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From: jik@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan I. Kamens)
Newsgroups: news.misc
Subject: Re: The Rape of Usenet (an alternative view)
Keywords: The wholesale capturing of Usenet by GEnie
Message-ID: <1989Dec21.174239.19794@athena.mit.edu>
Date: 21 Dec 89 17:42:39 GMT
References: <946@crash.cts.com> <6576@brspyr1.BRS.Com> <1989Dec21.024040.25157@athena.mit.edu> <32387@news.Think.COM>
Sender: news@athena.mit.edu (News system)
Reply-To: jik@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan I. Kamens)
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lines: 72

In article <32387@news.Think.COM> barmar@Think.COM writes:
>So you're saying that no computer system that charges users should have
>access to netnews?  Many university computer centers charge for usage.
>Many corporate computer centers also do.

  No, I'm saying that no computer system that makes a profit off of
netnews without giving netnews anything in return should have access
to netnews.

  If GEnie were gatewaying in the other direction, or if GEnie charged
only to cover the costs of transporting the news to the user's
computer, I would have no objection.  As it is, they are not
gatewaying or in any way giving back to USEnet for what they are
getting from it, and they are making a nice profit off of the time
people spend reading the postings they've ported to GEnie.

>You aren't paid when you write a letter to a newspaper, yet the newspaper
>charges people to let them read it.  What's the difference?

  Here's a milli-gilly of an analogy.  The difference, which I would
think would be quite obvious, is that when you write a letter to a
newspaper, you KNOW that they might print it, and you KNOW that they
are going to charge people to read it.  You write the letter
voluntarily.

  If I post a message to the artari.st newsgroup, and it gets
gatewayed to GEnie without my knowledge or consent, and they make
money off of it, and I don't get anything in return, that's just plain
wrong.

>GEnie is providing a service to its users by linking them to an information
>source.  What's wrong with them charging for that service?  And it costs
>them money to provide it; they have to pay for the disk space and the
>telecommunications costs.

  There's nothing wrong with GEnie charging for the services they
provide.  My objection is to their providing USEnet access without
giving USEnet anything in return.

>Most computer centers that provide Usenet are making a profit from it in
>one way or another; why else would they do it?  The technical information
>we receive in netnews has value.  The "rec" groups improve the morale or
>the employees, which is reflected in productivity and the attractiveness of
>the company as a place to work.  Profit is just very indirect sometimes.

  First of all, the computer centers that provide Usenet also (in most
cases) allow their users to post messages back to Usenet.  Therefore,
both sides are "profiting".

  Second, your I consider your attempt to convince me that "profit"
and "benefit" are equivalent and can be discussed without making any
distinctions between them to be ridiculous.

  Yes, Project Athena "profits" from having news here (and no, we
don't charge for it), and yes, we do allow anyone who can read news to
post it as well.

  Yes, Portal does charge their users money to read News.  However,
they also allow their users to post in the other direction.  There are
some people who find even this level of charging for Usenet access
objectionably (although I am not one of them), and therefore include
copyrights with there articles to attempt to stop Portal from
redistributing.  That's another issue entirely.

  GEnie profits from News and doesn't give ANYTHING back to the people
who wrote the Nws from which they are profiting.  It is this to which
I, and other people, object.

Jonathan Kamens			              USnail:
MIT Project Athena				11 Ashford Terrace
jik@Athena.MIT.EDU				Allston, MA  02134
Office: 617-253-8495			      Home: 617-782-0710