peterm%halcyon.uucp@seattleu.edu (11/16/90)
Re: Ken Chaffin's 11/13 post on this topic, it is admittedly not easy to come up with good, on-point analogies. Thus, Chaffin's objection to the telecom analogy makes some sense. Yet, although Chaffin's USPS alternate seems promising on the face of it, it falls down somewhat via its questionable dependence on a one-to-many communications premise. Further, various proferred analogies have weaknesses--not only is there no lack of exceptions to the "laws" Chaffin refers to, but some of these so-called "laws," of course, really aren't that, and instead, to an extent, are more "internal" codes of conduct, ethics, etc.--voluntary, self-regulatory stuff. In sum, it seems advisable to caution against what may be over-preoccupation with so-called, and not too viable, analogies.