Xref: utzoo news.groups:3666 comp.graphics:2446 comp.sys.ibm.pc:15422 comp.sys.mac:15877
Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!cmcl2!phri!dasys1!tneff
From: tneff@dasys1.UUCP (Tom Neff)
Newsgroups: news.groups,comp.graphics,comp.sys.ibm.pc,comp.sys.mac
Subject: RFC - comp.binaries.gif
Message-ID: <4358@dasys1.UUCP>
Date: 10 May 88 22:58:35 GMT
Reply-To: tneff@dasys1.UUCP (Tom Neff)
Followup-To: news.groups
Lines: 51
Keywords: graphics gif new groups
Summary: put GIF pictures in their own group?

This is a request for COMMENT on creating a new group: comp.binaries.gif.
This is NOT a request for votes - let's discuss it first.

GIF stands for Graphics Interface Format, and was invented by the folks
at CompuServe fairly recently as a storage format for color raster graphics
images.  It is designed to be portable across many different computer
architectures.  GIF files can be anywhere from a few K to half a megabyte
in size (this is the range I have seen, anyway); the average seems to be
about 50k bytes.  The raster size and color palette is defined within each
picture file.  Implementations exist for most of the popular personal
computers at this point; I really don't know what has been done for Suns
et cetera, but in principle you can view GIF on any graphics display.

Anyway, we are starting to see a fair volume of GIF files posted to the
net, along with programs to view them.  I am proposing that we create a
newsgroup just for the picture (xxxx.gif) files themselves; here are my
two main reasons:

 1. Right now people tend to post GIF files to the .sys or .bin newsgroup
for *their* brand of computer, be it Mac, Amiga or whatever.  Thus people
with other makes who COULD view them, don't see them because they unsubscribe
to the foreign groups.  We could ask everybody to crosspost like mad, but
these files are large enough that the extra space consumed would be a bother
to sysadmins.

 2. Conversely, there are people who CAN'T view graphics files, who
nonetheless have to pay to carry them right now because they are lumped in
with unrelated -- but desired - material.  Pictures are not the same as
programs, so some comp.binaries moderators may dislike having them submitted;
worse yet are the discussion groups like rec.startrek where X% of readers
have nothing but VT100s!  GIF is totally useless to them, and bound to
remain so.

The two big advantages, then, of comp.binaries.gif would be (a) it would
allow GIF-capable users on ALL kinds of machines to share a common pool
of pictures; and (b) it would insulate NON-GIF-capable sites from the
comm burden of carrying pictures -- they could turn off the group at their
discretion.

I suppose if we created this group, then comp.binaries.gif.d would kind of
have to happen to, because users are still learning how to view GIF from
what I can see in the message base.

Well this is longer than I intended, but those are the issues.  Dunno if
Gene would prefer your comments posted here or mailed to me, but I will
"fer sure" summarize anything I do get in the mail.  Thanks for listening.

-- 
Tom Neff			UUCP: ...!cmcl2!phri!dasys1!tneff
	"None of your toys	CIS: 76556,2536		MCI: TNEFF
	 will function..."	GEnie: TOMNEFF		BIX: are you kidding?