Post by Klaus MeinhardPost by DMcCunneyPost by CRNGI still can't figure out why anyone would prefer a proprietary
labor intensive forum over a news group. I just don't see the
advantage.
It depends upon the forum and the newsgroup.
If you are the author of software you provide online support for,
how many different places do you monitor to make announcements,
note problems, and answer questions? Especially since time spent
doing that is time *not* spent writing and debugging code, and
getting new software out the door.
JP Software seems to be a one man shop these days, and I can't blame
Rex for setting up a server and vBulletin for web forums to give him
one thing to look at, and the web forums can be used by anyone with
a decent browser. I don't find them all that hard to navigate and
use.
Thanks. Nice to hear a voice of reason :-)
You're welcome.
Post by Klaus MeinhardFeelings of nostalgia aren't very helpful if you have a company and try
to sell a product. You want an environment for your support efforts that
doesn't put off clients with threads full of personal feuds, slander and
invectives.
Which underlay my comment about the forum and the newsgroup. Many have
simply become snake pits and spam traps. Life is too short to wade
through that.
Post by Klaus MeinhardAFAIK 4dos support started in BBS message boards, where the operator
generally had a keen eye on manners of his clients. This was closely
followed by a managed 4DOS support board on Compuserve, where the
legendary Mike Bessy was responsible for support of 4DOS.
Yep. Back in the day, I co-hosted the 4DOS conference on RIME, which
was the second largest BBS network after Fidonet, and I had Tom Rawson
and Rex Conn in the conference. Rex talked about writing 4DOS for his
own use, and releasing it as shareware when it reached a sufficient
level of development to be usable by others. He said he thought it
might sell enough copies to buy a new computer and perhaps a few gadgets
for his boat. Instead it became his main occupation. I asked whether
he ever wished it *had* worked out as he expected, and he said "Yes,
when I wake up in the morning and there are 500 messages about 4DOS in
my Inbox!"
Post by Klaus MeinhardSo far, so good. A certain amount of control was possible (and mostly
unnecessary, because people tended to behave. They weren't anonymous in
those days).
RIME, at least, *required* real names, and sysops of RIME systems were
expected to confirm the identities of their posters. This was a bit of
a challenge because many different types of BBSes could be part of RIME,
and some of them didn't use real names - you chose an alias that you
used on the board. RIME worked via a client the BBS installed to
connect to the network, and in the case of software like MajorBBS that
used aliases, the client had to dig the user's real name out of the
board's registration database and put it on outgoing posts to RIME, and
do the reverse on replies coming back.
Post by Klaus MeinhardThen came usenet, and Eternal September, and a massive amount of new
users without respect for netiquette or even basic politeness flooded
the net. Mike Bessy's personality was such that he sometimes told stupid
people that they did something stupid, which could then erupt into a
long flame war.
And the fundamental problem with Usenet was a distributed star
architecture with no central hub, so there was no way to establish any
real control. Usenet was designed and implemented in happier days and
the folks who did it never saw a need to impose that sort of controls.
Back before Eternal September, bad behavior got your mailbox stuffed
full of flames, and *really* bad behavior got complaints to the admins
of the site you posted form and your access went away. After AOL got
gated to Usenet, that was no longer effective.
Post by Klaus MeinhardDoes anybody know of any company still offering official support on
Usenet? I think the decision to move support to a managed forum was
regrettable from my personal viewpoint, but inevitable from a business
point of view.
I'm not aware of any. And while I regret the fact that everything has
shifted to web forums, I don't blame companies that went that way. In
their place, I'd do the same thing.
It's a bit ironic when I see complaints that reduce to "I want to keep
doing things the same way I've always done them!", when the nature of
the computer world is change, and sitting still isn't a viable option.
The longer you try to stay put, the more trouble you store up for when
you are finally forced to change.
______
Dennis