lear@NET.BIO.NET (Eliot Lear) (09/21/88)
Recently, news.admin has contained messages in it that would make a mud throwing contest seem civilized. Most of it has stemmed from the discussion of Portal. Many have pointed out that the need for nettiquette. I suggest that moderation is the ultimate fulfillment of that need. The moderation would be of the losest level, since news.admin can harbor a broad variety of discussions. (One could argue that this, in itself is a problem, but I won't). I simply want to keep the conversation civilized. If no one else, I will volenteer to moderate. Note this is a call for discussion. If there is sufficient interest, I'll call for votes. Eliot -- Eliot Lear [lear@net.bio.net]
werner@utastro.UUCP (Werner Uhrig) (09/21/88)
> I suggest that moderation is [needed] ...
I've done so several times already; given that not that many
people read this group, I'd even suggest that it should not
be put to a vote but simply be decided on by the backbone
kabal - but they are hiding in their mailing-list and
don't pay much attention to this group anyway ...
it certainly should not be a matter of 100 votes, just a simple
majority ..... rules? what rules? nothign is cast in stone, and
they certainly don't apply to admins ... (-:
--
--------------------> PREFERED-RETURN-ADDRESS-FOLLOWS <---------------------
(ARPA) werner@rascal.ics.utexas.edu (Internet: 128.83.144.1)
(INTERNET) werner%rascal.ics.utexas.edu@cs.utexas.edu
(UUCP) ..!utastro!werner or ..!uunet!rascal.ics.utexas.edu!wernerrsk@mace.cc.purdue.edu (Rich Kulawiec) (09/21/88)
Yes, please. I really can't see how it would stifle the sort of useful discussion that goes on here; but it would cut out the uesless discussion that goes on here. I read this group because I'm a news admin and it seems that I need to read it; but I really don't like wading through a lot of the junk postings. ---Rsk
karl@triceratops.cis.ohio-state.edu (Karl Kleinpaste) (09/21/88)
werner@utastro.uucp writes:
I've [suggested moderation of news.admin] several times already;
given that not that many people read this group, I'd even suggest
that it should not be put to a vote but simply be decided on by the
backbone kabal - but they are hiding in their mailing-list and
don't pay much attention to this group anyway ...
False on two, possibly three, counts.
First, the backbone mailing list hasn't had any traffic in, say, 6
weeks or thereabouts. Not a thing. You can't `hide' behind something
which has not had any recognizable existence (recently).
Second, `they' cannot be counted on for a single, collective opinion
about anything. *I* read news.*; I even try to read at least a
substantial fraction of every single posting except in very rare
circumstances (e.g., empty MES attacks and the like). A number of
other backbone folks do as well. There are some who more-or-less
ignore it as a content-free flame-fest [mind you, I am not saying that
their opinion is wrong], but I have no idea if that's even a
substantial fraction, much less if it's a majority.
Third, it is not clear to me that the `backbone' exists in any
definable way at this point, other than as the mailing list alias
@rutgers.edu. This is largley due to discussion in mid-summer on the
list concerning whether it was `time to kill the backbone.' This was
initiated by Spaf, and debated among a number of people for a week or
two, and sometime thereafter Spaf made some mechanical changes to the
canonical news.lists postings to remove references to `backbone,'
generally replacing them with `well-connected hosts' or somesuch.
Does the backbone exist? You tell me.
One could always suggest, of course, that there has been no traffic in
the backbone list for the last several weeks because there's been
nothing in need of being addressed there.
--Karljane@tolerant.UUCP (Jane Medefesser) (09/22/88)
In article <Sep.20.18.27.20.1988.13663@NET.BIO.NET> lear@NET.BIO.NET (Eliot Lear) writes: >Recently, news.admin has contained messages in it that would make a >mud throwing contest seem civilized. Most of it has stemmed from >the discussion of Portal. Many have pointed out that the need for >nettiquette. I suggest that moderation is the ultimate fulfillment of >that need. Well I'll vote YES for moderation - at the worst, it will cut down on a lot of inappropriate cross-posting (a la MES) that don't really belong here. I'll even further my vote to include moderation of news.sysadmin as well. For the people who want to continue to flame or cross-post to news.admin, perhaps we can create a new group, a subgroup of news.admin called news.admin.bullshit or news.admin.whocares.... ============================================ (*Look, ma - no offensive quotes!!!*) Jane Medefesser uucp: {pyramid,mordor,oliveb,ucbvax}!tolerant!jane Usenet Administrator Tolerant Systems San Jose, Ca 95134
NMBCU@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU (09/22/88)
I'm also in favor of this newsgroup being moderated. As an administrator
on this net, I too can't stand wading thru the personal flames, in search
of useful articles. But I'm only in favor of it being moderated, if Gene
Spafford moderates. He already moderates at least one other newsgroup -
"NEWS.ANNOUNCE.NEWUSERS", and I've never seen anything in it that didn't
belong. If Spaf is too busy, but can suggest another trust worthy
sole with a good track record for moderating, I'm still for it. However,
if he can't think of anyone, then I'm against it.
