jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) (10/22/88)
In article <5178@medusa.cs.purdue.edu> spaf@arthur.cs.purdue.edu (Gene Spafford) writes: >As far as comments about the backbone go, well, everyone complained >about the backbone group and its attempts to set some guiding >policies. It was only when the backbone refused to follow their own policies that the backbone became a target for incredible amounts of abuse. Unilateral moves by the backbone became less and less tolerated. > Those complaints took their toll; Bob Webber and his ilk got >their way. The backbone is gone, as such. It would appear that Bob Webber is gone as well. Bob Webber was NOT the problem. While I wrote a great number of very harsh words, which I now regret somewhat [ no, not that they were harsh, only the choice of actual words ], the complaints peaked when the backbone failed to do its job. > And until someone can come >up with a reasonably fair, sane method of resolving disputes for a >network of over 10,000 sites and 300,000 readers -- including some very >stupid and anti-social members -- you'll have to settle for this: No backbone? That is not a solution. A democratic technocracy is what we do need. The backbone, as it existed prior to 1988, was doing a fine job. When the backbone became so large that power struggles grew - THEN - the backbone ceased to work. >commentary and debate in the news.* groups, with an occasional >unilateral move that may or may not be accepted by everyone else. What we need is a smaller backbone with members selected by the community. It was claimed, true or false I won't say, that Rick Adams and Greg Woods were directly responsible for comp.society.women being held hostage. If this were in fact true, then it would behoove us to remove those members from the backbone committee. That is the type of unilateral move we don't need. On the other hand, in the good old days, comp.sys.next probably would have been created weeks ago. That is an example of A Good Thing. What I propose is a 15 member committee. Fourteen members are selected from the largest sites by vote, after a nominating process. They then select a speaker-to-the-net from some other ``well-connected'' site. This body then formulates and implements USENET policy. All discussions are made public in a moderated digestified newsgroup. No more secret meetings. Members serve until they resign or are removed by vote of no-confidence. Empty seats are filled by nominations from the backbone and vote of the net. The chairman serves at the discretion of the remainder of the backbone. Presumably since the backbone would then be responsible to the community, we wouldn't have the secret police running around behind our backs as we had earlier in the year. -- John F. Haugh II +----Make believe quote of the week---- VoiceNet: (214) 250-3311 Data: -6272 | Nancy Reagan on Richard Stallman: InterNet: jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US | "Just say `Gno'" UucpNet : <backbone>!killer!rpp386!jfh +--------------------------------------
jbn@glacier.STANFORD.EDU (John B. Nagle) (10/22/88)
Let's not overorganize this thing. Our happy computer-mediated anarchy
here works suprisingly well. We should continue in that mode if only to find
out how far we can go.
As for "comp.sys.next", within one week of the NeXT product announcement,
the appropriate newsgroup had been created and was in full operation, and
traffic in other newsgroups on that subject was starting to fall off.
The system worked. In a few weeks, someone will surely kill "alt.next" as
redundant, and the process will be complete.
Could we worry about something else now, please?
