LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) (02/12/90)
We run Netnews at a large (20,000 user) VM/CMS installation. We get a full feed and give read and post access to all users. With that many people involved, we've had some unfortunate situations where our users have posted inappropriate and/or offensive things. We've also had situations where our users have complained about offensive postings that were not posted at our installation. Our management is becoming increasingly concerned, perhaps (though I think and hope they're bluffing) to the point of shutting down the whole thing. I'd like to find out how other places handle these sorts of things, in particular: 1. Do universities limit student posting in any way? 2. How do you deal with a user who posts inappropriate stuff? What kinds of things do you deem "inappropriate"? 3. What do you do when users complain about articles posted at another site? Our most recent complaint was against a rotated posting in rec.humor that contained racist, anti-semitic, anti-homosexual, foul language, and everything else. 4. Are there electronic filters for any of this? If so, do they just look for specific "bad words" or are more sophisticated things being done? 5. Our management is concerned that we could be sued for things our users use our system to say or for things (said by users of other systems) that our computer propogates. Is there any precedence for this? Thanks in advance for your advice, and I appolgize if I'm bringing up a topic that has already been discussed to death. Relay-Version: Version 1.7 PSU-NETNEWS 5/20/88; site BGUVM.BITNET Posting-Version: Version 1.7 PSU-NETNEWS 5/20/88; site BGUVM.BITNET Path: psuvm!barilvm!bguvm.bitnet!avir From: Aviel Roy-Shapira <AVIR@BGUVM.BITNET> Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf-lovers Subject: Re: The Prisoner (Re: BATTLESTAR GALACTICA) Message-ID: <657AVIR@BGUVM> Date: Saturday, 10 Feb 1990 15:46:05 IST Organization: Ben-Gurion University, Beer-Sheva, Israel References: <408@wshb.UUCP> <18825@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> <2059@syma.sussex.ac.uk> Are you referring to the 'Who am I - You are No. Six' series? That was a weird one. I'd like to know whatever happend to the series, who the hell he was? And, pleas let me know about any novelisations.
gsmith@garnet.berkeley.edu (Gene W. Smith) (02/12/90)
In article <90042.134648LRL@PSUVM.BITNET>, LRL@psuvm (Linda Littleton) writes: >We run Netnews at a large (20,000 user) VM/CMS installation. We get a >full feed and give read and post access to all users. With that many >people involved, we've had some unfortunate situations where our users >have posted inappropriate and/or offensive things. One possibility would be to restrict undergraduates to a smaller distribution. Most of what undergraduates have to say is of no interest to anyone anywhere anyway. The fact that so many of them post from Penn State is making the site notorious. -- ucbvax!garnet!gsmith Gene Ward Smith/Brahms Gang/Berkeley CA 94720 "I am quite prepared to prove in court that I am neither stupid nor insane." quoted from ONE FOR THE BOOKS, the authorized biography of Captain Carnage.
tale@cs.rpi.edu (David C Lawrence) (02/12/90)
In <90042.134648LRL@PSUVM.BITNET> LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) writes: > 1. Do universities limit student posting in any way? We don't. > 2. How do you deal with a user who posts inappropriate stuff? What > kinds of things do you deem "inappropriate"? It depends on what I see; I don't look at everything that goes out of here. If I never get word of it, I don't complain. Sometimes I do get word of it and have to tell the person complaining to stop wasting my time because the imagined evil of the article in question was nothing that the person who posted it was really at fault for. I _hate_ it when idiots off-site write me messages telling me that such-and-such wrote something that they found offensive. There are lots of things that I deem inappropriate. I generally just hold my tongue about them because often mine is just really another opinion and even I violate my own mental guidelines about what I think is appropriate. (If I'm aware of that _before_ I post then I don't post. Sometimes things seem to be quite appropriate at one time and hindsight reveals something different.) The major things I am concerned about here are completely illegal things being posted (hasn't happened around here yet, but one of the afforementioned idiots once tried to claim that one of my users was inciting people to pirate software; the user was doing no such thing) or just really bad net.citizenship, like forging articles or slipping something into a moderated group directly that they shouldn't post to. > 3. What do you do when users complain about articles posted at another > site? Our most recent complaint was against a rotated posting > in rec.humor that contained racist, anti-semitic, anti-homosexual, > foul language, and everything else. Inside I'd probably scoff at them and be disgusted with the fact that this person can't just