Copyright 1991, Fido Software. All rights reserved. Duplication
and/or distribution permitted for noncommercial purposes only.
For use in other circumstances, please contact Fido Software.
FidoNews is published weekly by and for the Members of the
FidoNet (r) International Amateur Electronic Mail System. It is
a compilation of individual articles contributed by their authors
or authorized agents of the authors. The contribution of articles
to this compilation does not diminish the rights of the authors.
You are encouraged to submit articles for publication in
FidoNews. Article submission standards are contained in the file
ARTSPEC.DOC, available from node 1:1/1. 1:1/1 is a Continuous
Mail system, available for network mail 24 hours a day.
Fido and FidoNet are registered trademarks of Tom Jennings of
Fido Software, Box 77731, San Francisco CA 94107, USA and are
used with permission.
Opinions expressed in FidoNews articles are those of the authors
and are not necessarily those of the Editor or of Fido Software.
Most articles are unsolicited. Our policy is to publish every
responsible submission received.
Table of Contents
1. ARTICLES ................................................. 1
WorldPol Sucks ........................................... 1
An Experimental Election in Region 18 .................... 10
Sister Nets - A proposal ................................. 13
A Few Comments on WorldPol ............................... 15
Another Top Ten List ..................................... 18
More Comments ............................................ 19
2. COLUMNS .................................................. 22
Talk Me Through It, Honey ................................ 22
3. LATEST VERSIONS .......................................... 24
Latest Software Versions ................................. 24
And more!
FidoNews 8-13 Page 1 1 Apr 1991
Yeah, it's just another of those old-timers grousing about
things. What do they know, anyway? They're just a bunch of
dinosaurs.
Further, this particular old-timer might be accused of having a
vested interest in P4. Perhaps so, but I was schooled in egoless
programming. That means you accept the FACT that you are going
to make mistakes, learn from them, and move on. Chairman Len
says it well: "A baseball player who hits .500 is considered to
be doing amazingly well, but if you think about it, that means
he's screwing up half the time."
Whether or not you choose to believe how seriously I take all
that is your problem, not mine.
I'd LIKE to see a Policy5, since one of the main design goals of
P4 was to provide a path to get from the IFNA environment to a
Policy (or, more properly, FidoNet) driven environment, to define
the mechanism needed to change Policy, to make that mechanism
answerable to the net. We KNEW we weren't solving all the
existing problems. That wasn't the goal. The goal was to make
it POSSIBLE to solve those problems, in the absence of IFNA.
A radical restructuring of Policy makes a lot of sense While
Policy3 and Policy4 both served their purposes, P4 at least is
"spaghetti code", a set of patches to address the vacuum caused
by the debacle known as (the implementation of) IFNA.
However, a radical restructuring does not necessarily imply
radical changes in the effects. WorldPol seems to want to do
both. In programming school, I was taught this was insanity.
Too many variables are being changed at one time. It's as if a
mailer author not only changed the code, but also the protocols.
What are you left to test against?
One of the primary design rules of P4 (at least while I was
involved) was "very small delta from P3". (The logic was the
more things you changed, the more things you gave people to vote
against - one lesson of Western Democracy the authors seem not to
recognize is that for better or for worse, people don't vote for
things, they vote against them.) If radical restructuring is the
goal of WorldPol, I submit it makes sense to attempt to keep the
FUNCTION as close to P4 as possible.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 2 1 Apr 1991
Ignorance of History
The problems with WorldPol are rooted in an absolute lack of
understanding of history. Correct that - it's not that it
doesn't understand it - it doesn't even consider it.
A simple, objective example of this is the list of credits.
Whether or not the authors like it, my words, and Thom
Henderson's words have been used, with absolutely no credit
given. I'm not seeking any glory by pointing this out - although
I do find irony in the fact that as bad as the authors seem to
feel Pol4 was, they seem to have used a lot of the language I
wrote into it in their efforts. It can't be said they are
ignorant of this fact, unless the authors don't read FidoNews, as
I've pointed it out here before.
On the other hand, I should be thankful I don't have to go to the
lengths Bill Bolton has to distance himself from it, so I guess
overall, it's a wash at a personal level.
More to the point, many of the problems that exist in WorldPol
are problems that occurred to earlier developers of Policy.
Clearly, we did not have all the answers. But we understood some
of the questions. To the best of my knowledge, no effort was
made to exploit those resources.
Policy4 development didn't start out with "Policy3 sucks" as a
basis. In fact, I was impressed with the document called
Policy3, and that only increased as I worked on P4. Further,
part of what we did as a part of P4 development was to talk to
the P3 developers about what we were trying to do. Anyone who's
been in FidoNet for a while knows there is no love lost between
Thom Henderson and myself, but I've nothing but respect and
praise for his work in the form of P3. I wasn't a real fan of
Thom's at the time I was working on P4, but we still managed to
talk about it, because we both cared about FidoNet more than our
personal differences.
As I've said elsewhere, FidoNet seems to have a very retarded
institutional memory. I won't quote Santayana here, but his
words apply in spades.
