Holger Metzger wrote
> Not sure, but I think this is a GNKSA requirement. When crossposting
> excessively you have to set a follow-up to one single group. But you are
> right, Mozilla should only /warn/ about excessive crossposting and
> /recommend/ to set a follow-up to and not refuse to post.
I do not know what a GNKSA requirement is, but cross-posting has
been going on for the many years I have been posting to Usenet.
I would agree that sometimes people post to newsgroups where the
subject is off-the-wall for the newsgroup, but it seems that just
as often people will post an off-the-wall subject to a single
newsgroup. I do not care to read the majority of the posts in a
newsgroup for a variety of reasons of which one in many cases is
that the post does not make sense to me to have been posted, and
then we have the spam posts. In my experience my level of
irritation for cross-postings has been almost non-existent,
whereas it has moderately occurred that I will reply to cross-
posted posts. On balance I see no problem at all with cross-
posting on Usenet and see it useful in some cases.
In an effort to over-kill my point ... I expect that information
theory will support the position that any topic organization method
will be inefficient for some topics. This derives from the fact
programming different language will have different efficiencies
for different purposes. A particular information organization
method such as the current Usenet topic hierarchy suggested by the
title of the groups represents a language that becomes inefficient
with respect to some possible alternate organizations. I expect
it can be shown that some efficiencies can be reclaimed by
regrouping (cross-posting) the detail groups for local purposes.
The point here is that removing the ability to cross-post is likely
against a provable, on-balance useful advantage.
Regards,
Neil Nelson