And for those of you who might say, well just skip the junk and read the
useful stuff, I shouldn't have to WASTE MY TIME even skipping the useless
stuff IN THE FIRST PLACE!
Nelsonkmw@ardent.UUCP (Ken Wallich) (09/22/88)
lear@NET.BIO.NET (Eliot Lear) writes: >Recently, news.admin has contained messages in it that would make a >mud throwing contest seem civilized. [...] I suggest that moderation is >the ultimate fulfillment of that need [of keeping out the "mud"]. Except it only looks like mud :-(. Moderation, my favorite word (well, at least in the top ten). I agree that we need to keep the drek out of the news.* groups, especially news.admin and news.sysadmin. (actually I would like to see the drek taken out of all the groups, but that is another discussion). >The moderation would be of the losest [sic] level, [...] I would guess just having the 'guard at the door' will probably eliminate the noise, and if not, the noise would still be low enough to be easy to filter. >If no one else, I will volenteer [sic] to moderate. Note this is a call >for discussion. If there is sufficient interest, I'll call for votes. Count this as a vote for being interested, I may even vote for Eliot :-)! -- Ken Wallich Ardent Computer Corp uunet!ardent!kmw Sunnyvale, California, USA "Slimey? Mud hole? My HOME this is!"
werner@utastro.UUCP (Werner Uhrig) (09/22/88)
In article <22185@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu>, karl@triceratops.cis.ohio-state.edu (Karl Kleinpaste) writes: > werner@utastro.uucp writes: > I've [suggested moderation of news.admin] several times already; .... > backbone kabal - but they are hiding in their mailing-list and > don't pay much attention to this group anyway ... > False on two, possibly three, counts. .... hehe, I was hoping someone would take the bait; it's kind of hard to get you "busy folk"'s attention .... (-: finally, some update information - even if it is only that "nothing is going on behind the scenes" ... which seems to be true "to the best of my knowledge" (which is little) ... what I missed was any thought on how to get this group into a moderated format. can/should it be done? how? ... -- --------------------> PREFERED-RETURN-ADDRESS-FOLLOWS <--------------------- (ARPA) werner@rascal.ics.utexas.edu (Internet: 128.83.144.1) (INTERNET) werner%rascal.ics.utexas.edu@cs.utexas.edu (UUCP) ..!utastro!werner or ..!uunet!rascal.ics.utexas.edu!werner
gmp@rayssd.ray.com (Gregory M. Paris) (09/22/88)
In article <22185@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu> (Karl Kleinpaste) writes: > One could always suggest, of course, that there has been no traffic in > the backbone list for the last several weeks because there's been > nothing in need of being addressed there. Or it could be that the backbone has started up a new, secret mailing list where they are, even now, plotting their plots and scheming their schemes to grab total, ultimate control over USENET. Yes, even as I type this it is becoming more clear. There's not only a backbone cabal, but there's also a secret backbone cabal! USENET freedom is doomed... (Yes, this was meant to be a joke.) -- Greg Paris <gmp@rayssd.ray.com> {decuac,gatech,necntc,sun,uiucdcs,ukma}!rayssd!gmp NO KILL I
yba@arrow.bellcore.com (Mark Levine) (09/22/88)
I support the idea of moderating the group. I can think of no good examples of mass media where an editor of some sort is not employed. For one-to-one communications like mail, there is no public concern, but for one to many, or even worse in our case, many to many communications, it seems to me everything should be edited or screened (or moderated, if you prefer). I can think of no reason, except cost, not to extend this to about every group (alt.flame would be a good exception). An editor is someone you can have a contract with: if I read and write in your group, you will make sure it is worth my while. Or more globally, if my organization pays for me (in whatever way) to have this access and pass along a feed to other organizations, it can be reasonably sure of what it pays for. The largest problem with using kill files and trying to ignore messages is that there is no back-pressure; the writer of a useless/offensive/less-than- correct posting never really knows how many people killed him, nor why. An editor can make contracts with the writer also: you send something to me, I'll tell you whether it gets used, and if not, perhaps why not. The reason you want such back-pressure, feedback, is that if it is present in a system, the system can actually improve! (For the benefit of those who like to belabor the obvious: Flames from individuals will not count as