Re: spam in ALA
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.
Frank Kotler
> Frank Kotler 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.
>
>> 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?
Perhaps. But see the last item on this page:
<http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=policies:discouraged>
> Or
> remove it and recreate comp.lang.asm. comp.lang.asm.x86 should never
> have been created without the mandatory comp.lang.asm.misc.
I suspect you're right, there. But what is, is.
> Maybe this
> can be done without all the formal procedures normally necessary
Possibly. I have an idea. We could ask!
> (I have cross posted this to news.groups.proposals).
I've removed everything but n.g.p. Hope this is where the question belongs!
> Otherwise it seems
> not worth the effort, the news system is dying as fast as assembly
> programming.
"The right of the people to peaceably assemble shall not be infringed."
- U.S. Constitution. Doesn't say anything about newsgroups that I can
find. I expect you'll find folks here who would like to keep Usenet
alive and healthy!
> 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.
Maybe I could and maybe I couldn't. "The situation is in flux." I *did*
make such a suggestion, just before we started having trouble...
Perhaps someone here has an answer. Our moderator has passed away. What
do we do???
TIA for any help!
Best,
Frank
Steve Bonine
> Perhaps someone here has an answer. Our moderator has passed away. What
> do we do???
http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=policies:mvi seems to be the
appropriate path.
Rob Kelk
wrote:
<snip>
>Perhaps someone here has an answer. Our moderator has passed away. What
>do we do???
Look for a new moderator or moderation team. Put out the call for
volunteers, and see whether anyone who Has A Clue about Usenet
administration steps forward.
(We have the same problem at rec.arts.anime.info, and have yet to find a
new moderator. I don't have the time there, and won't for at least three
months...)
--
Rob Kelk Personal address (ROT-13): eboxryx -ng- tznvy -qbg- pbz
Any opinions here are mine, not ONAG's.
ott.* newsgroup charters: <http://onag.pinetree.org>
Any Usenet message claiming to be from me but posted from any server
other than individual.net is a forgery. Please filter out such
messages if you have the capability.
Herbert Kleebauer
Wouldn't it be much easier if the maintainer of the checkgroups list
just removes the "(moderated)" without any prior RFD or CFV.
There would be some simple alternatives, but I don't know how
successful this would be. Maybe someone can comment.
- If I just send a control message to make c.l.a.x unmoderated, how
many of the servers will accept this unsigned control message.
And how much will switch back to moderated status when the next
checkgroup message is sent?
- I contact the newsmaster of Google and try to make the group unmoderated,
then at least Google can be used to post and read the group. And
if somebody wants to use a different news server, he has to convince
the newsmaster himself to make the group unmoderated. Because Google
and not some "Big 8 Management" (not formal but in practice) decide
which groups exist, this should be possible with the remark that it
is unmoderated at Google.
- 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.
Steve Bonine
> Steve Bonine wrote:
>> Frank Kotler wrote:
>>
>>> Perhaps someone here has an answer. Our moderator has passed away. What
>>> do we do???
>> http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=policies:mvi seems to be the
>> appropriate path.
>
> Wouldn't it be much easier if the maintainer of the checkgroups list
> just removes the "(moderated)" without any prior RFD or CFV.
That action would change a few characters in a text document, but it
would have no real effect in the real world.
> There would be some simple alternatives, but I don't know how
> successful this would be. Maybe someone can comment.
>
> - If I just send a control message to make c.l.a.x unmoderated, how
> many of the servers will accept this unsigned control message.
> And how much will switch back to moderated status when the next
> checkgroup message is sent?
Essentially none. But what you're attempting is fraught with problems.
Unmoderating a newsgroup is tricky because it needs to be changed, by
the server administrator, on each individual server. What you end up
with is an environment in which it's marked as moderated on some servers
and unmoderated on others. The people who are using a server where it's
still marked as moderated will have their submissions emailed to the
non-functional moderation address and they won't see posts from the
other group of servers because they won't be approved. It will cause
significant confusion.
> - I contact the newsmaster of Google and try to make the group unmoderated,
> then at least Google can be used to post and read the group. And
> if somebody wants to use a different news server, he has to convince
> the newsmaster himself to make the group unmoderated. Because Google
> and not some "Big 8 Management" (not formal but in practice) decide
> which groups exist, this should be possible with the remark that it
> is unmoderated at Google.
I doubt that Google would pay any attention to your request, and even if
they did it would only address the problem at Google.
