the Doctor (``Doctor'' Mikie Shea)

[Bruce Lilly]

An open letter to Dennis Zientara:

In article <1991Feb16.204911.21017 at kodak.kodak.com> you, zientara at kodak.kodak.com (Dennis Zientara) opined:
>I saw that many immature participants responded with obsenity and/or
>profanity. Others also obviously immature, tried to participate by 
>having the biggest mouth :-) Still others tried to prevail by virtue 
>of sheer volume of postings.

The biggest mouth, and the least mature postings were those from
``doctor'' Mikie Shea.

>The literally hundreds and hundreds of postings with reasonable prices
>seems to indicate that:
>
>	1) Although the Doctor's view wasn't popular, it was very
>           correct. Let's call him Dr Who ;-)

As was correctly pointed out, in calm, mature postings by several people,
the prices proposed by Gil were reasonable for what was being offered.
Mikie's postings clearly indicated that he did not understand the
difference between a 7300 with 0.5MB RAM and 20 MB disk and a 3B1 with 2Mb
RAM and 80 MB disk.  Mikie's view was dead wrong. Call him ``Doctor No''.
I don't recall (probably because there weren't) ``hunderds and hundreds
of postings with reasonable prices'' in the thread of discussion which
followed Gil's offering.

>	2) Although the person trying to sell his equipment has many
>           followers, they did not chip in and buy his equipment as 
>           a show of support. (just words, words are cheap)

You don't know what you're talking about, Dennis. I bought from Gil.
Others obviously did also, as some of the items which I wished to purchase
had already been spoken for, less than 24 hours after the original
posting. Where did you get your omniscience regarding private business
transactions?

>	3) Perhaps the original poster will eventually lower his prices
>           and be able to sell his equipment also.

This seems a spurious remark, since Gil has sold (at least several items
of) what he offered.  But, Dennis, this seems to be based on your
incorrect #2 ``observation''.

>I also noticed that many of the original respondents like Jan, Lenny,
>Augustine, and more have wisely retreated from the limelight of a discussion
>that has gravitated to rather juvenile groppling. Those with more juvenile
>personalities have remained and have been joined by sleepers crawling out
>of the cracks of the woodwork like scavengers cleaning up after a great
>feast or slaughter, which ever way you view the discussion.
>
>Personally I have enjoyed observing the discussion. How about a new newsgroup:
>comp.sys.3b1.discussions where people can argue over things that they have
>no knowledge about ? without being unduly criticized ??  After all, this group
>is loaded with VERY opinionated readers with VERY LARGE egos.

You're entitled to your opinion, but it is not necessarily correct. First,
the original discussion took place in unix-pc.general, which is not the
same as comp.sys.3b1 (technical error on your part). Second, you clearly
misunderstand the background of these groups (which is important to
understand before ``analyzing'' what happened). The unix-pc groups came about as
a means of support for particular products which had been discontinued by
their manufacturer and vendor. They (the groups) are a means of sharing
information about the machines, and are a source of assistance and
information for those who may have encountered some problem with their
equipment. Unlike most newsgroups, there have been very few ``flame
wars''.  Except for the occasional posting from IBM users who
incorrectly assumed that the unix-pc groups were for posting regarding
running some variety of the UNIX(R) operating system on IBM PC's, the
postings were well focused on the topic of the 3B1/7300.

Mikie's postings were clearly inflammatory, and were resented by many readers
(as evidenced by the responses). They added nothing in the way of support
for the 7300/3B1. Dennis, your posting also seems to be somewhat
inflammatory. I don't care to see a repeat of the Mikie Shea flamefest, if
you wish to discuss this further, please use electronic mail. It is
peculiar that you should post on this topic at this time, since (thank
goodness) Mikie Shea and the furor which he started have long been gone.
Are you deliberately trying to start up anither flamefest?

Alternatively, you can observe discussions ``where people can argue over
things that (sic) they have no knowledge about'' in other newsgroups.
That's not what unic-pc and comp.sys groups are for.

Finally, I note that Mikie Shea has not seen fit to post an apology to the
readers of this group, and especially to Gil.  Such an apology is
warranted.

>\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
>the sleeper
>
>juvenile 

--
	Bruce Lilly		blilly!balilly!bruce at sonyd1.Broadcast.Sony.COM