Newsgroups: comp.robotics
Path: brunix!uunet!munnari.oz.au!spool.mu.edu!enterpoop.mit.edu!micro-heart-of-gold.mit.edu!news.media.mit.edu!fredm
From: fredm@media.mit.edu (Fred G Martin)
Subject: Mini Board traffic
Message-ID: <1993Jan5.055631.18966@news.media.mit.edu>
Sender: news@news.media.mit.edu (USENET News System)
Organization: MIT Media Laboratory
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 05:56:31 GMT
Lines: 36

I'm surprised that several netters feel so strongly that the goings-on
regarding the Mini Board is inappropriate for this newsgroup.  

Some have referred to the Mini Board as a "product."  I wonder if it
is clear that nobody who's been involved in acquiring parts, printing
and distributing boards, or etc. is making money on this---it's not a
commercial venture, and shouldn't be thought of as such.  (Some
people, like Alan Kilian, even sold their parts for a loss, not really
a good business strategy ;-( )

Perhaps you nay-sayers will consider this:  I receive a fairly steady,
though not heavy, stream of requests for more information about the
Mini Board.  I have a stock reply for these people, so it doesn't take
up much of my time to respond, but I'll bet many of these folks would
not hear of the project if not for the mundane traffic about ordering
parts, etc. 

Given that the volume of this newsgroup is really quite small compared
with most, I would ask you to consider not having such a harsh
attitude to a little noise traffic about the Mini Board---if it is
just a minor annoyance, isn't making an entry into your kill file an
appropriate response?

Finally, thanks to the work of another net citizen---Greg Kulosa
(gkulosa@oberon.com)---there will soon be a Mini Board mailing list,
so the point will be moot.  I do hope that some traffic continues to
spill over to this group though, so that new readers can get curious
as to "what is that durned thing?!".

	- Fred



P.S.  If you are one of these new readers, you can find out about the
Mini Board by FTP'ing to cher.media.mit.edu and looking at the file
pub/miniboard/info.
