[cap-talk] Avoid overconfidence (was: Any hope in RSA 2008?)

[Sandro Magi]

Ivan Krstić wrote:
> 
> "The challenges for this community appear to be producing:
> 
> 1. real-world systems that solve real-world problems in convincingly
>    superior ways than mainstream alternatives, and
> 
> 2. explanations of their beliefs and ideas that are widely-accessible,
>    well-written, and compelling. I can't point everyone who asks me
>    about capabilities to MarkM's thesis, and I don't know what else
>    to point them to."
> 
> Moping about capabilities being ignored by research and industry is  
> misplaced energy, and when coupled with implicit and relatively  
> unsupported claims of the supposed superiority of the approach, it  
> just all looks foolish. Neither researchers nor security product  
> designers are idiots. If you show them your approach is good, they'll  
> listen. Yet forty years after people started looking into capability  
> systems, there still exist neither excellent written materials on the  
> subject nor compelling real-world demonstrations of their superiority  
> to alternatives. This means that the people who are championing this  
> approach simply aren't doing a good job, and the fact they're being  
> ignored is largely their own doing.

This has been an interesting thread, and I think Ivan's message sums up 
the current situation nicely. Some real-world capability systems are 
maturing to the point where such reading material will be needed, so 
this advice is timely (E, Waterken, Tahoe, Joe-E, Coyotos, immediately 
come to mind).

To this end, I'll quote some great advice from a fantastic lecture [1]:

   I have now come down to a topic which is very distasteful; it is
   not sufficient to do a job, you have to sell it. `Selling' to a
   scientist is an awkward thing to do. It's very ugly; you
   shouldn't have to do it. The world is supposed to be waiting,
   and when you do something great, they should rush out and welcome
   it. But the fact is everyone is busy with their own work. You must
   present it so well that they will set aside what they are doing,
   look at what you've done, read it, and come back and say, ``Yes,
   that was good.'' I suggest that when you open a journal, as you
   turn the pages, you ask why you read some articles and not others.
   You had better write your report so when it is published in the
   Physical Review, or wherever else you want it, as the readers are
   turning the pages they won't just turn your pages but they will
   stop and read yours. If they don't stop and read it, you won't
   get credit.

   There are three things you have to do in selling. You have to
   learn to write clearly and well so that people will read it, you
   must learn to give reasonably formal talks, and you also must
   learn to give informal talks.

   [...]

   Question: What kind of tradeoffs did you make in allocating your time
   for reading and writing and actually doing research?

   Hamming: I believed, in my early days, that you should spend at least
   as much time in the polish and presentation as you did in the original
   research. Now at least 50% of the time must go for the presentation.
   It's a big, big number.

Sandro

[1] You and Your Research, by RICHARD W. HAMMING, 
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html