Linux-Advocacy Digest #196, Volume #31 Tue, 2 Jan 01 18:13:03 EST
Contents:
Re: Why Hatred? (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Why Hatred? ("Aaron R. Kulkis")
Re: Operating Systems? Where would you go next? ("Aaron R. Kulkis")
Re: Red hat becoming illegal? ("Aaron R. Kulkis")
Re: Why Hatred? ("Aaron R. Kulkis")
Re: mail reader (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Why Hatred? ("Aaron R. Kulkis")
Re: Why Hatred? ("Aaron R. Kulkis")
Re: New to Linux, and I am not satisfied. (Bob Hauck)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why Hatred?
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2001 22:21:04 +0000
R.E.Ballard ( Rex Ballard ) wrote:
> > What I can't understand, is the bitter
> > hatred and resentment that some
> > of the Windows zealots have.
>
> This is actually a very acurate word. For many, Microsoft isn't
> a company, it's a religeon. Bill Gates is a god. They believe
> that if they pay enough tribute to Bill Gates, that his money
> will somehow magically flow back into their pockets.
:)
> > Why spread FUD and criticize a different environment?
>
> True Microsoftians, followers of the Gospel According to Bill,
> must check in daily for the truth as proclaimed by Microsoft.
> They often have indirect economic interests, such as being
> Microsoft Partners, or having Microsoft as a major stockholder
> in their company (part of the price for the Enterprise License
> Agreement). They chat with the Apostles at MSDN. and true devotees
> will even spend their evenings watching MSNBC to see what they should
> be talking about INSTEAD of the Microsoft Antitrust case.
8*}
> > The only reason I can come up with is fear.
>
> Absolutely. Microsoft has a legitimate fear (that Linux driven
> innovation would leave them in the dust). They translate that fear
> into threats of the end of civilization as we know it unless
> Microsoft is left to practice it's religeon unfettered by
> regulation of any kind.
It's religion actually. I've never heard of religeon.
> > They must be afraid of Linux.
>
> They fear the unknown. The only way anyone can truly know
> Linux would be to spend actual time learning about it and
> using a properly preconfigured system, usually for about 3 months.
> Since you can't go to the strore and test-drive
> a Linux system, you can't make an informed opinion.
Or have previous experience of UNIX on another platform for about two
years, mebbe. Oh so sorry, that doesn't count does it?
> Most of the Winvocates attack Linux based on their experiences
> with a botched installation of a user-hostile version of Linux
> such as Corel's Debian or a version of Red Hat that they (sorta)
> downloaded off the internet. Very rarely do I see articles written
> by people who actually spend money on Mandrake (advertized as the
> best version for New Users) get it installed properly (I've had
> amazing luck with 7.2, but you could call if you had to). They
> rarely install a full compliment of software.
And what do I have at the bottom of about 90% of my posts for the last few
weeks?
"Pete, running KDE2 on Linux Mandrake 7.2"
When I installed, I installed _everything_. You see, I descovered the
installation process is a bit brain dead - if you leave anything off,
you'll find odd, unrelated things don't work. That's not a fault of Linux
but the Mandrake distro.
> Windows Programmers fear that the Linux system render their
> programming skills obsolete. They've spend years learning
> to use Visual Studio, learning the subtleties of COM, OLE, MFC,
> and ActiveX. Again, in the lack of any basis to make an assessment,
> they fear that Linux programming will be too hard to learn. Worse,
> it might be too EASY to learn, which would reduce the asking price
> for programmers of that caliber.
Oh boy I'm shakin' in my boots! Let me see, what did I learn several years
_before_ I came to Windows. UNIX System Programming. That's one of the
courses I went on. I also went on many DEC courses about OpenVMS.
You want to know how many courses I've been on for Windows?
None. Not one.
It's not that Linux is easy - it's GUI programming that is hard to learn.
That's a big difference with Linux programming - on Linux you can use a CLI
- on Windows you're forced to use the GUI.
I've learnt a few of them, and none of them could be said to be a piece of
cake.
--
Pete, running KDE2 on Linux Mandrake 7.2
------------------------------
From: "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why Hatred?
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2001 17:14:44 -0500
Glitch wrote:
>
> > In theory MS could release an OS with an entirely different structure
> > for the registry and not break a single application. This is possible
> > since the interface to the registry is controlled through regedit or
> > the appropriate library functions. OTOH with Unix the system is
> > configured through any text editor and the configuration parameters
> > are exposed at the lowest level - through the file system. Any small
> > change to these files would break numerous programs.
