I would be more comfortable if we took a very strong stand
against advertising from corporate businesses, but were much more
relaxed when it comes to private proprietorships, cool aid
(registered trade mark of general foods if Capitalised, I
believe) stands, that sort of thing.

Some items will never become mass market items. Personal service
is so hard to find for some speciality niches that I think we
should encourage small business, not chase it out. Small business
is our only defense against corporate business, which has only
one real driving force behind it, total enslavement of the entire
human race to it's own corporate credit department, like Sears,
or Visa.

Now, if Ford Motors or G.E. was to advertise here, I would
object, but if I see a header on a message that interests me, for
a unique item or service that, like this one, will never be a
mass market, and therefore will be impossible to locate if not
found on a niegbourhood bulletin board, and if the header is
clear enough and the message small enough, I would not complain.
I might even open the message, download it, and buy the
ferfluggering shroud peg brace and end splitter, whatever.

Binary attachments, pictures, large files in .doc format, etc, I
would think we can agree, are inconsiderate and an annoyance to
those of us, the majority, who do not have massive bandwidth
available either for sending or receiving. It is the large
corporate advertising pipe with it's animated cartoon and massive
sound files we want to exclude, not some fellow low budget boat
bum who invents a new and novel service or device that can use a
leg up to enable us to find him in this jungle of too much
corporate advertising. We should be free to discuss the relative
merits of new methods and jigs, etc. This is an ideal test
market, attracting a focused group. Corporate budgets and methods
are unavailable to most of us, and small startups should be
welcome. Several of my ideas here have flopped, and it would be
a shame if nobody else got the chance to do so too, assuaging my
regets. Besides, some of these 'useless ideas' are entertaining
in their own right.

A current thread about washing clothes stimulated me to conceive
and invent the towable washing machine, a balloon half full of
clothers, soap and water, half full of air, with fins to
encourage agitation. It is better than catching krill in your net
laundry bag, believe me. Now if someone could just stimulate me
to invent a similar clothes dryer? What's wrong with a halyard
clothesline in the rain?

But would I dare to mention it? Eventually, I would possibly
require a royalty of anyone who used my idea! Those with a hyper
sensitivity would protest any new, non-conventional use of this
space on that principal.

The democracy of the net has one advantage over the real
tyrranical dictatorship of true 'democracy' whatever that is. It
is not legally possible to enforce minor abuses, unlike the
corporate law which dictates that commercial trucks bear
identification plates, so free citizens can identify and accuse
transgressors. We operate here on tort and retort, discussion,
consensus, and that is fair. I support freedom of speech. This
must be at the discretion of those who have the guts to let their
reputation show, and must be denied those who would speak
anonymously.

We have all paid an equal share to construct this info highway,
just as with our roads, and we all have an equal right to use it
and develop it the way we think it should go, so long as it does
no real damage to anyone. How does this small announcement hurt
us? How would suppression of such startup announcements hurt us?
I would remind all that startup announcements are specifically
sanctioned (sanctified?) in the "proposed charter", a ridiculous
vanity fair document with no contractual capacity which was never
imposed or adopted by the current consensus group. This is an
unmoderated, open bulletin board. As with any physical bulletin
board, it is possible for anyone with the temerity to do so to
tear down messages they find offensive, but that would constitute
fraud and theft and if it caused damage to the original poster,
could result in a tort, or legal lawsuit to demand restitution.

We should not chase earnest children away. When they flower, they
may need to be kicked out of the nest, but in early days need
encouragement. I think a personalised log, or even just a
re-useable cover, with a gilded silouette and name of the vessel
sounds good. As an occasional sailor and log keeper, I use one
yearly journal with dates over and over again, just adding the
day of the week below the entry for the same date last year or
so. It makes for interesting browsing as the years go by, and is
compact, if seemingly malorganised.

Otherwise, my, or any, suggestion of any improvement in any
process, like clothes washing for instance, becomes an huge
annoyance to someone and his razor sharp axe grinder. Perhaps we
should ban street vendors, those pioneers of enterpreneurship?

A more fair rule might be that each of us is limited to one flame
per month about any subject. Don't complain here, contact the
ISP. Ban anonymisers. Support fair weights and measures and
purity. Support contract law. Abolish all large corporate
interests impinging on the freedom and ability of free citizens
to dictate to government. Let there be no restraints on freedom
except where it damages others.

I guess it's all about where to draw the line? We must all push
in the direction we choose, or be dragged where we know not.

Anyone want to subscribe to my weekly commentary column? It's
really quite inexpensive.

Well, I guess that's worth about 2 cents!

Terry K

Larry W4CSC wrote:

This newsgroup is not a free, online advertising medium for your
products or services. Spamming Usenet is against your ISP's
Acceptable Use Policy. Please take your ad to your webpage and stop
the spamming of newsgroups. You WILL be reported to the abuse
investigators of your internet company.

Capice?

On Fri, 12 Dec 2003 12:41:53 -0000, "www.dontsink.com"
wrote:

If you would like a top quality *personalised* logbook for your yacht,
gold embossed with your yacht name (or your name/company name)
please visit:

http://www.dontsink.com

Logbooks personalised and delivered free in the UK.



Larry W4CSC

NNNN

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