Re: ISP vs "newsgroup server provider":

Bob Cunningham <exw6sxq@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

> On Tue, 13 Dec 2005 14:36:52 -0800, Evan Kirshenbaum
> <kirshenbaum@xxxxxxxxxx> said:
>
>> Bob Cunningham <exw6sxq@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
>
> [...]
>
>> Again, an ISP provides "Internet service", not "Internet
>> services".
>
> That's like saying a garden-tool store sells only one garden tool,
> or a stamp collection contains only one stamp. We don't say "stamps
> collection", but that's what we mean when we say "stamp collection".

If you really think that those are parallel, I dont know what to say.

> When some of us say "Internet service provider", we mean
> "Internet services provider", but we don't say it that way,
> because it's not idiomatic.

That's what I meant when I said that if people think about it that
way, then they've reanalyzed what the phrase means. I suspect that it
must be confusing for such people, as they will typically deal with
many providers of "Internet services".

Let me be sure that I understand you, though: Active-News, as a
provider of newsgroups (and nothing else); Google, as a provider of
search; Amazon, as a provider of on-line shopping; Yahoo, as a
provider of e-mail and stock quotes and instant messaging; and
weather.com, as a provider of weather reports are all ISPs to such
people. I can't say that I've heard them described as such, but I'm
not going to second guess your experience or introspection.

>> Someone who provides only e-mail service or only newsgroups is not
>> an ISP. You have to already *have* Internet service in order to
>> use it.
>
> I accept that your remarks conform to the technical-jargon
> definition of "Internet service provider". Lay people greatly
> outnumber technogeeks.

In my experience, lay people talk about their ISP as the company
they pay money to to get them "Internet". No other provider of
Internet services that they use is their ISP (or even "an ISP").

I'll buy that people may have reanalyzed the name to mean "services"
and think of their ISP as providing services, as (and because) most of
them now do. But I haven't heard people use "ISP" to refer to other
service providers (even of the services they rely on their ISP for)
and I suspect that when people start going elsewhere for the
"fundamental" services, as many do these days to Google for news and
to Yahoo or Gmail for e-mail, that for them the scope of what an ISP
provides will shrink back to its original meaning. The ISP will again
be like the phone company, the cable company, the gas company, or the
mail service--the one that hooks you up.

>> > Keep in mind that I'm discussing this topic from the point of
>> > view of a Joe or Jane Sixpack who has no need to be concerned
>> > with the jargon of technogeeks.
>
>> If this is the case, then Jane and Joe have reanalyzed what the
>> phrase means.
>
> Anyone who thinks English terms have only one meaning is living in a
> fool's paradise.

You certainly couldn't be talking about me. Besides the fact that
you've been reading my articles for too long, the very setence you're
replying to assumes that words can have more than one meaning.

>> Certainly at one point "ISP" meant "The company that allowed me to
>> get on the net". I don't believe that I've ever heard anybody
>> consider Google or Amazon as an ISP, even though they manifestly
>> provide "services".
>
> One name for a picture tube is "kinescope". In the early days of
> television, coast-to-coast distribution of shows was done by making
> a recording from the face of a kinescope. The result was first
> called a kinescope recording. People began calling the shows
> themselves kinescopes. Technogeeks laughed at that "error", but the
> general public found the usage convenient and were content to
> continue its use. In the contexts where it was used, it was correct
> terminology.

Sure. That's why what you say is plausible. I'd still like to see
some evidence that it is, in fact, true for a substantial portion of
the population.

>> I don't believe that I've ever heard anybody consider Google or
>> Amazon as an ISP, even though they manifestly provide "services".
>
> A number of years ago there was an alt.usage.english newcomer who
> posted from Dejanews, the forerunner of Google Groups. She was
> asking questions about the mechanics of posting. I mentioned a time
> or two that she should consider Dejanews a temporary means and that
> she should plan to sign up with a regular Internet Service Provider.
> She commented at one point, "But I thought Dejanews *was* my
> Internet Service Provider". I would expect to find that there are
> lots of people who feel the same way.

And I suspect otherwise, although the population is big enough that
"lots" isn't a very high bar. Now all we have to do is figure out a
way of finding out which of us is correct.

--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |There is something fascinating
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |about science. One gets such
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |wholesale returns of conjecture out
|of such a trifling investment of
kirshenbaum@xxxxxxxxxx |fact.
(650)857-7572 | Mark Twain

http://www.kirshenbaum.net/


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