[pianotech] Pianotech/CAUT: RE:New Format

[Ron Nossaman]

On 3/8/2011 5:49 PM, Joe Defazio wrote:

> Let's not "take our toys and go home."  Let's make it better
> instead.

Absolutely! Or at least leave lame enough alone rather than killing it 
outright.

My list:
Email listserv, much like we have already. As JD said, I can delete what 
I'm not interested in, archive what I am, and organize it as I wish. The 
software doesn't presume to do the thinking for me, or pretend to be 
something it's not as it prevents me from doing what I want. Digest form 
for those who want it, and a plain text option on the server. I do like 
that little feature. There will always be the lazy clod, ignorant sod, 
or outright sociopath who will return post 800K of pictures, 13 levels 
of replies, or the entire digest repeatedly, and there's really nothing 
administrative or system specific that can be done about it without 
shooting legitimate reposting in the foot. Governments worldwide through 
all history, recorded or rumored, have proven beyond all doubt that you 
can't legislate good sense, or even minimal competence. Can't elect it 
either, for the most part, but that's off topic.

Editing already posted messages, I don't see a reason for. We do it in 
real life by passing through again with revisions and corrections, and 
that's the way the listserv should work as well. History has been, and 
is being rewritten altogether too rampantly already without condoning it 
on list.

Searchable archives are imperative but problematic. The results will 
never be better than our own organization of the original threads 
posted, and the correlation between the subject line and the subject. 
Pretty much doomed there, I expect. What I consider a major sin to date 
though, is the disassociation and apparent loss of most of the 
attachments posted with the original messages. A whole bunch of photos, 
documents, and spreadsheets have been posted through the years that seem 
to have fallen into the bit bucket somewhere along the line and 
evaporated. Those who were on line at the time and interested, saved 
copies in their own archives, safe from the inquiring minds of all the 
more recent list participants. There's a lot of valuable (to us) 
information there. What happened to them?

Otherwise, what's wrong with the old format?
Ron N