HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: bengtl@maths.lth.se (Bengt Larsson)
Subject: Re: Advertising on Net: how can we stop it?
Organization: Lund Institute of Technology, Sweden
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 19:11:35 GMT

In article <1992Dec23.064822.28475@pegasus.com> tleylan@pegasus.com (Tom Leylan) writes:
>bengtl@maths.lth.se (Bengt Larsson) writes:
>>tleylan@pegasus.com (Tom Leylan) writes:
>>
>>>You see we just want free-flowing and unrestricted information and if
>>>that is somebody explaining how clever he is because he pirated some
>>>PC game or the company who's came he stole announcing the new low price
>>>we believe they deserve equal time.
>>
>>This stuff is about categorizing information, not restricting it.
>
>Thank you for repeating the words of all those who favor restrictions
>on free speech... "categorizing" what an interesting euphemism.

Total nonsense. It isn't an euphemism unless there is some other
distinction, like some speech being made harder to distribute.

-- 
Bengt Larsson - bengtl@maths.lth.se

Newsgroups: news.groups,news.admin.misc
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: 68HC11
From: scimitar@suction.acme.gen.nz (Robert Singers)
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 92 13:21:59 +1300
Organization: Barbed Wire Cat Productions

Are there any groups that deal with programming the Moterla 68HC11?

Robert Singers               | Nothing I say or do should be taken as
scimitar@suction.acme.gen.nz | a reflection of any form of reality or
                             | consensual hallucination.
Newsgroups: news.groups,news.admin.misc
From: peter@ferranti.com (peter da silva)
Subject: Re: PROPOSAL:  Yes votes >= 200+2*No Votes
Organization: Xenix Support, FICC
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 01:22:10 GMT

In article <EMCGUIRE.92Dec23110313@fuller.intellection.com> emcguire@intellection.com (Ed McGuire) writes:
> In article <id.0D1W.J32@ferranti.com> peter@ferranti.com (peter da silva) writes:
>    I don't know. I find there is a higher correlation between a low
>    absolute number of "NO" votes and a healthy group.  [...] I mean
>    high signal-to-noise ratio.

> Sounds like a natural correlation to me.  But then do you think that I
> should be free to vote against a newsgroup which I expect to be poor
> quality?

That's not what you said. You said you were voting against groups which
you expected to be low volume or no traffic volume existed in other groups.
That's nonsense. In general, it's the groups where there's high existing
volume that tend to be junk, because they're often proposed as a defensive
measure by people who *don't* want to read that stuff. Which is a reasonable
reason to create a group, but by no means the only one.

Perhaps you're not explaining your reasons very well, but I sure can't
correlate *this* definition with your earlier messages.

> Another issue I have with easy newsgroup creation

I'm not suggesting easy newsgroup creation. I'm suggesting appropriate
newsgroup creation. Under my proposal there would be fewer groups
created than there are now. But your random votes would still be just
noise.

> is that mailing
> lists are generally of better quality in terms of s/n ratio.  I also
> think that mailing lists are accessible to more people than
> newsgroups.

To *different* people. I can follow dozens of groups, but I have a hard
time dealing with more than a handful of mailing lists.
-- 
Peter da Silva                                            `-_-'
Ferranti International Controls Corporation                'U` 
Sugar Land, TX  77487-5012 USA
+1 713 274 5180                            "Zure otsoa besarkatu al duzu gaur?"
From: magnus@thep.lu.se (Magnus Olsson)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: RFD: sci.crypt.research
Date: 28 Dec 92 10:19:50 GMT
Organization: Theoretical Physics, Lund University, Sweden


My personal opinions on a few of the points raised:

1) I think we need a moderated group on cryptography, if only because
the sheer volume of flamage on sci.crypt makes it difficult to find
the time to read the group (and, yes, I *do* have a threaded
newsreader, and I *do* know how to use a killfile, but it's not that
simple when threads with subjects like "PGP technical question"
contain both technical discussion and flamage).

2) The concept of having a moderated .research group works well on
sci.math, and I think there's also a moderated
comp.compression.research. There also seems to be quite some support
for sci.physics.research.

3) Making an *unmoderated* sci.crypt.research simply wouldn't work -
the very reason for moderating it would be keeping the volume of
flamage down, and without moderation there's absolutely no way to keep
the flamewars out (people simply aren't that disciplined that they'll
spontaneously move a technical thread out of the research group once
it turns to political issues).

4) Sci.crypt should definitely be left as it is. That way, nobody
would be censored, and those who don't like moderated groups can
continue posting there.

