phil said:I've seen that before from uk.rec.cycling; the last time I looked it was
hideously out of date though, posts would only appear ages after they
were made. It must have improved since then, as it seems to be okay
now...
I've never actually looked at cyclingforums.com, but I am a regular on
uk.rec.cycling where it causes frequent complaints.
cyclingforums.com is a commercial website that provides a web interface
for a number of cycling newsgroups, much like the gateway between the
unicycling forum and rec.sport.unicycling, except that cyclingforums.com
does it for profit.
There are several reasons that urc readers object to the gateway.
* People object to their posts being annexed by a commercial
organisation which then treats the posts as its own. There isn't even a
way to stop cyclingforums.com archiving your posts, unlike Google groups.
* People resent being described as "guests" in their own newsgroup.
* People find it irksome when cyclingforums posters describe the
newsgroup as "this website", not knowing any better (those of us who
read urc tend to be the sort of geeks who regard the distinction between
www and usenet as important).
* People posting from cyclingforums tend to have no idea of netiquette.
They don't know how to behave on usenet, and in most cases aren't even
aware that they are posting on usenet. They tend not to be urc
regulars, just people who are browsing a website and replying to
anything that catches their eye. And that's a particularly heinous
crime in usenet, where one of the rules that keeps groups running
smoothly is that people should lurk for a while and familiarise
themselves with the character of a group before they start posting.
At least on the unicycling forum, people tend to be regulars and to be
familiar with the character of the forum/newsgroup.
--
Danny Colyer (the UK company has been laughed out of my reply address)
<URL:http://www.speedy5.freeserve.co.uk/danny/>
"He who dares not offend cannot be honest." - Thomas Paine
