Xref: utzoo news.admin:6355 news.groups:11068 Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!tinman.cis.ohio-state.edu!bob From: bob@tinman.cis.ohio-state.edu (Bob Sutterfield) Newsgroups: news.admin,news.groups Subject: Re: Changes to Alternative Newsgroup Hierarchies Message-ID: Date: 24 Jul 89 14:22:21 GMT References: <7429@medusa.cs.purdue.edu> <5202@ficc.uu.net> <1641@uw-entropy.ms.washington.edu> <5205@ficc.uu.net> Sender: news@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu Reply-To: Bob Sutterfield Followup-To: news.admin Organization: The Ohio State University Dept of Computer & Information Science Lines: 45 In-reply-to: peter@ficc.uu.net's message of 23 Jul 89 12:56:24 GMT In article <5205@ficc.uu.net> peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: In article <1641@uw-entropy.ms.washington.edu>, charlie@mica.stat.washington.edu (Charlie Geyer) writes: "Strictly speaking, gnu.* is not part of UseNet." Right. gnu.* just happens to use the same transport medium, machines, news-readers, etc... it rides on the back of Usenet. But strictly speaking it isn't part of it. Your statement is mostly correct, but though there's no :-) here it seems there's some sarcasm intended. gnu.* uses existing, convenient, and widely-available technology, that's often also used for the Usenet. "Riding on the back of" something implies an additional burden. Since gnu.* is disjoint from and unrelated to the Usenet, it can't be a burden on the Usenet. If we're going to speak strictly, we ought to speak accurately. If [Stallman]'s not sufficiently confident about the rightness of [his ways and means], he should change them rather than trying to squash any dissenting voice. You're welcome to discuss any alternative ways and means you like. But gnu.* is an inappropriate place for such (hypothetically) neutral discussions, just as it's an inappropriate place for discussions that promote things that will actively hinder GNU. Stallman's not trying to squash anyone's voice, he's just trying to keep the channel clear to get work done on GNU. If you have a project, you're welcome to create a mailing list for your coworkers. You're even welcome to create a newsgroup and gateway it with that mailing list, and offer that newsgroup to anyone who wants it. (That's exactly what happened with info-gnu-*/gnu.*.) That done, would you feel accomodating towards people who are hostile toward your project, yet want to use your project's mailing lists/newsgroups to encourage your downfall? I doubt it... In fact, you'd probably be a little bewildered as to why those folks might have gone to the effort of connecting themselves to your discussion forums in the first place; and if they weren't connected, you'd wonder why they worry about the content of the discussion carried there. Perhaps gnu.*, alt.*, and so on should further divorce themselves from UseNet proper. How can there be a divorce if there was never a marriage?