human-nets@ucbvax.ARPA (10/14/84)
From: Charles McGrew (The Moderator) <Human-Nets-Request@Rutgers>
HUMAN-NETS Digest Saturday, 13 Oct 1984 Volume 7 : Issue 60
Today's Topics:
Response to Query - OCR and Electronic Mail,
Computer Security - Break me!,
Computer Networks - Cost of 56KB home data service,
Computers and People - Flaming(2 msgs)&
Unions/Working at Home(2 msgs)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri 12 Oct 84 22:49:48-PDT
From: Ken Laws <Laws@SRI-AI.ARPA>
Subject: OCR & Electronic Mail Response
To: WBD@OFFICE-2.ARPA
I used to think that it would be wonderful to scan in documents via
OCR and throw the originals away. I have since discovered that 1)
ordinary copying and paper filing work just as well for most purposes,
2) it is much easier to generate new text from scratch (if you
understand a topic) than to make a sensible document by pasting old
paragraphs together, and 3) I can't throw the originals away because
on-line copy cannot capture the feel, the beauty, the mystique (not to
mention the graphics) of an original. I do occasionally wish I had an
OCR wand at my terminal for tabular data entry (names, addresses,
etc.) or for lengthy quotations. I also sometimes wish I had my
entire personal library on disk so I could do keyword searches.
Usually, however, I am quite happy manipulating paper copies of things
that come to me on paper.
As to net responses: As moderator of the AIList digest, I have been in
a position to observe many request/response cycles. The variables
involved are exceedingly difficult to quantify, and I certainly don't
have the answers yet. This would be a wonderful area for someone to
study.
I have noticed a few regularities. People who make general requests
("Does anyone know anything about ...") seldom get much response. A
specific request, however, will draw answers only to the specific
query; this is often not very helpful. Flames often draw the most
response -- opinionated statements draw rebuttal, which may in turn
spark support for the original idea or mention of related topics.
The best query is thus one which sets forth a hypothesis and asks for
opinions. (People will then often provide facts as a way of
buttressing their arguments.) The dynamics of the interchange are
delicate, however. Few people will respond to a raving lunatic, or to
a naive beginner asking about the obvious, or to someone exhibiting
expertise (e.g., by citing references). [Exceptions: philosophers
seem to love nothing better than cutting down another philosopher, and
there are rare situations in which practitioners in other fields will
have a genuine dialog.]
I suppose the problem is one of motivation. It takes considerable
time to answer net queries. (More accurately, to be the kind of
person who frequently answers queries.) There is also considerable
emotional risk in exposing one's views and perhaps one's poor spelling
and grammar or even misunderstanding of the entire question. There
are also mechanical difficulties: many readers don't know how to
construct a valid return address for a digest message. (My mailer
couldn't handle the double From: lines in the message I'm replying
to.) Those who surmount these obstacles take a chance on never
receiving a thank you, thus oscillating between feeling used and
wondering if the message ever got through. Or the mailer might spit
back an error message a week later, and the good Samaritan finds that
his effort has been wasted unless he goes to extraordinary effort of
finding a consultant who knows how to get the [now outdated] message
through. And, of course, there's apathy. We can't even get people to
vote in presidential elections, a contest where the winner gets
>>us<<; how can we expect anyone to trouble with smaller matters.
There are rewards to answering queries, of course. It's a good way to
make friends, although you have to be a real net freak to feel warmth
toward someone you only know as "foo!bar@baz". (Someday I hope to
meet the people I've corresponded with.) It's also a good way to make
professional contacts, although it may take years to pay off in
anything recognizable as tenure credit. Most of all, though, it's a
chance to show off. I admit it, I enjoy brushing off my knowledge and
trotting it out. Some people like to show off a little in a private
response, others like to make a public show. Regardless, I
hypothesize that you will get the most replies to a query if you can
appeal to people's desire to strut their stuff.
-- Ken Laws
------------------------------
[Forwarded from the Stanford bboard by Laws@SRI-AI.]
