karl@giza.cis.ohio-state.edu (Karl Kleinpaste) (12/22/89)
If you have not read <15158@well.UUCP> in comp.sys.atari.st, please do so. It is the parent of this article, so if your newsreader supports a direct move-to-parent operation, you can get there easily. Dave Small has shut down the link for the technical and political reasons expressed, and is now working on convincing GEnie to redo it the right way. Brad, it has not become illegal to be a read-only site; but it was improper for the users of such a site to be _forced_ to be read-only. Quoting Dave's first paragraph: | After receiving mail on some concerns people have had with the | USENet -> GEnie uplink, I've gone ahead and shut it down. It won't be back | up unless those concerns are resolved to everyone's satisfaction. --Karl
dsmall@well.UUCP (David Small) (12/24/89)
Howdy. I see quite a few messages concerning me and the USENET->Genie Uplink, and before any more net bandwidth is wasted, I want to say: it's off, and it's staying off. What basically happened is this. I feel GEnie should become a USENET site, with full, two-way communications, email, some method to not stress the net with too many GEnie messages (probably a seperate "USENET" category on GEnie). I feel this would be mutually beneficial to the Net and to GEnie; both places have, in the case of comp.sys.atari.st, experts available nowhere else. For instance, Allan Pratt's insights into TOS 1.4 here are priceless; Jim Allen's insights in the LS373 problem / EPROM TOS 1.4 are equally priceless, in terms of helping out ordinary people with their machines. I've found GEnie to be remarkably flexible and open to new ideas; they are willing to try ideas that other networks would not. A quick look through their new RoundTables will show you that. They are young and take risks; that's how they came to compete with Compuserve. I discussed the USENET link with one of the more knowledgeable GEnie execs, and we thought we could at least give it a try. See, when selling companies on something, it's the old writer's adage, "show, don't say". You have to SHOW them what it will do for them. They already know the ST area's popularity; I wanted to show them USENET and its style. It's a valuable resource, and I believe a link between it and GEnie would be mutually beneficial (with proper controlers, never fear). So I set up a kludgy, tiresome,and not very reliable thing to bring some notes over, just to show one way it could be done. It's written in BASIC and runs on two machines. It is *definitely* not something I want to run the rest of my life,or to the end of next month! Sheeesh, sneakernets are a pain. This allowed a *very few* GEnie management people to look at the content, say, hmmmm, this seems like a good thing. A few other areas than the Atari area expressed interest as well; I see this has been twisted by Diane Close into me "trying to license technology to GEnie for other areas", when that "technology" is some lousy, sneaker-netted BASIC code.The *idea* was the thing, that exchanging information would benefit everybody. So, I announced what I'd done in the comp.sys.atari.st area, and didn't do a very good job;it was late and I was tired. I didn't give the full view,of bringing GEnie up 2-way and with email, with them being an information source, and not just a drain. I got what I deserved, which was to be flamed. I also got a little more than I deserved, which was a sort of "guilty until proven innocent" flame about how I was "raping UNIX". This really offended me deeply; I had a close friend get raped, and I know what the word means. I don't claim a rational reaction to it. It seems I had been misinterpreted into I was planning on running a 1-way link forever to Rape Unix and make Big Bucks. I've made nothing off the link and have said I will not. Period. I was doing it for freedom of information exchange,not for profit. I've made nothing and that's that. So, I received many notes from the original post, raising questions I had not thought of (or heard of). Some mentioned: 1) Anthology copyright. I know Compuserve tried an anthology copyright, but don't know how it worked out. I remember talking to Scott Mace / Infoworld about it some time ago. If GEnie ever tried to pull that on USENET notes, I'd drop the link instantly. As is, it's an extremely valid point, I agree we can't have it, and I'll tell GEnie that as a base rule. 2) 2-way communications. Genie must not just be a drain but a source. I agree. Another base rule. [But cut me a bit of slack; a link from GEnie to USENET is FAR harder to do, and I had to whip up a BASIC demo to show the *possibility*. The intent was always there.] By the time I'd read the first day's letters, I'd already suspended the link; the second day's finished it. It's off and WILL STAY OFF until all these issues are resolved satisfactorily, to EVERYONE. AFTER that, naturally, we got The Rape of USENET and a very self-justifying note about how it was necessary to "mobilize action". A real "Full Nixon" defense there ... a few quiet letters pointed out these problems, and I pulled the plug. As it said in my original note, "I am not here to cause problems to anyone ... if anyone has problems with this, drop me a line.". Little did I know I was dealing with a system that had already been burned in this area. Nearly all the letter writers, and those in comp.sys.atari.st, favor the link,provided a) it