Microsoft Responds to the Evolution of Online Communities

Didn't ask me...

--
Don Guillett
Microsoft MVP Excel
SalesAid Software

"Bruce Sinclair" wrote
in message ...
In article , "Bob Phillips"
wrote:
That is a shame Ron, I have enjoyed your contributions. But MS don't care,
there will always be hundreds stepping up even if they aren't up to your
capabilities, and they have shown a blind indifference to those more
capable
users amongst us.

Now *that* is an excellent point.

There are many helpful people here, many of them with the mystical 'MVP'
status.
Did MS ask anyone that is actually *in* this on line community what they
thought ?
I suspect not, but I look forward to hearing anyone say that this is not
so
and that MS consulted widely before announcing these changes.

In article , Simon Lloyd wrote:

My forums have both members and newsgroup forums, we have many folk
that come to use the interface with the newsgroups, we use nntp software
to automatically post and retrieve posts from the newsgroups, i don't
think other news readers are configurable to allow automation, but would
be good if we could find one so that the members that use these forums
for the NG interface will still be catered for.


There's *alot* of news software out there, so I'm sure some of it will do
what you are wanting to do ... but suggest you give people some options,
rather than picking something to 'support'.
What is right for one person is nasty for others.

Jim Cone laid this down on his screen :
My opinion is that it is the precursor to abandoning VBA.
We can look forward to the release of VSTO.Not ("VerySlowToOperate.Not") to
handle all Office programming needs. It will require the $499.00 Office
upgrade and a 64 core 16 GHZ processor and Net.Framework 2.234 thru 19.432
installed on your machine. (The 1500 page manual sold separately). The
upside is that it will be almost as fast as VBA. Happy Trails.
--
Jim Cone
Portland, Oregon USA

Well Jim, what does that say for VBA7, expressly created for use with
M$Ox64? I fear you may be right, though?

regards,
Garry

"Bruce Sinclair" wrote
in message ...
In article , Simon Lloyd
wrote:

My forums have both members and newsgroup forums, we have many folk
that come to use the interface with the newsgroups, we use nntp software
to automatically post and retrieve posts from the newsgroups, i don't
think other news readers are configurable to allow automation, but would
be good if we could find one so that the members that use these forums
for the NG interface will still be catered for.


There's *alot* of news software out there, so I'm sure some of it will do
what you are wanting to do ... but suggest you give people some options,
rather than picking something to 'support'.
What is right for one person is nasty for others.


You mean as MS are doing?

All your post are belong to us.

- Jon
-------
Jon Peltier
Peltier Technical Services, Inc.
http://peltiertech.com/


On 5/10/2010 4:01 AM, Bob Phillips wrote:
Everything looks better when we control it!

On 5/10/2010 12:07 AM, Bruce Sinclair wrote:
In , Jon wrote:
On 5/9/2010 7:40 PM, Bruce Sinclair wrote:
In , Simon
wrote:

Nice thought but i was under the impression that these newsgroups will
be closed once the forums are settled. If they're still going to be
running then happy days

Yes, interseting point. I saw that MS said they would 'close' the groups ...
but AFAIK, most NNTP servers don't accept 'remove group' commands from
anyone except themselves. MS may find this more difficult to do thatn they
think (assuming they don't simply mean that they will take the NNTP
interface off their web site - that they can do).
Again, if MS did try to kill off the groups, there would be little to stop
people adding/creating them again.

Anyone got any more info on what MS really mean here ?

I think they mean they will simply turn off their own nntp servers. As
you say, they can't control the presence of these groups on the whole
nntp/usenet network.

Quite. Well, if that really is what they mean, why didn't they just say so ?
Minor damage only if that's the case ... and in some ways, a good thing for
those of us here.

If that's what they mean, then who wrote the subject line?

- Jon
-------
Jon Peltier
Peltier Technical Services, Inc.
http://peltiertech.com/

In article , Jon Peltier wrote:
All your post are belong to us.

Ah, now, which organisation had exactly that policy (everything that goes
through our networks we own the rights to forever without paying anything)
for everything sent through its network in any way a year or so back ? It
might have been telecom (a major NZ communications company) or them and a
partner of some sort. Might even have been a MS partner. I can't recall
exactly, but when the terms and conditions of the new "service" were
translated into English (from IT and lawyer speak) I do recall the uproar.




- Jon
-------
Jon Peltier
Peltier Technical Services, Inc.
http://peltiertech.com/


On 5/10/2010 4:01 AM, Bob Phillips wrote:
Everything looks better when we control it!

In article , "Bob Phillips" wrote:

"Bruce Sinclair" wrote
in message ...
In article , Simon Lloyd
wrote:

My forums have both members and newsgroup forums, we have many folk
that come to use the interface with the newsgroups, we use nntp software
to automatically post and retrieve posts from the newsgroups, i don't
think other news readers are configurable to allow automation, but would
be good if we could find one so that the members that use these forums
for the NG interface will still be catered for.

There's *alot* of news software out there, so I'm sure some of it will do
what you are wanting to do ... but suggest you give people some options,
rather than picking something to 'support'.
What is right for one person is nasty for others.

You mean as MS are doing?

Yep. That's what I mean. Suggesting there is only one way to do something
with a computer is simply crazy, as "everyone knows" this is simply wrong.
Why they think people will believe it is beyond me.
And it may well be that someone quickly comes up with a "MS forum to
newsgroups translater" of course.

In article , Jon Peltier wrote:
(snip)
Anyone got any more info on what MS really mean here ?

I think they mean they will simply turn off their own nntp servers. As
you say, they can't control the presence of these groups on the whole
nntp/usenet network.

Quite. Well, if that really is what they mean, why didn't they just say so ?
Minor damage only if that's the case ... and in some ways, a good thing for
those of us here.

If that's what they mean, then who wrote the subject line?

Ah. That is obviously from marketing.

In article , Simon Lloyd wrote:

Brude i don't understand?, the folk who use our forums do not use or
see a newsreader but simply foum posts in a vBulletin community, so if
you mean they have no choice of NG viewer then your right, but then
again they choose to use our forums for the interface as threads seem
easier for them to follow.......depends what you're used to i suppose

Yeah I understand that Simon. But I doubt they "choose" to use the web
interface for forums ... I believe that's all they know. And, if like me,
they knew there was a good way to access newsgroups (which the forums are
connected to ?) then that's what they would choose. I suppose there might be
an occasional person that prefers a web interface for this sort of thing.
There's always one, and yes, it does depend on what you are used to. Of
course, if that's all you know, that's what you will prefer.

News groups are text. Ascii characters ... and there's plenty of ways to
look at those (news readers) and I'm sure that the vast majority would
prefer one of those if they knew about them.

As an aside, I've been fascinated by the occasional post with something like
... "if you found this helpful please press yes" ... cos we don't see any
buttons here. We also get an occasional pile of "stuff", presumably some
left over HTML or other formatting, presumably from some of the the forum
posts.