Different Social Orientation
WorldPol was written by people from a fundamentally different
society. No, I'm not referring to their national origin, or
language differences (although those cause some very real
problems.) Zone 4 is a VERY small zone. It's smaller than any
REGION in Zone 1. It's smaller than a number of NETS in Zone 1.
It's about the size of FidoNet in the time of Policy 1.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 3 1 Apr 1991
There are a lot of implications to be derived from this. When
FidoNet was that small, things were a lot easier. Everyone knew
each other, or knew each other one person removed. The people
who were involved had to be very motivated to be involved,
because being in FidoNet then was much more of a technical pain
in the ass then it is now. The membership was more cooperative.
Interpersonal differences were more easily resolved, because we'd
all been through a common trial by fire, and we were all there
for mostly the same reason - the sheer joy of playing with the
technology.
I submit these qualities must exist to no small degree in Zone
4. While the software technology is much more mature, they have
to deal with phone systems that make mine look good. In some
ways, I'm envious of them, as in many ways, FidoNet was much more
fun when it was smaller.
But now it's big. It's not just big here - Zones 2 and 3 are
pretty hefty, too. Many nodes (if not most) are run by people of
far less technical competence than in "the old days". They are
operated, in many cases, so people can consume their echomail.
There is no common "trial by fire", at least, not here in Zone 1.
Some might say it would be great to get back to those times. But
that's impractical. The evolution of Policy has been necessary
because what seems like common sense in a small group of
similarly motivated individuals breaks down rapidly in larger
group dynamics. Common sense, unfortunately, is not all that
common.
I'm often called a jingoist. This is about as off base as a
statement can get. Further, I believe the majority is not always
right, and in any case, the rights of the minority must be
protected. However, WorldPol is a serious case of the tail
wagging the dog. It is a minority, and in many ways, an
adolescent minority, telling the majority that everything it's
done is wrong. It's a generation gap. What I'm trying to say
here is we were teenagers once, too. Give us some credit for
that, and for having grown through that. With luck, Zone 4 will
eventually face the same problems of scale we've had to deal with
for YEARS now. Certainly, we made mistakes in dealing with them,
but WorldPol is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Western Style Democracy or Democracy in General
WorldPol uses the nebulous phrase "democratic by western
standards" to describe its political intent.
I don't have any argument with that at a philosophical level.
It's at a practical level it falls to pieces.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 4 1 Apr 1991
I can't find a good definition of "democratic by Western
Standards" anywhere. For instance, if you consider WorldPol
analogous to the US Constitution (that's as standard a western
democratic document I know), ratification of changes requires a
two thirds vote of all the states. It's not clear to me if
WorldPol needs a plurality, a majority of those voting, an
absolute majority, or what.
Defining the Problem
One of the things I found ironic was that a lot of the language I
wrote that appears in P4 (and WorldPol) is of the form:
"Here's the problem. Here's how we're trying to address that
problem."
Or the reverse:
"Here's a rule. Here's why this rule exists."
For the life of me, I can't see where WorldPol defines what
problems existing in P4 it wants to solve. I'm not (by any
means) saying there are no problems in P4. But in programming
school, they always taught me to carefully define the problem
before trying to solve it, or, dollars to donuts, you will end up
solving the wrong problem, not solving any problem, or creating
new ones. WorldPol is an object lesson on this point.
All I see WorldPol say is something nebulous like there are local
problems that P4 doesn't address. What problems? If it's
possible to solve them at a high level, rather than implementing
hundreds of different solutions to the same problem at lower
levels, doesn't that make more sense?
Geography
Geography is a very big part of my objections to WorldPol.
FidoNet was not designed as an "I Me Mine" network. Networks
exist to minimize the costs of the WHOLE, not as social clubs.
Networks exist to minimize the cost of sending mail to a
locality. If I have five messages to send to LA, but one of the
nodes there belongs to a net in NJ, I'm going to make two LD
calls instead of one to deliver those messages. That's stupid.
That's more than stupid. That's annoying.
I've never understood the "oppression" people seem to believe
geography imposes. I get angry when people say it's done to give
the coordinators power. A statement like that couldn't be
further from the truth. It's actually exactly the opposite -
geography constrains the coordinators from making arbitrary
decisions about who may or may not be in "their" networks. This
constraint seems totally removed.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 5 1 Apr 1991
Geography is simply an objective technical standard. Since
WorldPol eliminates geography, without providing an objective
technical standard, and it defines objectivity as its driving
logic, I find it illogical, and oxymoronic.
There already are provisions for exceptions to geography in P4.
They state that the "next level up" and all coordinators involved
have to agree to the exception.
If geography is removed as a criterion for membership, the
overall costs to the network as a whole will be increased. How?
Simple - every time someone has a spat with their NC, they will
move to another net. For a period, they will be dual
nodelisted. The diffs will be that much bigger to move around.
Extra calls will be made to deliver mail. Dup loops will be
created up the gazoo.
If, at any given time, 1% of the network is unhappy with their
coordinators, in a net of 10,000, this means 100 nodes in some
weird state of flux. Offhand, I'd say that if ONLY 1% of the net
is unhappy about something, we're getting off easy.
