On Sun, 15 Mar 1992 13:02:39 EST Jerry B Altzman <JAUUS@CUVMB> said:
 
>This is all very well and good, but  for those of us who for some reason
>*DON'T* want to be backbone servers (e.g. our bosses think that LISTSERV
>eats up  too much CPU/Disk  space to begin  with) it is  highly annoying
>when one  of our downstream (read:  leaf) sites claims that  THEY are on
>the  backbone. Then  all of  our LISTSERV  mail makes  the hop  from our
>machine, to theirs, back to ours...
 
I am not sure I understand  the situation that you are describing. Surely
mail to whatever lists  of local users you might have  isn't going to get
sent to  another machine and back,  backbone or not. You  must be talking
about  the mailing-list  traffic sent  to  your local  users by  upstream
lists. If  your upstream  node is  not on the  backbone either,  you will
indeed  be  served by  a  downstream  node, which  becomes  topologically
closer. This  is unfortunate, but  I am  afraid I don't  quite understand
your attitude.
 
If you don't run  LISTSERV and want to play with  mailing lists, you have
to rely on the  services offered by LISTSERV sites. You  may not like the
service  you are  getting, but  you are  free to  run your  own LISTSERV.
Similarly, if you don't run a backbone  LISTSERV, you have to rely on the
services offered by backbone LISTSERV  sites; same comment applies. There
are things that can be done to make  the files flow the way they used to.
Suggesting that nodes downstream Columbia  University should not join the
backbone because Columbia  University does not wish to  join the backbone
is not one of  them. In fact, it does not make me  eager to spend my time
helping you solve this problem.
 
  Eric