Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!xanth!ames!pasteur!agate!violet.berkeley.edu!rob
From: rob@violet.berkeley.edu (Rob Robertson)
Newsgroups: news.admin
Subject: Re: Moderators Making Money Off the Net
Keywords: Capitalism Moderator Ethics
Message-ID: <20038@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 7 Feb 89 00:42:26 GMT
References: <2712@looking.UUCP> <1449@papaya.bbn.com> <166@deltam.UUCP> <488@utoday.UUCP> <19979@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <668@pcrat.UUCP>
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In article <668@pcrat.UUCP> rick@pcrat.UUCP (Rick Richardson) writes:
|I think that companies believe that Usenet contributes to
|their bottom line either directly or indirectly.  I doubt
|that many simply consider it an employee perk or a charity
|contribution.

|So, in reality, there are a lot of companies that are using
|Usenet to make money.  Nothing wrong with that at all.
|Blatant marketing hype is frowned upon, but reasonable
|advertising pass with nary a whimper (The recent Uunet and
|(every 3 mo.) Telebit announcements come immediately to mind).

First UUNET doesn't make money, they are non-profit.

When people do post product announcements to a group it is usually
frowned upon, 'cept in misc.products.  Technical discussions are an
exception, ie comp.sys.sun, these groups are for users of the
products.  

|In this case, the Usenet salary for a moderator is a big goose
|egg.  This is something that should be changed.  I suggest that
|the salaries come from a tax on pay access sites and _leaf_ sites
|that don't pull their own weight.  This would include UUNET
|(note my address), Portal, and others, as well as AT&T and other
|_leaf_ sites.

|The moderators would become employees of the Usenet Community Trust
|(or whatever), and the Compilation Copyright for every group would
|be owned by the Usenet Community Trust (or whatever).

That would be great, hire a couple people just to do billing, a few
JCL/cobol programmers for the billing system, some user support
positions, a couple of software folk, about 50-60 people to act as
paid management and about 300 lawyers to persecute those folk who are
breaking the redistribution "rules" or not paying their share.  Boy
would Usenet thrive. 

rob
				william robertson
				rob@violet.berkeley.edu