Even if some relaxation of geography is to be put in place, it
should be specified. As it stands, it's been removed with an
implication there are restrictions, but they are completely
unspecified. I-Me-Mine types will press this to the limits.
By eliminating geography, and not putting any other standard in
place, WorldPol makes it legal to be a member of more than one
local net, even outside of transitional periods.
I used to raise the analogy that you don't get to pick your phone
exchange. WorldPol provides an even better one: you don't get to
pick your voting district in a western democracy (other than by
moving). WorldPol makes gerrymandering an individual right
rather than an abuse by the government. It makes (EASILY)
possible the old Chicago standard of democracy - vote early, and
often. Once again, WorldPol is oxymoronic by its own standards.
WorldPol is fundamentally dangerous on this point. Given local
Policy, and non-geographic nets, it is entirely possible to
create special interest nets. This was tried years ago (Jr-Net)
and found to be counterproductive. Echomail and file
distribution networks are the answer to special interests, not
the elimination of geography. In this I-Me-Mine age, these
special interest nets easily can take on a positively evil tinge
- the jumps between "CM only systems" and "9600 CM only" and
"9600 CM systems with BBS' only" and "9600 CM systems with free
access BBS' only" and "<your favorite mailer here> only" and
"women sysops only" and "no blacks or gays or women or Hispanics
or Jews need apply" aren't all that big. (After all, race and
sex are objective facts, and therefore legal criteria for
decision making under WorldPol.)
FidoNews 8-13 Page 6 1 Apr 1991
Bill of Rights versus Rules of Conduct
Policy has always had a dualistic function. At one level, it is
a code of conduct - the laws of the land. At another, it is a
bill of rights.
I believe WorldPol dilutes - actually destroys might be more
accurate - the latter function. Further, I believe that if we're
going to start splitting things up, it makes MUCH more sense to
split them along the "bill of rights/laws of the land" division
than the "global/local" one.
This may well have been the intent of the authors. However, it
is not reflected in work.
Mediator Insanity
By altering the complaint process, WorldPol dramatically
increases the workload of upper levels of the *C structure. In
many ways, this is "anti-democratic".
Simple statistics make it obvious that given there are maybe 30
people in my net, and 10,000 in all the others, that it's far
more likely a complaint involving a person in my net will have to
be handled at the RC or higher level than at the NC. Given there
are perhaps 500 people in my region (just a guess), and 10,000 in
all the rest, it's fairly likely that a complaint involving one
party from my region will have to be resolved at the ZC level.
Further, this varies the number of levels of appeal, depending on
where your complaint is initially made. Depending on who is
complaining about your actions, you might have one or two or
three levels at which to make your argument. Doesn't justice
imply equal treatment under the law? Not under WorldPol.
I actually like George Peace. I don't have anything against him,
or my RC, Don Dawson. I can't imagine why I'd want to make their
lives miserable by handing them complaints that can and should be
handled at the NC to NC level.
Coordinator Requirements
Local Policies may increase the service requirements of local
coordinators. A local policy may be put into place that requires
the local host to provide OUTBOUND services, by its own example.
This creates Gordian knots that are too convoluted for me to even
think about. It sounds to me like only rich white men might be
allowed to be coordinators.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 7 1 Apr 1991
What happens if a net sets up requirements that cannot be
attained or sustained?
Elimination of FidoNews Requirement
The tyranny of the majority strikes again.
While diffs may be all we need to technically operate, FidoNews
conveys the spirit. Or it did, until WorldPol made it optional.
Further, since the "eliminate FidoNews" option seems to run up
the chain, it appears to me that 51% of a ZONE could decide the
other 49% are on their own with regards to FidoNews.
If FidoNews is the official newsletter of FidoNet, how are
official notices to be made to those areas that decide they don't
need FidoNews? Is Policy6 going to be distributed in the
nodediff? And are the coordinators going to distribute a
discussion about Policy6 in the diffs? Or are we going to create
mandatory echomail conferences? And if we do the latter, what
happens to those folk that want to use GroupMail? Or those folk
who are in the net for their own reasons, and neither support nor
desire echomail?
Unanimous Election of IC
The IC must be selected unanimously by the ZC's and is removed by
a majority. Once again, what means majority - majority of those
voting, or absolute majority? And what happens when (not if) the
ZC's can't come to unanimous agreement on an IC?
Changing the Defaults
WorldPol changes the defaults wholesale. While this may or may
not be a good idea, it has to be carefully considered.
The main example of this is the selection of *C's. Where before
the default was by appointment, now it is by election.
Transitional Problems
WorldPol declares existing Policy to be in effect where WorldPol
is not specific and local policy has not yet evolved. Granted,
the problem of transition will be encountered with any drastic
restructuring of Policy. However, this water seems awfully cold
and deep to me.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 8 1 Apr 1991
Let's use geography as an example. I would guess the authors
might argue that the "geography exception rules" of P4 are still
in effect under WorldPol. From my perspective, that's not how it
reads, and given some experience with Policy complaints, I know
MANY will argue the other side. WorldPol states that geography
is no longer a criteria, therefore, clauses relating to it in
subordinate Policies are invalid.
