4 ms·
> USENET had many excellent corners as well as places where you could witness or, if desired, participate in, full-on fecal matter throwing contests. Not sure w
by bityard 3y ago
> USENET had many excellent corners as well as places where you could witness or, if desired, participate in, full-on fecal matter throwing contests. Not sure why people think it was some idyllic environment different from anything seen today.
I was fairly late to the game, but by the time I was on usenet, it was _mostly_ full of spam and flamewars, with only a few "moderated" groups being of value. (And even those tended to be populated mainly by, shall we say, "outspoken" individuals.)
- jandrese 3y agoThe eternal September is living proof that no discussion system can scale without robust moderation. Usenet worked when it was a handful of academics, students, and professionals. Once the average Joe got access it went downhill in a hurry, especially on the groups that had the broadest appeal. rec.music was hopeless, but rec.music.classical.guitar would probably be pretty good. Even Reddit shows this, with the default (the ones you get if you don't login) subreddits being a sea of trash but a lot of value to be found in the more specialized subreddits.
- beej71 3y agoThe only people who would be willing to sign everything and build a web of trust would be a handful of academics, students, and professionals. I wonder if that could act as a gateway.