Off topic kills value of the list and group

[Alan Dayley]

On Wed, Nov 5, 2008 at 3:44 PM, Craig White <craigwhite at azapple.com> wrote:
> ----
> sounds reasonable but doesn't fly...mail lists always have their
> off-topic dalliances and learning to cope, delete, respond or whatever
> is just part and parcel of the medium. Perhaps we need another round of
> top or bottom posting, html mail suitability or just go for one of the
> tried and true pointless discussions such as vi or emacs/gnome or
> kde/which distro is best just to satisfy the notion that it isn't always
> politics.
>
> Yes, it has useless stuff...in fact, I would point out that the OP of
> the 'We are screwed' thread has a noise to signal ratio of about 90%. I
> do not ask that he or anyone be removed from the list and support his
> right to post as much as anyone's because I too can filter or just
> delete his nonsense as I see fit.
>
> While I appreciate that on its face, there seems little to be served by
> having a political discussion on list, it is encouraging to see a
> diverse point of view by the list members and while I have a tough time
> finding respect for low quality, unsubstantiated opinions typically
> expressed by Mike Havens, I do enjoy vigorous discussions for those I do
> disagree and it does help all of us recognize that there are disparate
> opinions. This is not a one-off type of commentary from Mike Havens and
> I'm quite sure that many are aware of that.
>
> My own personal disappointment stems from the apparent lack of interest
> in topics such as the H1B visas, the release of the white space
> bandwidth by the FEC and end up getting swamped by traffic about Obama
> being a Socialist which is about as stupid as political discourse can
> get these days.
>
> The easy solution is that people who sign up for mail lists learn how to
> use their delete key or better yet, the combination of 'threads' and the
> delete key can just kill an entire thread in a single click.

I agree that off-topic stuff will happen from time to time.  It cannot
be fully prevented unless someone is tightly moderating.  Tightly
moderating is not what I want to do or experience on this list!

I, however, disagree that the answer is just to use the delete key.
The community must express it's "rules" and put down detours before
they even approach extreme.  Else, the reason for the list ceases to
be.  It would be personally painful for me to leave this list but if
the off-topic stuff grew too much, I would loose interest in the
signal because of the noise.

We are now at well over 80 messages is in the "screwed" thread with
more in the "had to do it" thread.  That's far enough off the defined
boundaries to just tell people to use the delete key, IMO.  For
unplanned reasons I am working from home today.  The web interface to
my work email does not provide threads or a good search feature.  I
had to select each message one by one to delete them from around the
work emails I needed to see.  Not everyone has the knowledge or
ability to apply a filter and be done with it.

Alan