History: Website and call for volunteers

Troels Forchhammer wrote:
 > In message <news:JX2qc.19008$4W4.3055@newssvr31.news.prodigy.com>
 > "Trade Surplus" <tradesurplus.RemoveThis@hotmail.com> enriched us with:
  >>
  >> They are both pretty empty at the moment which brings me to the
  >> second purpose of this post. We need more volunteers.
 >
 > What is the time frame for this?
 >
 > I would like to volunteer for something, but I fear that it'll take me
 > quite some time to get it done (I barely manage to find time to follow
 > up on the interesting threads here, and taking this on would probably
 > go from the ever-decreasing spare time).
 >
 > And what is involved in taking on a month?
 >
 > Who posted how much?
 > What topics were discussed (and how much)?
 > Both of the above?
 >
 > As for that - 1992 and 1993 seems reasonable for taking on a month ...

Christopher might correct me here but I think that we have more or less
decided to do the first pass at the annals on a topic basis rather than
month by month. Once we have that as a framework we could then go back and
do the month by month stuff later. For example you could take the topic of
TEUNC and find the two to eight significant events in the history of TEUNC,
e.g. TEUNC first proposed, TEUNC officially founded, UFAT founded etc.

The list of topics was posted by Christopher and copied into the website
here... <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/history_topics.html" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/history_topics.html</a>
You can just pick a topic, a simple one of you don't have much time. Since
the topics are mostly independent of each other they can be done in
parallel by different people so that there is no great pressure on anyone
to finish their bit so that soneone else can start.
--
Trade
<a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/index.html" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/index.html</a><!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

Trade Surplus wrote:
 >
 > I've put together a couple of crude pages for the development of the Tale
 > of Months.
 > A project worksheet here
<font color=purple> > <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/history_topics.html</font" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/history_topics.html</font</a>>
 > and a draft Tale of Months here
<font color=purple> > <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/Tale_of_Months.html</font" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/Tale_of_Months.html</font</a>>
 >
 > They are both pretty empty at the moment which brings me to the second
 > purpose of this post. We need more volunteers. If you would like to see the
 > annals fleshed out with more detail then volunteer by posting a reply to
 > this post or send a mail to Christopher Kreuzer at
 > spamgard.DeleteThis@blueyonder.co.uk or me at tradesurplus.DeleteThis@hotmail.com.
 >
 > --
 > Trade
<font color=purple> > <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/index.html</font" target="_blank">http://www.geocities.com/eoghan@snet.net/index.html</font</a>>

I think you should read the numerous FAQs before you duplicate work
already done to a high standard.

Perhaps a bit of reading would be in order before you decide on what to
include in the site..

Stan and Steuard seem to have good info on this.

FWIW

M.<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

Michael O'Neill <onq.DeleteThis@indigo.ie> wrote:

 > I think you should read the numerous FAQs before you duplicate work
 > already done to a high standard.

This history project is not meant to answer FAQs. It is meant to trace
the evolution of certain long-standing features of these newsgroups, one
of which is oft-debated topics. It could be considered something to look
at after the FAQs, if people want to see past posts on the subjects.

It could in that sense be considered an annotated guide to the Google
Group archives, picking out (and linking to) interesting threads on
certain topics. Of course, people can always (and always should) do
these historical searches themselves, but I see no problem with a bit
more cohesion.

Think of it more as a collection of dates and events, instead of having
any heavy Tolkien theorising or lots of Tolkien facts. The exact form of
the entries will become clearer as volunteers start to research and
create them. Admittedly, this part of it does need a lot more
discussion, but it is better to get started than to have nothing happen.
That is what I feel anyway.

 > Perhaps a bit of reading would be in order before you decide on what
 > to include in the site..

The list is still incomplete. Do you have any suggestions?

 > Stan and Steuard seem to have good info on this.

Steuard has made some suggestions, and Stan has said he thinks it might
be hard to stay objective about certain issues, which is fair enough.

Christopher

--
---
Reply clue: Saruman welcomes you to Spamgard<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

In message <news:G5nqc.80$jd5.42@newssvr33.news.prodigy.com> "Trade
Surplus" <tradesurplus DeleteThis @hotmail.com> enriched us with:
 >

<snip>

 > Christopher might correct me here but I think that we have more or
 > less decided to do the first pass at the annals on a topic basis
 > rather than month by month.