tolerate it. Politically I'd probably have to be nice and kind and still end up telling him to just live with it. I will not write to either the other user or his admin. It is difficult to find sympathy on the net for people being offended, even when it is something that is very much offends many, many users like a recent story posted in the altnet. There are a sufficient number of people who get excited about anything that remotely resembles censorship, real or imagined, that a clamour is easily raised by the notion that something should be done to the user or his article. > 4. Are there electronic filters for any of this? If so, do they just > look for specific "bad words" or are more sophisticated things > being done? They might exist but we don't run any. That's another thing I would scoff at. I mean, heck, once you catch someone using a "bad word" in English are you going to start checking the Finnish, German, Japanese, et al postings that sometimes find their way into the net-at-large? Afterall, it might offend one of the multilingual users ... > 5. Our management is concerned that we could be sued for things our users > use our system to say or for things (said by users of other systems) > that our computer propogates. Is there any precedence for this? I am not aware of precedence but I am sufficiently legally naive that you shouldn't listen to me about this. -- (setq mail '("tale@cs.rpi.edu" "tale@ai.mit.edu" "tale@rpitsmts.bitnet")) "Nice plant. Looks like a table cloth."
ckd@bu-pub.bu.edu (Christopher Davis) (02/12/90)
First, a massive disclaimer: I am not the news or system administrator for any system here at Boston University. The only computer I have administrative responsibility for is the Mac on my desk. This is policy and situation *as I understand it* and does not represent the official policies of any Boston University department. LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) said: > 1. Do universities limit student posting in any way? BU does not limit student posting *from any machine with news access*. The main campus system (buacca.bu.edu, aka buacca.bitnet) does not run news, and isn't likely to any time soon. Other machines have either local news spools or use NNTP from a central dedicated server. Only the campus Un*x boxes are running news (to my knowledge) and not all of those; in any case, the Un*x machines are all departmental and require some "reason" to have an account. Examples: the Computer Science machines are for those in a CS class or degree program, the Engineering machines are for those in certain majors in BU ENG, etc. So they don't limit it if you have news access in the first place, but odds are you won't. [2-4 deleted, since I can't say much to those topics] > 5. Our management is concerned that we could be sued for things our users > use our system to say or for things (said by users of other systems) > that our computer propogates. Is there any precedence for this? I don't believe there are any precedents. The answer is "we don't know until someone gets taken to court." Sigh. -- Christopher Davis, BU SMG '90 <ckd@bu-pub.bu.edu> <smghy6c@buacca.bitnet> NETWORK PLANNING CONSTRAINT OF THE MONTH: "You can't send bits over a non-existent link." --Valdis Kletnieks <valdis@vtvm1.cc.vt.edu>
tar@ksuvax1.cis.ksu.edu (Tim Ramsey) (02/12/90)
In the referenced article, LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) writes: [ ... ] >1. Do universities limit student posting in any way? Speaking for my Dept. only, we used to. When we first made news available we did not forward postings from our undergrad system to off campus sites. After some coaxing, Higher Ups decided to allow undergrad articles to be sent off campus on sort of a trial basis. Since then (somewhere around two years ago), we have had very few problems. >2. How do you deal with a user who posts inappropriate stuff? What > kinds of things do you deem "inappropriate"? Generally, I begin by sending the author mail explaining why I think his/her article was inappropriate. I might suggest that the user cancel the article if I think that is warranted. If the user doesn't comply, I might bump the problem up the chain of command (to the system administrator). Examples of inappropriate articles would be UNIX questions that should be sent to our local consultant mailing list, questions posted to the wrong newsgroup (a C question posted to talk.abortion, for instance), or articles dealing with obviously illegal subject matters (chain letters, software piracy, etc.). I almost never cancel a user's article without his/her permission or instructions from Higher Ups. >3. What do you do when users complain about articles posted at another > site? Our most recent complaint was against a rotated posting > in rec.humor that contained racist, anti-semitic, anti-homosexual, > foul language, and everything else. I tell them to 1) put the author and/or subject in their KILL file, 2) stop reading that group, and/or 3) email the author and complain to him/her. >4. Are there electronic filters for any of this? If so, do they just > look for specific "bad words" or are more sophisticated things > being done? I've not heard of any, but then I haven't looked. >5. Our management is concerned that we could be sued for things our users > use our system to say or for things (said by users of other systems) > that our computer propogates. Is there any precedence for this? Here go the net.lawyers again. IMO, the only worthwhile advice you'll get is from an attorney. -- Yup, I'm an undergrad. Tim Ramsey Dept. of Computing and Information Sciences Internet: tar@ksuvax1.cis.ksu.edu Kansas State University, Manhattan KS 66506 UUCP: ...!{rutgers,texbell}!ksuvax1!tar (913) 539-4977 (voice) 2-7114 (FAX)
LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) (02/12/90)
So far, in just one day, I've gotten over 20 answers to my question of how to deal with users saying inappropriate things on the net. I will summarize later, but for now see that I need to clarify the questions. >2. How do you deal with a user who posts inappropriate stuff? People answered the expected stuff of warning the user, then taking away their privileges, etc. What I'd like to know is: 2a. Who issues the warnings and deals the user's appeals? Does this generally befall the news administrator? 2b. Do you wait for users to call bad stuff to your attention, or does someone go looking for it? >3. What do you do when users complain about articles posted at another > site? Our most recent complaint was against a rotated posting > in rec.humor that contained racist, anti-semitic, anti-homosexual, > foul language, and everything else. I should clarify that it way a high level professor who rot13'd the message and then complained to my boss's boss's boss, who told me to cancel the article. I did (just from our local system) and am wondering how others would have handled this. Our director got word of it and has told me to filter out bad stuff if possible, and otherwise to go ahead and cancel any non-local posting that any of our users complain about. Thanks for the feedback and advice.
davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr) (02/13/90)
In article <90042.134648LRL@PSUVM.BITNET> LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) writes: | 3. What do you do when users complain about articles posted at another | site? Our most recent complaint was against a rotated posting | in rec.humor that contained racist, anti-semitic, anti-homosexual, | foul language, and everything else. We have news on a few hundred machines here (commercial site), and I can't imagine anyone admitting that they were reading a non-work realated group, took the trouble to unrot the article, and then complained. If it did happen I would show them how to unsubscribe. I mailed a detailed answer back, but I though this might be of general interest. -- bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen) "Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me
tale@cs.rpi.edu (David C Lawrence) (02/13/90)
In <90043.092940LRL@PSUVM.BITNET Linda Littleton <LRL@psuvm.psu.edu> writes:
People answered the expected stuff of warning the user, then taking away
their privileges, etc. What I'd like to know is:
I'd be hard pressed to recommend revocation of privilege for first or
even second offenders. It really doesn't matter how I feel about it
though because Rensselaer has a rather complete Campus Computer Use
Policy which outlines what is not considered acceptable behaviour. I
don't think it gets put into play much but mention of it and the
consequences is usually enough to calm someone down.
I saw a recent message that one of the people who recently reposted
one of the pyramid schemes got his account yanked. Without knowing
anything else about the user and his environment my gut reaction is
that this was wrong; he could likely have posted it out of sincere
naivety, not realising that it was really a wrong thing to do.
2a. Who issues the warnings and deals the user's appeals? Does this
generally befall the news administrator?
"Not my job." I think this varies a lot though because of the
different capacities people can serve in. When I started as news
admin for Rensselaer I was an assistant systems programmer for the
campus public access workstations. Now I am a software engineer for
the Computer Science department and a part-timer for the FSF. While
some of my responsibilities do step into the domain of system
administration, and I have been given root privileges on many
machines to facilitate this, I am not really a system administrator.
Most user problems aren't my problems; I don't worry about accounts
and dumps and restores and screwed up home directories and how much
diskspace people are using and so on and so forth.
The network around here then is not only the machines but also the
admins. If there is some sort of problem coming out of domain.rpi.edu
it isn't my job to put the user on disciplinary action. What I will
have to do is talk with both the user and his system administrator and
get it all straightened out.
2b. Do you wait for users to call bad stuff to your attention, or does
someone go looking for it?
