HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: sandrock@aries.scs.uiuc.edu (Mark Sandrock)
Subject: Re: misc.health.alternative should be in talk
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 16:47:35 GMT

sdb@ssr.com (Scott Ballantyne) writes:

>misc.health.alternatives is not a good name for this newsgroup. Under
>a misc.health heading I would expect to find things like:
>...

>The name is simply not descriptive or informative.  The subject matter
>of the group is about medical treatments which have been either been
>rejected or are unaccepted by scientific medicine, i.e. alternatives
>to scientific medicine, not alternatives to health. Those of us who
>oppose the group also feel the name is misleading, since we do not
>regard alternative medicine as healthy.

Hey, enough of this 'orthodox' bigotry, now! I would suggest that anyone
who is interested check out a few books from the public library and look
into the history of say, homeopathy. It might be a real eye-opener! For
instance, it seems that there *have* in fact been successful single and
double blind tests of homeopathic remedies. But don't take anyone's word
for it, check it out for yourself. Be scientific about what you accept!

And, btw, didn't the chiropractors win their lawsuit against the AMA?
Hasn't word gotten around yet?

These persistent shrill attacks merely call to mind the debating style of
a certain about to be ex vice president...

Mark Sandrock
-- 
Univ of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign   "He could run through the pain. That
Chemical Sciences Computing Services    was his greatest gift."
505 S. Mathews Ave./Urbana, IL 61801          --Leigh Montville on Zatopek
Email: sandrock@aries.scs.uiuc.edu              in *A Bridge to Long Ago*
From: majafri@cco.caltech.edu (Mansoor  A. Jafri)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: Is Dave Hayes wasting your tax dollars?
Date: 22 Nov 1992 10:54:10 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
NNTP-Posting-Host: sandman.caltech.edu
Keywords: waste in government

In article <1992Nov21.220028.4444@bagend.uucp> jan@bagend.uucp (Jan Isley) writes:
>dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov writes:

>>You cannot tell me how to run my news site.

>I could care less what you do at home, however, we do have a right to
>tell you how to run JPL because as taxpayers, we helped pay for it.
>As a taxpayer, in these hard times with NASA budgets being what they
>are, it also concerns me that you seem to have so much free time at work.

	Jet Propulsion Laboratory belongs to Caltech and not Unlce Sam.
	It is a private organization. Substantial amount of funding comes
	from private/industrial groups.

	So, sleep at ease, none of your tax dollars are being wasted by 
	messages being posted by Dave Hayes (although a system administrator
	here, I don't know the guy). 

	btw, furthermore, no tax dollar was wasted in sending this 
	message either ;-)

	One a little serious side, Jan Isley has certainly disappointed
	by trying to inflict a low blow on someone. Sure, can't find 
	anything else or can't defend one's position so why not get nasty?
	Disgusting, in my opinion. 

	
>Do not suffer the company of fools  ||  Jan Isley ...!gatech!bagend!jan
>  Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha    ||  jan@bagend.uucp (404)434-1335
From: jmaynard@oac.hsc.uth.tmc.edu (Jay Maynard)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: Give up, Dave, you've lost!
Date: 16 Nov 1992 15:32:04 GMT
Organization: UT Health Science Center Houston

[Note: My participation in this discussion does not mean that I support any
invalidation or revoting of the the rec.music.makers.synth result.]

In article <1992Nov15.223126.16981@watson.ibm.com> strom@Watson.Ibm.Com (Rob Strom) writes:
>1. Avoid bundling multiple unrelated votes onto a single ballot.  My preference
>   is that the only bundling which should be allowed is either:
>   (a) different ways of splitting a single newsgroup
>   (b) different ways of renaming a single newsgroup

Unfortunately, as the Guidelines stand, neither of these are conforming. 

>   (c) uniform renaming of an entire hierarchy -- e.g. x.y.* to x.* or x.y.z.*

The Guidelines require separate votes for each group in such a case, but as I
understand your comments, that is not a problem.

The problem is that this would disallow one coherent vote on the kind of thing
that this reorg (only one part of which is in question) was designed to
address: How do you bring related groups that are currently in different
places in the hierarchy together?

A related question is how you would have handled the rec.ham-radio reorg.
There, the hierarchy was moved, two additional groups were created, and one
group moved out. The discussion and vote went smoothly, and the reorg was a
success. Splitting up this related set of proposals into three separate
discussions and votes, or even just three separate votes, would have created
significant extra traffic for the net and work for me.

Your definition of "unrelated" is far too broad.

>2. The ballot should name all affected newsgroups in the subject line.
>   Assuming (1) is enforced as above, the subject line should not be overlong.

