Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!ucsd!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!uwm.edu!uwvax!umn-d-ub!umn-cs!nis!viper!dave From: dave@viper.Lynx.MN.Org (David Messer) Newsgroups: news.groups Subject: Re: The Namespace: A Serious Delusion for the Net Message-ID: <2956@viper.Lynx.MN.Org> Date: 28 Nov 89 10:59:41 GMT References: <5513@cps3xx.UUCP> Reply-To: dave@viper.Lynx.MN.Org (David Messer) Organization: Lynx Data Systems, Eagan, MN Lines: 85 In article <5513@cps3xx.UUCP> gcf@frith.egr.msu.edu (Gordon Fitch) writes: >There seems to be a delusion on the part of some people >that the namespace structure -- the system of newsgroup >naming conventions -- is to help readers find articles >they want to read. ... > >The function of the namespace is to help sysadmins filter out >articles they don't want on their systems. This is basically correct. The namespace is already too large to allow new users to figure out what they want to read from the group list. The list is more help when they want to post, however. > [Opinion about how corporations and academic institutions are > authoritarian, deleted] > >The namespace prefixes, then, are actually grades of >validity or value with respect to an official point of >view. More like 50,000 official points of view... >This is why comp.women and sci.aquaria were given so much >trouble: in the official view, one would have contained >social issues and the other recreational material. I thought it was because aquarium hobbiests [mostly] aren't scientists and women [mostly] aren't computers. >Speech >about social issues or recreation has intrinsically _less_ >_value_ than speech about computers or science. Hmmm... Or could it be that such groups tend to attract idiots who post articles because they like to here the keys click on their terminal? Could it be that using company resources to allow employees to talk about their fish isn't in the best interests of the stockholders of a corporation? Is it time for talk.groups? >[Extrensically, it is hard to say why speech about, say, physics, >is of more or less value to a software company than speech >about gender issues in employment. I didn't know there WERE any "gender" issues in employment. Why, English is basically a gender-free language ... unless you mean employment agreements written in Latin or something. I didn't know there was a group for discussion of employment agreements written in foreign languages -- interesting. Of course there are a lot of SEX issues in employment, but they are probably covered in soc.feminism or soc.rights.human I suppose. >[More blather about the authoritarian nature of system > administrators deleted.] > >Eric Hoffer (ugh -- but give the devil his due) is said to >have said that if you let people do what they want, they >will mostly all do the same things. It is interesting to >see how the participants in Usenet, an anarchy, without any >direct external pressure, attempt to form themselves at once >into two contradictory polities, both taken from the >external world: the authoritarian, pyramidical structure of >the corporation, and the level political space of the >democracy. I thought you said that USENET was an authoritarian structure? Never mind, it is the nature of an anarchy to behave as you describe; that is why anarchys don't survive for long. >[Blather about how sysadmins from important sites could decide > how usenet is run, and how the poor reader, who doesn't contribute > anything but bytes to the data stream, should be given more of > a voice, deleted. [Hmmm.. I may be editorializing a little in > my summary here. Nah. :-) ]] As has been said before anyone can be as important as he wants simply by buying a computer and taking on as much of the news load as he can afford. If you share your wealth with us poor folk (as the current "backbone" does), many sysadmins of small sites will be grateful. Of course, you will probably have to put up with the complaints of some of the users that you aren't giving them enough. -- Remember Tiananmen Square. | David Messer dave@Lynx.MN.Org -or- | Lynx Data Systems ...!bungia!viper!dave Brought to you by Super Global Mega Corp .com