Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site yale.ARPA
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!epsilon!zeta!sabre!petrus!bellcore!decvax!yale!kaufman
From: kaufman@yale.ARPA (El Magnifico Qux)
Newsgroups: net.news.group
Subject: A proposal for combat of newsgroup proliferation
Message-ID: <116@yale.ARPA>
Date: Wed, 4-Sep-85 22:09:06 EDT
Article-I.D.: yale.116
Posted: Wed Sep  4 22:09:06 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 7-Sep-85 04:26:55 EDT
Reply-To: kaufman@yale.UUCP (El Magnifico Qux)
Organization: Yale University CS Dept., New Haven CT
Lines: 29
Keywords: newsgroups mod.control
Summary: Create mod.control!

Consider this view of the current newsgroup creation problems:

	Groups that shouldn't be are being created by people who
	aren't following the accepted newsgroup creation procedure.

This is somewhat analogous to some of the signal/noise problems in certain
newsgroups:

	Articles that shouldn't be are being posted by people who
	aren't following the accepted guidelines for choosing newsgroups,
	or for withholding articles from the net completely.

The latter problem is one of the ones that the moderation experiment is
intended to solve, and it seems to be working.  I propose that the newsgroup
creation problems could be combated by the same method: we could create
mod.control for newgrp and rmgrp messages.  The control newsgroup would
stay around for cancel messages, and in deference to old software the
mod.control messages might need to be cross-posted into control (though
non-cancel messages in the control newsgroup would want to be ignored
by the new software).

It seems rather odd to combat newsgroup proliferation by creating a new
newsgroup, and I'm not sure the size of the problem warrants it, but the
idea of mod.control appeals to me: it seems like the logical extreme of
the moderation experiment.  Perhaps Those-Who-Lead would like to comment?

Qux

Kaufman-David@Yale-Comix.Arpa	Kaufman@YaleCS.Bitnet	..!decvax!yale!kaufman