webber@klinzhai.RUTGERS.EDU (Webber) (04/28/87)
In article <7961@utzoo.UUCP>, henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer) writes: > > Moderation does not mean quality improvement, it just means that you > > end up with what the moderator thinks is the good stuff. Remember > > Sturgeon's Law, that 90+% of everything is garbage, was generated in > > edited journals containing the publications of professional writers. > > Most people disagree about what is the good stuff. > > On the contrary, there is usually general agreement about what is excellent > and what is real trash; the differences of opinion arise in the broad band > of quality in between. By and large, the most important role of moderators > is just to exclude the trash and reduce duplication in the middle range. Oh. Do you think editors intentionly publish 90%+ junk or that professional writers intentionally write 90%+ junk. For that matter, if there was general agreement as to quality, who would publish these `inferior' postings that you are so concerned about. Clearly the poster thought they had merit. For that matter, probably the poster's friends thought they did too. Of course people who thought the poster's point of view was entirely worthless probably didn't, but they probably will post replies that the original poster will think were without merit. And people who don't care about the issue under discussion will think that both postings were without merit. It works like this whether people are discussing a BOF at usenix or RISC vs CISC. Of course, if you hang out only with people that think like you, you could come to believe everyone sees things the same. However, if you spent some time reading news, you would see that there are many viewpoints on every issue and many shades of response. While you may choose not to adopt all of them, to needlessly suppress them is sad. > There is nothing particularly harmful about this, and the net improvement > in average quality is considerable. Average quality? Is that an oxymoron or something? I could care less about average quality. I am interested in TOTAL QUALITY. If you broadcast one less message than technically possible, then you have diminished it. And yes it is harmful -- it harms everyone who was denied access to that opinion. ------------------- BOB (webber@aramis.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!topaz!webber)