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Re: mailing list vs "the futur"



On Wed, Aug 29, 2018 at 12:18:59AM +0100, Mark Rousell wrote:
I have at no stage advocated a "generic architecture of NNTP transit servers".

I have at no stage advocated any NNTP servers being "open to arbitrary groups",
other than those created by group owners.

[snip long list of other things you haven't said]

You're right; the problem is that you haven't said much at all of any substance, so I find myself trying to guess how the vague things you do say could possibly map to anything in the real world. I'll stop doing that.

Fine, so you prefer web UIs, if I understand you correctly.

No, I hate them. But I'm a realist and I understand why things are evolving the way they are.

   So the "broad client support" in question would be a web browser and that
   basically includes everything. Welcome to the 21st century!


Except that web browsers accessing web forums in the 21st Century don't do
everything. They can't. Other tools do some things better. That's rather the
point. There are other tools that bring other capabilities to the table. For
example, some of these tools are the NNTP and SMTP and IMAP protocols

FWIW, I think SMTP (and IMAP) is on its way out as well. I expect that in 20 years HTTP will still be going strong but SMTP will be a legacy protocol with dwindling recognition (the way NNTP is today). The theories about the superiority of NNTP and SMTP and IMAP are less compelling than the reality that the class of protocols designed for the internet of the 1980s are too susceptible to abuse for use on the modern internet. If SMTP does have a strong presence in 20 years it will probably be in a form that isn't interoperable with a 2018 SMTP implementation. (Which is not entirely impossible; unlike NNTP, SMTP isn't too moribund to evolve. I think it's just unlikely to evolve enough.)

Most people currently under the age of 20 probably won't notice that it's gone.


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