feedback to the receiver, or so I assert. Trying to blast people publicly as an attempt at feedback is, as has been pointed out, equally or more offensive) This is not censorship. It is merely quality control. If you find an editor offensive, you can unsubscribe without giving up the playground to the bullies. If you feel censored, you can be an editor, and find out whether you were correct or just a poor communicator. Certainly an editor can quickly and easily raise the standards and enforce the etiquette. We seem to have all the problems of electronic publishing here; why can't we apply the off-the-shelf solutions? We cannot fix problems of illiteracy, lack of courtesy, or the disintegration of western culture here, but we can at least get up to the level of a tabloid. Even a constructive message may invite me to cross-post the response.... Eleazor bar Shimon, once and future Carolingian yba@sabre.bellcore.com
richard@gryphon.CTS.COM (Richard Sexton) (09/22/88)
In article <880@sword.bellcore.com> yba@arrow.UUCP (Mark Levine) writes: > > I can think of no reason, >except cost, not to extend this to about every group (alt.flame would >be a good exception). > The fact that (about) 30 of the (about) 400 newsgroups on the NET are moderated is no doubt due to the tremendous popularity of the idea of moderated groups. Just in case this passes though, dibs on rec.guns. Really. -- .sigfile reposessed richard@gryphon.CTS.COM {backbone}!gryphon!richard
jim@fsc2086.UUCP (Jim O'Connor) (09/23/88)
In <Sep.20.18.27.20.1988.13663@NET.BIO.NET> Eliot Lear writes: > Recently, news.admin has contained messages in it that would make a > mud throwing contest seem civilized. Most of it has stemmed from > the discussion of Portal. Many have pointed out that the need for > nettiquette. I suggest that moderation is the ultimate fulfillment of > that need. After looking at my newsgroups file to check what the purpose of "news.admin" is, I have to agree. lib/newsgroups says news.admin is for "comments directed to news administrators". I am guessing that these comments would best serve the readers of news.admin if they were presented as advice/instruction/information about administering their systems. I am a realtively new administrator and I have been reading news.admin looking for just these types of articles and have found little that applies. Moderating news.admin to keep the discussion within this scope should be possible. Anything not qualifying for news.admin could be directed to news.misc, which MIGHT be the more appropriate place for the Portal discussions going on. > If no one else, I will volenteer to moderate. Note this is a call > for discussion. If there is sufficient interest, I'll call for votes. > > Eliot > -- > Eliot Lear > [lear@net.bio.net] My two bits on this is that I think the moderator should be an experienced news administrator (I know I don't qualify). If Eliot fits the description, he has my support. --- James B. O'Connor +1 615 821 4090 x651 Filtration Sciences Corp. UUCP: uunet!fsc2086!jim 105 West 45th Street or jim@fsc2086.UU.NET Chattanooga, TN 37411
karl@sugar.uu.net (Karl Lehenbauer) (09/23/88)
No. News.admin consistently contains some of the most entertaining reading on the net, better even than alt.flame. So what if a few people have to hit 'n' a bunch of times? Seriously, though, I don't think calls for moderation should be made without specifying who is going to moderate -- they really go together. ...and there's always the question of what is to be censored, and what is being censored. -- -- "Insert the disk at your own risk." -- Firesign Theater -- uunet!sugar!karl, Unix BBS (713) 438-5018
dhesi@bsu-cs.UUCP (Rahul Dhesi) (09/23/88)
I think news.admin and news.sysadmin should both be moderated so that
the moderator can (a) keep articles meant for news administrators in
news.admin, (b) keep articles meant for system administrators in
news.sysadmin, and (c) divert the rest to either news.misc or junk.
Further, I think it would be a good idea to rename news.admin to
news.newsadmin, so "newsadmin" and "sysadmin" are clearly seen as an
analogous pair of newsgroups, one for news administrators and for sys
administrators.
I think it's ridiculous to claim that moderation is akin to
censorship. Censorship is done by government. Material that is
censored cannot be published in any forum except by risking a prison
sentence. Moderation simply serves to keep the junk out of certain
places, and it doesn't prevent it from being published in other
places.
The original "serious dilemma" article about Portal did belong in
news.admin. Some of the follow-ups did too. Many of the follow-ups
didn't.