If someone goes looking for it around here he's on his own little
vendetta. No one here is commissioned to be the Mary Whitehouse(*) of
Rensselaer.
I should clarify that it way a high level professor who rot13'd the
message and then complained to my boss's boss's boss, who told me to
cancel the article. I did (just from our local system) and am wondering
how others would have handled this.
I almost certainly wouldn't have cancelled it except under direct
threat from my superiors. My immediate superior tends to site with me
on most issues regarding freedom/restriction though so I'm not too
extremely concerned that I'm often treading on his toes. Cancelling
it from your own system is technically fine though. You didn't send
out any search-and-destroy missiles all over the net and no one else
can really tell you what must exist on your machine.
Dave
(*) Benefits of C News #102 -- expands cultural and political horizons
through knowledge of the source code.
--
(setq mail '("tale@cs.rpi.edu" "tale@ai.mit.edu" "tale@rpitsmts.bitnet"))
"Nice plant. Looks like a table cloth."gary@sci34hub.UUCP (Gary Heston) (02/14/90)
In article <90043.092940LRL@PSUVM.BITNET>, LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) writes: > [ ... ] > their privileges, etc. What I'd like to know is: > 2a. Who issues the warnings and deals the user's appeals? Does this > generally befall the news administrator? Virtually nobody else would be in a position to do any of this. In most cases, the students' advisor or employees' supervisor (as the case may be) is likely to be unfamiliar with the understood policies or what could be done about it. A news or site admin can explain to Joe User what the joys of rsh are, which can do wonders to bringing someone in line. > 2b. Do you wait for users to call bad stuff to your attention, or does > someone go looking for it? The obvious thing here is, who in the HECK has time to scan 5 or 6 megabytes per day of text? Assuming the typical 5 characters per word, that's a megaword. Now, I'm somewhat of a speedreader. I can, in some cases, read at 1200 words per minute. (That's fast, incidentally, but I've done over 2000 in special cases.) At 1200 wpm, it would take me 14.5 HOURS straight to scan the stuff. Not humanly possible. Relying on complaints, and what we come across in our own reading activities is the only possible way to go. Sort of like trying to catch speeders. > >3. What do you do when users complain about articles posted at another > > site? Our most recent complaint was against a rotated posting > > in rec.humor that contained racist, anti-semitic, anti-homosexual, > > foul language, and everything else. > I should clarify that it way a high level professor who rot13'd the > message and then complained to my boss's boss's boss, who told me to > cancel the article. I did (just from our local system) and am wondering > how others would have handled this. I'd tell boss's boss's boss to tell high professor to not bother him with trivial complaints, they should go to the netadmin, which anyone reading news should know to reach at site!postmaster. You don't call the president of a company when the light bulb in your office burns out, you call maintenance. I'd tell high professor that he shouldn't unrot13 a message unless he enjoys things normal people find offensive. If you don't like pictures of naked women, don't open a copy of Playboy. If you don't like pictures of naked men, don't open a copy of Playgirl. I'm even worse, I read Fortune and Forbes. The professors' complaint is akin to someone standing in the middle of an interstate, and complaining about people driving by at 55 MPH. Get out of the road. If you boss tells you to remove something, though, you have to. I'd probably null the article instead of deleting or local canceling, though, so it would stay in history and not get reposted to your site. > Our director got word of it and has told me to filter out bad stuff if > possible, and otherwise to go ahead and cancel any non-local posting that > any of our users complain about. Thank your director for this new responsibility, and ask him to let you know when your staff of eight news scanners will report, along with your new title of supervisor, and the nice new equipment your staff'll need. If he gives you a funny look, show him the above in this posting. > Thanks for the feedback and advice. Any time. It sounds like you've got a no-win situation, though. Good luck. -- Gary Heston { uunet!sci34hub!gary } System Mismanager SCI Technology, Inc. OEM Products Department (i.e., computers) Hestons' First Law: I qualify virtually everything I say.