> - 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.
Self-approving is contrary to the AUP for any legitimate ISP and is a
good way to lose your access.
How about just doing it the right way? It's not like someone is asking
you to write the Great American Novel. Submitting the RFD or MVI will
take less time than the alternatives that you've listed and will
actually accomplish something.
Martin X. Moleski, SJ
>> http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=policies:mvi seems to be the
>> appropriate path.
>Wouldn't it be much easier if the maintainer of the checkgroups list
>just removes the "(moderated)" without any prior RFD or CFV.
Our experience suggests that it is better to rmgroup
an unwanted moderated group than to try to change
the moderation status.
The board prefers to check first whether anyone is
willing and able to moderate the group.
>- If I just send a control message to make c.l.a.x unmoderated, how
> many of the servers will accept this unsigned control message.
> And how much will switch back to moderated status when the next
> checkgroup message is sent?
I don't know.
>- I contact the newsmaster of Google and try to make the group unmoderated,
> then at least Google can be used to post and read the group. And
> if somebody wants to use a different news server, he has to convince
> the newsmaster himself to make the group unmoderated. Because Google
> and not some "Big 8 Management" (not formal but in practice) decide
> which groups exist, this should be possible with the remark that it
> is unmoderated at Google.
I suppose that you're a free agent and no one can control
what you do. I'm not sure why Google should listen to
you. Do you suppose that they will act on all such
requests to cease moderating groups?
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.
Tim Skirvin
Herbert Kleebauer <kl...@unibwm.de> writes:
>>> Perhaps someone here has an answer. Our moderator has passed away. What
>>> do we do???
>> http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=policies:mvi seems to be the
>> appropriate path.
> Wouldn't it be much easier if the maintainer of the checkgroups list
> just removes the "(moderated)" without any prior RFD or CFV.
What you're asking for us for the group to be unmoderated; and no,
I don't think it is the simpler solution.
> There would be some simple alternatives, but I don't know how
> successful this would be. Maybe someone can comment.
> - If I just send a control message to make c.l.a.x unmoderated, how
> many of the servers will accept this unsigned control message.
Ideally very few. And you probably wouldn't like the results even
for those few servers; having a group that's moderated in only-some places
is worse than having a group that's moderated in all places.
> And how much will switch back to moderated status when the next
> checkgroup message is sent?
Probably not many; there aren't too many sites that pay attention
to those unsigned control messages in the first place that also listen to
checkgroups.
> - I contact the newsmaster of Google and try to make the group unmoderated,
> then at least Google can be used to post and read the group. And
> if somebody wants to use a different news server, he has to convince
> the newsmaster himself to make the group unmoderated. Because Google
> and not some "Big 8 Management" (not formal but in practice) decide
> which groups exist, this should be possible with the remark that it
> is unmoderated at Google.
This doesn't even make any sense. You'd be better advised to
proposed comp.lang.asm.x86.unmoderated than to try to make a "shadow"
version of the real group.
> - 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.
But really, why don't you just find somebody to run a robot
moderator for you?
- Tim Skirvin (sk...@big-8.org)
--
http://www.big-8.org/ Big-8 Management Board
http://wiki.killfile.org/ Skirv's Wiki <FISH>< <*>
Jim Carlock
to place an appropriate header to get it post to
comp.lang.asm.x86
Previous attempted message...
Not sure I can do this with Outlook Express, but we will see
how it turns out.
I sent messages to two email addresses, one to,
board at big-8 dot org,
and one to,
uvm at lists dot big-8 dot org
I do not know which email can help and I'm not sure how to go
about things or what all is required.
I'm trying to post this to comp.lang.asm.x86 and hoping to figure
out what these extra fields in the Outlook Express client are for.
Distribution: and Keywords:
Any suggestions are welcome. In the meantime I'm going to read the
previous messages and try to figure out what all is going on. I
used keywords in the past to place a Keywords: header on a post,
but never messed with the Distribution. It appears clax did not
accept the post, so I'll repost to only this group.
Who should I contact in regards to requesting to take over the clax
newsgroup so that things can begin normal operations there again?
--
Jim Carlock
You Have More Than Five Senses
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/381163/more_than_five_senses.html
Kathy Morgan
> My first attempt to cross-post this failed. I can not get OE
> to place an appropriate header to get it post to
>
> comp.lang.asm.x86
If you are not the moderator of the group, putting the appropriate
header on the post is considered to be approval forgery and is a
violation of the TOS for most NSP's. Those that do accept posts with
forged approvals generally will not propagate the message to other
servers, so in general it's much better not to do it.
