NavList:

   

Reply

--- True Oh King!




Frank Reed  wrote:

>
> "The natural life cycle of mailing lists.
> Every list seems to go through the same cycle:
> 1. Initial enthusiasm (people introduce themselves, and
> gush a lot about  how wonderful it is to find kindred
> souls).
> 2. Evangelism (people moan about how few folks are posting
> to the list,  and brainstorm recruitment strategies).
> 3. Growth (more and more people join, more and more lengthy
> threads  develop, occasional off-topic threads pop up).
> 4. Community (lots of threads, some more relevant than
> others; lots of  information and advice is exchanged;
> experts help other experts as well as  less experienced
> colleagues; friendships develop; people tease each other;
> newcomers are welcomed with generosity and patience;
> everyone -- newbie  and expert alike -- feels comfortable
> asking questions, suggesting answers,  and sharing
> opinions).
> 5. Discomfort with diversity (the number of messages
> increases  dramatically; not every thread is fascinating to
> every reader; people start  complaining about the
> signal-to-noise ratio; person 1 threatens to quit if
> *other* people don't limit discussion to person 1's pet
> topic; person 2  agrees with person 1; person 3 tells 1 & 2
> to lighten up; more bandwidth  is wasted complaining about
> off-topic threads than is used for the threads  themselves;
> everyone gets annoyed).
> 6.
> a. Smug complacency and stagnation (the purists flame
> everyone who  asks an 'old' question or responds with humor
> to a serious post; newbies are  rebuffed; traffic drops to a
> doze-producing level of a few minor issues; all  interesting
> discussions happen by private email and are limited to a
> few  participants; the purists spend lots of time
> self-righteously congratulating  each other on keeping
> off-topic threads off the list).
> -OR-
> b. Maturity (a few people quit in a huff; the rest of the
> participants  stay near stage 4, with stage 5 popping up
> briefly every few weeks; many  people wear out their second
> or third 'delete' key, but the list lives  contentedly ever
> after). "
> Not new. But always entertaining...  :-)
>
> -FER
> 42.0N  87.7W, or 41.4N  72.1W.
> www.HistoricalAtlas.com/lunars
>





__________________________________
Celebrate Yahoo!'s 10th Birthday!
Yahoo! Netrospective: 100 Moments of the Web
http://birthday.yahoo.com/netrospective/

   

Reply