Re: hard working individuals

smb@research.att.com
Mon, 23 Nov 92 16:32:39 EST

I didn't feel that it was necessary to get into the way usenet
runs and since I don't know a whole lot about it, it didn't
seem appropriate to me to describe it. From the standpoint of
the new user, usenet looks a lot like another resource the way
a boot server or name server looks: it's part of the computer
and it does some kind of work for them. Terminological
precision and a deep heartfelt appreciation of how much hard
work and how many long nights the authors of all this software
deserve is not my place to talk about, I felt, having had
nothing to do with the completion of those big tasks.

No. You're missing Gary's point entirely. And you're coming across
as very resentful that he didn't answer your question in exactly the
form you expected the answer to be in. No one is asking for ``deep
heartfelt appreciation'' of anything. Nor is ``terminological
precision'' the issue. Gary's point -- and mine -- is that you're
asking the wrong question. He tried to point you in the right direction,
but you misundersood him. Briefly -- very briefly -- the ARPANET, and
later the Internet, are in a very strong sense ``official''. There's
a formal structue, with management, paperwork, etc. Usenet is totally
the opposite. There is *no* structure, no organization, no formal
anything. Usenet is simply the collection of machines, on and off the
Internet, that happen to co-operate in doing the same thing. Assorted
individuals may or may not ``do Usenet'' as part of their job, but the
net as a whole isn't structured. You can't ask what Usenet as a whole
did or didn't do; that's not a meaningful question. Usenet per se can't
do anything, because there is no such thing. Individuals have done
whatever it is that has been done.

The difference here is not terminological, it's substance. The words
are different because the reality is different.

--Steve Bellovin

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