> Not sure I can do this with Outlook Express, but we will see
> how it turns out.
I'm not sure what it is you're trying to do with OE. It did post your
message. If you're trying to post with an approval header and you're
not the moderator, be glad that OE didn't help you to do it. (Certainly
you're not a moderator for news.groups.proposals, so DO NOT put an
approval header on a crosspost that includes news.groups.proposals.)
> I'm trying to post this to comp.lang.asm.x86 and hoping to figure
> out what these extra fields in the Outlook Express client are for.
>
> Distribution: and Keywords:
Those fields are pretty much universally ignored by both servers and
humans, and they have no effect at all (good or bad) on posting to a
moderated group.
> Any suggestions are welcome. In the meantime I'm going to read the
> previous messages and try to figure out what all is going on. (snip) It
> appears clax did not accept the post, so I'll repost to only this group.
clax can only accept the post if there is an active moderator processing
posts. When a message is crossposted to more than one moderated group,
moderators of all the groups need to accept it. If any one of them
rejects the message, it doesn't appear anywhere. As I understand it,
lack of a moderator for clax is the problem you want to address.
Have you read the various FAQ's about group moderation? Russ Alberry's
"Pitfalls of Moderation" and Denis McKeon's "Moderated Newsgroups FAQ"
are both posted regularly, and there are additional FAQs at
<http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=faqs:moderation>.
--
Kathy
Mark Kramer
Kathy Morgan <kmo...@spamcop.net> wrote:
>If you are not the moderator of the group, putting the appropriate
>header on the post is considered to be approval forgery and is a
>violation of the TOS for most NSP's.
Tim has just posted that forging approval to a moderated group is
acceptable. In fact, the group he was talking about was the one
the OP was trying to post to.
>Those that do accept posts with
>forged approvals generally will not propagate the message to other
>servers, so in general it's much better not to do it.
Ummm, if a server accepts an article for a moderated group, yes, it
does try to propogate it. There is no reason it would not.
>If you're trying to post with an approval header and you're
>not the moderator, be glad that OE didn't help you to do it.
How does one post to self-moderated groups, where there is no moderator,
then? Should one be glad that one's tools don't allow one to post to such
groups?
>clax can only accept the post if there is an active moderator processing
>posts.
Or someone forges and approval.
>When a message is crossposted to more than one moderated group,
>moderators of all the groups need to accept it.
Well, courtesy says, and I think the newest almost-standard may say,
they SHOULD all approve it, but technically only one approved header is
required. There is a section of text, as I recall, that specifies how
to process articles posted to multiple moderated groups, but it requires
the moderators to know what groups are moderated. I don't know if there
is any standard adressing how to deal with multiple keyed approvals.
Tim Skirvin
> Kathy Morgan <kmo...@spamcop.net> wrote:
>> If you are not the moderator of the group, putting the appropriate
>> header on the post is considered to be approval forgery and is a
>> violation of the TOS for most NSP's.
> Tim has just posted that forging approval to a moderated group is
> acceptable. In fact, the group he was talking about was the one
> the OP was trying to post to.
That's not really what I meant, but I see where you're coming
from. I was thinking about "self-moderated" groups, where there's no
"official" moderator but everybody is expected to approve their own
posts. I think there are still a few out there, mostly in alt.*.
>> If you're trying to post with an approval header and you're not the
>> moderator, be glad that OE didn't help you to do it.
> How does one post to self-moderated groups, where there is no moderator,
> then? Should one be glad that one's tools don't allow one to post to such
> groups?
Oh, I guess you did know about those groups. Nevermind.
- Tim Skirvin (tski...@killfile.org)
--
http://wiki.killfile.org/ Skirv's Homepage <FISH>< <*>
http://news.killfile.org/ News<->Web Gateway
Kathy Morgan
> Ummm, if a server accepts an article for a moderated group, yes, it
> does try to propogate it. There is no reason it would not.
If it was the moderator who approved the article for posting, that's
true. However, some servers knowingly accept posts with forged
approvals for local consumption only and do not propagate the posts with
forged approvals to other servers. For more, Google
news.admin.net-abuse.policy for the discussion about Altopia and forged
approvals in 2000.
--
Kathy