Not Final And Yet We're Voting On It
This is the most amusing statement in the whole document. It
goes well out of its way to say "This isn't the real thing" and
yet we are voting on it.
There appears to be one whole line missing from the version in
FidoNews, as well as numerous syntactic problems. Are we voting
on what was in FidoNews, or what the authors intend? Excuse me,
but I'd rather vote on something concrete, not intentions. It's
not that I question the intentions of the authors - it's that
I've learned how the best intentions can be abused by others.
Answers
I don't claim to have all (or even any) of the answers to these
problems.
During the last great IFNA election, there was some development
of a Policy structure, I believe by John Roberts and others, that
made a lot of sense to me.
Rather than dividing Policy along geographic lines, it was
structured along functional lines. Sub-Policies related to
specific problems, not localities.
As I said earlier, the most important suggestion I can make is to
carefully define the problems people feel need solving, determine
which ones really are problems, and pick a very small number of
them to try to solve. To me, it seems the most fundamental
problem is the structure of Policy as opposed to the Policy
itself.
Finally, the authors of WorldPol, after spending some time
studying history, should follow the basic rules of Boston driving
while developing Policy. When you drive in Boston, you look at a
situation, and determine what is in the selfish interest of each
of the drivers in that situation. It doesn't matter if the light
is red for the other guy, or if you have the right of way, or
that it doesn't make sense to pull into the oncoming lane to make
a turn. If it makes sense for that selfish SOB to do any of
those things to get where he's going quickly, he will do them.
So long as you drive with that in mind, you'll avoid a great
number of accidents. (Note carefully I didn't say all, because
it's impossible for a logical mind to comprehend just how
illogical some people can be.)
FidoNews 8-13 Page 9 1 Apr 1991
In the case of Policy, what makes sense to the authors CANNOT
merely be assumed or implied, because if there's any nebulous
wording, it can, and will be used against all of us in a Policy
dispute.
It is hard to believe that it was barely a month ago when Region
18 elected a new Regional EchoMail Coordinator. I've delayed
publishing, so as not to interfere with the recent ZEC 1
election. Amnon Nissan is a candidate.
The last year has been exciting for the democracy proponents in
FidoNet. I think we all agree that elected coordinators command
more respect than anointees. February 1990 was a significant
month in Region 18. Our REC decided to step down after doing a
fantastic job for three years. He was unfortunately anointed to
the position after a previous election had been invalidated by
the zone coordinating structure. I won't mention names! That
is in the past. Amnon Nissan wanted a fair election for his
replacement. He kept his word.
The election was defined as all current NEC's having one vote for
two willing and able candidates: Steve Cross and Dave Corthell.
Some of us questioned the process whereby only the NEC's could
vote. I argued that a popular vote would represent the
individual SysOps' wishes AND would eliminate the unfair
advantage that a small net has over a large net in voting. The
cry was One NODE, One Vote vs. One NET, One Vote.
Well, the decision had already been made. I offered a
compromise. Why not conduct an experimental popular election as
well? For the first time we could all see if it really makes a
difference. Amnon thought it a fantastic idea. It would need
two separate impartial vote counters. Ben Mann (RC18) would
collect the One NET, One Vote and I would collect the popular
vote. The individual NEC's would collect SysOp votes, and
forward copies to Ben and myself. The following ballot went out
via NetMail and EchoMail:
Dear Network Echomail Coordinator,
Our REC, Amnon Nissan has endorsed an experiment to allow the
tabulating of the raw node votes in the Region 18 REC
elections. This has the approval of the Zone and Region
Coordinators. The intent is to demonstrate if any difference
exists between the following methods:
(a) A network tabulation where a network has ONE vote. This is
referred to as ONE NET, ONE VOTE.
(b) A network tabulation where the raw vote is counted and
processed. This is called ONE NODE, ONE VOTE.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 11 1 Apr 1991
Only method (a) is binding. Method (b) is experimental. An
additional comment is required. If you not wish to have your
net's vote published, your report will be tabulated in a LUMP
count with other nets not wishing to be individually listed. I
do need your response for method (b). Send (a) to Ben Mann.
The findings will be published in FidoNews.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Region 18 experimental REC election. Password:______
NET:______ Dave Corthell:_____ Steve Cross: _____
Abstain:_____ Fill in the actual numbers of raw votes. e.g.
17, 15, 3. I do [ ] don't [ ] want the raw vote
published.
--------------------------------------------------------------
The following is a list of Nets responding to the Region 18
Experimental Ballot. Where a DON'T PUBLISH request was made,
the NET is identified by the password. Where no preference is
indicated, I publish it. I hope we will generate some meaningful
statistics for FidoNews. Special thanks to those responding!
NET or No. of Dave Steve
PASSWORD NODES CORTHELL CROSS ABSTAIN PUBLISH
Miscellany: 28 of 48 NECs reported OFFICIAL results to Ben Mann.
OFFICIAL results were 24 (86%) Corthell and 4 (14%) for Cross.
Popular results were 70% Corthell and 30% Cross. There are 942
eligible nodes in Region 18. It would appear 44% were denied
participation by their coordinators.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 12 1 Apr 1991
* Refused to participate in experiment, but returned ONE NET,
ONE VOTE preference.
