Path: cdrom.com!barrnet.net!sgiblab!sdd.hp.com!cs.utexas.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!pipex!sunic!news.funet.fi!ngw!news.funet.fi!not-for-mail From: Bernard Lang Newsgroups: alt.cd-rom Subject: Commercialism vs Noise on internet Date: 1 Mar 1994 12:27:39 +0200 Organization: FUNET-NGW Lines: 151 Sender: daemon@news.funet.fi Distribution: alt Message-ID: <9403011021.AA19035@margaux.inria.fr> Reply-To: Bernard Lang NNTP-Posting-Host: news.funet.fi Return-Path: <@UCCVMA.UCOP.EDU:B.lang@INRIA.FR> Comments: To: CDROM-L%UCCVMA.BITNET@frmop11.cnusc.fr, an62929@ANON.PENET.FI Comments: cc: aquigley@UNIX1.TCD.IE, john@WASH.DEMON.CO.UK, mario@SEAS.SMU.EDU To: CDROM-L Redistribution There has been a recent discussion about advertising on the group, and I have FF.02 to add. I agree with several other replies that the original two complaints were ill-timed since they were addressed to a reseller who seldom advertises, and is otherwise quite helpful to the group by answering questions from the membership. He was exceptionally posting a rather short ad to inform about changes in his shipping policies. Strangely, I never saw any complaint (other than my occasional own) about resellers who keep posting the same excessively long ads day after day (or week after week). I believe those ads are a useful source of information for many of us. But it is useful only if it is manageable, i.e. terse. Else it is just noise, since we do not have time to read all that. Ads should be short, informative and infrequent, and should contain pointers to where to get more info when interested. For those who complain about commercial usage, some replies: - the restriction apparently applies only to some parts of internet (but feel free to filter :-), and send me the program that can) - are you sure no academic, or other, ever used his e-mail for profit (e.g. when consulting), or even just for fun (which is not supposed to be funded by taxpayer money, unfortunately). - what of all the personal ads for selling 1 or 2 CDs. That is real noise on a planetary scale, and is also a commercial transaction. Also one could argue that the CDROM business is a powerful mean of data transmission that helps relieve the communication load of the net, and is thus useful to the net community. Those freeware authors that complained about their freeware being included on non-free CDROM should be aware that distribution has a cost, and that someone is paying for the FTP archives where they want their wares be made available free (not to mention the profit of whoever is running the communication lines). I would personally refuse to store on an ftp archive a piece of freeware with a copyright forbidding its inclusion in a for-sale CDROM (well, there could be an issue of the CDROM price... but I do not believe it seriously occurred so far, with the competition there is). There are really two issues: 1- who is paying for what (e.g. taxpayer for private enterprise?), and while this is important, it is in my opinion the minor point. 2- will the net be so cluttered with noise as to be unusable or to require drastic usage restrictions, thus limiting the freedom we now enjoy. In my opinion, the second issue is the essential one (since communication is not that expensive anyway, and will get cheaper). That is why I am a lot more incensed by the increasing number of people who do not bother using e-mail (not always out of ignorance, though this may often be the case). One paper thrown on the floor is nothing much, but if everyone does it the place quickly becomes a pigsty. The net covers the planet, and even a very small percentage of misbehavior can make it unlivable. One common example is people broadcasting a call to all resellers for their prices (not to mention the "me-too" messages, who would do as well by e-mail). Now: ads may not always interest me, but these calls NEVER do. The authors could as well send individual messages to all resellers, and would probably get better response. (I suspect most resellers do not follow the group on a regular basis) Note: for this specific problem, I created a list of most (I may miss some by accident, and I get no help) publishers and resellers that advertise or are reachable on the net, which I post occasionally (it is now about 40kB). IMHO, the summum seems to have been reached by the following posting: > From: an62929@ANON.PENET.FI > Organization: Anonymous contact service > Subject: Adult CDROM's wanted > Looking for adult CDROM's. Pictures or animation, Mac or IBM. Email > me with information, or if you can't work your way through the > anonymous server, post to this newsgroup and I'll get back to you. Not only is he using broadcast to reach resellers, but he is encouraging them to reply the same way (please don't). He may not have realized it, but it is rude to a large community. It is true that people need to be educated (at least technically) when they join the net, and that is too often bypassed (and I am sure I have done the wrong thing several times). But there many ways to get that education on the net: free info, books, guides available. And help from the community (see the discussion of John Washington and Mario Nascimento ). I have been wondering whether posting a small info message regularly (every other day? ... or every week?) would help relieve the problem. I have one to propose below. Any opinion? And sorry for the long posting... that is not proper :-) Cordialement to all Bernard Lang B.Lang@inria.fr =============================================================================== Basic Information about CD-ROM on internet February 28, 1994 ========================================== (e-mail b.lang@inria.fr for any error or omission) The (excellent) FAQ (answers to Frequently Asked Questions) is maintained by Robert Bruce (Walnut Creek) and is available - via anonymous ftp from ftp.cdrom.com: /pub/cdrom/faq - by sending email to info@cdrom.com with the subject "FAQ" - or for $6 (Visa/MC/Amex) on floppy, call 1-510-674-0783 - with all other FAQs, by FTP at rtfm.mit.edu CD-I FAQ: posted in comp.multimedia by Lex van Sonderen CompuServe: 71552,2204 CD-ROM related newsgroups: alt.cd-rom comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.cd-rom comp.publish.cdrom.hardware \ CD-ROM publishing comp.publish.cdrom.multimedia | (mastering, hardware, comp.publish.cdrom.software / software, ...) For a list of Producers and their CDROM, CDROM mastering services, reviews, list of publications, varied FAQs, CD-ROM software, drivers, ...: ftp.cdrom.com:/pub/cdrom Get the README file. The group alt.cd-rom is also available from a list server: To subscribe send e-mail to LISTSERV@UCCVMA.UCOP.EDU or to LISTSERV@UCCVMA.BITNET with the first line: SUBSCRIBE CDROM-L FirstName LastName To cancel subscription use the first line: SIGNOFF CDROM-L To get more details on list server send: INFO REFCARD Interesting Posts and other informations are collected and e-mailed to subscribers (free) in the CD-ROM Updater. Send e-mail to: Aaron Quigley for more details. To order catalogs, CD-ROM discs, or hardware, or ask related info: A list of CD-ROM sources accessible by internet is maintained by Bernard Lang . Send info by e-mail to be included as publisher or reseller in the list. ... and for general questions about the net, get the Big Dummy's Guide from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) by ftp at: ftp.eff.org in the "/pub/Net_info/Big_Dummy" directory. Get file /pub/Net_info/Big_Dummy/big-dummys-guide.txt or other files for non-ascii formats (and also the file "bigdummy.faq") ***** PREFER E-MAIL TO POSTING *** Think twice before posting ***** ***** read news.announce.newusers ***** ===============================================================================