OK - put me down for the lists of top-posters (using netscan and
google). I hope that there's no target date for this (well - "some time
in 2004" would be OK with me

<snip>

--
Troels Forchhammer
Valid mail is <t.forch(a)mail.dk>

A Thaum is the basic unit of magical strength. It has been universally
established as the amount of magic needed to create one small white
pigeon or three normal sized billiard balls.
- (Terry Pratchett, The Light Fantastic)<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

Trade Surplus <tradesurplus.RemoveThis@hotmail.com> wrote:

 > Christopher might correct me here but I think that we have more or
 > less decided to do the first pass at the annals on a topic basis
 > rather than month by month.

That sounds about right. Still need to discuss/develop things quite a
bit more, but no harm in people just trying out their own way of doing
things (for minor stuff) and then reporting back, and then discussing a
bit more, and then settling on a final way of setting up the more
detailed framework.

First priority seems to be finding out WHO, WHAT, and HOW MUCH.

That list of posters was a start on WHO.
The number of posts/threads by year is a start on HOW MUCH.
Picking out broad topics of discussions is WHAT.

And as Michael said, the FAQs would help with that last one.

 > Once we have that as a framework we could
 > then go back and do the month by month stuff later.

<snip>

 > You can just pick a topic, a simple one if you don't have much time.
 > Since the topics are mostly independent of each other they can be
 > done in parallel by different people so that there is no great
 > pressure on anyone to finish their bit so that soneone else can start.

A very important point! To answer Troels' question, yes, this is meant
to be fairly long-term, but hopefully some momentum will be generated if
people get interested.

Christopher

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---
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 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

Troels Forchhammer <Troels.RemoveThis@ThisIsFake.invalid> wrote:
 > In message <news:G5nqc.80$jd5.42@newssvr33.news.prodigy.com> "Trade
 > Surplus" <tradesurplus.RemoveThis@hotmail.com> enriched us with:
  >>
 >
 > <snip>
 >
  >> Christopher might correct me here but I think that we have more or
  >> less decided to do the first pass at the annals on a topic basis
  >> rather than month by month.
 >
 > OK - put me down for the lists of top-posters (using netscan and
 > google). I hope that there's no target date for this (well - "some
 > time in 2004" would be OK with me

Um. Actually, I already extended that list of all-time posters and began
to break the list down by year. I could do with someone to discuss the
methods with, though, and even take over, as it is a bit overwhelming.

Troels, if you are interested in seeing the results I've produced so
far, maybe you could e-mail me and I can send you a copy?

Christopher

--
---
Reply clue: Saruman welcomes you to Spamgard<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

Christopher Kreuzer wrote:
 >
 > Michael O'Neill <onq.DeleteThis@indigo.ie> wrote:
 >
  > > I think you should read the numerous FAQs before you duplicate work
  > > already done to a high standard.
 >
 > This history project is not meant
 > to answer FAQs. It is meant to trace
 > the evolution of certain long-standing
 > features of these newsgroups, one
 > of which is oft-debated topics. It
 > could be considered something to look
 > at after the FAQs, if people want
 > to see past posts on the subjects.

<snip rest of clarification>

I see. The site read like FAQ headings. Discussion headings.

Okay.

 > The list is still incomplete. Do you have any suggestions?

I have made some already. I think the off topic discussion on aft are at
least as important to the history of the group as the on topic
discussions. I think they deserve a separate category or categories.

As to authority or oversight, I think you have to set up a framework that
can be extended to allow contributions by interested parties.

Even a prolific poster such as myself doesn't get involved in ALL
threads.

For example, I tend avoid the religious threads, so I don't know much
about them and I'm not really competent enough to contribute to any of
the more abstruse linguistic threads.

[regarding this latter sub-category, if the concept of OT was strictly
applied, as opposed to being applied in a partisan manner, suchj posts
would also be referred to another group, possibly one of the language
groups such as alt.language.artificial, soc.culture.nordic,
alt.english.usage / alt.usage.english, et cetera - but I digress]

I think there are a lot of nuggets waiting to be found, both in flame
exchanges and in OT threads.

To summarise.