5) Creating a special group for the political discussion (like
talk.politics.crypt) can't hurt, but I'm afraid it won't help either.  
Look at what happened when talk.politics.space was created: Lot's of
sites don't get that group (since it's not considered as "serious" as
sci.space), and even thos who *do* post to t.p.s in the majority of
cases *crosspost* to sci.space (I suppose to ensure that everybody can
hear them).


I will definitely vote FOR a moderated sci.crypt.research (or maybe
sci.crypt.technical would be a better name, since I suppose much of the
discussion would be about technology rather than about academic
research?).

I would vote AGAINST an unmoderated sci.crypt.research, since I think
such a group would very quickly defeat its purpose.

              Magnus Olsson                | \e+      /_
    Department of Theoretical Physics      |  \  Z   / q
        University of Lund, Sweden         |   >----<           
 magnus@thep.lu.se, thepmo@seldc52.bitnet  |  /      \===== g
PGP key available via finger or on request | /e-      \q
From: stanley@ruby.OCE.ORST.EDU (John Stanley)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: RFD: sci.crypt.research
Date: 29 Dec 1992 01:00:24 GMT
Organization: Oregon State University, College of Oceanography
NNTP-Posting-Host: ruby.oce.orst.edu

In article <4fDb2em00WB=84isY1@andrew.cmu.edu> "Thomas W. Strong, Jr." <strong+@CMU.EDU> writes:
>  This is a formal Request For Discussion regarding the establishment of

No, it is not. It was not cross-posted to news.announce.newgroups.

Please, before you attempt to create a new newsgroup, read the
guidelines that say how it is supposed to be done. Then ask someone who
has done it for help. It will save YOU a lot of trouble and
embarassment.
From: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Jack Campin)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: talk.politics.usa.conservative (Was: Re: RFD: talk.politics.patriot)
Date: 22 Dec 92 19:15:35 GMT
Reply-To: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Jack Campin)
Organization: COMANDOS Project, Glesga Yoonie

jfurr@polaris.async.vt.edu (Joel K. Furr) wrote:
> >Is there a specific party or other organization that actually calls itself
> >the "patriot movement" that Brian might have had in mind?  Or does he mean
> >a grab-bag of everything from Larouche to televangelists to Aryan Nations
> >to the Libertarian Party?

> Again, I think people should stop tarring the right wing with the brush of
> "retrogressive" or "larouche".  I consider myself moderate to liberal but
> find it surprising that people who apparently are my ideological peers
> somehow don't feel that the people on the other side of center have a
> right to their views.  Remember the old "I disagree with what you say, but
> will defend to the death your right to say it" line?  It applies here.

For crying out loud.  How the heck am I supposed to interpret a proposal
like Brian's?  I genuinely do not have the faintest clue whether the
"patriot movement" is a lobbying organization with a membership of a
million and paid staff of 50 or something that exists only in his brain
after watching Red Dawn once too often.  If he really meant something like
"talk.politics.republican" (your interpretation, though his proposal for
the Gold Standard as an issue is not something I've heard of them making
recently), why on earth didn't he say that?  His proposals *do* cover the
range of outfits I mentioned; if he means something more specific, it's
for him to say what it is.


> Given that the Republican party and right-wing organizations such as the
> NRA aren't suffering for membership, I think a USENET group called
> talk.politics.usa.conservative would be read and used by a lot of people. 

Well, as other people have pointed out, there are already lots of
newsgroups devoted to that kind of politics: talk.politics.guns or
alt.individualism, for two, and (de facto) talk.politics.misc.  So if this
one's different, what makes it so?

cheers - jack

-- 
--  Jack Campin    room G092, Computing Science Department, Glasgow University,
17 Lilybank Gardens, Glasgow G12 8RZ, Scotland   TEL: 041 339 8855 x6854 (work)
INTERNET: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk or via nsfnet-relay.ac.uk    FAX: 041 330 4913
BANG!net: via mcsun and uknet     BITNET: via UKACRL    UUCP: jack@glasgow.uucp
From: fischer@iesd.auc.dk (Lars Peter Fischer)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: eunet?
Date: 21 Dec 92 20:41:04 GMT
Organization: Mathematics and Computer Science, Aalborg University


>>>>> "zombie" == zombie  (zombie@EBay.Sun.COM)

zombie> What are the eunet.* groups for?

The eunet groups are for discussion of matters pertaining to Europe
and the EUnet. Since they are too broad to be really regional, it
makes more sense to use the truly international groups. Hence they are
not used much.

