Re: Root Terminal Security Question

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Date: Tue, 13 Jul 2004 18:10:22 GMT

Mark Nagy wrote:
> On Tue, 13 Jul 2004 06:42:29 GMT, Alan Connor <zzzzzz@xxx.yyy> wrote:
>
>
>>[...] Many people who value the Usenet will just silently killfile you.
>>
>>This is very effective in the long run. You don't see a lot of over-
>>sized signatures on the Usenet, do you?
>
>
> Surely you realize that is specious? Perhaps the reason you don't see a lot of
> people with pet frogs in glowing backpacks is that you discouraged them by not
> saying anything? I'd guess you were joking, but a lot of otherwise seemingly
> lucid people act like they think being unexplainedly difficult is the best way
> to "send a message" to someone who bugs them without knowing it. Of course it's
> hard to be *sure* that's why they act that way - unless they say so. Even if
> their pet peeves are published prominently, so are many things that many people
> - including punitively annoyed people - *don't* care about, or even strongly
> *prefer* too see disregarded. If you're going to get in a huff over minutiae -
> however much more of an expert you are in the associated subject - hiding the
> reason isn't just not "nice" - it's dumb. I don't question that you probably
> know many things I don't, and probably know people who share your assumptions,
> but do you really think strangers around the world who don't even get so much as
> a sign that you read their message know you chose to ignore it for a particular
> reason. I'm sorry if I abused the group by saying this, but sometimes
> unquestioned bull is more harmful than breaches of protocol...

Hey Mark,

I've been thinking about this "over length tagline" issue for a wee bit
now and I can't shake the idea that it's a load of crap.

I've been online in one form or another since 1989 and I've seen some
problems, I've seen some annoyances and I've seen some real joy in
everything from Fidonet to Usenet. Frankly this issue reflects some of
the problems with the vast size of "The Internet" -- people forget that
there are other *people* on the other end of these messages.

I mentioned to Mr. Connor, who has graciously offered to correct and
ignore me, that I haven't heard this 4-line convention. Actually, I do
recall some usenet tutorial that prescribed a max of four lines. If I
recall correctly it was based on a rationale that more than four lines
was prone to gratuitous advertising, wasted bandwidth, and four lines
ought to be enough for anybody, ahem.

I have every reason to believe that there are folks out there not
reading my posts for a wide variety of reasons. That is their
prerogative. What I don't know won't hurt me, but consider -- as a
result I may go on uninformed about the issue and open my machine to all
sorts of security issues like a vast number of other users out there.
I'm on a Linux box now, but how many Windows users are maintaining
Zombie machines because they don't post questions (with or without
egregiously long taglines) asking if it's okay to have a user account
with no password while they are permanently connected to a broadband
Internet connection, etc.?

And the amount of bandwidth saved by limiting tags to four lines pales
in comparison to the amount of bandwidth spent debating this issue. As
for content, it's much easier to simply ignore posts based on an
objective measure like size. If I spent all four of my taglines
offering Viagra or penis enlargement adds would I be criticized?

On second thought, is there somebody that will pay me to do just that?

The virtue of a strict four line limit on taglines has yet to be
demonstrated to me. As a result of my saying so, I expect to receive at
least one response chastising me for wasting time and space, and
inviting me to get the hell out of the newsgroup so I stop wasting
bandwidth and the time it takes "real professionals" to killfile me.

In deference to the "real professionals" out there, I have eliminated
one line from my tagline ("You can take my life, but you can never take
MY ENTERTAINMENT!" -- Mel Gibson) and I will voluntarily unsubscribe
from the two security newsgroups I subscribed to yesterday, thus saving
folks here from having to go to all the trouble of creating a filter
just for me.

Now, EVERYBODY BACK TO WORK! :-)

-- 
Mark E. Adams, 2004 -- drop the "dot" to email me.            line 1
                                                               line 2 
CONSIDER: ===========---------,,,,,,,,,............. . .  .  .line 3
The qotc (quote of the con) was Liz's:                        line 4
	"My brain is paged out to my liver."                  line 5
                                                         Damn!
                                                         Ach!! line 7

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