Hello Roy.

30 May 06 12:06, you wrote to me:

 MvdV>> P4 was written with little or no concern for the situation
 MvdV>> outside Z1 period.

 RW> I'm sure that it wasn't, but then, there's been too many
 RW> interpretations that are in error from Z2.

Who is to judge what interpretations are in error? We have no independent
judges and the original writers have all left.

 MvdV>> For one it tacitly assumes local calls are free.

 RW> And they are.

In most parts of the US and Canada. In most other parts of the world local
calls are not free.

 MvdV>> So it does not matter who calls who when it comes to the host's
 MvdV>> obligation of delivering incoming routed mail.

 RW> The host isn't obligated to deliver routed mail, only coordinate it's
 RW> delivery or pickup.

Right....

 RW> It's been my experience that a host will require those sysops under it
 RW> to fetch their own mail from the host or hub.

A requirement that is outside policy and therefore falls under the header
of a dictatorial decree.

 MvdV>> In Z2 local calls are *not* free and so it does matter who
 MvdV>> calls who. That is just one example, there are many others.

 RW> As I described it above.

Dictatorship....

 RW>>> Of course, but many of them didn't know best and they had no
 RW>>> common sense. Many of them ran their nets and regions like a
 RW>>> dictatorship...

 MvdV>> Actually in the past when FidoNet was run by the technicians,
 MvdV>> the *C's ever so often *did* know best.

 RW> Ummmm, those were the dictators I pointed out above.

A dictatorship *can* be an effective way to run something. It has proven to
be the best way to run a ship...

 RW> It is only lately that things have been freed up.

Unfortunately in most cases the dictatorships were replaced by anarchie.
Which got us from the fire into the frying pan.

 MvdV>> Now that the technicians have left and the politicians have
 MvdV>> taken over, it has become a free for all with little or no
 MvdV>> regard for what once was called "the smooth operation of the
 MvdV>> network" .....

 RW> I find the network is operating smoother than it has in the past.

Really? It has become a free for all. The nodelist is a mess and does not
reflect reality, routing ever so often leads into a black hole, *Cs are
asleep with their system on autopilot, universal connectivity is down the
drain. I think the network is on the verge of collaps.

 RW> Nobody is enforcing ZMH, for instance.

And that, is not an improvement. Ignoring ZMH is detrimental to connectivity IMNSHO.

 RW>  Well, maybe in Z2.

Hardly. In the past NCs used to do regular checks to see if the nodes were
still on-line. Now many are afraid for what they will find: black holes. So
now they refrain from checking lest they would have to strike half the
nodes from their nodelist segment.... :-(

Michiel

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