Hello Roy!

On Tuesday December 05 2006 11:03, you wrote to me:

 MvdV>> What we have seen is the emergence of ION RCs and hosts.

 RW> Yes. To the detriment of the network.

To the detriment of the network indeed. It started with ION nodes. Then we
got ION hosts and hubs and now we have ION RCs. The latter still limited to
Z1 and Z6. Yet...

 RW> There are several RCs in Z1 listed that way with no POTS in their
 RW> listings. There are 4 RCs listed with POTS vs 6 without POTS, plus
 RW> there is no way to reach those without other than via their ION
 RW> listing.

The majority of the nodes in FidoNet still depends on POTS for their
connectivity. Therefore ION *Cs should be strongly discouraged. I have
difficulty accepting that regions 10, 13, 15, 18 and 19 can not come up
with a suitable candidate that can provide POTS connectivity. They are not
one man regions....

 RW> Even that is not a given. R10C was never online while I lived in that
 RW> region

I *did* send her some mail a couple of years ago through her binkp server....

 RW>  and for all I know, still isn't.

Then how did you get your mail? I recall you mentoning netmail to you could
be routed through her?

 MvdV>> This however is a new developement that puts us further down on
 MvdV>> thge slope. Terry Roati is not ION, he not reachable at all.
 MvdV>> Not by POTS/ISDN and not by InterNet.

 RW> He supposedly has a website, but I havn't been there in a very long
 RW> time, so I don't know that it's still working.

He may have an e-mail and a snail mail address as well. Doesn't matter, as
far as FidoNet is concerned he is uncontactable.

 RW>>> We can't expect Fidonet to grow with this happening.

 MvdV>> What we can expect is it to quickly desintegrate this way.

 RW> Had I been a newbie when trying to get listed in R19 when I moved
 RW> here, I would have been out of luck, as the R19C's POTS never answered
 RW> my calls.
 RW> I had to route my netmail through 1:379/1 - who is in R18.

One can not expect newbies to find their way into the network under those conditions.

ION RCs are a no-no, but titally unreachable RCs like we see in Z6 are
worse. How can anyone possibly perfrom his duties RCs if he is
incommunicado?

 MvdV>> The most optimistic count of zone 6 tells us there are eight
 MvdV>> sysops left. A more realistic count says two or three. How hard
 MvdV>> can it be to relocate them to another zone?

 RW> xxcarol claimed that there's a lot of work involved.

It can't be more work than merging R28 and R29. That was done two years ago
and once it was decided, it took a week.

 RW> Move those who respond to netmail to a new zone and let the others
 RW> know about the move when they get in touch.

And if they do not get in touch within a reasonable time frame, just drop
them. The latter is what should have been done anyway. Nodes that have
dropped over the light horizon, it serves no puprose to keep them in the
nodelist.

 CS>>>> The ship (XO) wants me to extend onboard really bad and will
 CS>>>> get it approved if i ask.  Something about me being able to
 CS>>>> reliably handle 1.6M$ in training funds which isnt an easy
 CS>>>> skill to find or learn.

 MvdV>> The sad reality is that Z6 is too small to function as a zone.
 MvdV>> Not enough manpower left to run the show.

 RW> Not to mention that those who're left are listed as RCs with no nets
 RW> in their regions.

Dead wood. Time to clean it out.

 MvdV>> If the best they can come up with for ZC is someone who is away
 MvdV>> from the system for 6 month of the year, and if they are
 MvdV>> totally dependent on Z1 systems to move their mail, I think
 MvdV>> enough is said.

 RW> According to the person with that Z1 mail link, sometimes she doesn't
 RW> get any mail while at sea, leaving the other 6 people in the zone
 RW> without mail until she returns to port.

It is my understanding that the other 6 do *not* get their mail from Carol.
So where do they get it from? (If they get it at all) Presumably from Bob
S, or Janis. Demonstrating once more that they totally depend on Z1 for
their mail.

 MvdV>> Sad, but those are the hard facts. Denying the facts and living
 MvdV>> in a dream world has never gotten anyone anywhere.

 RW> Well, it did get xxcarol a ZC position.

Sooner or later the navy will send her somewhere else. If she has not taken
care of things by then, things will take care of themselves. She can choose
between closing shop in an orderly fashion or go down in FidoNet history as
the first ZC to abandon ship....

 RW>>> They don't seem to be too worried about whether or not they're
 RW>>> available for Fidonet activity - time to cut them loose...

 MvdV>> He, we agree! Let's not make a habit of it. ;-)

 RW> We have to start agreeing sooner or later, Michiel. Or we won't have
 RW> anything to do but argue when the rest of this crew are gone. :o)

Hmmm.. I see. If we end up the last two nodes left, we shall just have to
find a way to keep the mail flowing between the two of us. So it might be a
good idea to save some ammo for later....


Cheers, Michiel

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