have genuine interest in spam and
spam prevention. The efforts of those people are insulted by the
activities and abuse of a few. Those few who (ab)use anti-spam as a cover
for their personal gain and personal vendettas only discredit those who
actually do work to stop abuse.

		--Dean


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