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Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: comp.org.usenix,news.groups
Subject: Re: Request for special USENIX Meeting
Message-ID: <7856@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 1-Apr-87 15:19:05 EST
Article-I.D.: utzoo.7856
Posted: Wed Apr  1 15:19:05 1987
Date-Received: Wed, 1-Apr-87 15:19:05 EST
References: <1486@hplabsc.UUCP>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 30

One technical comment on Dave's diatribe:

> ... implementing something that allows people to browse groups
> by "keyword" or "topic" (and remove the whole concept of newsgroups
> except as an administrative and transmission aid)...

Give us a break, Dave, this one has been hashed over before.  When we
can't even get people to use the right newsgroups and pick sensible
Subject headings, how can we expect them to get keywords right?  (Doing
it right automatically is an advanced AI project.)  The successful
keyword-based information systems generally have three characteristics:

1. Their keyword space is under tight central control.

2. The choice of keywords for an individual item is done by, or at least
	supervised by, professionals.

3. Even so, their retrieval ratios are abysmally bad.  The few systematic
	studies that have been done have typically shown users who think
	they are getting 80% of the stuff they want, when they are really
	getting more like 30%.  No kidding -- it really is that bad.


By contrast, following discussions by topic is possible *today*, and the
better news-reading programs make at least an attempt at it.  No changes
are needed to make this work, except perhaps convincing people to install
and use better user interfaces.
-- 
"We must choose: the stars or	Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
the dust.  Which shall it be?"	{allegra,ihnp4,decvax,pyramid}!utzoo!henry