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From: steve@valid.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.news.group,net.abortion,net.misc,net.motss,net.origins,net.philosophy,net.politics
Subject: Re: reorganization of soapbox newsgroups
Message-ID: <289@valid.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 22-May-86 22:11:47 EDT
Article-I.D.: valid.289
Posted: Thu May 22 22:11:47 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 24-May-86 00:24:04 EDT
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I would like to suggest an alternative:  put the
conversion to talk.xyz groups on hold temporarily.  In the
meantime, encourage more self-restraint by with respect to the length
and frequency of postings.  

This is NOT a proposal for the backbone to just let things continue as they 
are.  By "encourage," I mean VIGOROUSLY encourage,
with the threat of converting to talk.xyz groups as a large stick held
over our heads.  

There is no discussion of the backbone sites' concerns in the 
non-technical groups that I read most regularly (net.politics and net.women).  
Some of us know that there's a traffic problem, but we don't *KNOW* there's a
problem, if you get my drift.  Let's see if emphasizing the seriousness 
of the problem will cut the traffic volume.

Some individuals will persist in posting huge volumes of stuff. 
That's always going to be a problem, no matter what groups are cut,
and it can be handled in the same way it would be handled if someone 
got too chatty in net.news.group.

The posting guidelines we need to follow are obvious; we need to build
a concensus among people using the non-technical groups to adhere to
reasonable guidelines ... OR ELSE!

A.  Don't repost huge chunks of articles.  Make people go look up the 
original posting.

B.  Don't post as often or at length. Short, infrequent postings will
have more impact anyway.

C.  Be terse.

The advantages to this approach are:

1.  If it works, nothing "official" has to change. We all get to 
keep posting, AND the backbone sites' overhead goes down.

2.  It's in the spirit of free and open communication combined with
individual responsibility, a spirit that is rare and wonderful and
well worth preserving. 

3.  If it works, it would probably also cut traffic (hence costs) on the
groups that aren't being proposed for talk.xyz.  

4.  If it doesn't work, the backbone will get much less flack
over making the talk.xyz change, because users will realize
that the backbone has given the net every opportunity to clean up its act.
So it's really a no-lose situation for the backbone. 

5.  If we don't try it, the groups that get converted to talk.xyz will
probably die.  It's very much in the best interest of people using the
non-technical groups to regulate ourselves.

Any comments, anyone?

-- 
_____________________________________________________________
The views expressed here are my own.  Really.  
Steve Homer   {hplabs,amd,pyramid,ihnp4}!pesnta!valid!steve