There is a eunet.politics that takes some heat from time to time, but
it's hard to see why stuff couldn't as well go to
alt.politics.europe.* (or talk.politics.europe, except that there is
no such group :-)

/Lars
--
Lars Fischer, fischer@iesd.auc.dk | It takes an uncommon mind to think of
CS Dept., Aalborg Univ., DENMARK. | these things.  -- Calvin
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: kogoma@vesta.unm.edu (Taki Kogoma)
Subject: Re: Informal Interest Poll: rec.arts.sf --> rec.arts.f-sf
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 92 21:40:53 GMT
Organization: Nit-Pickers for a Better Tomorow Afternoon

In article <750@ulogic.UUCP> hartman@ulogic.UUCP (Richard M. Hartman) writes:
>I haven't run a vote yet, but I am about at the point of posting
>an official RFD on renaming rec.arts.sf.* to rec.arts.f-sf.*

Please keep in mind the fact that renaming a group involves
newgroup-ing the new name and then rmgroup-ing the old one several
weeks/months later.  This will inevitably result in a period of
fragmentation while the assorted control messages propogate along the
net, not to mention the possibility that a news admin may not get
around to implementing said control messages (Thank you Bruce Becker
and John Palmer).

Further muddying the waters is the practice of aliasing newsgroups -
which to my experience often leads to long-term fragmentation and
general confusion (c.f. rec.games.rpg which some sites *still* have
aliased to rec.games.frp.misc instead of rmgrouping it and the
periodic confusion about the name).

So the question about whether to rename is, "Will the benefits outweigh
the pain?"

(At present, I am not convinced that the benefits are worth
it...however, if we find ourselves still arguing about this a few
years down the line, I might be convinced otherwise.)

>Note: I have NOT taken part in rec.arts.sf discussion because I know
>it would take all of my time.  Would someone repost this in the appropriate
>place under rec.arts.sf w/ replies cross-posted to news.groups?

At the risk of mild flame-bait, this sounds like "Namespace
fascism"...

-- 
Capt. Gym Z. Quirk  (Known to some as Taki Kogoma)  kogoma@vesta.unm.edu
 I'll get a life when someone demonstrates that it would be superior to
                          what I have now...
Newsgroups: news.groups,news.admin.misc
From: emcguire@intellection.com (Ed McGuire)
Subject: Re: PROPOSAL:  Yes votes >= 200+2*No Votes
Organization: Intellection, Inc.
	<1992Dec17.113806.45717@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu>
	<EMCGUIRE.92Dec18222138@mother.intellection.com>
	<id.JF0W.1XL@ferranti.com>
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 11:13:35 GMT

In article <id.JF0W.1XL@ferranti.com> peter@ferranti.com (peter da silva) writes:

   A better measure would be an attempt to estimate how many flame wars
   and roving noise discussion occur in the new group. A low-volume group
   that is also low-noise is FAR better than a high-volume one that is
   also high-noise. I have observed that groups that passed with a high
   volume of YES *and* NO votes tend to be among the noisier ones (for
   example, anything.advocacy).

   There are any number of groups on the net with very low volume, but a
   decent readership, that *I* would consider more successful than any number
   of more popular groups, and would NOT have made it as mailing lists. On
   the other hand, I'm on a number of mailing lists that are way over the
   100 vote line that don't make sense as newsgroups.

Well, I agree that low noise groups are better than high noise groups,
and I'd say the high noise groups you mention that passed despite high
"no" votes really shouldn't have passed.  If the 100+ rule had been
adjusting for the growth of Usenet, perhaps they wouldn't have.

I also agree that mailing lists and newsgroups are not the same thing.
However, a newsgroup which is successful on the basis of traffic alone
would probably make it as a mailing list to start with.
-- 
Ed McGuire                   1603 LBJ Freeway, Suite 780
Systems Administrator/       Dallas, Texas 75234
 Member of Technical Staff   214/620-2100, FAX 214/484-8110
Intellection, Inc.           <ed@intellection.com>
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: dmartin@pico.engr.mun.ca (Dan Martin)
Subject: Re: RFD: rec.sport.rowing
Organization: Memorial University of Newfoundland
Date: Sun, 27 Dec 1992 23:45:03 GMT

I am 110% for this newsgroup.  I am a Canadian rowing who trains pretty
much in isolation from the rowing scene.  This would provide me with
valuable information about competition dates, national team training
techniques, equipment updates, as well as a chance to met some fellow
rowers.  Please get this newsgroup working!!  

