qux@yale.ARPA (El Magnifico Kaufman) (09/07/85)
In article <202@almsa-1> control@almsa-1.UUCP (William Martin) writes: >In article <3207@nsc.UUCP> chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach) writes: >> >>Moderation as it currently is set up turned out to be a rather unqualified >>failure. ... >>I just don't think there is a way to graft moderation onto the USENET >>setup, unless you are willing to redefine USENET. >> >While I hesitate to challenge an expert in this, let me mention that >mod.rec.guns is working just fine, and I would call it a success. Might it be that the reason most moderated groups failed was that there existed parallel unmoderated groups? Posting to a moderated group is (or at least can be) somewhat of a hassle, and doesn't have the instant gratification of posting to an unmoderated group and then immediately reading one's own message. Of course, eliminating net.singles in favor of mod.singles (or whatever) would have caused even more uproar than just creating mod.singles did. Is leaving the unmoderated groups around what you meant by not "redefining USENET," Chuq? Qux Kaufman-David@Yale-Comix.Arpa Kaufman@YaleCS.Bitnet ..!decvax!yale!kaufman
chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach) (09/12/85)
>>>Moderation as it currently is set up turned out to be a rather unqualified >>>failure. ... >>>I just don't think there is a way to graft moderation onto the USENET >>>setup, unless you are willing to redefine USENET. >>> >>While I hesitate to challenge an expert in this, let me mention that >>mod.rec.guns is working just fine, and I would call it a success. > >Might it be that the reason most moderated groups failed was that there >existed parallel unmoderated groups? I don't follow mod.rec.guns, so I can't say for certainty, but the only places where I've seen any kind of success for moderated groups are groups that have no unmoderated counterpart -- things like mod.map, net.announce, stuff that essentially has to be moderated or has always been moderated. I don't see how you can move from unmoderated to moderated in the existing environment (a good argument against mod.bizarre -- the track record shows it won't work...) >Is leaving the unmoderated groups around what you meant by not "redefining >USENET," Chuq? The unmoderated groups (and the anarchy thereof) are the heart and soul of USENET. Anything that mucks with that mucks with USENET. I think it is really better to consider mod.all as a separate subnet rather than a different part of USENET -- the same has been true for fa.all for a long time, the only difference is that fa.all is ARPA based and mod.all is .UUCP based. fa.all and mod.all simply aren't USENET, they just happen to use the same transmission media. There are probably a good number of groups that would be well served to move into a moderated environment. These are likely the groups that would also be most useful on stargate or some similar form of network transmission (net.unix-wizards is top on that list, so is net.lang.c). There are just as many groups that would probably wither and die under moderation. We might want to consider a two pronged approach. First, find out which groups ought to be moderated and move them there (removing the unmoderated group in its wake -- I don't think there is any way for both to survive). Second, find ways to help readers parse the junk out of the groups that aren't moderated. I'm playing with this now, but I'm not ready to talk about it beyond saying that I'm taking the user interface to the bare ground (and possibly beyond) and trying to build it back again. I may find something that works, it may fail miserably. Either way, I'm not sure it'll be USENET anymore. It'll hopefully have the advantages of USENET without many of the problems. -- Chuq Von Rospach nsc!chuqui@decwrl.ARPA {decwrl,hplabs,ihnp4}!nsc!chuqui An uninformed opinion is no opinion at all. If you dont know what you're talking about, please try to do it quietly.
mark@cbosgd.UUCP (Mark Horton) (09/15/85)
>the only places where I've seen any kind of success for moderated >groups are groups that have no unmoderated counterpart -- things like >mod.map, net.announce, stuff that essentially has to be moderated or >has always been moderated. net.announce has net.general as an unmoderated counterpart which failed its original charter (announcements and queries that were important enough for the whole net to read.) mod.sources still has net.sources as an unmoderated counterpart, and I consider mod.sources successful. Also, mod.map was originally net.news.map, although that group was effectively moderated also. mod.unix has net.unix-wizards as a counterpart. It can be done - there are lots of success stories. >The unmoderated groups (and the anarchy thereof) are the heart and soul of >USENET. Anything that mucks with that mucks with USENET. I think it is >really better to consider mod.all as a separate subnet rather than a >different part of USENET -- the same has been true for fa.all for a long >time, the only difference is that fa.all is ARPA based and mod.all is .UUCP >based. fa.all and mod.all simply aren't USENET, they just happen to use the >same transmission media. It's true that mod has a different character than the original Usenet. Let's recall what that original character was. It consisted entirely of technical discussions, announcements, and queries. Lately the net has been snowed under by nontechnical newsgroups which are busting the disks, CPU's, phone bills, and reading time of large numbers of people. This is not "Usenet" either, it's "Talk Net". Perhaps it's time to move those nontechnical discussions to another distribution group or groups as well. Mark Horton