On Thu, 17 Jan 2002, Zerin wrote:
> [... snip ...]
Of course, there are advantages to the mailing list:
* You have your choice of mail client, each differ in features and are
specifically crafted for handling the list's output (e-mail). A form
on a web page is a form on a web page, regardless of whether it's in
IE, Mozilla, Opera, Konqueror, or Lynx. While it is possible to
script Mozilla to add features, why bother when mail user agents
(MUAs) are already in abundance and work well?
* You have your choice of who you want to killfile. Most MUAs allow you
to filter on the From: line, at least. That means you get to choose
who you consider "meanies" and don't read e-mail from, since Alex may
not always agree with that assessment.
* You have your choice of how you want to organize messages, provided
people continue to use subject tags appropriately. Most people don't
want a forced system of organization, as they are interested in more
than one aspect of CircleMUD. Those that do, can filter based on the
Subject line.
* Many of the things you mentioned are easily done with the list server.
Some (arbitrary censorship) aren't desirable, but still conceivable by
the magic of UNIX (sed s/damn/darn/g :)).
> > Newbies and pros alike can get along peacefully
> due to securitys and user groups.
I would argue that they *do* get along just fine. The real dichotomy is
between veterans and lazy people who think this list can/should act as a
personal tutor to them. Both the CircleMUD development team (George and
Alex in particular) and various contributors have worked hard to put
together comprehensive documentation and assistance for newbies. If we
count the list archives, there's a *lot* of stuff out there. One's told
where to look when one signs up.
> The only problem I see is people who do not have the
> new age fancy browsers
Lynx renders webboards just fine in my experience. I don't use them,
however, for many of the same reasons posted above. Also, the noise ratio
tends to be much higher on webboards.
> People who do not know how in the world to sign up for the mailing
> list would have easier time signing up for a message board
Usually, if one can't manage subscription despite being told precisely how
to do it (or, even, having the web form), one would be better off not a
list member.
-dak
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