response 75 of 152:

Sep 30 02:27 UTC 1995

   We could invent a new season.  Call it "Construction".

   But what good does it do?  Changing the number of restarts
for Agora won't diminish the number of items, but might actually
increase them if we adopted say a monthly system, becuase people
might become more tempted to enter an item "before the conference
goes away".  There is also the increased temptation to enter useless
items in the hopes of making it the "last" item.

   I don't think the size of Agora is as important as what we ask
people to do with Agora, and how we present it to them.  For a long
time now I've wanted to change Agora, such that when people first
get into it, they see item #1 that saying something akin to the
follwing:

     Welcome to the Grex computer conferencing system!

     You are in a conference called "Agora", which is the
     general marketplace on Grex.  This conference has many
     different things talked about in it, unike other conferences
     on Grex, which are more focused on a particular topic like
     food or poetry or comptuers and the like.

     This "item" that you are reading is the introductory item,
     and will give you some hints about some other items you
     might want to look at that will give you a really short
     (but hopefully useful) glimpse at some of the things you
     can do while on Grex.  When you are back at the "Ok" prompt,
     you can type  read 2  and see item #2, which is about a
     certain topic about Grex.  There are six special items
     that are "read only" that explain things.  Here is a list
     of your choices:

     Item 2 - A short introduction to the conferencing software
     Item 3 - How to use email on Grex
     Item 4 - THe Grex "Party" program
     Item 5 - Ways to get help when you are confused!
     Item 6 - Other programs you might want to know about
     Item 7 - A guide to setting yourself up on Grex

     If you are interested in email, then at the OK prompt
     you could say  read 3  (and press enter) to look at
     item #3

   (The text of hypothetical item #1 in Agora).  The next nn
items (in my example, six) talk about the basics of how to
do things.  Obviously, this needs some work and we would need
to fine tune things.

   This would have several adavantages:

   + people who've never heard of us before could get a slight
     idea of what are some of the things you can do here.

   + there wouldn't be this largely inane first item with 398
     responses that drive people away becuase they think that
     Grex is nothing *but* things like Agora #1,

   + It makes the introduction to conferening seem more tame.

   + If it helps even 5% of those who look at it, we might
     attract (and keep) more interesting people.

   Then, after these special intro items we could have all
the usual stuff.  For experienced (or hooked) Grexaholics it
doesn't matter where we put them.  But for the newcomer who
is nearly totally lost, we need to help them out.

   I'm curious as to what people think about this.

response 77 of 152:

Sep 30 15:41 UTC 1995

   (I don't think it occured to anyone to do that.  Mlady will not be
on much, I think, since her initial impressions where rather negative.
If this account does go up for reaping, I promise that I will leave an
entry in passwd effectively reserving it in the future).

response 79 of 152:

Sep 30 16:21 UTC 1995

   Well, if I'm wrong, great.  I'd never want a person to go away
from grex.  This is unforunate though, that we didn't do something
about the id when the first mlady died.

response 81 of 152:

Sep 30 16:23 UTC 1995

Why am I back at this respond or pass thing?

response 85 of 152:

Sep 30 19:30 UTC 1995

Actually, there was a BIG discussion about having a menu-based, or
checklist-based, .cflist-builder here in coop a while back.

Re #80:  mlady, there is nothing that I saw that reflects badly on you, or
shows dislike of you personally.  Selena and others have expressed distaste
of the SITUATION that you have inadvertantly become part of.

You are very welcome here, and you are right:  a disproportionately large
chunk of Agora is mindless junk.  But not all of it:  I'm currently engageed
in a very serious discussion about the future of Social Security.

We let you go anywhere you think you might want to go on this system (except
the staff cf; that just for staff).  You can joing ANY or ALL of the more
serious cf's from any Ok: prompt.  No one is stopping you.  No one is standing
in your way.  No one will get mad at you or kick you off the system for
joining anohter cf.  No one will care in the slightest if you never see agora
again (unless you are already involved in a discussion, and leave them
hanging).  I had NEVER read ANY agora items prior to last week, and I've been
on the system for over a year now.  No one has condemned me or shunned me;
no one has said ANYthing, except to try to tell me that agora isn't all that
bad, and that I should try it.  Not even a hard sell.  DON'T tell me you can't
go wherever you want on this system.

We have a very simple system for setting up a cflist:  type "help conf" at
an Ok: prompt, and look at the list.  Choose the cf's you would like to be
in.  type "edit .cflist".  enter the cf's you would like to look at, in the
order you would like to look at them, each on its own line.  Exit the editor
you are in.  Congratulations, you have made your own .cflist !!!  Even a menu
system simply CANNOT be much easier than that !!

You don't have to read anything in Agora (or anywhere else) that YOU don't
want to:  when you see the next "Respond or pass" prompt, type "forget", and
you'll never see that item again (unless you TRY).

You like your name?  You don't mind that a previously very active and
well-known Grexer used to have it?  Fine, keep it.  Why was it still
available?  Because of an oversight.  Why are you getting grief about it?
You aren't; staff is.  Note that Selena directed her comments toward those
who had the power to prevent it.

I hope that you will continue to give us an opportunity to overcome those bad
first impressions.

response 87 of 152:

Oct 1 01:19 UTC 1995

I again object strenuously to reserving any logins for any reasons. Why do
people want to create fetishes here? Are decisions like these being made
here by the arbitrary action of staff? They have no right to do that. This
system is "owned" by all the members, and they never gave permission to
create fetishes. I would support an explicit policy forbidding login
fetishes on Grex. Let people choose the logins they want, and if someone
leaves - whether reaped by inactivity or the "grim reaper" - that
abandoned login should be open to the first taker. It would even be
interesting to explain to newusers adopting a "known" abandoned login, who
had it previously. They might be interested, and the subsequent discussion
would be a far more fitting memorial to someone than burying and hiding
the login. 

response 89 of 152:

Oct 1 09:38 UTC 1995

I agree with Rane too.

Re #80: I personally don't agree with your harsh evaluation of
agora, but you're entitled to your opinion. Next time you're in
bbs, I'd suggest trying the "help conferences" command. It'll
show you a list of all conferences on grex; hopefully you'll find
things that are more to your liking.

response 91 of 152:

Oct 1 18:30 UTC 1995

So she's a little brash. Some ppl are trying to provoke a reaction, and some
are using that to cover for private fears.  Don't judge too quickly.

response 93 of 152:

Oct 1 19:56 UTC 1995

Nor have we been encouraged to do so.

response 95 of 152:

Oct 2 00:34 UTC 1995

I hate to say it, but that's a good example of why I'm against adding a
.cflist-builder to newuser.  Newuser takes too long, is too technical, &
asks for too many decisions for a lot of new users as it is.  So their
eyes glaze over (or something) by the time they're asked for the funny keys.
Now are we supposed to ask whether they want melvin, cantalope enigma, vomit,
or a number of others in their list of conferences to read regularly?

Honestly, I *love* the idea in the abstract.  I gave up on reading agora
a couple of seasons ago, I hate it so much these days, & I can't imagine
anyone's wanting it as their first impression of Grex.  But I think that
another long, somewhat meaningless set of decisions before you get to log
in the first time isn't going to work much better for the people who would
need it most.

response 97 of 152:

Oct 2 01:36 UTC 1995

If I were doing it I would probably make it part of the menu and lynx shells,
as well as a command that people could run.  It would then use a menuing
system to branch out into the various catagories that public.txt lists
conferences in, and let people choose from the various conferences.

response 99 of 152:

Oct 2 16:18 UTC 1995

I think that she might have become fascinated by her own revulsion.