Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!utastro!werner From: werner@utastro.UUCP (Werner Uhrig) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac Subject: One more time (Re: WHO CARES (was Re: Mac SE for sale) Message-ID: <3672@utastro.UUCP> Date: 1 Mar 89 13:17:06 GMT References: <84702@felix.UUCP> <928@stech.UUCP> Distribution: usa Organization: U. Texas, Astronomy, Austin, TX Lines: 122 In article <928@stech.UUCP>, sysop@stech.UUCP (Jan Harrington) writes: > in article <84702@felix.UUCP>, kehr@felix.UUCP (Shirley Kehr) says: > > In article <1154@bub.sdl.UUCP> lad@sdl.UUCP (Lawrence A. Deleski) writes: > >> but there is nothing wrong with posting macs for sale in comp.sys.mac. > >> How about it netters, wanna vote on this? I asume you are being rethoric here; if you want to call for a vote on the purpose of a group, you do that by , at least, cross-posting in group news.groups. Calling for a vote in a followup article like yours reaches only the "hardcore" news-junkies (and folks with an axe to grind in this topic) - anyone who is bothered by for-sale articles and who has any sense is trying hard to ignore this discussion thread. calling for a vote in an article in this thread, is like asking on skid-row who is for "free needles" - news junkies should not try to redefine the purpose of news-groups and make it even harder for the busy majority to keep track and in touch with technical issues. discussions were held way back, and misc.for-sale was created as an outlet for the MINORITY who would insist to abuse this media for commercial activities and to do so without even restricting the distribution area of their articles (carelessly and through ignorance, I don't know what is worse) > > Yes. I'd rather see Macs for sale here too. That way I don't have to read > > about PC's and other stuff that I couldn't imagine using in any current > > machine. look, this is ridiculous. read the classifieds in your local news-paper, read the bulletin board in your computer store, read a local BBS-system. Because, let me tell you, there are a lot better bargains to be found there!!! From the articles I have seen here, the majority of for-sale articles are priced in a way that have me convinced that the poster is not limiting the distribution simple to be able to reach a larger pool of FOOLS - and I consider that DOUBLE abuse of this communication channel provided courtesy of someone else's wallet!! I suspect, some of you might even be under the impression that the for-sale articles will give you a "feel" of the used-equipment market: WRONG, not the articles on this network. the fact is that most netters, at any given time, are not in the market for used equipment, and if they are they should be interested in learning about equipment for-sale "IN DRIVING DISTANCE!!", not half-way around the globe. (in case you didn't notice, you folks, carelessly, ignored my remark that I have little problem with for-sale articles posted to comp.sys.mac with distribution limited to an area the seller/buyer is willing to travel by car for a demo: > > Has anyone read misc.forsale lately? I posted a PC for sale there > > and not only have I not had any replies, I haven't even seen a complaint > > about the price. I wonder if anyone reads misc.forsale unless they have > > something to sell. the message you should have gotten is (and a little investigation might have led you to it) that commercial gain messages are against the rules of the game and are, explicitly, disallowed at many of the major backbone sites. That the net-gods, in their wisdom and knowing that there are always bozos who will disregard the wishes of the ones paying the bills, and who will insist that they deserve a forum to do with as they please in their little corner of the net where they pay the bills, well, the gods decided to create a top level msg-class "misc" and below it "misc.for-sale", thus making it possible for those companies who choose not to support for-sale articles, to simply not propagate a whole class of messages. you NEARLY got the right message when you wonder if it could be that the only ones who care are the ones that happen to want to sell something. you folks remind me of the telephone and door-to-door solicitors who act surprised when I tell them that they are abusing my time and the priviledge of ringing a person's doorbell and telephone. they say: "but, but, there are people who buy things" (hinting, of course, at what a wonderful bargain they have, rather than that ringing enough doors you can always find a sucker, eventually). so, to conclude, that because posting to misc.for-sale doesn't work, but posting to comp.sys.mac led to a sale, ergo posting for-sale articles to comp.sys.mac is both accepted and effective is WRONG, WRONG, WRONG !!! you abuse the privilege of having your articles to comp.sys.mac broadcasted by those sites trusting that you will not abuse it with commercial gains articles, and you are showing no concern and understanding of the nuisance you are to most people by sprinkling your commercial into the middle of a technical discussion forum. In addition, you have no insight and foresight in that if we'd all use this medium for our personal advertisements, it would soon come to a screaching halt. Just imagine, all your dear neighbors coming by and ringing your doorbell every weekend to tell you: "can I just have 30 seconds of your time to tell you about the garage-sale I'm holding? but if you are not interested, just use 2 seconds to say NO, and I'll be on my way..." lovely concept, isn't it ?!?! especially if it's not just your neighbor but THE WHOLE FREAKING WORLD that knocks on your electronic door .... plus, you end up paying for the phone-call !!! > I agree that sales notices of Mac-related things should go in comp.sys.mac. > It's where we all look. Personally, I think that the people who post > used machine sales are doing us all a service. I don't mind it one bit. OH, brother, "doing us a service" - what a concept. maybe we should all type in the contents of the computer section of the local classifieds and post them (mail them to you ???....) "It's where we all look" - really. why don't you look into reading the periodically posted articles explaining netiquette to new users? just maybe it contains a section on "for-sale" and commercial gains news-articles ... -- -----------> PREFERED RETURN-ADDRESS FOLLOWS <-------------- (ARPA) werner@rascal.ics.utexas.edu (Internet: 128.83.144.1) (UUCP) ..!utastro!werner or ..!uunet!rascal.ics.utexas.edu!werner