Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/17/84; site hao.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!genrad!panda!talcott!harvard!cmcl2!seismo!hao!woods From: woods@hao.UUCP (Greg Woods) Newsgroups: net.news,net.news.group Subject: Re: the recent rmgroups have started me thinking ... Message-ID: <1835@hao.UUCP> Date: Thu, 31-Oct-85 11:28:15 EST Article-I.D.: hao.1835 Posted: Thu Oct 31 11:28:15 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 2-Nov-85 07:41:31 EST References: <179@mit-eddie.UUCP> <1823@hao.UUCP> <255@mit-eddie.UUCP> Organization: High Altitude Obs./NCAR, Boulder CO Lines: 123 Xref: watmath net.news:4216 net.news.group:4163 > What makes you think the backbone sites will be told what they should > pay for? For one, they are free not to carry the groups they don't want > to, tough luck on the rest of the net. Isn't this, in practice, just about equivalent to the "backbone cabal" running things, which has been objected to so strongly? I don't like that idea either, even if I *am* on a backbone site. I'd much rather see us adopt, stick to, and when necessary, enforce a common set of rules agreed on by NETWIDE consensus that would reduce traffic in an ORDERLY manner. > What I was referring to is the decisions of individuals to do something > that has netwide effect. Isn't that exactly what happens if the backbone admins decide to drop a group from their sites? Only worse, because many will still think the group exists when in practice only a small proportion of net readers will see what they post in that group. > This puts the fault on both the creators and > destroyers of net.bizarre and net.internat. True, if the creators of > net.internat and net.bizarre had obeyed the rules, we wouldn't be > shouting like this. But if there had been some discussion about the > removal of net.bizarre and renaming of net.internat before the rmgroups, > we wouldn't be shouting like this either. True, we wouldn't. Instead, we would have made a quiet statement that it's OK to violate the rules. The reason we ARE shouting so much is that this quietness is exactly what has happened in the past. Now that someone (Gene) has decided to ENFORCE the rules, look what happens, PRECISELY because he (and those in his position) were trying to avoid the inevitable confrontation it would cause. I guess Gene believes (and I concur) that we can no longer afford not to enforce the rules that we have. > You seem to think that the netwide votes will always be in opposition to > the backbone votes. No, not that they ALWAYS will, just that they SOMETIMES might, and what happens in those cases? If everyone EXCEPT those paying the lions' share of the cost wants to keep net.flame, say, (as a hypothetical example) how can we FORCE the backbone to pay for it? > Judging from the comments I've seen from other > news/site admins on reducing net volume, I'd say most people are in > favor of removing some groups or at least restricting their > distribution. Me, too. How many flames do you think Spaf would get if he tries to rmgroup net.flame, despite the apparent agreement that it should go (jj is taking a survey, and he says so far it's about 50:1 in favor of getting rid of net.flame). > Also, the site vote would have to be a function of how > many outgoing feeds the site has Sounds like a good idea, but an accounting nightmare. > In the final > instance, a site like ihnp4 can reject any netwide decision and refuse > to pass a newsgroup, which will undoubtedly reduce traffic in certain > high-volume low-content groups. In that case, what's the point of taking a netwide vote? > rmgrouping all the groups a set of individuals don't want to exist is > unfair to the rest of the net I have yet to see anything like this happen. I don't think Gene, myself or anyone else who agrees with us has ever said we don't want net.internat to exist in some form. We just want to see it created PROPERLY, so that we don't HAVE to go through this again next time. > As an aside, the rmgrouping of net.bizarre and net.internat did NOT help > decrease the volume of postings, because (1) many people have chosen not > to honor the rmgroup message and (2) the flames that have sprung up as a > result of the rmgrouping take the place of the traffic in the deleted > groups. So, in effect, articles which would not have been posted > otherwise were posted, which is what we are trying to prevent. This is true, IN THE SHORT RUN. Spaf's attempt to enforce the rules THIS time is a long-range plan. Obviously, it has brought up some issues that need to be discussed. Maybe we SHOULD change the rules for newsgroup creation. It is beginning to become obvious that demonstrated volume isn't the only criteria we should use. In that case, let's change the rules. But until we do change them, by netwide consensus, we should enforce what we have. Any rules that allow the creation of a "useful" group such as net.internat must also include some OBJECTIVE criteria for defining what is "useful". What groups SHOULD be allowed to be created without prior demonstrated volume? Does that mean we should rmgroup those that do not fit the existing criteria, or adopt "grandfather clauses"? I'm not just trying to be difficult here; I really think these are things that need to be clearly defined, in order that we can AVOID having a meta-discussion like this again in the future. Whatever set of rules we adopt must take into account the fact that we can't allow total freedom any more. The backbone sites won't pay for it. > Of course it does. Read my above two paragraphs. No one is *forcing* > any site to do *anything*! But with the rmgroups, you are forcing sites > *not* to receive the articles they want. A backbone site is within its > rights not to carry traffic, but it shouldn't make that decision for the > whole net. The way the net is currently set up, a couple of backbone sites dropping a group DOES drop it as a netwide group. It becomes a fragmented local group, with the readers and posters under the illusion that it is a netwide group. I feel it IS better to rmgroup it and let the individual sites or groups of sites create local groups for it if they still want it. > I believe that if voting rules were adopted, those people who were not > cooperating would be quick to cooperate once told they'd lose their news > feeds if they didn't. In other words, enforce whatever rules are in place at the time. But, this requires enforcement of the rules by neighboring sites; it just requires the cooperation to come from a different place. Same problem. There has to be SOME kind of centralized enforcement or the rules are a joke. --Greg -- {ucbvax!hplabs | allegra!nbires | decvax!noao | mcvax!seismo | ihnp4!noao} !hao!woods CSNET: woods@NCAR ARPA: woods%ncar@CSNET-RELAY