xanthian@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Kent Paul Dolan) (10/29/90)
brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton) writes: [About using his "trial" method for creating new newsgroups.] > The main problem is that trials do not apply to things like renaming > groups, splitting groups, recreating groups or moving groups. No, the main problem is that the cadre desiring a new newsgroup is diffuse, and the trial method does not provide to _all_ those interested the chance to participate, since it does not provide good propagation. I eat dessert first, I want my group _now_, and doing it by the voting mechanism shows me daily progress toward getting the group created, in the ebb and flow of discussion, while having a trial group created somewhere I can't see it makes it look like my needs (wants) are being ignored. The problem with "trial" is that it doesn't take human nature into account, not that it is generically a bad idea otherwise. IMHO. > We need a solution for those problems. (Other than the standard USENET > answer, which seems to be "throw as big a committee as you can get at > it.") > My suggestion is to accept volunteer custodians for various > unmoderated groups and group hierarchies. This custodian would have > the semi-unilateral authority to create subgroups etc. within that > hierarchy. (I refer to 2nd & 3rd level hierarchies here, not 1st level > ones like "comp.") > When I say semi-unilateral, I mean that the custodian would initiate > discussion, *within* the hierarchy, of changes within it, weight the > arguments and make the decision s/he thinks is best considering the > wishes of the participants and good common sense. > This is not a perfect solution, but it sure beats doing everything by > big committee. Let's hear others. The mechanism I'm using to reorganize comp.sys.amiga has part of the flavor of your suggestion, but more of the flavor of having a big committee spawn a subcommittee to get some real work done when the overhead of hearing from everyone with an opinion bogs the process down. Rather than start the discussion in news.groups, I posted a local call for discussion in the group to be modified, comp.sys.amiga. We've gone through about 500Kbytes of discussion and email interchange, and two revisions of the original proposal. What we have hammered out is accepted by 85-95% of the group, and the voices saying "let it alone" sound lonely indeed. Things have proceded reasonably smoothly because almost everyone reading and posting was intimately familiar with the problems involved with reading a group with an average 1000 articles online per week of expiration time, and most were familiar with the common traffic threads in the group, and so able to make informed choices about how it should be partitioned. Occasionally, on some of the more trivial choices, where no agreement on a name existed, but the functionality of the subgroup was agreed, or where a split could be done two equally popular ways, I put on my "little tin dictator" hat and made an executive decision. Much more often, the will of the group prevailed. With all this preparation done, the subcommittee is about to report back. Despite many calls to "get on with the vote", the month we have spent creating a coherent proposal should be of value in the formal CFD/CFV period. I _still_ believe the n.a.n and n.g readership fully deserves a chance to comment and vote on the proposal; the inodes and directory structures and disk sectors and news scripts and mail relays and phone connect time involved belong to the greater net, not just to the Amiga community. Perhaps, if this works well, the example can be more widely imitated, and even made part of the guidelines. /// It's Amiga /// for me: why Kent, the man from xanth. \\\/// settle for <xanthian@Zorch.SF-Bay.ORG> <xanthian@well.sf.ca.us> \XX/ anything less? -- Convener, ongoing comp.sys.amiga grand reorganization.