Re: The FAQ system approaches obsolescence. What do we do now?

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Eric S. Raymond (esr@locke.ccil.org)
Mon, 5 Dec 1994 22:25:17 -0500 (EST)


>1. FAQ's originated from the desire to cut down on news traffic as more and
> more new users flooded groups with frequently asked questions, most of which
> had a simple "textbook" answer. True, they have evolved into a valuable
> information resource beyond this original aim, and for other purposes WWW
> access may be a better access method, but the need to provide readily
> accessible answers to frequent questions in the newsgroup itself is not
> fading or becoming obselete in any way. There are more new users hitting
> Usenet now than ever before, and they've got lots of questions to ask and
> need to be able to find the answers already in the newsgroup if we don't
> want to be deluged.

You have a point here. FAQ format will continue to be optimal for topics that
really are newsgroup-centered --- that is, until newsreaders develop hooks to
Web browsers.

> 2. Not everyone has WWW access. WWW access requires IP, and not everyone has
> that.

WWW won't require IP for long. I know of a couple of different approaches to
this being worked on now.

-- 
					Eric S. Raymond <esr@locke.ccil.org>
					WWW: //www.thyrsus.com/~esr/home.html


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