Re: ALERT This mailing list may be voted into a newsgroup - Mailing list pgsql-general

(All as I understand it. If Marc or someone else who's involved wants
to correct and clarify it'd be appreciated.)

This mailing list is already gatewayed to
comp.databases.postgresql.general (that's where the spammers harvest
your email address if you post to the list).

This is nothing new. It has been that way for a while, with minimal
problems on the mailing list side, with the exception of spammers
harvesting email addresses.  That's partly because it's primarily a
one-way gateway - mailing list to newsgroup. Posts to the newsgroup
are only propagated to the mailing list if the posting email address
is a subscriber to the mailing list.

But comp.databases.postgresql.general was never correctly created -
it's a bogus newsgroup. As it's bogus, many newsservers won't carry it
by default, though they'll often add it if users request it.

The discussion in news.groups is about "doing the paperwork" for the
already existing groups. There's interest in the newsgroups and
providers are being asked to carry them. Formalising their creation
will make that easier, as many newsservers will start carrying them
automagically.

There may be significant pressure to change the gateway to a two-way
gateway, sending all usenet posts to the mailing list, as part of the
"doing the paperwork" process. That may cause problems. On the other
hand without the full two-way gateway there's a risk of the forum
splitting into two parts, with mailing-list subscribers not seeing
posts from usenet participants, fragmenting threads and making both
the mailing list and the newsgroup less useful for all participants.

Cheers,
  Steve

On Fri, Nov 05, 2004 at 08:42:40AM -0800, Andy M wrote:

> ALERT
>
> There is a person by the name of Mike Cox who's trying
> to turn this mailing list into a Big-8 newsgroup. Many
> of you know that this and most of the other postresql
> mailing lists are already gated to Google Groups and a
> small number of private news servers. If Mike Cox
> succeeds, this list will be available as a newsgroup
> on a great many more ISPs and NSPs, which could be a
> good or a bad thing. For one, e-mail addresses on this
> list will probably receive an increased volume of
> spam.
>
> This person Mike wrote his own charter for this
> mailing list, without asking for help from any of the
> list subscribers. He went ahead and submitted the
> proposal to the Usenet big-wigs without consulting the
> mailing list first. The discussion is occurring in the
> news.groups Usenet group by a bunch of Usenet techies.
> Please get involved in the discussion and express your
> views. By all means, vote, when the time comes.
>
> If you have no access to Usenet, you could follow the
> discussion via Google Groups. Here are links to some
> of the threads--
>
> http://shorl.com/jevukofrolelo
> http://shorl.com/hunofetaprona
> http://shorl.com/boranobrimise
>
> Andy