+ Denotes anomaly, but the vote was counted. My baseline was
the nodelist before elections. Host and Hub entries were
not entitled dual voting.
& Denotes last minute update.
What did this experiment prove? I noted 2 significant items.
Perhaps you will note other items from the raw data above?
(1) Apathy is as much a problem in FidoNet as in the real world.
It seems that once the battle for democracy is over, folks
just don't care to participate.
(2) The coordinating structure can't be relied on to collect
votes. Only 58 percent reported official results to Ben
Mann and 48 percent reported experimental data to me. How
can a SysOp participate if a mechanism isn't in place for
them to learn of the issues or respond to.
I think it is imperative that the candidates themselves poll
nodes and encourage participation. No one else will do it. That
was been proved again and again and again...
Amnon Nissan, Ben Mann, and myself had one heck of a time trying
to figure out who the actual NEC's were. Many Region 18 Net
Coordinators aren't putting in the UNEC flags. Come on guys!
Get it right! I think all coordinators need to review their
segments manually at least 6 times a year. An NEC from a
different region may want to establish a non-backbone echo. The
U flags are important.
We need to establish a realistic vote counting mechanism. Too
many things are getting lost between the Region Coordinator and
the individual SysOp. I know the guys at the top are interested,
but middle management is not participating in many cases. Let's
fix another cause of apathy.
Feel free to respond to Fred Niemczenia at 1:371/7.
+---------------------------------------------------+
I Sister Nets - EchoMail with a different flavor! I
+---------------------------------------------------+
Ever since joining FidoNet, I have been fascinated with the
concept of EchoMail. It is a truly universal medium to
exchange ideas, meet and get to know different people and
cultures with all their ideals and beliefs.
It does not matter whether you're black or white, male or
female, handicapped or not. EchoMail does not discriminate.
I went back to Germany last fall (born and raised there),
and met with people who had never seen me before, yet were
willing to treat me with friendship and hospitality because
we wrote some messages back and forth, enjoying each others
company from afar.
You have to experience this to truly appreciate it.
Every Net has their own Echo areas, some as a pre-determined
minimum requirement in joining the Net (designed to act as
an info-pool for the Net), others optional as SIGs for
particular areas of interest within their area. Some of the
latter may then grow into nationally or internationally
distributed echoes. The system works well.
I would like to take the local Echo area idea a bit further:
By mutual choice of two reasonably compatible cities (or
Nets), mostly determined by their size (userbase), I suggest
a shared Echo area for the sole use of these two cities
(Nets). This would be on an intercontinental (inter-zonal?)
basis, not national or state to state. (After all, national
stuff is covered to exhaustion by the news media...)
Yes, there are MAJOR logistical problems:
1. Language.
However, as I read the international Echoes, English seems
to prevail anyhow, everyone seems to adopt and overcome this
obstacle in some form.
2. Cost.
Can a Net containing 10 nodes afford to send messages across
the pond via modem? High speed modems seem a must, but two
minutes of connect from Canada to Europe are still in the
$3.00 plus range. Considering 30 days to a month, Nets and
users splitting costs, that would come to $2.25 per sysop
(using the above hypothetical example).
Would this be acceptable? You tell me.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 14 1 Apr 1991
3. Interest.
It's tough enough getting an entire Net to agree on
something as silly as a poll schedule, let alone an
international Echo connect. Can a majority vote decide on
this? That hardly seems fair. But I think if everyone
understands the concept, it'd be a worthwhile effort for all
involved and will therefore find acceptance in a lot of
Nets. The fewer the number of nodes, the easier the decision
I guess...
So where do I start?
Well, I decided that the Snooze would be as good a place as
any. I'd like to organize a pool of interested Nets in Zone
1 and at the same time encourage the formation of similar
pools in the other Zones. From there we could play
matchmaker and interested Nets could figure out their
individual details from there.
I do not know what looms on the WORLDPOL or ECHOPOL horizon,
or how new policies may affect, hinder or prohibit such an
undertaking. I just happen to think that it's a good idea
that should be pursued.
Your comments and ideas on this are welcome and appreciated,
I would like to hear from all interested Nets and Zones.
Past issues of Fidonews have contained a lot of carping about
WorldPol. What I'd like to know is, where were all the
complainers during the formulation of WorldPol? I recall
comments on WorldPol being solicited on several occasions, and
apparently most of the complainers weren't interested enough to
send their comments in to the group working on WorldPol. This,
of course, is the great Fidonet tradition... let someone else
do all the work and then flame the **** (insert expletive of
choice here) out of them when the final proposal is presented.
I had some reservations about earlier versions, too, but I sent
a netmail message containing some of my problems with the
document. I got a rather thoughtful response from Pablo which
indicated that my comments had at least been considered. No, I
didn't get everything I asked for, but at least you and I was
given the opportunity to help shape this document, which is
more than we can say about a lot of previous efforts.
Now to the bottom line: Maybe it's not perfect, but is it
better than Policy 4? This sort of reminds me of the old
backhanded insult: "You're smarter than you look, but then
you'd have to be!" Almost anything written by reasonable
people would have to be better than Policy 4, in my opinion.
