> That works as long as folks are ftp'ing their FAQ's. The point you miss,
> though, is that FAQ's are still useful when sent along USENET channels,
> sans ftp, sans http. (So far, no Web browser I've seen does news as well
> as dedicated news readers, and we've talked about the "one size fits all"
> vs. the "specialist program" debate already.)
Considerably more useful I might add to. News in New Zealand has had a well
defined system of average charging set up that makes it a most cost effective
option for networking in NZ. (followed closely by email - this is why UUCP feeds
are still very popular among the home users here, they are cheap.)
FAQs posted to a news group are accordingly the cheapest and most
satifactory way by which most NZ net users will receive them. Any other way
involves extra expense.
The other thing that bothers me with this whole discussion about replacing
posted FAQs with WWW pages, and simply posting pointers to the net, is the
bandwidth increase this will generate. Consider this example, currently a
posted FAQ enters New Zealand over the international link *once* and is then
locally copied and propogated around at a considerably reduced cost over the
interior networks.
Each site that receives a copy of the FAQ is likely to have several users
who read that FAQ from the one copy of it. From our perspective, ignoring local
propogation costs, 'we' pay for the FAQ just the once.
On the other hand a WWW page, without caching, will demand multiple
transports of the FAQ over the international link. Even with caching the FAQ is
likely to have to be recached two or three times over the period between
postings of the FAQ in the normal manner. The net cost in bandwidth is a two to
three times plus increase in the sourcing of FAQs.
And you have issues of who pays for the cache space and the
maintenance/support of the caching system used. For the moment posted FAQs
remain the nicest way for Internet users in NZ to receive them.
Philip
--
Philip R. Banks Syntax: mail < banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz > @@@@@/|
@@@@/#|
"So many humanoids, @@@/##|
so little fibre optic." @@/---|
--- "Bumper Stickers for Borg" @/ |
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