OT posts? How about shunning them as a solution......

[John Robertson]

Once in a while I get tired of all the OT posts by folks that seem to
think we have no news sources of our own.

The noise to signal ratio here has certainly increased in the last month
or two...

I\'d ask that only subjects aligned with the newsgroup heading are
appropriate or responded to but these characters think someone is
interested IF they get replies.

Nuf said.

John :-#(#

 

[Dimiter_Popoff]

On 6/24/2022 22:24, John Robertson wrote:

Once in a while I get tired of all the OT posts by folks that seem to
think we have no news sources of our own.

The noise to signal ratio here has certainly increased in the last month
or two...

I\'d ask that only subjects aligned with the newsgroup heading are
appropriate or responded to but these characters think someone is
interested IF they get replies.

Nuf said.

John :-#(#

It is not the OT posts, many of which are OK, if we talk only on
topic the group will rapidly die.
It is the trolls - we all know who they are and many of us could do
a better job ignoring them. Not sure it would help as they are
more than one and feed each other though, so probably no workable
solution. One of them tried to post to CAE and after getting zero
responses to their two posts seems to have given up.

 

[Don Y]

On 6/24/2022 1:50 PM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:

On 6/24/2022 22:24, John Robertson wrote:
Once in a while I get tired of all the OT posts by folks that seem to think
we have no news sources of our own.

The noise to signal ratio here has certainly increased in the last month or
two...

I\'d ask that only subjects aligned with the newsgroup heading are appropriate
or responded to but these characters think someone is interested IF they get
replies.

Nuf said.

John :-#(#

It is not the OT posts, many of which are OK, if we talk only on
topic the group will rapidly die.

Yup. USENET stopped being a source of information decades ago.
There are simply too many other/better sources available to folks,
nowadays (personal contacts, mailing lists, forums). All of these
have the advantage of effectively being *moderated*.

[An email correspondent can \"go dark\" if your contacts \"wander\";
you can be booted from a mailing list/forum for similar reasons.]

USENET is the \"virtual pub\" wherein folks \"shoot the shit\" about
<whatever> with little expectation of targeted replies. If you don\'t
like what the guy on the next barstool is yacking about, get up and
move.

On topic posts here tend to be \"Gee, look what I did!\", \"This is a problem
I\'m having; have I overlooked anything?\", or \"There doesn\'t seem to be an
clean solution to address this issue; are there any OtB ideas that I
should explore?\"

It is the trolls - we all know who they are and many of us could do
a better job ignoring them. Not sure it would help as they are
more than one and feed each other though, so probably no workable
solution. One of them tried to post to CAE and after getting zero
responses to their two posts seems to have given up.

 

[John Doe]

Don Y <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:

> Yup. USENET stopped being a source of information decades ago.

But you\'re still here.

There are simply too many other/better sources available to folks,
nowadays (personal contacts, mailing lists, forums). All of these
have the advantage of effectively being *moderated*.

That\'s probably true for many groups, but as I have asked before...

Point to one such group for electronics design.

 

[Fred Bloggs]

On Friday, June 24, 2022 at 3:24:25 PM UTC-4, John Robertson wrote:

Once in a while I get tired of all the OT posts by folks that seem to
think we have no news sources of our own.

The noise to signal ratio here has certainly increased in the last month
or two...

I\'d ask that only subjects aligned with the newsgroup heading are
appropriate or responded to but these characters think someone is
interested IF they get replies.

Nuf said.

You have no control over what gets posted so get over it. If you don\'t like OT then don\'t read them.

John :-#(#

 

[Rich S]

On Saturday, June 25, 2022 at 7:51:38 PM UTC, Fred Bloggs wrote:

On Friday, June 24, 2022 at 3:24:25 PM UTC-4, John Robertson wrote:
Once in a while I get tired of all the OT posts by folks that seem to
think we have no news sources of our own.

The noise to signal ratio here has certainly increased in the last month
or two...

I\'d ask that only subjects aligned with the newsgroup heading are
appropriate or responded to but these characters think someone is
interested IF they get replies.

Nuf said.

I hear you John. This & other \'profession-oriented\'
newsgroups rely on the good will of mature
people. These groups were small enclaves
within the vast wilderness of the internet. But the ratio
(topical / non-topical) shifted as collective will shifted.
There simply more of \"them\" than \"us\".
There are several reasons, and I\'m not sure that much
could be done, i.e., to reach out to other engineering professionals,
technicians, professors, and college students -- but
other more modern internet platforms get all the
love.
= Rich S.

 

[Bertrand Sindri]

John Robertson <spam@flippers.com> wrote:

Once in a while I get tired of all the OT posts by folks that seem to
think we have no news sources of our own.

The noise to signal ratio here has certainly increased in the last month
or two...

I\'d ask that only subjects aligned with the newsgroup heading are
appropriate or responded to but these characters think someone is
interested IF they get replies.

This is exactly why killfiles exist. They let you clean up the cruft
yourself. Adding always.look@message.header, manta103g@gmail.com,
user@example.net, soar2morrow@yahoo.com, dtgamer99@gmail.com,
skybuckflying@gmail.com and bill.sloman@ieee.org to your killfile would
immediately remove almost all the OT stuff from your view of the group.