Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!sco!davidbe
From: davidbe@sco.COM (The Cat in the Hat)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: Proposed Guidelines Change
Keywords: bovis, paranoia
Message-ID: <429@scorn.sco.COM>
Date: 21 Nov 89 22:16:16 GMT
References: <1989Nov10.045531.4549@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> <36393@apple.Apple.COM> <1626@crdos1.crd.ge.COM> <2562D3D9.16489@ateng.com> <5289@ncar.ucar.edu> <1530@uvaarpa.virginia.edu> <25683F82.25276@ateng.com>
Sender: news@sco.COM
Reply-To: davidbe@sco.COM (The Cat in the Hat)
Organization: The Sewing Circle Optics
Lines: 39


According to hb@uvaarpa.virginia.edu (Hank Bovis):
-As the net gets bigger, there will inevitably be more and more group
-proposals -- too many to get careful attention from very many people.
-But the larger the vote on anything, the harder it will be to get a 2/3
-vote.  

Indeed.

In article <71632@uunet.UU.NET> in news.lists, Rick Adams said...

-52865 articles, totalling 92.091339 Mbytes (114.360331 including headers),
-were submitted from 5928 different Usenet sites by 13975 different
-users to 797 different newsgroups for an average of 6.577953 Mbytes
-(8.168595 including headers) per day.

Now...sci.aquaria got about 1000 votes, not counting various accounting
errors, making it the largest vote turnout yet.  In other words, even with 
the serious campaigning on both sides (whether right or wrong) only about
7% of the total Usenet population *that posts* voted. 

Hell, even US national elections get a better turnout than that.

And perhaps that's a blessing.  Because if there are "too many [proposals]
to get careful attention from very many people" we (I, anyway) *want* it to
be difficult to create a new newsgroup.

The net isn't going to get too much bigger in the future, even if it does,
it's irrelevant.  Instead more people are going to be participating in trying 
to control it (hah! as if such a thing could be done...).  And when that 
happens, a 2/3rds for newsgroup creation isn't such a stiff price to pay. 

-- 
     David Bedno, Systems Administrator, The Santa Cruz Operation, Inc.
   Email: davidbe@sco.COM / ..!{uunet,sun,ucbvax!ucscc,gorn}!sco!davidbe 
  Phone: 408-425-7222 x5123 Disclaimer: Speaking from SCO but not for SCO.  

" -- they're normal.  terrifyingly, appallingly normal -- like they've gone
 through normal and come out the other side." - neil gaiman in _Sandman_ #11