--
Rahul Dhesi UUCP: <backbones>!{iuvax,pur-ee,uunet}!bsu-cs!dhesidavid@ms.uky.edu (David Herron -- One of the vertebrae) (09/23/88)
yeah, what Karl said :-)
--
<-- David Herron; The official MMDF guy of the 1988 Olympics <david@ms.uky.edu>
<-- ska: David le casse\*' {rutgers,uunet}!ukma!david, david@UKMA.BITNET
<-- What does the phrase "Don't work too hard"
<-- have to do with the decline of the american 'work ethic'?dww@stl.stc.co.uk (David Wright) (09/24/88)
In article <1581NMBCU@CUNYVM> NMBCU@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU writes:
# ... I'm only in favor of it being moderated, if Gene Spafford moderates ...
Yes, I'd vote for that! How about it Gene?
Up til now I've been against moderated groups, especially for the sort of
discussions that ought to go on in this group, but things have got so
bad recently that I'm changing my mind.
We have two 'admin' groups (news.admin,news.sysadmin) which although having
slightly different purposes are really about the same thing: my
/news.admin/h:j KILL file for news.sysadmin sometimes clears every waiting
message. So how about replacing these two by one moderated, called
news.admin, and a misc group which stays un-moderated, and is still
allowed to contain unrestricted junk, on the understanding that many
admin's won't bother to read it? If you call that group news.misc then
you don't even need a newgroup - we already have that very group.
And we can ELIMINATE ONE WHOLE GROUP (news.sysadmin).
--
Regards,
David Wright STL, London Road, Harlow, Essex CM17 9NA, UK
dww@stl.stc.co.uk <or> ...uunet!mcvax!ukc!stl!dww <or> PSI%234237100122::DWWskyler@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Patricia Roberts) (09/24/88)
I think it is a great idea for news.admin to be moderated. I don't think it's a great idea for the group to be limited to administrators, however. I think that there is a genuine need for peons to be able to communicate with administrators--the fact that some people abuse that opportunity does not deny the need. -Trish
len@netsys.COM (Len Rose) (09/24/88)
Why not give moderation a try? If it doesn't work out it can be reversed. At least there won't be all this controversy everytime portal denizens run amok , or a new MES(IT) ploy is discovered. I am beginning to think that people were right when they insisted that all groups be moderated. Len Rose - Netsys,Inc. len@ames.arc.nasa.gov or len@netsys.com
weemba@garnet.berkeley.edu (Obnoxious Math Grad Student) (09/24/88)
In article <385@stiatl.UUCP>, pda@stiatl (Paul Anderson) writes: >Ditto here as well. Perhaps there needs to be two groups: one dedicated >to maintenance and education about keeping the network up and one dedicated >to complaints about how the network is used. They already exist: news.admin and news.misc. I ran up a proposal for news.usenet, to make the difference clearer, a long time ago, and got very little response. Note how I'm handling the followups: this discussion itself does not belong in news.admin. ucbvax!garnet!weemba Matthew P Wiener/Brahms Gang/Berkeley CA 94720
brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) (09/25/88)
With nothing personal against Mr. Spafford (and no attempt to call a vote, since I think moderators should be appointed, if past voting experience is any measure) I suspect the moderator of a new admin's group should not be a backbone member. Much of the legitimate discussion on this group has related to the position of the backbone in the net. The moderator should be an admin from a midling site, with no special interests. Many people can work to act unbiased, but it's much easier to have somebody who doesn't have to work at it! Besides, I dunno about Gene, but moderating one group is plenty enough work for me! Right now I've got some jerk at linus who sends me a couple of insulting mail messages every day because I once rejected his silly pun. This sort of problem I wouldn't wish on anybody. (Anybody from Linus listening and willing to have this particular one wished on them?) -- Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473
yelorose@juniper.uucp (Bob Mosley III) (09/26/88)
In article <2067@looking.UUCP> brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) writes: > >Besides, I dunno about Gene, but moderating one group is plenty enough >work for me! Right now I've got some jerk at linus who sends me a couple >of insulting mail messages every day because I once rejected his silly pun. >This sort of problem I wouldn't wish on anybody. (Anybody from Linus >listening and willing to have this particular one wished on them?) >-- >Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473 ...this sounds like the sort of crapola one M> Joseph Barone used to do to me back on my old account on Ut-EMX. Every day I'd find no less than 5 messages claiming that "because your posting is annoying, I'm going to abuse my e-mail privleges and abuse the hell out of you". ...complaints to his root revealed that he himself was the rootadmin, and instead of admitting to his he invented a fake account to refute my claims. ...oh well, that's fine. I'm sure that Raytheon's general administration loved those buffers I sent with my complaint in snail mail. ...the best way to handle these jerks is to set up some sort of purge shell in your mail reader. I had one in my old account, but I havn't had a chance to port it over to the new one. ...this brings up a good point: If the admin of a particular problem side refuses to take action and supports it's problem users, what recourse is there? With all the problems coming from Portal, there must have been some sort of procedures set up to dispose of them accordingly. OM PS - Brad, how's Ty doing with his new assignment on JLI? The results so far have been impressive as hell! (no pun intended!)
