[net.news.group] Moderated groups and Macintosh groups

sjl@amdahl.UUCP (Steve Langdon) (11/05/85)

In <4142@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> Jeff Shulman proposed

> As for the Mac groups, I would like to see them stay and be broken up into
> the following three groups:
> 
> 	mod.micro.mac
> 	mod.sources.mac.public
> 	mod.sources.mac.shareware
> 
and also offered to act as a moderator.  At least one other posting
included an offer to moderate a Mac related sources group.  I think that
a well thought out change of this type would serve everyone's interest.

My proposal is as follows:

1)      Leave net.micro.mac alone
	Rational: There are few complaints about this group and it
	can be reasonably argued that moderation would inhibit free
	discussion.
2)      Create mod.sources.mac
	Rational: Moderation is useful and appropriate for this type
	of group.
        Caution: The moderator will need access to all of the widely
        used Macintosh development environments. The following would
        be my list, but opinions may differ.
		Mac C from Consulair
		Megamax C
		Aztec C from Manx
		SUMacC
       Unfortunately the environments differ enough to prevent full source
       portability between these systems.
3)     Create mod.executables.mac and, if people are worried about the
       shareware issue, mod.executables.mac.shareware or mod.shareware.mac
       Rational: A large number of the programs posted in net.sources.mac
       are not sources.  Although I would prefer that sources could be
       used, the incompatibilities mention above and a number of other
       reasons make executable form necessary for some programs.
       This problem is not unique to the Macintosh and we should solve
       it properly.
4)     Inform the users of net.sources.mac that it will be removed after
       enough time has past for the new moderated groups to be running
       smoothly.

I think that a change like this would increase the quality of the
information transmitted and reduce the volume by eliminating duplication.
I would be happy to defend the merits of sending Macintosh related
information on Usenet, but I believe that we can avoid that debate by
using the net more efficiently.
-- 
Stephen J. Langdon                  ...!{ihnp4,cbosgd,hplabs,sun}!amdahl!sjl

[ The article above is not an official statement from any organization
  in the known universe. ]