Off Topic content contains valuable information which has contributed to
the readers understanding of many subjects, both in current affairs and
historical. I propose the following sub-groupings:

Political

Historical

Religious

Language

Oh yes, and

'''@@@@Flames@@@@'''

LOL!

That's an entire education in itself and at one stage took up most of the
posts if the entire aft group!

Sub headings;

Regular Flames

Vistor Flames

TROLLs

Reporting abise.

<chuckle>

[Don't let's sanitise the aft/rabtexperience to the point of uselessnes
for future generation of readers/posters in how to deal with future
aggressive tendencies...]

And let's take it from there.

I see this a labour of love to be undertaken over many years, but the
framework can be added to. Offline backups must be kept of all
articles/links so that the site can be put back up should the current
server changes its policy, have its Mb limits exceeded, or simply fall
over in use, as they do.

FWIW

M.<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

Michael O'Neill <onq.TakeThisOut@indigo.ie> wrote in
news:40AB33B6.FF2862D2@indigo.ie:

[snip]

 > To summarise.
 >
 > Off Topic content contains valuable information which has contributed
 > to the readers understanding of many subjects, both in current affairs
 > and historical. I propose the following sub-groupings:
 >
 > Political
 >
 > Historical
 >
 > Religious
 >
 > Language
 >
 > Oh yes, and
 >
 > '''@@@@Flames@@@@'''
 >
 > LOL!
 >
 > That's an entire education in itself and at one stage took up most of
 > the posts if the entire aft group!
 >
 > Sub headings;
 >
 > Regular Flames
 >
 > Vistor Flames
 >
 > TROLLs
 >
 > Reporting abise.
 >
 > <chuckle>

[snip]

I agree with you that OT should not be left out, as all kinds of OT
discussions obviously are an important and characteristic part of the aft
village life. But IMHO it is a bad idea to deal with it in such detail as
you seem to suggest. To write the history of the aft/rabt trolls would be
the most effective troll feeding.

John<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

John Swanson wrote:
 >
 > Michael O'Neill <onq.DeleteThis@indigo.ie> wrote in
 > news:40AB33B6.FF2862D2@indigo.ie:
 >
 > [snip]
 >
  > > To summarise.
  > >
  > > Off Topic content contains valuable information which has contributed
  > > to the readers understanding of many subjects, both in current affairs
  > > and historical. I propose the following sub-groupings:
  > >
  > > Political
  > >
  > > Historical
  > >
  > > Religious
  > >
  > > Language
  > >
  > > Oh yes, and
  > >
  > > '''@@@@Flames@@@@'''
  > >
  > > LOL!
  > >
  > > That's an entire education in itself and at one stage took up most of
  > > the posts if the entire aft group!
  > >
  > > Sub headings;
  > >
  > > Regular Flames
  > >
  > > Vistor Flames
  > >
  > > TROLLs
  > >
  > > Reporting abise.
  > >
  > > <chuckle>
 >
 > [snip]
 >
 > I agree with you that OT should not be left out, as all kinds of OT
 > discussions obviously are an important and characteristic part of the aft
 > village life. But IMHO it is a bad idea to deal with it in such detail as
 > you seem to suggest. To write the history of the aft/rabt trolls would be
 > the most effective troll feeding.
 >
 > John

Note the difference between feeding TROLLs - which can only occur during
a TROLLin episode - and archiving a good TROLL, which is post operative.

<smiles>

BTW I was partly joking in relation to the extent of the flame/TROLL
threads categories.

Perhaps I should have used the <irony> </irony> tags!

LOL!

Still a general guide might be appropriate. Some of the more
gut-bustingly funny ripostes occur in the flame threads. At other times
they show ways of thinking that some might find interesting.

I'm reminded of poor old Hogarth with his supposed degree failing to spot
the mathematical sequence in my

1!!111!!!!!11111111!!!!!!!!!!!!!111111111111111111111

endings to posts one year, or some of the poetry or lampooning that has
occurred over time also makes good reading.

I'm not therefore promoting blatant TROLLs or insults, but the more
witty, satirical and involved flames, for their entertainment value.

In relation to the OT threads I was serious; the detail there is
neccessary IMO to allow the prospective reader to find a discussion that
might interest him.

