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Grex > Coop8 > #115: Cyberspace Communications, Inc. finances through 8/31/96 |  |
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| 25 new of 119 responses total. |
srw
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response 75 of 119:
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Oct 14 01:51 UTC 1996 |
"Badger" is a pretty strong word for what I'm looking for. I
can see why Misti would object to that. For instance, watching
PTV is free, but you get badgered several times a year. At
least I find it quite offensive. Such overkill turns me off, to
be honest.
I would prefer to "remind" users rather than "badger". I hope
we never remotely as offensive as the PTV pledge break
intrusions. I agree with rcurl that we could be more agressive
than the occasional motd reminder that we now do, and I agree
with danr that those who can afford to help us do need to be
reminded.
If the message is worded properly, those who truly cannot
afford to pay will not be offended or feel guilty, while those
who canafford to help should see the need to do so.
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rcurl
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response 76 of 119:
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Oct 14 07:34 UTC 1996 |
A badger by any other name (like remind) is still a badger. Hoever, I
don't care what you call it - *I* know what it is. 8^}
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davel
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response 77 of 119:
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Oct 14 13:57 UTC 1996 |
I too would really object to the public-radio-type regular extended fundraiser
as badgering. (I don't watch TV, but I assume that PTV is similar in this.)
Occasional reminders, somewhat more aggressive than a line in the motd, would
not be out of place, IMO - emphasis being on "occasional".
In particular, I know my own experience of being on Grex was that it was quite
a while (a couple of months at least, maybe half a year or more) before I
discovered fairly accidentally how Grex was supported. We've improved since
then, but I still encounter users who apparently think we're funded by some
outside source. An occasional, lowkey message designed to *not* seriously
bother those who do know is appropriate as a means to get info to those who
*don't* know, IMO.
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rcurl
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response 78 of 119:
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Oct 14 15:51 UTC 1996 |
OK. That's fine. Lowkey badgering. 8^}
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dang
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response 79 of 119:
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Oct 14 17:39 UTC 1996 |
I remember when I joined, I knew full well how grex was supported, and still
didn't support grex for over a year for a number of reasons. Being badgered
may have stopped me from supporting at all. Just a note.
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chelsea
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response 80 of 119:
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Oct 14 18:00 UTC 1996 |
Also, I'm one of those users who will quickly lose interest
in sending in any money if Grex goes the way of additional
tiered access or membership perks.
So, you'll win some and you lose some. Just like real life. ;-)
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rcurl
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response 81 of 119:
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Oct 14 20:49 UTC 1996 |
And I refuse to donate any money unless I am asked. Well, we have taken care
of all possible ways for Grex raise money: being asked (badgered); not be
asked (ignored); and giving perks (elitism).
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adbarr
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response 82 of 119:
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Oct 17 10:59 UTC 1996 |
Re #80 Mary - is Grex now at the ideal size, speed, etc? It seems like the
system has steadily grown over the years, improving equipment, access, and
technical capabilites. Have we reached the pinnacle? Perhaps an earlier state
of affairs was better? I can't tell if you are against change, or just for
change that is slow and deliberate? If you are against change then the current
process of evolving seems hard to reconcile with your position. If you are
in favor of deliberate, but slow, change then what is the destination in your
mind? I am not being hostile to your ideas, I just am not really sure I
understand and I would like to understand.
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chelsea
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response 83 of 119:
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Oct 17 13:37 UTC 1996 |
I'm not against the process of change. Why I'm suggesting we should be
extra cautious now is that we are at a point where the next set of (major)
improvements (bandwidth) will be expensive, in two important ways.
One, it will mean Grex will need to bring in a bunch more money each
month. When we get into the position that it is *necessary* we have
significantly more members then membership enticements will follow. We'll
see tiered access, quotas and other membership perks as necessary for
Grex's survival. I'd see this as a real shift from where we started
and the original concept for the system.
Two, we run on volunteer staff. Increase our population significantly and
their generosity will wear thin. I'd suggest we first designate how we
will handle any increased volume before we facilitate their arrival.
Change is not the problem. Growth is not the problem. Not planning how
we'll address growth-related problems is a problem. Grex should grow
while we keep in mind what we'd like Grex to be. *Besides big*.
There is an item in the Membership conference, item #5 I believe,
where some of this is being discussed. I've asked tsty for a link
to Co-op a few days ago but he must be busy with real life.
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janc
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response 84 of 119:
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Oct 17 15:54 UTC 1996 |
I'm certainly very pro-growth, but I agree with everything Mary just said.
A sudden increase in capacity could flood us in so many new users that the
"culture" that we have developed here, of openness and cooperation, would
collapse under the strain. It's not like it isn't sometimes strained even
at the current rate of growth.
I do believe that we need to raise more money, and we may need to offer more
perks to members. But we should *not* create those perks by taking anything
away from guests. The perks should be based on new services. For instance,
we might be able to talk a local ISP into giving discount coupons to our
members. I think we should develop a "Grex store" selling tee-shirts and mugs
and other Grex periphenalia. We might offer modest member discounts on that
kind of stuff.
The one possible exception to this is mail. We may need to find ways to
discourage people from just Grex as a mail host (I'm not sure if we do, but
we may). That may involve some limitations on what guests can do.
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e4808mc
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response 85 of 119:
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Oct 17 17:34 UTC 1996 |
Is the daily announcement today a premptive decision to get $250 a month to
do something in particular about Internet speed? Did the board decide to do
something that I missed? Or is it a request for money to buy a particular
replacemnt itme?
[I must be sleeping when I think I'm logged on at night:-)
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janc
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response 86 of 119:
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Oct 17 19:17 UTC 1996 |
No, it's just me trying to find an attention-grabbing way to ask for people
to become members. I think it accurately reflects the state of things though.
We have some intriguing possibilities for getting much better internet
connectivity that would take only a little more support. In fact, we can
probably do things that will make people say "wow, the system is much faster
now" within our current budget. But to really be able to sustain these things
in the long term, and really to be able to do things that will continue to
serve us in the long term, we need a significantly larger member base. With
only about 100 users out of 14000 supporting us, that's going to be a bit of
a strain. If we can increase it to 140 to 14000 (1%) we will be in solid
shape. The message is maybe a bit of an exaggeration. With the current
member base we will probably be able to make some significant improvements.
But we could do much, much better with just a bit more support.
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ajax
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response 87 of 119:
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Oct 17 20:53 UTC 1996 |
While it wouldn't make as great a difference as an ISDN line, US
Robotics just announced a new modem protocol that can transmit data
at 28.8Kbps, but receive it at 56Kbps from an ISP. My guess is that
it will achieve widespread adoption in 1997. Check out
www.usr.com/x2 for more info. (Or NASDAQ USRX if you're looking for
a good investment :-).
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krj
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response 88 of 119:
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Oct 17 22:19 UTC 1996 |
Mary wrote: "I'd suggest we first designate how we will handle any
increased volume ((of users)) before we facilitate their arrival."
Well, yes, but we have to realize that many more users are coming,
whether we facilitate their arrival or not.
On the topic of staff workload: perhaps Grex should attempt to
determine what work the staff finds most satisfying, and what work
the staff finds most distasteful. Increasing the unpleasant things
which need doing should be avoided, just to conserve the staff.
(You can sort of see where this is going, with respect to my other
comments on mail...)
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scg
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response 89 of 119:
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Oct 18 05:33 UTC 1996 |
The big problems as far as staff time goes right now (other than dealing with
moving) tend to be mail related in one way or another. Both in cleaning up
after our overloaded mail system and in answering an ever increasing amount
of help mail. Valerie is now doing the bulk of the staff work, with various
others of us pitching in in various ways. We certainly need more staff people
before the system can grow very much. We're working on that.
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ajax
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response 90 of 119:
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Oct 18 05:40 UTC 1996 |
Is the "help" mailing address a synonym for the "staff" mailing address?
If so, how about separating the two, so that staff and non-staff can choose
whether or not to get mail sent to "help." This would distribute the load
a bit by allowing non-staff people to respond to some help requests, the
same way the "write help" requests are handled.