John Naglelear@NET.BIO.NET (Eliot Lear) (10/23/88)
John B. Nagle writes: > The system worked. The system was ignored, thus it did not work. -- Eliot Lear [lear@net.bio.net]
emv@a.cc.umich.edu (Ed Vielmetti) (10/23/88)
>> The system worked. >The system was ignored, thus it did not work. There was no system, and it still worked. --Ed
tneff@dasys1.UUCP (Tom Neff) (10/23/88)
In article <8187@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US> jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) writes: >What we need is a smaller backbone with members selected by the community... >What I propose is a 15 member committee. Fourteen members are selected >from the largest sites by vote, after a nominating process. They then >select a speaker-to-the-net from some other ``well-connected'' site. >This body then formulates and implements USENET policy. All discussions >are made public in a moderated digestified newsgroup. No more secret >meetings. Members serve until they resign or are removed by vote of >no-confidence. Empty seats are filled by nominations from the backbone >and vote of the net. The chairman serves at the discretion of the >remainder of the backbone. This is a well intentioned proposal which might actuall work on the mechanical level (for all I know) if you could get it up and running. I suspect John and those who agree with him will have a great deal more spade work to do convincing these Well Connected Site (WCS) honchos, not a few of whom probably feel stung by recent developments, to go along with it. There's a bigger problem though. I think it's archaic at this point to try and establish a "constitutional" oligarchy of supersites. Surely one of the things we learned this spring was that if the supersites are calling the shots, there is too much emphasis placed on the perceived needs of the supersites, and not enough on what the smaller people need, want or think.* There are more and more small sites all the time, and more and more mid-sized sites are getting better and better connected. The net rutgers, decwrl et al. USED to oversee really doesn't exist anymore. If Usenet is to be governed in any way, shape or form other than anarchy, you will have to include a broader representation of its constituents. -- * The net being what it is, this translated into a number of reasoned and/or impassioned arguments purporting to show why what the small fry need, want or think was irrelevant! But the net effect (excuse the expression) remains the same. -- Tom Neff UUCP: ...!cmcl2!phri!dasys1!tneff "None of your toys CIS: 76556,2536 MCI: TNEFF will function..." GEnie: TOMNEFF BIX: t.neff (no kidding)
brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) (10/24/88)
You simply can't elect people on this net. We have endless trouble just having votes on new newsgroups. A couple of times it has been suggested that moderators be nominated and elected. It's always been a mess. The idea behind a good working anarchy is that you don't talk, you DO. In the end, that's what will happen anyway. Face it. The people who own the sites on this net own their sites. They will do with them exactly what they will. They have no duty to feed or not feed anything to anybody. Democracy is meaningless because in the end, if a site owner wants to disagree with a "majority decision" then the site owner is free to do exactly that. So why have something for appearances when it has no real meaning? -- Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473
richard@gryphon.CTS.COM (Richard Sexton) (10/24/88)
>>> The system worked. >>The system was ignored, thus it did not work. >There was no system, and it still worked. There was no system, nobody noticed, and it still worked. -- Point of light #999 richard@gryphon.CTS.COM {backbone...err, well connected site}!gryphon!richard
lmb@vsi1.UUCP (Larry Blair) (10/24/88)
In article <17793@glacier.STANFORD.EDU> jbn@glacier.UUCP (John B. Nagle) writes: >The system worked. In a few weeks, someone will surely kill "alt.next" as >redundant, and the process will be complete. Sure... and the 20% of the sites that are stupid enough to let any bozo on the net remove groups from their systems won't have it any more. Of course, getting the rest of us to remove the group manually is virtually impossible. -- Larry Blair ames!vsi1!lmb lmb%vsi1.uucp@ames.arc.nasa.gov
skyler@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Patricia Roberts) (10/24/88)
In article <2198@looking.UUCP> brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) writes: >Face it. The people who own the sites on this net own their sites. >They will do with them exactly what they will. They have no duty to feed >or not feed anything to anybody. Democracy is meaningless because in the >end, if a site owner wants to disagree with a "majority decision" then >the site owner is free to do exactly that. Mercifully, I have blocked many of the details of last spring's debacle. However, as I remember it, it was not merely a question of X person (whose name I have long since entirely blocked) not getting that group at his site, but making certain that nobody got it. That, it seems to me, is not a working anarchy, but a tyranny of the minority. Nor is it a situation which would be solved by the proposed oligarchy. As I understand it, the problem was that the group could be removed by many people. One (or maybe two or three--I don't remember) person would not abide by the procedure which was supposed to be in effect then. They could just as easily not follow a new procedure. [Perhaps the solution is to rationalize not the voting, but the method for creating a new group--who has that ability and who doesn't. If there were only one site which could issue create and remove group notices, then the procedure would at least be predictable. Granted, if there were one site which could issue create and remove group notices, that site would be hated by everyone.] Although I was furious at the time, in retrospect I have to admit that (as far as I know) that was the only time such insanity happened. Perhaps I am innocent, but it seems to me that to abandon a system or create a new one because of one (albeit extremely unpleasant) breakdown is overkill. -- ==================================================================== -Trish "...a lifetime is too narrow skyler@ecsvax.uncecs.edu too understand it all..." --A. Rich
jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck) (10/24/88)
In article <17793@glacier.STANFORD.EDU> jbn@glacier.UUCP (John B. Nagle) writes: >>The system worked. In a few weeks, someone will surely kill "alt.next" as >>redundant, and the process will be complete. In article <1138@vsi1.UUCP> lmb@vsi1.UUCP (Larry Blair) writes: >Sure... and the 20% of the sites that are stupid enough to let any bozo on >the net remove groups from their systems won't have it any more. Of course, >getting the rest of us to remove the group manually is virtually impossible. And sites that think it's ridiculous to have to read two groups to get all the NeXT articles will just add alt.next comp.sys.next to their alias file, and those who stubbornly insist on alt.next will find their group drying up. Of course they could put the reversed alias in THEIR alias file. Alias wars, anyone? -- - Joe Buck, card-carrying ACLU liberal jbuck@epimass.epi.com, or uunet!epimass.epi.com!jbuck, or jbuck%epimass.epi.com@uunet.uu.net for old Arpa sites
jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) (10/25/88)
In article <8084@gryphon.CTS.COM> richard@gryphon.CTS.COM (Richard Sexton) writes: >>>> The system worked. >>>The system was ignored, thus it did not work. >>There was no system, and it still worked. >There was no system, nobody noticed, and it still worked. There was a system, and it didn't work; now there isn't a system, and it does. [ food for the line eater ] -- John F. Haugh II +----Make believe quote of the week---- VoiceNet: (214) 250-3311 Data: -6272 | Nancy Reagan on Richard Stallman: InterNet: jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US | "Just say `Gno'" UucpNet : <backbone>!killer!rpp386!jfh +--------------------------------------
jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) (10/25/88)
In article <2198@looking.UUCP> brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) writes: >The idea behind a good working anarchy is that you don't talk, you DO. >In the end, that's what will happen anyway. I'm not ready to give up on a benevolent dictatorship. I'd prefer free chocolate and dancing girls with my newsfeed, but I'll settle for some manner of organization. -- John F. Haugh II +----Make believe quote of the week---- VoiceNet: (214) 250-3311 Data: -6272 | Nancy Reagan on Richard Stallman: InterNet: jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US | "Just say `Gno'" UucpNet : <backbone>!killer!rpp386!jfh +--------------------------------------
karl@triceratops.cis.ohio-state.edu (Karl Kleinpaste) (10/25/88)
jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) writes:
I'm not ready to give up on a benevolent dictatorship.
It seems that the net as a whole was. And my recent attempt to reform
the relevant mailing list is bordering on failure after only 2 weeks'
existence.
--Karlwoods@ncar.ucar.edu (Greg Woods) (10/26/88)
In article <8187@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US> jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) writes: >What we need is a smaller backbone with members selected by the community. >It was claimed, true or false I won't say, that Rick Adams and Greg Woods >were directly responsible for comp.society.women being held hostage. Whether it is true or not, you have slandered my name in public by making such a charge, and I demand to see your evidence. I claim you're full of it. All I did was post my opinions, just as you and everyone else did. Being on the "backbone" (in the old sense) or "the committee" (in the new sense) does not, as far as I know, mean that you no longer get to have any personal opinions. One could just as easily claim that Gene Spafford, who favored the group, rammed it down everybody's throats. And it would be equally ridiculous to do so. Even on the backbone we more-or-less went by majority rule. As a particular example, comp.society.women DID get created. The reason it took so long was because it was such a controversial issue, not because I or Rick opposed it in particular. There were *many* people on *both* sides of the issue who felt strongly about it. It was necessary to discover who was in the majority first. --Greg
jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) (10/27/88)
