To the best of my recollection some of the lists to which I am subscribed refer posts to moderation where the subject list is, "Re: Contents of main digest...", thus, in the main, catching posts to which one may have replied in haste, by simply hitting the 'reply' button. such a policy would have caught the post by Bob Dove. Aside to Bob Dove, top-posting is placing you reply above the quoted material, the usual practice is to cut the quoted material and then reply underneath the quoted material, or to interleave them into the quoted material. see: http://www.catb.org/~esr//jargon/html/T/top-post.html http://home.online.no/~shughes/a57998/quote.html which may be of some help. -- John Seago GNU/Linux User #219566 http://counter.li.org AFFS http://www.affs.org.uk/
Sorry? Top posting is bouncing a topic in a forum so as to attempt to cause more intrest / arguments whatever without actualyl contributing or indeed paying attention to the discussion allready done. I really dont want to see alug become a moderated list. One of the benifits of alug is that its a free forum where issues / comments are always responded to quickly. Moderation will reduce both of these aspects. Replying below is anoying because it means you have to scroll through a previous email that you have allready read, especially where there (may) be multiple of those. Culling of traffic is always good. Interleaving messages is always good. Yes you might post some complete crap to the list every now and then, and be embarrased, or indeed flamed about it. But thats all in the good spirit. J ps. this isnt really comming from my microsoft windows through hotmail account honest guv.
From: John Seago <johnseago@two-ravens.org.uk> Reply-To: John Seago <johnseago@two-ravens.org.uk> To: ALUG <main@lists.alug.org.uk> Subject: [ALUG] Blocking Posts to the List Date: Fri, 8 Apr 2005 16:41:28 +0100
To the best of my recollection some of the lists to which I am subscribed refer posts to moderation where the subject list is, "Re: Contents of main digest...", thus, in the main, catching posts to which one may have replied in haste, by simply hitting the 'reply' button. such a policy would have caught the post by Bob Dove.
Aside to Bob Dove, top-posting is placing you reply above the quoted material, the usual practice is to cut the quoted material and then reply underneath the quoted material, or to interleave them into the quoted material. see: http://www.catb.org/~esr//jargon/html/T/top-post.html http://home.online.no/~shughes/a57998/quote.html which may be of some help. -- John Seago GNU/Linux User #219566 http://counter.li.org AFFS http://www.affs.org.uk/
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J wrote: [...]
Replying below is anoying because it means you have to scroll through a previous email that you have allready read, especially where there (may) be multiple of those. [...]
Whole-quoting *and* top-posting are *both* irritating habits. Please take the time to cut the email which provokes your reply down to what is needed and nothing more. http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html#quoting Of course, we should be careful to acknowledge any substantial points which have not been challenged. In that spirit, I mention that I had never heard J's other meaning of "top posting" and I don't want more moderation of main either. I just ask for documented technical limits like the attachment block and the size limit that reduce large waste and digest disruption. I remind people that whole-quoting may even be a breach of copyright in some cases (albeit minor), while quoting a small amount for commentary or criticism is fair dealing. -- Sincerely, MJR/slef http://mjr.towers.org.uk/
snip snip snip
Of course, we should be careful to acknowledge any substantial points which have not been challenged. In that spirit, I mention that I had never heard J's other meaning of "top posting"
Oh! erm ok... My issue with writing emails above what you are replying to is tat people say it "disturbs the flow of reading" well my answer is simple - I am not using the replied email as a crib. I expect you to have read the previous email, and I only include it there incase you have not. This is meerly a different style of writing to inline emails, and should only be used when you are writing a complete email that has some kind of introduction, and some kind of ending. I agree fully that if you just write an email saying "yup, thats right" with the rest of the email below, that it can be very misleading.
and I don't want more moderation of main either. I just ask for documented technical limits like the attachment block and the size limit that reduce large waste and digest disruption.
Which is why I tend to delete all but the last one or two emails in the history, but I am using it meerly as a history crib, not as the historical flow of reading - I have the archive or my inbox if I want to do that.
I remind people that whole-quoting may even be a breach of copyright in some cases (albeit minor), while quoting a small amount for commentary or criticism is fair dealing.
