msb@sq.UUCP (10/14/87)
I just posted and quickly Canceled an article, because as I hit s to send, I realized I needed to add a paragraph. It occurs to me that articles are canceled for many different reasons. I think it would be nice if the C command in rn, and the corresponding commands in other news interfaces, would ask for a one-line comment explaining why the article was canceled. Thus: Because I posted to the wrong group Because I want to retract what I said Because I realized I was asking for something illegal Because my boss is censoring me To fix some typos This would replace the present one-liner that says something like "canceled from rn". Why? Well, because of my next idea. The cancel message should appear as a message in the newsgroup as well as, or even instead of, appearing in the "control" newsgroup, which almost nobody reads. Then, when a canceled message evokes followups, the readers of the followups will be able to figure out what happened, and maybe some flame wars will die down faster. Is this a good idea? Mark Brader "That's what progress is for. Progress SoftQuad Inc., Toronto is for creating new forms of aggravation." utzoo!sq!msb, msb@sq.com -- Keith Jackson