It seems to me that, as a self-moderated list, what the 313 list is supposed to do is - this may seem a little radical - moderate itself. By this I don't mean converting the 313 list into a web forum or installing some vengeful and pedantic autocrat as arbiter of what should or should not be discussed on 313.
Instead, why not chip in whenever you think someone's posted something that steps over the line into wholly off-topic territory? Conversations like this thread can be a bit ineffectual sometimes, because while there might be a common agreement that "there should be less extraneous posts" there are most likely differing ideas on what exactly constitutes an extraneous post. And as long as that's the case, this issue will just keep on coming up. I remember a good few years back (it's 313's tenth anniversary in September) there used to be the "ob313" habit, with people excusing off-topic content by sticking something pointedly on-topic into the e-mail as well. That convention seemed to stabilise things for quite a while; some similar common notion of what makes a post acceptable or unacceptable might well be helpful now. For example, a post I made last week is what I'd actually call unacceptable: the one where I jokily responded to MEK's post about being definition-obsessed. That sort of thing is a bit much, and I'm willing to hold my hands up to it. But what would it take to have made it an acceptable post? An ob313-type sentence immediately after the pointless remark? A couple of sentences on, say, the degree to which Detroit techno fans are definition-obsessed compared to the "mainstream" electronic music community? That's the question that needs to be answered, and I think that once the line's been established we can get back to the sorts of engaging and often quite challenging debates that used to take place here on 313. There's no need to burn down the whole house just because someone spilt an ashtray. Brendan