This one falls down mainly because 1) is a Bad Thing.

>3. If (1) is not enforced as above, then post separate announcements
>   with Subject lines explicitly naming the affected groups to the affected groups.

This one I have little problem with - though I fear that it will fragment the
discussion on a proposal too much - and could support, provided steps were
taken to prohibit followups to the pointer articles.
-- 
Jay Maynard, EMT-P, K5ZC, PP-ASEL | Never ascribe to malice that which can
jmaynard@oac.hsc.uth.tmc.edu      | adequately be explained by stupidity.
           "Cat: Four legs and an attitude." -- Jim Reese
From: mughal@iago.caltech.edu (ASIM M MUGHAL)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: Is Dave Hayes wasting your tax dollars?
Date: 22 Nov 1992 01:47 PDT
Organization: California Institute of Technology
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: iago.caltech.edu
Keywords: waste in government
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    

In article <1992Nov21.220028.4444@bagend.uucp>, jan@bagend.uucp (Jan Isley) writes...
>dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov writes:
>>
>>You cannot tell me how to run my news site.
> 
>I have been meaning to ask this for some time, thanks for reminding me.
>Which site is that Dave?  Do you have a system at you home that you own,
>or do you mean the JPL site?

	Err, I hate to intrude here but I think it is obvious he means 
	the site he is a sys admin of :)

>I could care less what you do at home, however, we do have a right to
>tell you how to run JPL because as taxpayers, we helped pay for it.

	No, sorry, you don't. JPL is Caltech's off-campus lab. Caltech is a
	private insitutute. Caltech *owns* JPL and administers it. Only
	Caltech has a right to determine how to run their resources. :)

	Thought a little unbiased clarification might help :)

>As a taxpayer, in these hard times with NASA budgets being what they
>are, it also concerns me that you seem to have so much free time at work.

	He is a sys admin and a news admin. Anything relating to these 
	issues *is* part of his work. Seems he works around the clock 
	but only gets paid for mere 8 hours a day. Poor guy doesn't even
	get any compensation for that... & gets flames anyways. I would 
	hate to be in his shoes ;)

A.M
[Standard Disclaimer]

>-- 
>Do not suffer the company of fools  ||  Jan Isley ...!gatech!bagend!jan
>  Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha    ||  jan@bagend.uucp (404)434-1335
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: andy@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Andrew Hackard)
Newsgroups: news.groups,news.admin
Subject: Re: About the elitism in news.groups
Date: 16 Nov 92 01:05:47 GMT
Followup-To: news.groups
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX

dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov writes:
>Here's what an actual poster from the rec.music.makers has to say.
>I'd strongly advise that you listen:

Ego sum totus auris, Dave...

>>I've read Chip Salzenberg's arguments and I have to say I disagree.  I
>>am not very familiar with how the networks work.  That doesn't mean I
>>don't have an interest.  Quite frankly, if I wanted to know something
>>about the policies of reorganizing a bboard, I wouldn't even know where
>>to start looking for information.  It's disappointing to hear that
>>people who evidently know more consider themselves superior instead of
>>consider themselves as a resource for those who could learn from them.

>That last sentence sums it up pretty well. Comments?

1) It's a newsgroup, not a bboard.

2) Tarring ALL sysadmins with the perceived deficiencies of a few strikes
me as rather disingenuous.  If this poster's sysadmin has a policy of
never helping his or her own users, that's one thing -- but sysadmins
have enough to do without worrying about questions from people half a
continent (or more) away.

3) Please, Dave, pass this on:
  -- Read news.announce.newusers and news.newusers.questions.
  -- Read news.groups IF you're interested in how newsgroups are created,
renamed, etc.  If not, then why bitch?
  -- That said, I realize that many users don't *ever* post; they're on
the net because they like to read articles.  However, democracy ain't an
armchair sport, and benevolent anarchy is even less so.  If you don't
avail yourself of the resources that are out there, don't expect a hell
of a lot of sympathy.

--
--Andrew Hackard                                 If I spoke for UT, this post
  andy@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu                        would make even less sense.