Always the political correct one. _________________________________________________________________ It's fast, it's easy and it's free. Get MSN Messenger today! http://www.msn.co.uk/messenger
J wrote:
[...] I expect you to have read the previous email, and I only include it there incase you have not.
The list is well-behaved and links to the archive from a footer link on every message, so as long as you attribute the quote, use an appropriate subject line and maybe include appropriate headers, most people who care should be able to locate it anyway. If there's an in-reply-to header, finding it in the mbox is quick. Please give readers the choice, instead of sending a copy.
[...] Always the political correct one.
I try to follow the "reasonable enough" bits of law. J's description of law-abidingness(?) sounds like the UKIP leaflet which arrived here today, which seems to use "scrap political correctness" as a euphemism for "repeal the race hate and discrimination laws." -- Best wishes, MJR/slef http://mjr.towers.org.uk/
The message <BAY16-F10CEBA15D882C90AC7D11DC53F0@phx.gbl> from "Edward Taylor" <manchicago@hotmail.com> contains these words:
snip snip snip
Of course, we should be careful to acknowledge any substantial points which have not been challenged. In that spirit, I mention that I had never heard J's other meaning of "top posting"
Oh! erm ok...
My issue with writing emails above what you are replying to is tat people say it "disturbs the flow of reading" well my answer is simple - I am not using the replied email as a crib. I expect you to have read the previous email,
Why? And you might care to consider that some people (myself included) don't read the list daily as a matter of course, by which time some of us (I included) may well have forgotten the context.
and I only include it there incase you have not. This is meerly a different style of writing to inline emails, and should only be used when you are writing a complete email that has some kind of introduction, and some kind of ending. I agree fully that if you just write an email saying "yup, thats right" with the rest of the email below, that it can be very misleading.
As can posting a lot, and then quoting everything below, including two sigs and list footers. -- Tony http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/ The only way to tell when a Finn is in love with you is that they look at your feet instead of their own.
"Edward Taylor" <manchicago@hotmail.com> writes:
My issue with writing emails above what you are replying to is tat people say it "disturbs the flow of reading" well my answer is simple - I am not using the replied email as a crib. I expect you to have read the previous email, and I only include it there incase you have not.
I read huge numbers of mail and news messages every day. While I will often have read the predecessor of any given message there's a good chance I won't have *just* read it, and thus won't have it in mind. I don't think this is particularly atypical. Inline quoting means that the context is immediately available, in natural reading order, in a single pass through the message. But having the quoted material lurking somewhere off the bottom of the screen is little more use than pressing '^' to see the predecessor directly - you have to stop, look elsewhere, stop again, find where you'd got to. Now multiply this delay by the number of readers, and consider how much of other people's time you are wasting (or how many people are not bothering to read your messages because you won't quote properly). -- http://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/
MJ Ray wrote:
Whole-quoting *and* top-posting are *both* irritating habits.
It is of course a matter of taste which method you use to reply to emails. But it does help the flow of a conversation if everyone sticks to the same method. I find inline(?) replies like this to be the best, they make it clear exactly what you're replying to, especially when there are several participants in the coversation.
Please take the time to cut the email which provokes your reply down to what is needed and nothing more.
I agree, the quote only really needs to be a reference point to what you're replying to, there's no need to quote the entire message as people have hopefully already read that.
I remind people that whole-quoting may even be a breach of copyright in some cases (albeit minor), while quoting a small amount for commentary or criticism is fair dealing.
Hmm. Surely downloading the message from your mail server is technically making a full copy of the author's original work without their express consent, as is reading a web page which gets copied into your cache. IMHO this is far too ambiguous to be seriously considered as infringing Copyright, if you send an email to a mailing list you've got to expect this kind of behaviour. Having said that, I hardly make a secret about my opinions on the flaws of Copyright law when applied to modern digital mediums. -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk ---------------------------------------------------- COMPUTER SUPPORT for small businesses and home users http://tolatech.co.uk ----------------------------------------------------
The message <4258366A.2030202@hippygeek.co.uk> from Ben Francis <lists@hippygeek.co.uk> contains these words:
MJ Ray wrote:
I remind people that whole-quoting may even be a breach of copyright in some cases (albeit minor), while quoting a small amount for commentary or criticism is fair dealing.
