Xref: utzoo comp.dcom.modems:1199 news.misc:1102
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!phri!roy
From: roy@phri.UUCP (Roy Smith)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.modems,news.misc
Subject: Re: Telebit Modems (actually prod-support newsgroup)
Message-ID: <3105@phri.UUCP>
Date: 9 Jan 88 17:14:21 GMT
References: <3101@phri.UUCP> <1499@codas.att.com> <5411@zen.berkeley.edu>
Reply-To: roy@phri.UUCP (Roy Smith)
Distribution: na
Organization: Public Health Research Inst. (NY, NY)
Lines: 40

In article <5411@zen.berkeley.edu> spp@zabriskie.UUCP (Steve Pope) writes:
> Given the "no-commercialization" rules on usenet, starting a newsgroup with
> a specific commercial purpose in mind (telebit product support) seems like
> a notably bad idea.

	You miss the point, which was that just because you're transporting
text around using the same programs as usenet does, doesn't mean you're on
usenet.  Perhaps I should be more explicit.

	Let's say I'm selling widgets.  I've got 50 customers with whom I
want to stay in contact so I can distribute bug fixes, answer technical
questions, maybe even send out promotional literature in the form of
print-it-yourself PostScript files.  Those 50 customers want to get this
stuff.  They are even willing to pay phone bills to get it.  Or, maybe, I'm
willing to pay phone bills to get it to them.  Why can't my customers and
I, using existing uucp and bnews programs, start up our own private
newsgroup?  If you don't own a widget (or do but don't care to see this
stuff), you don't even have to know that this newsgroup exists.

	I could call this private group comp.dcom.modems.widget9600 if I
wanted to, but I consider "comp.*" to be part of usenet's reserved name
space (which is why I don't think mixing the inet groups in was a good
idea).  Creating a new name space for these explicitly commercial groups
which, by formal definition, would *not* be part of usenet, would just make
maintaining the administrative distinction a bit easier.

	The fact is, such alternate name spaces already exist, many of them
with alternate rules as to what is appropriate and what isn't.  The alt
namespace, for example, contains groups dedicated to subjects not
considered politically proper for usenet.  Those of us who don't think it
appropriate to discuss recreational drug use on company-owned machines
don't have to even know that other people are doing just that, spending
their own money to transport the text around.  And those of us that do want
to discuss that topic, find it no trouble to intermix those articles with
usenet traffic, sharing the same disk space, the same transport and user
interface programs, and the same phone lines and modems.
-- 
Roy Smith, {allegra,cmcl2,philabs}!phri!roy
System Administrator, Public Health Research Institute
455 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016