In particular, WorldPol does two things that are long needed:
1) It extends the right to vote on later versions of Policy
down to the average sysop. Now, I've heard a lot of people
complain that the logistics of such a vote would be a
nightmare. When someone says that, I have to wonder what their
real motives for opposing it are. C'mon, people, if you're in
Fidonet you have a computer, and computers are real good at
counting things. Consider a municipal election in a city that
has maybe 10,000 voters (this would be a small city by American
standards). Usually what happens is that each precinct tallies
up the votes for their precinct, then sends the results to a
central place that receives and tallies the vote counts from
each precinct. We do the same thing in Fidonet, except we
subdivide the work even further - the NC counts the votes from
his net and forwards them to the RC, which takes the vote
totals from his region and forwards them to the ZC, and so on.
We've conducted several elections this way in Zone 1, and apart
from those few die-hards who've never liked the idea of giving
the average sysop any say in how Fidonet is run, I've heard few
complaints about the election process.
2) It puts an end to certain geographic restrictions in
Fidonet. Unfortunately, this is the one thing that may kill
it, since only NC's (and above) are allowed to vote on it, and
there are still many NC's out there who, in their own little
black hearts, like the idea of being able to force sysops (and
potential sysops) in a given geographic area to deal with them
FidoNews 8-13 Page 16 1 Apr 1991
and them alone. One of the key features of a democratic
organization is that you are free to join any branch of the
organization that you wish. I know of no organization in the
"real world" (other than those connected with various levels of
government, and Fidonet certainly isn't part of the
government!) that require people to deal only with one
particular branch or office based solely on their place of
residence (I DO know of one religious organization that
insisted that members attend only the group "serving" their
particular neighborhood, but this group also tried to control
many other aspects of their members' lives, including where
they should live and whether or not they should date or
marry!).
We need only look to UseNet, which is MUCH larger than Fidonet,
to prove that an electronic mail and conference network can be
fully functional without giving considerations to geography.
Geographic restrictions are particularly inappropriate in the
United States, where differing tariffs for intrastate and
interstate calls can cause toll calls within one's home state
to be priced at a much higher rate than calls to a neighboring
state (it costs more to call a place 200 miles away in my home
state than to call a place 2,000 mile away elsewhere in the
U.S.).
It is my hope that *C's will ask themselves, if I were a sysop,
would I want a vote on policies that will affect my hobby?
Would I want the freedom to associate (or to NOT associate)
with whomever I please, or would I want to be forced to be part
of a particular group based solely on the place I happen to
live at?
When we were being asked to vote for Policy 4, we were told
"it's not perfect but it least it has some mechanism to allow a
vote on future policies, and it can be changed later." Well,
later is now. Policy 5 isn't perfect (and if you are waiting
for a perfect policy, it may be a long time in coming) but it
IS better than Policy 4. Yes, it's a bit vague in spots but so
are present policies. Yes, it should be modified to give more
consideration for points and point-ops, but when the average
sysop is allowed to vote on future policies, I think you will
see policies that give more consideration to points.
If we are waiting for the PERFECT policy document, we may have
a long wait! But, we should ask ourselves whether the proposed
document is better than what we have now. The main effect of
the proposed policy is to bring more democracy to Fidonet and
to lessen the adverse impact that the few in *C positions can
have on the many who are in Fidonet, which still maintaining
enough control to keep the mail flowing smoothly, and allowing
for local policies that might be needed to address unusual
local conditions.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 17 1 Apr 1991
Let's look upon WorldPol not as the final document with which
we'll have to live for the next 20 years, but as one more step
along the road to a fully democratic Fidonet. It's not
perfect, but it's a good policy and one that we can build upon
in the future.
Holdyer Horses
e:pi/lambda.nu
Another Top Ten List
The Category
Given WorldPol, it's possible to have your own little social
clubs for nets. Here's a list of new nets just waiting for
WorldPol's adoption so they can rise phoenix like from the ashes
of that awful, mean, nasty, old Policy4.
From the Home Office in Wausau, Wisconsin:
Top 10 New Local Networks Possible Under WorldPol
(Anton, a drum roll please!)
10 FastNet - 9600 Only
9 NeXTNet - Only REAL Computers, not clowns (er-clones)
8 NerdNet - Show your pocket protector at the door
7 WitchNet - Applications accepted only via crystal ball.
6 ScumbagNet - Only Barristers Need Apply
5 NumerologyNet - Phone numbers must sum to 3
4 BeerNet - Usually served at bars (sorry, that's beer nuts)
I've been hearing a lot about WorldPol v1H recently. In
FidoNews, in local echos, in other networks, everywhere.
WorldPol is causing a lot of discussion in my BBS world. And, it
seems, a lot of apprehension. In FidoNews 811 I brought out my
problems as related to WorldPol's treatment of pointops, so I
won't do that again in the detail I have previously.
With the realization that I may soon have to live under POLICY5
I feel it's my responsability to air my views or give up the
right to complain about the results (I hold that those who do
not vote in civil elections have no right to gripe about those
elected . . . in this instance I'm not allowed to vote but I feel
I still have to air my views).
