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Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 alpha 5/22/85; site cbosgd.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!gatech!cbosgd!mark
From: mark@cbosgd.UUCP (Mark Horton)
Newsgroups: net.news.group
Subject: Re: "Moderation a failure"
Message-ID: <1480@cbosgd.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 14-Sep-85 19:45:05 EDT
Article-I.D.: cbosgd.1480
Posted: Sat Sep 14 19:45:05 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 15-Sep-85 04:38:30 EDT
References: <205@kepler.UUCP> <774@vortex.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Columbus, Oh
Lines: 32

>the only places where I've seen any kind of success for moderated
>groups are groups that have no unmoderated counterpart -- things like
>mod.map, net.announce, stuff that essentially has to be moderated or
>has always been moderated.

net.announce has net.general as an unmoderated counterpart which failed
its original charter (announcements and queries that were important enough
for the whole net to read.)  mod.sources still has net.sources as an
unmoderated counterpart, and I consider mod.sources successful.  Also,
mod.map was originally net.news.map, although that group was effectively
moderated also.  mod.unix has net.unix-wizards as a counterpart.
It can be done - there are lots of success stories.

>The unmoderated groups (and the anarchy thereof) are the heart and soul of
>USENET. Anything that mucks with that mucks with USENET. I think it is
>really better to consider mod.all as a separate subnet rather than a
>different part of USENET -- the same has been true for fa.all for a long
>time, the only difference is that fa.all is ARPA based and mod.all is .UUCP
>based. fa.all and mod.all simply aren't USENET, they just happen to use the
>same transmission media. 

It's true that mod has a different character than the original Usenet.
Let's recall what that original character was.  It consisted entirely
of technical discussions, announcements, and queries.  Lately the net
has been snowed under by nontechnical newsgroups which are busting the
disks, CPU's, phone bills, and reading time of large numbers of people.
This is not "Usenet" either, it's "Talk Net".

Perhaps it's time to move those nontechnical discussions to another
distribution group or groups as well.

	Mark Horton