spam in ALA
Wolfgang Kern
or do they think Asm-coders are all fat and need viagra by default ?
interesting is that all these contain this two lines in the header ...
Organization: clax86
Sender: cla...@wotan.crayne.org
Someone made ALA the waste-bin for CLAX ? :)
__
wolfgang
Rod Pemberton
news:grc9fd$8qc$1...@newsreader2.utanet.at...
> is it only me who see all this unwanted stuff ?
No. I see it where I read, and it's on GoogleGroups too. So, it's likely
everyone is seeing it.
> interesting is that all these contain this two lines in the header ...
>
> Organization: clax86
> Sender: cla...@wotan.crayne.org
>
> Someone made ALA the waste-bin for CLAX ? :)
I'm not too familiar with nntp protocols, but I think it's spoofed. First,
I recognize the computer generated names from older spam. Second, there are
at least five differences I see in those headers and valid ones on CLAX.
Third, it actually says "spam" on half of them...! So, I don't think the
CLAX moderating computer has been hacked or is being used as a gateway for
spam. Also, the MISMATCH in the "path" line is a good indication that it
was received from somewhere unexpected.
Previously,
> AMD Phenom
But, who wants to discuss spam? So, I'll ask questions about your new
computer... Is the project a go or on hold? Did you buy some parts? Did
you spend way too much? How fast is it? It's got to be fast... And, then
you can ask Alexei all sorts of questions about the cpu virtualization
instructions... What brand of video card did you decide on? SSD's?
:-)
Rod Pemberton
Wolfgang Kern
Rod Pemberton wrote:
>> is it only me who see all this unwanted stuff ?
> No. I see it where I read, and it's on GoogleGroups too. So, it's likely
> everyone is seeing it.
>> interesting is that all these contain this two lines in the header ...
>>
>> Organization: clax86
>> Sender: cla...@wotan.crayne.org
>>
>> Someone made ALA the waste-bin for CLAX ? :)
> I'm not too familiar with nntp protocols, but I think it's spoofed.
First,
> I recognize the computer generated names from older spam. Second, there
are
> at least five differences I see in those headers and valid ones on CLAX.
> Third, it actually says "spam" on half of them...! So, I don't think the
> CLAX moderating computer has been hacked or is being used as a gateway for
> spam. Also, the MISMATCH in the "path" line is a good indication that it
> was received from somewhere unexpected.
Yeah, my main joke on it was "are we all fat ..." :)
> Previously,
>> AMD Phenom
> But, who wants to discuss spam? So, I'll ask questions about your new
> computer... Is the project a go or on hold?
I still wait for more info about AMD Phenom II pros/cons...
> Did you buy some parts?
not yet, I just collect availability and costs for all needed parts.
So the next generation of KESYS-PCs could be up-to-date for a while.
I planned to replace my former AMD K8 standard with any AMD 64, but
it took me quite longer as estimated, so I'll go a step further yet.
> Did you spend way too much?
yeah, but only in theory yet :)
> How fast is it? It's got to be fast...
Not sure if a 3 GHz quad core really result in much more speed
than the much cheaper 2.8 MHz dual core
OTH I already see the 140 Watt CPUs from AMD become affordable, but
regardless of the purchase-date, my decision will always be late.
> And, then you can ask Alexei all sorts of questions about the cpu
> virtualization instructions...
:)
> What brand of video card did you decide on?
ATI, because I can't get register-level info for Nvidea
> SSD's? :-)
I think about it, even the prices are still high.
__
wolfgang
Frank Kotler
Thanks for the heads-up, Wolfgang! May be my fault. I'll look into it.
Apologies to all...
Best,
Frank
nathan...@gmail.com
>
> > Someone made ALA the waste-bin for CLAX ? :)
>
> Thanks for the heads-up, Wolfgang! May be my fault. I'll look into it.
> Apologies to all...
>
Does this mean you are the new CLAX co-moderator??
Nathan.
Frank Kotler
I'm "assisting" (if you call it that) Chuck's assistant moderator. The
situation is "in flux", I think you could say. Messages are getting
through to clax due to Chuck's foresight in setting up a
"robomoderator", and his widow Dian's kindness in keeping the machine
plugged in. Could go dark at any moment.
I rejected "those" messages. How they got posted to ala is a mystery to
me. But they appear to be originating from the machine where the
robomoderator runs. I just rejected another similar message using a
different "reject" option. Hasn't showed up here... yet... Maybe I was
just doin' it wrong... Wish us luck!
Best,
Frank
Steve
>nathan...@gmail.com wrote:
>> Does this mean you are the new CLAX co-moderator??
>
>I'm "assisting" (if you call it that) Chuck's assistant moderator. The
>situation is "in flux", I think you could say. Messages are getting
>through to clax due to Chuck's foresight in setting up a
>"robomoderator", and his widow Dian's kindness in keeping the machine
>plugged in. Could go dark at any moment.
>
>I rejected "those" messages. How they got posted to ala is a mystery to
>me. But they appear to be originating from the machine where the
>robomoderator runs. I just rejected another similar message using a
>different "reject" option. Hasn't showed up here... yet... Maybe I was
>just doin' it wrong... Wish us luck!
Hey,
Best of luck, and thank you.
Regards,
Steve N.
Rene
news:grdj5s$mm3$1...@aioe.org...
I don't care about all that, I only want to know when You will be shipping
the pills I have ordered and paid for.
Rene
P.S. Thanks for taking up the good work from Mr. Crayne (hope this line is
correct English) and good luck with it!
Rod Pemberton
> > SSD's? :-)
>
> I think about it, even the prices are still high.
>
From some of the removed statements, I'm getting the impression this isn't
for a personal PC build. FYI, one thing I've noticed over the past six
months is that the number of different IDE drives available from my local
store has _rapidly_ declined, from over 40 types to around 10. And, about
half of those drives are 2.5 inch notebook IDEs. I was hoping IDE prices
would make some major drops. But, it seems they've kept prices constant and
don't seem to be replacing IDE inventory once sold. So, I suspect the
manufacturers might finally be winding down IDE production in favor of SATA.
If you still need "register-level" IDE, I wouldn't wait too long... Side
thought, I guess I won't have to write that IDE code for my OS now. :-)
Rod Pemberton
Wolfgang Kern
Rod Pemberton wrote:
>>> SSD's? :-)
>> I think about it, even the prices are still high.
> From some of the removed statements, I'm getting the impression this
> isn't for a personal PC build.
Yes, I like to have at least the next few years (~50 units sceduled)
on uniform hardware, because I can't/wont rewrite all the required
driver-software every three month.
> FYI, one thing I've noticed over the past six months is that the
> number of different IDE drives available from my local store has
> _rapidly_ declined, from over 40 types to around 10. And, about
> half of those drives are 2.5 inch notebook IDEs. I was hoping IDE
> prices would make some major drops. But, it seems they've kept
> prices constant and don't seem to be replacing IDE inventory once sold.
> So, I suspect the manufacturers might finally be winding down IDE
> production in favor of SATA.
I recognised this here too.
Looks like merchants took one more time their red pencil and decided
to save a few bucks on hardware-components.
This time they may be right, because there isn't any gain from a
parallel 32-bit-I/O vs. single-bit serial-I/O, when I/O-ctrl+Bus+CPU
becomes much faster than a rotating mass-storage can deliver the data.
> If you still need "register-level" IDE, I wouldn't wait too long...
I stock a few drives in case of warranty replacement anyway.
> Side thought, I guess I won't have to write that IDE code for my OS
> now. :-)
:)
As I already have it, I'll keep the few bytes for LBA28/48 and also
the olde CHS-story in my OS. If I'd remove it, the gap would be to small
to fit software required for the almost braindead SATA/SCSI/USB hardware.
__
wolfgang
Alex
Jike Song
There still a lot SPAMs these days;-(
Frank Kotler
Well... Your friendly local would-be clax moderation team has lost touch
with the robomoderator. If the robomoderator is still running (which I
very much doubt) it's outta control, and may well be sending spam... or
worse. I haven't seen any spam in ala lately. (Rosario's stuff isn't
off-topic, it just doesn't *look* like assembly language :)
But, now that you mention it, it is becoming apparent that we don't know
what we're doing, and could use some help. Anyone who knows anything
about NNTP, moderated NNTP, running a server - particularly with a
cgi-bin directory (the robomoderation software is a mixture of
executables, Perl scripts, bash scripts, .html...) - or anything related
-and would be willing to give us advice, guidance... a kick in the
butt... please get in touch. fbkotler at myfairpoint dot net or fbkotler
at users dot sf dot net - we won't make ya *do* anything you don't want
to...
Best,
Frank
Rod Pemberton
news:gs6mq2$l2g$1...@aioe.org...