dave@compnect.UUCP (Dave Ratcliffe) (02/16/90)
In article <90043.092940LRL@PSUVM.BITNET>, LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) writes: > So far, in just one day, I've gotten over 20 answers to my question of > how to deal with users saying inappropriate things on the net. I will > summarize later, but for now see that I need to clarify the questions. > > 2a. Who issues the warnings and deals the user's appeals? Does this > generally befall the news administrator? > Should fall to the News Administrator. That's what he/sh is there for after all. > 2b. Do you wait for users to call bad stuff to your attention, or does > someone go looking for it? My system recieved over 4000 new articles last night. To 'go looking' for no-no's in all that traffic would take forever, not to mention out-bound traffic. THEN you have to decide just what constitutes a no-no. One person's no-no is another persons snicker. Probably best to handle things on an individual basis as they are objected to. > >3. What do you do when users complain about articles posted at another > > site? Our most recent complaint was against a rotated posting > > in rec.humor that contained racist, anti-semitic, anti-homosexual, > > foul language, and everything else. > > I should clarify that it way a high level professor who rot13'd the > message and then complained to my boss's boss's boss, who told me to > cancel the article. I did (just from our local system) and am wondering > how others would have handled this. > Your high level professor walked into the posting with both eyes open. He DE-ROTed it all by himself (no smoking gun pointed at his head) then proceeded to complain about the 'nasty stuff' he saw. Was the boss's boss's boss TOLD that it was an encoded posting? Since this is no major league big user system I run here, I would have just told him to leave the ROT13 stuff alone next time. Possibly the same action done with tact would have worked at your site (I have no tact, ask my friends :-) ) Personally, my feeling is that those who tread into the Usenet waters should be made aware that certain conditions exist. Some objectionable (to some) postings will turn up. If they don't want to read them, stay out of the newsgroups where they flourish (alt.sex, alt.flame, alt.humor, etc...). Remind them that in the real world, people DO use profanity in their conversation on occasion and that this too shall pass. Usenet is like a big party with hundreds of conversations going on all over the place. As with a party, if you overhear something you find objectionable, tell the person who posted it, wait to see how everyone else reacts, or move on to another group. Sometimes it's REAL nice running a small site..... *>> Dave <<* [------: Dave Ratcliffe :---------: UUCP: uunet!wa3wbu!ka3adu!compnect!dave :-] : Small sites make it easier to : 2832 Croyden Rd. Harrisburg, Pa. 17104 : : be a net.policeman : Data: (717)657-4997 - (717)657-4992 : [.................................:...........................................] One of these days, I'm gonna ROT13 my .sig file
allen@sulaco.Sigma.COM (Allen Gwinn) (02/16/90)
In article <1990Feb12.052427.4143@agate.berkeley.edu> gsmith@garnet.berkeley.edu (Gene W. Smith) writes: [in response to Linda Littleton's article] > One possibility would be to restrict undergraduates to a >smaller distribution. Most of what undergraduates have to say is >of no interest to anyone anywhere anyway. The fact that so many >of them post from Penn State is making the site notorious. ...or better yet, just give a literacy exam. That might accomplish the same thing at PSU :-) -- Allen Gwinn sulaco!allen DISCLAIMER: The opinions, if any, are my own. "You insecure, obscure, homozygous adolecent. Take your plebe-infested, flea-bitten rectum to the closest 220VAC outlet, and learn the true meaning of the word flame." - Jim Thompson jthomp@central.sun.com
allen@sulaco.Sigma.COM (Allen Gwinn) (02/16/90)
In article <90042.134648LRL@PSUVM.BITNET> LRL@psuvm.psu.edu (Linda Littleton) writes: [wrt offensive articles posted/read on the net] >Our management is becoming increasingly concerned, perhaps (though I >think and hope they're bluffing) to the point of shutting down the whole >thing. I'd like to find out how other places handle these sorts of >things, in particular: >1. Do universities limit student posting in any way? I am one of the S.A.'s at SMU in Dallas. Shortly, I am going to bring a new machine up on line for our undergraduates to post from. There are no plans to limit any kinds of postings, or newsgroups. >2. How do you deal with a user who posts inappropriate stuff? What > kinds of things do you deem "inappropriate"? I, personally, feel that it is your right to say whatever you want to say. As far as content, if someone gets offended at something posted from this site (or someone at this site reads something that offends them) I feel that this is their problem. If