edhew@xenitec.on.ca (Ed Hew) (11/27/89)
Again, please note that the following comments are made in the spirit
of suggesting alternatives. I am not necessarily expounding them as
being the only correct possible alternative, merely *an* alternative.
Indeed, there is a significant problem here with the theory that all
newsreaders (being an intrinsic part of USENET) should perhaps have
direct input on matters affecting newsgroup creation, modification,
and removal. On the other hand, should site administrators (and their
appointees) be involved in direct control of the voting mechanism as
opposed to indirect? [Note that any administrator can control a person's
vote simply by granting/denying them an account; thereby forcing that
person to go elsewhere or perhaps impliment their own site.] All this
is part of the larger discussion.
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[In the message "Re: Some observations on this whole mess.", Christopher Davis <ckd@bu-pub.bu.edu writes... ]
CD">>>>> On 13 Nov 89 07:10:55 GMT, edhew@xenitec.on.ca (Ed Hew) said:
CD"
CD"Ed> [...only sysadmins/newsadmins would vote on new groups...] Would such
CD"Ed> a system be viable or even desireable? Should all valid votes
CD"Ed> originate from "usenet@site_name" ?
CD"
CD"Or news@site, or root@site? Not everyone uses 'usenet'. Modifying that
CD"slightly and saying it has to come from the listed contact from the map
CD"entry... well, maybe. Assuming that the sys/newsadmin (admin hereafter)
CD"votes, and that nobody's forging the admin's mail, and that the system even
CD"*has* a news or system administrator...
Forgeries in a hotly contested vote would of course be a problem, but
not any more so than the current situation allows. In order to eliminate
the problem we have to eliminate the current holes in the transport
mechanism that allow this. If I had a ready solution to that one, I
win a popularity contest.
CD"Ed> Would one vote per site be viable?
CD"
CD"Sounds good to me. But I want all those NNTP workstation votes. Maybe I
CD"should take gnus-use-generic-from out of my .emacs file--I could get votes
CD"for bucsb, bucsf, bu-pub, bass, corona, miller, pabst, stpauli, labatts,
CD"harp, molson, xx, ...
CD"
CD"I don't think so, in other words.
CD"
CD" Christopher Davis, BU SMG '90 <ckd@bu-pub.bu.edu> <smghy6c@buacca.bitnet>
In order for a one vote/site method to work, there would have to be
a suitable agreement on exactly "what is a site". The current definition
would IMHO be that if you're registered on the uucp project maps (or
"equivalent" Internet domain, etc.), then you are a "site". Of course,
anyone wanting to load a vote would merely contribute to making our
map dirs much larger. A more stringent definition than the current
guidelines would be required. This would again cause a controversy
as to whether controls on "who can/should register" are desireable.
I myself would probably be amoungst the first to comment that site
registration should be as currently accepted - you put it up, you
maintain it, you can register it. I however do recall somewhere
reading guidelines that "internal" sites should be handled by means
of an organizational top level registration. Perhaps someone with
a better memory than mine is welcome to expound on that point.
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In article <1629@crdos1.crd.ge.COM> on 15 Nov 89 17:33:19 GMT davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr) writes:
BD" It brings up the question of why one site with 40 readers has less
BD"influence than 10 readers on workstations. And how do I count the people
BD"reading via rrn? Do I count readers (~1000), workstations (~300) or
BD"copies of the articles on disk (1).
The point here is simply whether newsreaders would be voting (one vote
per person) or whether it would be one vote per site. My suggestion would
be to use the latter (one vote per site). The method arrived at on any
individual site to either appoint or elect the vote-issuer would of course
vary. One extreme would be a privately, corporately or otherwise centrally
owned and controlled site where the owner has the final say and may or may
not choose to share his "power" with the peons :-). The other extreme would
be a cooperately owned and financed site where all who participate do so
not just to consume resources but to in actuality provide (read: pay) for
them. Of course, you could have any number of situations in between.
The purpose here is that it would place internal site-politics where they
belong - within the given site, thereby sparing the net of the petty
bickering we've witnessed recently. Joe User would take his complaints
to his site-monarch, his site-president, his site-dictator. If JoeU can't
stomach the rulership of his site, he can cecede and form his own political
entity (knowing full well that when he does so he becomes the autocrat with
full power within his dominion - and of course has the headaches and
expenses, not to mention users of his own to deal with).
BD" I'm not knocking your proposal, just noting that it brings up issues
BD"on its own. My suggestion that votes by sysdms only *weighted by phone
BD"bills* was intended to spur some better suggestions, but all the people
BD"who don't pay the bills think I'm trying to disenfranchise them. I am.
BD"
BD"bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen)
I suppose that what I've outlined above would only provide a "vote" to
those who pay for that right (it really isn't *that* expensive), and
are prepared to accept the ongoing responsibility that being directly
enfranchised entails. Yes, it would be true that this would
"dis-enfranchise" many people, but then again, try and vote at a
National Hockey League Board of Directors meeting (eg) without first
*purchasing* a franchise.
There are precedents. Just look at any of our legislative representative
bodies in government. We don't sit in our parliaments. People either
elected or appointed by either the population or _other_bodies_ do,
depending on the body we're talking about and the country we live in.
(When's the last time you directly voted for the Supreme Court members?)
Sometimes we have voted for them, more often we haven't. Usually we
don't agree with what they do.
Mechanisms to impliment virtually anything can be developed given a desire
to do so. The question we must considering resolving is: Do we want to
do it this way in USENET, and if so, are we correct in taking this stance?
Ed. A. Hew Authorized Technical Trainer Xeni/Con Corporation
work: edhew@xenicon.uucp -or- ..!{uunet!}utai!lsuc!xenicon!edhew
->home: edhew@xenitec.on.ca -or- ..!{uunet!}watmath!xenitec!edhew
# Justice is only relative to what you can afford to prove in court.