response 350 of 367:

Apr 25 05:30 UTC 1997

In #349, Rane wrote:

> I think the only people that will walk out are those that have a problem
> dealing with a public forum.

I give up - it's become apparent that Rane doesn't understand what I've
been saying for *months* now.  I'll say it again - in case it'll do some
good:

I no longer choose to support Grex because I don't think that the
suggestion of unregistered reading is appropriate at this time, given the
current quality of Grex's operation.  Period.

You've repeatedly ignored the numerous times I've said that I don't have a
problem with unregistered reading - because you continue to group me into
a contrary position.  If Grex had been running smoother two months ago,
I'd have voted yes.  If anything had been done to make Grex run better,
I'd have renewed my membership.  Nothing has changed here - and as such, I
feel my money is being wasted.

And Rane says he's not criticizing anyone?  Yeah, and wild bears don't do
their duty in the woods, either.

> Incidentally, there is no evidence whatever that anything will change
> for current users with unregistered web reading. I don't think there will be
> any noticeable change, or any problems we haven't already had. I know a
> good way to find out, though.

This is one of the flimsiest arguments I've heard regarding this issue.
There's no evidence to support or refute *either* of our positions -
because nothing has been tried yet!  How can you refute my arguments with
evidence that doesn't exist?

My arguments are based upon the notion that Grex, given no changes, is too
slow of a system *right now* to reliably handle the load that unregistered
reading will place upon it.

Oh wait - I forgot.  Rane is *so adamant* about unregistered reading at
all costs, he doesn't seem to care about the consequences - who decides to
leave for what reason, or now, apparently, on how slow the system gets as
a result.

What's the point of having more people accessing a system that
proportionally fewer people will be successfully able to access?

response 352 of 367:

Apr 26 11:54 UTC 1997

btw, here is some edited email i received during the last regular
election cycle ... editing to preserve anonymity, i might add.
  ----clip
  
All I can say is, Grex isn't
close to what it was when I  first  logged  on,  in  94.  It  has
changed  in  many  ways  that I dislike, and the best way, I have
found, to show a disappreciation of  something  is  to  pull  out
one's  support of it.         
  
[clip]

hoping that maybe I could somehow help get grex back closer
to  where it had come from. [clip]
 
[clip] Fairly certain that the ones with a  voice
at grex didn't want to head the way I had in mind, I did the best
I could do- I left Grex to its' own devices. If they were  right,
I figured that Grex would prosper fine without my support, and if
they were wrong.. well, they couldn't say I hadn;t tried to steer
them  away  from it.          
  
I wish you well, TS. With any luck,
you won't have happen to you, what happened to me.  

[clip] <<of a hard, by-name slam>>
  
Perhaps it is cruel of me to enjoy that last
part,  but  you  know, I cannot apologize for it. It just went to
show that while Grex didn't want my ideas, they didn't  want  his
either,  which  were  typically  on  the  opposite end from mine.

but  I
guess I did log in not too long ago. Whatever. There is of course
one last reason I don't wish to support Grex- it  allows [clip] 
access  to its' policy-deciding conference. I'd rather not put my
money into a place where he has a voice, thank you.          
  
Good day, tsty.
        
  
  ---clip

response 354 of 367:

Apr 26 13:41 UTC 1997

Sounds like whoever-it-was is withdrawing support because we
don't censor people that he or she doesn't like.

response 356 of 367:

Apr 29 02:08 UTC 1997

I don't know that it's all that appropriate to post such mail.  There is
no evidence to suggest that the original author of this text wanted this
material made public, and there are enough lacunae in the text as
presented that it is doubtful that our interpretation of the text is or
could be at all close to the original author's intentions.  One thing is
clear: the original author of this text is unavailable to be part of
this discussion.

response 358 of 367:

Apr 29 12:21 UTC 1997

Our original plan had been to upgrade Grex to a 4/460 system.  This would have
been a very quick process (replace some cards, no software changes) but it
would have given a much smaller speed increase than the 4/670.  When we found
such good deals on the 4/670, we decided to skip a step.  This will cost us
much less money in the long run, but it means we have to stay on the old
system a bit longer to get a much bigger speed increase.  Doing less frequent
upgrades with bigger improvements means performance is less consistant, but
it also allows us to move to faster machines sooner than we otherwise would
have.  CPU-wise, we are currently going to be a bit squeezed until the
upgrade, but I still think it was the best path for Grex.

response 360 of 367:

Jul 12 15:33 UTC 1997

So..update time...whats the early reviews of unregistered reading?  Has
it been a success?  A failure?  Has anyone used that feature at all?
Or has the world ended as some suggested?  

response 362 of 367:

Jul 12 23:51 UTC 1997

I'd be interested in seeing statistics on the amount of
anonymous reading, and in fact the level of usage of backtalk
in general. I assume that kind of information can be extracted
from the server logs.

response 364 of 367:

Jul 13 17:36 UTC 1997

Rob, welcome back!

response 366 of 367:

Jul 15 04:34 UTC 1997

The server logs are indeed extracted every week, and you can find a 
pointer to them on our home page. You can look at the counts on backtalk 
hits. The ones with /pw/ in the URL are named. The ones without /pw/ are 
anonymous.