TimHardy

[in response to edited comment above] My point exactly - this thread was a massive distraction from our core tasks which is why I asked for patience.

Doing a "hit and run" response to comments on HN between other tasks takes far, far less time than writing a concrete, specific, water-tight technical document on security. No one on this thread was happy with the one we rushed out before and rightly so. We're not going to repeat that mistake :)

Hi

Thank you, yes we know about haystack and are very aware of the dangers. I also have a heavily annotated copy of The Net Delusion sat on my desk right now. We're not going into this blindly and each of us has a tin foil hat ;)

I do apologise if we're coming over as distracted by this conversation and in a hurry to get back with our work. I fear this risks becoming an "emacs vs vi" thread that ultimately resolves nothing - I've worked close to 100 hours already this week and will be working flat out until well past midnight GMT tonight. To be brutally honest while security is critical participating in this particular conversation cannot be an immediate priority for me and the team even though we do welcome your interest and criticisms.

I asked for patience. I'll repeat that again. We are exhausted and rushed off our feet not least because we have to earn a living when not working on Sukey. Please give us time. By all means if you don't trust us, don't use it and don't sign up now. Wait and see.

We are in a massive crunch to get ready for the TUC demonstration on 26 March. We are supporting the legal, democratic right of peaceful protest within a democratic society. If and when we extend the tool - as we hope to do - so that it could be used in authoritarian regimes then it has to be bullet proof security but right now we want our users to go into it with open eyes - aware of all the criticisms you guys have raised and having read our: http://sukey.org/idiotwarning

I hope that we will have addressed all of your issues and will have got the code up under a licence that makes everybody happy before the 26 March.

I'm really sorry if that answer doesn't satisfy some of you. We are not bad people just very busy and under enormous stress. I apologise if that has made us seem curt or evasive. I do hope that you come to realise that with time.

An email from RMS has to be one of the high points of my life so far: front page, however briefly, on HN comes second :) You are important to us but our priority right now has to be getting the code right and ready and addressing criticisms in the code rather than debating it online.

They don't do #ff yet however ;)

Kettling also discourages protest. We have had many emails from elderly individuals, people with disabilities, families with young children who have been scared to march. There is a massive demonstration being planned in the UK by the TUC on 26 March against the savage cuts being imposed in the UK and a whole raft of ideological reforms that are being pushed through by a minority government and which have nothing to do with the state of the nations finances.

We have just had an election in which MPs courted votes with a signed pledge to scrap tuition fees - then slashed funding to the universities by up to 100% in many subjects and tripled the fees. When a mockery is made of the ballot and the voting system by such duplicitous behaviour, then people have a moral and legal right to take to the streets in mass, peaceful demonstrations.

When aggressive police tactics are used to dissuade people from doing so you have a serious failure of the democratic process.

We see our role as one of increasing transparency and accountability and reducing tensions in the street and we hope that we can help people legally and peacefully demonstrate and by doing so put pressure on the government to change their policies.

That is something all people, I hope, would want to see in a healthy, democratic society.

You're right, there are many dangers here and we are taking them extremely seriously. As I said above, I apologise for any confusion and lack of clarity caused by the rush to have it ready in time. All this will be fixed!

That's exactly how it is pronounced, Sue-key!

Right now it's a service: there's no product to see, just a live updated map during the demonstration on Saturday.

We are not giving instructions to people as to the route to follow. That is the role of the stewards (what you call organisers, scouts, commanders). We merely provide people with information with which they can make their own decisions.

We aim to reduce tension between police and protesters by increasing transparency: our approach is the diametric opposite of encouraging us and them thinking. I would personally be very happy to see kettling banned and support the legal challenges being made to it at the moment.

However, if the threat of kettling is being used to prevent peaceful protest and to scare people away from exercising their democrat right to do so then I believe that a tool like Sukey is essential rather than waiting years and years for the law to be changed, not knowing if it ever will be.

I'll get one of the team who specialises in security to answer your questions. I've emailed everyone but it may not be until tomorrow if they are out or asleep right now.

You're right that it is paramount that we be open about security and I apologise for the rushed nature of our security pages. Rewriting all of the copy on the site is on our road map right now.

First up, yes, we are going to OS all the code and have been talking with Richard Stallman himself about which is the right licence (yes, really - you should have seen the response when he emailed us. I stopped dead in the street and shouted "Oh my god!" to the bemusement of passers by when the email popped up on my phone).

This project has come about at great speed, none of us has slept much in weeks, there are many, many things we need to do - we're not hiding the source because we're evil, we just haven't had a minute to put it up on git or whatever public svn system we decide to go with. Please be patient with us :)

More answers to follow as I read through the comments below.

Hi, I'm Tim from the Sukey team and editor of beyondclicktivism.com. I'd like to address each of your questions.

Please bear with me a moment - it's nearly 1am here and I've just got in so I'm going to take off my coat and grab a drink first then I'll come right back.