Usenet NEWS vs. Bittorrent

[Leo Mauler]

--- On Tue, 7/8/08, Jeffrey Watts <jeffrey.w.watts at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Tue, Jul 8, 2008 at 7:24 AM, Leo Mauler
> <webgiant at yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> > I'm just pointing out that it is a better way for
> > Joe Average to download binaries than bittorrent, 
> > for lots of reasons all beneficial to Joe Average, 
> > be he the uploader or the downloader.
> 
> And I'm pointing out that it's wasteful, and poorly
> designed for today's modern 24/7 Internet.

Only from the perspective of ISPs.  From the end user perspective it frequently works a lot better than the alternatives (such as bittorrent).

> I don't care if it's more useful for you, it's not 
> good for the ISPs.

Depending on the definition of "not good".  If you lose clients because you don't have a news server, then having one is good.

> You seem to forget that this stuff costs money, and 
> a service has to be good for both the servers as well 
> as the clients.  Netnews is not,

Not good for the ISPs, great for the clients.

> and that's why it's slowly going away.  This is a
> good thing.

Only if the ISPs don't hemorrhage users away to ISPs with news servers.
 
> > There's a difference between supporting something
> and just admiring its technological advantages to the end
> user.  I support NetNews' text-only groups, but I
> merely admire the system of binary distribution through
> NetNews.  I'd still want text-only NetNews to stick
> around, and if the price is binary NetNews vanishing, then
> so be it, despite its technological advantages to end users
> in the sharing of binary files.
> 
> You've obviously never run a production INN server. 
> There is NOTHING admirable about how it works.

There's plenty admirable from the end user side of things, regardless of what you've seen on the server end.

> > Amiga technology made really great computers, but IBM
> > PC technology ended up working better for me.  I can 
> > admire Amiga without desiring that it return and 
> > replace something I really do want.
> 
> Okay, let's use your analogy.  What you're asking
> for is like asking Time Warner Cable to _support Amigas_.

Considering, to extend your analogy, that TWC had been "supporting Amigas" right up until a few days ago, this analogy is somewhat silly given what you were trying to say with it.

> Regardless, I'm going to call "Hitler" on this one.
> It's pretty clear this won't go anywhere, and I doubt 
> everyone else wants to listen to it much more.

Godwin's Law doesn't state when a discussion ends, or even who wins.  Its just the percentage chance that "Hitler" will get mentioned in a discussion, directly proportional to the length of the discussion.  People always assume it means something it never meant.