>From a ComputerWorld Ad:
Dear Hackers:
...We at MicroFrame have developed a device to
keep you out...called Data Lock and Key...Our own computer is
protected by a Data Lock. We invite you to dial in
(201-828-7120). You will be answered by a 1200 baud modem.
The data we gather from your efforts will help us...For clues
call our voice line (201-828-4499) and ask for Data Security.
(MicroFrame, 205 Livingston Ave., New Brunswick, NJ 08901)
(discussion in net.crypt only, please).
--
Spoken: Mark Weiser ARPA: mark@maryland
CSNet: mark@umcp-cs UUCP: {seismo,allegra}!umcp-cs!mark
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 12-Oct-84 20:54:27 PDT
From: Lauren Weinstein <vortex!lauren@RAND-UNIX.ARPA>
Subject: Cost of 56KB home data service
If you have to ask, you won't be able to afford it. Seriously, with
costs for Plain Old Telephone Service shooting through the roof, it
doesn't take too much imagination to guess how much *any* sort of
special data service is going to cost.
Such services are really oriented toward relatively well-heeled
business users, *not* toward typical home users.
--Lauren--
------------------------------
From: pur-ee!ef.malcolm@Berkeley (Malcolm Slaney)
Date: 12 Oct 1984 1639-EST (Friday)
To: abc@brl.ARPA
From: Brint <abc@BRL-TGR.ARPA>
Subject: Electronic Decision Making
Excerpt:
..In the experiments, ... people "talking" by computer took
longer to agree, and their final decisions tended to involve
more risks than those reached by groups meeting in person.
Reaction:
Relative to what? As I write this, the U.S. Congress is
passing their fourth or fifth "temporary funding" bill to keep
the government (and my salary) going for another day or two.
I have to agree with the except. Given my group of friends and any
one decision I have noticed that decision discussed electronically
take much longer than the ones done face to face. I think this is
because electronic mail tends to hide the personalities that make it
possible for a "leader" to forge a consensus.
I wonder if it is this characteristic of electronic mail that leads to
flaming.....a member of a group that is "not happy with the way things
are going" can flame and people will just ignore the mail, while in a
face to face conversation the person would quickly be excluded from
the conversation.
Malcolm
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 13 Oct 84 10:05:49 EDT
From: Brint <abc@BRL-TGR.ARPA>
To: Malcolm Slaney <pur-ee!ef.malcolm@UCB-VAX.ARPA>
You make a good point. Certainly, the impersonality of electronic
mail permits stronger language than one might care to use in person.
And the power of a personal leader might certainly be reduced in the
electronic media.
Perhaps for concensus-reaching activity to be effective in an
electronic mail environment certain ground rules would be needed. For
example, the opportunity to respond to debate or express a position
might require an expiration date and time to avoid foot-dragging.
Perhaps an entirely new set of parliamentary rules a la Roberts Rules
of Order would be needed.
My other point, made with half a tongue in cheek, is that if last week
indicates the best that Congress can do, new technology might render
the Congress less useful to a more self-governing society. In the
extreme, we might envision voters settling "legislative" issues at
their terminals!
Brint
------------------------------
From: decvax!minow@decwrl.ARPA
Date: Thu, 11 Oct 84 18:59:45 edt
Subject: Homework/Piecework/Telecommuting, forwarded from Usenet
The following article was distributed on Usenet recently. I am
forwarding it to Human-Nets with the author's permission. She does
not receive Human-Nets -- I will forward replies to her, or you can do
so to "decvax!!ihnp4!psuvax1!burdvax!kew@decwrl.arpa"
Martin Minow
decvax!minow
From kew@burdvax.UUCP (Karen Wieckert) Sun Feb 6 01:28:16 206
Newsgroups: net.women,net.politics
Subject: Homework/Piecework/Telecommuting
Homework, piecework and home computer work (telecommuting is the
favored word) are becoming major concerns of women's organizations,
unions and businesses. There are numerous examples of companies who
rely upon piece work, including CRAY computer. Many companies do this
sort of work overseas where the laws are not as stringent and the
wages are considerably lower.