it can't get them in legal trouble for saying it in the "Real World(tm)", then it probably won't get them into trouble here. Besides, the Net has ways of policing its own. You people at PSU ought to know that :-) However, back to the concept of "inappropriate", the only things that I would find "inappropriate" are things which could materially harm the network or pose technical problems. Examples might be: crossposting to umpteen zillion inappropriate newsgroups, forging "newgroup" messages, or just hacking around on it in general with the intent to do harm. Then, there is a strong possibility of action. >3. What do you do when users complain about articles posted at another > site? Our most recent complaint was against a rotated posting > in rec.humor that contained racist, anti-semitic, anti-homosexual, > foul language, and everything else. Nothing. Tell them not to unrot things, or read newsgroups that might offend them so. >4. Are there electronic filters for any of this? If so, do they just > look for specific "bad words" or are more sophisticated things > being done? Oh, I'm sure you could write most anything like that. But what would it accomplish? Are you going to be there in the "Real World(tm)" when these same people get offended? What do you do for them in that situation? >5. Our management is concerned that we could be sued for things our users > use our system to say or for things (said by users of other systems) > that our computer propogates. Is there any precedence for this? I don't think you have anything to worry about along these lines. I think that the legal responsibility would be on the writer of such an article much the same as if someone made a public statement of questionable content. However, I'm no lawyer (yes... I do have *some* ethics), so please consult your own for better advice. -- Allen Gwinn sulaco!allen DISCLAIMER: The opinions, if any, are my own.
tneff@bfmny0.UU.NET (Tom Neff) (02/16/90)
When posting is outlawed, only outlaws will post!
tale@cs.rpi.edu (David C Lawrence) (02/19/90)
In article <583@sci34hub.UUCP> gary@sci34hub.UUCP (Gary Heston) writes: > A news or site admin can explain to Joe User what the joys of rsh > are, which can do wonders to bringing someone in line. rsh == restricted shell. (That's for the sake of primarily BSD people like me who didn't quite understand on the first person why you were bringing remote commands into this. :-) > I'd tell boss's boss's boss to tell high professor to not bother him > with trivial complaints, they should go to the netadmin, which anyone > reading news should know to reach at site!postmaster. Don't count on it. The articles you are replying to are from BITNET and site!user might not even be understood there. It won't deliver local mail around here, either, because we don't do UUCP. (Yeah, yeah, we can hack up the cf. It's the _idea_ of it though. :-) Furthermore, if they're like many other larger sites then very possibly the postmaster isn't the news admin. I'm not the postmaster around here, which is something I quite appreciate. A better bet on many UNIX systems is to mail to "news" or "usenet". Even if the postmaster is the same person it is quite possible that she likes to keep different aspects of her job seperate. Dave
mark@promark.UUCP (Mark J. DeFilippis) (02/21/90)
In article <1990Feb12.083329.18289@deimos.cis.ksu.edu>, tar@ksuvax1.cis.ksu.edu (Tim Ramsey) writes: > In article <1990Feb12.052427.4143@agate.berkeley.edu>, > gsmith@garnet.berkeley.edu (Gene W. Smith) writes: > > [ ... ] > > > One possibility would be to restrict undergraduates to a > >smaller distribution. Most of what undergraduates have to say is > >of no interest to anyone anywhere anyway. The fact that so many > >of them post from Penn State is making the site notorious. > > Speak for yourself. I have as much interest in hearing what an undergrad > has to say as I do a high school dropout or anyone else. > > -- > Yup, I'm an undergrad. At Adelphi University we do not allow undergraduates to post as we feel their knowledge-base limits the positive contribution they can make to the computer hierarchies. Considering the limited number of undergraduate postings I think there are many universities that maintain this policy. Either this or I am totally wrong, and many universities allow undergrads to post and all these undergrads are well behaved and know when they cannot make a positive contribution. Much of the comp groups deal at an applied level that most experienced people in industry are familiar with. Other groups deal at the graduate level. Prime examples are comp.arch, comp.theory, sci.math, etc. Of course there are the talk and rec hierarchies, but we don't bother getting those groups here since we get our news via UUCP. We will be on internet, and bitnet soon and when we are, things will change as we get our news via internet. But for now, they cannot post, and I am sure experienced industry people, and grad. students out there are happy with that. One can look intelligent, assert intelligence, have a reputation for intelligence, but we really find out when you speak. Once you have any reputation it sticks. A local town here boasts that 83% of their high school grads are going to college now! This is up some 41% from 18 years ago. With all the federal talk about our poor public educational systems, you don't think 83% of the high school grads are college material do you? -- Mark J. DeFilippis SA @ Department of Mathematics and Computer Science Adelphi University, Garden City, NY 11530 (516) 663-1170 UUCP: philabs!sbcs!bnlux0!adelphi!markd
