On Wed, 2009-11-18 at 18:12 -0700, James Carroll wrote: > Although you must admit, gmail is encouraging the trend of top > posting, if that is really such a bad thing...
GMail is a big part of the problem. It's a fundamentally broken MUA, optimized for conversations between small groups, not lists. GMail has good spam filtering, and it's handy being able to access from any computer. In all other respects it is vastly inferior to a modern MUA like Evolution or mutt. Top posting without trimming is bad because: 1) Unlike personal messages, all messages to lists are archived and publicly available. Six months from now, a Google search could return your reply. Properly editing your reply makes it infinitely more useful. If your message isn't worth editing, it isn't worth sending. 2) Most people deal with less than fifty message per day. Knowledgeable list subscribers, on the other hand, often juggle hundreds of messages per day. If you want your message to be noticed and responded to by someone experienced, you should make it as easy to read as possible. Don't expect them to remember what the thread of conversation was two hours ago, that could be dozens of conversations ago. Proper trimming, interleaving context with reply, makes it much easier for experienced list members to pick up the conversation and provide a useful response. 3) It's the way things are done. Like showing up for a job interview in jeans and a t-shirt, you might be tolerated if you top post on a Linux related list, but you'll stand out a sore thumb and everyone will know you probably don't really understand what's happening. 4) It wastes electron, leading to the accelerated destruction of electron forests. -- "XML is like violence: if it doesn't solve your problem, you aren't using enough of it." - Chris Maden -------------------- BYU Unix Users Group http://uug.byu.edu/ The opinions expressed in this message are the responsibility of their author. They are not endorsed by BYU, the BYU CS Department or BYU-UUG. ___________________________________________________________________ List Info (unsubscribe here): http://uug.byu.edu/mailman/listinfo/uug-list
