Complaint about (unintentional?) abuse of usenet by your dept. (fwd)

In article <Pin...@paladin.wright.edu>,
Patrick Craig <s00...@discover.wright.edu> writes:		
>My name is Patrick Craig, and I am a teaching assistant at Wright State
>University in the CS205 class.  My views are _not_ those of Wright State
>University.  I take it that absolutely none of you have ever been first
>time usenet posters?  Or have ever made a mistake in your lives?
Of course there had to have  been a first for many of us... but as a rule
of netiquette,
we read (lurk) in a newsgroup and read the FAQ before posting.  And then
when we do post, it is to be about something relative to the topic of the
newsgroup.  If it is not relevant, it is considered to be 'spam'.

>Our students are human beings, and we're doing the best we can to get them
>to post the correct attachment formats to the correct newsgroups. 
>Occasionally they will make a mistake, however, and that's human nature.
>The so-called "abuse" _is_ unintentional, and it upsets me to think that
>you people would try to take it any other way.
The problem is not whether or not your students post in the correct format--
it has to do with contributing something to this newsgroup.  They do not
contribute- they merely repost.  This is abuse.

>If you're looking to vent anger, why don't you take it to professional
>counseling?  A more constructive response to this problem would have been
>to offer to give us a hand with showing our students netiquette standards. 
Isn't that your job as an assistant instructor in CS205?  To allow your
students
to post without knowledge is truly sad.
 If you want your students to practice posting onto USENET,
why not use a newsgroup which is set aside for 'testing'? 

>I want to thank you all for making the world a more bitter place.      
I think you are the one who is most bitter.  We have been tolerating these
off-topic CP2 posts for several years-- we're just tired of it.

My suggestion to you and your class.  Either post someplace else (alt.test)
or make the posts on-topic... something about ASCII art-- and not just a
repost of something that has already been posted.  Don't waste our time
any longer.
-joan
--
             _ 
        ~0  (_|          < spu...@juno.com >
       |(_~|^~~|      SPUNK'S GALLERY OF ASCII ART:
       TT/_ T"T   < http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/7373/ >
jgs^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

>From: "fwiese" <fwi...@dataweb.nl>
>To: <cse...@cs.wright.edu>
>Subject: Complaint about (unintentional?) abuse of usenet by your dept.
>Date: Sun, 5 Oct 1997 08:33:43 +0100
>X-MSMail-Priority: Normal
>X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1161
>
>Dear sirs/ladies,
>
>Past week the newsgroup alt.ascii-art received several binary posts under
>the subject header CP2. The posters introduced themselves as being M.I.S.
>students at Wright State University. The messages seemed to be part of a
>course called CS205-02.
>According to your webpages the instructor of this particular class is
>someone called *graff*. I refer to:
>
>http://www.cs.wright.edu/schedules/fall97/CS.html
>
>Would you be so kind to inform the responsible person that in alt.ascii-art
>(in fact: in the majority of newsgroups) posting binaries is considered to
>be *abuse*?
>
>Kind regards,
>Mic Barendsz


"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone."

					
My name is Patrick Craig, and I am a teaching assistant at Wright State
University in the CS205 class.  My views are _not_ those of Wright State
University.  I take it that absolutely none of you have ever been first
time usenet posters?  Or have ever made a mistake in your lives?

Our students are human beings, and we're doing the best we can to get them
to post the correct attachment formats to the correct newsgroups. 
Occasionally they will make a mistake, however, and that's human nature.
The so-called "abuse" _is_ unintentional, and it upsets me to think that
you people would try to take it any other way.

If you're looking to vent anger, why don't you take it to professional
counseling?  A more constructive response to this problem would have been
to offer to give us a hand with showing our students netiquette standards.  

I want to thank you all for making the world a more bitter place.      


Patrick Craig
My views do not represent those of Wright State University.

In article <Pin...@paladin.wright.edu>, Patrick Craig <s00...@discover.wright.edu> writes:
|> >From: "fwiese" <fwi...@dataweb.nl>
[ snip ]
|> >Would you be so kind to inform the responsible person that in alt.ascii-art
|> >(in fact: in the majority of newsgroups) posting binaries is considered to
|> >be *abuse*?
|> >
|> >Kind regards,
|> >Mic Barendsz
|> 
|> 
|> "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone."
|> 
|> 					
|> My name is Patrick Craig, and I am a teaching assistant at Wright State
|> University in the CS205 class.  My views are _not_ those of Wright State
|> University.  I take it that absolutely none of you have ever been first
|> time usenet posters?  Or have ever made a mistake in your lives?

