From: rdd@rascal.ics.utexas.edu (Robert Dorsett)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: Ideas on how to split rec.aviation
Date: 24 Jul 1992 00:27:16 -0500
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[ apologies in advance if this doesn't get to the net in one piece ]

jfarrell@jf.Eng.Sun.COM wrote: 
> I don't quite understand how sci.aeronautics.airliners is supposed to work.
> It gets an independent RFD/CFV, and assuming it passes, we all tell anyone
> who wants to discuss A320 controls to take it over there?

Something like that.  :-)  There are three groups in Geoff's proposal which
I view as "high-collision" with other group charters, and which probably
shouldn't go in a *rec.aviation* re-organization CFV.  They should be
RFD'd separately, and tailor-targeted to appeal to the other constituencies.
One MAJOR problem is that the re-organization is "dominated" by a 
*rec.aviation* viewpoint, which isn't necessarily the one shared by the
people interested in these other groups.

The theory and military groups are the obvious conflict-groups; my 
perception is that support for these *tend* to be from people who either 
aren't participants or who aren't aware of the other groups.  I think that 
simply pointing out the existence of the other groups will tend to heighten 
user awareness, and reduce the possibility of these groups passing a vote.

The airliners group is a significant problem, though--I've wanted one for a 
LONG time, but am forced to admit that the *user*-base just isn't there, even
if the subscriber-base is.  Yes, there's a LOT of interest in the topic, 
but there's not very much qualified commentary.  I feel an unmoderated 
airliners group in rec.* would be very high noise (especially since the RFD 
charter is for an airlines group, and not just airliners).  There's also a 
propagation issue--rec.* doesn't reach as many industrial/scientific/academic 
sites as sci.*.  For both reasons, I think the group should be 
sci.aeronautics.airliners or sci.aeronautics.transports or somesuch.

Geoff and I disagree pretty fundamentally on this.  The sci.aeronautics
item is in the survey to try to get a "raw" feel, unprompted, of how
*users* feel about it.  

Currently, preferences are leaning toward a rec.*.airlines group, which I 
find pretty disappointing.  If created, it'd likely be VERY high noise (see 
my traffic-analysis of airliner traffic), and will scare off any aerospace 
professionals who might otherwise *eventually* start to participate, as 
usenet becomes more widespread in corporate settings, and individuals obtain 
better independent access to the net.  


So, to answer your question, yes, the A320 discussions can be banished to an 
airline[r]s group, no matter where it goes--although they really would belong 
on sci.aeronautics :-).  Sci.aero's charter, btw, explicitly included airliner 
operations and human factors; it was meant to be a "technical" aero 
engineering/aviation group, but has evolved as an aerodynamics/propulsion/
structures group, generally fairly noisy in recent months, but much more 
detailed on those *topics* than "equivalent" traffic on rec.aviation.


As for the *moderator* issue, I'd like to do it, but don't feel the group 
would stand as good a chance of passing if I did--I tend to be a bit *too*
technical in outlook.  Karl Swartz has volunteered, and would likely do
a good job.  He's a fairly hard-core enthusiast, and is interested in 
just about everything dealing with airlines and airliners.  He is a frequent
poster on rec.travel.air and rec.aviation.  He's indicated that his 
moderation would be very "open"; it'd mainly be noise-control (for instance,
do we *really* need five people to post the AP wire report, after a 
crash, and fifteen people to speculate, off the wall, what caused it, all
in the first twelve hours? :-)).  He's also expressed a belief in "active",
participatory moderation, to stimulate discussion.  This opposed to many
moderators, who don't feel compelled to take a particular interest in the
traffic they filter.


As I said before, rec.aviation's tradition is for *recreational* general
aviation, and that's where all its strengths lie, even in GA technical
areas.  If we diversify outside that scope, I think there's a significant
risk of noisy groups.  I don't like noisy groups, even though I may 
occasionally contribute in excess of my quota. :-)

As someone else commented, aviation really is a bastard discipline.  It's
both recreational and professional, and draws from the sciences and engineer-
ing; it touches on everything from labor-union relations to autoland systems.
More than one person has commented that what we need is an "aviation"
hierarchy, but that's not likely to happen. :-)  For the time being, we 
shouldn't try to extend the scope of the *recreational* group to include 
disciplines which would be more logically included under other "topical" 
hierarchies.






--
Robert Dorsett
Internet: rdd@rascal.ics.utexas.edu
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