From: ae547@yfn.ysu.edu (Ronda Hauben)
Newsgroups: alt.amateur-comp
Subject: Re: Amateur Archeology & Today's Net (was What a Strange Newsgroup)
Date: 12 Nov 92 19:55:49 GMT
Reply-To: ae547@yfn.ysu.edu (Ronda Hauben)
Organization: St. Elizabeth Hospital, Youngstown, OH


       continuation of response

In a previous article, bobp@hal.com (Bob Pendleton) says:

>From article <1dkn5mINNiba@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu>, by bm665@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Jay Robert Hauben):
>> 
>> In a previous article, danr@ais.org (Daniel Romanchik) says:
>> 	
>But, what do I find here?
>
>I don't find discussions of amateur computing. 

The original description of what we hoped whould be in the newsletter
(which was started 5 years ago this past september) was:
"There was an effort by administrators of the UAW-Ford program at
the Dearborn Engine Plant to kill interest in computers and computer
programming. We want to keep interest alive because computers are the
future. We want to disperse information to users about computers. Since the
computer is still in the early stage of development, the ideas and
expereinces ofthe users need to be shared and built on if this
tecvhnology is to advance. To this end, this newsletter is dedicated
to all people interested in learning about computers." (Introduction, 
vol i, no 1, p. 1)

In a similar way Usenet News was started as an electronic newsletter
for unix users.

But usenet news now includes discussions of politics, economics,
culture, etc.

In a similar way the Amateur Computerist newsletter includes such 
discussions - only the additional aspect is that usenet doesn't really
have any place where labor isues are discussed - whereas the amateur
computerist does.

So in this beginning of trying to forge a link between the Amateur
Computerist newsletter and usenet - labor issues have been important
as they are virtually unrepresented elsewhere on usenet.

But the problem we had at Ford was that workers were being discouraged
from learning programming - so we also felt we had to deal with the problem
as well as with encouraging programming.

We would welcome try this programs - especially in languages that people
have for their home computers as part of this newsgroup.

Also, we welcome newsgroup readers input into what they want to happen here.
And we welcome their posting to start threads they are interested in.

We are currently working on the publication of a supplement on Usenet
and so have been kept busy trying to get it ready for publication.

That will be posted here when it is published.

Already the publication of drafts of some of the 
articles to useent has been very helpful
in both clarifying confusions in the articles and in stimulating very
thought provoking discussion about the real significance of usenet in
email - I had hoped more of that discussion would take place as part of 
this newsgroup.


>I find discussions of the labor movement. I have some sympathy for the
>labor movement. There are a lot of hard rock miners in my ancestry.
>But, that isn't amateur computing. 

Oh, but it is. The attack on technology that is represented by what
happened to us at Ford shows that the fight against the commercial 
limitations put on computer education and technological development -
are what have to be fought for the amateur to be able to prevail.

Those who built the early personal computers had to fight IBM and 
other computer companies to be able to get open architecture and standards
established

The Amateur Computerist is the continuation of that fight - for openness
and standards which will make it possible to have technology progress.

>
>I haven't seen a single article in the group that relates to its name.
>A good name for this group would be alt.labor-movement, or perhaps
>alt.flint_sit-down_strikers. But, alt.amateur-comp? No, this isn't
>about amateur computing.
>
>I like what you are doing, but the name does not describe what you are
>doing and it is going to be a constant irritant and source of
>disappointment for people who drop in to see what is being discussed
>here.

But the name does describe the newsletter. And we welcome your help to
be able to do what we hope to do - but we are only 2 months old - and we are
also only an alt. group which means that we don't get very wide circulation.

So we are bucking problems - also our own newness and limited access
makes this all difficult - but that's the challenge.

So I will post the difficulty I had with my mailbox, and I hope otheres
will post their problems, and that such problems will be answered as
part of the newsgroup, not just in email - as then people can learn
from each others problems and also we are new at dealing with this technology.
(I need also to post some ofthe problems I have had trying to use tin 
or nn for I do have access to them but I haven't figured out how to use
them yet and so just continue with freenet which is something I have 
found easy to use but it does have limits like a poorer version of emacs
and time limits that mean that posts often end up with typo's because
the online access has been hard.)

>
>What's happening is something I've seen happen many times before.
>You've jumped into a new world, but you're still acting like you're in
>Flint. Let me tell you, you aren't in Flint any more. You're out in
>the big wide net.world. If you're going to have to learn how this
>world works.
>
>				Bob P.
And we welcome the criticism and comments and differences so that we do 
learn how to deal better with the difficulties. So its helpful you posted
this and that you did so as part of the newsgroup rather than via email.


>
>P.S.
>
>You might have noticed, most of the people on the net have no idea why
>anyone would ever want to join a union. Many, if not most, would
>refuse a job if they had to join a union to get the job. Think about
>it.


I have noticed. I did spend 6 months on usenet before the alt.amateur-comp
newsgroup was created. This newsgroup has encouraged the discussion of 
labor issues - and to have a place where a pro labor point of view
is welcomed on the net is something important. (And perhaps you have
noticed there are disagreements among those with a prolabor point of
view and it is good to see those disagreements discussed publicly.)


Keep your criticisms and comments coming - but don't try to box us into
something different from what we are trying to do - we are not trying
to narrow down what we do so that it is different from the newsletter -
we are trying to give the newsletter a place to develop and have
its development contribute to the development of usenet.


>--  
>Bob Pendleton             | As an engineer I hate to hear:
>bobp@hal.com              |   1) You've earned an "I told you so."
>Speaking only for myself. |   2) Our customers don't do that.
>                   <<< Odin, after the well of Mimir. >>>
>

                           for the Amateur Computerist,
                                Ronda
-- 
Ronda Hauben                    email address:ae547@yfn.ysu.edu
Amateur Computerist Newsletter              or
P.O. Box 4344                   rhauben@heartland.bradley.edu
Dearborn, MI 48126
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