Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!rutgers!ucla-cs!zen!ucbvax!hplabs!pyramid!csg From: csg@pyramid.pyramid.com (Carl S. Gutekunst) Newsgroups: news.admin Subject: Re: Expiration dates on OtherRealms Message-ID: <4040@pyramid.pyramid.com> Date: Tue, 28-Jul-87 18:37:56 EDT Article-I.D.: pyramid.4040 Posted: Tue Jul 28 18:37:56 1987 Date-Received: Thu, 30-Jul-87 03:41:28 EDT References: <2525@hoptoad.uucp> <2821@phri.UUCP> <1371@epimass.EPI.COM> Reply-To: csg@pyramid.UUCP (Carl S. Gutekunst) Organization: Pyramid Technology Corp., Mountain View, CA Lines: 35 >>To expound on how rec.mag.otherrealms is different/better/whatever than the >>other groups, and thus deserves a longer expiry is pretty arogant.... I'm surprised by the number of people (observed over the past year) that have trouble with an author who thinks his meticulously edited magazine is "better" than the drek the engulfs even many of the moderated groups. While certainly some groups are a judgement call, I don't think that there can be any dispute that the edited magazines on USENET -- OtherRealms, alt.gourmand, Risks, Arms Digest, and a few others -- are of vastly superior quality, and the authors are indeed providing us with a service. And if the author asks (even demands) special handling for his superior product, I am perfectly willing to comply. And we put our money where our mouth is: we're paying to ship alt.gourmand around the world. (Literally.) Anyway, the level of Chuq's arrogance is not the issue here; it is whether the nature of rec.mag.otherrealms warrants long expiration dates. And I vote yes. I'd claim that *any* newsgroup that is periodical in nature -- including comp.mail.maps and news.announce.newusers -- should be set to expire for at least as long a period as it is posted. I'm interested in minimal user confusion, with minimal intervention on my part. Empty newsgroups, especially on popular topics, definitely cause confusion. The author knows when his next publishing date is, and I do not; so it's easier for me when he indicates this in the header (instead of my having to run a special expire to keep the group around longer). When disk space is a problem, there is always find(1); but OtherRealms is TINY relative to just two day's worth of control messages or a week's worth of talk.bizarre, so it is not very high on my list of places to go salvaging space. It is a problem of meeting the needs of the lowest common denominator. Small and minimally managed sites will be the least confused by keeping the latest articles in the group at all times. Those of us who run a tighter ship and are most concerned about disk space can exercise our rm privileges.