doesn't stress the area with low signal/noise chatter, b)is 2-way, and c) gives email.It's handy for everyone. (Sheesh, someone is already chiding me for "giving in and dropping the link... give me a break. It was the right thing to do,obviously, and I tried to react as quickly as possible.) Now it IS the holidays; the GEnie people I talk to, who seem sane, are off. I'll bring all this up with them when they get back, and I'd be willing to bet they'll agree that these are reasonable conditions. I think that both USENET and GEnie can then reach a mutually beneficial agreement to share information, handle the copyright hassle, and move forward. I think you would be surprised at just how much flex there is at GEnie,and willingness to try new ideas; they did, after all, eat Compuserve alive, and staid companies don't do that. I really, honestly didn't mean to offend anyone. If I did so, I apologize. My intent was solely to provide means for USENET to show what it could do to GEnie, to get some solid link set up, a la The WELL or PORTAL. (I use both and am well pleased with them). If I didn't think GEnie would go for it, or at least have a good chance of it, I wouldn't be wasting my time; I am not twiddling my thumbs here at my regular job at Gadgets. I just meant to a be a catalyst to get things going and help some people out; that's what freedom of information exchange means to me, personally. I am a bit offended at the "guilty, guilty, guilty until proven innocent" I got, but looking back, I didn't write all that clearly where all this was headed, so it's partly my fault. Diane's original "Rape of Net"is a real problem; Diane knows Mark, a beta tester for my company that's involved on GEnie, but who doesn't know the full story of what's going on, and persists in seeing dark motives in anything. For instance, it's pure nonsense that I'm going to "license" my oh-so-hot BASIC and shoes to GEnie; and go "ravage" other newsgroups -- why, GEnie would look at my link and laugh themselves sick. The whole thing came from one conversation with GEnie; if we got a 2-way link up, then other groups would probably be interested. That's it -- no money -- no license -- no Dark Plot -- no nothing. I haven't heard about it since until Diane quoted it as FACT from a "High Gadgets Source". So I hope I've laid to rest worries about what I'm doing, and no one's hiring hit-men to virus my machine... (see what I mean about blown out of proportion?) Here's where it goes from here. The link is down and stays down until everyone thinks it should go up; even then, I think a trial period only is in order. It could well be the systems aren't compatible in style and tone. I won't tolerate a GEnie anthology copyright, and neither should you. The link has to be 2-way and that takes some code writing. Email should be brought up. (Interestingly, email is the one totally non-controversial part of this; every letter I got supported an email link if nothing else). I think I've managed to let GEnie's management see the potential for USENET, as well as other Sysops there who have never been exposed to USENET. They'd love to become a site and be able to contribute, and benefit, as things should be. As for GEnie's charges, they are quite low, and look, I pay the Well and have no objection to it. Someone has to maintain the mainframes and pay the link charges. I don't mind leaving that choice to the individual. I personally think that the GEnie users who will be interested in USENET will be more of the same that we have here; the technically proficient users, and in the ST world, a number of C and assembly language programmers. But that's a long ways down the pike. So look. I could have handled this better; I focussed my attention more on the link, which was bad enough, then on the people end. I apologize. I do think much positive has come of this; there are many people who want a link to GEnie, BUT only if it is full. I agree. And they don't want stupid copyright hassles and anysuch. (Incidentally, remember this is an *experiment* on GEnie's part. They're interested. It is possible some do not understand that and might spout rules about copyright, but one of my first priorities is to get them to lift that rule for anything coming into the NET or going out to it. Don't expect them to be 100% on the ball; I know many organizations that wouldn't even try this idea). I would ask that next time, before we hang GEnie before finding out the facts, that someone write a quiet note or two finding out what's going on. Letter writing campaigns to GEnie? Huh? There's a bad need for a reality check here. I will keep the Net informed of what happens. Don't expect immediate action; this is a bureaucracy, after all. But at the same time, let's not fly off the handle based off the information contained in one pretty innaccurate, very emotional note, based mostly off of heard it from a friend of a friend, okay? So look, it's the holidays! Enough of this. The matter is settled, hopefully things will go forward in a way where everyone benefits. Anyone who cares to help out on an email interface is more than welcome to drop me a line here; in the meantime, I'll try to continue to support comp.sys. atari.st, as I've been doing over the last two years. I'm happy to have this chance to shed some light onto this whole unfortunate misunderstanding. -- happy & *safe* holdays, okay? -- -- thanks, Dave / Gadgets