Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!lll-crg!nike!ucbcad!ucbvax!MC.LCS.MIT.EDU!kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu From: kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU Newsgroups: mod.politics Subject: Quality vs. Quantity Message-ID: <12240764971.25.MCGREW@RED.RUTGERS.EDU> Date: Sun, 21-Sep-86 15:30:14 EDT Article-I.D.: RED.12240764971.25.MCGREW Posted: Sun Sep 21 15:30:14 1986 Date-Received: Sun, 21-Sep-86 22:21:23 EDT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu@mc.lcs.mit.edu Organization: The ARPA Internet Lines: 70 Approved: poli-sci@red.rutgers.edu [ Due to moderator brain-damage, the reply to this message appeared last issue. My apologies to both gentlemen. - CWM] From: Willie Lim When JOSH was the moderator of POLI-SCI there were complaints of him dominating the discussion by insisting on having the last word in almost every debate that he was involved in. Yes, he often replied to messages in the same digests they appeared in. And if the original sender wanted to reply to his reply, it would be several days before it would appear in the digest, at which time JoSH's reply to the reply would appear with it. Our current moderator does the same thing. Why don't you find it equally objectionable? It doesn't really matter so long as you can reply to it. You could regard it as compensation for the time he spends moderating the list. What ended up happening was that many people didn't feel that it was a discussion anymore and stopped sending in their contributions. His replies always made sense. Non-libertarians stopped sending messages when their last argument had been exploded. After JoSH went away they gradually came back to the list and started broadcasting the same arguments that had been demolished years earlier. I could reply to almost every objection to libertarianism that I have seen by resending messages Josh sent four or five years ago. From the libertarian point of view, there is an explanation for the frequent long messages on this and other mailing lists. It is because the electronic mailing system is free. As a result individuals do not have incentives to conserve on words and strive for quality instead of quantity. Oh, come on! I read, store, and reply to my mail on a machine that I own. This machine cost me several month's savings. More valuable yet is the time I spend reading and replying to messages. Currently about 40 hours a week. The owners of many machines on the net(s) are willing to let people use small amounts of resources at night and on weekends to further the cause of man's knowledge. "Hackers" and "randoms" have written software of enormous value and given it away for free. Most of the electronic mail software and editing software on the net has been written by people who wrote it to use mailing lists like this one or to make other unofficial use of computer resources. What does the government have to do with any of this? Nothing, except that they own and operate the ARPAnet. Using a machine that happens to be on the ARPAnet is not necessarily using network resources. The network only exists to link these machines. Well, I send about 10k bytes of mail per day. Coast to coast off- hours phone rates are on the order of at most 30 cents per minute for a voice grade line. A voice grade line can carry data at about 9600 bits per second, so my mail takes less than ten seconds, or about 5 cents to send each day. Actually, since the ARPAnet leases lines around the clock, they aren't paying any more for the lines if they are used at night and on weekends. I would be quite willing to pay my fair share, if there were some way to distribute the costs that wouldn't cost a hundred times more than the resources consumed. I am already paying far more than that in the cost of my computer, my phone bill, by electric bill, and most importantly, the value of my own time. I have plenty of incentives to strive for quality rather than quantity. I take it that you agree with my recent messages to this list? It is interesting that you now contest the LENGTH of my messages, rather than their CONTENT! I assume you wouldn't bother to do the former if you were able to do the latter. ...Keith -------