I printed hard copies of FidoNews 810, 811, and 812 to take a
look. So here we go. :-)
---
There is no clause in WorldPol requiring geographic/technical
networks, which is what we have now. Upon the adoption of
WorldPol that clause will be grandfathered into the Zone
policies. But when the grandfathering is defeated by the
adoption of Zone policies (and it will happen, I assure you) we
will really have a mess on our hands. Here's one likely
scenario.
A pointop sets up his own BBS. While he was a pointop he
established a reputation of being a nasty twit. He applies to
his local network and is denied for whatever reason. But he
DOES meet the FTSC requirements for holding a node address and
has not previously engaged in any Annoying or Excessively
Annoying Behavior. He can't afford the long distance charges
to join another network and so is denied access to FidoNet,
not because he is incapable of running a reliable system or
engaged in EAB, but because the NC (or whomever) doesn't like
him.
In the above scenario the NC doesn't issue an address because
s/he knows that the pointop can apply to another network where
his reputation isn't known. But he also knows that the pointop
can't afford the LD charges of communicating with his network,
and so is denied complete access to FidoNet.
But with geographic/technical-only networks there is no reason
for the NC not to issue an address - the sysop is just obnoxious
but hasn't been declared EA by anybody (including the NC). The
variations on this theme are almost infinate. So much for that.
---
FidoNews 8-13 Page 20 1 Apr 1991
---
There is much hubbub about the new rights of "grunt sysops" to
vote. Giving the normal sysops the vote is great and wonderful.
But it presents some logistical problems to those counting votes.
The vagueness with which WorldPol 1H speaks of elections and
procedures can lead to the idea that, without an election policy
at the Zone level (and there is no gurantee that one will come
about), the ZC will be left counting votes and doing verification
of eligibility. And in the unlikely event that each voting
sysop carries the election echo vote verification could take
forever.
WorldPol's refrence to "western standards" is really strange,
because the "western standard" by which you judge elections is
different depending on what country you're in. According to many
in the United States, the system of elections used in Israel
(generally regarded as a democratic country) is crazy.
An ideal system for system of Zone-wide elections (that is, where
every sysop in a Zone gets a vote) works like this:
The sysop at 1:130/2991 sends his vote to 1:130/0. 1:130/0
counts and verifies all votes he received, and then sends the
totals to 1:19/0, the RC.
The RC totals and verifies the numbers from each net, and
verifies the votes of any regional independants who choose to
vote. He then sends the totals to the ZC.
The ZC totals and verifies the numbers from each region, and
then announces the results.
With this system electorial advantage of large networks is
retained while still giving representation to small networks. In
Zone-level elections the advantage of large networks is minimized
anyway since the likelyhood of every member of the largest
networks in a Zone all voting the same way is somewhere between
zero and nil.
But who knows what could come out in election procedures adopted
after WorldPol. Suppose, for instance, that Zone 1's policy does
not set up election procedures. Each of the 10 Regions in Zone 1
then must come up with an election policy, and there is no
telling what they might be. And then what about that Zone-wide
election for which there is no procedure? And how about the
idea that Region 1:19 doesn't come up with an election policy,
either, then each of the 32 networks has to come up with one, and
given the way in which each net does its business, there's no
telling what might happen.
FidoNews 8-13 Page 21 1 Apr 1991
The solution? How about a policy that spells out exactly what
happens during an election? Simple enough...
---
---
Those are my biggest gripes. There are others, such as language,
or I've already covered them in my article in FidoNews 811.
This is just an effort to influence the voting on a policy over
which I have no control or say and had no input in writing.
Take this and other articles, posts, and converstaions into
consideration when you vote. If you vote.
I just got back from Supercomm '91 in Houston. It's an
exhibition of TelCo products ranging from line splicing tools
to SONET cross connects. I saw very little ISDN and quite a
lot of 'fiber to the home'. I think you might be interested.
You use a modem, and you have an analog phone system in your
house. Down at your neighborhood switch box, these analog
signals are converted to digital signals. This bit rate is
called the T0 rate; it's about 64 Kbps ( bits per second ).
ISDN proposes to connect you with 2 T0 digital links plus a 16
Kbps data link ( the 2T Plus D ).
After adding some overhead to a T0 signal for diagnostic and
management purposes, a DS0 format is generated, and this is the
basic rate for most transmission systems used today. For
transport purposes, 24 DS0 signals are bundled together to form
a DS1 signal format. This is the signal passed between your
neighborhood box to the TelCo Central Office ( that big
building with no windows ! ).
Bundling 28 DS1s together ( with more overhead channels ) gives
you a DS3 rate, and that is trunk level signal that is passed
between major switching stations, large corporations and long
distance phone companies.
Backtracking a little, DS0 is 64 Kbps, DS1 is 1.5 Mbps ( million
bits per second ) and DS3 is 45 Mbps. A new international
standard called SONET provides a basic signal level called
STS-1 and this is a 50 Mbps. While the DSx formats are
asynchronous signals, the STS-1 is a synchronous signal. Given
the base of DS3 equipment, there are several vendors of DS3 to
STS-1 conversion units.
