🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <4akrkb$9gl@hades.omen.com.au> Dave Nagle, dnagle@hades.omen.com.au writes:
>Why on earth would a reader of a group called general expect to 
>find any sort of tightly focused subject matter? As you say, it 
>attracts posts that are about anything and everything. Probably 
>crossposted from their real home. So what?

Dave, I am beginning to suspect that you don't have even the vaguest
clue.

It works like this: aus.general is there for what's left over. It's
for what doesn't go anywhere else. Whether people misinterpret the
group name or not is irrelevant; as there is a FAQ posted every other
week that explains the group's purpose, they have no excuse.

In addition to this, the traditional purpose of ".misc" and ".general"
groups has been around since the 1980s. It's not like it's a big
secret, and it's consistent across hierarchies. That's why you'll
find a .general just about everywhere.

>There is also the technical problem that you cannot remove the 
>article from aus.general without also removing it from 
>aus.politics, aus.org.efa and the other groups it was posted to.

I can now remove articles from just aus.general. (No great
technological breakthough - I just found a useful part of NNTP that
allows this.) I prefer to do this, rather than cancel articles,
but even in the latter case, I don't see a problem with cancelling
excessive or inappropriate crossposts. If it's in the wrong place,
it's in the wrong place. It's too bad if it's also in the right place.

Think of it this way: your neighbours are having a loud party at 3 am.
Yeah, it's their property and they can do what they want, but the
noise isn't just in their backyard, it's in yours, as well. You have
the right to call the police and have them shut up.

Incidentally, what's your view on spam? If I post an ad to 15,000
newsgroups, including aus.ads.commercial, would you support cancelling
it? I would assume from your arguments that you would not.


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Phil Herring                                         revdoc@uow.edu.au
 (c)1995 Phil Herring. This article may not be reproduced for profit.
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