Political

Historical

Religious

Language

All these are just suggestions and many topics will cross over, but I
think it is important to allow people some critical way of finding a
subject they might be interested in.

As regards hosting, it might be enough to provide pre-packaged Google
links to various subject searches.

That way subjects could be classified as above with a page of headers
with associated embedded hyperlinks naming the topic of the thread. In
this way a simple "find in page" search of the header text could produce
a relevant result, avoiding having to enter the morass that is Usenet on
Google.

In other words the process is one of relevant archival retrieval, of
pre-selecting the relevant threads giving definitive or relevant answers
on certain subjects, and is not simply another way of accessing Google.

I would see it as a way of cutting the information mountain down to
managable proportions.

You want a growth industry niche job?

"Finding *relevant* results on the WWW and Usenet".

FWIW

M.<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

"Michael O'Neill" <onq DeleteThis @indigo.ie> wrote in message
news:40AC9726.F74D287F@indigo.ie...


This is the most amusing post I've read in a long time.
O'Neill trying to validate his enormous amount of Off-Topic posts.

Christopher is taking on the difficult task of creating the Annals of
AFT/RABT and O'Neill sees all of his "wonderful" and "interesting" Off-Topic
posts falling by the wayside like garbage being swept away to clear the
street.

I love it!

O'Neill, what's it like to find all that time wasted?
That nobody ever cared?

T.A.
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

"The American" <a_real_american.RemoveThis@hotspammail.com> wrote in
news:BqWdnfa15aZ6XTHdRVn-gQ@adelphia.com:

[snip]

> I love it!
>
> O'Neill, what's it like to find all that time wasted?
> That nobody ever cared?

Since you too have indulged in OT posting, often in response to Michael
O'Neill, I guess you already have answered that question in your own heart.

John
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

"John Swanson" <nospam DeleteThis @nospam.com> wrote in message
news:Xns94EFBB253C684392orpww00@195.67.237.53...
> "The American" <a_real_american DeleteThis @hotspammail.com> wrote in
> news:BqWdnfa15aZ6XTHdRVn-gQ@adelphia.com:
>
> [snip]
>
> > I love it!
> >
> > O'Neill, what's it like to find all that time wasted?
> > That nobody ever cared?
>
> Since you too have indulged in OT posting, often in response to Michael
>

Well, you're right.
I have indulged.
And I really hope that my and all other off-topic posts get filtered.
There have been a few times I've thought one of O'Neill's off-topic posts
clever and/or funny and have complimented him on it.
I even think when he's talking Tolkien he's very insightful and I've enjoyed
it.

But come on!
He's constantly off-topic!!!
And maybe I'm reading between the lines but I think it's driving him nuts
that 99% of his posts will be filtered out.
I find that funny.
And I know he's tough enough to take my little jabs.


T.A.
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers 

On Thu, 20 May 2004 10:41:00 -0400,
The American <a_real_american DeleteThis @hotspammail.com> wrote:
>
> "Michael O'Neill" <onq DeleteThis @indigo.ie> wrote in message
> news:40AC9726.F74D287F@indigo.ie...
>
>
> This is the most amusing post I've read in a long time.
> O'Neill trying to validate his enormous amount of Off-Topic posts.
>
> Christopher is taking on the difficult task of creating the Annals of
> AFT/RABT and O'Neill sees all of his "wonderful" and "interesting" Off-Topic
> posts falling by the wayside like garbage being swept away to clear the
> street.
>
> I love it!
>
> O'Neill, what's it like to find all that time wasted?
> That nobody ever cared?

That certainly wasn't his justification when I finally gave him a permanent
home in my killfile. Michael seemed to believe he was on some sort of quest
or crusade to reveal all the evils of the world (as he saw it) and thought
that his views/beliefs/observations were of such extraordinary importance
that they belonged in AFT (and at times in RABT), whether anyone tried to
make them on-topic or not. Worse, he seemed bound and determined not to
mark offtopic posts as such, and finally I through him and his good pal
BaronJosefR in my killfile, where he can proselytize his political beliefs,
and providing folks ignore him, I don't even get much of a wiff of it.

--
Aaron Clausen
mightymartianca DeleteThis @hotmail.com
 >> Stay informed about: History: Website and call for volunteers