dyer@spdcc.COM (Steve Dyer) (08/31/88)
I have been missing all of the responses from Mark Horton, et. al, other
than those which were quoted by others and surrounded by their own
exclamation points.
A volunteer effort which offers services without charge can respond
with emotion and handwaving, but once you start charging a fee, especially
a sizable one, you really owe your clientele a bit more. Let me remind
Mark that he was unable to offer spdcc.COM the "service" of having
more than one mail forwarding site (i.e. more than one MX record
for the case of the primary forwarder being down) because the unpaid
volunteer who managed the database thought that it was just "too much
trouble" to organize things that way and he refused. End of discussion.
I wondered what my $150 counted for, when I could (and can) contact the
NIC directly to get this trivially, for no charge. I see a volunteer
mentality attempting to operate under a fee structure.
I should add that my sentiments tend to be with the folks who
are questioning the recurrent dues (and I am one site which has
paid once for the 1st year and not again.) $150/yr seems excessive
and arbitrary to a good number of people, considering the nature of
the service (a one-time administrative interchange with the NIC),
and it seems to me that the only appropriate response to such a
charge is to offer an accounting of how much in "dues" has been
taken in by the UUCP Project and how these monies have been spent.
Frankly, I'm quite willing to be persuaded, but you have to present
the facts, and keep the personal details out of the discussion.
--
Steve Dyer
dyer@harvard.harvard.edu
dyer@spdcc.COM aka {harvard,husc6,linus,ima,bbn,m2c,mipseast}!spdcc!dyer