jvogel@jarthur.Claremont.EDU (Jeff Vogel) (02/22/90)
In article <2283@promark.UUCP> mark@promark.UUCP (Mark J. DeFilippis) writes: >At Adelphi University we do not allow undergraduates to post as we feel their >knowledge-base limits the positive contribution they can make to the computer >hierarchies. That is truly a shame. Undergraduates are a bit more prone to immaturity that grad students and up, but speaking as one, we are a bit more capable than you think of understanding the material in the comp. and sci. groups and even contributing. >Much of the comp groups deal at an applied level that most experienced people >in industry are familiar with. Other groups deal at the graduate level. >Prime examples are comp.arch, comp.theory, sci.math, etc. Not always. In fact, I could readily comprehend %90 of sci.math when I read it, and all of my posts but one (which was not wrong, but posted instead of E-mailed) were helpful. Many of my friends who work with computers may not have understanding on the graduate level, but know more about the systems than many of the graduate students who work here. >But for now, they cannot post, and I am sure experienced industry people, >and grad. students out there are happy with that. This is snobbery. Less likely to be able to help is not equivalent to unable to help. I'm not sure about the caliber of undergrads at your college, but many undergrads here are taking grad school level courses at the same times, and others have expended a good deal of effort learning about the areas that interest them. I honestly ask: grad students and people with actual jobs, do you really not want us around? Have you so forgotten (or perhaps, not forgotten) your undergrad days as to feel we are not useful? BTW, I favor a mandatory semester of reading news before being able to post. That would at least let people know what is really annoying to other readers, and give a chance to pick up basic netiquette. -- | Jeff Vogel, Harvey Mudd College, CA : jvogel@jarthur.claremont.edu |
gwollman@jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU (Garrett A Wollman) (02/24/90)
Speaking as an undergrad at Hopkins, I must say that (at least around here) anyone who isn't smart enough to make a worthwhile contribution to some newsgroup isn't smart enough to use a large SysV Unix system with lots of [sometimes] buggy software. With the large international student population here, many people read their appropriate soc.culture groups. Other people read rec.whatever. Almost everyone reads rec.humor.funny. <Hi Brad!> Even though all Hopkins students are entitled to a Unix account, a very small percentage actually take up the opportunity and *use* it. I imagine the same is true at other schools with a choice of mainframes. [If you forgot about all the class accounts, there would be more people using the VAX 6410 than this 3B4000.] -GAWollman -- "All societies are based on rules to protect pregnant women and children. . . . As racial survival is the only universal morality, no other bases is possible." - Lazarus Long [RAH, _TEFL_] ---------------Hopkins doesn't *want* my opinions------------------------
jp@frog.UUCP (John Pimentel) (02/28/90)
In article <2283@promark.UUCP> mark@promark.UUCP (Mark J. DeFilippis) writes: >At Adelphi University we do not allow undergraduates to post as we feel their >knowledge-base limits the positive contribution they can make to the computer >hierarchies. Considering the limited number of undergraduate postings I >think there are many universities that maintain this policy. Either this >or I am totally wrong, and many universities allow undergrads to post and >all these undergrads are well behaved and know when they cannot make a ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >positive contribution. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Mark, if we (the world) had more people like you, we'd all be in trouble. Mark, I would like you to open your mouth and put your leg into it. You are probably the biggest..... I've ever had the misfortune to read. Personally, I feel your "positive contribution" lacks intelligence!!! >Mark J. DeFilippis -- HAVE A "<put your own words here>" DAY! STANDARD DISCLAIMER APPLIES. UUCP: .......!decvax!\ ....frog!jp ....!mit-eddie!/