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Path: utzoo!linus!gatech!spaf
From: spaf@gatech.CSNET (Gene Spafford)
Newsgroups: net.news,net.news.group,net.flame
Subject: Re: Fear and Loathing on the Clouds
Message-ID: <1718@gatech.CSNET>
Date: Thu, 24-Oct-85 22:22:27 EDT
Article-I.D.: gatech.1718
Posted: Thu Oct 24 22:22:27 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 25-Oct-85 07:49:49 EDT
References: <614@h-sc1.UUCP>
Reply-To: spaf@gatech.UUCP (Gene Spafford)
Followup-To: net.flame
Distribution: net
Organization: The Clouds Project, School of ICS, Georgia Tech
Lines: 253
Xref: linus net.news:3327 net.news.group:3282 net.flame:11529

(Preface: Normally, I try to avoid responding to petty insults and
slander.  As a very "visible" person on the net, I've gotten my share
of abuse for trying to help keep things going.  If I let every little
slam get to me, I'd have quit long ago.  I realize that there are many
little individuals who try to make themselves seem important by writing
long and impressive rants about various things.  So it is with the
article to which I am responding.  I would normally ignore this
(especially since it is crossposted to net.trash...er, net.flame)
However, Mr. Thau makes one or two grievious errors of fact that I
would hate others to accept merely due to lack of rebuttal.  I will
include some semi-flame comments so the low-lifes who view
net.flame as a reason for being will have a brief, somewhat bright
moment out of this rather dull affair.   --EHS)

In article <614@h-sc1.UUCP> thau@h-sc1.UUCP (robert thau) writes:
>"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."
>				--- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Controversy equalizes fools and wise men -- and the fools know it"
				Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

This, of course, is also a snappy quote, and helps explains Mr. Thau's
posting, I would guess.

>It seems that Gene Spafford has recently taken to reorganizing USENET
>to suit his tastes. 

First error of fact.  Were I to be reorganizing it to suit my tastes,
there would be only a few unmoderated "net" groups, considerably more
regional groups, and some better set of rules and guidelines than
currently exists.  What I *have* been doing is attempting to make
things a little more organized and consistent.  And it hasn't been just
recently.

>(...But what does small global volume (1-2 messages per week) add up to?)

Does anyone know where Mr. Thau can go (his machine is at Harvard)
where they can teach him to add?  Multiplication would be helpful
too.  Then maybe we can continue this chat and talk about phone bills.

>Recently, however, Spafford has taken it upon himself to delete two
>thriving, busy newsgroups --- net.internat and net.bizarre.

The PLO is thriving and busy too, but I don't want them using my
machine, nor am I going to pay for their phone calls.  Busy is not
sufficient justification for existence...except in government civil
service jobs.

>The case
>of net.internat is especially distressing, as this newsgroup's
>signal-to-noise ratio has reached heights heretofore undreamt of on USENET.

One-to-one?  (sorry, folks.)

>Spaf may not have created the rules he cites, but his *centralized* enforcement
>of them, with a literal-mindedness rarely seen outside of fourth-grade
>classrooms and the IRS, is something entirely new.  Spaf's oft-repeated
>hallucination that the New Order already came about three years ago,
>and that he is simply "continuing to maintain" it (a direct quote),
>by the power vested in him by nobody in particular, is simply wrong.

No comment. ("By dint of railing at idiots we run the risk of becoming
idiots ourselves."   --Gustave Flaubert) 

...naw, I can't resist.  Why did you combine the 4th grade and the IRS
in that comparison?  Did you find the 4th grade particularly taxing?

>I was here too.

Right.  And we have all noticed how you have worked at maintaining a
major news feed, and justified the costs to your administration.  We've
noted how you've helped write and debug the news software, maintain the
newsgroups, write tutorials for new users, answer thousands of
questions by mail, and otherwise contribute to the general welfare.
Your many constructive comments and suggestions in groups other than
net.flame have been recognized by many.  That's why I value your
comments so much.

>I admit that net.bizarre consists, at this point,
>entirely of trash.  What I object to is its unilateral deletion by a
>cabal of topologically well-placed superusers.

Object away.  We objected to it remaining.  My mail (as of 9pm tonight)
is over 20 to 1 in favor of the move.  You are one of only 3 people
whom I have heard stating objections to it.

>A decision not to carry the
>newsgroup at any individual site might be marginally "anarchic," if it were
>not propagated, but a gaggle of rmgroup messages hit absolutely everybody.

gaggle, n. -- a flock of geese, hence a chattering company.
(Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary, Unabridged)
...hit EVERYONE?  My lord, what happens to news when it gets to your
machine?  Flocks of geese attacking your users!  No wonder you're
upset!  ...or were you just exaggerating a mite?

>In any case, if the decision were truly a local one, there would have
>been no need to inform the network as a whole, at length, in net.announce.

You're objecting to us notifying the user community about what we did
and why?  Hmmm, then I guess we could have avoided some of your tirade if
we had tried to do it in secret.  That's a mighty nice philosophy you
have there.  Or maybe you objected to the use of net.announce?  What
would have been your choice -- net.rec.birds? The purpose of
net.announce is: "Moderated, general announcements of interest to all."
Oh, okay, maybe you're right -- it probably wasn't of interest to a few
people.

Also, whoever said it was a local decision?  (You did, right there -- I
read it myself.  And you were wrong.) It had been discussed in
net.news.group about a month ago, and in mail with all 26+ backbone
admins, plus comments in other newsgroups.  

>Also, while the net.announce posting on the subject contained a number of
>helpful hints on setting up an alternate backbone and so forth, Spaf's real
>feelings on the matter seem to be summed up by the first paragraph,
>which says in full, without qualification, "Net.bizarre is going to go away."

