Re: FN-FORUM: Website and program check please

date posted 8th February 2004 17:56

On Sunday 08 Feb 2004 1:07 am, John Bremner wrote:

> Businesses will find Newsthing very useful for legitamate purposes. The=
re
> is a warning on the front page about how to abide by the rules.

John, the only warning I can find is the following buried at number 7 on=20
the terms and conditions:

"Cross-posting to more than 5 Newsgroups is likely to get you banned, as =
is
sending the same message too often to the same newsgroup. You are=20
hereby warned not to do that. If you get banned, it's your own doing,=20
and nothing to do with Newsthing or Dogfast Software."

I ask again, what the hell does "banned" mean? If you mean that=20
indiscriminate use of this tool may result in your ISP pulling your
account, then say so. If, on the other hand you mean that indiscriminate
multiple postings may get cancelled, then tell your potential users about=
=20
it. (http://www.faqs.org/faqs/usenet/spam-faq/)

> >Who are these annoying gits and why do they have no justification
> >for complaint?
>
> There is no justification when a message is on topic, and not cross pos=
ted
> to more than 5 relevant groups. People who complain under these
> circumstances are annoying gits who need to get a life...

If a message is on topic, then it will not generate a complaint. If=20
it's generated a complaint, it was almost certainly off-topic. These=20
"annoying gits who need to get a life" are the user community, the people=
=20
that actually make Usenet worthwhile, instead of any signal being drowned=
=20
out by the noise of advertising.

At no point in your pages do you acknowledge that before posting to a=20
newsgroup one should obtain the FAQ (if available), read it, and follow
any strictures on advertising. I hope that you are familiar with this:
http://www.faqs.org/faqs/usenet/advertising/how-to/part1/ and I think
that you should at least link to it from your pages. After all, a witles=
s
user of your product might find their account cancelled.