If items are sent to a list, the sender accepts the norms of that medium, and has no redress against quoting or overquoting on that list.
To take that material *OUTSIDE* the list without express leave of the originator is not good manners, and *MIGHT* amount to an infringement of copyright, and certainly passing it off as your own work is an infringement. (However, I wouldn't think that a mistake in attributions could be a matter which couldn't summarily be covered by an apology.)
Hmm. Surely downloading the message from your mail server is technically making a full copy of the author's original work without their express consent, as is reading a web page which gets copied into your cache.
I wouldn't have thought so, under any normal circumstances. You post, you send to a list and you put up a website knowing that this is how software handles them.
IMHO this is far too ambiguous to be seriously considered as infringing Copyright, if you send an email to a mailing list you've got to expect this kind of behaviour. Having said that, I hardly make a secret about my opinions on the flaws of Copyright law when applied to modern digital mediums.
The laws are pretty woolly until fraud can be demonstrated, then they are quite unambiguous. In Mercadia, Jeremy James has been given a nine year prison sentence for sending up to 10,000,000 porn and fraudulent spam items *A DAY* over a long period. He's out on bail pending an appeal, but it isn't thought likely to succeed. (BBC R4 Today program) -- Tony http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/ The only way to tell when a Finn is in love with you is that they look at your feet instead of their own.
Ben "tola" Francis wrote:
Hmm. Surely downloading the message from your mail server is technically making a full copy of the author's original work without their express consent, as is reading a web page which gets copied into your cache.
Indeed, it is. It isn't copyright infringment in England because of blanket permissions in the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1990 as amended and I'm pretty sure that none of them permit you to republish a whole work posted to a list. I'd be extremely interested to hear if anyone knows recent case law. -- MJR/slef
On Fri, Apr 08, 2005 at 04:10:52PM +0000, Edward Taylor wrote:
I really dont want to see alug become a moderated list. One of the benifits of alug is that its a free forum where issues / comments are always responded to quickly. Moderation will reduce both of these aspects.
The alug list is moderated tho, you have to be a subscriber to post and you can only post in plain text. If you post using html or are not a subscriber then the email will get stuck in the moderation queue, which tends to get dealt with as and when an interesting mail appears, if i'm not about/busy etc. then the mail could sit there for several days. The reasoning behind this is to reduce spam, if the list wasn't moderated then you would all be getting 5 or 6 extra spams to this list a day.
Replying below is anoying because it means you have to scroll through a previous email that you have allready read, especially where there (may) be multiple of those. Culling of traffic is always good. Interleaving messages is always good.
Replying above and leaving the original message intact is the worst though, as I'm not going to bother reading it, if you must top-post then please just kill the last message so that you don't quote anything. The main reasons for bottom posting (well, it isn't bottom posting really) is that you answer each point logically so people can follow the flow of the conversation. If you are going to top post then I'm not going to be bothered to read the quoted text at the end of the mail, that would be really silly as it would be impossible to work out which bits you are replying to if there was a sequence of answers. Adam -- jabberid = quinophex@jabber.earth.li AFFS || http://www.affs.org.uk/ || Not a filesystem
The message <BAY16-F34232E3B64EA15CD3DDB37C53F0@phx.gbl> from "Edward Taylor" <manchicago@hotmail.com> contains these words:
Sorry? Top posting is bouncing a topic in a forum so as to attempt to cause more intrest / arguments whatever without actualyl contributing or indeed paying attention to the discussion allready done.
I repost the whole of your message as it amply demonstrates all (or most of) the shortcomings of top-posted replies. Firstly: One may or may not immediately put the reply into context without referring to the quoted text, but more usually, not. The first part of the quote at the top acts as a reminder, and a reference-point.
I really dont want to see alug become a moderated list. One of the benifits of alug is that its a free forum where issues / comments are always responded to quickly. Moderation will reduce both of these aspects.
No. I do my own moderation, and I tend to plonk habitual top-posters.
Replying below is anoying because it means you have to scroll through a previous email that you have allready read, especially where there (may) be multiple of those.
Overquoting is as bad as top-posting.
