On Jun 3, 2005, at 9:52 AM, chris wrote:
[snip]
But let me ask you... does your own reply make sense when read as it
is?
You changed the subject, and then top posted a reply. So upon first
reading, a person will look at yours and say "WTF is this guy talking
about, where did this topic come from".
Conceeded: it would have been a good time to use an inline quote,
given the irregular way that the thread was initiated. I do not
believe one form should be rigidly adhered to.
[snip]
You will often see the following during these arguments
A: Because it is more confusing to read.
Q: Why is top posting bad?
[snip]
That is nice rhetoric; it causes confusion by omitting quote indicators
and flouting the convention of writing Q&A from top to bottom. I can
see that top-posting hits some people the same way -- but I don't know
why it should, given our multi-colored inboxes and quote levels. That
it does lends credence to Dennis' account of the history of netiquette:
[Bottom posting] was around LONG before Bill and his minions decided
that they didn't give a damn about standards.
Now, it would strain my brain to actually recall what correspondence
was like on the Digital mainframe we had in high school, but I would
readily believe that bottom-posting was the standard then. Innuendoes
flying like green and amber lightning . . . it was more like chat,
wasn't it?
But top posting *does* imply a certain standard of structure for email
correspondence, however new and unwelcome to some. (Bottom-posting
certainly favors the two-bit retort!) The expectation is that each
message will be an original work that stands on its own, a
correspondence piece rather than a piece of a conversation.
It gives me pause, believe me, that Mr. Gates sanctioned this (wherever
the idea actually came from). I shall rather think of top-posting as
the favored format of OS X Mail. :p It does seem like progress to me.
--
Thad Launderville
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