Date:         Thu, 02 May 1996 13:12:07 -0400
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         "Rodney L. Boleyn" <boleyn@scr.siemens.com>
Subject:      Re: news group


EXPRES@gnn.com (Ron Salmon) wrote:
>Therefore, from the standpoint of cost of online time, I prefer the 
>list in its present format. 
>Besides, who said we had any choice in this matter?

And Wendeln@onyx.afsac.wpafb.af.mil (Ted) wrote:
>
>I agree.  Right now I have anywhere from 125-150 messages to weed
>through when I first log-on each day.  Even if I'm only interested in
>5-10 of the messages, I have to handle them all.  When was the last
>time the membership was polled on a news group?

Here's my $0.005:

A) The mailing list doesn't get spammed by advertisers and
cross-posters, thereby alleviating tons of stoopid flame responses
which the original poster nevers sees anyway.  Take a look at
rec.autos.makers.vw.aircooled to get an idea of the difference.

B) Vanagon@lenti has the highest SNR of any non-technical list/
newsgroup/forum I've ever participated in, even before considering its
high bandwidth.  I attribute this partly to the fact that you have to
seek out the list and actually take some initiative in order to start
receiving it.  The list doesn't automatically show up on the machines
of millions of people who might have seen a VW bus once.
   [By non-technical, I mean you don't need a Ph.D. in internal
   medicine, nuclear physics, or microcellular biology in order to
   participate.]

C) If you like threaded newsreaders, get a threaded mail reader.  I
like the concept, but I don't really trust threaded readers--topics
tend to wander, and when I peek in on an "old" thread, I'm often
surprised to find it has morphed into a completely unrelated (and
often interesting) new topic.  Actually having to skim all the
articles can be a positive thing.

D) The last time this topic came up was about 4 months ago.  And 4
months before that.  I've been on the list since August 95, and this
is the third time it's come up, just since then.

Personally I like it as a mailing list.  The format may not be as
convenient as some other alternatives, but it keeps the content more
focused.

-Rodney