Re: Isn't it time for a newsgroup^H^H^H^H digest?

["Richard C. Thrapp" <richardt owlnet rice edu>]

On Tue, 30 Mar 1999, Gleef wrote:

> 
> On 29 Mar 1999, Marius Vollmer wrote:
> > mark@hoist.nlcomm.com writes:
> > 
> > > How about a list digest first?
> > 
> > I don't know how digests really work (I'm not reading any), but how
> > suited are they for discussing things, compared to just summarizing
> > announcements?
> 
> Bad for active discussion, but they are great for the lurkers who are to
> timid to post anyway.  I don't think anyone wants the entire list to turn
> into a digest, but if the mailing list software offers it as an option,
> many would be interested.
> 
>  
> > The behaviopur of a mailing list is fine, it's just that news can deal
> > better with the volume.  For me, using gnus, mailing lists and news
> > are about the same anyway, only that inn is better at handling large
> > volumes than gnus` nnml backend.
> 
> The trouble with newsgroups is that it is very difficult to keep out
> undesirables.  Since I have signed on to this mailing list, I have seen
> only one piece of spam sneak on.  I don't know of any newsgroups that have
> a record like that.
> 
> -Gleef

How about a moderated newsgroup?
The problem is finding a moderator ... but if we have some sort of
"registration", we can cut the job of the moderator down and possibly even
pass the torch or have a group of moderators...

ie. Registered users' posts are automatically posted.  Anything else is
sent to the human moderator for judgement.  If it is allowed, he is
automatically added to the registered users list.  If some spam is
posted by a registered user, he can be removed by the moderator.
(I think a system like this could be implemented very easily with a few
perl scripts and a small database.)

Sure, the signal to noise ratio would get worse, but only slightly, I
think.

50+ e-mails a day from this one list is often too much if you just work on
gnome in your free time, but using a digest method doesn't allow people to
get into the discussion actively when you have the time to work on it.
With a newsgroup, you can read it whenever you want and not have it
clutter up your inbox.  Also, it's often easier/faster to access last
week's messages through a newsgroup than through the archive.


-- 
                                                         ___
Richard Thrapp           richardt@rice.edu              <*,*>
   Student      http://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~richardt/   [`R']
Rice University    Repartition, Reformat, Reinstall     -"-"-