As long as we are taliking about rmgrouping ...

[Greg Skinner]

I propose that we remove net.sources and only allow the posting of
sources in mod.sources.* for the following reasons:

Net.sources is by far and away the highest volume newsgroup.  As such,
it occupies the largest bandwidth during news transmission.

Net.sources falls prey to the repeated information problem -- too many
repostings of old information.  Examples:

	* Please repost hack version 9000 ...
	* I have a program that prints files backwards, sideways, upside
	  down ...
	* Here is a sendmail.cf that runs rings around Mars ...
	* etc., etc.

There is no *demonstrated need* for the posting of sources to the whole
net.  Many sites do not allow their users to play games, so there is no
need for those hosts to have the sources to games on their machine.
Furthermore, many sites don't even care to see that a new sendmail.cf
has been posted (they don't run sendmail).  In general, there isn't a
need for all the sites to have all the software peole want to post.  If
someone wants software they should mail the authors for it.
Subsequently, mod.sources can be used for the posting of *announcements*
of available software.

A good example would be the posting of the news sources.  The majority
of sites are not running the latest version of news, and have no
intentions of converting to the newest news when the newest news
arrives.  They need not be burdened with the news sources typing up
their phone lines and occupying their disk space.  When they want to
upgrade, they can request the news sources by mail.

I have had the unfortunate experience of seeing multiple rnews's running
because the last one didn't finish before the next one was forked (from
the same machine).  Some huge posting from net.sources.* was usually the
culprit.  I've also seen it tie up phone lines and RJE links.

If newsgroups like net.flame, net.religion, etc. are going to be
rmgrouped, then net.sources.* should go with them.  Net.sources.* is
just cluttering up the net too much to stay around in its present form.
If you want software from someone bad enough, send them mail and use
your phones to carry the traffic.  If you want to advertise your
software bad enough, announce its availability and accept requests for
it.  But don't subject the rest of the net to software it doesn't want
or need to see.

To sum up, net.sources.* should be rmgrouped.  Mod.sources.* should
remain, with stict controls on the content of the group by the
moderator.  Submitters should be *encouraged strongly* to post requests
for or advertisements of software, and only in extreme cases of need
should large sources be posted to the net.  This goes for the posting of
bugs and shareware as well.
-- 
It's like a jungle sometimes, it makes me wonder how I keep from goin' under.

Greg Skinner (gregbo)
{decvax!genrad, allegra, ihnp4}!mit-eddie!gds
gds at mit-eddie.mit.edu