> >
>
> oh yeah, and having a corrupt registry, or no registry at all would have
> no affect on any WIndows programs?
> Give me a break.
> At least if a config file in Unix is incorrect a person is actually
> able to read the file and fix what is wrong. Unfortunately humans do not
> yet know how to read (at least with ease) the contents of the Win
^^^
LOSE
> REgistry. Besides, it must not be very efficient if MS has to make a
> REgistry Cleaner in order to tidy things up. Plus, the bigger the
> registry you have the slower your system can be. I've yet to see a
> unix/linux system slow down just b/c it has a lot of config files.
--
Aaron R. Kulkis
Unix Systems Engineer
DNRC Minister of all I survey
ICQ # 3056642
H: "Having found not one single carbon monoxide leak on the entire
premises, it is my belief, and Willard concurs, that the reason
you folks feel listless and disoriented is simply because
you are lazy, stupid people"
I: Loren Petrich's 2-week stubborn refusal to respond to the
challenge to describe even one philosophical difference
between himself and the communists demonstrates that, in fact,
Loren Petrich is a COMMUNIST ***hole
J: Other knee_jerk reactionaries: billh, david casey, redc1c4,
The retarded sisters: Raunchy (rauni) and Anencephielle (Enielle),
also known as old hags who've hit the wall....
A: The wise man is mocked by fools.
B: Jet Silverman plays the fool and spews out nonsense as a
method of sidetracking discussions which are headed in a
direction that she doesn't like.
C: Jet Silverman claims to have killfiled me.
D: Jet Silverman now follows me from newgroup to newsgroup
...despite (C) above.
E: Jet is not worthy of the time to compose a response until
her behavior improves.
F: Unit_4's "Kook hunt" reminds me of "Jimmy Baker's" harangues against
adultery while concurrently committing adultery with Tammy Hahn.
G: Knackos...you're a retard.
------------------------------
From: "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.os.linux,comp.os.os2.advocacy,comp.os.os2.apps,comp.os.os2.misc,comp.os.os2.networking.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: Operating Systems? Where would you go next?
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2001 17:15:59 -0500
Richard Steiner wrote:
>
> Here in comp.os.os2.misc, "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> spake unto us, saying:
>
> >Richard Steiner wrote:
> >
> >> Have you asked the folks who maintain XEDIT?
> >
> >What's the point.
>
> Because those are the people who have the ability to change the default
> to something that makes more sense for current users.
OK...you give me their names, and I'll contact them.
Is it a deal?
Of course...you're still missing the point that the current IDIOTIC
DEFAULT was released, and kept in place for 30+ years.
>
> >Anybody who has access to the source code, and doesn't IMMEDIATELY
> >recognize it as a flaw and fix it, is beyond reason anyway.
>
> Chances are good that there is less than one full-time person assigned
> to supporting that product, and that the source is not routinely looked
> at in any detail.
>
> Keep in mind that this is a very old product. The chances are good
> that those who are currently maintaining it have little more than a
> basic understanding of the source code, probably obtained by fixing
> specific customer problems that've been logged against the product.
>
> It's quite possible that the folks maintaining it simply aren't aware
> that the default configuration behaves in such an inconvenient manner.
>
> You have very little to lose by submitting a formal change request, at
> least if you have the ability to do so.
>
> --
> -Rich Steiner >>>---> [EMAIL PROTECTED] >>>---> Eden Prairie, MN
> OS/2 + BeOS + Linux + Solaris + Win95 + WinNT4 + FreeBSD + DOS
> + PC/GEOS + Fusion + vMac + Executor = PC Hobbyist Heaven! :-)
> To hell with user friendly. Will it keep beer cold?
--
Aaron R. Kulkis
Unix Systems Engineer
DNRC Minister of all I survey
ICQ # 3056642
H: "Having found not one single carbon monoxide leak on the entire
premises, it is my belief, and Willard concurs, that the reason
you folks feel listless and disoriented is simply because
you are lazy, stupid people"
I: Loren Petrich's 2-week stubborn refusal to respond to the
challenge to describe even one philosophical difference
between himself and the communists demonstrates that, in fact,
Loren Petrich is a COMMUNIST ***hole
J: Other knee_jerk reactionaries: billh, david casey, redc1c4,
The retarded sisters: Raunchy (rauni) and Anencephielle (Enielle),
also known as old hags who've hit the wall....
