On Tue, 27 Mar 2007 11:27:29 -0500
"Schliesser, Benson" <bensons(_at_)savvis(_dot_)net> wrote:
Eric-
It sounds like your argument is: "We're too incompetent to say our
names at the mic, so we're probably too incompetent to use a RFID
system." Did I get that right?
While I'm certainly not going to defend the competence of every IETF
participant, I don't find much merit in that argument. In my
(unscientific) first-hand experiences, it seems that most people do
manage to wear their nametags at the meeting. And many of the names on
those tags are of cultural origins other than my own, i.e. from a
non-English speaking country. If I could actually see the name of the
person speaking, it seems like a great improvement over hearing a name
which is unintelligible to my ears or hearing no name at all. And if
somebody forgets their RFID-badge, then I'm no worse off than I am
today.
I think his point was more what you cite below:
In other words, I think we could come up with a system that worked
well enough to be a net improvement over our current operational
model.
On the other hand, I am amused by your idea of scanning the streets
for RFID responses that look like IETF-badges. Then my robot army
could track down and kill all IETF participants whom oppose my plans
to take over the Internet! Or maybe I could just use them for some
fun practical jokes instead...
RFIDs carry serious privacy risks, and IETFers *do* (and will) forget
to take them off (and in this case, wrap them in aluminum foil or some
such). To give just one example, does everyone in the IETF want
everyone else to have the potential to know who's in which hotel rooms?
--Steve Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb
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