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From: reid@decwrl.UUCP
Newsgroups: news.config,news.groups,comp.sources.d
Subject: Re: Wanted: net.sources feed (comments -- long)
Message-ID: <10332@decwrl.DEC.COM>
Date: Wed, 10-Jun-87 18:48:09 EDT
Article-I.D.: decwrl.10332
Posted: Wed Jun 10 18:48:09 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 13-Jun-87 05:29:49 EDT
References: <934@maynard.BSW.COM> <15888@gatech.gatech.edu>
Reply-To: reid@decwrl.UUCP (Brian Reid)
Distribution: world
Organization: DEC Western Research
Lines: 38
Xref: utgpu news.config:160 news.groups:911 comp.sources.d:761

Gene Spafford talks about alternative groups. I'd like to elaborate on what
he said:

>Alternative sources groups (or alternative *anything* groups) have a
>couple of major distinguishing features that some people seem to be
>overlooking: 1) they don't reach everyone on the net, so they don't get
>submissions from everywhere, so the volume is lower; 2) to get the
>group you have to purposely seek it out, so you know ahead of time what
>you're getting into; 3) you're consciously arranging the feed, so
>you're spending your own money on the transfer.  As such, these groups
>will be self-limiting.

1) No group reaches everyone on the net. Even the so-called "mandatory"
   groups have at best 25% readership. Most sites expire rapidly enough
   that it isn't even reasonable to look for things in the spool directory
   for groups that you don't read. I expect alternative groups to have
   readerships befitting their content, whatever that content might
   be.

2) Alternative groups are currently forced to be second-class citizens.
   The periodic "checkgroup" messages flush them from time to time on
   many systems. The mechanisms for moderators do not really support
   a moderated alternative group.

3) There is no reason why the alternative groups cannot use the same kind
   of distribution that the mainstream groups have now: relaying. The
   use of PC Pursuit and nntp makes it possible to ship alternative groups
   to many places for not much money. There is no need for alternative
   networks to be star-shaped, with all news radiating out of a single
   hub. There can be alternative backbones just as there is an official
   backbone. Therefore people will not be spending more money per byte on
   receiving the alternative groups than they will be on receiving official
   groups.

I agree very much with Gene that alternative groups are healthy, and that
people who want to pay for them should be allowed to move them around and
have them be "real" groups. I think it would be nice if the mechanisms in B
News software were a little more accepting of alternative groups.