🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Aug28.230103.2854@ifi.unizh.ch> lytras@avalon.physik.unizh.ch (Lytras Apostolos) writes:
> 7. Usenet is not an advertising medium.
>
>    Because of Usenet's roots in academia, and because Usenet depends
>    so heavily on cooperation (sometimes among competitors), custom
>    dictates that advertising be kept to a minimum.  It is tolerated
>    if it is infrequent, informative, and low-hype.
>
>    The "comp.newprod" newsgroup is NOT an exception to this rule:
>    product announcements are screened by a moderator in an attempt to
>    keep the hype-to-information ratio in check.
>
>    If you must engage in flackery for your company, use the "biz"
>    hierarchy, which is explicitly "advertising-allowed", and which
>    (like all of Usenet) is carried only by those sites that want it.
>
>Why should c.s.n.a overrule a widely accepted rule like this? This just
>is not the place to put pricing information. If the demand for such
>information is really big, then one should rather think of making the
>un"censored" articles available on an archive server. So people who want
>it, can get it, but people who object to commercializing Usenet to this
>point won't be offended. This discussion is not ridiculous, but rather
>annoying, because the rules are there, they're widely respected and
>accepted, and there has not been *one* good reason for changing them in
>this discussion, so far (IMHO, of course, you may perceive things
>differently).

What rule?  Deleting the price makes the product announcement no less
an advertisement.  Pricing information in a product announcement _is_
information.  Pricing information in "HSD's BLOWOUT SUMMER-SALE" is
hype (I dont think sale announcements belang in c.s.n.a).

The quality of information in c.s.n.a has been very good, and I've
seen very little hype.  Putting the prices in only adds to the
information, and to think that it adds hype is ridiculous with the
exception of announcements of pricing changes on already announced
products (like the blowout sales that were so popular this summer).

The guidelines only state a concern for the hype-to-information ratio
and do not specifically mention prices _anywhere_.  Furthermore, these
are only guidelines and not rules.  


I for one want to see the prices in new preduct announcements.


andrew
-- 
andrew@cubetech.com     | "We shall not cease from exploration
Andrew Loewenstern      |  And the end of our exploring
Cube Technologies, Inc. |  Will be to arrive where we started
                        |  And know the place for the first time." -T.S. Eliot