brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) (05/12/89)
To get particular, here is the kind of information that I think would be useful to have in the header, so that I can configure my newsreader as I like: First of all, I think that just about every posting falls into one of the following categories, and I would not mind if the poster indicated this by selecting one from a menu: query - a request for help or information news - some topical piece of new information opinion - a general opinion on a topic flame - a vigorous and possibly inflamatory opinion information - non-topical new information fiction - humour and other fiction commercial - a commercial message that isn't advertising advertisement - a commercial message to promote a product Plus for followups rebuttal - a rebuttal of a case made in the parent article new information - a new element to the discussion (factual) response to query - a response to a query message And for information messages original - the poster is the author of this information reprint - the information comes from another source Now I think we can come up with more categories, but this covers the main ones in my book. You might use such information to: See responses to queries only filter out flames look for news Not send advertising through non-commercial feeds. Now the first question many of you will ask is, 'who is going to classify their message as a flame -- won't everybody say it's reasoned opinion or new information?' Naturally some people will lie, and there will also just be plain differences of opinion on what's a flame and what isn't. But even today, people willingly post their flames to alt.flame, letting the world know. You can put alt.flame in your filter program. If you find a poster posting a lot of flames and not having the courtesy to label them as such, you can remind that poster, tolerate the problem or instruct your newsreader to filter them out. That's up to you and your newsreader. If a person does not put any classification on their article you have the same problem. In some groups, this may be no trouble. In other groups, you may simply not have the time to read articles that the author does not classify. It's up to you. You could also send mail to the author asking them to classify their articles, and if you got really annoyed, you could filter out the poster. The nice thing about classification is that where in some cases you might be inclined to filter out everything a poster writes, if that poster is willing to classify, you only have to do some of it. This means more, reasoned, communication. -- Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473