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Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!mandrill!hal!ncoast!allbery
From: allbery@ncoast.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sources.d
Subject: Re: Moderated lists - just say "no"
Message-ID: <6288@ncoast.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 28-Nov-87 16:32:07 EST
Article-I.D.: ncoast.6288
Posted: Sat Nov 28 16:32:07 1987
Date-Received: Tue, 1-Dec-87 05:07:08 EST
References: <1133@mtunb.ATT.COM>
Reply-To: allbery@ncoast.UUCP (Brandon Allbery)
Followup-To: comp.sources.d
Organization: Cleveland Public Access UN*X, Cleveland, Oh
Lines: 96

As quoted from <1133@mtunb.ATT.COM> by dmt@mtunb.ATT.COM (Dave Tutelman):
+---------------
| Well, after my most recent experience, I think I'll not post any more to
| comp.source.misc, or at least not as long as it's moderated.  My complaint
| isn't with Brandon; he's doing the job as well as it can be done.  My tale
| of minor horror would have occurred as long as ANY moderator were in Brandon's
| shoes.  Here's the story:
+---------------

You could have solved some problems by posting differently.  Not to mention
the fact that this episode pointed up some major problems with the Net as
it currently stands.

+---------------
| idea to post to comp.sources.misc.  What I did (hey, it seemed like a
| good idea at the time  :-) was to:
|    -	Post a shar of the source to comp.sources.misc.  This was already
| 	over 50K; couldn't add the executable for those without TPascal.
| 	Therefore, label it Par 1 of 2, and....
|    -	Post a uuencoded arc of the MS-DOS executable as part 2 of 2
| 	to comp.sources.misc.
+---------------

The mistake.  I *must* break uuencodes out and post separately to a different
newsgroup.  I suggest to ANYONE who wishes to post both sources and binaries
to do so SEPARATELY, sending the binaries to the appropriate group, and
announcing that fact.  Not so doing slows up not only your posting but
everything else in the queue -- a good way to get OTHER submitters angry at
you.

+---------------
|    -	You may remember that Brandon was having trouble convincing his
| 	mailer that comp.binaries.ibm.pc existed.  Thus it is a week later
| 	that executable appears in comp.binaries.ibm.pc,
| 	labeled "Part 2 of 2".  More mail:  "I missed Part 1; could
| 	you send it."
+---------------

Not my mailer, but everyone elses' inews.  I had a discussion with Spaf about
comp.binaries.ibm.pc a few months ago, he suggested I try to find another
moderator for it, and if that failed to unmoderate it.  After almost *no*
response to the moderation request (not until *after* the sh*t hit the fan,
which is about the only way to get the attention of most net.people), I
sent out the control message.  Which was summarily ignored by 2.10.2 and
2.10.3 sites (yes, they still exist -- and one bounce was from a 2.9 site!).
The result was that the newsgroup was defunct for about 2 weeks.

+---------------
| Thus three closely related postings appeared over three newsgroups
| (I had only intended 2) over the space of almost three weeks.  The rules
| were followed perfectly, and their application had removed much of the
| value of the posting and confused a lot of people.
+---------------

"Followed perfectly"?  If you had read the Welcome! posting any time since
the formation of comp.binaries.ibm.pc in May, you would have realized that
you can NOT post binaries to comp.sources.misc.  As a result, *I* had to
attempt to rectify your mistake.  The result was lost time.

Nor is this an arbitrary decision on my part.  The rule is there because it
was so voted by the people who subscribe to comp.sources.misc, after a long
discussion.  If you feel it's wrong, I invite you to reopen the debate in
comp.sources.d; if the decision should change, I will comply.

+---------------
| NEXT TIME, I'll "just say no" to moderation, and post the whole thing
| in the relevant newsgroup (misc.wanted or rec.bicycles).  Any flames
| about the appropriateness of putting programs in those newsgroups
| will go straight to ramdisk to be read next week   :-)
+---------------

Under the circumstances -- the sources being primarily of use in a particular
application as a response to a particular request -- this is undoubtedly the
best thing to do anyway.

An alternative:  if you send the pointer message to me "under separate cover"
and clearly identified as part of your submission, I can post it to the
correct newsgroup when I send out your posting, as a special case of
redirecting non-sources.  This will insure that all messages go out at the
same time (barring net-based failures like that which afflicted
comp.binaries.ibm.pc).

General Observation:  It helps to consider why the newsgroup is moderated
BEFORE you post to it, and to check into the rules before posting.  This would
have prevented both this problem and the recent events surrounding MicroEmacs,
which was sent out months ago to comp.sources.unix only to run into r$'s
"editor block".  Also consider the reasons for the rules (complaining about
my policy of redirecting non-sources does little good when the majority has
made it clear that this is preferred; in r$'s case, too many big editors
had been received and posted, and people were complaining about their non-
editor submissions which were effectively blocked until the editors had
cleared [I got bit by this myself]).
-- 
Brandon S. Allbery		      necntc!ncoast!allbery@harvard.harvard.edu
 {hoptoad,harvard!necntc,cbosgd,sun!mandrill!hal,uunet!hnsurg3}!ncoast!allbery
			Moderator of comp.sources.misc