Subject: Re: AstroWeb announcement

From: [email-masked] (anton koekemoer)
Date: Wed, 6 Apr 94 10:17:33 EST

Dear friends,

Don Wells writes:
> as in 'AstroWeb Consortium'. In private mail I mentioned to Anton that
> I was unsure whether we should call ourselves a 'Consortium', a 'Group'
> or a 'Collaboration'. Anton said he couldn't see any difference between
> the words for this purpose. As a native English speaker, I thank him for
> this observation...

However, I readily admit that my English is not the best, particularly since I
never have a dictionary handy... If these words do have different implications
for the way in which we are organised then it would be worth discussing further
(eg: is a 'leader' implied in any of these terms, or are they all consistent
with action by general consensus?) - otherwise, I'm happy to stick with
'Consortium' as originally suggested.

Also, if I have time I may draft up a logo for AstroWeb (or a couple - logos
rarely seem to get general approval).

						cheers,
						 - anton.

---

From: dwells (Don Wells)
Date: Tue, 5 Apr 94 22:12:20 EDT

anton koekemoer writes:
 > .. I readily admit that my English is not the best..

You are being too modest. Your command of syntax, vocabulary and
idioms is quite impressive.

 > .. If these words do have different implications
 > for the way in which we are organised..

No. The three words are essentially equivalent for our purposes. The
differences are merely interesting nuances, subtle hints which are
probably only interesting to Bob and me.  Bob apparently approves of
the choice, and so do I.

The primary definition of the word 'consortium' is "an international
banking or financial combination".  An unabridged dictionary will give
a secondary definition like "any association, partnership or
union". The etymology of the English word 'consortium' is that it is
the Latin word for 'partnership'.

                -*-

I expect to release the new version of my pages into production within
the next 1-2 hours.  Today I added extensive text describing the
Consortium and the database.  I recommend that all of you review this
text as soon as you can, and suggest corrections or additions. There
is an obvious omission: there is no page describing the classification
codes. The data format page needs to be updated by someone.

-Don