mjc@nl.cs.cmu.edu (Monica Cellio) (12/01/88)
While many sites don't benefit directly from Internet, a lot of Usenet's traffic is gatewayed through the Internet. No, a random usenet site isn't going to get in trouble if one of its users violates Internet rules, but the gateway sites *are* in danger when this happens. That's why we should try to be reasonable with respect to Internet rules; if we lose the gateways because they're afraid of losing their Internet rights, where will we be? How hard would it be to modify the news software at gateway sites to reject a distribution field of, say, "usenet-only"? No, I'm not a news hacker, and I don't know how distributions are implemented in general. But if such a thing is reasonably easy, it might be a way to make everyone happy -- go ahead and violate Internet rules if you like, *but* include the special distribution so no one has to get in trouble for it. -- "As a description of a highly sophisticated technological achievement, 'Avon's gadget works' is somewhat lacking in class." UUCP: seismo!cmu-cs-k!mjc ARPA: monica.cellio@nl.cs.cmu.edu --