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From: vnend@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (D. W. James)
Newsgroups: news.admin
Subject: Re: Article Classification is the key to solving USENET problems.
Message-ID: <8376@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Date: 11 May 89 17:35:37 GMT
References: <3222@looking.UUCP> <3233@looking.UUCP>
Reply-To: vnend@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (D. W. James)
Organization: Princeton University, NJ
Lines: 94
Race: 87%W, 13%Amerind, trace other
Sex: M
Age: 30
Height: 69"
Weight: 205
Preference: 4 (if I'm remembering that scale right.)
Shoe-size: 8 1/2 EE

In article <3233@looking.UUCP> brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) writes:
)Why am I so interested in the References: line?
)I believe that the final key to solving most of the problems on USENET is
)better article classification.  Article headers should contain as much
)information about the poster as possible, in a machine understandable
)form.
	
	I disagree, for reasons I'll get to below, especially with the
part about article headers.
 
)Once we get posting programs including more and more information, it's up
)to the reader to configure his or her reading based on that info.  Not
)everybody will do it, but the burden now falls on the reader.

)Then, if your reader doesn't present USENET to you the way you want, then
)that's your problem, and you shouldn't complain to the net about it.

	Some of us would say that this is the way it works now, and
that you are the one complaining to the net.
 
)Some say undergrads and novices should not post.  I say that sites should
)simply put flags on articles indicating the poster's usenet experience
)and let the reader decide.   Some say you shouldn't crosspost between
)soc.women and talk.abortion -- I say let the newsreader filter that out.

	The first, to put it delicately, a touchy subject (Personally, I
think it is silly), the second is already implemented, at least under
rn.

)To this end, I am having written, at my own expense, a more powerful
)postnews/Pnews program.  This will include a simple language to control
)posting.  Tests can be made, menus can be popped up and information can
)be added to articles, both on a global or newsgroup specific basis.  I
)will give this program away free.

)In the end, the only thing people should have to complain about is whether
)or not people classify their articles well.  Those who are novices can
)learn, and those who deliberately lie can be put in kill files.

	Let me get this straight.  Are you saying that since USENET doesn't
work the way Brad Templeton wants it to, and because you have spent so much
of your own time writing something that you think makes reading news easier
for you, that the *entire net* should modify its software to conform to your
software?  And even to the point of suggesting (in the posting about
'broken' reference lines) that any site that broke a reference line (broken
being your own definition) be cut off from the net?  Brad, your chutzpa
amazes me.

	The purpose of the net is facilate communications.  That communications
takes place in the *body* of the article, not the header.  If you want to 
select articles that only interest you, then you should be looking at the
body, not the header anyway.  The proposal to increase header size serves 
only to make things more expensive, by transmitting information other than
what the net needs (current required header info is needed for propogation
of articles) and not adding to discussion that is the purpose of the net.
I'll only suggest the problems of acquiring the information you want 
accurately, deciding what is esential information for the purposes of weeding
out articles (do we stop at race, age and sexual preference or go on to
shoe size?), and implimenting this mess all across the network.

	What Brad suggests, that WHO posts an idea is more important than the
IDEA itself, is both dangerous and poorly conceived.  I can only hope that
the majority of people out there agree, or I'll be forced to predict The End
of the Net. (1/2 :-)


)In fact, the only problem this doesn't solve is the disk space and transmission
)cost of wasteful postings.   But the biggest cost of USENET is actually
)the human cost -- time spent reading postings you don't want to and
)complaining about them.  If we can deal with that problem we are well
)on the way.

	Are there wasteful postings?  There are postings that you think
are wasteful, and there are postings that I think are wasteful.  If we
disagree, who is correct?  I think that the sceme that you are proposing
is inherently wasteful, since it adds to traffic without adding any content.
You, obviously, disagree.  Who is correct, and what gives either of us the
right to expect the other to accept our vision of the net?  Are you saying
that you really want headers that look like the one on this article?

 
)If there is interest, I will list some of the ways I think articles can
)be classified, and how they might work.
)Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd.  --  Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473

	I'm afraid to ask, but in truth am only interested to see what it 
tells us about you.


-- 
Later Y'all,  Vnend                       Ignorance is the mother of adventure.   
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