(I'm not a sysadmin...thankfully.)
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: cmeadows@nyx.cs.du.edu (Chris Meadows)
Subject: Re: RFD: rec.arts.fantasy
X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University
	of Denver for the Denver community.  The University has neither
	control over nor responsibility for the opinions of users.
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix at U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 92 19:44:36 GMT

In article <1992Nov16.220416.1@fnalo.fnal.gov> morrow@fnalo.fnal.gov (Tho
 Shalt Not Covet Thy Neighbor's Elmo) writes:
>
>	First, put the words Request for Discussion at the top of your RFD,
>or have you missed the "ambiguity" flamewars raging in news.groups?
>
>pvanheus@frodo.cs.uct.ac.za (P A van Heusden) writes:
>> rec.arts.fantasy
>
>> Charter
>>  A newsgroups for academics and other interested people to discuss asp
cts
>>  of Fantasy literature in.
>> 
>> Purpose of this group
>>  Fill the wide gap in netwise discussion of Fantasy. By this, I mean f
ntasy
>>  as literate, not the kind of "I love this author rave rave rave" stuf
 you
>>  find in alt.fan.<whatever>.
>
>	Not going to happen.  As soon as this group gets created, it will
>be filled with "I love this author rave rave rave".  Honest, the number 
f
>people who want to discuss fantasy as literature is much less than the
>number of people who want to discuss Piers Anthony.
>-- 
>"I've never said anything about his family but the warmest, kindest thin
s."   
>--Ross Perot, on Bush's family                                          
      
>  
>elmo (morrow@physics.rice.edu,morrow@fnal.fnal.gov)


As has been demonstrated conclusively on rec.arts.sf.written.

Long live Piers Anthony!  YaaaaaaY!!!  :-)

--
Chris Meadows // CHM173S@SMSVMA // CMEADOWS@NYX.CS.DU.EDU
   "If blood be the price of admiralty, then I've just bought me 
    a naval commission."  -- Corwin, SIGN OF THE UNICORN, Roger Zelazny

Newsgroups: news.groups
From: dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov (Dave Hayes)
Subject: Re: Music Group Reorg Disagreement (was Re: *BAD* music group reorg will not be honored)
Reply-To: dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov
Organization: Jet Propulsion Lab - Pasadena, CA
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 08:48:01 GMT

dave@frackit.UUCP (Dave Ratcliffe) writes:
>1) Never assume
>2) Never assume
>3) Never assume

THEN he writes:

>Then you [have] one of 2 problems:

Those sure sound like assumptions to me. Have you ASKED the person what
their problems are?

>In either case the info was there for you to read and you SHOULD have
>had enough interest to see how things operated instead of blindly
>assuming you needed to do nothing. 

You cannot imply SHOULD when it wasn't known that it was possible.
-- 
Dave Hayes - Network & Communications Engineering - JPL / NASA - Pasadena CA
dave@elxr.jpl.nasa.gov       dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov         ...usc!elroy!dxh

   The word 'choice' is a fraud 
         while people choose only what they have been taught about to choose.
Newsgroups: news.groups,news.admin.policy
From: jbotz@mtholyoke.edu (Jurgen Botz)
Subject: Re: Usenet Documentation Revision Project : Update (Phase Zero completed)
Organization: Mount Holyoke College
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 16:50:19 GMT

In article <1992Nov17.200624.5463@muddcs.claremont.edu> irilyth@fenris.claremont.edu (Josh Smith) writes:
>Here's an update on the Usenet Documentation Revision Project.
>Phase Zero (gather existing documentation) appears to be completed. I now
>have the following documents:
>
> [list deleted]

Don't forget "What is Usenet? Not!" by Ed Vielmetti.
--
Jurgen Botz                  |   Internet: JBotz@mtholyoke.edu
Academic Systems Consultant  |     Bitnet: JBotz@mhc.bitnet
Mount Holyoke College        |      Voice: (US) 413-538-2375 (daytime)
South Hadley, MA, USA        | Snail Mail: J. Botz, 01075-0629
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov (Dave Hayes)
Subject: Re: Getting on with a new proposal for Guidelines
Keywords: music, makers, synth, flame war, vote, rfd, cfv
Reply-To: dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov
Organization: Jet Propulsion Lab - Pasadena, CA
Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1992 02:09:28 GMT

huggins@quip.eecs.umich.edu (Jim Huggins) writes:
>|I have to do it another way. Stay tuned.
>Any idea when this will actually be happening?  Next week?  January?
>Just wondering what time frame we're discussing here.

As soon as I can. Perhaps by January would be good, it would give people
a chance to calm down. 

>[The fact] is that you are not accepting the newgroup message for r.m.m.synth.
>To debate with this being the sole fact is to in essence debate
>the rightness or wrongness of your actions, which inevitably leads
>to personality wars and flames.

That explains what we are seeing. Ok. 

>My guess is that is would also cut down on some of the flameage
>(call me an optimist), since both sides could deflect flames by
>returning to the question "But what do you think about the TEXT?".

