Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!chuq
From: chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: news.admin
Subject: Re: The lay of the land (was Re: sci.aquaria)
Keywords: non-fish
Message-ID: <36772@apple.Apple.COM>
Date: 25 Nov 89 08:13:57 GMT
References: <712@calmasd.Prime.COM> <3013@com50.C2S.MN.ORG> <7098@ficc.uu.net>
Organization: Life is just a Fantasy novel played for keeps
Lines: 34

>One thing, though, where to be a feudal baron in times past was largely a
>hereditary thing, here on Usenet all you have to do to become a baron is
>score a 3B1 or a PC and a newsfeed.

Actually, rather than hereditary, think of them as landed gentry -- they
were the owners of the land (the hereditary aspect being secondary -- the
king or overlord could give someone a title on whim and make them a baron).
Which, when you consider a sysadmin to be the 'owner' of the machine and the
rest of us the sharecroppers...

>Also I suppose that in times past the
>existing barons worked really hard to keep each other down and to keep others
>from becoming bigshots.  Here it's still pretty easy to find help.

Not really. There were schmucks in the heirarchy, but the smart lords were
the ones that kept out of the peasants hair and let them run their lives as
much as possible -- as long as they paid their taxes, of course.

A good argument could be made that the people who till the land know how to
till it better than the people who own it -- unless the owner also happens
to be a tiller. And smart landowners let the experts run the show and don't
meddle, since that's the best way to maximize profit.

I do so love twisting analogies into unrecognizable forms...

-- 

Chuq Von Rospach   <+>   chuq@apple.com   <+>   [This is myself speaking]

When it comes to matters ourside your specialties, you are consistently and
brilliantly stupid [....] with respect to matters you haven't studied and
have had no experience basing your opinions on casual gossip [....] and
plain misinformation -- unsuspected because you haven't attempted to verify it.
	-- Robert Heinlein to J.W. Campbell, Jr. 1941