18 Jun
2001
18 Jun
'01
7:01 a.m.
Douglas Quebbeman skrev:
out
> Since most vintage machines can't run
TCP/IP but CAN run uucp, would
> there be any interest in a dialup uucp node for retrieving email, files,
> etc specifically geared toward vintage machines?
I've been thnking of this in a bit wider
context.
With some of the changes happening on the
Internet, it's
not quite as friendly as it used to be. An alternative
network seems like a good solution, and uucp as been
with us for a long time. We could even host rogue USENET
newsgroups.
IMO it's the opposite. Everyone's so friendly they've got molasses running
of their arses. What the net would need would be some
good olf-fashioned
intolerance.
There's a Star Trek:NG episode where Picard meets a Captain of another
ship from a civilization where no one speaks in specifics, but in metaphor.
I felt very at-home with these fictional aliens, as I tend to speak in
metaphor as well.
Having said that, I meant friendly in what must have been a less-than-
apparant fashion. It's unfriendly in that too much traffic is channeled
through supernodes whose stability is questionable. It's unfriendly in
that you never know when a portal is going to suddenyl start sending
you cookies or snooping up your wazoo with clear gifs, and while all
this huge volume of web surfing and streaming-audio-and-video clogs
up the Net, it makes it damned near impossible to get e-mail and news
feeds through.
But yeah, a dose of intolerance can be healthy; I always think of
Peter Finch in "Network": "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take
it anymore!"
-dq