Help me - please!

[Kevin Carothers]

> hear from the pople who read this newsgroup.
>It is unfortunate that, in the past few years, so much hostility has 
>developed on the Usenet.  
[...]
   Geez. You can say *THAT* twice.
   USENET consists of thousands of nodes, with thousands of people. Lets
   face it. We communicate with everyone from geniuses to psychopaths.

>I, myself, quit participating in any but the most technical newsgroups 
>about 6 months ago as a result of a similar unpleasant incident, after 
>participating in the Usenet since 1983.

   It's sad to say, but you can't get away from hostility by quietly 
   reading/posting to comp.sys.os-9 any more than you can avoid 
   random violence by a homicidal maniac. 

>people would think more about others, and that not everyone is exactly like
>them in their means, degree of experience with the net, or personal philosophy.

   This is a wonderful thought. 
   Unfortunately, since USENET is a "faceless" media, a lot of people lose
   sight of how they should(n't) behave. There is a percentage of people
   on USENET who show a remarkable ability in letting their "id" per-
   sonalities show through...They feel justified at calling people incredibly
   awful things over stupid little incidents, like spelling, ".sig" length,
   technically unimportant issues, even what did and did not ocurr in a 
   Star Trek episode. 

   P.S.
   I perfectly expect to get flamed by posting this article in this newsgroup.
   

   P.P.S.
   Since I can't get mail thru to Frank (In Germany):
   Thank you for sharing your thoughts and feelings. Some things are 
   MUCH more important than ANY ".c" file.


Kevin