I still don't think that this would cut down on flamage. Even the
proposal I'll put out will generate flames...but perhaps most of
the trivial ones can be ironed out by a working group. 
-- 
Dave Hayes - Network & Communications Engineering - JPL / NASA - Pasadena CA
dave@elxr.jpl.nasa.gov       dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov         ...usc!elroy!dxh

Penitent (adj.) - 1. Someone who has been made incapable of enjoyment.
Xref: sparky news.groups:21958 soc.culture.indian:37149 soc.culture.pakistan:16735 soc.culture.bangladesh:5947
From: mallya@octel.com (Satyanarayana Mallya)
Newsgroups: news.groups,soc.culture.indian,soc.culture.pakistan,soc.culture.bangladesh
Subject: Re: CFV: soc.religion.islam.ahmadiyya moderated
Date: 16 Nov 92 03:06:26 GMT
Organization: Octel Communications Inc., Milpitas Ca.

In article <1e4bdfINNhai@CURIE.SYSTEMSY.CS.YALE.EDU> ahmed-shakil@cs.yale.edu (Shakil Waiz Ahmed) writes:
>
>In article <Bxq8v1.426@ucunix.san.uc.edu>, bhatnagr@ucunix.san.uc.edu (Raj Bhatnagar) writes:
>> In article <1e3q41INNgse@CURIE.SYSTEMSY.CS.YALE.EDU> ahmed-shakil@cs.yale.edu (Shakil Waiz Ahmed) writes:
>> 
>> 
>> >Ahmadiyas aren't Muslims.
>> 
>> And are you the one vested with the authority to decide who is a Muslim
>> and who is not? I don't think so. As much of the intra-Islamic politics
>> as I know, each Islamic sect's trying to call the other sects Non-Islamic
>> is a very popular and never ending feud. Which sect should the world 
>> listen to? I guess equally to all of them.
>
>I thought democracy was an issue of majority?  Surely, when an important
>decision is to be made in any context, there will be various opinions.
>But ultimately, the majority vote is implemented.  Since the majority
>of Muslims do not wish to be associated with Ahmadis, there is no
    ^^^^^^^
	In a secular society it would not be limited to muslims. That is
ze difference. Though this might be somewhat tangential, your demand is some-
what similar to the argument that a majority race can/should decide to which
race can be classified as a human. As the ahmeddiya sect believes in Allah as 
much as you do, I think they have right to classify themselves as part of islam!
Causing/Instigating social blockades of that sect will only underline your 
intolerance.
	
>
>Actually, I shun the fact that Ahmadis insist on attaching the "Islam"
>name to their religion, thereby accomplishing the very unwelcome stunt
>of associating other Muslims with them.

I guz that would mean you will have to live with it!

>-- Shakil

Satya Mallya

************************************************************
Satya Mallya
 ___    _____  ____  .                       
|   |__   |   |      |
|  ||     |   |----  |
|__||     |   |____  |____    
   |___
************************************************************
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: jhawk@panix.com (John Hawkinson)
Subject: Re: RFD: sci.solid-state.electronics
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 04:34:06 GMT
Organization: PANIX Public Access Unix, NYC

Please keep all this discussion in news.groups and out of the related
groups (sci.electronics, sci.physics, etc.). 

In <sehari.721709404@class1.iastate.edu> sehari@iastate.edu (Babak Sehari) writes:

>I received several suggestion about the name. It is hard to
>satisfy everyone. What about this:
> 
>sci.electronics.quantum_physics.solid_states
> 
>This would satisfy most people, both in physics and in electronics.
>We want to encourage contribution from both sides of issue in this newsgroup.
>This group would be small enough, to focus on the field and large enough
>not to become a post group.  The name is obvious enough for the new
>people to find their way in.

This name is bad for a couple of reasons:

	1) Though it stays within an existing hierarchy (sci.electronics.),
	   it creates a new sub-hierarchy which will probably never be
	   used, setting bad precedent and cluttering up the namespace.
	   Perhaps sci.electronics.solid-state or sci.physics.solid-state,
	   but you can't have it both ways.

	2) Avoid using underscores in group names. Instead use dashes (-),
	like sci.solid-state.

	3) It's too long. Some newsreaders have a limit to how much
	of a newsgroup name they display, and it's too long to type.

	4) Portions of newsgroup names which exceed 14 characters
	are incompatible with a lot of news software. The
	"quantum-physics" part is 15 characters.

Anyway, my "vote" goes to sci.electronics.solid-state. Perhaps
you should take a straw poll?

