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From: horne-scott@cs.yale.edu (Scott Horne)
Newsgroups: news.admin,comp.sources.d
Subject: Re: The responsibilities of volunteers
Message-ID: <27716@cs.yale.edu>
Date: 11 Dec 90 04:51:13 GMT
References: <8195@uwm.edu> <1990Dec9.231719.11572@athena.mit.edu> <1990Dec10.055351.13221@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG>
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In article <1990Dec10.055351.13221@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG> xanthian@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Kent Paul Dolan) writes:
>jik@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan I. Kamens) writes:
>> jgd@convex.csd.uwm.edu (John G Dobnick) writes:
<
<<< Let's deal in some facts, if you please.
<
<< Yes, let's. But let's deal with all of the facts, not just the ones
<< that are convenient for you, OK?
<
<Well, while we're setting rules, let's not make unilateral decisions on
<just what is important about posting software to comp.sources.unix, OK?

Who other than you is doing so?

<<< What's *wrong* with you people? *Two* "fixes" a week aren't
<<< sufficient? Are you addicted to a constant flow of free code, or
<<< what?
<
<< Are you really trying to claim that an average calculation over the
<< entire life of comp.sources.unix (with Rich moderating it) is a valid
<< indication of the actual *current* status of the newsgroup? That's
<< completely ridiculous.
<
<Well, my site's undergone a hardware upgrade this year, but the last
<article count I saw for comp.sources.unix was 501, so at least that many
<postings have hit the group. That doesn't at all look to me like the
<signs of an idle moderator.

What's your point?  It's not clear that that 501 represents current activity
in the group.

>And, strangely enough, there's an article
<currently online in the group for each day of this site's expire time.
<Looks like he's just been _pouring_ sources out, to me.

Take the trouble to look at those articles, and you'll see that they
constitute only one or two packages.  This is a trickle, not a flood.

<< First of all, we've been discussing the chronological (as opposed to
<< qualitative -- I don't think anyone here has challenged Rich's ability
<< to do a very good job on the submissions that *do* get posted)
<< consistency of Rich's moderation.
<
<As was noted by another poster in response to the article with the graph,
<what we see is that the group's output has _always_ been bunchy.

Then maybe we've *always* had a problem!

<Impatient authors have and have always had a multitude of alternate
<publication paths. Some have used them. My site was using trn off an ftp
<site before it came out in c.s.u. It is a fair assumption that authors
<who wait patiently for their software to be posted do so because they
<are willing to trade time for the imprimateur of quality Rich's
<excellent moderation gives the software published through c.s.u.

Who cares about Rich's "imprimateur [_sic_] of quality"?  (By the way, while
you have that twelve-year-old daughter of yours there helping you with
arithmetic, ask her to help you spell `imprimatur'.)  Their sources are
good regardless of what Rich says; I doubt very many are trying to get
prestige by having Rich's name associated with their code.  (And for those
who are, we can create a `comp.sources.imprimatur.rich'.)

<Since the main value of the group is its reputation, and that depends
<entirely on the diligence and probity of the moderator, proposals to go
<to a multi-moderator system or to replace the moderator are quite beside
<the point. I can think of perhaps three other people on the net I'd
<trust with the job, and none of them have stepped forward to offer
<assistance.

Last I checked, this wasn't your net.  And as for "reputation", well, there
you go again with your "unilateral decisions on just what is important about
posting software to comp.sources.unix".  I read the group for sources, not
for "reputation".

<Bingo!  We have a scarce and irreplaceable resource, and aside from the
<false to fact character assassination postings here, he is also being
<abused by overuse.

And how valuable this resource will be if we all leave him alone and nothing
is posted!  After all, its entire value rests in that "imprimatur", huh?

And could you kindly point out a few of those "false to fact character
assassination postings"?  (Get that twelve-year-old to help you with hyphens,
too.)

<< Third, as I have pointed out in another message, it is ludicrous to
<< try to claim two packages are posted to c.s.u per week, when six of
<< the last twelve months have seen *no packages at all* posted to the
<< newsgroup, or at least, not according to what's in the archives on
<< uunet.uu.net.
<
<You slept through your statistics classes, or you took a pass when
<common sense was handed out? That is the biggest set of logical
<contradictions yet posted in this pile of newbie nattering. If there are
<sixteen packages posted every other month, or eight per month, the
<average is the same.

You're the one who needs to take a statistics class.  (Maybe that twelve-year-
old can tutor you.)  Sixteen packages in one burst every two months is not
the same as two packages per week.  By your argument, Rich might as well just
queue it all up and say "There will be 10,400 packages a century from now."

					--Scott

-- 
Scott Horne                               ...!{harvard,cmcl2,decvax}!yale!horne
horne@cs.Yale.edu      SnailMail:  Box 7196 Yale Station, New Haven, CT   06520
203 436-1817                    Residence:  Rm 1817 Silliman College, Yale Univ
Uneasy lies the head that wears the _gao1 mao4zi_.