A: The wise man is mocked by fools.
B: Jet Silverman plays the fool and spews out nonsense as a
method of sidetracking discussions which are headed in a
direction that she doesn't like.
C: Jet Silverman claims to have killfiled me.
D: Jet Silverman now follows me from newgroup to newsgroup
...despite (C) above.
E: Jet is not worthy of the time to compose a response until
her behavior improves.
F: Unit_4's "Kook hunt" reminds me of "Jimmy Baker's" harangues against
adultery while concurrently committing adultery with Tammy Hahn.
G: Knackos...you're a retard.
------------------------------
From: "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,us.military.army
Subject: Re: Red hat becoming illegal?
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2001 17:16:15 -0500
billh wrote:
>
> "Aaron R. Kulkis"
>
> > Why do you keep denying your initial reason for opposing to me?
>
> I don't, as my initial reason for disliking you is your consistent lying
> about what you've done. BTW, it is your lies that oppose you.
liar.
--
Aaron R. Kulkis
Unix Systems Engineer
DNRC Minister of all I survey
ICQ # 3056642
H: "Having found not one single carbon monoxide leak on the entire
premises, it is my belief, and Willard concurs, that the reason
you folks feel listless and disoriented is simply because
you are lazy, stupid people"
I: Loren Petrich's 2-week stubborn refusal to respond to the
challenge to describe even one philosophical difference
between himself and the communists demonstrates that, in fact,
Loren Petrich is a COMMUNIST ***hole
J: Other knee_jerk reactionaries: billh, david casey, redc1c4,
The retarded sisters: Raunchy (rauni) and Anencephielle (Enielle),
also known as old hags who've hit the wall....
A: The wise man is mocked by fools.
B: Jet Silverman plays the fool and spews out nonsense as a
method of sidetracking discussions which are headed in a
direction that she doesn't like.
C: Jet Silverman claims to have killfiled me.
D: Jet Silverman now follows me from newgroup to newsgroup
...despite (C) above.
E: Jet is not worthy of the time to compose a response until
her behavior improves.
F: Unit_4's "Kook hunt" reminds me of "Jimmy Baker's" harangues against
adultery while concurrently committing adultery with Tammy Hahn.
G: Knackos...you're a retard.
------------------------------
From: "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why Hatred?
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2001 17:17:17 -0500
Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
>
> "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
> > >
> > > "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> > > news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > > > > Oh life is so hard using Windows isn't it!
> > > >
> > > > Yes, it is.
> > > >
> > > > Routine batch-processing jobs (like data collection and report
> generation)
> > > > is something that I can routinely accomplish with 15-120 minutes
> > > > of script programming, and then a mere couple of SECONDS to type
> > > > the command thereafter.
> > > >
> > > > Meanwhile, in LoseDOS land, the same task will continue to take
> > > > several HOURS of my time EVERY WEEK.
> > >
> > > Any script you can write in Unix can be written for Windows as well. I
> > > don't understand your point.
> >
> > Really?
> >
> > Fork off 500 paralell processes on a LoseDOS machine and see what
> > happens.
>
> The same thing that happens under Linux.
You're saying that the LoseDOS machine will stay up and running?
Erik, you REALLY need to lay off the drugs, man...seriously...
--
Aaron R. Kulkis
Unix Systems Engineer
DNRC Minister of all I survey
ICQ # 3056642
H: "Having found not one single carbon monoxide leak on the entire
premises, it is my belief, and Willard concurs, that the reason
you folks feel listless and disoriented is simply because
you are lazy, stupid people"
I: Loren Petrich's 2-week stubborn refusal to respond to the
challenge to describe even one philosophical difference
between himself and the communists demonstrates that, in fact,
Loren Petrich is a COMMUNIST ***hole
J: Other knee_jerk reactionaries: billh, david casey, redc1c4,
The retarded sisters: Raunchy (rauni) and Anencephielle (Enielle),
also known as old hags who've hit the wall....
A: The wise man is mocked by fools.
B: Jet Silverman plays the fool and spews out nonsense as a
method of sidetracking discussions which are headed in a
direction that she doesn't like.
C: Jet Silverman claims to have killfiled me.
D: Jet Silverman now follows me from newgroup to newsgroup
...despite (C) above.
E: Jet is not worthy of the time to compose a response until
her behavior improves.
