Interesting. I did notice it's hard to conduct serious discussions in forums, but it's harder to find mailing lists for a given subject.
Anyway, I can't really counter your statements except: 1) Doesn't the ability to not be notified about each and every topic worth the troubles? 2) A javascript forum would solve the threading issue. See the Israeli http://www.tapuz.co.il/Forums 3) Many forums have a PM system which solves the need for a personal contact while protecting the privacy of the e-mail address (which is easier to abuse and harder to change). 4) I think one of the biggest downsides of a mailing list is the lack of a search engine. Then again, most forums have a terrible search engine anyway (i.e. you can't search exact phrases). _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss@opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss