Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!bellcore!texbell!splut!jay From: jay@splut.conmicro.com (Jay "you ignorant splut!" Maynard) Newsgroups: news.groups Subject: Re: Sci.ad.nauseum.aquaria redux Summary: Not all the vociferous zealots are on the no side. Message-ID: <2995@splut.conmicro.com> Date: 1 Nov 89 16:24:09 GMT References: <35951@apple.Apple.COM> <4848@ncar.ucar.edu> <21596@gryphon.COM> Reply-To: jay@splut.conmicro.com (Jay "you ignorant splut!" Maynard) Organization: Confederate Microsystems, League City, TX Lines: 96 In article <21596@gryphon.COM> oleg@gryphon.COM (Oleg Kiselev) writes: >The "ridiculous" situation has been created by a few vociferous zealots like >you, who have taken upon themselves the burden of looking out for our good, >because obviously we are not capable of taking care of ourselves and making >rational decisions. I am afraid to sound Libertarian, but what right do YOU >have to enforce your biases on very large groups of people who have the >education and the intellect to make a group decision of their own?! The "ridiculous" situation was created by Richard Sexton, who - in his best vociferous zealot manner - insisted on putting it in sci.* simply to improve distribution. He admitted it in a quote which has been repeatedly re-posted here. He has a few vociferous zealots backing him up, with repeated flames and politicking. The people who oppose the name sci.aquaria do so out of a real concern: that a new user won't be able to understand how to find a group. Remember the discussion that Greg and I had a month or so ago? I feel that more groups is better than fewer, but that that is only true when the groups are properly named so as to be quickly found without having to resort to grepping the newsgroups file - something a new user isn't likely to know how to do. In addition, we feel that misnaming a group to improve its distributiuon is fraud of the worst sort committed upon the news administrators of the net. I doubt that there would have been any controversy at all if the name rec.aquaria had been chosen. It was even Richard's original choice, before alt.aquaria was created. Why, all of a sudden, does this belong in sci.*? Before you say, "Well, it's scientific", tell me why a detailed mathematical explanation of why an aircraft which stalls in an uncoordinated turn flops over and starts spinning should not go in rec.aviation, or why an in-depth analysis of collisions on a radio network as a function of how many stations can hear each other should not go in rec.ham-radio.packet. Be specific. >> I'd like to, but I really don't have the power to single-handedly >>invalidate a vote. >Oh, but don't you wish you did! You do not feel, obviously, that if a few >hundred people vote and there are 100 more people who want the group than who >don't -- then the group should be created. It should be created only if YOU >agree with it. How unbiased. The problem comes when, as in the current situation, the vote really mixes two issues with differing desirabilities: 1) Should there be a group to discuss aquaria in the mainstream Usenet? I don't know of anyone who has disagreed with this idea. I certainly don't. 2) Should that group be named "sci.aquaria"? This is the controversial issue. Lots of well-reasoned argument - yes, and some flamage - has gone into this one. In the end, Richard decided to bull ahead with his idea, and the rest of the net be damned. >>The best I can do is ask the other site admins >>on the net not to honor it if it should pass. >That's a SCI group, mind you. Not an ALT or REC or TALK. So? Greg has that right, just as you have the right to ask the site admins on the net to honor it if it should pass. You also seem to forget that Greg, in addition to being moderator of news.announce.newgroups, also has another job, and that's one he gets paid for: site administrator of ncar.ucar.edu (and possibly others). His actions as admin of that site are his business alone. If he chooses not to carry a group that he feels that strongly about, then that's his choice - and the only people who can make him change it are his employers. >I remember some time ago Richard called for rec.aquaria. That was before ^^^ >alt.aquaria was created. The vote failed. There wasn't enough interest. >Richard created alt.aquaria -- and it succeeded spectacularly. Notice that >your stupid guidelines quashed the original group proposal. Alt.aquaria does >well without any help from you or Chuq. It succeeded despite the fact that >there was little or no interest in it early on. Yet now, when sci.aquara is ^^^ >proposed, the interest in the group seems beyond any that I have seen in the >voting for a long, long time. Why the switch? Even Richard thought at first it should be under rec. If Richard had stuck with his original idea, then rec.aquaria would have overwhelmingly passed with little controversy. Instead, Richard chose to commit fraud upon the news administrators of the net. I have no trouble believing why the controversy started. Richard has damaged the group - if it does get created - by his choice of the name and hardheaded insistence on sticking with it, just like Trish Roberts damaged a good group on the problems of women in computing by hardheadedly sticking with a grossly inappropriate name. Of course, Richard's hardheadedness will prevent his seeing this. -- Jay Maynard, EMT-P, K5ZC, PP-ASEL | Never ascribe to malice that which can jay@splut.conmicro.com (eieio)| adequately be explained by stupidity. {attctc,bellcore}!texbell!splut!jay +---------------------------------------- Gandhi II: no more Mr. Passive Resistance...he's out to kick some butt!