Dan,
Olympic Dreamer
Xref: sparky news.groups:24800 comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc:7106 comp.os.ms-windows.misc:5669
From: emv@msen.com (Edward Vielmetti)
Newsgroups: news.groups,comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc,comp.os.ms-windows.misc
Subject: Re: RFD: comp.os.ms-windows.networking
Date: 21 Dec 1992 23:29:46 GMT
Organization: Msen, Inc. -- Ann Arbor, Michigan
NNTP-Posting-Host: garnet.msen.com
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8]

Stephen C. Trier (trier@slc6.ins.cwru.edu) wrote:
: In article <shephard.724735838@sfu.ca> shephard@fraser.sfu.ca (Gordon Shephard) writes:
: >>  comp.os.ms-windows.networking 

: As a reader of comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc and comp.sys.novell, I question
: why this group is needed?  There's plenty of coverage for networking under
: MS-Windows, and since the questions are different for different networking
: suites, I see no need for an all-encompassing "MS Windows" networking group.

My original suggestion when this came up was to make a special narrow
little niche for 'winsock', the MS Windows sockets interface for TCP/IP.
Probably 'comp.os.ms-windows.winsock'.

Just to be clear on why I would even care at all - the desire is
to come up with a newsgroup that is a suitable conduit for discussion
of matters taht involve the Internet, that involve MS Windows, and
that involve development of software that makes the Internet easier
to use under MS Windows.  Getting a common sockets interface
(winsock) is necessary but not sufficient to start having people
develop tools like Gopher, World Wide Web, multi-media e-mail, etc.
that work under not just one vendor's networking stack but that
have some hope of being reusable across five or ten different
people's systems.

A 'winsock' mailing list is already going, but it speaks more to the people
banging out the spec than it does people writing codes to use it.

A general 'networking' group might get traffic - a lot of traffic! - but it's
going to be less focussed than it needs to be to get the attention of
busy people.  

  Edward Vielmetti, vice president for research, Msen Inc. emv@Msen.com
        Msen Inc., 628 Brooks, Ann Arbor MI  48103 +1 313 998 GLOB
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: talk.politics.usa.conservative (Was: Re: RFD: talk.politics.patriot)
From: wbralick@afit.af.mil (Will Bralick)
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 1992 03:30:11 GMT
Organization: Self-similar

In article <BzqrD5.8JC@polaris.async.vt.edu> jfurr@polaris.async.vt.edu (J. Furr) writes:
| 
| Which is why I recommend putting the word "usa" in the name.  That way,
| any Australians who have an idea that conservative means "green" or
| "nature" politics will look at it and say "'talk.politics.usa.con- 
| servative'.  Well, that's a group that's about American politics.  Let's go
| back to aus.conserve and hang out."

But conservatism isn't just an American phenomenon (Edmund Burke is
credited (by Russell Kirk) as being the first modern conservative 
and he was Scottish).  Most American conservatives would agree that
Mrs. Thatcher is a conservative.  Isn't the political party she headed 
called the Conservative Party?  Did the Aussies think that Mrs. Thatcher
was a Green?  I personally prefer that the scope of the discussion not 
be (implicitly) limited to the US.

| If there were a us. hierarchy, I'd say "put this group there."  But as
| mail trickles in from people explaining the us. hierarchy to me, I'd say
| that it's not real likely to be a functioning hierarchy anytime soon. 
| Thus, the least ambiguous name would be "talk.politics.usa.conservative". 

Yet another consideration is that conservatism is not just about
politics -- it has a cultural focus, too.  In the West this is usually
tied to the canon of Western thought (cf. the Great Books of the Western
World), real (tm) art and music ;-), ethics and morals, etc.  So the
*.politics.* hierarchy might not be appropriate, either.

So, how about talk.culture.conservative?  Culture is the broader term and 
this formulation would avoid confusion with the politicized conservation
movement.


Regards,

-- 

Will Bralick			          Speaking _only_ for myself.

Standard disclaimers apply.            Void where prohibitted by law.
From: casseres@apple.com (David Casseres)
Newsgroups: news.groups
Subject: Re: I thought this newsgroup was ending Nov. 23?!?!?
Date: 21 Dec 92 21:06:10 GMT
Followup-To: news.groups
Distribution: usa
Organization: Apple Computer Inc.

In article <liqk2dINNimj@exodus.Eng.Sun.COM>, landauer@morocco.Eng.Sun.COM
(Doug Landauer) wrote:
> 
> > > >I second this question.
> > >    KILL IT!  PULL THE PLUG!
> > Better yet, kill the other groups and restore this one.  It was a lot more
> > fun and a lot more useful.

Actually I wrote that.  Please be tidy and careful in your attributions.

