Posting netiquette

[Guest guest]

Hi All,

 

I'm noticing such incredible volume coming in from the list recently that

I'd like to suggest we watch our posting netiquette. Can we hold our posts

down to our answers and whatever is necessary from the post we're

answering? No need to resend the entire prior post... everyone has it

already! And if we snip away the advertising and other Onelist text at the

bottom, we can save a great deal of space... by the time that advertising

gets resent and added to by three or four people, the junk on the bottom

gets truly formidable! )

 

I saw one post today that was a 2K thank-you note to someone else for

something she posted. But then her _entire post_ was dangling below...

and the entire post came to 59K!!!

 

Another post was 35K long... but the author's actual answer was only 2K!!!

All the rest was a whole string of posts, the entire thread that came

before that short answer. We don't need to clutter up our computers with

all those copies of former posts.

 

Some of us receive the Digest version... and every bit of these long posts

is going into the Digests. If you're reading that, it's not so easy as

just reading the message on top and letting the rest of it go... you have

to scroll through the whole thing to get to the next post!

 

It all goes into the Archives too... ever try to search for something in

the Archives when the same posts are repeated 10 or 12 times? ))

 

And also, I think some list members pay for their internet service

according to how much they receive... this kind of lonnnng post is costing

them money.

 

Maybe someone thinks he has to post the entire message he's answering...

because otherwise, the reader won't know what it was. Here's where the

subject line is important.

 

If you preserve the subject line, then any reader can always find the

previous posts on that subject. Change the subject if you want to, but

leave a reference to the former subject so we can tell what you're

answering. Like this:

> Genuinity, was Re: Intellectualism/ Reality conside

 

But even when you do that, that may have been many answers with the same

subject. So to let us know which one of them you're answering, you have to

name someone. Either include a little of the previous post with a name,

like this:

>"Gloria Lee" <glee

>So far, I am doing what I do best..which is fussing at Harsha :)... My

>philosophy here is: Build it and they will come. However, any ideas are

>welcome,

----

 

or like this:

>Gloria:

>So far, I am doing what I do best..which is fussing at Harsha :)... My

>philosophy here is: Build it and they will come. However, any ideas are

>welcome,

-----

 

or just begin with:

 

Hi Gloria,

------

 

That way, with both the subject line and the name, we'll know exactly what

post you're answering. And you'll make sure that your post gets read by

anyone interested in that subject!! Sometimes I simply don't have time to

read everything on the list... and if I'm interested in one particular

subject, I skip down and read everything with that subject line. But if

you write an answer and put an entirely different subject line on it, I

won't know that... so I'll never see your wonderful answer.

 

Thanks, everybody!

 

Dharma