chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) (12/22/89)
It always amazes me how USENET (including myself) can get itself hyped up about things that Do Not Matter. We spend hours and megabytes nitpicking about comma placement in newsgroup guidelines, when the fact is the guidelines are unenforceable and meaningless. People build the hype with emotionally charged words like 'rape' or 'fascist' so that the discussion immediately drops into one of emotional, subjective flamage rather than trying define problems and find answers. We spend endless hours arguing trivia, and no time discussing the real problems: high volume, high noise, abusive posters, incorrect 'facts' and incompetent 'experts'. The 'rape' of USENET? It's something that's been going on for years. We had this argument over GEnie before. What happened? Nothing. We had this argument over Portal before. What happened? Nothing. We had this argument over commercial public access systems before. What happened? Nothing. We had this argument over CompuServe before. What happened? Nothing. Now we're having this discussion again. The same people will roll out the same emotionally-laden and factually empty rhetoric. The same people will disagree with their normal opponents. The same names will be used to call the same people the same nasty things. Lines and lines and megabytes will flow, emotions will run high and nasty stuff will be said that anyone with any reason will later regret. What will happen? Nothing. So why bother? There are lots of *real* problems on USENET that go wanting because they aren't 'easy', there's no 'quick fix' and because they'd take work. They also don't lend themselves well to rhetoric, argument or emotional flamage. So they get ignored. So nothing happens. So why bother? On the other hand, we'll go from argument to argument, with the same people yelling the same things at each other regardless of topic, creating topics out of thin air if one peters out without a convenient crisis at hand. So why bother? Because USENET is not an information network, it's an argument network. We're not here to help each other, we're here to yell at each other. Arguing is fun, it's time-consuming, it generates egoboo and responses. it's easy. Fixing problems takes work. It's easier to yell at someone else for not having fixed it. So why bother? Let's have an argument instead. We won't fix anything, but we can prove how politically correct we are, and then we can go on to some argument knowing we fought the good fight, and if it didn't solve anything, well, we did our best. -- Chuq Von Rospach <+> chuq@apple.com <+> [This is myself speaking] For herein may be seen noble chivalry, courtesy, humanity, friendliness, cowardice, murder, hate, virtue and sin. Do after the good and leave the evil, and it shall bring you to good fame and renown. -- Malory