> ... clax moderation team has lost touch
> with the robomoderator.
My personal assumption is that it cost someone some money to run a moderated
newsgroup and a bill wasn't paid. Or, that network bandwidth was "gifted"
(employer?...) to Chuck (rip). Good guess? Bad guess? Assuming too much?
Anyway, I sent a test post to c.l.a.x. and a.l.a. It'd should be posted in
six, no later than 24 hours, if working. (Can we assume you and Jim did
like wise?...)
Rod Pemberton
Frank Kotler
> "Frank Kotler" <fbko...@verizon.net> wrote in message
> news:gs6mq2$l2g$1...@aioe.org...
>> ... clax moderation team has lost touch
>> with the robomoderator.
>
> My personal assumption is that it cost someone some money to run a moderated
> newsgroup and a bill wasn't paid. Or, that network bandwidth was "gifted"
> (employer?...) to Chuck (rip). Good guess? Bad guess? Assuming too much?
Could have been a lot of things...
> Anyway, I sent a test post to c.l.a.x. and a.l.a. It'd should be posted in
> six, no later than 24 hours, if working. (Can we assume you and Jim did
> like wise?...)
Yeah, to clax anyway. Be interesting to see if your post shows up in
ala. Apparently, if a cross-posted message includes a moderated group,
they *all* get blocked until the moderator approves it... We found out
that if the "moderator's assistant" rejects a message with the wrong
option, it apparently removes clax from the newsgroups... and apparently
gets reposted (thus the spam here). If it's done right, it just gets
bit-bucketed. We shall see what happens when the moderator just ignores
it...
Best,
Frank
Herbert Kleebauer
> >>> Does this mean you are the new CLAX co-moderator??
> >>
> >> I'm "assisting" (if you call it that) Chuck's assistant moderator. The
> >> situation is "in flux", I think you could say. Messages are getting
> >> through to clax due to Chuck's foresight in setting up a
> >> "robomoderator", and his widow Dian's kindness in keeping the machine
> >> plugged in. Could go dark at any moment.
> Well... Your friendly local would-be clax moderation team has lost touch
> with the robomoderator. If the robomoderator is still running (which I
> very much doubt) it's outta control, and may well be sending spam... or
> worse. I haven't seen any spam in ala lately. (Rosario's stuff isn't
> off-topic, it just doesn't *look* like assembly language :)
>
> But, now that you mention it, it is becoming apparent that we don't know
> what we're doing, and could use some help. Anyone who knows anything
> about NNTP, moderated NNTP, running a server - particularly with a
> cgi-bin directory (the robomoderation software is a mixture of
> executables, Perl scripts, bash scripts, .html...) - or anything related
> -and would be willing to give us advice, guidance... a kick in the
> butt... please get in touch. fbkotler at myfairpoint dot net or fbkotler
> at users dot sf dot net - we won't make ya *do* anything you don't want
> to...
Wouldn't it be the best to make comp.lang.asm.x86 unmoderated? Or
remove it and recreate comp.lang.asm. comp.lang.asm.x86 should never
have been created without the mandatory comp.lang.asm.misc. Maybe this
can be done without all the formal procedures normally necessary (I
have cross posted this to news.groups.proposals). Otherwise it seems
not worth the effort, the news system is dying as fast as assembly
programming. Maybe you could post a weekly message to c.l.a.x that
this group is no longer supported and alt.lang.asm should be used
instead.
Rod Pemberton
> Rod Pemberton wrote:
> >
> > Anyway, I sent a test post to c.l.a.x. and a.l.a. It'd should be posted
in
> > six, no later than 24 hours, if working. (Can we assume you and Jim did
> > like wise?...)
>
> Yeah, to clax anyway. Be interesting to see if your post shows up in
> ala.
Nope, it's not on ala... almost 24 hours now. It's not on clax for that
matter, either...
Did my post make it? It should be in a (reject/filtered) log somewhere, if
it did. All but a few of my posts used to make it.
My guess is someone turned on email spam filtering which checks for a valid
domain in the return email address. Or, someone switched to an ISP which
blocks automatically... Since the "email" address I use to post nntp (to
clax and others) is not valid... I suspect my post was blocked or filtered
as spam. If so, clax is _likely_ blocking other regular clax posters, and
you'll need to figure out how to bypass or disable the incoming email
filtering by domain name.
> Apparently, if a cross-posted message includes a moderated group,
> they *all* get blocked until the moderator approves it... We found out
> that if the "moderator's assistant" rejects a message with the wrong
> option, it apparently removes clax from the newsgroups... and apparently
> gets reposted (thus the spam here). If it's done right, it just gets
> bit-bucketed. We shall see what happens when the moderator just ignores
> it...
Somehow, Herbert's post made it through to both clax and ala. (His has a
valid domain...)
If you're still not in control of clax, are you guys _sure_ Herbert's not
the, um..., "new" moderator?... ;-)
RP
Jim Carlock
: Nope, it's not on ala... almost 24 hours now. It's not on clax for that
: matter, either...
:
: Did my post make it? It should be in a (reject/filtered) log somewhere,
: if it did. All but a few of my posts used to make it.
I approved at least one of your posts, but it was over 24 hours after it
was submitted. None of the posts I approved showed up anywhere. And none
of the posts I rejected showed up anywhere, that I know of.
Herbert knows things I do not know. I can be reached at any e-address
sent to microcosmotalk.com if anyone wants to contact me, just place a
full name in front of the domain name so I won't mistake it for SPAM.
I suppose I can configure a sendmail/CAPTCHA webpage to do the same as
well, but that might take a day or two to get working.
Into the subject of compilers and such, anyone here know of a VB.net
compiler? I need to find a compiler and do not want to install all of
.Net. Just curious if anyone has messed with such.
--
Jim Carlock
http://www.microcosmotalk.com/contact/
Herbert Kleebauer
> Herbert knows things I do not know. I can be reached at any e-address
All I know is, that a posting for a moderated group is only
normally distributed if there is an "Approved" line somewhere in
the header. If this line is missing, the posting is not distributed
but forwarded to the moderator which then inserts this line and
repost it.
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 11:42:28 +0200
From: Herbert Kleebauer <kl...@unibwm.de>
X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (Win98; I)
X-Accept-Language: en
MIME-Version: 1.0
Newsgroups: news.groups.proposals,comp.lang.asm.x86
Approved: A real assembly programmer <kl...@unibwm.de>
Subject: Re: spam in ALA
So all you have to do is, to insert such a line yourself before
posting (and you need an news provider which accepts postings
with an "Approved" line).
I was not here when clax was made moderated. But as I understand it,
this was made to stop spamming from a single person. But I really
don't understand how somebody spends time to spam a newsgroup but then
isn't able to insert this single line himself to circumvent the
moderation. This surely wasn't an assembly programmer,
Frank Kotler
FWIW, the "it could have been a lot of things" was a falling tree took
out the electricity. Dian chopped up the tree and spliced the wires back
together, and we are now back in touch with the robomoderator. But, as I
wrote to Jim:
--------------------
Whatever was going on before the tree fell is still going on, is my
guess. I bit-bucketed two "good" messages before wotan disappeared
(three, if you count my apology for the first one). I keep hoping
they'll pop out of a queue somewhere, but noooo...
* Stump is not doing its job and posting them... using "formail" if I
understand the script (an app I've got, but not familiar with it).
* Stump is doing its job, but
"news.posted.pacificinternet.POSTED!not-for-mail" isn't doing theirs.
(perhaps not paid, as Rod speculates)
* Something else.
Probably one of those three. :) I can't think of any experiment to
narrow it down. Any "fix" is only going to be a temporary solution anyway...
---------------------
I assume there are error messages on Chuck's machine. Since we don't
have access to it, we don't know if it just doesn't like you personally,
or what...
> Somehow, Herbert's post made it through to both clax and ala. (His has a
> valid domain...)
Herbert forged the approval. As he points out, any assembly language
programmer ought to be able to figure out how to do it. He has posted
messages admitting it to a newsgroup frequented by big-8 board members.
As a "paranoid" assembly language programmer, this doesn't seem like a
good idea to me. Follow news:news.groups.proposals to see if he gets
charged with "unauthorized access to a computing device" or just yelled
at... or maybe they'll think he's clever and ask him how he did it. I'm
waiting with bated breath...
> If you're still not in control of clax, are you guys _sure_ Herbert's not
> the, um..., "new" moderator?... ;-)
Moderator and sole poster, at the moment. Maybe we'll vote him in as
official moderator. Since he's against censorship, he'll probably
approve the spam. :) (there's a *lot* more of it than showed up here!)
Since Herbert bypassed the address-munging step, his true address shows.
Send your messages to him and maybe he'll forge an approval for ya! :)
Since ngp is the official channel for discussion of creation/removal of
groups, anyone interested in the fate of clax may want to monitor that
group.
