jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck) (03/11/89)
In article <6055@sdcsvax.UCSD.Edu> hartung@amos.UUCP (Jeff Hartung) writes: >>Hey! Why are there people posting binaries to this group? That's what >>the moderated group comp.binaries.ibm.pc is for. This group is for >>discussion only! Anyone thinking of posting a binary please do so to >>c.b.i.p, not here. In article <1736@csuna.csun.edu> abcscagz@csuna.csun.edu (Jeff Boeing) writes: >Now, this is something I have very mixed feelings about. > >Moderating comp.binaries.ibm.pc seemed like a good idea at first: it would >cut out any non-binaries traffic and make sure that someone (Rahul Desi, in >this case) would screen the binaries to make sure they were postworthy. It was more than just a good idea. It was a condition for having binaries accepted on the net at all. With a moderated group there is quality control and an archival mechanism. It is very expensive to post binaries on the net; not only do they take a lot of bandwidth, but sections don't get everywhere and then there are requests for reposts, etc. Given the cost, most news admins said they wouldn't tolerate binaries except in moderated groups. With rare exceptions, it's not a disaster if there is a three-week delay in getting a program out. Your program isn't going to save the world, and the world won't end if it has to wait. So don't post binaries to the wrong group, especially this one. >(1) Delay time. One lousy disk crash -- which was certainly not Rahul's > fault -- caused the entire backlog of binaries to be set back several > weeks. Rahul hasn't gotten half way through the binaries he's intended > to post yet. And even if this disaster hadn't happened, I'm sure that > old R.D. is probably flooded with far more binaries postings than he > can preview. Hopefully, Rahul will only post the decent and useful programs and not the crap. That's why we have moderators. Traffic is up to 4 Mb per day now. We simply can't post whatever huge monstrosity we want to anymore; we can't afford it. >The moderated newsgroup is still a good idea, but I ask you, fellow netters, >should binaries postings be restricted to the moderated group ONLY? An >unmoderated forum (such as this one) seems to me like a good place to vent >those binaries that didn't make it (or are delayed up the wazoo) to c.b.i.p. Damn straight. Binaries postings should be restricted to the moderated group only. -- -- Joe Buck jbuck@epimass.epi.com, uunet!epimass.epi.com!jbuck