Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!usc!bbn!bbn.com!rshapiro
From: rshapiro@bbn.com (Richard Shapiro)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: rec.arts.cinema: moderated or not?
Message-ID: <50487@bbn.COM>
Date: 6 Jan 90 03:30:13 GMT
References: <50437@bbn.COM> <5200@buengc.BU.EDU>
Sender: news@bbn.COM
Reply-To: rshapiro@BBN.COM (Richard Shapiro)
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA
Lines: 49

In article <5200@buengc.BU.EDU> bph@buengc.bu.edu (Blair P. Houghton) writes:
>In article <50437@bbn.COM> rshapiro@bbn.com writes:
>>Briefly,
>>the example of r.a.m demonstrates what happens to a 'movies' group
>>when it isn't moderated.
>
>You mean, it discusses MOVIES?
>Sorry to say, rs, but r.a.m is one of the few groups that actually
>does do what its name implies, and does it both broadly and deeply.


It discusses a handful of movies in a highly restricted way (but in
tremendous volume). It doesn't come close to living up to its name
(the art of cinema is not exactly a topic of choice on r.a.m). It can
hardly be called 'broad' when 90% of the postings cover this week's
hot movie; it can hardly be called 'deep' when major topics are "who
would make a better Batman than Michael Keaton" or "in what movies
does Michelle Pfeiffer appear nude".

There are things r.a.m is useful for (lists of various kinds, simple
factual queries, casual reviews of very current movies). General,
substantive, historically informed discussion of cinema is not
something r.a.m is useful for.



>there's no way I'm going to unsubscribe r.a.m

Of course, no one suggested that you should. Ideally, there will be no
overlap between the two groups. 

>More important, what happens to the two-thirds of a group
>that leaves frustrated during the initial year of its
>existence, which will be spent crossposting to news.groups
>argument of proper method for moderation of spoilers and
>spoiler warnings, and what to the further one-sixth who
>abandon it because of the eventual choice of methods?


This is an interesting hypothesis. Is there any real basis for it? One
fact I do have: a significant number people have *already* abandoned
r.a.m, in frustration. What happens to *those* people?  This proposal
is trying to address their concerns.  Speculaton about people leaving
a group that doesn't even exist yet seems a bit premature, to say the
least.

The evidence at hand is this: r.a.m is not meeting people's needs, in
part because it's unfiltered. A new, moderated group can help fill the
gap.