F: Unit_4's "Kook hunt" reminds me of "Jimmy Baker's" harangues against
adultery while concurrently committing adultery with Tammy Hahn.
G: Knackos...you're a retard.
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: mail reader
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2001 22:24:03 +0000
Adam Fineman wrote:
> I'm looking for a mail reader that can handle multiple accounts (mixed
> IMAP & POP). Netscape, e.g., can only handle multiple accounts if they
> are all IMAP.
KMail of KDE2 works pretty well. It handles my two EMail accounts with ease.
--
Pete, running KDE2 on Linux Mandrake 7.2
------------------------------
From: "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why Hatred?
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2001 17:17:39 -0500
Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
>
> "mlw" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
> > > > > Any script you can write in Unix can be written for Windows as well.
> I
> > > > > don't understand your point.
> > > >
> > > > Really?
> > > >
> > > > Fork off 500 paralell processes on a LoseDOS machine and see what
> > > > happens.
> > >
> > > The same thing that happens under Linux.
> >
> > This is completely false. Processes in Linux are much more lightweight
> > in their counterparts in Windows land.
>
> Yes, they are. But 500 processes should not cripple either machine on
> today's hardware.
I'll believe it when I see it.
--
Aaron R. Kulkis
Unix Systems Engineer
DNRC Minister of all I survey
ICQ # 3056642
H: "Having found not one single carbon monoxide leak on the entire
premises, it is my belief, and Willard concurs, that the reason
you folks feel listless and disoriented is simply because
you are lazy, stupid people"
I: Loren Petrich's 2-week stubborn refusal to respond to the
challenge to describe even one philosophical difference
between himself and the communists demonstrates that, in fact,
Loren Petrich is a COMMUNIST ***hole
J: Other knee_jerk reactionaries: billh, david casey, redc1c4,
The retarded sisters: Raunchy (rauni) and Anencephielle (Enielle),
also known as old hags who've hit the wall....
A: The wise man is mocked by fools.
B: Jet Silverman plays the fool and spews out nonsense as a
method of sidetracking discussions which are headed in a
direction that she doesn't like.
C: Jet Silverman claims to have killfiled me.
D: Jet Silverman now follows me from newgroup to newsgroup
...despite (C) above.
E: Jet is not worthy of the time to compose a response until
her behavior improves.
F: Unit_4's "Kook hunt" reminds me of "Jimmy Baker's" harangues against
adultery while concurrently committing adultery with Tammy Hahn.
G: Knackos...you're a retard.
------------------------------
From: "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why Hatred?
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2001 17:18:25 -0500
Peter K�hlmann wrote:
>
> Pete Goodwin wrote:
>
> > I must be in a part of Europe where I don't see as much of this. Certainly
> > my Windows skills are very much in demand. I'm not an MSCE BTW.
> >
>
> Perhaps just because you're not an MSCE.
> In our company beeing an MSCE would not mean anything at all except perhaps
> to be extra carefull with that guy.
MSCE = Microsoft Brainwashing Victim
--
Aaron R. Kulkis
Unix Systems Engineer
DNRC Minister of all I survey
ICQ # 3056642
H: "Having found not one single carbon monoxide leak on the entire
premises, it is my belief, and Willard concurs, that the reason
you folks feel listless and disoriented is simply because
you are lazy, stupid people"
I: Loren Petrich's 2-week stubborn refusal to respond to the
challenge to describe even one philosophical difference
between himself and the communists demonstrates that, in fact,
Loren Petrich is a COMMUNIST ***hole
J: Other knee_jerk reactionaries: billh, david casey, redc1c4,
The retarded sisters: Raunchy (rauni) and Anencephielle (Enielle),
also known as old hags who've hit the wall....
A: The wise man is mocked by fools.
B: Jet Silverman plays the fool and spews out nonsense as a
method of sidetracking discussions which are headed in a
direction that she doesn't like.
C: Jet Silverman claims to have killfiled me.
D: Jet Silverman now follows me from newgroup to newsgroup
...despite (C) above.
E: Jet is not worthy of the time to compose a response until
her behavior improves.
F: Unit_4's "Kook hunt" reminds me of "Jimmy Baker's" harangues against
adultery while concurrently committing adultery with Tammy Hahn.
G: Knackos...you're a retard.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bob Hauck)
Subject: Re: New to Linux, and I am not satisfied.
