🚀 go-pugleaf

On Fri, 14 Feb 97 03:00:21 +1200, system@codeworks.gen.nz (Wayne W.
McDougall) wrote:

>dnagle@wt.com.au (Dave Nagle) writes:
>
>> system@codeworks.gen.nz (Wayne W. McDougall):
>> 
>> > 2. Why *should* I publicly post details of my activities?
>> 
>> It's considered good netiquette - I'm sure you are in favour of 
>> that.
>
>Look, I have already asked you in email for any pointer to back up your
>opinion on this one. You failed to respond, because it doesn't exist.
>But do feel free to not respond to this now public challenge.

The FAQ for Cancel Netiquette can be found, among other places, at
http://www.math.uiuc.edu/~tskirvin/home/cancel.faq

It is clear from reading this that Wayne's action, though well intentioned
is quite improper. 

And even if he was authorised to be the moderator, there are standards to
be followed as defined in section IIB of the FAQ:

 B. What standards are there for cancelling posts?

        When cancelling your own post, the only standards are the
software requirements.  Third-party cancels, however, have certain
standards that should be followed.

        There are three main reasons for following these standards when
using third-party cancels.  First is to identify the canceller, which
gives the practice accountability.  The second is to make sure that a 
particular message is only cancelled once.  Finally, some news 
administrators would rather not accept certain cancels, and a standard 
will allow them to opt out of the system.

        The first standard is simple to fulfill; all legitimate third-
party cancels include an "X-Cancelled-By:" header, containing the email
address of the canceller.  

        The second problem is solved much more creatively.  The $alz
convention (named after Richard Salz, the creator of INN), specifies 
that the message ID for a cancel message prepend the message ID of the 
original message with the string "cancel.".  For example:

Original Message ID:            <48u6e8$lqi@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu>
  Cancel Message ID:            

        The third problem, that of sites wanting to opt out certain
types of cancels, can be solved by adding certain "pseudo-sites" to the
path of the cancel; if a particular site wishes to not accept cancels
of that type, they can alias out that pseudo-site.  For information on
how to do this, see section II.E.

        The commonly accepted pseudo-sites are as follows:

cyberspam!usenet        Spam/EMP cancels (universal)
spewcancel!usenet       Spew cancels
mmfcancel!usenet        Make.Money.Fast cancels
bincancel!usenet        Binary (in a non-Binary group) cancels
adcancel!usenet         Ad cancels (for the biz.* hierarchy only)
retromod!usenet         Retro-Moderation cancels

        The !usenet part denotes that something must come after that
part of the path; it is not strictly necessary.  Multiple pseudo-sites
can be used in one message.