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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!ihnp4!aicchi!dbb
From: dbb@aicchi.UUCP (Burch)
Newsgroups: net.news.group
Subject: Reducing costs to USENET backbone sites
Message-ID: <598@aicchi.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 2-Nov-85 12:13:56 EST
Article-I.D.: aicchi.598
Posted: Sat Nov  2 12:13:56 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 3-Nov-85 09:39:42 EST
Distribution: net
Organization: Analysts International Corp; Chicago Branch
Lines: 27


Well, it seems that we have missed the point yet again.
What we all want is reduction of the cost of USENET to sites that pass on
the largest proportion of the traffic. To this end, we have decided to
reduce the volume of postings (we hope) by limiting the number of groups
and reducing the number of postings via mod.* groups.

Well, what about making the whole mess more efficient?
To this end;
1. Stargate; This seems like the best way for backbone sites to ship stuff.
   It has the advantage of being "free" and allowing the creation of
   "erzatz backbones" that have cable and can suck the stuff off CNN for
   their own use and for those sites that they feed.
2. Buy some better modems; there are some pretty neat 9600 bps modems that
   don't require special circuits. Yes, this is some up front money, but
   the payback will be very,very short, especially if the old modems are
   sold or re-used
3. Fix NETNEWS. It spawns a subprocess for each article. It could be MUCH
   better! Also, data compression is likely to yield rapid payoffs.
4. Find "interested sites". Maybe Apple woulld pay for some of the costs
   of net.sources.mac, and such like. Maybe some site with vested interest
   in net.flame will offer to be a special backbone for that group.

Anyway, lets look at these sorts of things before we destroy too much.

-Ben Burch
"Opinions are mine alone, and not those of my employer."