Nan:2006-08-17-zenith-lcc

From: board@big-8.org (The Big-8 Management Board)
Subject: 3rd RFD: remove comp.sys.zenith (LAST CALL FOR COMMENTS)
Newsgroups: news.announce.newgroups, news.groups, comp.sys.zenith,
 comp.sys.zenith.z100
Followup-To: news.groups
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2006 15:07:11 -0700

                      REQUEST FOR DISCUSSION (RFD)
                      remove comp.sys.zenith-reorg

This is a formal Request For Discussion (RFD) to remove the
newsgroup comp.sys.zenith.


PROCEDURE:

The B8MB plans to begin voting on this proposal after five days.  Please
offer any final discussion or comments before the end of this waiting
period.  Voting may take up to one week (7 days); a result will be posted
following the end of the voting period.

All discussion of this proposal should be posted to news.groups.

The full (draft) group removal procedure is documented here:

  http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=policies:rmgroup



SUMMARY OF DISCUSSION:

There was some confusion as to whether comp.sys.zenith (csz) or
comp.sys.zenith.z100 (csz.z100) was proposed for removal.  It is
comp.sys.zenith that is proposed for removal. The absence of a "parent"
group has no effect on the other groups.  In this particular case,
csz.z100 existed quite alone in standard Big 8 distribution for 13 years,
before csz was promoted.

The origins of the two groups are murky, but both might have been
INET groups, with the more active group, csz.z100, receiving an early
promotion in 1987. Both groups were gatewayed to mailing lists in 1987.
comp.sys.zenith was gatewayed to Heath-People, which was a successor
to H19-People.  According to early List of Lists, the name change was
intended to reflect that the list also discussed the H88, H89, H100, Z19,
and Z100. csz.z100 was gatewayed to INFO-HZ100.  INFO-HZ100 may have been
the much more active list.

Early in the period which Google has archived, persons who wanted to
discuss the pre-Z100 Heath computers and terminals were directed to the
INET group csz, while those who wanted to discuss the Z286 and Z386 were
directed to comp.sys.ibm.pc since they were simply PC clones distinguished
only by their brand name.  Nonetheless, as the INET group csz leaked, it
came to be dominated by Z286 and Z386 discussion, and it was a much busier
group during the early 1990s than csz.z100.

Over time, the discussion of the Z286 and Z386 have essentially
disappeared leaving csz almost empty.  The occasional discussion of
pre-Z100 computers (H89, etc.) has been about evenly split between the
two groups, csz and csz.100. While the Z100 (and H100) use a different
microprocessor, they may share more of the pre-Zenith, Heath cultural
heritage.  There is no indication that these rare posts were unwelcome.

Over the previous 11 months, there have only been 3 "Zenith" related
messages in csz.  One was about the Z100.  One was about a Zenith DVD/VCR
player that is in the wrong hierarchy and manufactured by a different
Zenith.  And one was an unanswered question about an H8.  This was the
only one that belonged in the group.

To reflect that csz.z100 historically has been, and likely will continue
to be used for occasional messages about the pre-Z100 computers, a change
is proposed to the newsgroups line for comp.sys.zenith.z100:

comp.sys.zenith.z100	Heath & Zenith computers, Z-100 series and others.


RATIONALE: remove comp.sys.zenith-reorg

comp.sys.zenith possibly has had 3 on-topic messages in the past 11
months.  One was specific to the Z100.  This extremely light discussion can be
accomodated by comp.sys.zenith.z100.  It is proposed that a change in the
description of the latter group be made to reflect its slightly broadened scope.

This RFD is part of a proposal to remove 31 low-traffic former-INET
groups.  Please see article <1152814343.19576@isc.org>, available here:

    http://news.killfile.org/?group=news.announce.newgroups&number=1363

Note: the proposal to remove two of the 31 groups, comp.os.rsts and
comp.std.announce, has been withdrawn.


HISTORY:

comp.sys.zenith has existed as an INET group at least since 1987.  It was
promoted to the standard Big 8 distribution in October 2000.


DISTRIBUTION:

This document has been posted to the following newsgroups:

  news.announce.newgroups
  news.groups
  comp.sys.zenith
  comp.sys.zenith.z100


CHARTER:

The newsgroup line is:

comp.sys.zenith		Heath terminals and related Zenith products.


PROPONENT:

Jim Riley <jimrtex@pipeline.com>



CHANGE HISTORY:

2006-08-17     3rd RFD (Last Call for Comments)
2006-07-13     2nd ("comprehensive") RFD
2006-07-06     1st RFD