Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!orchid!imprint
From: imprint@orchid.UUCP
Newsgroups: news.stargate
Subject: Re: "try-out trials" (and some general opinions)
Message-ID: <7041@orchid.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 19-Apr-87 08:13:45 EST
Article-I.D.: orchid.7041
Posted: Sun Apr 19 08:13:45 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 19-Apr-87 18:35:50 EST
References: <965@vortex.UUCP> <6582@bu-cs.BU.EDU> <2403@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu>
Reply-To: imprint@orchid.UUCP (U of Waterloo Student Newspaper)
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 80
Summary: Delays not implied by moderation

It has been suggested that a moderator choosing the "best"
items, and listing the names of others who said the same
thing would cause a dealy while the moderator waited for the
definitive piece. 

Not so. A Usenent Moderator and an ordinary Editor in print
communication are essentially the same thing. The newspaper
editor still gets a paper out every day, even though he has
given you only 40% of what he had avaialable.
The periodicity could be the same, just condensing
repetitive stuff -- condensing it all the way to a list of
names on occasion. You don't wait for definitive articles to
publish a paper, you wait for the press deadline. Then you
go with the best of what you've got.

But unlike commercial publications who make money by serving
the interests of specific populations newsgroups are
essentially non-commercial, volunteer public service
facilities. They are more reminiscent of the university
student newspaper than commerical publishing. I know in
Canada it is virtually pointless to sue a student paper for
liable because they have no money to speak of, you'd never
get damages even if you proved the intent of a piece was
defamatory.

I think *International* law is ultimately going to have to
address the problem of communication media that span the
world. I.E. there has to be some clear statements about what
the international community considers appropriate to
transmit between countries. Likewise, there will always be
local controls on distrubution which cannot backfire on the
foreign source.

I would not carry a posting on my machine from anybody that
advocated, for instance, burning Jews or encouraged people
to blow up airplanes or plant bombs in railway cars. However
there probably are countries where this would be acceptable.
Let the site be governed by the laws of the area -- just
like a newspaper -- and transmission be governed by the laws
of the world.

But really, libel law is not a big problem. Liable
prosecutions are few and far between, convictions even
rarer. If stargate's mandate is to facilitate discussion of
ideas, extremely defamatory material can be justified as in
"the public interest". For Stargate to be sued, the intent
(on Stargate's part) to defame and libel an individual would
have to be proven. If Stargate doesn't even read what goes
through its transmission facilities, this would be quite
unlikely. Newspapers carry a caveat on letters pages "The
opinions expressed here are those of the author, not the
paper". That defines the public interest of the letters page
making it almost entirely immune from libel suits except in the
case of systematic and repeated deliberate abuse.

Let Common Sense rule over Common Paranoia. Newspapers very,
very rarely get sued for libel even when deliberately
defaming people -- because that's their job. I've never
heard of a libel suit over a letter to the editor. And
usenet is like a publication which exclusively carries
letters to the editor.

In order to increase quality, individuals might consider
trying to run publictions on the net, just like a print
periodical but with no presses. Mailing lists already work
much like that. Is there any reason not to charge a
subscription to the reader who wants a particular "magazine"
type service delivered to him? 

The glory of the net is the fact of user-defined standards,
rather than editor-mediated standards. Send e-mail to
posters who annoy you and let them know how you feel,
encourage them to improve their work if you can. Let's not
try to make the net an exclusive club which lives up to
"our" standards -- whoever "we" are. Lots of high quality
media already exist (and will come to exist in electronic
versions of some sort). But usenet is different. Its very
open-ness opens new, as  yet untapped possibilities. Let's
not throw out those future possibilities because some jerk
might sue somebody!