webber@aramis.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (09/10/87)
In article <13890@amdahl.amdahl.com>, gam@amdahl.amdahl.com (Gordon A. Moffett) writes: > ... > Oh, let us not back ourselves into the corner that the other network > did about how to creat newsgroups. > > I think it should remain simple: a new newsgroup is created by Good > Judgement as to what is needed. I analogize creating newsgroups to > creating directories: if they get used, great, if they don't they don't > take up much space anyway. What's wrong with that? Sounds good to me. From what I understand then, you are claiming that allbery@ncoast's message was just a courtesy note to other admins letting them know what was coming and finding out if there were any objections that he was not already aware of. Perfectly reasonable. Since I am sure he already knows the grounds upon which I object, there is no reason for consideration of them to delay him further in the creation of the group. I look forward to seeing just what kinds of messages end up on his moderated sf-lover board. Incidently, for those of you who don't read sf-lovers and hence don't know the history behind allbery's request (yes both of you over there in the back row trying to hide behind your newspapers), let me make the following statement: This particular episode began when someone (not me) proposed rec.arts.sf-lovers.books as a place for the kind of discussion that tends to get crossposted between rec.arts.books and rec.arts.sf-lovers, but that gets lost among the rest of the discussions that occur in both groups (and often tends to irritate the non-sf-lovers (yeh you two)) in rec.arts.books. The motivation was quite reasonable although the discussion quickly degenerated into accusations of snobbery from the people who don't focus their sf interests around the printed literature. I am not a news administrator at my site and hence can not properly create the obviously required ``alt.sf-lovers.books'' (no moderator necessary). The news administrator at my site appears to believe that the news.groups procedure is necessary to create such groups. Is there a news administrator that feels it would be proper to simply send the creation messages for ``alt.sf-lovers.books'' and also thinks that ``alt.sf-lovers.books'' is a sufficiently worthwhile group to take the effort to actually create it???? If so, I would appreciate hearing from you. --- BOB (webber@aramis.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!webber) p.s., Since a number of people other than me were interested in such a group, the fact that I may or may not actually end up with access to it on my local machines is not relevant to the request. Indeed, apparently nothing is relevant to the request except that some news administrator things that it is a ``good idea''.
allbery@ncoast.UUCP (Brandon Allbery) (09/12/87)
As quoted from <1473@aramis.rutgers.edu> by webber@aramis.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber): +--------------- | Sounds good to me. From what I understand then, you are claiming that | allbery@ncoast's message was just a courtesy note to other admins | letting them know what was coming and finding out if there were any | objections that he was not already aware of. Perfectly reasonable. | Since I am sure he already knows the grounds upon which I object, | there is no reason for consideration of them to delay him further in | the creation of the group. I look forward to seeing just what kinds | of messages end up on his moderated sf-lover board. | | Incidently, for those of you who don't read sf-lovers and hence don't | know the history behind allbery's request (yes both of you over there | in the back row trying to hide behind your newspapers), let me make | the following statement: | | This particular episode began when someone (not me) proposed | rec.arts.sf-lovers.books as a place for the kind of discussion that | tends to get crossposted between rec.arts.books and | rec.arts.sf-lovers, but that gets lost among the rest of the | discussions that occur in both groups (and often tends to irritate the | non-sf-lovers (yeh you two)) in rec.arts.books. The motivation was | quite reasonable although the discussion quickly degenerated into | accusations of snobbery from the people who don't focus their sf | interests around the printed literature. | | I am not a news administrator at my site and hence can not properly create | the obviously required ``alt.sf-lovers.books'' (no moderator necessary). | The news administrator at my site appears to believe that the | news.groups procedure is necessary to create such groups. +--------------- Sigh. Mr. Webber, your tendencies toward blatant misquotes and misrepresen- tations of my position do neither the net nor me (nor yourself) a service. I have stayed out of the rec.arts.sf-lovers.books debates; I have no opinion on the matter. I also was not saying that I was going to create the group. For your information, alt.config (where I posted the article) is the alt subnet's equivalent of all of the news.all groups, including news.groups; I was posting the equivalent of a newgroup suggestion in news.groups, but to the correct newsgroup for the alt subnet. I also was not advocating it as the ultimate, absolutely correct answer to any problems that might exist in rec.arts.sf-lovers. The alt subnet exists in order to provide alternatives to the standard Usenet; one of these alternatives can be "experiments" with new formats for old newsgroups. The net can then decide as a whole which newsgroup it prefers, by "voting with its feet" (or its unsubscribe keys, in this case). I also did not, by posting that message, state that I felt there was something wrong with rec.arts.sf-lovers; if I had felt that way, I would have subscribed directly to the Internet SF-Lovers mailing list. To explain the exact intent of my posting: I was proposing, in the proper way, that a new alt-subnet newsgroup be created, and explained how I thought it might work. This was intended (and in fact so stated) to stimulate discussion of the proposed newsgroup, possibly including suggestions for different guidelines, and (hopefully) to be acted upon by the alt subnet's backbone-equivalent (proto-Spaf? ;-) after such discussion had produced a majority for/against. I fail to see what this has to do with your eternal war against a rationally-structured net, unless it's simply to take a cheap shot at moderators, or to deliberately misrepresent moderators in an unfavorable light. -- Brandon S. Allbery, moderator of comp.sources.misc {{harvard,mit-eddie}!necntc,well!hoptoad,sun!mandrill!hal}!ncoast!allbery ARPA: necntc!ncoast!allbery@harvard.harvard.edu Fido: 157/502 MCI: BALLBERY <<ncoast Public Access UNIX: +1 216 781 6201 24hrs. 300/1200/2400 baud>> All opinions in this message are random characters produced when my cat jumped (-: up onto the keyboard of my PC. :-)