NANOG, its decline in s/n

Thu Aug 8 14:35:12 UTC 2002

John,

I agree with what you have said.  I too have hosted nanog, and it was 
a pleasure... except if you ran out of cookies.

What I have seen is that nanog was a "community" more then anything 
else.  This list does not only exchange information, it represents 
built relationships among a lot of engineers.  Some go well beyond 
simple business relationship and reach a personal level.

The "old pro's" may simply remember a time not so long ago when nanog 
was 45 people or so in jeans talking about BGP and peering and 
sharing a t-shirt or two.  Nanog pro's remember days when you knew 
everyone on the list and in the room, and knew their histories.  So 
here we are, doing what most old foggies do and talk about the good 
ole days, and how these young whipper snappers dont knew how to 
behave.

The truth is that while operations posts are the norm, an occasion 
piece of slightly off-topic information doesnt bother me, on the 
contrary I think it helps us remember that we are a community.  I 
would love to see an off-topic nanog list we could subscribe to, but 
no efforts to create side lists have seemed to have taken off.

I have noticed that many of the pro's have stopped posting. Is it 
because of their displeasure with the list or is it because now their 
boss's have now subscribed to the list.  It's visibility in the 
internet world has squashed a lot of free discussion on this list is 
my opinion.  Just as your sig mentions "not speaking for anyone else."

And for the record, I learn a lot from the pro's and newbies on this 
list.  So I hope both keep posting, and replying off-list with 
extremely helpful information.   I have appreciated it greatly.

Thanks,
Dave

PS- I have not seen great activity on any peering lists.  Perhaps a 
bot unsubscribed a bunch of people.  If I could be emailed off list, 
I would appreciate any current activities or small lists discussing 
peering openly.  Perhaps something list visible.  Thanks again.

At 1:01 -0700 8/8/02, John M. Brown wrote:
>Having been a participant of the NANOG list since 1995, twice
>a past host of the meetings, and someone that believes we should
>help and educate, I am most concerned over the trend that is
>showing itself here on the list.
>
>This is a list about knowledge, share, help, and operations.
>
>Some on this list are "Old Pro's"  others are just "Old ....."
>
>I see new names, new faces, sometimes the same questions, sometimes
>slight variences of those questions.
>
>What then happens is people attack the sender (heck I've even been
>slightly guilty of this), banish them to newbie.dev.nul.
>
>Threads move quickly from the question to debates on random junk
>and thus become a waste to the community.
>
>When I first got on the Internet, 1984, it was full of cooperative
>and helpful people.  18 years later, not so much.
>
>We have real issues to deal with, DMCA, Clarke, The Implosion of ICANN
>(with means the ITU will run things me thinks, not good), and various
>other laws, acts and general clue.void from .void.gov.
>
>So instead of picking on each other, calling it "standard NANOG hazing"
>or whatever, lets help, be good in our technical honesty, or don't
>post.  If someone doesn't listen to your answer, a BIGGER stick isn't
>going to help, take it private, or move along.
>
>We are all pro's here, right ??  We got a net to run, lets go do it.
>
>respectfully,
>
>john brown
>a person not speaking for anyone else

-- 

David Diaz
dave at smoton.net [Email]
pagedave at smoton.net [Pager]
Smotons (Smart Photons) trump dumb photons