Xref: utzoo comp.cog-eng:543 comp.databases:1055 comp.dcom.lans:1426 comp.dcom.modems:1918
Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!portal!cup.portal.com!David_W_Tamkin
From: David_W_Tamkin@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: comp.cog-eng,comp.databases,comp.dcom.lans,comp.dcom.modems
Subject: Re: HELP ME!!AA
Message-ID: <6077@cup.portal.com>
Date: 30 May 88 23:32:19 GMT
References: <5807@cup.portal.com> <2115@ur-tut.UUCP> <182@optilink.UUCP> <15759@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU>
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Lines: 35
XPortal-User-Id: 1.1001.2689

In article 15759@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU Wolfman assumes that JJ has access
to the net at his college.

I do not defend JJ's tactics.  They offend me and give Portal a bad name.
At least, Wolfman, you recognized that Portal is a site that retails net
access (as well as its internal offerings); one trouble I have on the net
is that many people expect my equipment and facilities to be identical to
theirs.

The real point, I believe, is that if JJ is paying Portal their $10 per
month and P C Purs_it their $25 per month, if he really were desperate
for funds he could give both up.  The net itself is a luxury.

My point of contention with Wolfman is this:

=

   Doesn't it strike anyone strange that 'Jay-Jay' can afford to pay
Portal communications for using Portal every month, and use that for
usenet access, when he is going to college and should have a link to
the usenet there?

=

Not all campuses have sites.  Not all students of the campuses with sites
have access.  JJ can live without the Usenet and the rest of what Portal
provides, including the higher electric bills and perhaps telephone bills
that leisure-time telecommunicating engenders.  JJ can also live without
access to anything that requires PCP.  He/She could even go so far as to
sell the computer system to raise funds.

I'm sure Wolfman didn't intend to imply that Portal was dispensable for
JJ solely because alternative access to the net existed; net access itself
is dispensable.  But Wolfman did seem to think that net access is available
to all students at all institutes of higher education.