mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) (09/26/86)
Greg Woods writes, in the following hot-headed exchange with Gene Smith: >> > Any group that meets the criteria for a talk >> >group (non-technical in nature, high volume and a low signal/flame ratio) >> >is a candidate for moving to talk. [Woods] >> For the fiftieth time, this is NOT the criterion for creating a "talk" >> group. Those CLAIMS, if you check out the recent traffic, are so much >> <insert rude adjective> LIES. Two highly technical groups have been made >> talk: *.{philosophy.tech,politics.arms-d}. There are NO flames in either >> such group. > These groups, according to a consensus of backbone SA's and other long-time >netters, are NOT considered technical. Period. Gene is, of course, entitled >to his opinion; you'll never get EVERYONE to agree on the definition of >"technical". Our opinion disagrees with Gene's, that's the bottom line. Fine. I have no opinion on philo.tech, but there seems to be some counter-consensus that some CS types have real technical use for the group. As far as arms-d is concerned, the backbone SA's are quite wrong. Arms-d is one of the few groups on the net that has good technical discussion on political issues. It's being killed off (I mean, the distribution is being forced back into the mails-- I can't understand why any backbone site thinks that the messages aren't going to pass through his site) on the basis of guilt by association. >> What it all boils down to, is there were some backbone people whose >> FAVORITE fatso cow was net.singles, but NO ONE for the other talk groups. > That may be true. The current system is far from perfect, but it sure >beats endless rounds of flames and personal attacks resulting in nothing >getting done, which is what has happened several times in the past when >reorganization was proposed in front of the entire net. Not the most >desireable situation, but that's the way it is. Face it, Gene; you're just >pissed off because YOUR favorite "fatso cow" got moved to "talk", and you >want to whine about it in front of the whole net. Well, frankly, I am unimpressed by the presentations of both sides here as far as tone is concerned. But more importantly, since it has been determined by the backbone that they will decide all issues, they've created a situation where now it is necessary to attack issues with this sort of petitionary fervor-- Woods seems to have conveniently forgotten the net.motss debacle at the beginning of the reorg stuff. >> These backboners did not even know what mod.philosophy.tech was ABOUT >> when they did their renaming scheme. > mod.philosphy.tech was created AFTER the renaming scheme was started, >as a last-ditch effort to avoid getting moved to talk. A good idea, >but too late. *mod* maybe. But there was movement in net.philosophy to split the group well before the reorg was proposed. A group had developed which wanted to discuss philosophical issues concerning mathematics and AI. THis simply wann't in tune with the philosophical issues that net.philo more typically deals with. C G W