From: joshua stein [mailto:jcs@rt.fm] Sent: Monday, November 20, 2000 12:02 PM

If users are smart enough to switch the port and encrypt their traffic, then obviously there's nothing to worry about. The original suggestion was to protect users that probably don't even realize they have shares open to the world.

Lord, please spare me from those who would save me from myself. What do you call someone that promises something and then intentionally doesn't deliver what was promised? What do you call it when that person knew that they would never deliver on the promise when it was made? Is it a crime when they collect money for the false promise? Every upstream I contract, for my clients or otherwise, makes no mention of any restriction except that needed to manage the upstream pipe. Evenso, that is always explicit. Various clients, in aggregate, total to over $120K per month, in hosting and access charges. Almost every one of them depends on SMB, or other protocols, to some degree or another. I also have various proprietary protocols that are used (Yes, some of us do design and write such things). We have enough problems from DOS attacks originating from the script kiddies, we don't need DOS attacks from our upstreams (uncontracted/unrequested port filtering). If a transit provider wants to filter their dial-ins, or anyone else, and they have that in a specified business arrangement, then fine, I have no problems with it. But, they will never get my business and I will never sign such a contract unless there is no competitor with a different policy. In the latter case, my next stop would be my attorney, regarding a restraint of trade suit. ---- R O E L A N D M. J. M E Y E R Managing Architect