Continuing with ever faster rates, SONET defines the OC-3 rate
( 3 STS-1 signals ) for 150 Mbps. OC stands for Optical
Circuit. And of course there is the OC-12, OC-24 and OC-48
rates; OC-48 being 2.4 Gigabits per second. Now lets put all
this in perspective.
The fiber optic cable being laid in the ground today will carry
at a maximum ONE OC-48 signal. For example, the entire Florida
backbone is carried on 6 fibers. The typical maximum for
buried fiber is 40 strands. These 40 OC-48s can represent
almost 1.3 million active phone calls, or 1920 full motion
digital video signals. Clearly an insufficient amount of
bandwidth to put two-way video into every home. Not enough,
FidoNews 8-13 Page 23 1 Apr 1991
even if the bandwidth is increased by 1000 times.
There are currently three types of digital video transmission
formats, with different compression algorithms, even at the
same rate. The most common, highest quality is the 45 Mbps or
DS3 rate. The coder/decoder ( codex is analogous to modem ) is
the least expensive, but as we can see from the above DS3
descriptions, the transport bandwidth is the most expensive.
The least used is 1.5 Mbps. Growing fast for commercial usage
in video conferencing is the dual 56 kbps format. While the
codex units are very expensive, the transport media is simply
two phone lines. The problem with this format is that it only
operates at about 3 frames per second. ( Broadcast quality is
33 Fps. ) This low quality video is unsuitable for most uses.
The accepted theory is that the codex for good quality dual T0
video is five years away.
Why do I mention video ? Well, what else is there ? We have
voice and data. You have probably transferred a GIF or a FLI,
which are the still and animated equivalents of photographs.
Video is the last frontier for image transmission for this
decade, anyway.
Another reason to mention video transmission is the television
cable industry, which is now beginning to DIE. You've heard of
junk bonds. Cable companies were heavily financed by junk
bonds, and now it's time for them to start paying up. As a
result, you see service prices rising, and growing complaints
from consumers. The accepted theory is that TelCos will have
permission to offer video in five years.
Given the current technology, this permission will prove nearly
useless in the implementation of interactive video. Broadcast
video, maybe, but interactive only in local areas. Any
improvements in video compression will be too expensive for the
home owner. Next time I'll outline the different methods in use
today for interactive television.
Utility authors: Please help keep this list up to date by
reporting new versions to 1:1/1. It is not our intent to list
all utilities here, only those which verge on necessity.
12 May 1991
Fourth anniversary of FidoNet operations in Latin America and
second anniversary of the creation of Zone-4.
15 Aug 1991
5th annual Z1 Fido Convention - FidoCon '91 "A New Beginning"
Sheraton Denver West August 15 through August 18 1991.
8 Sep 1991
25th anniversary of first airing of Star Trek on NBC!
7 Oct 1991
Area code 415 fragments. Alameda and Contra Costa Counties
will begin using area code 510. This includes Oakland,
Concord, Berkeley and Hayward. San Francisco, San Mateo,
Marin, parts of Santa Clara County, and the San Francisco Bay
Islands will retain area code 415.
1 Feb 1992
Area code 213 fragments. Western, coastal, southern and
eastern portions of Los Angeles County will begin using area
code 310. This includes Los Angeles International Airport,
West Los Angeles, San Pedro and Whittier. Downtown Los
Angeles and surrounding communities (such as Hollywood and
Montebello) will retain area code 213.
1 Dec 1993
Tenth anniversary of Fido Version 1 release.
5 Jun 1997
David Dodell's 40th Birthday
If you have something which you would like to see on this
calendar, please send a message to FidoNet node 1:1/1.
NASA Space Shuttle Press Kit
----------------------------
FidoNews 8-13 Page 30 1 Apr 1991
This is just a notice to everyone and anyone that USS Vulcanix,
a BBS specializing in Space & Astronomy, Star Trek, and Science
Fiction has the latest NASA Shuttle Press Kit available for
FREQ (File REQuest).
What is the Shuttle Press Kit? Well, it's a long ASCII text
file containing almost anything you'd want to know about a
shuttle flight. Here's a portion of the table of contents for
SPACE SHUTTLE MISSION STS-37 (April 1991):
SUMMARY OF MAJOR ACTIVITIES
VEHICLE AND PAYLOAD WEIGHTS
TRAJECTORY SEQUENCE OF EVENTS
GAMMA RAY OBSERVATORY
GREAT OBSERVATORIES
PROTEIN CRYSTAL GROWTH EXPERIMENT
SHUTTLE AMATEUR RADIO EXPERIMENT
ADVANCED SHUTTLE GENERAL PURPOSE COMPUTERS
RADIATION MONITORING EQUIPMENT-III
STS-37 CREW BIOGRAPHIES
STS-37 MISSION MANAGEMENT
The file contains some very interesting information, and anyone
who likes the shuttle will love it. Example: It has a
day-by-day listing of what happens each day. The magic filename
to FREQ from my system is STSKIT. This will send you the file
STS37KIT.ZIP, and it's about 25,000 bytes (zipped).
