Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!vsi1!altnet!uunet!ateng!chip
From: chip@ateng.uucp (Chip Salzenberg)
Newsgroups: news.misc
Subject: Re: Usenet: Is it 'dying'?
Message-ID: <1988Sep19.115310.8712@ateng.uucp>
Date: 19 Sep 88 15:53:09 GMT
References: <187@limbic.UUCP> <16463@apple.Apple.COM> <16139@onfcanim.UUCP>
Reply-To: chip@ateng.UUCP (Chip Salzenberg)
Organization: A T Engineering, Tampa, FL
Lines: 24

According to dave@onfcanim.UUCP (Dave Martindale):
>For three years (or perhaps more), a machine called "micomvax"
>provided the major newsfeed for the Montreal area.  [...]
>Two months ago, micomvax decided to get out of the news forwarding
>business.  [...]
>A couple of weeks after that, the administrators for many of the Montreal
>machines met in a bar downtown, and worked out a new distribution network.

This method of problem-solving may be more common -- and effective -- than
the net.doomsayers would have us believe.  For example, when AT&T bowed out
of the news forwarding business, much of Florida was stranded without a news
feed.  After one evening of head-bashing and mapmaking, we (Tampa Bay area)
sysadmins arrived at a scheme which is better than before (it includes
redundant feeds originating at uunet and gatech).  As a bonus, the tba
groups are now propagated faster.

>As long as there are enough people with the desire to support it, and
>some spare machine cycles and disk blocks, Usenet will remain connected.

Righto.
-- 
Chip Salzenberg                 or 
A T Engineering                My employer may or may not agree with me.
	  The urgent leaves no time for the important.