META: was/Re: Improving the Extropians list

Technotranscendence (neptune@mars.superlink.net)
Sat, 19 Jun 1999 09:25:47 -0700

Saturday, June 19, 1999 12:19 AM Dwayne <dwayne@pobox.com> wrote:
>Well, I wasn't really serious, I was just responding with a silly post
>to what I thought was a silly idea (three posts per day, bah!),

I didn't think it was all that silly. Not that my feelings are hurt.:) Seriously, I believe setting up simple rules like mine would be easier than moderating the list since traffic and membership is so high. (I've been on other lists where such rules have been informally implemented and they seem to work quite well. For example, Liberty Loop. See my web page with the link to "The Free Radical.")

The problem is, as mentioned by others, that quite a few people post their arses off here, and even though we can filter or delete stuff, it would be nice if the initial quality was high so as little filtering and deleting had to go on at the end. It's like the difference between reading the final published novel by an author you like versus reading all her notes, diary entries, rough drafts, and the like.

Another suggestion: we could implement these rules temporarily -- hey, nothing is here that can't be changed and undone, right? -- for, say, a week, then see if list quality goes up and members like it. It might be the case, after all, that my suggestions won't work -- or perhaps list quality will go up only slightly while the effort and reduction in good posts goes down overall. I wouldn't want that.

Cheers!

Daniel Ust
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Olympus/4612/ust/ust.html http://www.monadnock.net/summa/