Re: A plea for restraint

From: Robin Hanson (rhanson@gmu.edu)
Date: Thu Oct 12 2000 - 07:17:08 MDT


Eugene Leitl wrote:
>Samantha Atkins writes:
> > I have been around long enough to see all too many
> > "innovations" that were actually less capable than what was done before
> > in crical areas while providing some welcome newness in others.
>
>Amen to that one.

And Amen to that Amen, and to Hal's original call. I have seen this
scenario played out many times before on this list and elsewhere.
People complain about noise/quality on an email list, and software
people decide that its a software problem they know how to fix, so
they add some features to something and declare the problem solved.

I have yet to see any web discussion forum that is as good as a
simple mailing list. I'm sure it isn't impossible to do better, but
the track record so far suggests the odds of success of any one try
are very low.

Robin Hanson rhanson@gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu
Asst. Prof. Economics, George Mason University
MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444
703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323



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