In article <895@ncar.ucar.edu> woods@handies.UCAR.EDU (Greg Woods) writes: >In article <8187@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US> jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) writes: >>What we need is a smaller backbone with members selected by the community. >>It was claimed, true or false I won't say, that Rick Adams and Greg Woods >>were directly responsible for comp.society.women being held hostage. > > Whether it is true or not, you have slandered my name in public by making >such a charge, and I demand to see your evidence. I claim you're full of it. He later goes to prove that I was not full of it ... >All I did was post my opinions, just as you and everyone else did. Being >on the "backbone" (in the old sense) or "the committee" (in the new sense) >does not, as far as I know, mean that you no longer get to have any personal >opinions. The newsgroup was duly and properly voted on, according to established procedures. There was no claim that the newsgroup was frivilious or a farce, as there was with comp.protocols.tpc-ip.eniac. The group passed by a more than healthy margin with a large number of votes. There was some discussion regarding the name of the group, however, that issue was resolved almost immediately. There was no discussion regarding the legality or propriety of the group as there has been in the past with rec.sex or rec.drugs. At that point, you, as a member of the backbone *DON'T* have an opinion. You have an obligation to perform your responsibility. Come November 8th when the voters in this country elect an electoral college to select the president, the members of that college will not have as an option doing something other than performing their responsibility. > It was necessary to discover who was in >the majority first. Said task having been performed prior to your decision to raise a fuss, I think my claim that you and Rick held the group hostage over threats of unilaterally rmgroup'ing it after its creation, is correct. -- John F. Haugh II +----Make believe quote of the week---- VoiceNet: (214) 250-3311 Data: -6272 | Nancy Reagan on Richard Stallman: InterNet: jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US | "Just say `Gno'" UucpNet : <backbone>!killer!rpp386!jfh +--------------------------------------
wes@obie.UUCP (Barnacle Wes) (10/27/88)
In article <17793@glacier.STANFORD.EDU>, jbn@glacier.STANFORD.EDU (John B. Nagle) writes: > As for "comp.sys.next", within one week of the NeXT product announcement, > the appropriate newsgroup had been created and was in full operation, and > traffic in other newsgroups on that subject was starting to fall off. > The system worked. In a few weeks, someone will surely kill "alt.next" as > redundant, and the process will be complete. Oh? Well apparently the control message to create comp.sys.next did not propagate this far out into "the sticks." Perhaps one of my upstream sites was kind (smart?) enought to kill it. I read news.all regularly, and I don't recall seeing a discussion about comp.sys.next, or a call for votes. I also don't recall an announcement of the new group. The first I heard of it was that someone at Umich created it without consulting anyone. Who says the process is working? Perhaps I should go create rec.boats.sailing to get rid of all those stinkpot owners and windsurfers, and then rec.boats.sailing.j-boats to get rid of Capri and Catalina owners, and other lower life forms? This is exactly the reason the voting rules were initiated in the first place, isn't it? It doesn't require "overplanning" as you say, just obeying the rules that are alread in place. -- "The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell "How come he didn't put `I think' at the end of it?" - James P. Hogan
woods@ncar.ucar.edu (Greg Woods) (10/28/88)
In article <8280@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US> jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) writes: [about comp.society.women] >There was >some discussion regarding the name of the group, however, that issue was >resolved almost immediately. There was no discussion regarding the >legality or propriety of the group as there has been in the past with >rec.sex or rec.drugs. > This is simply not true. There was a HUGE debate about the name, which raged on for weeks, and another even more heated debate about whether socially-oriented groups belong under comp at all. The group's creation was "held up" while this larger issue was resolved. And I certainly didn't hold it up single handedly; it was Gene's decision (and a smart one, supported by the majority of the backbone admins) to wait for the larger issue to be resolved before creating the group. And Gene himself favored creating the group as proposed (remarkably impartial conduct on his part, I'd say). >At that point, you, as a member of the backbone *DON'T* have an opinion. >You have an obligation to perform your responsibility. One thing people tend to forget: my only "responsibility" in the strictest sense is to my employer. They are the ones who pay my salary. If my boss decided (for whatever reasons) that he didn't want a certain group carried on our machine, I would have no choice but to honor his request despite the outcome of any netwide votes or discussions. In this particular case, once ALL the issues were resolved, the group was created. >> It was necessary to discover who was in >>the majority first. > >Said task having been performed prior to your decision to raise a fuss, Wrong. Discussion had been going on on the backbone list ever since the group was first proposed, long before the netwide vote was completed, about whether this group and other like it (such as comp.society, comp.edu and comp.risks) really belonged in the comp heirarchy. There was even some discussion about moving some of the existing groups out of comp. Repeat: this discussion started BEFORE the vote was completed. It did, due to its controversial nature, take longer than the vote did. The discussion didn't go netwide until the vote was over and people began calling for creation of the group. It was then necessary to explain the reason for the delay. >I think my claim that you and Rick held the group hostage over threats of >unilaterally rmgroup'ing it after its creation, is correct. And I still say you're full of it. I never threatened to rmgroup anything. Rick may have, but I didn't. What Rick did was HIS decision; I had no part in it. All I did was vigorously oppose the placement of the group in the comp heirarchy by stating my opinions on the subject. And I still don't think it belongs there, but nevertheless the group is being carried there on my site. --Greg
