[WikiEN-l] Abuse of your services

Fri May 6 21:22:05 UTC 2005

slimvirgin at gmail.com wrote:

>>Usenet is not a fixed and relied-upon source like a peer-reviewed journal,
>>but in the *vast* majority of cases, people are who they say they are and
>>made their posts.
>>
>
>You can't know this. Most people who post do so anonymously, and even
>if you know their real names, what does that tell you? They're not
>credible, published sources just because they post to Usenet.
>
It really depends on the era. If you have a John Mashey or Erik Fair
posting from 1983, it's almost certainly authentic and authoritative
(the kremvax hoax of 1984 was the first time that most of us were
even aware that forged postings were possible). Conversely, anybody
can print a credible-looking book these days, so one's analysis of
believability has to be based on context and content, not just the
mechanism of transport.

Stan