Hello Steven,

 MvdV>> Since 1978 when I came to live in Driebergen again, my phone
 MvdV>> number has changed three times. Never lost a friend over it.

 SH> You live in the Netherlands, a country where one can be
 SH> anywhere one wants to be in three hours or so.  I can't get
 SH> out of the Yukon in three hours and even getting to
 SH> Vancouver takes 2.5 hours by plane and 24 hours by car.  I
 SH> have friends and acquaintances stretching across 4000+
 SH> miles and one has to work at retaining those.

I fail to see the relevance. For friends that make contact through FidoNet,
it does not matter if they are on the next block or on the other side of
the world. For the virtual community physical distance is irrelevant. So
how is you situation different from mine in regard with loosing friends by
a change of node number?

Incidentally, my FidoNet address changed five times since I started playing
with mailers. Never lost a friend over that either.

 MvdV>> A node that is not directly reachable needs another node that
 MvdV>> will accpet the mail for him/her. The host is the logical place
 MvdV>> for that.

 SH> But my node is directly reachable.  That you can't reach it
 SH> is not my problem but others can and do.

More than half of the FidoNet community can not reach you directly. That
/should/ bother you. Your presence in the nodelist is not just there for
your own personal satisfaction you know, it is there for the benefit of
others. So that they can contact you. You could at least have the courtesy
to see to it that those that can not reach you directly should at least be
able to do so via host routing.

Also you are contradicting yourself. You worry about loosing friends over a
change of node number. You are afraid you may loose contact. yet it does
not bother you in the least that over half of the FidoNet community can not
reach you directly. Strange.

 MvdV> And before someone starts hollering "ION discrimination" I should
 MvdV> add that that goes for POTS as well. POTS nodes should not be
 MvdV> RIN or ZIN either, they should be in a net where they can be
 MvdV> reached by host routing. Unless there is a sound /technical/
 MvdV> reason why this is not feasible.

 SH> When my system was a POTS system, it was accessible to
 SH> anyone who wanted to call it.

When your system was a POTS system, ION's could not reach you directly.

 SH> That did not happen very often but I had calls from places as
 SH> far away as Amsterdam.

Your point being?

 MvdV>> Yes it does. Lok it up in FTS-5000. "Pvt" means
"not callable by
 MvdV>> POTS" and that is exactly what you are.

 SH> I'd suggest you re-read FTS-5000 again.  Note the following
 SH> copied from that document:

Ah, yes that is the version that expired last year. It no longer reflects
current practise.

Current practise is that "Pvt' mans not reachable by POTS. IP mailers
either do not use the nodelist at all or ignore the Pvt keyword.

 SH> IP nodes have listed numbers are listed addresses and are
 SH> not "Pvt".

Since the meaning of "Pvt" changed to "not callable by
POTS", they are.

 MvdV>> It does. P4 says you should as a minimum be reachable
 MvdV>> during ZMH. Your "number" of 000-000-000 does not answer
 MvdV>> during ZMH. You MvdV> are in violation of policy.

 SH> If my number was listed as 000-216.126.122.38 which is

But it isn't. It is listed as 000-000-000 and that can not be an IP number
so it must be a telephone number.

 SH> to it.  And if the authors of FTS-5000 had understood that
 SH> IP nodes that did not have fixed IP addresses would obtain
 SH> fixed domain addresses to deal with this, the number field
 SH> could contain sequences like "000-northof60.tzo.com"

The authors of FTS-5000 are technicians, not laywers. They understand that
putting "000-northof60.tzo.com" in the phone number field of the
nodelist will break a LOT of existing software.

 MvdV>> There is an even greater part that needs new software (that is
 MvdV>> not presently available) to handle your case properly.

 SH> What new software?

A new mailer and nodelist compiler for one. My present mailer does not know
what to do with a telephone number of all zeros. You could help me by being
listed in a normal met with a Pvt keyword so that my mailer knows not to
call that number and divert to the host, But that you refuse t cooperate.
You compel me to get new software.

Software that as I said isn't even available rigt now. No software can
correctly handle a phone number of all zeros.

 SH> Anyone who needs to connect with me directly needs
 SH> only BinkD software and an Internet connection.

But I HAVEN'T GOT THAT!

Getting Binkd and an internet connection IS getting new software, don't you see that?

And for your information, there is no such thing as truly free InetNet access here.

 MvdV>> That does not change the fact that you are selfish. The
 MvdV>> way you are listed causes problems for many and that is
 MvdV>> annoying. The problem can be solved. But you refuse to
 MvdV>> change your node number because you do not want to let
 MvdV>> go of your "vanity plates".

 SH> The way I am listed may have slight glitches which will be
 SH> fixed as soon as I can reach my RC.  But the listing is for
 SH> the most part acceptable in Zone 1 which is still where I
 SH> am located.

The world of FidoNet is bigger than Zone 1 and zone 1 is not an island. The
way you are listed is considered problematic by a large part of the FidoNet
community. If the members of zone 1 ignore that and insist on that
isolationist attitude of "we do it our way and screw the rest"
than I say the members of zone 1 are arrogant and selfish and that attitude
needs to change.

Regards, Michiel

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