This is really useful and interesting, Mike. I've never seen it put so clearly and succinctly.
Steve On 11/01/07, Mike Stevens <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Despite what I posted earlier, because some people of mentioned bits if > it, > I've decided, as one of the ancient mariners > of this parish. to try to make some sort of summary of what happened. But > my memory of it all > is distinctly partial, in both senses of the word. > > I think it must have been about eight or nine years ago that it all > happened. At that time this list was privately hosted ( > [EMAIL PROTECTED], > or something), and was interfaced to the Usenet group uk.rec.waterways so > that all postings that appeared on one also appeared on the other. That > was > the root cause of the first problem. > > Some of us who came to the interface from the mailing list side didn't > know > very much about Usenet. One of them was a chap called Peter Hardcastle, > known as Dral. Another was me. That was another contributory factor. > > The gateway between the two systems had some technical faults which may or > may not have been curable - technical opinion on that point differed at > the time. The problem was that threads that went via the mailing list no > longer threaded properly in Usenet, which upset some of the people who > came > to the combo from the Usenet side. Vociferous among these was a chap > called > Andy Mabbett, a self-appointed net-cop. > > The proximate cause of the big row came about as follows. Dral was then > in > process of building an excellent site called "Canal Roots and Routes", > which > I believe still exists. > He used to preview some of his material on the mailing > list as a sort of beta-test. As part of this process, he made a visit to > the BCN which he wrote up > and posted on the group. Much of this was very appreciative, but he did > express regret that some areas of the BCN didn't seem to be cared for by > the > local residents. Somebody else, it may have been Kevin Maslin, asked for > more details so that he could follow the matter up locally. Dral > responded > in the spirit of the request. > > At this point, Mabbett, who at that time managed a Birmingham Council web > site, > cross-posted Dral's reply, out of context, to the Birmingham Local > newsgroup, not one of the most polite in the Usenet community. As a > self-appointed netcop, he should have known better than that, in my view. > The criticisms there, without the context, annoyed some of the Birmingham > group members who responded vigorously, and in some case abusively, both > on > the two newsgroups and, in some cases by direct e-mail to Dral. > > Dral went ballistic - justifiably in my view - and that's where the > row > started, and went on for ages. I sided with Dral as I was also trialling > material for my website and shared his strong concerns about copyright, > which some Usenet enthusiasts, Maggot included, seemed to think didn't > apply > to Usenet. > > That was phase 1. > > Alongside this was another row about the quantity of off-topic wibble that > was carried on the combined list & group. If you think what we've seen > recently is a bit much, you should have seen it as it was in those days! > This is where the pub analogy, either recalled or re-invented here > recently, > came into play. It may have been the late Jeff Dennison who launched it, > or > my memory might be playing tricks. > > A number of people hated the war and left the group/list combo. Some of > them set up an invitation-only mailing list (a) to get away from the > Dral/Mabbett abuse and (b) to be a place where they could chat off-topic > without offending others. I joined it a bit later. That list still exists > and is still invitation-only. > > Then came phase 2. > > The arrangements for hosting the mailing list fell through for a reason I > don't remember - perhaps our host was changing server and couldn't > afford > the space for the list on his new one. Or perhaps he used that excuse to > escape from the row. A new arrangement was found on a server run by > Bruce > Peckett, who decided, probably wisely, that to continue the gateway > between > the mailing list and the newsgroup was either impossible to achieve > without > the failings of the old arrangements, or at the least was to difficult to > do. That's when the split between the two systems took place. > > Bruce was hosting a number of mailing lists at the time, and felt it best > to > set up a sort of code of conduct for them all. Nobody objected at the > time, > until David Long (one of the people involved in the original setting up of > uk.rec.waterways) offended against one of Bruce's rules (I forget in what > way) and Bruce suspended him from the list. A number of members felt that > Bruce had gone over the top. This provoked another round of > flame war and lost us more subscribers. > > That's as I remember things. Others will probably remember them > differently. > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
