Having been a participant of the NANOG list since 1995, twice a past host of the meetings, and someone that believes we should help and educate, I am most concerned over the trend that is showing itself here on the list. This is a list about knowledge, share, help, and operations. Some on this list are "Old Pro's" others are just "Old ....." I see new names, new faces, sometimes the same questions, sometimes slight variences of those questions. What then happens is people attack the sender (heck I've even been slightly guilty of this), banish them to newbie.dev.nul. Threads move quickly from the question to debates on random junk and thus become a waste to the community. When I first got on the Internet, 1984, it was full of cooperative and helpful people. 18 years later, not so much. We have real issues to deal with, DMCA, Clarke, The Implosion of ICANN (with means the ITU will run things me thinks, not good), and various other laws, acts and general clue.void from .void.gov. So instead of picking on each other, calling it "standard NANOG hazing" or whatever, lets help, be good in our technical honesty, or don't post. If someone doesn't listen to your answer, a BIGGER stick isn't going to help, take it private, or move along. We are all pro's here, right ?? We got a net to run, lets go do it. respectfully, john brown a person not speaking for anyone else