Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!stb.UUCP!rsex
From: rsex@stb.UUCP
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: aquaria: version 2
Message-ID: <9002150200.AA22184@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov>
Date: 15 Feb 90 02:00:06 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
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Note: before we start here, let me make it clear I'm not interested
in a debate about the merits of sci.aquaria. What is under 
discussion here is whether or not is is justified to crosspost
to aquaria groups to improve distribution of an article.

Benjemin Rice writes:
>hougen@umn-cs.cs.umn.edu (Dean Hougen) writes:
>
>>3.  The duplications in the three newsgroups are made necessary by a number
>>of numbscull site.admins who refuse to carry one or more of the groups.  Most
>>authors would be happy to stick their article in the one group in which it
>>best fits, saving cross-posting for those rare occasions where the subject
>>matter fits equally well in two or more groups.  But, thanks to the afore-
>>mentioned idiots, following that quite reasonable procedure results in the
>>article's not getting everywhere that it should.  Thus, many articles get
>>cross-posted in order to assure that the interested parties on the other end
>>will recieve them.
>
>Let's question a few assumptions in this paragraph, lest someone
>accidentally confuse them with truths.

Thats all very well, but just saying it's not true does not make
it such; you did not prove it was not true. You gave us your
opinion.

For example:

>a) Are *.aquaria cross-postings really _necessary_?  I say no.

That was an opinion. Here is a fact. You need to cross post
your *.aquaria article to get it to all the sites it should
go to.

>b) Would most authors really be happy to choose just one of the
>*.aquaria groups?  (First it may help to define "most authors".
>Offhand, I would say that Richard S. and Oleg are "most authors" in
>*.aquaria by at least one metric. :-) If authors really would be happy
>picking one group, why are there currently so many cross-posts between
>alt.aquaria and rec.aquaria (this thread being only one of many)?
>Don't both of these groups have good propagation?

No. Alt.aquaria goes to roughly 70% of the net. Distribution
of sci.aquaria is worse than that, and rec.aquaria is worse
again.

Now, since by your definition Richard and Oleg are ``most authors''
and they have claimed they would post to the correct group if the
distribution was fixed, then yes, most authors would post to the
correct group.

>c) "[Posting to just one *.aquaria group] results in the article's not
>getting everywhere that it should."  But to where _should_ an article
>get? 

An article should go to every site that carries the group. 

>Perhaps we should discourage cross-posts between rec.aquaria and
>alt.aquaria, since both (apparently) have good propagation.

According to the latest arbitron stats, rec.aquaria has the worst
distribution of all the aquaria groups.

>It may be
>beneficial to cross-post between alt.aquaria and sci.aquaria, since
>sci.aquaria has poor propagation.

So this is ok, but you object to adding rec.aquaria to the list ?
I'm cornfused.

--
Steve and Beth