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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!oliveb!hplabs!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: <1823@hao.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 25-Oct-85 16:16:50 EST
Article-I.D.: hao.1823
Posted: Fri Oct 25 16:16:50 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 29-Oct-85 01:32:10 EST
References: <179@mit-eddie.UUCP>
Organization: High Altitude Obs./NCAR, Boulder CO
Lines: 76
Xref: watmath net.news:4169 net.news.group:4038

> USENET stands for User's Network.  In my opinion this means a network
> for the users.  In other words, the network should be whatever its
> users want it to be. 

  This is only true if the users casting the votes are also the ones
PAYING for it. Everyone seems to forget that part. In the past, the cost
wasn't such a major problem as it is now. The "correct" way to phrase the
above paragraph is: the net should be for each site the net they choose
it to be on that site. The problem with instituting a truly democratic
net is that the backbone sites will pull out, as soon as other people
start telling them what they should pay for. No backbone, no net.

> net.bizarre and net.internat.  In the first place, Spaf is correct in
> stating that those groups should never have existed, according to the
> current charter of USENET, since a consensus was not reached by the net
> whether the groups should have been created.  However, Spaf's
> countermove, removing the groups, shouldn't have been done either,
> because there was no consensus by the net that the groups should be
> removed.

  I disagree. Failure to remove those groups would be a statement in fact
that the rules of newsgroup creation are just words and have no real meaning.
People do not obey rules unless they are enforced. Past experience has
shown (including in this case!) that people do not follow the rules
voluntarily. Therefore, SOMEONE has to enforce them. If not the backbone
sites (who are paying for most of it) and net administrators (who are
doing most of the work to keep it going), then who?

> What I am pointing out here
> is that the actions of a few are jeopardizing the entire net, which
> cannot continue if the net is to continue.

  No, it is the exponential growth of the net (and hence, the cost associated
with it) that is jeopardizing the net. The actions of a few, in this case,
are an attempt to save the net in some form by adding a little organization
to it, given that it is impossible for it to continue unlimited as it has 
in the past.

> What is needed is what was proposed before, a site voting
> mechanism on whether an action should be taken net-wide.  In other
> words, if someone is going to do something which affects the net as a
> whole, as opposed to any local distribution, all the sites in the net
> should vote on it.

  I disagree wholeheartedly. Although it sounds good on paper, the facts are
that you cannot FORCE any site to agree with a netwide decision that affects
THEIR phone bills. Trying to do this will only result in many sites, including
those who are generously donating phone time/money to the rest of the net,
off the net altogether.

> This is not to say that groups cannot be created at all though.

  Neither do the current rules, which were not followed in this case.

> the removal of said groups should have been done on a site-to-site basis, in
> other words they should have no longer agreed to carry it, leaving the
> rest of the sites who wish to carry the groups alone.

  This does not follow. This would only be true if the groups had been
created properly in the first place. Since they weren't, this doesn't apply.

> What is needed is better use of regional
> distribution, moderation where necessary, and above all cooperation of
> all users of the net to abide by the rules.

   I agree with the first two. Experience has shown over and over again that
the last is unrealistic. We have seen both ignorant and malicious users not
cooperating. I see no reason to expect things to improve in the future.
We have to enforce the rules or they are useless.

--Greg
--
{ucbvax!hplabs | allegra!nbires | decvax!noao | mcvax!seismo | ihnp4!noao}
       		        !hao!woods

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