Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/17/84 chuqui version 1.7 9/23/84; site nsc.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!gatech!nsc!chuqui From: chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach) Newsgroups: net.news,net.flame Subject: Re: Is anyone else offended..... Message-ID: <2908@nsc.UUCP> Date: Wed, 26-Jun-85 14:58:39 EDT Article-I.D.: nsc.2908 Posted: Wed Jun 26 14:58:39 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 27-Jun-85 06:25:42 EDT References: <266@timeinc.UUCP> Reply-To: chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach) Followup-To: net.news Organization: Plaidhenge Lines: 163 Keywords: responsibility, liability, common sense, euthanasia Xref: watmath net.news:3495 net.flame:10811 Summary: Somehow, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore, Toto! [This starts out as a flame, then degenerates into something resembling coherent thought. Future followups of this article will go to net.news only, in the hope that people will talk about the issue instead of foam at the mouth] In article <266@timeinc.UUCP> greenber@timeinc.UUCP (Ross M. Greenberg) writes: >Is anyone else offended at the idea of a site administrator taking it >upon themselves to pull the plug on a popular newsgroup, such as net.flame? Oh, probably. But they also don't pay the phone bills. >I wouldn't presume to try to run his site, but would he be offended if >all of his neighboring sites refused to pass his mail? Or his news articles? It sounds like you ARE presuming to run my site. Why is it the anarchy of Usenet runs so well until someone tries to do something that you don't agree with? Everyone is so interested in in their right to have their article posted to every machine in the bloody universe that they seem to have forgotten that it is no more than a priviledge given to them because they are part of a cooperative information exchange. >I feel that a SA should only control their machine. They shouldn't >try to control what *I* read. I'll translate this -- an SA can do anything he wants, as long as he doesn't do anything. Bullshit. [A short, romantic interlude, where chuqui goes out of the room long enough to find his nice, quiet, sane voice. This is, it seems, the end of the flame] Let me make three points, and then expound from there: o Usenet is not a right, it is a priviledge. o Usenet exists because a group of systems got together and cooperated on developing the programs and share information with each other. o Usenet is an anarchy. Too many people out there have forgotten these facts. You have NO RIGHT to my system. I allow you access to it because it is to my advantage. As a source of technical information, Usenet is second to none. Since National is in the Unix[TM AT&T Bell Laboratories] business, it helps us build better products. Because of this, it is worth a certain amount of money (CPU, disk, personnel, and phone costs) each month. Parts of it are also considered useful by people here for personal reasons, and so as a perq it is worth more money every month. National also gets added visibility in the technical and Unix markets and so as a PR, marketing, or recruitment vehicle it is worth more money. The amount it is worth, however, is not infinite. When Scott and Alex and the UCLA slime-crawlers association started off in net.flame, I decided that I'd had enough. Rather than be arbitrary, I checked with the people here on nsc that read news, and I checked with the SA's downstream of me and asked them to check with their readers. I haven't found a single person on any of these sites who was willing to go with me to my boss and help me justify the continued existence of net.flame. I haven't asked them to do so, mind you, just be willing to do so, since I am no longer willing to justify the existence of that group myself. Now, if nobody on my site cares enough about that group to say so, and nobody at any of the sites downstream care enough to say so, then WHY AM I PAYING FOR IT? I can't justify it for its technical merit. I can't justify it as a perq to my readers. I can't justify its PR value [in fact, most of the stuff posted to net.flame makes the people in it and the companies they work for by reference look rather silly, at best, so it has a NEGATIVE PR value] and I can't justify it as part of my responsibility to my downstream sites. Why, then, should I continue to carry it? Because some college age mongoloid feels it is his right to post legally questionable material to the net? So far, I've put a lot of work into being fascist and arbitrary. I could save myself a lot of time and a lot of mailbox misery by simply pulling the plug on this stuff, but I was silly enough to try to do it right. The bottom line is that I can do anything I want on this site, because Usenet IS an anarchy. Many places have -- the problems with getting stuff through net.sources.games is a good