> It was a lot less fun, since I was interested in only about 10% of the
> articles, and had time to read only about 5% of them.  If you have a
> decent newsreader, you should still be able to get the same set of
> articles.  If you really want it to look like it used to, why don't you
> implement a "newsgroup union" feature in your newsreader?

I have an excellent newsreader which makes it easy for me to read all the
groups.  The problem is that they are all separated from one another, and
do not have the same readership.  Thus if I have a question about something
that happens to be a marketed product, I am only supposed to ask it in
.marketplace -- where it will be seen mostly by people who are looking to
sell their old chainring bolts, or find out what's the best kind of
mountain bike for under $300.  In the old rec.bikes, there was a good
chance someone would just be browsing around and would find my question by
chance and have a worthwhile answer for it.  There was much more
freewheeling discussion, which is what some people are talking about when
they complain about "having to wade through a bunch of crap."

And now, let me suggest that YOU get a decent newsreader.  One that allows
you to browse efficiently in a list of threads, ignoring those you don't
care for.  That way YOU can choose what threads to read, instead of letting
the division into many groups limit your choices for you.

And if such a newsreader isn't available to you for reasons of where you
are or what kind of equipment you use, DO something about it!  Don't make
the rest of us take up the slack for your inadequate software!

The same applies to everyone else who complains about "having to wade
througha bunch of crap."  Solve your own problems.  Get some decent
software.

For anyone who wants to know, the newsreader I use is NewsWatcher 1.3d5, on
a Mac.  It's freeware, and should be easily obtainable through any Mac user
group.  If you aren't using a Mac, there MUST be something available out
there that will let you browse a list of threads.  If there isn't, there
MUST be someone who is interested enough to write one.

--

David Casseres
Exclaimer: Wow!
Newsgroups: news.groups,news.admin.misc
From: emcguire@intellection.com (Ed McGuire)
Subject: Re: PROPOSAL:  Yes votes >= 200+2*No Votes
Organization: Intellection, Inc.
	<EMCGUIRE.92Dec21100505@mother.intellection.com>
	<1992Dec21.191558.28303@ennews.eas.asu.edu>
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1992 23:44:31 GMT

In article <1992Dec21.191558.28303@ennews.eas.asu.edu> sridhar@asuvax.eas.asu.edu (Sridhar Venkataraman ) writes:

   I can give you atleast 2 examples for groups which passed by wafer
   thin margins and are far healthier than groups which passed by 400+
   votes.

There is a direct correlation between a wide vote margin and a
"healthy group" (if by this you mean high traffic).  Existing groups
which fail the proposed 200+2*No rule did not appear as often in the
traffic "top 250" as those which pass; and when they did appear they
had less traffic.

Why should we ignore this correlation and establish our voting policy
on the basis of your isolated counterexamples?

By the way, I do not mean that voting policy should be based on the
week's worth of traffic data I used.  I consider those results
preliminary and will follow up on both high- and low-traffic groups
when the new arbitron data reach my spool.

If it turns out that the vote margin is /not/ a good advance indicator
of traffic, then we should not use it that way.  In that case the 100+
rule should be abandoned in favor of a advance indicator, such as the
existence of a mailing list with a certain minimum number of sites
receiving it.
-- 
Ed McGuire                   1603 LBJ Freeway, Suite 780
Systems Administrator/       Dallas, Texas 75234
 Member of Technical Staff   214/620-2100, FAX 214/484-8110
Intellection, Inc.           <ed@intellection.com>
Newsgroups: news.groups
From: arromdee@jyusenkyou.cs.jhu.edu (Ken Arromdee)
Subject: Re: talk.politics.usa.conservative (Was: Re: RFD: talk.politics.patriot)
Organization: Johns Hopkins University CS Dept.
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 21:48:30 GMT

In article <BzoFvy.5DM@polaris.async.vt.edu> jfurr@polaris.async.vt.edu (Joel K. Furr) writes:
>Right.  Nor should the group have "patriot" in its name, as there are
>many, many citizens of the USA who consider themselves patriots who don't
>subscribe to the philosophies and group agendas outlined in the original
>CFD for this concept.  The group should have .usa. in there to make it
>obvious that we're not talking about Norway, St. Vincent and the
>Grenadines, or San Marino, for example, and should be "conservative" since
>that's essentially the most descriptive, unambiguous word for what the
>poster of the CFD has in mind for this group.  

What about misc.activism.progressive?  Should it be renamed to misc.activism
.usa.progressive?
--
"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 (arromdee@jyusenkyou.cs.jhu.edu, arromdee@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu)
Newsgroups: news.groups,news.admin.misc