[JadeNB]

Is there anything more to this than: Eric Raymond says that someone told him, apparently with no substantiation, that "multiple runs" of this sort of bizarre entrapment had occurred? It looks more than a bit paranoid to me, and such allegations seem to demand a serious burden of proof.

EDIT: I won't complain about the downvote, but I assume it indicates that the answer is: yes, there's something more to it. I didn't mean to seem snarky (and I have removed editorialising about esr that might have given that effect), and would really appreciate an explanation of why this deserves to be regarded as more than 3rd-hand hearsay.

[braythwayt]

There are some number of people who admire the good things ESR has done in a narrow specialization, and carry that over to granting him some authority in areas like conspiracy theorizing where he has not accomplished anything of note.

There are some number of people predisposed to believe these things regardless of who says them, because, well, they already believe this happens, so it's just confirmation of their world-view.

There isn't anything more presented to us than "Eric Raymond says that someone told him, apparently with no substantiation, that 'multiple runs' of this sort of bizarre entrapment had occurred," but that doesn't mean that members of either of those sets of people will dismiss it outright.

Meanwhile, Mr. Raymond's track record on non-Unix subjects like race, guns, foreign policy, and white identity politics are on the Internet for everyone to review and either applaud or boo as they see fit.

[redthrowaway]

I'm pretty willing to trust ESR on both the content of his correspondence and the general trustworthiness of his counterpart. It is, as you say, unsubstantiated, but reputation still counts for something.

[mcv]

He has a reputation on Open Source, but this is hardly his first paranoid conspiracy theory.