From: kas5213@ritvax.isc.rit.edu
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh
Subject: Re: My objections to the survey... (just an opinion)
Date: 6 Nov 92 15:32:18 GMT
Reply-To: kas5213@ritvax.isc.rit.edu
Organization: Rochester Institute of Technology

ahmed-shakil@cs.yale.edu (Shakil Waiz Ahmed) writes:


>When the survey was first posted, I read through it, asked myself what
>the point was, and decided not to participate.  I had several reasons
>for it, and hence decided to abstain.  Khaled (one of the authors of
>the survey questionaire), noted the fact that I had not sent in my
>answers, and asked me why I was not responding to the survey.  We had
>a little discussion by email, and we disagreed about the validity of
>my reasons for abstaining.  He has asked me to voice my objections
>publicly, and thus I will do so.  Personally, I would have been happy
>keeping my reservations to myself and simply not participating, but
>since I have been asked to post them, I shall do so.

>SCB is a free forum for anyone to post what they like.   It isn't
>meant as a news service, nor as an entertainment center.  It's simply
>a bulletin board.  How often does one conduct surveys of bulletin
>boards?  What would such a survey accomplish?  To me it seems it is
>just an ideal excuse for groups of people to fingerpoint at others as
>people they dislike and hence promote some kind of "ranking" on SCB,
>i.e. a possible introduction of polarization on a semi-official scale.
>What would it accomplish?  So it would turn out that certain things
>are liked by a number of people, and other things are not.  Will the
>survey change anything?  It can't.  Does the survey say anything?  I
>don't see how.

>More importantly, conducting a survey where one can specify ones
>gripes and likes gives off the illusion that there is an authority to
>whom one can direct such comments.  There isn't, and that wouldn't be
>in the spirit of an unmoderated newsgroup.  I basically object to any
>kind of bureaucratization of SCB.  An organized survey, in my opinion,
>cannot contribute anything good to the general status of SCB, if
>anything, it could promote some negative feedback.  Surveys are useful
>if they can be employed to improve upon something.  Any attempt to do
>that would violate the very spirit of scb.  I've never seen any such
>survey on any other newsgroup, and I think there is a good reason for
>it...

>Over email, Khaled told me that the survey will help answer the
>question as to what SCB is.  The question of what SCB is, should not
>be something up for debate.  It *is* a newsgroup just like every other
>for the simple reason that *anyone* can post to it.  It was created in
>the same manner as every other unmoderated newsgroup and there is
>nothing that distinguishes it from that.  If you want an estimate of
>the readership, you can read news.lists and get a very good estimate
>with more statistics than any survey is going to give you.  As for who
>reads it, again in a forum like SCB, people have the right to be
>silent readers, and they will be unlikely to reply.  Those who want to
>communicate, post anyway, and so you see who they are.  For me, SCB is
>a WYSIWYG system! (What You See Is What You Get)

>In short, my main objection is that an organized survey gives off the
>illusion of a controlling authority behind SCB.  Yet the people who
>are conducting the survey cannot implement any changes based on the
>result.  They may conduct the poll for their own curiosity, but I
>question what useful results that could yield.  But it is precisely
>because SCB is a free-for-all forum that they have every right to
>conduct such a survey!  That doesn't mean that I have to participate.
>:)  Again, I was simply going to refrain from participating and keep
>my mouth shut, but since I was asked to voice my objections...

>-- Shakil Ahmed
>=======================================================================
>Dept. of Computer Science     INTERNET: ahmed-shakil@cs.yale.edu
>P.O. Box 2158, Yale Station   BITNET  : ahmed-shakil@yalecs.bitnet
>New Haven, CT 06520-2158      UUCP    : {ucbvax,harvard,...}!yale!ahmed
>=======================================================================


Wow, I sure do feel stupid for answering that survey. 
If anything surveys are good, no reason to make it a big deal by not 
answering. 
                                            ADNAN SIDDIKY
Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh