rissa@chinet.UUCP (Patricia O Tuama) (09/07/88)
In article <3358@c3pe.UUCP> aliza@c3pe.UUCP (Aliza R. Panitz (AlmostLady)) writes: >Take a look at the monthly statistics. Three of the highest volume systems >are "pay uucp" arrangements - portal.cup.com, dasys (a.k.a. Electric Cat) >and killer. > >The demographic load profile of Usenet and news changes considerably when >a signifigant portion is generated by people whose primary use of the >machines is for news and mail. > >Maybe this is something to consider in discussions of the future of the net. >(This is the first time I've seen the issue raised in News, but it's been >on my mind for a while) Well, usually when this issue is brought up the focus is on public access machines in general regardless of whether they charge or not, the idea being that netters from these sites are somehow polluting the otherwise pristine waters of Usenet. Now obviously Richard is not going to condemn PA sites in general, so to make his point about Portal he has chosen to dump on PA machines that charge fees as though somehow that makes them different from PA sites that do not. There simply isn't any proof that PA netters as a group are any worse or any better than netters who have access through their employment or through their universities. Furthermore, many of us first became acquainted with the net through our jobs or schools, then gave up that access when we left our employers or graduated and now we are simply interested in maintaining contact with the Usenet community. Passing judgment on the worth of netters or sites based on whether or not they are public access is extremely short-sighted and simplistic. There are plenty of people posting from industrial or university sites who are complete jerks, who waste net.resources and who contribute vir- tually nothing to Usenet as a whole. And since PA sites only account for about 5% of all postings, I think you could safely say that there are more jerks writing from non-PA sites than there are total posters on all public access sites combined. With the exception of Portal (which does seem to send out a strikingly high proportion of garbage) most PA machines are not really all that dif- ferent from any other site. Furthermore, don't forget about university sites like Berkeley that sell access to the lunatic fringe or companies like yours who give usenet access to non-employees. As you no doubt know there's a whole passle of people on your machine, Aliza, who don't work for your company. What about your demographic load profile, hmmm? at that point trish, concerned ps: killer doesn't charge for net.access