SAGE/Usenix membership

[Steve Wills]

On Mar 14, 2005, at 10:13 PM, H. Wade Minter wrote:

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> On Mar 14, 2005, at 11:08 AM, Matt Pusateri wrote:
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>> Hello list,
>>
>>
>> I am contemplating joining SAGE and or Usenix. Can anyone who is
>> currently a member or former member provide some feedback?  I'm
>> looking to ascertain what you find valuable or invaluable about either
>> memebership?
>
> I renewed my SAGE membership after a lapse of several years at the 
> LISA conference last fall.  I wasn't that impressed when I was a 
> member back in the late 90s, but figured I'd give it another shot.
>
> So far, the only semi-useful thing I've seen out of SAGE is their 
> mailing list.  The traffic over the last several months has been 
> alright, not particularly relevant to what I do, but of decent 
> technical content.  However, the list itself is pretty useless because 
> the list admin rejects mail with what they call "Enclosures", and what 
> everyone else calls "Content-type: headers".  Yes, if your mailer 
> inserts a Content-type: header (as most mailers do nowadays), they'll 
> reject your post.   So unless you like telnetting to port 25, you may 
> have a hard time getting anything posted to the list, which tends to 
> limit its usefulness.
>
> So I'm not getting any value for my $40.  I doubt seriously I'll renew 
> my subscription again.
>
>

I also ran into a problem with their mail server, which rejected my 
mail since it was coming from a residential IP (which to me seems like 
a poor anti-spam practice, but they claim it helps a lot and doesn't 
generate too many false positives. Anyone up for a discussion of their 
own anti-spam techniques, what works, what doesn't?) . This was the 
first time I ever tried to mail the list and I only did so as a way of 
seeing if that would make me feel like I got more out of it, because at 
the time I wasn't feeling like I was getting much out of it. I'm still 
not sure I really do get a lot out of it, although I feel like that's 
partly my fault for not taking advantage of what they offer.

I do have to disagree with their refusal to take a position on 
outsourcing (as was mentioned in another email).

But, to mention one of the good things about SAGE, the Short Topics 
booklets are very nice and helpful. I wish they still mailed out 
printed copies.

Steve