Ding, Ding! (was Re: Debian User List)
On Sat, 2007-03-31 at 21:46 -0600, Paul E Condon wrote:
> I started using Debian with Potato. The transition to Etch will be my
> third dist-upgrade between releases. I'm beginning to see a pattern.
>
> During the freeze period, users must pretty much stop confronting real
> software problems on which they really need help. The people to follow
> this list with the intention of being helpful get bored. People start
> telling jokes and whiling away the time in other ways.
>
> But this time the OT seems not to degenerate into shouting about
> Hitler and Nazis. I wonder, is the Debian community growing up?
>
> I see three reasons for limiting OT:
> 1) OT wastes bandwidth, especially for people on narrow band connections.
> 2) OT wastes storage in the archive
> 3) OT clutters up the archive and makes finding useful stuff more difficult.
>
> But:
> 3) Google search seems to address 3). at least to my satisfaction.
>
> 2) The cost of disk has dropped to the point where the cost of the
> extra storage must be trivial.
>
> Reason 1) is, however, valid, and setting up a filter for downloads
> over ppp is definitely a good idea. But I wonder if the narrow band
> debian-users are not also the people who actually need the most help
> from this list. They might have given up on asking for instructions on
> how to set this up. I think I once knew, but if I did know, I've
> forgotten. Something needs to be done to help these people.
>
> Perhaps there could be a new digest that leaves out OT threads. This
> could be set up relatively quickly, I think. And, I think the OT
> posters are already pretty good about marking their post OT.
>
> OTOH, Etch will be released real soon now, and the problem will go away.
Paul, you are "Ding, Ding!" spot on.
--
greg, greg@gregfolkert.net
The technology that is
Stronger, better, faster: Linux
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