Best,
Frank
Herbert Kleebauer
> As a "paranoid" assembly language programmer, this doesn't seem like a
> good idea to me. Follow news:news.groups.proposals to see if he gets
> charged with "unauthorized access to a computing device"
You mean it is maybe not allowed to add the text line:
Approved: A real assembly programmer <kl...@unibwm.de>
to my posting. I suppose (or at least hope) that even in the USA it is not
possible to copyright the word "Approved:".
> Since he's against censorship, he'll probably
> approve the spam. :) (there's a *lot* more of it than showed up here!)
Are you sure this is spam posted to clax? Couldn't it be spam which
is sent to the moderators email address and therefore this spam only
exist because it is a moderated news group. Otherwise the same amount
of spam should be also in all the unmoderated news groups.
Rod Pemberton
> Herbert forged the approval.
...
> Since Herbert bypassed the address-munging step, his true address shows.
> Send your messages to him and maybe he'll forge an approval for ya! :)
Yup, header lines now enabled in OE... at least temporarily. They're hard
to find registry keys... I haven't tested them. I think one isn't set
properly.
Newsgroups do seem to be "dying," slowly. Many ISP's have pulled access.
Traffic to clax and ala has been almost non-existent for months now.
Various html based forums seem to be active. If I hadn't needed to connect
to openwatcom.users.c_cpp a few years ago, I'd have never bothered. I
didn't really care for newsgroups the '80's when I first was exposed to
them. If it wasn't for aioe, I probably wouldn't have posted so long, since
other free servers come and go, taking my nntp connectivity with it. My ISP
stopped carrying them just about the time I couldn't maintain free
connectivity. And, it took a while before I found out how to register to
other free nntp "anonymously."
So, maybe, you guys ought to take him up on his offer to send a, um,
"constructed," nntp control message to un-moderate clax... Or, maybe it's
time the robo-moderator should just be turned off. There is still
alt.lang.asm, and alt.os.assembly for newsgroup die-hards... Or, if clax is
left moderated without a moderator, it'll be for the extreme die-hards...
Someone could regularly send a new "Are you having trouble posting?" which
says to insert the Approved: line. As per HK, those with problems doing so,
shouldn't post to clax, right?
Rod Pemberton
nathan...@gmail.com
> Frank Kotler wrote:
> > As a "paranoid" assembly language programmer, this doesn't seem like a
> > good idea to me. Follow news:news.groups.proposals to see if he gets
> > charged with "unauthorized access to a computing device"
>
> You mean it is maybe not allowed to add the text line:
>
>
> to my posting. I suppose (or at least hope) that even in the USA it is not
> possible to copyright the word "Approved:".
>
I'm guessing he was being a bit dramatic to entice the CLAX regulars
to get involved in the NGP discussion. Shouldn't _they_ (the throng
of consistent posters to CLAX, I mean) be the ones to decide the
newsgroup's fate?
I would volunteer if there was *something* that I could do. At the
moment, the only thing I can think of is to suggest a reasonable
substitute -- use a listserv. One could be set-up on SourceForge, for
instance.
And, yes, in the USA, it *is* plausible that one could convince an FBI
agent and/or prosecuting attorney that your "Approved" spoofing of a
news server qualifies as "unauthorized access to a computing device"
or nearly so. But I am pretty sure that "context" issues would have
to be considered before it could go before a judge.
Given the types of laws that have been passed in the last few years --
also, the types of successful cases in court the last few years -- I
find myself more and more in agreement with Frank's "paranoid"
attitude. "Better to be safe than sorry" they say...
Nathan.
Frank Kotler
to ngp - off-topic there, and we need to stay in their good graces. Post
it there yourself, if you really want to. If I, or Jim, approve it, it's
gonna fall into a black hole, I'm pretty sure. So I "cut and past"ed it
off the moderation screen, and reproduce it here for your viewing
pleasure - fbk)
On Apr 16, 11:27?am, Herbert Kleebauer <k...@unibwm.de> wrote:
>
> not worth the effort, the news system is dying as fast as assembly
> programming.
Why are you so eager to put everything on its death bed?
Some facts you should consider:
- Hutch's MASM Forum seems just as active as ever.
- Jeff Duntemann is working on a new edition of his book.
- Randall Hyde is working on a new edition of his book.
- Jeff Owens constantly adds new stuff and updates existing code/
resources at his site.
- The NASM forums at SF are still busy with questions all over the
map.
... etc.
Nathan.
nathan...@gmail.com
> (Nathan crossposted this to clax and ngp(!!!). I'm not going to post it
> to ngp - off-topic there, and we need to stay in their good graces. Post
> it there yourself, if you really want to. If I, or Jim, approve it, it's
> gonna fall into a black hole, I'm pretty sure. So I "cut and past"ed it
> off the moderation screen, and reproduce it here for your viewing
> pleasure - fbk)
>
Ah... I *wondered* why the post wasn't showing. Now I know. Thanks
for posting it here Frank!
I had forgotten that Herb's message was cross-posted... didn't realise
mine would be inheriting that trait.
Nathan.
nathan...@gmail.com
Looks like a steady incline with a slight "hump" in the middle of the
double-ought decade.
If it's dead, then it *must* be a walking, talking zombie.
Nathan.
Jim Carlock
: http://markmail.org/search/?q=assembly+language
:
: Looks like a steady incline with a slight "hump" in the middle of
: the double-ought decade.
:
: If it's dead, then it *must* be a walking, talking zombie.
Little seems to go correctly. We need to keep working away at it all
until something gives birth to a blessing.
Happy Sabbath.
--
Jim Carlock
More Than Five Senses
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/381163/more_than_five_senses.html
Frank Kotler
...
> Otherwise it seems
> not worth the effort, the news system is dying as fast as assembly
> programming.
I happened across this in news.groups.proposals. The opinion of the
co-chair of the "Big8 Board" on the imminent demise of Usenet...
-----------------------
I think Usenet will never die. It almost certainly won't
ever be as central as it was in the Glory Days. Heck,
the last time I checked, FIDO (!) was still carrying
traffic (!).
OK, there is a big difference from mere survival and thriving.
Once upon a time, the death of Usenet was predicted because
it was being swamped by new users; now the problem is the
loss of new users to other media. I'm convinced that Usenet
can cope with the change in the news server landscape.
If I'm wrong, you can sue me. :o)
Marty
-- Co-chair of the Big-8 Management Board (B8MB) <http://www.big-8.org>
Unless otherwise indicated, I speak for myself, not for the Board.
-----------------------
I think I agree with him, and I think the same reasoning applies to
assembly language... particularly the "big difference between mere
survival and thriving"... We may not be "thriving", but don't bury us
yet! :)
Best,
Frank
Rod Pemberton
> Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
> ...
> > Otherwise it seems
> > not worth the effort, the news system is dying as fast as assembly
> > programming.
>
> I happened across this in news.groups.proposals. The opinion of the
> co-chair of the "Big8 Board" on the imminent demise of Usenet...
>
> -----------------------
> I think Usenet will never die. It almost certainly won't
> ever be as central as it was in the Glory Days. Heck,
> the last time I checked, FIDO (!) was still carrying
> traffic (!).
>
> OK, there is a big difference from mere survival and thriving.
> Once upon a time, the death of Usenet was predicted because
> it was being swamped by new users; now the problem is the
> loss of new users to other media. I'm convinced that Usenet
> can cope with the change in the news server landscape.
> If I'm wrong, you can sue me. :o)
>
> Unless otherwise indicated, I speak for myself, not for the Board.
> -----------------------
>
> I think I agree with him, and I think the same reasoning applies to
> assembly language... particularly the "big difference between mere
> survival and thriving"... We may not be "thriving", but don't bury us
> yet! :)
>
Oh, there is a good purpose for Usenet: usurping it's _wonderful_ features
for other uses...
Firstly, it has many postable servers, i.e., posting "entry" points, and
widespread distribution abilities with numerous readable servers, i.e.,
readable "receiving points." These features could be usurped for randomized
placement of secured email communications. I.e., posting encrypted email
communications secured by public key encryption methods to random groups on
random servers. As well as being able to distribute messages, there are
numerous postable non-propagating servers without any Big-8-Groups that have
"stale" or "low-use" newsgroups that could be usurped for use as secured
email "drop boxes" or secured email servers.
Alternately, since the Usenet system is capable of handling large amounts of
message and file traffic and it's usage has dropped dramatically since many
ISP's dropped free access for their customers. It's "free" bandwidth could
be usurped by encrypted P2P file distribution via file partialing, as is
currently used in some P2P systems. The bandwidth could be used to
dramatically improve some file sharing and distribution network that
distributes large files, say like bittorrent. In fact, a P2P service could
even implement newsgroups to preserve all the non-mentionable alt.* groups,
while at the same time doing Usenet users a "big favor" via adding
encryption on them...
