View Single Post
  #6   Report Post  
Old 01-02-2013, 04:26 PM posted to rec.ponds.moderated
Paul W. Schleck[_2_] Paul W. Schleck[_2_] is offline
external usenet poster
 
First recorded activity by GardenBanter: Jan 2008
Posts: 5
Default Shall we move to social media?

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

In San Diego Joe writes:

On Friday, January 25, 2013 4:23:41 PM UTC-8, Phyllis and Jim wrote:
We are coming to the time when rpm will have to pay the annual $100 again

f

or the server to moderate messages. Looking at the low frequency of post

s

on rpm, it seems worth discussing whether to move to a free social media

lo

cation which will also permit moderating. What do people think?


As someone who is not active here, I don't feel I should get a vote. But...
every time this board moves, it loses users. When we got spammed so badly
on rec.ponds, my posts never showed up on the new moderated version, not su
re why.


Google Groups shows at least 140 approved articles from you on
rec.ponds.moderated, fewer recently, but many in the early lifetime of
the newsgroup (2007 and 2008):

https://groups.google.com/forum/?fro...ykkfJRIatTQKWa

Can you explain how the moderation system on the board works and wh
y it costs $100/year?


The $100/year is for reliable commercial hosting on a Unix server, with
shell login, that is directly connected to the Internet, and is
configured for most standard services (mail, news, www, etc.) and most
standard software packages (compilers, script interpreters, web server,
news and mail clients, etc.). As a commercial service, it is
well-hardened against SPAM and intrusion attacks, and is contractually
obligated to the moderation team to provide reliable service long-term.
That service is Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC ("Panix"), and is
used by another half-dozen moderation teams who subscribe to Panix for
accounts to run their moderation software.

A moderated newsgroup, even a low-volume one, has a lot of
"behind-the-scenes" processing, including filtering of incoming SPAM and
binary attachments, reviewing submissions, rejecting or approving them,
formatting rejection letters back to the submitters, formatting articles
for posting to the newsgroup, and posting to the newsgroup via a news
server. To do this reliably over the long-term without delays, errors,
or eventual burnout really requires the automation support of moderation
software, particularly software that allows for shared moderation by a
team. The software used by rec.ponds.moderated is Secure, Team-Based,
Usenet Moderation Program (STUMP). STUMP is free for those who can
provide their own hosting and technical support. The community of
moderation teams hosted at Panix are willing and able to provide mutual
technical support to each other for STUMP for free.

It may be possible to provide moderation services completely for free,
without paying a hosting service like Panix, but you may get what you
pay for (or even negative value if it requires substantial configuration
from scratch, fails to work properly, or goes away suddenly in the
future). I also don't see any free alternative being able to be
realistically stood up into operation before the annual Panix
subscription expires.

My recommendation, therefore, would be to keep the newsgroup, and seek
voluntary contributions with the annual Panix subscription. I myself
pledge $20 towards this cause.

- --
Paul W. Schleck

http://www.novia.net/~pschleck/
Finger for PGP Public Key

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v2.0.19 (FreeBSD)

iEYEARECAAYFAlEL2voACgkQ6Pj0az779o4k4ACfcEEjMVYAK5 cZi/8KTzppLINN
j40An3Lra9ggwLertSQQ16I2pZYZeM4A
=DmTX
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----