jww@sdcsvax.UUCP (Joel West) (09/01/85)
Curtiss Jackson quoted the infamous Lauren, then added: > >Couldn't a mailing list have done a better job? The amount of waste > >involved in the net is almost unimagineable. Mailing lists could > >serve many interested people far better in many cases than newsgroups > >being sent everywhere. > > I think that we ought to seriously consider mailing lists > for the more arcane groups; Perhaps we have an administrative/political/psychological problem that can, for once, be solved by software. :-) A "mailing list" is, by definition, merely an alias for a list of E-mail recipients who get messages from other members. (For example, I belong to two, uucp-project and info-applebus). A "news group" is something everyone on the Net can see. One doesn't write messages, but rather posts "articles" to the news group. Instead of using ucb/mail (mailx to you, Curtiss) one uses fancy stuff like postnews and vnews. Suppose this dichotomy were reduced. Suppose the net software were modified to handle mailing lists. This means that if I want to subscribe to 'net.bizarre', a publicly maintained mailing list, my local copy of newsgroups and mailing lists includes the address of owner-net.bizarre. Perhaps I post an article to net.bizarre.request; perhaps I post to net.bizarre with the Keyword: subscribe After this, the net.bizarre articles are fed to my machine along whatever path the "owner" sees fit. They get dumped in /usr/spool/news/net/bizarre; others on my machine may read them with "vnews", if they like. LOOK MA, A REAL NEWS GROUP! I MEAN, I CAN "POST", "FOLLOWUP", "REPLY". Maybe if I'm lucky I make the top 25 list for the week. And, incidentally, if the "owner" of net.bizarre comes up with 75 sites receiving his mailing list, he posts to "net.news.group" and suggest the net as a whole take it. I'm serious, folks. Frankly, I wouldn't mind if 30% of the news groups were handled this way. It would, at least, provide a more palatable alternative to allow specialized topics to be sent off the net and onto mailing lists. Joel West CACI, Inc. - Federal (c/o UC San Diego) {ucbvax,decvax,ihnp4}!sdcsvax!jww jww@SDCSVAX.ARPA "Keep those cards and letters coming, boys and girls!"
rcj@burl.UUCP (Curtis Jackson) (09/05/85)
I heartily second Joel West's suggestion to build support for mailing lists into news software. I know we have the problem of people not running the latest software, but it is getting better. -- The MAD Programmer -- 919-228-3313 (Cornet 291) alias: Curtis Jackson ...![ ihnp4 ulysses cbosgd mgnetp ]!burl!rcj ...![ ihnp4 cbosgd akgua masscomp ]!clyde!rcj
peter@graffiti.UUCP (Peter da Silva) (09/16/85)
> Suppose this dichotomy were reduced. Suppose the net software were > modified to handle mailing lists. > > ... implementation removed to save space. See References line... > > And, incidentally, if the "owner" of net.bizarre comes up with 75 sites > receiving his mailing list, he posts to "net.news.group" and suggest > the net as a whole take it. I like it, but I'm easily pleased. You could call it mail.whatever... a decent method of creating new groups, and killing old ones (throw low-volume groups into the mailbag at the six-monthly purge).