Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!olivea!spool.mu.edu!agate!ucbvax!ADUS.ECN.UIOWA.EDU!librarian
From: librarian@ADUS.ECN.UIOWA.EDU (ADUS librarian)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apollo
Subject: USENET, ADUS, etc.
Message-ID: <9106212044.AA11575@adus.ecn.uiowa.edu>
Date: 21 Jun 91 20:44:18 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 26

For what it's worth..
I would like to add some anecdotal evidence to the discussion of the
value of USENET... When a user calls me looking for some piece of
code, I almost always get around to asking "Are you on the Internet-
can you ftp?". I haven't kept formal statistics, but I believe the
percentage who are is well below 50%. Many of these groups may never
be hooked up (they have company policies which forbid it, etc.) Of
those who are on the Internet, I haven't directly asked how many
have set up a USENET connection and read comp.sys.apollo, but when I
suggest I might research particular problems there, I often get a
"comp.sys.apollo?; USENET?". The percentage of people who contact me
who do not have direct access to comp.sys.apollo is probably
considerably below 50%. These intuitions fit fairly well with an
informal poll conducted at the sys-admin conference in Orlando, and
reported in the May RING.

It is probably unrealistic to think that any single medium (ADUS,
USENET, your local sales office) can be the universal channel through
which HP should reach users (maybe the telephone is one way). Many
Apollo users may never be reachable through USENET (we have made
comp.sys.apollo available on the UIowa node to anyone who has a
modem). Many Apollo users may never get to go to conferences.



Dave Shaw