Agreed, mostly. Slashdot could be more responsible when linking, but likely it would take far too much time to get anything done if every story needs to wait for an admin's approval...if the admin even approves in the end. As far as I'm concerned, if it's posted on the web and it's not protected by passwords or some other scheme, it's public domain and you should expect hits, even to the point that you can no longer handle it -- doesn't mean you have to like it when it happens, but not be surprised if it does. Otherwise, don't put it up.
There could have been a much better solution to this rather than the childish diatribe he posted blaming MC and michael. His web server is still up, so obviously he still has a connection. It's serving a small text file, which granted can handle a/.ing much better than a page with twenty large images...but in light of the fact that his web server is handling the text file just fine, I personally think that once Slashdot got wind of it and he started getting heavy traffic, he could have done one of two things:
Post a text-only version of the page, promising that those that were truly interested in it enough to come back in a week and check it out again would see the pictures put back up -- which would have been very quick and easy to do.
Post a text-only version of the page, and instead of having pictures, simply go into more detail about what he did in text rather than relying on images to show his accomplishment.
As you said, there was no reason for him to think they should ask about the capabilities of his web server, and certainly no reason for him to take personal insult at the matter.
Making something with his own hands that is cool enough that the Slashdot editors think it worthy to link to should be taken as an honor, not an insult. I can most definitely understand his frustration, but I think his anger misplaced.
While it's a shame to see that another site has been slashdotted into oblivion, Drew, the guy at the bigasterisk.com site mentioned in the story, seems to be missing a fundamental ideal of the web.
He states that MC68040 and michael have "decided that it's time for [him] to go down" -- ouch -- and that they did not ask if they could link to him.
While I understand that maybe his web server puked a few times under the load and he's annoyed at that, he seems to have forgotten that one of the original ideas of the WWW was to have people link back and forth to each other, to share interesting and noteworthy sites with friends and anonymous surfers. I saw his site before it went down; nowhere on that page did it specify that he should not be linked to unless asked first. If he didn't want it accessible to the public from links on other pages, he shouldn't have put it up.
Maybe leaving out a condition for linking was a small oversight, maybe not; but it's unfair for him to blame michael-the-slashdot-editor for it.
Slashdot Mirror
There could have been a much better solution to this rather than the childish diatribe he posted blaming MC and michael. His web server is still up, so obviously he still has a connection. It's serving a small text file, which granted can handle a /.ing much better than a page with twenty large images...but in light of the fact that his web server is handling the text file just fine, I personally think that once Slashdot got wind of it and he started getting heavy traffic, he could have done one of two things:
Post a text-only version of the page, promising that those that were truly interested in it enough to come back in a week and check it out again would see the pictures put back up -- which would have been very quick and easy to do.
Post a text-only version of the page, and instead of having pictures, simply go into more detail about what he did in text rather than relying on images to show his accomplishment.
As you said, there was no reason for him to think they should ask about the capabilities of his web server, and certainly no reason for him to take personal insult at the matter.
Making something with his own hands that is cool enough that the Slashdot editors think it worthy to link to should be taken as an honor, not an insult. I can most definitely understand his frustration, but I think his anger misplaced.
He states that MC68040 and michael have "decided that it's time for [him] to go down" -- ouch -- and that they did not ask if they could link to him.
While I understand that maybe his web server puked a few times under the load and he's annoyed at that, he seems to have forgotten that one of the original ideas of the WWW was to have people link back and forth to each other, to share interesting and noteworthy sites with friends and anonymous surfers. I saw his site before it went down; nowhere on that page did it specify that he should not be linked to unless asked first. If he didn't want it accessible to the public from links on other pages, he shouldn't have put it up.
Maybe leaving out a condition for linking was a small oversight, maybe not; but it's unfair for him to blame michael-the-slashdot-editor for it.