Reply-To: hauck[at]codem{dot}com
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2001 22:23:26 GMT
On Thu, 28 Dec 2000 14:51:28 GMT, T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Said Bob Hauck in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Tue, 26 Dec 2000 16:43:44
>GMT;
>Spammers aren't the problem; you can restrict posting only, I would
>expect, on a modern news server, and I wouldn't mind that.
I think you would, given the amount you post <g>.
>>In the "old days", there used to be a lot of open NNTP servers. The
>>spammers and software pirates and idiots have pretty much killed off
>>that breed. That's too bad, but I think it is the price you pay for the
>>growth of the Internet.
>
>No, its the carriers who have killed off that breed, by keeping
>bandwidth so expensive.
Huh? No, the death of open servers was caused by a huge increase in
load brought on mostly by dumbasses.
I agree with you that bandwidth charges that ISP's pay are too high.
The Telecom Act of 1996 is in many ways a disaster, but that's a
different discussion.
>>*If* they charge a flat rate, ISP's with 10 simultaneous users pay the
>>same dollar amount as ones with 500. That sounds to me like the small
>>guy is subsidizing the big guy, since at least some of the NNTP service's
>>costs are related to per-user resources.
>This would only be true if the cost per user were linear, and its not.
Right, it is stepped. A given machine can handle so many users acceptably,
then you have to buy another. Just like dialup ports, you have to buy
them in chunks. The incremental cost of adding another user is never zero.
>No, they charge by ISP, but by size of ISP, not by number of users who
>use the Usenet service.
I'm not clear on how this isn't just a variation on the "number of
simultaneous users" scheme that they actually use. The number of people
who use the service is going to be some relatively constant percentage
(between ISP's) of the number of customers the ISP has. I don't see how
your scheme creates any disincentives for heavy use that the
simultaneous user scheme doesn't also create.
The only difference I see is that your scheme wouldn't deny connections
that are over the amount paid for. But that won't happen with the
current scheme either if the ISP judges his load right and doesn't try
to cheap out. Supernews provides tools to check on this, so there's
really no excuse for people to be getting denied. If you had that
problem with your other ISP, it is _his_ fault, not Supernews.
>> You might ask yourself why they are a minority and why there are
>> fewer and fewer of them doing it themselves and more are contracting
>> with Supernews and the like.
> Because fools chase easy money, rather than honest profit.
No, that's not the reason. I can testify that owning a small ISP is not
"easy money", Usenet or not.
>>Disk space is cheap, but not free, and the high-performance variants
>>needed for a good news server are especially non-free. Bandwidth is not
>>particularly cheap to an ISP either because they can't (well...shouldn't)
>>buy a consumer pipe that's already been oversold 30 to 1. And labor is
>>very expensive.
>
>Indeed, and ISPs make money on all of this they successfully resell.
So you'd be willing to pay a separate fee for Usenet then? ISP's don't
"resell" Usenet by itself, they roll it into a package with a bunch of
other things. It turns out that most people use the other things but
few use Usenet. So, it is a low priority for most ISP's. In business,
you often outsource things that are a low priority. That's what is
happening.
If there were enough people willing to pay specifically for Usenet, then
there would be a way to make it pay for itself and fewer ISP's would
outsource it. Maybe there _are_ enough such people to make doing that
worthwhle, but I wouldn't bet on it being the case for a user base of
1000 or so, where maybe only 50 use the service when it is free.
If I'm wrong, somebody somewhere must be offering the service you seek.
Is anybody offering individuals NNTP access for $5/month or similar? I
honestly don't know. Maybe you've hit on a new business model.
> Any moderate sized ISP can support a Usenet server, if they're not
> brain-dead.
Yes, they can. The question is whether it makes business sense to do
so. More and more these days the answer is "no".
> The costs are minimal, and if you don't make money, you
> charge more.
You don't really know what the costs are, you're just guessing, and
ISP's don't make money on Usenet directly. They can't raise the price
for everyone and stay competitive, and most of them don't think there
are enough people willing to pay a separate fee. Thus, they outsource
in order to keep their costs down.
>>You seem to forget that I actually ran a Usenet server with a full fead
>>for about four years. I know what I'm talking about.
>
>You don't do it anymore. And four years is a long time on the Internet.
Read it again Max. I didn't do it four years ago, but for a period of
four years (ending about a year and a half ago). I'm sure that still
puts me into the fogey category, but at least it isn't four years.
[snip discussion of admin pain]
>Oh, the horrors of having to work for a living.