Culling of traffic is always good. Interleaving messages is always good.
I can't argue with that - nor would I wish to.
Yes you might post some complete crap to the list every now and then, and be embarrased, or indeed flamed about it. But thats all in the good spirit.
I really *DO* hope this is laced with heavy irony...
J
ps. this isnt really comming from my microsoft windows through hotmail account honest guv.
Of course not. Who ever said it did?
From: John Seago <johnseago@two-ravens.org.uk> Reply-To: John Seago <johnseago@two-ravens.org.uk> To: ALUG <main@lists.alug.org.uk> Subject: [ALUG] Blocking Posts to the List Date: Fri, 8 Apr 2005 16:41:28 +0100
To the best of my recollection some of the lists to which I am subscribed refer posts to moderation where the subject list is, "Re: Contents of main digest...", thus, in the main, catching posts to which one may have replied in haste, by simply hitting the 'reply' button. such a policy would have caught the post by Bob Dove.
Aside to Bob Dove, top-posting is placing you reply above the quoted material, the usual practice is to cut the quoted material and then reply underneath the quoted material, or to interleave them into the quoted material. see: http://www.catb.org/~esr//jargon/html/T/top-post.html http://home.online.no/~shughes/a57998/quote.html which may be of some help. -- John Seago GNU/Linux User #219566 http://counter.li.org AFFS http://www.affs.org.uk/
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When top-posting the temptation is to hit 'reply' and leave in *EVERYTHING* Nuff'said. -- Tony http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/ The only way to tell when a Finn is in love with you is that they look at your feet instead of their own.
The worst thing about top-posting is that people who have the habit of it tend to just plonk their response at the beginning, leaving the rest whole and entire. This then gets kicked around the rest of the group, all of whom do the same thing. As a result you get Response 10
Response 9
Response 8
Response 7
Response 6
Response 5
Response 4 > Response 3 >> Response 2 >>> Response 1 >>>> Original Message
and emails 10s or 100s of KB heavy, all of which pile up in your inbox like a drawer full of socks and pullovers. (This is encouraged by the MS mailer, which you have to positively fight with in order to put your reply anywhere else but the top, and to delete anything. People who find this happening by default readily assume that this is how it's supposed to be, so being good little people they do what they think is correct, and so it goes ... ). By the way, am I top-posting or bottom-posting here? Best wishes to all, Ted. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding@nessie.mcc.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 08-Apr-05 Time: 22:12:46 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------
On Fri, Apr 08, 2005 at 10:12:46PM +0100, Ted Harding wrote:
As a result you get
and emails 10s or 100s of KB heavy, all of which pile up in your inbox like a drawer full of socks and pullovers.
Yup, sucks doesn't it, then of course the Outlook users wonder why their mail program is taking forever to download and open mails ;)
By the way, am I top-posting or bottom-posting here?
Neither, as you didn't quote anything :) Adam -- jabberid = quinophex@jabber.earth.li AFFS || http://www.affs.org.uk/ || Not a filesystem
The message <200504081641.28518.johnseago@two-ravens.org.uk> from John Seago <johnseago@two-ravens.org.uk> contains these words:
To the best of my recollection some of the lists to which I am subscribed refer posts to moderation where the subject list is, "Re: Contents of main digest...", thus, in the main, catching posts to which one may have replied in haste, by simply hitting the 'reply' button. such a policy would have caught the post by Bob Dove.
I wondered what the big download was all about. I automatically delete anything about the digest: I'm far too disorganised to have the time to cope with so many items in a lump.
Aside to Bob Dove, top-posting is placing you reply above the quoted material, the usual practice is to cut the quoted material and then reply underneath the quoted material, or to interleave them into the quoted material. see: http://www.catb.org/~esr//jargon/html/T/top-post.html http://home.online.no/~shughes/a57998/quote.html which may be of some help.
Yers. There are other protocols quoted on the net. Try a google on the name 'Moraes'. -- Tony Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing on usenet?
participants (8)
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Adam Bower -
Anthony Anson -
Ben Francis -
Edward Taylor -
John Seago -
MJ Ray -
Richard Kettlewell -
Ted.Harding＠nessie.mcc.ac.uk