I should have said, "Net.bizarre is maybe going away"?
Was I wrong?

>Postings of this sort, no matter what the content, are symptomatic of
>somebody trying to take control.

Hah!  I'm crazy, but I'm not THAT crazy.  Why would anyone want
"control" of this net?  In fact, I don't think "control" can even be
defined in this context, let alone realized.  You have never met me or
conversed with me on *anything* (to my knowledge) -- how can you
derive such a conclusion, other than as a paranoid fantasy?

>More peculiar is Spafford's contention that established procedures were not
>followed in the creation of net.bizarre.  The initial create messages
>were indeed wildcats, but subsequently there *was* a discussion on
>net.news.group, which *did* result in a consensus.  What's the gripe?

Major error of fact.  It wasn't consensus -- it was resignation.  We
gave up sending out "rmgroup" messages in hopes that the group would
die out on its own or we could find a way of making a "rmgroup" stick.

>Equally peculiar is Spafford's claim that net.internat was started as
>a wildcat newsgroup.  As postings on net.internat itself have made clear,
>the group was mandated at an EUUG meeting.  

EUUG != Usenet.  Mandates have little meaning without control.  (aha!
Maybe that is the "cabal" seeking control which has you so worried?)

>Its cancellation is even more peculiar.  On the basis of Spaf's own
>postings, this group seems to be the summum bonum:  a technical group
>(easy to justify to management) with a relatively small, but nontrivial
>volume, in which over 50% of the postings have something new and interesting
>to say.

Technical to you.
Relatively small compared to net.flame.
New and interesting to you.
You != Usenet.

>Compare that to net.unix.  (Or has it improved since I unsubscribed?)

(Cheap shot for the net.flamers: Not "since", "because")

Net.unix is for beginners to ask questions.  To the more experienced users,
those sometimes seem trivial or very naive.  What do you have against
novices?  Just what do you believe to be wrong with the group?

>However, we only truly arrive in tripped-out looking-glass electric kool
>aid wonderland when we examine Spafford's ideas on how a newsgroup *should*
>come into being.  

(Another for the flamers: If you have difficulty adding (as above), I
suppose even tying your shoes might bring on such an attitude. Or is it
a complication of your paranoia?)

>Ignoring the fact that moderated groups so far
>seem half-successful at best,...

If you mean half of them have been successful, maybe I can agree.
It depends on your view of success.

>...moderation implies central control, the evils
>of which are by now apparent.

It does?  They are?  That conclusion only comes to people attempting to
tie their shoes, Robert.

>If the net is going
>to remain worthwhile as more people sign on, newsgroup
>creation has got to get more flexible, not more rigid.

And how long will the net last when the load finally causes more backbone
sites to drop out?  Flexible creation is not the complete answer.  It
may be part of the answer, but it certainly is not correct all by itself.

>Another Spafford objection to creation of new newsgroups which seems partially
>reasonable at first blush is that locally written software is breaking
>because it's running out of space.  Well, I've written my own software.
>It runs (more or less) on a PDP-11.  Adjusting it for more groups, should
>that become necessary (it hasn't) is simply a matter of changing a number
>in a header file and typing 'make'.  I have *no sympathy* for anyone whose
>software would require more work than this.  *NONE*.

Great!  I'm glad that you have written such software and are going to
document and distribute it to every net site that needs it, and that
you'll handle bug fixes and upgrades, and you'll make sure that it
fits into memory on *every* machine that needs to run it.

Gee, maybe you aren't such a jerk after all.

>One final note.  I am one of the recipients of mail to the 'usenet' alias
>on tardis.ARPA.  As such, I have noticed (just today) new newsgroups called
>(of all things) net.internat and net.misc.coke.  Plainly, there are people
>out there (like me) who aren't usually terribly vocal in this forum, but
>nevertheless resent being screwed over by the gods.

Ahem.  I don't think I want to hear about you being "screwed over" by
any gods.  I hope that they're at least humanoid gods.

As to the "newgroup" messages, if you bothered to see the followup, it
was a mistake caused by a faulty shell file.  It was not an attempt to
recreate the groups.

>At the very least, it would be nice to avoid this situation by declaring
>a moratorium on the removal of groups until there is a genuine, rational,
>net-wide consensus on how to proceed.  That's *net-wide*, not majority
>vote of the backbone cabal.

It isn't a cabal.  (Nor is it a gaggle.)

If you'll go back and read my article again, you'll see that I suggested
that just such a discussion be started in net.news.  If we declare
a moratorium on deletions, we should also declare one on creations, too.
Lauren Weinstein has been suggesting the same to me for a while now.

>(p.s. If traffic on the backbone is such a problem, why not simply improve
>connectivity to eliminate the backbone?  This is a *solution* which could
>be implemented by *local* decision of backbone sites to shuck some connections,
>and *local* decisions at other sites to add new ones.  Any takers?)

Good move!  Suggest something and then ask someone else to do it.  That is
precisely the attitude that causes us most of our problems netwide.
There are too many individuals suggesting great things but doing nothing
themselves -- except complain at length.


USENET: "Those who can, try.  Those who can't, bitch and moan mightily
	about the ones who try."

I've directed followups to net.flame where they belong.
-- 
Gene "sometime in 1986" Spafford
The Clouds Project, School of ICS, Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332
CSNet:	Spaf @ GATech		ARPA:	Spaf%GATech.CSNet @ CSNet-Relay.ARPA
uucp:	...!{akgua,decvax,hplabs,ihnp4,linus,seismo,ulysses}!gatech!spaf