Xref: utzoo alt.flame:9646 news.newusers.questions:515
Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!csri.toronto.edu!wayne
From: wayne@csri.toronto.edu (Wayne Hayes)
Newsgroups: alt.flame,news.newusers.questions
Subject: Re: (VERY) Long dead subjects, was (Re: Signature files (LONG))
Keywords: KLANG KLANG KLANG
Message-ID: <1989Sep12.124629.27897@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu>
Date: 12 Sep 89 16:46:30 GMT
References: <19611@gryphon.COM> <1989Sep11.125116.18148@gec-mi-at.co.uk> <250D145B.4189@ateng.com>
Followup-To: alt.flame
Organization: University of Toronto, CSRI
Lines: 47

In article <250D145B.4189@ateng.com> chip@ateng.com (Chip Salzenberg) writes:
>BBS weenie alert...
>
>According to clark@gec-mi-at.co.uk (Peter Clark):
>>The point being, this is a *WORLD*WIDE*PUBLIC*NOTICE*BOARD*
>
>"Board" indeed.
>
>This is a newsgroup.


Next lesson: nitpicking has it's limits.  When it comes right down to it,
USENET is really nothing more than a huge BBS.  Physically it's different,
because it consists of many independant machines. But as programmers love to
point out, there is a major difference between the physical and logical
layouts of modern computer systems.  And logically speaking, USENET is
just a big BBS with lots of discussion groups.  (Just like logically speaking,
your /usr directory is probably on a different physical hard drive than your
/spool directory, and these days can even be a hard drive across campus
somewhere.  Nowadays, it is the logical layout that counts, not the physical
layout.)

	Also don't forget that USENET started out *much* smaller than it is
now, and as I understand it, not made for the intricate discussions /
forwards / responses / etc / etc / etc.  that it is now capable of.  Then 
it *was* probably for news, much like we use the "msgs" command now.  (I'm
not sure about this, but it's what I gather.)  But now it is certainly more
than just "news" as that word is generally used.

	Still, though, by far my favourite BBS.

	I think that the point was, and still is, that we should be considerate
in our use of this huge, most wonderful of BBS's, that is for the most part
free to the people who use it.  Many sites get this stuff at excrutiatingly
low speeds, like across land lines at 2400 or even 1200 baud, or via
satellite to australia, for instance.  Extra bandwidth, with large frivolous
.signature files, large quotes with little response, etc, etc, etc, are
costing real people money.  And what about those who read the stuff at 1200
or 300 baud?  I have little patience to wait for someones 8 line X 80 character
pretty picture that I've seen a thousand times already, trudge across my
screen.

	'Nuff said. Followups to alt.flame (which I don't read, hahahahahaha)
-- 
"If I had only known, I would have been a locksmith."   -- Albert Einstein

Wayne Hayes	INTERNET: wayne@csri.toronto.edu	CompuServe: 72401,3525