Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site jhunix.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!genrad!panda!talcott!harvard!seismo!umcp-cs!aplcen!jhunix!ins_akaa From: ins_akaa@jhunix.UUCP (Kenneth Adam Arromdee) Newsgroups: net.news.group Subject: Re: elementary posting rules Message-ID: <1131@jhunix.UUCP> Date: Fri, 8-Nov-85 14:53:21 EST Article-I.D.: jhunix.1131 Posted: Fri Nov 8 14:53:21 1985 Date-Received: Sun, 10-Nov-85 09:21:54 EST References: <202@bambi.UUCP> Reply-To: ins_akaa@jhunix.ARPA (Kenneth Adam Arromdee) Organization: Johns Hopkins Univ. Computing Ctr. Lines: 38 In article <202@bambi.UUCP> mike@bambi.UUCP (Michael Caplinger) writes: >Why aren't the following three rules enforced? ... >2) No automatic quoting of messages. If people want to quote, make them >work hard to do it. Maybe they'll find it easier to paraphrase. > >3) No messages with less than X lines of content, for X on the order of >10. Content is NOT quotes or signatures. Maybe that would stop the >stupid "me too" message from being sent. > Michael Caplinger If someone has to insert a quote by "hand" (i.e., including a file containing a saved article), how could the program possibly tell that the quote is not "content"? By checking through every article in every newsgroup to see if one of them happens to contain the quoted material? If anything, it seems that this would increase volume, since any posting shorter than 10 would have to be padded out. (And I can imagine the traffic in semi-illicit programs that would automatically save an article, include it in a file, add the >'s before each line of the quote, pad the article if shorter than 10 lines, etc..., that would develop if this idea came through.) By the way, wouldn't making it "easier to paraphrase" A) discourage point- by-point rebuttal (effectively meaning that whoever posted the first article can never be completely rebutted) and B) make it easier to misquote, also? PS: I am pleased to announce that Johns Hopkins no longer prohibits reading of net.news or net.news.group, though other groups such as most other net.news.* subgroups and net.unix are still on the proscribed list. -- ------------------------------------------------------------------- If you know the alphabet up to 'k', you can teach it up to 'k'. Kenneth Arromdee BITNET: G46I4701 at JHUVM and INS_AKAA at JHUVMS CSNET: ins_akaa@jhunix.CSNET ARPA: ins_akaa%jhunix@hopkins.ARPA UUCP: ...{decvax,ihnp4,allegra}!seismo!umcp-cs!aplvax!aplcen!jhunix!ins_akaa