Path: utzoo!attcan!lsuc!ncrcan!ziebmef!cks
From: cks@ziebmef.uucp (Chris Siebenmann)
Newsgroups: news.admin
Subject: Re: Setting up a UUCP site in Ontario
Keywords: charging?
Message-ID: <1989Mar18.223857.16492@ziebmef.uucp>
Date: 19 Mar 89 03:38:53 GMT
References: <89Mar14.020238est.19867@me.utoronto.ca> <5381@hcr.UUCP>
Reply-To: cks@ziebmef.UUCP (Chris Siebenmann)
Distribution: ont
Organization: Ziebmef Public Access Unix, Toronto, Ontario
Lines: 46

In article <5381@hcr.UUCP> mnarayan@hcrvx1.UUCP (Michael Narayan) writes:
[reordered for clarity]
| I don't think that you should be censoring what your users post.
| If they are paying for connect time to your system, then they are
| bearing the cost of what they write.

 On the other hand, what they post reflects on your site. I don't want
my site to become known as the next Portal; that's why most postings
on the Ziebmef are checked over first, and why I read all postings
made from here. 

| Isn't the idea behind Usenet to provide a FREE service ? Don't existing
| sites provide a free service, with the site owners/operators paying
| for the system and administration with their own money ? I don't think
| that you should be charging users for Usenet access. However, if there
| was some standard system cost ...

 This is a widely held and (IMHO) quite wrong assumption. Many sites
already charge some or all of their users to read news by charging for
connect time and/or CPU time (quite possibly including Doug's current
site). I see nothing wrong with explicitly charging for Usenet access
(charging for access time when the only thing you offer is Usenet is
currently being done by several sites). Note also that Uunet currently
charges for "Usenet access" in bulk form, and may very well make a
profit sometime soon -- and I for one will applaud if it happens. 

 My current view of Usenet is that it is remarkably similar to how
people can distribute the FSF's programs. People are perfectly free to
charge whatever the traffic will bear to make copies of FSF programs;
they just can't forbid their customers from further distributing the
code. A similar rule holds for Usenet. If the people reading news from
your site become dissatisfied with your rates, there is nothing
preventing them from going elsewhere or setting up their own site. 

 "Standard system cost" is an oxymoron; systems vary widely, as do the
costs of running them (from nearly zero to VERY high -- consider
how much attcan must be paying in phone bills!). Doug is certainly
going to have some continuing costs for the long-distance calls to get
news to Sudbury, and TB+ modems and large disks don't come cheap
either.

-- 
	"Though you may disappear, you're not forgotten here
	 And I will say to you, I will do what I can do"
Chris Siebenmann		uunet!{utgpu!moore,attcan!telly}!ziebmef!cks
cks@ziebmef.UUCP	     or	.....!utgpu!{,ontmoh!,ncrcan!brambo!}cks