Of course, as I suggested a couple of months ago when we had an earlier
storm of "CP2" posts, it would be much politer to create a newsgroup at
your own university, dedicated to this sort of exercises. At my university
there are a number of courses with newsgroups of their own where students
can practise. For a CS (I take it that's Computer Science) class this
should not be too difficult to arrange.

|> Our students are human beings, and we're doing the best we can to get them
|> to post the correct attachment formats to the correct newsgroups. 
|> Occasionally they will make a mistake, however, and that's human nature.
|> The so-called "abuse" _is_ unintentional, and it upsets me to think that
|> you people would try to take it any other way.

It is only natural for people to make mistakes while they are learning (and
occasionally afterwards too, I admit). That is enough reason to give them a
place of their own for practising, since you know /beforehand/ that they
will annoy people and, being polite, you would like to prevent that, wouldn't
you?

Btw, the annoyance is not just with the formats. Also posts that make it
here in the beloved ASCII format are never anything more than repeats of
recent posts. If you want your students to become Respected Netizens (note
mildly ironic use of capitals... I have a hunch I have to stay very explicit
in everything I write here) you might as well ask them to show some creativity.
After all, that IS what this newsgroup is all about.

|> If you're looking to vent anger, why don't you take it to professional
|> counseling?  A more constructive response to this problem would have been
|> to offer to give us a hand with showing our students netiquette standards.  

Of course, Internet instructors ought to be the first to know and show
Netiquette to their students.

|> I want to thank you all for making the world a more bitter place.      

You're welcome. You seem to be doing a good job at it yourself, too.

--
                                     ^^
ir. H.J.H.N. Kenter                 oo )       ken...@cs.utwente.nl
University of Twente               =x=  \      tel. +31 53 4894099
Tele-Informatics & Open Systems      |   \     tfx. +31 53 4893247
P.O. Box 217   7500 AE Enschede     /|__  \
The Netherlands                    (____)_/    http://www.cs.utwente.nl/~kenter/
 
Famous last words: Segmentation Fault (core dumped)

Patrick Craig <s00...@discover.wright.edu> wrote:

>>From: "fwiese" <fwi...@dataweb.nl>
>>To: <cse...@cs.wright.edu>
>>Subject: Complaint about (unintentional?) abuse of usenet by your dept.
[-----8<--[snip]-----]
>>Kind regards,
>>Mic Barendsz

Seems like a perfectly reasonable and polite email to me, so why are
you getting so touchy about it?

> I take it that absolutely none of you have ever been first
>time usenet posters?  Or have ever made a mistake in your lives?

I take it that you have never been a regular newsgroup reader or
lurker that has had their newsgroup regularly spammed by the
same group?

If your students make a mistake perhaps you could encourage
them to apologise. This is after all an international newsgroup and
we have been getting these "mistakes" for a very long time, with
no explanation.
 
>Occasionally they will make a mistake, however, and that's human nature.
>The so-called "abuse" _is_ unintentional, and it upsets me to think that
>you people would try to take it any other way.

What other way way could we take it when we weren't even given the
courtesy of an explanation? As I understand it this has been going on
for at least a year if not longer.

>If you're looking to vent anger, why don't you take it to professional
>counseling?  A more constructive response to this problem would have been
>to offer to give us a hand with showing our students netiquette standards.  

Not knowing what your students were supposed to be doing until
recently that would have been a bit difficult. Why do you think
people were trying to get in touch with the head lecturer?

>I want to thank you all for making the world a more bitter place.      

And I would like to thank you for showing us the bitter state of
the assistant teachers at Wright University. I'm sure your students
have learnt just how easy it is to embarrass yourself in a world-wide 
forum. You have set a fine example.

Next time, perhaps before venting YOUR anger you would like to
examine the situation a little closer.

hmmmm since you are so quick to upset and don't seem to have much
understanding of newsgroups, I wonder if that is why
your students haven't learnt any netiquette?

Just a thought.

Shanaka