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The rec.games.computer.quake.* newsgroups have passed their vote and were scheduled for creation on the 16th of November, 1995. Thanks to all people who voted! However, the groups were put on hold because we heard from id Software that the name of the game was likely to change. We may have to change the name of the groups too, so this would mean another RFD and CFV. I hope that all Quake fans will vote for the new groups, if a new vote has to take place.
Note: this version of the rec.games.computer.quake.* RFD has been slightly edited in order to make it WWW-friendly. You can fetch the ``official'' version, as well as a copy of the CFV and the official results, from: ftp://ftp.uu.net/usenet/news.announce.newgroups/rec/rec.games.computer.quake.
Summary: Discussion of the game QUAKE, its sequels and add-ons.
Replaces alt.games.quake.
Proposed By: Raphaël Quinet
RFD Posted By: Kyle R. Hofmann
With Help From: The 57 members of the quake-proposal mailing list.
Posting Date: Sep 14 1995
rec.games.computer.quake.announce Info/FAQ/announcements about Quake. (Moderated) rec.games.computer.quake.editing Editing and hacking Quake-related files. rec.games.computer.quake.misc General discussion about Quake.
The rec.games.computer.quake hierarchy is intended for discussing various topics relating to the computer game Quake, written by id Software (the makers of Doom) and its sequels and user-written add-ons. Quake is a highly customizable 3D first-person action/adventure game scheduled for release in December 1995. The servers and clients will be available on many different types of computers and platforms, as Doom was.
Although the game has not been released yet, it is expected to be very successful, given the amount of discussion already present on several newsgroups and mailing lists. The alt.games.quake newsgroup alone gets an average of more than 1300 messages per month and has received more than 5000 messages since its creation. Most of the Doom-related or action games newsgroups and mailing lists get a large number of messages about Quake.
The Usenet readership statistics for alt.games.quake are included below. They show that, despite the low propagation of the group, it is already getting a lot of traffic. The replacement of alt.games.quake by new groups in the rec hierarchy would mean that more Quake players will be able to take part in the discussion (for comparison purposes, the average propagation of the rec.games.computer.doom.* newsgroups is around 51%).
Estimated total number of people who read the group, worldwide.
| Actual number of readers in sampled population
| | Propagation: how many sites receive this group at all
| | | Recent traffic (messages per month)
| | | | Recent traffic (megabytes per month)
| | | | | Crossposting percentage
| | | | | | Cost ratio: $US/month/rdr
| | | | | | | Share: % of newsrders
| | | | | | | | who read this group.
Month Rank V V V V V V V V
jul95 2506 4900 102 29% 1331 2.4 6% 0.13 0.2% alt.games.quake
may95 2792 9000 91 28% 977 1.7 6% 0.05 0.2% alt.games.quake
mar95 2547 7300 112 25% 507 0.8 5% 0.03 0.2% alt.games.quake
jan95 3095 2600 68 16% 309 0.6 8% 0.05 0.1% alt.games.quake
This first Request For Discussion proposes the creation of three newsgroups. Other newgroups such as .playing, .multiplayer or .help will be added later and will be part of a separate proposal, which will be posted in November when more information about Quake is available. These first three groups are proposed now in order to have them created by the time Quake is released, thus preventing a flood of off-topic messages in other newsgroups.
It is likely that Quake will be a very successful game and will require more than three newsgroups. Several other names have already been discussed on the quake-proposal mailing list. However, it is uncommon in Usenet to create many groups about something which doesn't exist yet (although the game will be released by the time the groups are created). In order to limit the risks of having people voting against the creation of a large number of newsgroups, we chose to limit the number of groups to three.
The three names r.g.c.q.announce, r.g.c.q.misc and r.g.c.q.editing were selected for the following reasons:
See the "epilogue" section below for a list of the newsgroups that will probably be included in a separate proposal, to be posted when more information about Quake is available.
In general, cross-posting among discussion groups is strongly discouraged. Articles posted to .announce can be cross-posted to other relevant groups.
No binaries should be posted in these groups. When relevant, short excerpts of source code or configuration files may be included in an article, but binaries and code in general should be posted in a more appropriate alt.binaries group (like alt.binaries.quake if this group is created).
This is the only moderated group in this hierarchy. The sort of postings likely to be approved by the moderator are general announcements that are interesting to the broad spectrum of Quake players. Examples of these types of articles are: anything from id Software, FAQs and other periodical informational postings, announcement of new levels or utilities, announcements of new servers, reviews, etc.
The current moderator of rec.games.computer.doom.announce, Tony Lezard, says that he would be happy to moderate this newsgroup using the following addresses:
Submit: quake@mantis.co.uk Contact: quake-request@mantis.co.uk (Tony Lezard)
Discussion in this group covers all aspects of editing and modifying the game. Quake will be a highly customizable game and id Software will release an editor which will allow people to create their own universes and change the game in many ways. Additionally, lots of third-party editors and utilities are expected to be released (some of them have already been developed but will not be released before Quake is available). Topics for this group will include: editors, editing related questions and suggestions, playability issues, design techniques, conversions of levels or objects to other formats.
Comments or questions about configuring a server or playing user-written levels should not be posted here - post in .misc instead (or in .playing when this group is created).
This group covers all topics that are not already covered by the other groups in this hierachy. The range of topics will be very broad at first, but will be reduced as other groups are created. Examples include: playing standard or user-written levels, help about playing the game or setting up a server, FTP issues, comparisons with other games, piracy, etc.
This newsgroup replaces alt.games.quake.
This RFD proposes the creation of three newsgroups. Many people would like to see more groups about Quake; they will be included in a future proposal for the reasons explained above. Here are some suggested names for the other newsgroups (to be discussed later):
rec.games.computer.quake.help Questions on Quake and add-ons rec.games.computer.quake.playing Playing Quake and add-ons rec.games.computer.quake.multiplayer Multiplayer games and Quake servers rec.games.computer.quake.programming New game algorithms
The group r.g.c.q.misc will be a replacement for alt.games.quake, whose poor propagation and now-redundant status make it no longer needed. Therefore, alt.games.quake will be removed two weeks after the creation of r.g.c.q.misc in order to prevent the sort of confusion and duplication of resources that is found in alt.games.doom now that the rec.games.computer.doom hierarchy exists.
The discussion period lasts 21 days from the initial post of this RFD. If there are no major objections to the naming or placement, then the CFV (Call For Votes) will be issued, lasting for 22 days. Following the vote, there is a 5 day discussion period after which newsgroups that passed will be newgrouped by the moderator of news.announce.newgroups.
Followups to this post are directed to news.groups, which is where further discussion will take place. Cross-posted followups are discouraged. Please read news.groups to participate. Thank you!
news.announce.newgroups, news.groups, alt.games.quake, comp.sys.mac.games.action, comp.sys.sgi.misc, comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action, comp.os.linux.misc, rec.games.computer.doom.misc, comp.os.os2.games, comp.sys.next.misc
quake-servers@ftp.idsoftware.com, doom-editing@nvg.unit.no, dooml@doomgate.cs.buffalo.edu
Note: In order to ensure that the votes were not biaised, this page contains only the Request For Discussion (RFD) and not the Call For Votes (CFV). People who wanted to vote for the creation of the new groups had to read the CFV from the newsgroups.
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