[DECtalk] my thoughts

[Tony Baechler]

Hi all.  Sorry in advance for overquoting, but I agree with this 
exactly.  This is my opinion too and is what I was trying to get across to 
Andre and the list.  I personally wouldn't mind maintaining the 
archive.  In the past, this is something I wouldn't do but considering 
Andre's attitude and the general lack of reasonable discussion, I would 
consider it.  I would not maintain it the way it is now.  Some files would 
go away and some would be moved around.  However the archive would still be 
alive, albeit in a different form.  The first thing I would do is get a 
mirror system set up.  I also sent email to Matthew about this.  I would 
buy dec-talk.org or a similar domain.  If none were available, I would use 
dectalk.goldenaudio.net since I can have unlimited subdomains and I own the 
goldenaudio.net domain already.

I will not do anything unless I'm asked by the majority of the list.  As 
has been pointed out, this stuff is fun and everything but it's dead.  I am 
unaware of anything new entering the archive since last November.  If it 
has, I missed it.  I have my own personal copy which I'll probably burn to 
CD, but other than that I have very little interest.  I do not expect 
anyone to donate and I would ask you to not donate to Andre.  No one who 
goes off and swears that much about nothing deserves money.  What we need 
to do here is either move the archive off his server and start our own or 
just let him kill it.  Either way is fine with me, but this constant 
complaining is ridiculous and gets us nowhere.  If it's that big of a deal 
to him, just shut it down.  It's not worth it!  I don't know, it seems as 
if he likes complaining or something.  As he says, he is complaining 
because he can.  I guess it's a power thing or something.  Fine, find a 
different archive to host and complain to someone else.  I don't need it 
and won't deal with it.  His insults don't really bother me because I have 
seen similar things from him and I would expect it.  I honestly don't 
understand why he is complaining so much.  Yes, I have run servers 
before.  I've been there and I know how it is.  I know that your bandwidth 
gets drained to almost nothing.  Really, I understand.  I have had to ask 
people to remove their files before.  It's unfortunate but that's 
life.  You need to do the best you can with limited resources.  My solution 
for the DEC-Talk archive would be to implement a strict bandwidth limiting 
Apache module and only allow mirrors to download from me.  In other words, 
there would be no direct downloads allowed from my server to the 
public.  However, I'm not going to even plan for anything until the list 
decides that this is indeed something they want.  My opinion is as I've 
said to just let it die.  If Jayson wants to host it, that's great with 
me.  He can just keep the static archive going and not allow new 
uploads.  In other words, just keep it around for historical reasons.  I 
wouldn't do that if I maintained it, but I wouldn't really expect any new 
files either.  I'll wait and see what the list thinks.


At 11:54 AM 8/17/2005 +0100, you wrote:
>Hi all,
>I've had a cool summer so far (figuratively speaking).
>I spent a week in Brno (which is why, Shaun, Red dwarf isn't on the dot -
>we have lives, you know).
>
>All this seriousness in the middle of my vacation is a bit too much for my
>poor addled brain awash with sun and fun, so I'll keep this brief:
>
>DECtalk has been fun.  I've had a great time doing this stuff, listening
>to the rest, asking questions.  But there comes a point where things run
>out.
>Was it Andre who said that DECtalk is great when your sixteen and got
>nothing to do in the summer? 'Cos that basically sums it up, it's a laugh
>but hasn't got much of a viable future unless someone keeps the hosting of
>it down.
>I was talking about this yesterday with Matthew and, like most of you,
>figure the archive to be mostly Dead.  There are new files now and then,
>but, by and large, nothing much happens.  Red Dwarf is the exception to
>the rule (and even that has an audience of about 3 people - say 10 to be
>optimistic).
>I'm enjoying it so will continue to the end of 8 - why not?  Even if the
>archive goes down, you guys can listen to the texts (rarely it is I go for
>an mp3) these days.
>I'll be sad to see it go if it does - but the wining, bitching,
>complaining and arguing is just a pointless way not to solve the problem
>because only a few people give a rats ass about this stuff don't they?
>it's not commercially backed or anything, and therefore it's not
>interesting to a vast majority of people.
>
>Personally, I'll use DECtalk to make wacky sounds if I need to, do stupid
>things when I'm bored - that's the entire point of it for me.  I don't use
>it as a day-to-day thing - if I did, it'd lose it's novelty.
>
>So anyway.  Donating doesn't seem to be reaching much of a peek - we have
>mirrors, which is fortunate - and I will get the first rd ep of 6 out this
>week I hope (I have exam results in tomorrow so I might get totally
>hammered if I do well).
>But the one thing I can't do is take all this too seriously, as I said.
>it's fun, it's comedy, it's a laugh.  Turning it into a powerplay for cash
>and bandwidth is just something you do with no real practical result --
>bit like the entire point of making the files in the first place,
>surprisingly enough.
>
>
>
>Ciao,
>Sean R.