--
John Hawkinson
jhawk@panix.com
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: yozzo@watson.ibm.com (Ralph Yozzo)
Subject: Re: RFD: rec.arts.fantasy
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 23:10:47 GMT
Disclaimer: This posting represents the poster's views, not necessarily those of IBM
Organization: IBM T.J. Watson Research Center
Keywords: fantasy RFD arts

In article <1992Nov17.102155.14072@neptune.inf.ethz.ch> qvortrup@inf.ethz.ch (Michael Qvortrup) writes:
>In article <Bxty6p.40F@uunet.uu.net> pvanheus@frodo.cs.uct.ac.za (P A van Heusden) writes:
>>Proposed Newsgroup's Name
>>=========================
>> rec.arts.fantasy
>
>This is covered by rec.arts.sf.written. During last years reorganisation
>is was hashed out sufficiently, that:
>
>	a) sf in this context stands for speculative fiction
>	   and thus contains fantasy
>	b) nobody could agree on a dividing line between
>	   science fiction and fantasy anyway
>
>In summary: there is no need.

I believe that all this debate about the naming of newsgroups 
would be lessened if there were a standard method of giving a newsgroup
an alias.  For instance, there could be an alias of 'health' for the
rec.med group.

The reason that I propose this is that the current naming of newsgroups
sometimes makes finding the correct newsgroup (for the topic you are interested
in) difficult.

For instance, I am interested in hospitals, health, and lyme disease.  
I searched for an appropriate newsgroup and could not find one.  Therefore,
I thought about starting a new group.  I never thought to search under
'sci.med'. (This, in my opinion, is a cryptic name.)
But 'sci.med' was the appropriate group for my interests.  

In some cases, the poor naming conventions causes two problems.  First, the user
cannot find the appropriate place for his/her topic.  Second, some
users will propose new newsgroups when (in reality) a current newsgroup will 
suffice.  Thus, invoking debates such as this thread.

Ideally, the alias system would be transparent to the user.  This
would mean that if I use 'trn' and I type "a health", the newsgroup
'sci.med' would be included the list of groups to be read.

Adding aliases to newsgroups should be less disruptive than the
massive renaming of newsgroups.

-- 
 Ralph Yozzo (yozzo@watson.ibm.com)  
 From the beautiful and historic Mid-Hudson Valley area of NY state
Newsgroups: news.groups,news.admin
From: sethb@fid.morgan.com (Seth Breidbart)
Subject: Re: About the elitism in news.groups
Organization: my opinions only
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 23:30:47 GMT

In article <1e6kemINNrvn@MINERVA.CIS.YALE.EDU> randall-joshua@yale.edu (Joshua Randall) writes:
>In article <7B8SBVBD@cc.swarthmore.edu> hildebra@math.wisc.edu (Jeff Hildebrand) writes:
>
>[deletion]
>
>>	The more complicated situation is with longer ballots. A suggestion
>>I saw made which made a lot of sense to me was this: On a longer ballot
>>which is going to effect several groups, make a short post to each group
>>affected, summarizing the effect on that group and including pointers to the
>>original RFD and the explanitory articles in news.announce.newusers.
>
>I've said this before, I'll say it again.  Who decides which groups
>are affected?  This will lead to the same problem we have now:  people
>claiming they never saw the vote because nothing was said about it in
>their group.

As long as the groups in question are unmoderated, the answer is:
ANYBODY.  You could have posted a "warning" message to all affected
groups.  I could have.  Even Mr. Hayes could have.

If a group is moderated, then the moderator (alone or in concert with
anyone else) decides if the posting is relevant.

Seth		sethb@fid.morgan.com
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: arromdee@jyusenkyou.cs.jhu.edu (Ken Arromdee)
Subject: Re: RFD: Should rec.music.makers.synth stand as a group name?
Organization: Johns Hopkins University CS Dept.
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 02:50:24 GMT

In article <1ec554INNmu1@talon.UCS.ORST.EDU> stanley@skyking.OCE.ORST.EDU (John Stanley) writes:
>>It is not
>>a revote. It is a newsgroup creation request worded in a different way.
>It is a vote on whether a previous vote should be accepted. It is a
>revote.  

This is not obviously a sensible definition of "revote", any more than the
word "manslaughter" means "any situation where a man is slaughtered".
--
"the bogosity in a field equals the bogosity imported from related areas, plus
the bogosity generated internally, minus the bogosity expelled or otherwise
disposed of."  -- K. Eric Drexler

Ken Arromdee (UUCP: ....!jhunix!arromdee; BITNET: arromdee@jhuvm;
     INTERNET: arromdee@jyusenkyou.cs.jhu.edu)