On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 11:37 AM, Salane Ashcraft <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> Please follow well established etiquette or don't post to the list. >> >> http://www.ubuntu.com/support/community/mailinglists/etiquette#head-c70bc55ce24849bd82885e8b0f7e972465944b5a >> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top-posting#Top-posting > > Hey Cory, you think it would be a good idea to somehow make it a must > for people to read these guidelines? Perhaps in an email sent to > someone when they register for this list?
My bank's website has a form for asking customer service questions. It has several required fields, some are often unrelated to the question I'm asking. Also, the box where you type the question has the text, "please limit your input to 700 characters." If I type the question and its too long then when I hit the submit button I get a big red error message saying that my question was too long and that I need to shorten it. So I trim it, trying to be more brief in my question and submit and get the error again. So I resume the process abbreviating words where I think I can and trimming out as much text as possible until I get an email message that passes the minimum character count. Then I get a big red error message saying that because I chose "Other" in one of the select lists that I need to specify some text in the appropriate box (which isn't marked as required). I do so and submit and finally get that message, "your question has been sent..." Fortunately I'm patient. Otherwise I would just give up and either pick up the phone and call to ask for help or just switch to a different bank. You might wonder why I'm writing this. My point is that my bank has made it hard for me to get the information I need by putting artificial barriers in place that ultimately make it harder for people to communicate with them. They'd like people to ask short, specific questions, so they put the character limit on the text box. They'd like to know if their advertising is effective so they require me to answer their survey questions before submitting. None of this helps me at all. We need to be careful to avoid putting too many barriers in place. Nothing stifles creativity and enthusiasm more than getting hit with a laundry list of rules and regulations you must comply with (well, except maybe getting caught up in a flame over them). I'm always eager to hear new ideas and thoughts on this list. However I am really tired of rants about etiquette. Every day I deal with people who don't know that its best to trim posts or reply below the original message. Its not my job to educate them, I simply lead by example. I would suggest that we've probably lost more opportunities to do something great as a team because of this top-posting fascism than probably any other issue we've addressed. -- Matthew Nuzum newz2000 on freenode -- ubuntu-art mailing list ubuntu-art@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-art