> I think Usenet will never die.
If the groups start getting hit with big blobs of encrypted email posts or
encrypted file data packets, oh, Usenet's use will definately grow... In
fact, it could become a total takeover of Usenet via P2P or encrypted email.
;-)
Rod Pemberton
Frank Kotler
> Jim Carlock wrote:
>
>> Herbert knows things I do not know. I can be reached at any e-address
>
> All I know is, that a posting for a moderated group is only
> normally distributed if there is an "Approved" line somewhere in
> the header. If this line is missing, the posting is not distributed
> but forwarded to the moderator which then inserts this line and
> repost it.
>
> Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 11:42:28 +0200
> From: Herbert Kleebauer <kl...@unibwm.de>
> X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (Win98; I)
> X-Accept-Language: en
> MIME-Version: 1.0
> Newsgroups: news.groups.proposals,comp.lang.asm.x86
> Approved: A real assembly programmer <kl...@unibwm.de>
> Subject: Re: spam in ALA
>
>
> So all you have to do is, to insert such a line yourself before
> posting (and you need an news provider which accepts postings
> with an "Approved" line).
Whew! I'm glad it isn't as simple to inject a control message!!! :)
As I may have mentioned (I intended to reply to an earlier message from
you... I don't think it got posted. I'm droppin' my *own* messages in
the bit-bucket now!), ngp signs their approvals with a PGP key. The
robomoderation software Chuck was using can be configured to do this...
maybe we should...
This would not, in itself, keep such a message from being posted, but an
application called PGPMoose crawls the news servers and issues a cancel
message for any forged approval it finds (as I understand it).
Apparently the news servers *do* honor a cancel message. Apparently they
can't be trusted to honor an "unmoderate" message, which is why removing
clax from moderation isn't as good an idea as it sounds. If it would
work, it might be a good solution. Although... the inmates of clax
*voted* for moderation. Along with a right to free speech, I've got a
right not to *listen* to your damn speech if I don't want to. (I can't
find this right listed anywhere, but I've got it! Tell me I don't!) I
don't know if it's "okay" to deprive the inmates of clax of this right,
since they voted for it.
> I was not here when clax was made moderated. But as I understand it,
> this was made to stop spamming from a single person. But I really
> don't understand how somebody spends time to spam a newsgroup but then
> isn't able to insert this single line himself to circumvent the
> moderation. This surely wasn't an assembly programmer,
A *portable* assembly programmer, no less! He Whose Name Shall Not Be
Mentioned thought a cross-CPU assembly language ought to be possible.
This generated some debate. More heat than light. ("you only [see] what
your sick C religion allows you to see" - you wouldn't have liked him,
Herbert.) People who should have known better got into arguing about
whether it was stupid to reply to a message about whether it was stupid
to reply to a message about... And of course Mr. Nudds (oops!) had a
reply to each and every one. Not a fun NG in which to try to learn
something about asm. This was comp.lang.asm - clax was *created* as a
moderated group in response to this problem. I didn't feel that I knew
enough about the issues involved to vote in the election (RFD). Knowing
what I know now, I'd have been agin' it. A little patience and
self-discipline ("don't feed the trolls - this means you") would have
solved the problem eventually, I think. Immediately (almost) we got into
trouble - the moderator went missing. Eventually, John Fine went through
the rigamarole of being declared moderator (a *chore*, not a "plum"),
and the group functioned again. The moderatorship was handed off in a
proper manner... until now. That's the way I remember it, anyway.
I don't know if the individual in question couldn't figure out how to
forge an approval, or figured out that it's a fairly serious no-no.
Arguably equivalent to stealing someone's password - "well they wrote it
down and left it out where I could see it" isn't much of an excuse. Or a
combination to a safe that's "easy to guess"... Since there are no
"money damages" involved, I don't think law enforcement will touch it -
they've got their hands full! I'm not sure if it's even technically
"illegal" (and where), TGIANAL! But having everyone forge an approval to
clax isn't a great solution.
BTW, while I agree with your reasoning that cla and clax shouldn't
coexist (can't be both a "directory" and a "file", by analogy), I
observe that news.groups (unmoderated) and news.groups.proposals both
exist, so this may not be correct. If you care to, you might try asking
news.freenet.de (if I've learned anything about reading headers) to
carry comp.lang.asm and see if it's possible...
Best,
Frank
Herbert Kleebauer
> Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
>
> ...
> > Otherwise it seems
> > not worth the effort, the news system is dying as fast as assembly
> > programming.
>
> I happened across this in news.groups.proposals. The opinion of the
> co-chair of the "Big8 Board" on the imminent demise of Usenet...
Oh yes, funny people this "Big8 Board" members. Had just a mail exchange
with such a co-chair. Finally we had to agree to disagree. I will
continue to add an "Approved:"-line when appropriate and she will continue
to try to cancel my news account or disconnect my ISP from the news feed.
At least they were pretty fast in forging cancel messages for the two
postings, though they couldn't even correctly copy and paste the email
address. Now, that raises the question, can a reply to an "illegal"
posting be legal or must all nested replies also canceled?
From: Herbert Kleebauer <kl...@unibwm.com.de>
Newsgroups: news.groups.proposals,comp.lang.asm.x86
Subject: cmsg cancel <49E84F04...@unibwm.de>
Control: cancel <49E84F04...@unibwm.de>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 08:32:46 -0700
Organization: Killfiles, Unlimited
Lines: 1
Sender: Herbert Kleebauer <kl...@unibwm.com.de>
Approved: tski...@killfile.org
Message-ID: <can.13650.49E...@unibwm.de>
X-Trace: vulture.killfile.org 1239982366 8823 171.66.185.30 (17 Apr 2009 15:32:46 GMT)
X-Complaints-To: use...@news.killfile.org
NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 15:32:46 +0000 (UTC)
X-Cancelled-By: tski...@killfile.org
X-Old-Xref: news.freenet.de control.cancel:153316202
Moderation approval forged (or in error) cancelled by tski...@killfile.org
> -----------------------
> I think Usenet will never die. It almost certainly won't
DOS and CP/M also will never die, even assembly programming
will never die, but that says nothing about the significance of
the zombie.
> ever be as central as it was in the Glory Days. Heck,
> the last time I checked, FIDO (!) was still carrying
> traffic (!).
>
> OK, there is a big difference from mere survival and thriving.
> Once upon a time, the death of Usenet was predicted because
> it was being swamped by new users; now the problem is the
> loss of new users to other media. I'm convinced that Usenet
> can cope with the change in the news server landscape.
At least the technical news groups live from a balance of users
with questions and users who are willing to share their knowledge.
Twenty years ago, netnews was a great system to get fast and
qualified help. But in these days it's mostly much easier and
faster to use a search engine like Google. So most of the few
questions still asked in news groups are from people who are
to lazy to use a search engine and such people were never very
welcome in news groups.
Also the structure of netnews is antiquated. When 32 kbit modems
where up to date, it mad sense to use distributed news server,
so you had "fast" access to your local server. But with fast DSL
and flat rates there wouldn't be a disadvantage of a central
server. And because Google already hosts the history of netnews,
it would be the ideal place for a central news server (this would
also make the "Big8 Board" obsolete). The only necessary thing is,
that Google would allow normal nntp access to the data base instead
of just a web front end (but after Microsoft finally added POP3
support for hotmail, Google surely can add NNTP access to news
groups). And when they add a few lines of sponsored links at
the top of every posting, the even could earn a lot of money
with this service.
> I think I agree with him, and I think the same reasoning applies to
> assembly language... particularly the "big difference between mere
> survival and thriving"... We may not be "thriving", but don't bury us
> yet! :)
Ask young people whether they ever heard about netnews. There are
even a lot of computer science students who doesn't know it (but
they also don't know anything about assembly programming and
even worse, they don't want to know anything at such a low level).
Harold Aptroot
news:49EBA1C1...@unibwm.de...
> Frank Kotler wrote:
>> Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
sorry for the long snip guys, but it was just too long for the reply I'm
about to give..
>> I think I agree with him, and I think the same reasoning applies to
>> assembly language... particularly the "big difference between mere
>> survival and thriving"... We may not be "thriving", but don't bury us
>> yet! :)
>
>
> Ask young people whether they ever heard about netnews. There are
> even a lot of computer science students who doesn't know it (but
> they also don't know anything about assembly programming and
> even worse, they don't want to know anything at such a low level).
I'm a CS student, and I'm well aware of this ridiculous attitude. I've tried
to do something about it, with no succes so far.