tneff@dasys1.UUCP (Tom Neff) (09/27/88)
One reason news.admin should not be moderated is this: Problems with newsgroup moderation, both mechanical and policy-wise, are appropriate news.admin topics. It would be a fine irony if we were unable to discuss the disadvantages of relying on a moderator just because the moderator had a big work load that week! :-), or if we could not compare notes on just how sick some East Coast mail hubs were lately because they were holding up the newsgroup. There is certainly a lot of dreck in here, but it seems to me we mostly need some stern reminders. The net.consensus on what's appropriate behavior is NOT a self-sustaining thing. It must be refreshed at regular intervals, and this is the responsibility of both site admins and users. -- Tom Neff UUCP: ...!cmcl2!phri!dasys1!tneff "None of your toys CIS: 76556,2536 MCI: TNEFF will function..." GEnie: TOMNEFF BIX: t.neff (no kidding)
spaf@cs.purdue.edu (Gene Spafford) (09/28/88)
In article <828@acer.stl.stc.co.uk> dww@acer.UUCP (David Wright) writes: >In article <1581NMBCU@CUNYVM> NMBCU@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU writes: ># ... I'm only in favor of it being moderated, if Gene Spafford moderates ... >Yes, I'd vote for that! How about it Gene? Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I'm not sure this is the best idea, for a couple of reasons: 1) Many people, especially some of those who feel the need to complain about the status quo, feel that I'm part of the problem. Thus, they would not like to see me moderate. 2) I can't devote much time to it. I'm heavily involved in the kinds of professorial duties one might expect of a junior faculty member trying to establish good credentials for tenure. The Usenet is kind of low on my list, in that sense. Combined with a heavy travel schedule, it really isn't practical to have me as moderator. 3) I don't read much of the Usenet anymore. In fact, most of the old-line backbone/senior admins don't read the net much either. There is too much noise, too much petty bickering, and too little value anymore for me to bother reading more than about 6 groups. Ideally, if you are going to have someone moderate a group about administering news, you'd like someone who tends to follow some larger subset of the newsgroups. Therein lies an interesting catch-22. You want someone with some restraint and experience with the network. However, I can't think of anyone in that category who still reads any significant number of groups in Usenet! The flap over portal was short-lived. Admittedly, it never should have happened in the first place. Unfortunately, the same process is at work in most of the netgroups. Perhaps news.admin should be left as is -- a reflection of the net as a whole. -- Gene Spafford NSF/Purdue/U of Florida Software Engineering Research Center, Dept. of Computer Sciences, Purdue University, W. Lafayette IN 47907-2004 Internet: spaf@cs.purdue.edu uucp: ...!{decwrl,gatech,ucbvax}!purdue!spaf
tneff@dasys1.UUCP (Tom Neff) (09/29/88)
If Spaf thinks "the flap over Portal was short-lived," then I guess he wasn't kidding when he said he doesn't read Usenet anymore! :-) -- Tom Neff UUCP: ...!cmcl2!phri!dasys1!tneff "None of your toys CIS: 76556,2536 MCI: TNEFF will function..." GEnie: TOMNEFF BIX: t.neff (no kidding)
kenny@felix.UUCP (__Lizzard) (09/30/88)
Of the news groups that I read, news.admin is one of the few where the signal/noise ratio bothers me. This very well could change in the next few days, if management follows up on their threat. (i.e. good-bye rec., talk., & soc.). :-( Anyway, between the MES and portal wars, let's say that I have, "sufficient interest", in the proposal. Regards, __Lizzard UUCP: hplabs!felix!kenny =========================================================================== Kenneth E. Paul "This is the story about a musician, a computer FileNet Corporation, and a song about a garden slug" J.Holmstrom Costa Mesa, Calif Disclaimer: /dev/null agrees with what I say.