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From: ISSSSM@NUSVM.BITNET (Stephen Smoliar)
Newsgroups: comp.music
Subject: RE: WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO THIS NEWSGROUP?
Message-ID: <9106150215.AA13482@lilac.berkeley.edu>
Date: 15 Jun 91 02:15:40 GMT
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In article <2100@anaxagoras.ils.nwu.edu> sandell@ils.nwu.edu (Greg Sandell)
writes:
>In article <1871@culhua.prg.ox.ac.uk>, sdpage@prg.ox.ac.uk (Stephen Page)
>writes:
>
>> What has happened to all the good people who promised summaries of articles
>> they had read, conference discussions, etc., on the original aims?
>
>It's ironic.  You set up a newsgroup for researchers, but researchers
>don't have a whole lot of time for the net.  I'll bet alot of us read
>comp.music and have ideas but are too busy composing, experimenting, doing
>DSP or whatever to draft a thoughtful posting.  Every day I see something
>I'd love to followup on, but if I want to get my dissertation done by
>December...

Nevertheless, there are some of us out here who occasionally try to use the
bulletin board as a way to get things going on a topic for a paper or discover
that their contributions to a discussion might turn into such a paper.  Readers
of rec.music.classical know that a really fine discussion on issues of
aesthetics, general culture, and individual perception of "great music"
was flourishing there throughout a good piece of March and April.  Much
of that material deserves to find its way into the scholarly literature
some day.  So one answer to your question, Stephen, is that you are reading
the wrong bulletin board!

There is, however, another answer which you might not like so much.  That is
the reminder that we have HAD such discussions on recent articles by Otto
Laske and Mira Balaban.  These discussions were made rather colorful by the
particular approach taken by Eliot Handelman;  but I, for one, do my best not
to let the color of personal style interfere with the content.

(Eliot approaches with a sinister look in his eye.  Smoliar holds up a mezuzzah
surrounded by a wreath of garlic shouting, "Back, Eliot!  Back!  Back!)

There are really only two things which bothered me about that whole affair now
that I can look back on it with a bit of perspective.  One was that Laske
simply pulled out of the argument in what looked like a fit of pique.  I
think that, ultimately, this reflected more poorly on him than it did on
Eliot;  and I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to convey this
impression to Otto in a face-to-face conversation.  The other was that Balaban
never participated in all that argument about her own paper!  Given that she
has an active BITNET address, there was no reason for her to remain "on the
outside."  My attempts to question her on this matter never led to any
satisfactory response.

One final response, Stephen, is that many of those "good people" you would like
to have as contributors do not always have the computer availability which
seems to come so readily to the community of synthesizer hackers.  The Society
for Music Theory has instituted its own "members only" ListServer;  and both
the traffic and the overall population have been very low.  (Personally, I
am opposed to this effort to be so exclusive.  I realize it makes for an added
benefit for members, but the mass is still too low to be critical.  I would
rather see them pool forces with the appropriate material which shows up on
comp.music and rec.music.classical until the volume level starts to get a bit
more impressive.)  I also heard a report from the United Kingdom to the effect
that many scholars there are still not using computers for ANY purposes and
remain wedded to pen and ink as their primary tools even when the best of
computer facilities are available to them.

I guess I would summarize my advice as follows:  Do not set your expectations
too high because not everyone is as receptive to the new age of computers as
you are.  Nevertheless, there is plenty of good material out there, provided
you widen your search space a bit.  Finally, do not worry so much about matters
of "good taste," because people you use this particular medium of communication
tend to learn pretty quickly how to look out for themselves.

===============================================================================

Stephen W. Smoliar
Institute of Systems Science
National University of Singapore
Heng Mui Keng Terrace, Kent Ridge
SINGAPORE 0511

BITNET:  ISSSSM@NUSVM

"He was of Lord Essex's opinion, 'rather to go an hundred miles to speak with
one wise man, than five miles to see a fair town.'"--Boswell on Johnson