I was merely trying to point out that there is more to it that "buy a
cheap PC and stick a bunch of big disks in it". There is a non-trivial
amount of admin overhead to running a news server.
Here's that economy of scale thing again. If one admin (or even three)
can run a server for 10,000 people, while another runs one for 1,000,
the first guy's costs are going to be lower per user.
>>News admins spend a lot of time tuning things and recovering from
>>various failures (e.g. one of your feeds went down for a day and is now
>>spewing gigabytes of old news at you as fast as it can). They are also
>>continuously spending money on more of those cheap LVD SCSI disks.
>
>You seem to be under the impression that I've said that it doesn't cost
>anything to run a news server. I don't know where you got that idea.
You keep telling me how cheap disks and bandwidth are. Really, though,
it isn't so much the direct cost but the extra admin overhead it takes
detracts from other things that are a higher priority.
>>Being a full-time news admin isn't so bad, actually, but trying to do it
>>part time is a pain in the ass and most small ISP's can't afford a
>>full-time admin for news.
>Maybe they're too small to be decent ISPs, too. I'm still up in the air
>about the efficiencies involved in the free market for Internet stuff.
That's a good question. The answer depends, I think, on what your
definition of "decent" is. For instance, if you want a 24x7 help desk,
you aren't going to get that from a 500-user ISP. OTOH, if you want a
help desk staff that can actually provide answers to technical
questions, that you probably will get.
There are lots of other factors to consider though. For instance, it is
really hard to make money on DSL as a small ISP. The monopoly telcos
keep it that way by the way they price it to the ISP. You have to
oversell by a certain factor to make a profit, and the smallest ISP's
just don't have enough customers to get there.
>Its still sorting out, but I don't really think there's much of an
>inevitable move towards larger or smaller.
I agree with that. There are advantages to both depending on what your
expectations as a customer are. For that reason alone I think there
will continue to be diversity.
>>Most of the users who complained about this were also clued enough to
>>understand how to read news with slrn from a shell account. Giving
>>these users shell accounts solved the majority of the complaints.
>
>Shell accounts are extremely rare these days.
Yes, they are another high-maintenance item that most ISP's choose to
avoid because the demand isn't there. However, they are an item that
some people will pay extra for, so they aren't quite dead yet. Maybe
you can start a similar trend for "good" Usenet service.
>>It is the volume of messages that's driving the consolidation toward
>>providers like Supernews among small to medium ISP's.
>
>Like its entirely impossible to even imagine not supporting every single
>useless binary group that everyone else does? For Christ's sake,
>there's no reason whatsoever (save those mentioned above, incompetence
>or ignorance) that this isn't a local problem.
Sure, you can drop binary groups. You can even pretend to have them but
not propagate them or take them from your feeds. But the trouble is,
this only works if just a small number of folks do it. If everyone did
it, you'd have binaries popping up in a bunch of other groups, which
would make the problem worse instead of better.
You can attempt some kind of automated filtering, or limit the length of
posts, or lots of other things, and manage to piss off people who get
"unfairly" rejected.
Or, you can create another admin burden for yourself and track down the
problem children and terminate their accounts.
None of the alternatives make ISP owners jump for joy. Another reason
to outsource.
> Well, you've roughly traveled through quite a bit of the silliness I'm
> referring to. Why is it you were disagreeing with me, again? ;-)
I agree that Usenet is having lots of problems. I agree that it is
becoming concentrated in fewer hands. I don't agree with your analysis
of the cause (i.e. money-grubbing ISP owners). Those who outsource have
valid business reasons for doing it. Outsourcing isn't a cause, but a
reaction.
>These are not per user costs; they are resource limitations which
>roughly scale to how *busy* a server is, not how many users it has.
Ok, fine, but busyness is a function of the number of users.
>Most of the bandwidth is on the feed-side, and that uses the storage
>resources as well. The per-user costs are almost negligible in
>comparison.
Uh, you sort of left out that readers are random-access. They result in
a lot of seeking. You can greatly reduce that for feeds by putting
history and active files and spool on different spindles, but that
doesn't help much for readers. A single reader is much less of a load
than a single feed, but that doesn't tell you anything about how the
problem scales.
> Its Usenet which is big; ISPs are small (and still they generally
> support only 2 or three users who use NNTP for every hundred
> subscribers they have.)
Yup, because only that many actually read Usenet.
--
-| Bob Hauck
-| Codem Systems, Inc.
-| http://www.codem.com/
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