There are laws which disallow piecework/homework which date back to
the 1920s or so. These laws were enacted because of grave abuses of
homework by businesses. I am no expert on the labor movement of the
early 1900s, but there is little doubt that some sort of change at
that time was necessary.
The issues are returning in the 1980s. In particular, many women who
want to stay in the home, but also need to support the family with
additional income, are pushing for "reform" of the labor laws. This
is particularly a concern in Maine, where women are isolated on farms
or whatever and are unable to work in the traditional settings. It is
an important economic concern for these women who would not be working
at all if they could not do knitting, etc. in their homes.
Rep. Olympia Snowe (R-ME), has introduced legislation in the House
which would allow for such work. However, it will never get a hearing
on the House Education and Labor Committee. The companion legislation
was introduced by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), and hearings have been held
by the Labor and Human Resources Committee (which Hatch happens to
chair). However, I do not believe the Republican Senate is even
interested in dealing with the issue. The text of the legislation is
thought to be broad enough to include computer piece work/homework.
It is important to note that women could form their own home
businesses. The issue is being able to do work for another company
and be paid for each unit of product produced for that company.
Many women's organizations have taken strong stands against homework
legislation. Their concern is that women will be exploited; being
forced to work in the home for low wages and no benefits. They also
are concerned about peripheral issues such as day-care and the erosion
of fragile child care programs already underfunded. I believe there
are legitimate reasons to be concerned.
Unions are concerned because of the loss of employee benefits and
issues related to office automation generally. For instance, an
example of Equitable Life Insurance in Syracuse NY in which a
computerized claim entry system was put in place. Women - an nearly
all of these claim clerks were women - were inputing these claims at
terminals eight hours per day with 1/2 hour lunch breaks and two 10
minute breaks during the day. Their work was monitored for how fast
they could enter claims and for how many keystroke errors they made
per day. We have all heard these horror stories of the "factory
office."
After seeing a 60 minutes program, (amazing what 60 Minutes does for
all sides), about 9 to 5 and Working Women - office worker unions -
the claim clerks asked 9 to 5 to attempt a union drive in their
office. The company got wind of it, hired a union busting firm and
low and behold the very first thing that was implemented was home
computer work for claim entry. Computer terminals were rented from
the company and people doing the work were paid a flat rate for every
claim entered. The homeworkers were not given any other benefits,
like health insurance, etc. They ended up making about the same in
wages but also were working considerably longer hours each day as well
as on the weekends. Last I heard, the union negotiations were still
going on. 9 to 5/Working Women have been witnesses at various
hearings on office automation, health concerns and such. Home
computer work has come up as an issue in these other hearings but only
as a union concern.
This has been a long-winded article whose only purpose was to lay out
some of the concerns and to suggest that it is far from a simple
issue.
Ka:ren
------------------------------
Date: Fri 12 Oct 84 13:37:01-PDT
From: Richard Treitel <TREITEL@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA>
Subject: homework and env't
To: redford%shorty@DECWRL.ARPA
John's message clarifies a few points but raises others. It is not
unusual for a research student such as myself to work for days or a
whole week without needing to contact anyone else, and indeed my
adviser might be grateful for the lack of interruption. But we insist
quite tenaciously on our right to a desk in the Department, even if we
don't use it much (I, in fact, use mine every day, and would rather
not transfer my work to home) because of all the other advantages
inherent in working on campus. I *live* off campus because (i)
there's not much housing on campus (ii) I prefer it. If offered a job
which gave me no choice but to stay at home, I'd turn it down. Those
for whom turning down jobs is a luxury they cannot afford would have a
legitimate complaint if this were the only kind of work they could
get, and they didn't want it.
None of this should be read as support for legislation ...
- Richard
------------------------------
End of HUMAN-NETS Digest
************************