Re: MacroOrganism

Thomas Lapp (thomas%mvac23.uucp@udel.edu)
Tue, 8 Dec 92 12:04:08 EST

Eeyore's Evil Twin <chuq@medraut.apple.com>:
> [flames]
> That's not possible now. The net is full of ill-informed experts who think
> that "what I want" is the only fact needed to prove a point, or worse, who
> either have the wrong facts or make them up as needed, and when people don't
> roll over and piddle, they get abusive. It's pretty much guaranteed by the
> third set of responses on ANY topic that whatever thread was started has
> either been smashed with a fireaxe or has turned into tangent because of
> topic drift. (Ever notice the prevalence of topics that start out with
> something like "The Russians have just dropped a nuclear bomb on Ceylon!"
> followed by 43 followups pointing out that it's been Sri Lanka for years,
> you idiot, and one following reminding us that it's not the Russians, but
> the Soviets?)
>
> it's not only almost impossible to hold an argument on the net, it's almost
> impossible to hold a conversation. It's a function of the noise level, and
> it's simply because of the population. too many people all trying to talk at
> once, and what you get is babble.

I've noticed this too over the couple of years I've been reading Usenet.
It's gotten worse during that time period as well.

The question I wonder about, is: If the newsgroups have too much babble
on them to be useful any more (and I do keep dropping groups as the noise
gets too much to handle), where is the intelligent conversation going?
My suspicion is that it is going to mailing lists like this one or to
moderated groups where the moderator takes care of removing all the
garbage and letting only the good stuff through (witness
comp.dcom.telecom). If this is indeed the case, then it appears that
the noise level is strictly a function of the number of people involved
and that Usenet is so prevelent now (esp. with gateways to FIDOnet, etc.)
that the noise level has surpassed the signal.
- tom

--
internet     : mvac23!thomas@udel.edu  or  thomas%mvac23@udel.edu (home)
             : lapp@cdhub1.dnet.dupont.com (work)
OSI          : C=US/A=MCI/S=LAPP/D=ID=4398613
uucp         : {ucbvax,mcvax,uunet}!udel!mvac23!thomas
Location     : Newark, DE, USA

This page last updated on: Jul 1 09:16