Re: PEAR DB 1.6.0 has been released

From: Ed Prochak <ed.prochak_at_magicinterface.com>
Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2004 01:16:59 -0500
Message-ID: <qsz1c.833$xL.780@fe03.usenetserver.com>

Ed Avis wrote:

> ed.prochak_at_magicinterface.com (Ed prochak) writes:
>
>

>>>.announce is a fair point, if there were an .announce group that
>>>should probably be used instead.  But there isn't.
>>
>>Depends.
>>there's a comp.software.shareware.announce
>>I thought there was a comp.software.announce but I'm wrong.

>
>
> I don't think you're being fair, it doesn't make sense to put all
> different kinds of software release in one group and nobody could be
> expected to read it, except perhaps the maintainers of software
> archives. A newsgroup is a community of people interested in the same
> thing and 'people interested in Oracle and tools used with it' is a
> more identifiable group than 'people interested in software'.
>
> In any case, PEAR DB is not shareware.
>
>

>>there's a php.general

>
>
> Yes, I would expect the announcement to be suitable for cross-posting
> between a PHP group and whatever the appropriate groups are for each
> database system. We are discussing whether in the case of Oracle the
> appropriate group is .misc or .marketplace.
>
>

>>>.marketplace is not appropriate because it is not a commercial
>>>announcement.

>
>

>>This is where we disagree. It LOOKS commercial to me.

>
>
> But do you think it _is_ commercial?
>
> After all the charter doesn't say 'all messages that look vaguely
> commercial with a brief glance'; I don't know of any newsgroup that
> applies such a capricious rule. Surely you agree that what matters is
> the content of the article.
>

I went bad to the original ad. and after readint the entire ad, I'd have to conclude it does look commercial. I even searched that posting for the word "free". It isn't there. The only place the word "open" is used is in that catchy opening:

     "Crack open the beer, PEAR DB 1.6.0 is here! "

So how far do I have to search to figure out if this is freeware that merely LOOKS commercial or if this is truely a commercial ad. I will not follow links from a posting of a source I do not trust because such links may load viruses or worse on my machine.

  Go back in GOOGLE and read it again, without the foreknowledge that it is open source, or freeware. Assume you never heard of PEAR before. How would you judge it from that view?

-- 
Ed Prochak
running    http://www.faqs.org/faqs/running-faq/
netiquette http://www.psg.com/emily.html
--
"Two roads diverged in a wood and I
I took the one less travelled by
and that has made all the difference."
robert frost

Received on Thu Mar 04 2004 - 00:16:59 CST