Answer Of The Week

• Answer to: "Why not carry?" From Bob Seaborn
• Answer to: "Why not carry?" from Renato Zambon

Answer to: "Why not carry?"
From Bob Seaborn

Note: This was sent to me by Bob Seaborn with permission to print in the Fidonews

Evening Frank,

Regarding the recent issue of Fidonews, in which you stated:

"In an article last week, Renato Zambon wrote about becoming the Z4C. My congratulations to him.

Part of the article mentioned Echomail areas available in his Zone. I've heard that there are many Echomail areas in other Zones that are not carried in Zone 1. My questions:

Why not?

Why shouldn't the Backbones in Zone 1 carry some of these echos?

There are those in Zone 1 that speak other languages. Why not give them a chance to get message echos in their language, or better yet, from their homeland? For that matter, why shouldn't all Zones carry echos from other Zones?"

I would like to advise you that I have been offered numerous echos (50-100) from zone 2, some in English from the UK Backbone which I have a direct link with, and some from other parts of Z2, mostly non-English. However, I am reluctant to make them available within zone 1, primarily because the echo, shall we call it policies?, of z2 differ widely from those in z1. Primarily in the echolisting requirements. Not that I'm a stickler for requiring an echo to be elisted before transporting it. Far from it, more to avoid the problems like we saw some time ago when Ward Dossche asked the ZHubs in zone 1 to distribute his ZCC-PUBLIC echo, which he didn't bother elisting. Then after a short while Bob Moravsik proceeded to elist the same echo-tag, then demanded that we ZHubs cease transporting 'his' echo. It took some time, plus yelling and screaming before we could convince Moravsik that we were NOT transporting his echo, but that of Ward Dossche, which used the same echo-tag.

With all the 'rescuers' and 'saviours' out there, plus the few individuals that appear to delight in deliberately causing problems, I see no need to aid them by transporting un-elisted echos that just scream to be hijacked. Factor in that most likely there will be a fair number of non-English speaking moderators, and all we'll see is confusion and trouble. None of which I think Fido needs at this time.

As a matter of interest, I am most willing to work with ANY non-zone1 moderators to get their echos elisted, and I have a Robot equipped to automagically update their echo every month, in such a way that there's no mention of the Robot anywhere, each moderator receives a direct acknowledgement of the submission direct from the Elist Robot. I have no plans to be involved in moderation, and I am not listed in the Elist entry for these echos. If this will help some moderators, fine, if they wish to make their own arrangements, excellent.

Anyhow, I hope this serves as a partial answer to the question that you raised.

.....Bob

Fido: 1:140/12
email: bob@nwstar.com

Answer to "Why not carry?"
From Renato Zambon

Editor:
In last weeks "Question of the Week" section, I asked why there weren't more echos from other Zones and in other languages available in the Zone 1 backbones. Renato Zambon replied to me with this explaination and permission to print it.

Renato:
Lack of interest, lack of other languages knowledge, lack of well organized information about these areas, a combination of these reasons I think. The last however is being worked with aid of the WWB (World Wide Backbone). Here is the part about regional and other languages echolists from the weekly information file backstat.ww (I did strip some space columns, and day in file dates, to adjust at 70 so you can place this message in Fidonews):

-----8<-----
3. World Wide Backbone Regional Echolists

Filename      Size  Date Description
------------ ----- ----- ---------------------------------
WWB-BRA.480   1302 03/01 Brazilian Portuguese echos
                             via 4:801/161
WWB-DUFR.229  7445 01/01 Belgian Dutch/French echos
                             via 2:292/624
WWB-FIN.222   3618 04/01 Zone 2 Finnish echos
                             via 2:221/0
WWB-FRA.230    318 10/99 Switzerland French echos
                             via 2:301/1
WWB-GER.224  43549 01/01 Zone 2 Region 24 German echos
                             Forward List
WWB-GER.230   2343 10/99 Switzerland German echos
                             via 2:301/1
WWB-IL.240     482 10/00 Israel R40 public echoes
WWB-IRL.226    588 12/00 Regional echos from Ireland R26
                             via 2:263/950
WWB-ITA.233   8058 02/00 Zone 2 Region 33 Italian echos
                             Forward List
WWB-MD.240    1029 10/00 Moldova public echoes
                             (Russian, Romanian)
WWB-POL.248   5215 11/00 Polish EchoMail
                             via 2:480/112
WWB-RUS.250  78463 02/99 Russian echos
                             (Region 50 backbone echolist)
WWB-SPA.234  10887 03/01 Spanish echos
                             via 2:341/14@fidonet
WWB-SWE.220  15038 04/01 Swedish echos
                             via 2:20/11

Bones of Regional listings are generally in their native language. Sysops desiring further information, english translations, hub locations etc are advised to seek support in the WWB_TECH echoarea. Regional echolists are distributed in the WWB_FWDL file echo.

Naming Conventions: Regional forward lists are prefixed "WWB-" followed by a three letter language designation eg: SWE for Swedish. The suffix format is .<Zone><Region><Region> Thus WWB-SWE.220 is a Regional forward list on the WWB distribution containing Swedish echos from Zone 2 Region 20. Submissions must follow this convention.

Regional forward lists are controlled by the REC or Distribution Hub of the list origin, and as such the REC/Hub is considered Moderator/ Owner of all echoareas on that list. WWB distribute for the echo owner, the owner of the echo retains all administrative control.

Regional list Owners may include information within the Regional list file as to Hub locations, distribution and/or any special circumstances/rules associated with any or all of the list echos. Connecting systems should read the list file of any Regional echoarea for further information.
-----8<-----

The listed files are, or must be, available for FREQ with these sysops/nodes:

Joe Jared 1:103/301
Sven Dueker 2:2432/200
Barry Blackford 3:774/605
Renato Zambon 4:801/161

And also in the anonymous ftp://glonet.co.nz.