Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!cmcl2!rutgers!bellcore!tness7!tness1!flatline!erict From: erict@flatline.UUCP (j eric townsend) Newsgroups: news.admin Subject: Re: The death of USENET Summary: Some ideas about what us "freeloaders" can do Message-ID: <860@flatline.UUCP> Date: 13 Jun 88 04:18:56 GMT References: <7475@swan.ulowell.edu> <2645@rpp386.UUCP> <56228@sun.uucp> Organization: a flat near the Montrose, Houston, Tx. Lines: 103 Right off the bat: I'm one of the "freeloaders" that Chuq speaks of. I'm running a UNIX-PC in leaf-mode, I receive only the groups that I care about, etc etc. My ideas lean towards a reconfiguration in our way of thinking about Usenet, and how we use it. In article <56228@sun.uucp>, chuq@plaid.Sun.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) writes: > USENET's focus started as, and it a good degree always has been, Unix and > computers (more or less in that order). That's what USENET is best at as > well. The other stuff, it's nice, as long as you can afford it, but > without the computer stuff, USENET wouldn't have ever gotten started. Right. Make USENET a specific set of groups that are tailored to business/hacker *specific* concerns: computers, their operation and maintenance, and things directly related to computers and their operation. Just because all the employees of FooBar, Inc. want rec.nude is no reason to make it part of Usenet. (See below.) > Here's my proposal of cuts. Guaranteed, I'll bet, to piss off everyone in > some way or another. But when radical surgery is necessary, these things > happen. For USENET to survive, we need to cut: Instead of cutting, how about splitting USENET into some subnets. Ie: USENET (COMPNET?) = comp.all. Depending on the intrest, comp.binaries may need to be moved to a seperate net all together. (BINARYNET?) Maybe the micro groups too. Look at all the attention that the RadShack Color Computer mailing list gets. Perhaps USENET and COMPNET. USENET would be everything *but* micro stuff, COMPNET would be micros and their binaries. {RECNET,FUN-NET} = talk,rec,misc ALTNET = alt.all, and other groups that are still likely to piss off employers, big business, and other "morally concerned" organizations. Basically, all of the fringe-people/barely bigger than a mailling list groups would be included. SOCNET = soc.all. Maybe some of the recs, but I doubt it. Ramifications of the above: 1) All of us alt.cyberpunk, alt.left-handed-threads, misc.butane-lighters, etc etc users would not have our "habit" financed by the business folks by default. If FooBar's president really liked the idea of carrying all the subnets, and wished to fund it, then they could do so. If FooBar's president wanted "No Fooling Around" on business machines, then they could just carry USENET. 2) Everything will be in an utter state of chaos for awhile. Some ideas on how to do this within the established news software: lib/news/sys files would be quite simple, actually: (distributions = world, na, usa, etc etc) foobar:(distributions),comp:L: <-- a no-nonsense business near me that only cares about USENET . thwango:(distributions),soc,alt,rec,misc:L: <-- a public access/games computer near me that doesn't cater to computer addicts. skreebonk:(dists.),comp,alt,soc:L: <-- a university near me that wants to trade educationally relevant groups. whifpoof:(dists.),comp,alt,soc,rec,misc,talk:L: <-- a different university near me that wants to trade both for-fun and educationally relevant groups. Splitting up into subnets would make things kind of chaotic for awhile. The coherency of a big usenet like we have now would be missing. Some sites would find it hard to get the groups they want, possibly because their neighbors refused to carry "silly" groups. HOWEVER... The splitting up of groups would improve the groups, I think. Only people with an intrest in the first place would be getting the groups at their site. All of us over in rec.autos.volkswagons.typeIs.karmann. ghia.cabriolets would be able to talk about convertable KG's to our hearts content with constant interruptions from cross-posting madpeople. :-) Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe all the existing folks will be willing to take up the slack, and establish more distributed workloads. Would *everybody* running ihave/sendme make things better? How about an abolishment of the newsfeed concept? Maybe the ihave/sendme stuff would work here. Instead of relying on one machine for my news, I would just make routine calls to all my neighbors, getting whatever news they had that I don't have. Comments? Ideas? Flamage? -- Know Future Skate UNIX or go home, boogie boy... J. Eric Townsend ->uunet!nuchat!flatline!erict smail:511Parker#2,Hstn,Tx,77007 ..!bellcore!tness1!/