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From: scott@zorch.UU.NET (Scott Hazen Mueller)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.misc
Subject: Re: Seismo's demise
Message-ID: <300@zorch.UU.NET>
Date: Thu, 22-Oct-87 22:04:42 EST
Article-I.D.: zorch.300
Posted: Thu Oct 22 22:04:42 1987
Date-Received: Mon, 26-Oct-87 01:34:29 EST
References: <6514@apple.UUCP> <7310001@hpcupt1.HP.COM> <214@papaya.bbn.com>
Reply-To: scott@zorch.UU.NET (Scott Hazen Mueller)
Organization: At Home; Modesto, CA
Lines: 27

In article <214@papaya.bbn.com> rsalz@bbn.com (Rich Salz) writes:
>Look at the current maps, or better you update your mail software: unless
>you really know what you're doing (and if you don't know about seismo's
>departure, then you don't), having to use "hard paths" is a mistake.
>	/r$

Well, speaking as someone who was still fairly recently a net.novice, I
can say that using "hard paths" may be a mistake, but it's often about
the only way to get anything done.  For instance, on any netnews site
that doesn't talk Internet addressing (any non-smail site, just about),
the first thing that you are presented with on replying is a hard path.
Being a mere mortal user at the time, I could hardly presume to tell
the sysadmin to do this or that, and so I learned to do mail via explicit
paths.  How did I do it?  Well, I learned a relatively small number of
long-distance links, and then routed things over those links.  What I'm
trying to point out is, on the typical "news is a hobby" Usenet system,
routing across explicit paths may be the only means available.  The
question wrt seismo's status is a legitimate one; not all users read news.*,
and not all administrators extract the important stuff and notify their
users...

...and another consideration is that many, many people still have lines
like seismo!foovax!me in their .signatures...

         \scott
-- 
Scott Hazen Mueller   ( near_me ? lll-crg!csustan!helium : uunet )!zorch!scott
(209) 527-1203