example, as well as the recent (and very quiet) loss of net.flame at Tektronix. My bottom line is that I want to do what I can to improve the network in a coordinated way. Failing that, if I can no longer tolerate the state of the network, I will do what I can to improve the network in my little corner of the world. I've worked pretty hard to keep nsc a clean system. I'd probably listen to the right/responsibility arguments a little more if the rest of the network tried a little harder. We're still plagued by line-eaters, by braindamaged notes, by ancient news, by black holes and by all those sites that don't put in enough time to keep their systems running reliably. If I have a responsibility to them, then they have just as strong a responsibility to me to keep their end up, and I feel that many sites on the net have failed to hold up their end at all. There are many sites that don't hold up their end of the costs of transmitting news, allowing backbones and other larger sites to pay their share of the phone bill as well. There are many, many sites that don't care enough to try to keep their users in line. If I have a responsibility to carry your messages, you have a responsibility to act like an intelligent human being and not abuse that responsibility. Many people, and I won't mention any names except the people at ucla-cs, have abused that responsibility by saying things that are legally questionable. These legally questionable postings might not only make them and their site liable, but also my site for passing them along (there was a discussion of this at the Dallas Usenix). What this all comes down to, in reality, is dealing with rogue posters -- the idiots who refuse to cooperate with the rest of the network and whose only purpose is to use the net as a toy to get their jollies. There are, as I see it, three ways of dealing with these rogues: 1) Do nothing -- This is the Usenet credo. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you ignore it long enough you'll stop noticing it (it won't go away). Well, I can't ignore it anymore, it has become overwhelming. 2) Yell at someone. First, you yell at the user. If they screwed up out of ignorance, this tends to work. If they are rogues, this is what they want, and they enjoy watching you turn red in the face and go through apoplexy. [case in point -- the apologies (and I use that term VERY loosely) from Scott and Alex that were almost as irritating as the original articles] You can yell at the SA, but that means you are dependent upon the SA to do what they should do, and get their people to act like they are housebroken. It has also been pointed out (in large red letters, mostly) that talking to an 'authority' at the site might cause problems for the offenders employment and school standing. My opinion is that they should have thought of that in the first place, but it DOES mean I don't use this option thoughtlessly. If someone pisses on the white house lawn, then their company will probably wonder about them. If someone is pissing on MY lawn, especially when they are on company time, they why should it be different? However, since people don't think that idiots should be held responsible for their actions, this isn't a popular choice to make. Just ask my mailbox. 3) Protect yourself. This can take many forms. Removing the offending newsgroups (net.flame) is one. Patching software to reject articles from sites (such as Orphaned responses) or people that refuse to cooperate with the usenet community is another. This is something you CAN do, because it is under your control. Of course, this is fascist, and therefore illegal in this anarchy called Usenet. I'd rather not have to use this option, but if (1) is no longer tolerable and (2) doesn't work, what choice do I have? I'm looking at ways to implement (3). Initially it'll be by getting rid of net.flame in my feed, but I have decided that I need better protection from the rogue sites and the rogue users on the net. Responsibility is a nice word, but only as long as everyone holds to it. There are sites and users out there who aren't, and I now find myself in a position where I feel I have to defend myself from them. I don't think I'm alone in this, just silly enough to go public with it. I've been looking for ways to get the net as an entity do work at fixing some of these problems, and simply haven't found any solutions that could be agree upon (see (1) above). I don't feel like I can wait anymore. In some way, I have to thank the people at ucla, because they finally pushed me over the edge and got me to do what I've been trying to avoid for about a year... -- :From the misfiring synapses of: Chuq Von Rospach {cbosgd,fortune,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo}!nsc!chuqui nsc!chuqui@decwrl.ARPA The offices were very nice, and the clients were only raping the land, and then, of course, there was the money...