nyssa@terminus.UUCP (The Prime Minister) (10/28/88)
I don't really want to get into this firefight, but I felt that John F. Haugh II made a mistake here which needs a little bit of correction... In article <8280@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US> jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US (The Beach Bum) writes: >At that point, you, as a member of the backbone *DON'T* have an opinion. >You have an obligation to perform your responsibility. Come November 8th >when the voters in this country elect an electoral college to select the >president, the members of that college will not have as an option doing >something other than performing their responsibility. The people selected as electors to the electoral college are in no way bound to vote for any candidate. History is "littered" with instances when an elector voted against his previously expressed preference, the most recent being in 1976, when Ronald Reagan got a vote from an elector from Washington state. Perhaps the comparison you were looking for was that of a delegate to the national convention? BTW- I disagree with this view; if the then backbone didn't have the right to express their own discretion, then finding backbone sites would have been very difficult. -- James C. Armstrong, Jr nyssa@terminus.UUCP
spaf@cs.purdue.edu (Gene Spafford) (10/28/88)
Let me suggest that if this thread of discussion is to continue that
names not be included as "examples." During the comp.women debacle,
there was considerable strong opinion on each of *many* (not just two
diametricly opposed) sides. There were some people all for the group
as stated, some violently opposed to putting it anywhere but talk, and
some who threatened to never carry it or to start a rmgroup war.
The key is, that everyone on the backbone list expressing an opinion
was a long-time, concerned admin. The names aren't especially
important unless you're trying to cause further strife. People like
Erik Fair, Rick Adams, Greg Woods, Mel Pleasant, Mark Horton and myself
(to drop just a few of the names) were all involved, and I think no two
of us shared the same opinion on the subject. That is the significant
factor -- not who said what.
A compromise was reached that was satisfactory for the moderator, and
which was grudgingly approved by almost all parties involved. No one
was especially excited about the compromise (that's the nature of
compromises), but the group got created in some form and has had a lot
of worthwhile (IMHO) traffic since. I don't believe anyone has refused
to carry the group, and no rmgroups were issued on it. As such, the
compromise was a roaring success.
The *process* is the matter of interest here. It did not work
smoothly, it pointed up some major flaws in the system, and it gave
some of us a slightly different insight into ourselves and the others
taking a stand on the issue. If anything needs to be debated or
discussed, let's do that without impugning any of the personalities
involved. Without naming names, let me note that *everyone* taking an
extreme stand on the issue has also devoted an incredible amount of
time and effort to the Usenet, and in almost every other way deserves
to be recognized as a valuable net-citizen.
Besides which, these folks are my friends so it pains me to see people
abuse them in public....
--
Gene Spafford
NSF/Purdue/U of Florida Software Engineering Research Center,
Dept. of Computer Sciences, Purdue University, W. Lafayette IN 47907-2004
Internet: spaf@cs.purdue.edu uucp: ...!{decwrl,gatech,ucbvax}!purdue!spafheiby@mcdchg.chi.il.us (Ron Heiby) (11/03/88)
The Beach Bum (jfh@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US) writes: > At that point, you, as a member of the backbone *DON'T* have an opinion. > You have an obligation to perform your responsibility. Come November 8th > when the voters in this country elect an electoral college to select the > president, the members of that college will not have as an option doing > something other than performing their responsibility. You imply that the electors have no choice as to how they cast their votes. I would challenge you to site a reference to the U.S. Constitution that supports this view. If the President-elect dies between the popular vote and the electoral voting, the elector has no obligation to vote for a dead person. Just because 99.99% of the time, the electors do go along with the popular vote that elected *them*, doesn't mean that they *have* to. Their responsibility is to cast a vote. The Constitution says nothing about for whom they must cast their vote. When the Constitution was written, there wasn't even a popular vote for President! I really don't want to start arguing the past all over again. I'd be happy to tell you my views via private email. -- Ron Heiby, heiby@mcdchg.chi.il.us Moderator: comp.newprod "There is a fine line between stupidity and cleverness." (This is Spinal Tap)