huver@amgraf.UUCP (Huver) (09/24/88)
Most "problem" articles result from inadequate understanding on what the
newsgroups are about. To remove this type of articles via moderation
would require lots of time, time that no one really has.
Aside from having all news administrators perform "good" work educating
their local users, the one thing we really need is:
A better local newsgroup access control method.
Suppose we add to the article posting programs one more restriction of
who can post to what groups? A file that lists top newsgroups followed by
user logins, for example:
news usenet, newsadmin, root
comp newsadmin ellen, tomk, ... \
(and more)
gnu ...
can be set up easily. This way, local filtering can be done with little
pain, and it is more effective than centralized moderation. Optionally,
this may be extended to apply to reading newsgroups as well (see below).
And to William B. Thacker's posting on USENET "pandering obscenity or
contributing to the delinquency of minors" (by letting 12 year-olds read
alt.sex):
This is a responsibility of the local news administrator. Currently, one
can set up the system NOT to accept certain groups; or write up a shell
script to remove articles from unwanted groups. Either way, these groups
will be "empty" to all local users, 12 or 21 year-olds alike.
But if the above proposal gets implemented on reading newsgroups, then a
news admin can grant access to selected users. If a news admin then lets
a 12 year-old read alt.sex, that news admin is liable, not USENET itself
(who really is just an entity like any public media; and in my opinion,
the best one).
--
"You laugh at FSF? Just think: the Japanese give money, equipment, and loan
personnel to FSF!" -huver {uunet!kitrain, plus5}!amgraf!huverwisner@killer.DALLAS.TX.US (Bill Wisner) (09/25/88)
> news usenet, newsadmin, root > comp newsadmin ellen, tomk, ... \ > (and more) > gnu ... No need to bastardize the news sources further. #define FASCIST and put this in your authorized file. usenet:news.all newsadmin:news.all,comp.all root:news.all ellen:comp.all tomk:comp.all wisner:all,all.all
lear@NET.BIO.NET (Eliot Lear) (09/25/88)
I don't think we should use the FASCISM bit on this group as I would still like to believe that good ideas and questions can come from people other than news administrators. As far as kill files are concerned, I think that having one person filter a group is easier than have lots of others do it. -- Eliot Lear [lear@net.bio.net]
jane@tolerant.UUCP (Jane Medefesser) (09/27/88)
In article <5622@killer.DALLAS.TX.US> (Bill Wisner) writes: >> news usenet, newsadmin, root >> comp newsadmin ellen, tomk, ... \ >> (and more) >> gnu ... > >No need to bastardize the news sources further. > >#define FASCIST and put this in your authorized file. > >usenet:news.all >newsadmin:news.all,comp.all >root:news.all >ellen:comp.all >tomk:comp.all >wisner:all,all.all Bear in mind that a lot of news installations - like this one - are not administered by the System Admin department, but by an individual from another department who has voluntered to do so because the sysadmins are just too busy. With this in mind, can you imagine what a can of worms could develop if everyone were required to maitain an "authorized" file? I for one have no idea from day to day when a new user is added to the system, and even when I AM aware, I can't determine whether or not that person will be a news reader. Our /etc/password file currently has about 250 user entrys because we don't delete old accounts (we inactivate the password). This would be a really difficult thing to administer here and at other sites like this. Again, I support moderation - and I like the idea a previous poster made about renaming news.admin to news.newsadmin (or something like that) to make a more clear distinction between the NEWS administration group and the SYSTEM administration group.
wisner@killer.DALLAS.TX.US (Bill Wisner) (09/28/88)
You can authorize by group, as well as by user, with FASCIST set.