From: utzoo!decvax!ittvax!swatt
Newsgroups: net.news
Title: Re: Beware the coming of NET WARS
Article-I.D.: ittvax.610
Posted: Mon Feb  7 17:35:38 1983
Received: Wed Feb  9 02:23:59 1983
References: sask.208


Clearly, Derek is right that something has to be done; random people
anywhere in the net should not have the ability to destroy news in
machines not under their control.

There is also the issue of those systems who pay the costs to store and
forward news having some control over how and how much their resources
are used.

Various proposed solutions have been kicking around the net for well
over a year.  There are two basic camps:

  1)	Administrative solutions.  These advocate new policies,
	USENET boards to make decisions, etc.  Derek's ideas are
	of this type. There was considerable discussion about
	a month ago about a proposed "USENET, Inc." organization
	to take over administration chores.

  2)	Technical solutions.  Change the news software to allow
	each site better control.

Both types of solutions have their problems, which have been fairly
well discussed already.

I personally fall into those who favor technical solutions, not
becuase I unconditionally reject central control, but because I
believe any central control will have to manifest itself in technical
fixes anyway just to be effective.

Our site doesn't (yet) have the problem of management objecting to
net.jokes, but I do worry about "erewhon!usenet" doing some random
damage to an important newsgroup just for fun.

So, my desires for technical changes are:

  1)	There ought to be a distinction between what a site is willing
	to accept for itself and what it is willing to forward to others.

  2)	The principle ought to be embodied that only the local news
	administrator can do something irrevocable, unless by special
	pre-arrangement for the convenience of people who adminsiter
	several sites (this of course requires either massive UUCP
	changes, or a layer of encryption).

  3)	The cost of running USENET ought to be more visible so the
	local administrator can make informed decisions about which
	newsgroups to support and which to drop.  Curently you have
	to go to a fair amount of work to dig this out, and if your
	site is like ours, news is EXPENSIVE.

Now one problem both administrative and technical solutions (mine
included) have in common is they all represent volunteering of someone
else's time.  Most people I talk to already maintain news in their
"spare" time, so there isn't a lot left over.  Doesn't someone out
there want to do a thesis on "Means of Distributed Control Over A
Public News Network?"

	- Alan S. Watt