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adbarr
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response 91 of 119:
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Oct 18 11:00 UTC 1996 |
I wonder if the entire function of free e-mail should be re-thought,
re-structured, and "re-provided"? Perhaps and e-mail division needs to be
proviced with staff, and equipment, etc. so the rest of the "system" (larger
than Grex) is not overwhelmed. E-mail should be, in my political opinion,
something that is a "right", just as speaking from the public green. Times
have changed a little.
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rcurl
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response 92 of 119:
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Oct 18 16:35 UTC 1996 |
But should tiny volunteer groups be responsible for providing this
"right"? The public provides those public greens - so should then the
public provide e-mail access? Or is e-mail more like paper-mail, a private
matter, for which users should carry the cost, even though access to it is
otherwise unrestricted? In my opinion, e-mail is the latter - a private
matter. The "public green" has not yet been identified in cyberspace. It
could be the web, except that access to it is much more restricted (by
economics) than is access to the public green.
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marcvh
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response 93 of 119:
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Oct 19 04:57 UTC 1996 |
E-mail is a postal box, not a public green or soapbox. Post office
boxes and other maildrops are not generally free and never really
have been. And if people can't access the public green because the
sidewalk is too clogged with people checking their free post office
boxes, well, that's something else entirely.
Does e-mail in unrestricted form encourage people to use Grex and
further the goals of the Grex community (whatever those might be)?
To my mind it's a commodity service, not something special or
unique.
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tsty
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response 94 of 119:
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Oct 19 09:57 UTC 1996 |
one consideration taht mdw discovered and i confirmed is that, particularily
the indian users, some logins can telnet to hither and yon and also *not*
get email on the b0x from which they telnet! <gad zooks, but true - hey,
it's a different part ofthe planet.>
so, rather than 'encourage' ppl to use the gallactic grex, the indian
situation 'forces' the use of the only port in space, grex.
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pfv
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response 95 of 119:
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Oct 19 19:38 UTC 1996 |
Grex is not the "only port in space" by a long shot..
There are *many* non-unix BBS's out there which provide for
e-mail access.
Hal9k was once my most reliable feed, and it offered QWK packets
and SOME Usenet feeds.
What Grex, and Mnut as well, do provide is:
1) Picospan Conferencing;
2) Janc-Party;
3) A site to learn more about Unix generalities, and both Sun-OS
and BSDI Unix & scripting;
4) A RT site where users of similar programs and OS's can share
insights, tips and advice;
5) A basic, entry-level capability for local folks, unable to
afford an ISP, to access the Internet in a limited fashion;
6) E-Mail.
Now, the conferencing is merely a subset of UselessNet, (as Russ
would describe it), and the 'party' is far less than IRC is even
at this point in it's evolution.
Further, the ISP's all provide some level of E-mail.
So, where do we find folks that need E-mail, and why?
1) Local users that rely on the dialins;
2) Library sourced Telnetters;
3) I doubt it, but: Certain Educational sourced Telnetters;
4) Business Telnetters with some sorta' weird 'Firewall';
5) ISP sourced Telnetters wanting (not needing) complete
anonymity;
I'd guess you folks should perhaps start considering your real
goals and community-views again, but this depends upon what you
*really* want to do, be, go..
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scott
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response 96 of 119:
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Oct 19 20:56 UTC 1996 |
Interesting experience this morning. I was talked by a new user who turned
out to be a school teacher in Mexico City. He was in an Internet class for
teachers ( so that they can then go teach their students). Naturally,
cyberspace.org was the announced destination. He said that their instructor
had talked about Grex as being a system with a big social function. If I can
get it going in e-mail I'll be sure to mention how we are funded.
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drew
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response 97 of 119:
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Oct 19 22:42 UTC 1996 |
Re #93:
Post office boxes are, however, amazingly cheap.
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popcorn
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response 98 of 119:
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Oct 20 03:33 UTC 1996 |
This response has been erased.
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tsty
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response 99 of 119:
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Oct 20 06:23 UTC 1996 |
yabbut (2nd cousin to the rabbit) do they have as good a staff? what
principles do they demonstrate?
hmmmmmm, maybe i ought ot go and find out myself. and report back here.
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