From: ksdavis@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (Karleen S. Davis)
Newsgroups: news.groups,alt.native
Subject: Re: soc.culture.<whatever>.*
Date: 16 Dec 92 23:00:45 GMT
Organization: Indiana University

gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us (Gary S. Trujillo) writes:
>
>  [. . .]  but there is a great deal of traffic in both NATIVE-L
>and NATCHAT, so it *does* seem appropriate to construct a Usenet counter-
>part to each of these lists, in order that it is easily-possible to create
>a gateway relationship between the mailing list / newsgroup pairs.  My
>suggestion would be something like:
>
>	NATIVE-L	soc.culture.<whatever>
>		    or	soc.culture.<whatever>.misc   (Floyd's suggestion)
>and
>	NATCHAT		soc.culture.<whatever>.d
>
>(where <whatever> is one of "native," "indigenous," or "aboriginal").

>In any event, I'll conclude by saying that I feel there is good reason
>to press for the creation of two newsgroups initially, to separate dis-
>cussion from information,  [. . .]

I do agree that it might be a good thing to plan ahead as we create
these new newsgroups for {native, indigenous, aboriginal} peoples so
that we can accomodate some kind of link between the existing mailing
lists on the topic.  I have been trying to think of a way to
accomplish this link without necessitating the creation of two new
newsgroups, but nothing has been readily apparent.  One idea that
occured to me was to link NATCHAT both in and out, but NATIVE-L only
in, but that means the people on NATCHAT will receive everything sent
to NATIVE-L.  No good.  I also thought of linking both mailing lists
only INTO the one group, but that means the people on the mailing
lists will not benefit from the new newsgroups (unless a reader
replies by personal mail), but it also means they do not lose either.
I'm not sure how a thriving mailing list would react, in terms of
volume, to being linked up with a full-blown Usenet newsgroup, with
all of its requisite flamewars and junk postings.

One of my concerns with creating two groups is that one will pass and
the other won't (admittedly likely), and I don't want to have
restricted ourselves to an unpleasant situation in that event.  If we
design the newsgroups' charters strictly around those of the mailing
lists, I think we're risking failure of the groups.  I think we should
find a compromise between making Usenet homes for these mailing lists
and making newsgroups that don't consider the mailing lists at all.

Another reason I am hesitating to support your suggestion is that the
names of your proposed groups do not clearly indicate their content.
To me, soc.culture.*.misc doesn't say "informational postings."  The
other, soc.culture.*.d, does indeed say "discussion," but it's the
type of discussion I was EXPECTING to find in the "misc" group.
Correct me if I missed one, but it's not common to see a *.misc AND a
*.d at the same level in a hierarchy.  They seem to mean the same
thing.  

If we were to create two newsgroups (which, for reasons stated above,
I don't prefer), I would rather see the discussion newsgroup linked
with NATCHAT be named either soc.culture.*.misc or simply be the
parent group soc.culture.*, and the informational group be named
something else, like soc.culture.*.info or something.  At the very
least, it should be a name that clearly indicates its contents.

I think, however, that we should consider alternatives that involve
the creation of only one group.  Perhaps we can only gate the mailing
lists into the group, with nothing gated out, or set up a two-way
exchange with only one of the lists.  Later, if it becomes clear that
a more filtered, informational newsgroup like the NATIVE-L mailing
list is needed, one can always be added.  Let's reach a compromise
that does not involve painting ourselves into a corner if only one of
the proposed newsgroups passes.

-sz
Newsgroups: news.groups