From: Gina Miller (nanogirl@halcyon.com)
Date: Mon Aug 18 2003 - 17:59:56 MDT
I'm glad you pointed out the two distinct lists, there is the Nanogirl News
list (just news) and the Nanotech list (news and discussion). This model has
worked very well for myself and the members of the two differing lists.
Originally I had just the one list that had not only the news but was also
open to discussion (which is still in the form of the Nanotech list).
Unfortunately this forced acceptance by members who were only interested in
the latest news to also fill up there inbox with messages they were not
interested in or just did not have time to read or respond to (this leads to
unsubscribers), this was the birth of the separate lists. By providing these
two options members are not lost, they can find their own comfort zone.
Maintaining email lists is not as easy as it may seem, especially when the
group is large and consists of many opinions and intellects. My list's
subject of nanotech is more narrow than the topics discussed here on the
extropy list, this creates even more complexity. I would like to think that
as a code I do not like censorship, when I began my list, I would not deny
any post with free speech as a priority. However this code has been broken
and I have been at times forced to intervene as moderator. I do not like to,
as it would be a much easier world to keep everyone happy, this however can
occasionally be, impossible. At times things have been submitted that appear
to be spam in disguise, here in lies the approval issue. I recall an
incident where profane insults were being thrown around and the discussion
wavered from the topic of the list, the focus was lost. Since I would like
my list to be appropriate for everyone (my email group settings in fact
specify that the group is appropriate for all ages), as the nanotech meme is
imperative to those of all ages, including youth, I had to express my
concern to the list and suggest (warnings that other members don't see can
be ignored) that the argument move somewhere else more appropriate. I was
very happy that everything was quickly resolved. Of course the Nanogirl News
list, is extremely easy to maintain, since only the news is distributed.
There has never been a problem. The few I have had on the other list, were
minor and worth going through to be able to enjoy the full experience of the
list. I suggest that the rarity of occurrences on my list, since 1998 are
still very good statistics. This must be accounted for on such a high
density of members on this list as well. This list is very open and very
patient, I know. I don't know what exactly is going on here or what has
been said, I've been so busy that I'm not reading everything, I've only
caught bits and pieces. I just thought I would share my experience regarding
maintaining lists since they were mentioned. We discuss the big questions on
this list, for that we should be proud. There's nothing else like here
(there's no place like home!). Gina Miller`
----- Original Message -----
From: <natashavita@earthlink.net>
To: <extropians@extropy.org>
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2003 9:46 AM
>
>
> Original Message:
> -----------------
> From: Dossy dossy@panoptic.com
> Date: Mon, 18 Aug 2003 12:06:58 -0400
> To: extropians@extropy.org
> Subject: Re: Lee Corbin's Goodbye
>
>
> On 2003.08.18, Mark Walker <mark@permanentend.org> wrote:
> > We have two choices: either no list moderation, which leads to an
> > unacceptable degradation of list quality; or some form of coercion is
> > used to enforce list rules.
>
> Add my personal preference and a third choice:
>
> We create two lists. One is a discussion list and is wholly and
> completely unmoderated. The other is a moderated (announce-only style)
> list, where only a few people can send to the list.
>
> Generally, everyone is encouraged to subscribe to the moderated list,
> which should be low traffic (less than 10 messages a day). Anyone who
> wishes to participate in discussion subscribes to the discussion list.
>
> Discussion threads start on the discussion list, where everyone can put
> in their two cents. When the thread reaches a point where it's either
> interesting or has terminated, someone (not necessarily a participant in
> the thread -- the volunteer can be anyone) then summarizes the
> highlights of the thread that might be interesting. They then send that
> summary to one of the moderators of the moderated list who collate the
> day's summaries, then sends it out to the moderated list.
>
> This way, folks who don't want to (or can't) sift through the noise get
> to at least see what they might have missed. Then, they can optionally
> go back through some threaded message archive and read up on the actual
> thread if they want deeper detail.
>
> This is similar to what folks like Gina are doing with the Nanogirl
> News, but would be specific to the content represented in the Extropians
> mailing list.
>
> This is a widely used technique for many mailing lists and Usenet
> newsgroups and works well, as long as there are enough volunteers who
> summarize worthwhile threads.
>
> -- Dossy
>
> --
> Dossy Shiobara mail: dossy@panoptic.com
> Panoptic Computer Network web: http://www.panoptic.com/
> "He realized the fastest way to change is to laugh at your own
> folly -- then you can let go and quickly move on." (p. 70)
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------
> mail2web - Check your email from the web at
> http://mail2web.com/ .
>
>
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Mon Aug 18 2003 - 18:15:45 MDT