Coordinator's Corner

The figures ... on a plate ...
By Ward Dossche 2:292/854

Dear Editor,

Just read a recent editorial and I got the writing-itch. I'll quickly entrust the ideas to paper before I get the writing-cramp.

> What's happening on the backbones after George Peace announced that
> he'll be shutting down? I'm getting mixed signals, myself.

Boy, are you right ...

Apart from the loss that the departure of George means it equally showed that there is a sparkle of the old Fidonet alive.

"Whattayamean?" I hear you asking ...

Well, within 24/48 hours of the news about George's departure hitting the wires I started getting all kinds of unsollicited offers to com- mercially pick-up mail elsewhere.

It made me feel alright about Fidonet that the vulture-approach is still very much alive. George isn't gone yet and some people are already picking the skeleton ...

> What's it going to be for the new Millennium? Are the 'bones going
> to settle down to the business of moving mail, or are we going to
> see more of the pointless bickering punctuated by power plays? This
> editor finds prognostication very difficult... especially now that
> the future is getting involved.

Interesting subject too ... lemme see ...

"Moving mail" is one thing ... "where to" is another.

I don't know if the weekly statistics about nodelist-evolution reaches many people but I may have to start publishing it again. Here are today's (Dec.17) figures anyway ...

+--------+-------+----------+----------+----------+----------+--+
!Zone/Jul!Ndl-323!Nodel.-330!Nodel.-337!Nodel.-344!Nodel.-351!%%!
+--------+-------+----------+----------+----------+----------+--+
!  1/351 !  2359 ! 2359    0! 2359    0! 2302  -57! 2280  -22!15!
!  2/351 ! 12038 !12057   19!12078   21!12019  -59!12002  -17!77!
!  3/344 !   208 !  206   -2!  206    0!  197   -9!  197    0! 1!
!  4/351 !   213 !  215    2!  215    0!  215    0!  208   -7! 1!
!  5/344 !    53 !   53    0!   53    0!   53    0!   53    0! 0!
!  6/225 !   916 !  916    0!  916    0!  916    0!  916    0! 6!
+--------+-------+----------+----------+----------+----------+--+
         ! 15787 !15806   19!15827   21!15702 -125!15656  -46!
         +-------+----------+----------+----------+----------+

.... so people can generate their own thoughts.

What these figures don't tell us for example is that Russia (R50) with its 5427 is about 2.5 times as large as zone-1 ... and growing too ...

+--------+-------+----------+----------+----------+----------+
!Reg./Jul!Ndl-323!Nodel.-330!Nodel.-337!Nodel.-344!Nodel.-351!
+--------+-------+----------+----------+----------+----------+
! 50/351 !  5354 ! 5387  +33! 5387    0! 5397  +10! 5427  +30!
+--------+-------+----------+----------+----------+----------+

It also means that the true decline in zone-2, ex.R50, is steeper than shown by the figures.

My intention is not to spark a doomsday-discussion about Fidonet but its participants need to realise that until something dramatical- ly new happens, any politicking and power-games about backbones is a rather silly concept for continuation.

Ward