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From: andrews@ubc-cs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.news.adm
Subject: hi, back for more abuse
Message-ID: <299@ubc-cs.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 2-Jul-86 14:05:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: ubc-cs.299
Posted: Wed Jul  2 14:05:52 1986
Date-Received: Mon, 7-Jul-86 00:32:48 EDT
Reply-To: andrews@ubc-cs.UUCP (Jamie Andrews)
Organization: UBC Department of Computer Science, Vancouver, B.C., Canada
Lines: 73


     I hope readers appreciate the equanimity with which I
respond to the latest comments about junker -- some of
which (from those shining examples of netiquette, the
backbone SA's) make net.flame look like a tea-party.
Readers interested only in flaming can just hit 'n' now.

     [First, let me say to preserve my SA's nerves that
junker is not run by ubc-cs, ubc-vision, or any other site
that I know of, and does not reflect the official policy of
the University of BC.  And it's not responsible for the
latest line-eater bugs, as anyone familiar with it could
see (obviously this excludes Jrrzon).]

     I suppose I'm partly to blame for the confusion for
not being clear enough in my description, although some of
the comments show that the writers did not even read my
description.  For example, I was posting the shar package
to let people play with it on testbed directories, and to
try to get beta-test sites.  Sorry I didn't phrase it in
exactly that way.

--
objections
--

     The objections seem to come in four flavours.  First
is "junker will break all the news software".  I stress
that beta-testing should result in a version that works
completely transparently to the rest of the news software.

     The second class of objections is "junker is an
asshole program that no one would want to see running".  I
never offered junker as anything but an alternative to
newsgroup cuts.  Ask the readers of net.x whether they want
to see their newsgroup go away, or have junker run on it. 
I think they would vote for some news rather than no news. 
If the people saying "junk junker, preserve the spirit of
the net" are the same ones who say "yah, cut net.x
totally", then they're hypocrites.

     The third class is "people will be able to get around
it".  People may be able to get around it, though most of
the ways people mention won't work.  But (for the last
time, I hope!) *this will not increase volume because
junker imposes a ceiling on the total volume*.

     The fourth class is "the other proposed solutions will
work better".  All power to everyone proposing solutions;
this is just another one.  We may not be able to solve the
volume problem without cuts in signal.  Given that, I would
prefer that the signal cuts be *objective*.  Junker meets
this criterion; so does *fair* moderation; newsgroup cuts
do not; unfair moderation does not.  I kind of support
moderation, but I'm uneasy about whether the signal cuts
will be fair.  Is a combination solution impossible?

--
conclusion
--

     I don't expect everyone to agree with the above, but
please keep your flames down or send them to /dev/hell.  I
will appreciate any indication that anyone has taken the
trouble to look at the shar package and make specific
comments.  Volunteer beta test sites still welcomed.
However, if the boycotters threaten to boycott pairs of
sites which use junker on to.* newsgroups between them, I
guess we're in a Catch-22, folks.

--Jamie.
...!ihnp4!alberta!ubc-vision!ubc-cs!andrews
"Good heavens, Miss Sakamoto, you're beautiful"