Pine controversy

[Lorraine Pozzi]

Isn't it great how Rod always gets right to the heart of the
matter!  Now that I have quite SCN cold turkey, I've been trying
to drum up excitement about online registration -- which has been
kicked around for, uh, lotsa years now.

A couple of questions...

Does Speakeasy still charge a fee for Pine classes?  And how come
Speakeasy users were happy to shell out $$$$ to learn this
extremely "difficult" program when we can't give it away?

Has anyone actually USED one of the recently installed graphical
interface terminals at the Library?  Help on the 1st screen, pre-set
Telnet to SCN just one click away, etc. etc.  Much easier to use than
the text-only terminals.   And aren't all the user's work files
stored on SCNA's computers, or have I missed a point?  Quite likely.
I also note that the new terminals are so popular that at Ballard,
for example, they now have a sign-up sheet for ANY terminal --
partly because of the proliferation of folks signing up for
Hotmail, etc. and spending hours meeting and arguing with their
new cyberfriends.   So SCNA is not the ONLY service impacting the
system.

And a final comment.  None of this, to quote Hillary, amounts
to a hill of beans if there is not board support.  So why aren't
all you opinionated folks running for the board where you can
actually make a difference?  There's lots of room there.

Lorraine
femme2 at scn.org

On Tue, 29 Sep 1998, Rod Clark wrote:

> > What would it take to instead adopt a Web-based e-mail model
> > option for SCN?
> 
> Al, 
> 
>    For examples of how some Web-based e-mail services work, see
> 
>         http://www.scn.org/guide/email.html
> 
> > * Yes, it'd be a programming challenge.  We have smart people,
> > though; I'd bet we can do it if we decide it's a priority.
> 
>    Keep in mind that it took SCN two years to make a standard
> canned e-mail program (Pine) work on SCN. When Lynx needed a
> patch applied to fix a security hole, this took several months,
> and the users complained that many of Lynx's features were
> disabled in the meantime. It has taken over a year now to get a
> standard canned Usenet server program running on SCN3, and it
> still isn't ready. For well over two years now, SCN hasn't been
> able to install a canned FTP server program that everyone can
> use.
> 
>    From your perch over there on the planet Zongo-Bongo, can you
> describe in more detail exactly how SCN would go about
> impersonating a software development company? I'm listening, and
> wearing my funny hat.
> 
>    SCN's only real option is to install standard, well supported
> software that needs an absolute minimum of the very few really
> expert SCN volunteers' time to support it. Only if such software
> is available in a well tested, highly secure, bug free version
> that has been pounded on by many other sites, might installing
> it on SCN be at all practical.
> 
> Rod
> 
> * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  From the Listowner  * * * * * * * * * * * *
> .	To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to:
> majordomo at scn.org		In the body of the message, type:
> unsubscribe scn
> END
> 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *  From the Listowner  * * * * * * * * * * * *
.	To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to:
majordomo at scn.org		In the body of the message, type:
unsubscribe scn
END