Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!samsung!gem.mps.ohio-state.edu!apple!chuq
From: chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: Proposed Guidelines Change (was Re: A Few Observations)
Message-ID: <36675@apple.Apple.COM>
Date: 21 Nov 89 00:50:12 GMT
References: <36393@apple.Apple.COM> <3503@kitty.UUCP> <45039@sgi.sgi.com>
Organization: Life is just a Fantasy novel played for keeps
Lines: 54

>	This greatly irritates those of us who read alt.aquaria 
>	and wish to read sci.aquaria, i.e., those quiet people
>	who voted in their quiet and inoffensive news.group
>	and are now penalized for frivolous reasons.

It greatly irriates some of us that Richard could take what would have been
a quiet and inoffensive group and turn it into a major controversy. If
Richard had paid any attention to any of the commentary, rec.aquaria would
have been created with an overwhelming mandate and we would have been done
with it long ago. But by pushing his own agenda and ignoring anyone who
disagreed with him, he barely squeaked by the election and has created a
group that continues to live in controversy.

Why does it continue to live in controversy? Because a lot of folks are
unhappy with the way it was created.

>	It seems to me that political or personal issues 
>	prompted most--if not all--of the controversy about
>	the group (as with comp.women).  With comp.women,
>	we saw all the violent feelings about feminism
>	boil up;

In both directions. The name 'comp.women' was chosen for political purposes;
a political fight should not then be surprising.

>	with sci.aquaria, we saw all the violent
>	feelings about Richard Sexton.  I feel name-space
>	issues were merest rationalization.

No, the discussions started because many of us felt the name was wrong. That
some of the discussion shifted over to Richard was because Richard argued
the point in ways that encouraged people to get pissed at him as well. Many
of us stuck to the issue as much as possible, and to say that people were
flaming Richard ignores the large part of the discussion that stuck to the
problem with the names.

Sci.aquaria was a name chosen for political reasons. Again, it shouldn't be
surprising that political arguments spring up.

>	And now that the alleged "name-space purists" lost 
>	the vote, they want to change the rules.

As Richard was *very* fond of pointing out, they are not rules. They are
guidelines. And those folks who feel that the guidelines were violated in
spirit are voting with their beliefs in doing what is good for the net
rather than blindly rubberstamping what they think is a failure of the
system. 

-- 

Chuq Von Rospach   <+>    Editor,OtherRealms    <+>   Member SFWA/ASFA
chuq@apple.com   <+>   CI$: 73317,635   <+>   [This is myself speaking]

All it takes is one thorn to make you forget the dozens of roses on the bush.