Not even wanting to know anything about assembly when you're studying CS is
like having a great love for cars but not wanting to know how they work. Ok
maybe not exactly, but it's the best I can come up with right now (I'm just
a student hey)
Anyway, I've been trying to get people interested, but almost no one seems
to care at all. I would have started an "assembly group" for students to
discuss assembly related topics between/after colleges. If anyone had
actually cared..
It's actually worse though, there are plenty of students who don't know a
thing about floating point numbers. They always use a double and always
claim it's for accuracy even when it isn't needed. And many don't even known
anything about binary math. Several students were amazed at my "clever
trick" that made a program for a practical assignment run faster than
theirs, the "trick" was replacing a division by 2 with a right shift (why
didn't the compiler do that automatically anyway?)
That, is how bad the situation is. This will be the biggest part of next
generation of people who will call themselves programmers..
But I'm sure you noticed, I'm posting here :)
(and not from google groups)
So it can't be completely dead yet
Harold
ps: English is not my native language
Jim Carlock
: I'm a CS student, and I'm well aware of this ridiculous attitude.
: I've tried to do something about it, with no succes so far.
That produced a chuckle, here. I signed up for a dotnet vb class,
and one of the first questions I asked of the professor, "Can I use
another compiler to build an application because I do not have .Net
installed on a machine?"
She told me, "No."
So I asked her, "Can I turn in the source code without compiling it?"
She again answered, "No."
So I'm looking for ways to install that dotnet compiler for VB, it's
name is vbc.exe and I downloaded the .iso image file to create the
DVD installer disk...
I hope this is not a losing battle. I might have to buy a whole new
computer to complete the class. I started looking at some new DELL
laptops with 256 MB Flash Drives...
nathan...@gmail.com
> "Harold Aptroot" wrote...
>
> : I'm a CS student, and I'm well aware of this ridiculous attitude.
> : I've tried to do something about it, with no succes so far.
>
> That produced a chuckle, here. I signed up for a dotnet vb class,
> and one of the first questions I asked of the professor, "Can I use
> another compiler to build an application because I do not have .Net
> installed on a machine?"
>
> She told me, "No."
>
> So I asked her, "Can I turn in the source code without compiling it?"
>
> She again answered, "No."
>
She is obviously jealous of your ability to produce perfect code with
your first try at a "copy con: final-exam.vbs" in the console! :)
That's the problem with ASM's (un)popularity -- it is an intimidating
language.
Nathan.
Frank Kotler
> Frank Kotler wrote:
>> Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
>>
>> ...
>>> Otherwise it seems
>>> not worth the effort, the news system is dying as fast as assembly
>>> programming.
>> I happened across this in news.groups.proposals. The opinion of the
>> co-chair of the "Big8 Board" on the imminent demise of Usenet...
>
> Oh yes, funny people this "Big8 Board" members. Had just a mail exchange
> with such a co-chair. Finally we had to agree to disagree. I will
> continue to add an "Approved:"-line when appropriate and she will continue
> to try to cancel my news account or disconnect my ISP from the news feed.
I admire your courage in standing up to authority, but I think it'd be a
good time to put your tail between your legs and slink away. You're
messing with powerful people, Herbert! Don't think of 'em as bad guys
who can cut off your service, think of 'em as good guys who make it
possible to communicate via Usenet at all... or not.
Apparently, news:news.groups is the place for chit-chat regarding
news.groups.proposals (there's a news.qroups.questions also - full of
spam!!! What's up with that???). We've created a bit of a stir there...
On the one hand, we've got:
Mark Kramer wrote:
> In article <tskirvin.20090417153547$69...@vulture.killfile.org>,
> Tim Skirvin <tski...@killfile.org> wrote:
>> [newsgroups trimmed; do not forge-approve messages to NGP!]
>> Herbert Kleebauer <kl...@unibwm.de> writes:
>>> - We just post a periodically message in c.l.a.x that every poster has
>>> to add the "approved-line" himself (an assembly programmer should be
>>> able to do this) or he has to use alt.lang.asm instead.
>> This is actually legitimate.
>
> Interesting. In the same article where someone is told not to
forge-approve
> articles into moderated newsgroups, someone is told that it is legitimate
> to forge-approve articles into moderated newsgroups.
>
> NGP truly is a remarkable place.
And on the other hand:
Peter J Ross wrote:
> In news.groups.proposals on Sun, 19 Apr 2009 20:13:08 CST, Martin X.
> Moleski, SJ <mol...@canisius.edu> wrote:
>
>> On Sun, 19 Apr 2009 16:47:27 CST, nathan...@gmail.com wrote in
>> <08aec491-a1bb-4843...@m19g2000yqk.googlegroups.com>:
>>
>>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/hla-stdlib-clax-fate
>>> I believe that I read somewhere on the big-8.org wiki that someone
>> >from n.a.n might be able to post the above mailing list link to
>>> comp.lang.asm.x86 in the event that the Proponent is unable to do
>>> so?? Also, would it be possible for someone to CC the MVA/MVI to
>>> c.l.a.x on my behalf?
>> As far as is humanly possible, we'd like to avoid
>> forging approvals.
>>
>> It's a last resort if all of the moderators are truly
>> gone.
>
> No. Forging approvals is *always* net-abuse. Please don't encourage
> posters to lose their Usenet access.
On the third hand, we've got a member of the Board sayin':
> An approval tacked on to a post by that moderator would
> be less offensive than one made by the board or by random
> members of clax--or so it seems to me (personal opinion,
> not a policy statement).
So opinions differ...
[snip]
>> I think Usenet will never die. It almost certainly won't
>
> DOS and CP/M also will never die, even assembly programming
> will never die, but that says nothing about the significance of
> the zombie.
"Well it's back to back, belly to belly,
Well I don't give a damn 'cause I done dead already,
Back to back, belly to belly,
At the Zombie Jamboree."
So what are you doing here? Necrophiliac? :)
>> ever be as central as it was in the Glory Days. Heck,
>> the last time I checked, FIDO (!) was still carrying
>> traffic (!).
I remember FidoNet fondly. I'll have to check that out. Doubt if there's
much traffic on the asm echo...
Somewhat related... one of Chuck's accomplishments was a package of BBS
software. I think I've got it archived... maybe I should do it again to
be sure. Might be a good idea to remember the "old ways", just in case...
One ring to rule them all, eh? I'll have to install the proper Flash(r)
player from Adobe(r) so I can see you in AsmChat(r). :)
>> I think I agree with him, and I think the same reasoning applies to
>> assembly language... particularly the "big difference between mere
>> survival and thriving"... We may not be "thriving", but don't bury us
>> yet! :)
>
>
> Ask young people whether they ever heard about netnews.
I should run my life by what young people know??? The only reason they
think they know all the answers is 'cause they didn't realize there were
more questions on the back of the sheet! They'll continue learning, even
though they think they know it all. How boring their lives would be if
they didn't!!!
> There are
> even a lot of computer science students who doesn't know it (but
> they also don't know anything about assembly programming and
> even worse, they don't want to know anything at such a low level).
Sure, but there are a few who *do* want to know how things *really*
work. It's "the few" who provide the advances that we depend on, not
"the masses".
Best,
Frank
Jim Carlock
: Oh yes, funny people this "Big8 Board" members. Had just a mail
: exchange with such a co-chair. Finally we had to agree to disagree.
: I will continue to add an "Approved:"-line when appropriate and she
: will continue to try to cancel my news account or disconnect my ISP
: from the news feed.
I sent you an email. Not sure how your software handled it. It came from
a microcosmotalk.com email address I believe. It didn't say much but I
wanted to make sure we could communicate with each other.
What I'd do, write to someone who responded to you, send them an email,
do the normal apology or what not, be graceful and kind and laugh, let
them know you made a mistake if so desired, you know the normal stuff
to make them feel appreciated and accepted and that you're a good guy
and not there to create problems.
I don't need to tell you this, you know what I'm talking about, but
just in case you need some suggestions, I think these should help out.
They're people just like you and I and if someone fails, consider they
made a mistake and give them an opportunity to correct their mistake,
so show them kindness, just as Jesus showed Peter and Simon kindness.
Love and kindness almost always work. There's only a few people that
it doesn't work on but those around that witness those that fail to
accept love and kindness do appreciate you and do look up to you.
Thank you, Herbert, for your help. I hope all goes well. If you find
the email I sent you, send me a reply so I can reply back to you.
Herbert Kleebauer
> Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
> > Oh yes, funny people this "Big8 Board" members. Had just a mail exchange
> > with such a co-chair. Finally we had to agree to disagree. I will
> > continue to add an "Approved:"-line when appropriate and she will continue
> > to try to cancel my news account or disconnect my ISP from the news feed.
