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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!mcnc!decvax!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-amber!chabot
From: chabot@amber.DEC (L S Chabot)
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Sartre
Message-ID: <4003@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 25-Oct-84 14:17:22 EST
Article-I.D.: decwrl.4003
Posted: Thu Oct 25 14:17:22 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 28-Oct-84 06:21:33 EST
Sender: daemon@decwrl.UUCP
Organization: DEC Engineering Network
Lines: 58

Can anyone inform me or flame about the etiquette of creating a mailing list
which has on it people who view their participation as forced, unwanted,
and apparently inescapable?   What am I talking about? I'm talkin' about the
"boring-people" mailing list, which should more appropriately be titled
"bored-people". 

I've always had a fond hope that I could one day grow up to be a amateur
inanist, and therefore a mailing list of truly boring people could have its
appeal, but the output of this group has almost entirely been 

	"How did I get on this, and get me out now!"

--which has rather limited appeal (except maybe to the instigator, and maybe a
few sadists (or masochists) of a rather tepid fever). 

So, as near as I can tell, the "boring-people" mailing list forwards stuff to
a number of bored people, not many boring people.  Truly boring people would
not wish to exit, but instead see this as a wonderful opportunity to discuss
technique, stale punctuation, old topics, and bad jokes and how to blow their
punchlines.  But unfortunately, this is not the result.  Instead we get two or
three desperate "Let me out!" messages a day, which are so boring by now as to
be barely yawn-worthy. [Note: the posters of these wish-to-escape messages are
not truly boring people in and of themselves--they are merely panicky.  It is
the aggregation of many such letters that is boring, not the individuals
involved.] 

A better method for a "boring-people" mailing list would be to have a sub-
newsgroup: say net.flame.boringonly.  Periodically, non-boring people would 
submit a posting to net.flame.boringonly saying:

	"I really want to delete a newsgroup today, any newsgroup, 
	and since there hasn't been much activity here, and I find 
	the very concept of the existence of a newsgroup in which I 
	can't participate (not being genetically boring) to nauseate 
	me with its blatant, overt discrimination; there are other news-
	groups so there's no reason why boring people can't submit to them!" 

And slightly more or less frequently there would be another kind of letter:

	"'lo.  I hear there is a boring-people mailing list.  Could I
	please be put on it?"

If these latter people were placed on the mailing list, and only these people,
then I think the future tedium of the "boring-people" mailing list could be
ensured (possibly even insured, maybe by Lloyd's).  Non-boring people could
therefore be restricted from posting help-help messages, and those among us who
wish to expand our boredom-consciousness could be free to let our hair all hang
out. down. something. 

Note: the above discussion is in no way meant to reflect on any existing 
newsgroups.  Any parallelism between an existing newsgroup and my example
should only be viewed as an exorcism of satiric license.

L S Chabot
UUCP:	...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-amber!chabot
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