[OS:N:] The meaning of life (or of mailing lists) [META]

[<charles macdonald hrdc-drhc gc ca>]

Ed, Ed indeed, I would guess that to Troll is human..

In another life, I publish a document, about a topic that holds my own 
interest..(or at least did at one time)  The rec.sport.skate discussion 
groups...

You can find a recent version at 
http://www.faqs.org/faqs/sports/skating/welcome/

That document contains following paragraphs (written by the former maintainer):
"Many Usenet FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions answer lists) usually begin 
with several paragraphs on netiquette, i.e., proper behaviour on posting to 
newsgroups. Rather than do that here, I will just recommend that if you have 
not already done so, you should *immediately* read the posting titled "A 
Primer on How to Work With the Usenet Community" The document may be obtained 
from  http://www.faqs.org/faqs/usenet/primer/part1/ or you will find it 
posted in the newsgroup 
http://groups.google.com/groups?group=news.announce.newusers  . After you 
have read the article, please read it again. 
"

Substitute mailing lists for USENET groups and you will have a good 
beginning..And remember that all the 700 or so folks reading this are 
primarily looking for ideas and suggestions on how one can get the public 
sector, particularly educational institutions to adopt open source software 
including Linux.

The comments about the difficulty that folks were having in expressing their 
need to a major vendor were right on topic.. They were hilighting a barrier 
that they were facing in achieving the goal of the list.

While many folks may be concerned with what the US is planning in the middle 
east, it is no more on topic on this list than my talking about what would be 
a good skate blade to buy, or the History of the  6SN7GTB Octal Dual triode 
(to name a couple of subjects that I put information up on the web about)

I am free to Join discussion groups that cover all those topics (and more) 
without having to have skaters read about Tubes, or tube fans to read about 
old cars, or or or.....

Yes if you are interested in more than one topic you have to read more than 
one group.  I helped split rec.sport.skating.ice into two groups so that the 
recreational folks would not have to deal with the semi-pro hopefuls and the 
folks in the stands would not have to hear the nittly-gritty of what socks to 
wear on the ice..Yet folks who are interested in both can enjoy both.

I apologize for using topics far from the list, but I pick them for the very 
reason that it shows how boring the world would be in we did not have 
filtering to keep information "clumped" on reasonably coherent topics.

AS I said before, I fear I am just fanning a troll...   Ed Please go away, 
and come back when you want to share how you managed to have 
Linux/Opensourse/OpenOffice.org accepted as a solution by your 
Council/club/school whatever.  I understand that the world would be more 
conveient if you could just set the rules to suit yourself, but the rules and 
conventions of Mail lists and newsgroups have been developed over the last 
twenty or so years because they work for the majority.  Please read the FAQ 
at http://www.faqs.org/faqs/usenet/primer/part1/
Particularly the part about "Think about your audience"

Anyway, I promise that I will Henceforth ignore Ed.. And in fact ask others 
to do the same.  (its hard)



Charles MacDonald - Labour Information Management
< My own Opinion unless Otherwise Credited >