>
> I admire your courage in standing up to authority, but I think it'd be a
> good time to put your tail between your legs and slink away. You're
> messing with powerful people, Herbert! Don't think of 'em as bad guys
> who can cut off your service,
Oh no, they can't cut of my news access. Maybe they would be able to
convince my ISP to not allow unregistered users to add the "Approved" line
(I think this really is a miss configuration of the server which lasts for
many years now), but I suppose they are not willing to spend even a few
seconds to change the configuration because a commercial ISP wants to
earn money and they are not paid by the "Big8 Board" but their customers.
And even their forged cancel messages are not real effective, many servers
don't honor them (it's still on Google) and when they are not fast
enough so there is already a reply, then the thread will even survive on
the servers which honor a cancel control.
And I really like impossible fights (would I otherwise do assembly programming).
You can't win, but you can generate workload. And if enough people generate
enough workload, you can slow down a system to a level it becomes unusable.
> think of 'em as good guys who make it
> possible to communicate via Usenet at all... or not.
People who do censoring are never good guys.
Herbert Kleebauer
> "Herbert Kleebauer" <kl...@unibwm.de> wrote...
> I sent you an email. Not sure how your software handled it. It came from
> a microcosmotalk.com email address I believe. It didn't say much but I
> wanted to make sure we could communicate with each other.
I got the mail and read it twice, but I didn't find anything I thought
you expect an answer.
> What I'd do, write to someone who responded to you, send them an email,
> do the normal apology or what not, be graceful and kind and laugh, let
> them know you made a mistake if so desired, you know the normal stuff
> to make them feel appreciated and accepted and that you're a good guy
> and not there to create problems.
The email I sent surely wasn't an apology. I hate censorship so much
(even censorship of spam) that I even refuse to use anything else than
my normal email address in news postings. I normally stay away from
censored (moderated) news groups and if had been aware that
news.groups.proposals is moderated I wouldn't have cross posted to
this group (the approval was to show up at clax). But how should
a normal human being imagine, that a group created for discussion of netnews
topics is censored.
Jim Carlock
:
: People who do censoring are never good guys.
There's another way to approach this as that statement ends up as
as bad as censorship. In effect, when you start calling names, in
this case by saying that someone "are never good guys" you end up
calling names.
The first and most important concept upon planet earth equates to
the concept of "brotherly love". Avoid wronging any brother, and
learn to control your body in a way that your presentation turns
out holy and honorable, not in a passionate lust. I see your zeal
against censorship, and I respect it, but I also see it turning
into that un unrestrained passionate orgy. Sometimes it takes a
few days to forget things and see things under a new light, and
then sometimes someone elses statements open your eyes and help
to see things you failed to notice.
As many of those that work for the Big-8, hold other jobs and so
perhaps only volunteer to make UseNet what it is.
So place brotherly love before any hatred of censorship. Do not
let any zeal or hatred crush brotherly love.
And in relation to these topics about newsgroups and censoring,
one interesting thing I noticed recently...
Microsoft servers, msnews.microsoft.com and news.microsoft.com,
appear to delete any message with the words "Jesus Christ" in
the message. Very odd. I did not confirm it with 100% certainty.
Take a look at the message I posted a few days ago (I posted
while connected to msnews.microsoft.com to originate the post).
Scroll down to #16 (that's the number today, may change in the
near future). It's a message posted on "Apr 18, 8:14 am" (search
for what's in quotes, may be a different date if you're not in
the Eastern Time Zone, so adjust appropriately).
A direct link to it:
http://groups.google.com/group/microsoft.public.dotnet.languages.vb/msg/c8cac44d6fa38fc1
Then connect to
nntp://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.dotnet.languages.vb
and you see that Microsoft deleted that message.
Most of the quote there came from The Bible, and I'm wondering if
someone human did the actual censorship, or if the server did the
deletion.
Robert Redelmeier
> People who do censoring are never good guys.
First, there is a huge difference between "censorship"
and "decline to publish". The former actively attempts to
seek out and eradicate expression of others. Or pervert it.
The second passively refuses to contribute to that expression.
Hyperbolicly, some frustrated writers scream "censorship",
devaluing and leeching the sympathy due the truly censored.
Their theory is "if you are not helping me, you are hurting me."
Second, "good" is an adjective that requires a scale of
values to measure against. This scale of values is far from
universal and you must expect people to differ. Unless you
advocate conformity which requires censorship :)
I have spoken at length to [film] censors. I assure you they
are very sincere and see themselves as "good guys", defending
public morals and particularly the development of children.
However much I might disagree with them, I must admit they are
entitled to their opinions and may have a valid scientific
point. Furthermore, their authority is democratically
based and their activities far from anything that could be
considered politically-active or interfering with democracy.
They are merely infringing on controversial human-rights,
something frequently in conflict with democracy.
-- Robert
Herbert Kleebauer
> Herbert Kleebauer <kl...@unibwm.de> wrote in part:
> > People who do censoring are never good guys.
>
> First, there is a huge difference between "censorship"
> and "decline to publish". The former actively attempts to
> seek out and eradicate expression of others. Or pervert it.
> The second passively refuses to contribute to that expression.
Sorry, but I don't understand this. If somebody wants to publish
a book and the publisher he asks tells him, he won't publish this
book because for some reason he doesn't like it, then this surely
isn't censorship. But if this publisher can decide that the manuscript
has to be destroyed and no other publisher will be allowed to print
it, then this is censorship. And news group moderation works that
way. The moderator decides which post is allowed to propagate
and which one is destroyed without anybody else being able to
see it. If the purpose of moderation would only be to remove spam,
then this could be done without censorship. This would not even
need a change in the news distribution system. Suppose a news reader
has a button "self approve the posting", which adds an "Approved"
header line to the posting, then this posting would be be immediately
distributed like in an unmoderated group. If you don't self approve
the message, it gets mailed to the moderator who can approve it
using a secure sign method or discard it. Within the news reader
you can choose whether you want to see all postings or only the on,
which were approved by the moderator.
> Second, "good" is an adjective that requires a scale of
> values to measure against. This scale of values is far from
I didn't introduce this term, I only replied to it:
> > think of 'em as good guys who make it
> > possible to communicate via Usenet at all... or not.
>
> People who do censoring are never good guys.
> I have spoken at length to [film] censors. I assure you they
> are very sincere and see themselves as "good guys", defending
> public morals and particularly the development of children.
Also the counties which makes war all around the world see
themselves as "good nations" because they bring peace to the
others (using bombs).
> However much I might disagree with them, I must admit they are
> entitled to their opinions and may have a valid scientific
> point. Furthermore, their authority is democratically
> based and their activities far from anything that could be
> considered politically-active or interfering with democracy.
> They are merely infringing on controversial human-rights,
> something frequently in conflict with democracy.
Nearly all wars and the exploitation of the poor counties (and even
the worst of all, the patents) are democratically based but that makes
them not less worse.
Herbert Kleebauer
> "Herbert Kleebauer" <kl...@unibwm.de> wrote...
> And in relation to these topics about newsgroups and censoring,
> one interesting thing I noticed recently...
>
> Microsoft servers, msnews.microsoft.com and news.microsoft.com,
> appear to delete any message with the words "Jesus Christ" in
> the message. Very odd. I did not confirm it with 100% certainty.
Isn't that a very daring conclusion? You also could conclude
that any message with the words "8PM EST tonight" is deleted.
> and you see that Microsoft deleted that message.
"Microsoft" surely didn't delete it. If it didn't disappear because
of a bug or server failure, it's always a person who initiate the
removal, not the company.
> Most of the quote there came from The Bible, and I'm wondering if
> someone human did the actual censorship, or if the server did the
> deletion.
How can a server delete a posting?
But even if this was removed by an administrator, then that is
something completely different to news group moderation. Anybody has the
right to delete any file he doesn't like from his own computer. A news
group moderator doesn't remove an unwanted posting from his server but
he inhibits the propagation of the posting to any server, also to
servers which would like to get the posting. I also didn't find any
cancel message for the posting (and I also checked that the posting
exists on a server which normally honors cancel controls). So in opposite
to this "Big8 Board" member who tried to remove my posting from all
existing news servers, this one only deleted it from his own server.
That surely can't be called censorship.
Rosario
news:49EC45E4...@unibwm.de...
> People who do censoring are never good guys.
in a moderated news group people choose to have a moderator.
And the above, they think, is the lesser evil (than Trolls)
Robert Redelmeier
>> and "decline to publish". The former actively attempts to
>> seek out and eradicate expression of others. Or pervert it.
>> The second passively refuses to contribute to that expression.
>
> Sorry, but I don't understand this. If somebody wants to publish
> a book and the publisher he asks tells him, he won't publish
> this book because for some reason he doesn't like it, then
> this surely isn't censorship. But if this publisher can decide
> that the manuscript has to be destroyed and no other publisher
> will be allowed to print it, then this is censorship.
