Recently, several people have asked me if we should consider
starting a MapInfo Usenet newsgroup in addition to (or instead
of) the mailing list we use now. I thought I'd toss it out for
discussion and see what everyone thinks.
First of all, Usenet newsgroups take a little effort to set up.
We would need someone who has access to a newsgroup server who
would volunteer to be the "maintainer" (this would not be me; I
have too much going on as it is right now).
After we get the initial issues sorted out here, the official
Usenet process starts with formal a Request for Discussion (RFD)
on news.announce.newgroups, then we need to find a volunteer site
to tabulate votes, then there's a call for votes. If we get
enough votes (and people outside the MapInfo community can and
will vote too, so you need to be coherent and persuasive in
laying out your arguments) then the maintainer can start posting
the messages to servers to start propagating the newsgroup across
the world.
Getting a slot in the "Big 8" hierarchies makes propagation very
easy, but you have to have the votes. The process can take 2-3
months. A quicker route is to create it under the alt or other
non-big8 hierarchy. That's faster to get started, but much more
difficult to get widespread coverage because many servers won't
carry alt newsgroups unless specifically asked (and even then
they still might not; alt groups are known for carrying a lot of
worthless twaddle).
For more info on the process see the news.newusers.questions FAQ
or read news.groups for a while or go read about it at
http://www.geocities.com/ResearchTriangle/Lab/6882/ncreate.html.
There's plenty of arguments pro and con, but I don't want to sway
people one way of another at this point. Post your comments
publicly, and if there's anyone out there who wants to offer to
be a maintainer/moderator and champion the cause, throw your hats
in the ring!
For everyone's information, there are currently 1143 subscribers
on MapInfo-L. Some of those are gateways and many people read
MapInfo-L from various web mirrors, so I don't really know how
many "eyes" really read this list. My guess is that to get the
votes to create a big 8 hierarchy like comp.infosystems.mapinfo,
or sci.geo.mapinfo or whatever, you will need to really get the
vote out. Typically, 1200 people is a small group by usenet
standards, but it's an active one!
If you have an opinion or some interest in getting involved,
speak up! For those of you on mirror sites, remember that the
list address is [EMAIL PROTECTED]; you don't have to be a
subscriber to post your opinions.
- Bill Thoen
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