Agreed, except publishers seldom return manuscripts,
especially these days.
> And news group moderation works that way. The moderator
> decides which post is allowed to propagate and which one
> is destroyed without anybody else being able to see it.
No, just like with books, the poster is free to take
her creation to a different publisher or newsgroup.
-- Robert
Phil Carmody
"Jim Carlock" <jcar...@NOSPAM.microcosmotalk.com> writes:
> "Herbert Kleebauer" <kl...@unibwm.de> wrote...
> :
> : People who do censoring are never good guys.
Those who are responsible for the distribution of topical information
to a set of people who have expressed an interest in that topic and
who pass on information to those recipients that is non-topical are
not good guys.
If I heard a Madonna song streaming on Snakenet Metal Radio, I'd
be freaking livid. Ditto a million types of non-topical things on
clax. Censorship is the removal of a medium for expression.
Moderating off-topic material out of a single usenet newsgroup in
no way removes the medium, there are certainly other newsgroups
upon which the expression can be freely expressed (even if that's
a newsgroup designed for loons). One only has the right to expression,
not the right to force an audience who has indicated no desire to
receive said expressions to so receive them.
Clax moderators, assuming they are disinterested in the posters'
identities, moderating on content only, are only doing those of
us who've been reading the newsgroup since the glory days of Nudds
a favour. Chuck was superb in this role.
Phil
--
Marijuana is indeed a dangerous drug.
It causes governments to wage war against their own people.
-- Dave Seaman (sci.math, 19 Mar 2009)
Rod Pemberton
news:6b19b$49ebad82$53558f0b$12...@cache100.multikabel.net...
> It's actually worse though, there are plenty of students who don't know a
> thing about floating point numbers. They always use a double and always
> claim it's for accuracy even when it isn't needed.
I don't recall ever using float or double in C. I tend to only use unsigned
integers. Very rarely, a signed integer is needed, or "int" is used because
the compiler optimizes it better.
I know for a fact that the 5Mloc RT OLTP financial application I programmed
on years ago used only integers (and/or text characters) for all financial
math including English fractions for cents, and later decimals. The math
supposedly took too much time compared to a bunch of hardcoded if statements
and since the complete set of math operations was known in advance they were
hardcoded.
> And many don't even known
> anything about binary math.
As a programmer, you should understand or know from memory one's and two's
complement, four-bit binary representations of every hexadecimal digit - 0
through 9 and A through F, two-bit binary representations of the truth
tables for logical-xor, logical-or, and logical-and. You should know how to
set, clear, and invert bits, using logical-xor, logical-or, and logical-and.
You should also know how binary shifts are equivalent to multiplication and
division by powers of two. The remainder, IMO, can be looked up or learned
when you need to use it.
Rod Pemberton
Rod Pemberton
news:P1%Gl.5785$Lr6....@flpi143.ffdc.sbc.com...
> I have spoken at length to [film] censors. I assure you they
> are very sincere and see themselves as "good guys", defending
> public morals and particularly the development of children.
>
Or, are they "bad guys" who deliberately censor and destroy the work of
others, because they have a financial incentive to do so? People can
rationalize anything if labelled as "good." Their rationalization and
acceptance of a belief which justifies their actions doesn't make it truth.
You only need to take a look at the cultural horrors from history that were
accepted by "good" people. See: Egyptians, Romans, Qin Dynasty, Mongols,
Nazis... I for one can tell you that the four most important parts of 1984
movie Terminator were removed by censors for "good" reasons for TV, but
removal of three of those four changes completely changed, or destroyed IMO,
the TV version of this excellent *horror* movie.
Rod Pemberton
Robert Redelmeier
> Or, are they "bad guys" who deliberately censor and destroy the
> work of others, because they have a financial incentive to do so?
Oh, dear. More hyperbole. What "financial incentive to
do so"? Who is paying them extra to cut more? Just being
paid will not make them biased, anymore than it makes police,
courts or computer programmers.
> People can rationalize anything if labelled as "good."
Some can. More often, they rationalize things they already
consider "good", often for emotional reasons. Including most
definitely defenses of liberty.
> Their rationalization and acceptance of a belief which
> justifies their actions doesn't make it truth.
Anytime I hear someone invoke "truth", I _know_ they are lying.
The exercise becomes discovering in which of many ways.
In this case it is a matter of [imposed] taste. Truth
has nothing to do with it.
> I for one can tell you that the four most important parts of 1984
> movie Terminator were removed by censors for "good" reasons for
> TV, but removal of three of those four changes completely changed,
> or destroyed IMO, the TV version of this excellent *horror* movie.
Well, that is your taste. Most people would consider that
movie scifi/action. The owners of that work (MGM?) decided
to accept the censorship in exchange for a wider (TV) audience.
Much the same happens today without any coersion: studios are
very leery of the MPAA advisory rating and will often tailor
scripts/movies to stay within PG-13. Do you want this stopped?
How? It is all individual choice, movie producers, theatre owners
and moviegoers. Basically driven by offended moviegoers. You
cannot stop them from being offended, nor expressing themselves.
-- Robert
Rod Pemberton
> Rod Pemberton <do_no...@nohavenot.cmm> wrote in part:
> > Or, are they "bad guys" who deliberately censor and destroy the
> > work of others, because they have a financial incentive to do so?
>
> Oh, dear. More hyperbole.
Yes, as was your misguided representation of film censors as "good guys"...
What's your point?
> What "financial incentive to
> do so"?
A job, being paid to do that job, and keeping that job.
> Who is paying them extra to cut more?
No one. How long will it take to be fired when they fail to cut enough?
> Just being
> paid will not make them biased,
Oh, that's rich! Robert this is just total BS!
They were hired to do a job. If they don't do that job, they get fired.
The bias of being willing to censor to do "good" is built into the job
description. The job description predominantly attracts only those
predisposed to the desired bias, i.e., selective filtering. It may also
attract those who are desperate. In which case, the desperate individual
who opposes censorship must make an awkward decision between being desperate
again by being fired for failing to perform their job duties, or accepting
the job based biases and getting paid. One who strongly opposes censorship
will not become a censor when not forced. Therefore, for most job
applicants, it must be an pre-accepted rationalization that one is doing
"good" in order to become a censor.
> > Their rationalization and acceptance of a belief which
> > justifies their actions doesn't make it truth.
>
> Anytime I hear someone invoke "truth", I _know_ they are lying.
The mere mention of a word which represents an important concept that should
be used frequently does not justify disqualifying all usage of said word
under the misguided perception that usage of it automatically presents a
contradiction or reversal of perspective.
> The exercise becomes discovering in which of many ways.
> In this case it is a matter of [imposed] taste. Truth
> has nothing to do with it.
Censorship is a matter of taste?... Censorship is a matter of fact. It
occurred or it didn't occur. This is provable. Therefore, it's also a
matter of truth.
> > I for one can tell you that the four most important parts of 1984
> > movie Terminator were removed by censors for "good" reasons for
> > TV, but removal of three of those four changes completely changed,
> > or destroyed IMO, the TV version of this excellent *horror* movie.
>
> Well, that is your taste.
...
> Most people would consider that
> movie scifi/action.
If you've only seen the censored version, I concur... since that's all that
was left: mediocre scifi and a bunch of pointless action.
> The owners of that work (MGM?) decided
> to accept the censorship in exchange for a wider (TV) audience.
No they didn't. The censorship was forced. Could they gain a TV audience
without censorship? No. Now, if they had had a way to gain a TV audience
without censorship, and they _chose_ to censor the film for TV anyway, then
and only then, could one claim they _decided_ to censor. If they can't
reach a TV without censorship, then it's coercion, or duress, or some other
vague term meaning they had no other options.
> Much the same happens today without any coersion:
coercion?
> studios are
> very leery of the MPAA advisory rating and will often tailor
> scripts/movies to stay within PG-13.
Being "very leery of the MPAA advisory rating" is somehow "without any
coersion[sic]"? I don't understand that claim at all. If they have
something to fear, then force, coercion, or duress or something similar _is_
involved. If the specific MPAA advisory rating of a film affects their
finances, as I believe it does, then the censorship is fundamentally
obligatory.
Rod Pemberton
nathan...@gmail.com
address seems wrong. ]]
On Apr 7, 6:23 am, "Rene" <inva...@arie.beukenoot> wrote:
> "Frank Kotler" <fbkot...@verizon.net> schreef in berichtnews:grdj5s$mm3$1...@aioe.org...
>
>
>
> > nathancba...@gmail.com wrote:
> >> On Apr 6, 12:42 pm, Frank Kotler <fbkot...@verizon.net> wrote:
> >>>> Someone made ALA the waste-bin for CLAX ? :)
> >>> Thanks for the heads-up, Wolfgang! May be my fault. I'll look into it.
> >>> Apologies to all...
>
> >> Does this mean you are the new CLAX co-moderator??
>
> > I'm "assisting" (if you call it that) Chuck's assistant moderator. The
> > situation is "in flux", I think you could say. Messages are getting
> > through to clax due to Chuck's foresight in setting up a "robomoderator",
> > and his widow Dian's kindness in keeping the machine plugged in. Could go
> > dark at any moment.
>
> > I rejected "those" messages. How they got posted to ala is a mystery to
> > me. But they appear to be originating from the machine where the
> > robomoderator runs. I just rejected another similar message using a
> > different "reject" option. Hasn't showed up here... yet... Maybe I was
> > just doin' it wrong... Wish us luck!
>
> I don't care about all that, I only want to know when You will be shipping
> the pills I have ordered and paid for.
>
> Rene
>
> P.S. Thanks for taking up the good work from Mr. Crayne (hope this line is
> correct English) and good luck with it!
Frank Kotler
...
> And I really like impossible fights (would I otherwise do assembly programming).
> You can't win, but you can generate workload. And if enough people generate
> enough workload, you can slow down a system to a level it becomes unusable.
This is your intention?
>> think of 'em as good guys who make it
>> possible to communicate via Usenet at all... or not.
>
> People who do censoring are never good guys.
So am I a bad guy because I *don't* run Usenet for you - all of us - to
use? These are the folks who *do* run Usenet, at least the "Big 8".
True, they don't like people forging approvals to their group. :) I
didn't know it was moderated. I suspect if the fake approval had gone
only to clax, no one would have complained. (your momma don't mind,
'cause your momma don't know) But you got us to the right place, so for
that I thank you!
They're not normally in the censorship business, from what I can see.
The usual discussion seems to be about *finding* a moderator for
abandoned groups, so that information can flow. They seem delighted that
someone *wants* to keep clax going, and have been very helpful. They
remove groups that aren't being used, not to block access, but to make
the system run smoother for the groups that *are* being used. *They*
wouldn't want the system to slow to a crawl. That would be... somebody else.
Father Moleski ("SJ" means he's a priest, right? Jesuit?) used to do
assembly on an 8088 - remembers the thrill of getting his first pixel to
appear on screen. I don't think these people are our enemies, Herbert!
I don't know what the "Big-8 Board" has to do with the "alt" hierarchy.
Nothing, I think. I don't know who makes this group possible. I notice
that when spam started appearing in ala, it caught our attention. Why
don't we normally have spam? Spammers too dumb to find us? (maybe they
heard assembly is dead, and don't bother. :) For comparison, look at
news:news.groups.questions - someone (or some software) is protecting
ala from spam. Good guys or evil censors? I dunno...
Best,
Frank
Herbert Kleebauer
> Herbert Kleebauer wrote:
> > And I really like impossible fights (would I otherwise do assembly programming).
> > You can't win, but you can generate workload. And if enough people generate
> > enough workload, you can slow down a system to a level it becomes unusable.
>
> This is your intention?
I wasn't speaking about a slow down of the news system (that's impossible).
> > People who do censoring are never good guys.
>
> So am I a bad guy because I *don't* run Usenet for you - all of us - to
> use? These are the folks who *do* run Usenet, at least the "Big 8".
No, these folks do not run usenet. There is also nobody who "runs" the
mail system or the WWW. The usenet system consist of the many news server
distributed over the world which exchange all the posted messages. Each
administrator is free to decide which news groups his server carries.
The "Big8 Board" can advice which groups in the big8 hierarchy should
exist to have a consistent system all over the world, but the decision
is made by the system administrator and nobody else. They also don't
have any more rights to cancel somebody else message than any other
user of the system.
> True, they don't like people forging approvals to their group. :) I
"Their group"? Just because they sent the control message to create
a group with this name doesn't make it "their group". If a news system
administrator decides to only accept a message for this group which
was approved by them, then this is ok. But if a news administrator
decides that he also accepts messages for this group which were
approved by somebody else, than this is the decision of the
administrator and no "Big8 Board" member can deny this.
> They're not normally in the censorship business, from what I can see.
> The usual discussion seems to be about *finding* a moderator for
> abandoned groups, so that information can flow. They seem delighted that
> someone *wants* to keep clax going, and have been very helpful. They
A master who looses his slaves isn't a master anymore. How could they
cancel a message if no messages are posted anymore.
> remove groups that aren't being used, not to block access, but to make
> the system run smoother for the groups that *are* being used. *They*
What exactly are they doing which makes the "system run smoother"?
> wouldn't want the system to slow to a crawl. That would be... somebody else.
The problem is, that the usenet is from a period when the system was
so slow. With the speed of the current internet, there is no need to censor
the messages on the server, you can easily download all postings and
decide yourself what you want to see. It is no problem if a posting is
just tagged with a "spam"-token by a group moderator and anybody can
freely decide whether he wants to see only the postings not marked with
a spam token or any message. What would you say if the same would happen
to the mail system. Somebody else decides which mails your are allowed to
receive and which ones are deleted by an mail moderator. Here in Germany
we are just on the way to do this for the WWW system (justified by the
expression "child porn"). The provider gets a list from the government
which domains have to be blocked. Because the list is secret (you can't
publish a list of domains which carry child porn), nobody can check
what really is blocked, maybe it's just a political statement which isn't
opportune.
> Father Moleski ("SJ" means he's a priest, right? Jesuit?) used to do
> assembly on an 8088 - remembers the thrill of getting his first pixel to
> appear on screen. I don't think these people are our enemies, Herbert!
>
> I don't know what the "Big-8 Board" has to do with the "alt" hierarchy.
> Nothing, I think. I don't know who makes this group possible. I notice
The alt.* groups as well as the big-8 groups are made possible bye the
people or companies who operate the news server and not by the big-8 group.
> that when spam started appearing in ala, it caught our attention. Why
> don't we normally have spam? Spammers too dumb to find us? (maybe they
You have to distinct between normal spam (Viagra, ...) which is automatically
filtered by most news server and messages explicitly posted to this group
but not liked by the moderator and therefore deleted. And trolls are best
defeated not by censoring but by:
--------------------------
/| /| | |
||__|| | Please don't |
/ O O\__ feed |
/ \ the trolls |
/ \ \ |
/ _ \ \ ----------------------
/ |\____\ \ ||
/ | | | |\____/ ||
/ \|_|_|/ | __||
/ / \ |____| ||
/ | | /| | --|
| | |// |____ --|
* _ | |_|_|_| | \-/
*-- _--\ _ \ // |
/ _ \\ _ // | /
* / \_ /- | - | |
* ___ c_c_c_C/ \C_c_c_c____________
> heard assembly is dead, and don't bother. :) For comparison, look at
> news:news.groups.questions - someone (or some software) is protecting
> ala from spam. Good guys or evil censors? I dunno...
No, it's neither Good guys nor evil censors, it's for sure the
crazy Intel syntax!
Jim Carlock
:
:
: --------------------------
: /| /| | |
: ||__|| | Please don't |
: / O O\__ feed |
: / \ the trolls |
: / \ \ |
: / _ \ \ ----------------------
: / |\____\ \ ||
: / | | | |\____/ ||
: / \|_|_|/ | __||
: / / \ |____| ||
: / | | /| | --|
: | | |// |____ --|
: * _ | |_|_|_| | \-/
: *-- _--\ _ \ // |
: / _ \\ _ // | /
: * / \_ /- | - | |
: * ___ c_c_c_C/ \C_c_c_c____________
I miss Beth.
: No, it's neither Good guys nor evil censors, it's for sure the
: crazy Intel syntax!
And Charles, as well, now.
Wolfgang Kern
"Jim Carlock" mentioned:
> : And trolls are best defeated not by censoring but by:
> :
> :
> : --------------------------
> : /| /| | |
> : ||__|| | Please don't |
> : / O O\__ feed |
> : / \ the trolls |
> : / \ \ |
> : / _ \ \ ----------------------
> : / |\____\ \ ||
> : / | | | |\____/ ||
> : / \|_|_|/ | __||
> : / / \ |____| ||
> : / | | /| | --|
> : | | |// |____ --|
> : * _ | |_|_|_| | \-/
> : *-- _--\ _ \ // |
> : / _ \\ _ // | /
> : * / \_ /- | - | |
> : * ___ c_c_c_C/ \C_c_c_c____________
> :
>
> I miss Beth.
Me too, and on a first glimpse I thought Mrs. Ascii posted again :)
> : No, it's neither Good guys nor evil censors, it's for sure the
> : crazy Intel syntax!
>
> And Charles, as well, now.
Oh yes, let's continue in a way he would have chosen.
__
wolfgang