[CAUT] lab woes

[Alan Crane]

At 09:28 AM 9/23/05, Michelle Stranges wrote:
>Yayaayyyyyyyyyy for the Wurly's!!
>
>:D

Might I be so bold as to suggest (strongly) that the CAUT list is not 
the place for these one-liners and posts simply expressing atta-boys, 
me-toos, and the like.  I'm not picking on Michelle here; in truth, 
its all of us cluttering up what has been a fairly professional and 
useful list in this manner________ especially lately.
This is one of the reasons a great many of us no longer participate 
in the Pianotech list (which, BTW, originated with this group as the 
first caut list) ... it simply took up too much valuable time to sift 
through useless material, most of which should have been sent 
privately, off-list, in the first place.
Not only do these extraneous posts bog down the CAUT list itself, 
they also nest in the CAUT list archives, making that excellent tool 
more unwieldy and less useful for everyone.
Filters, you say??  Well, really, I can't think of one person on this 
list whose wisdom and experience I don't value and I'm just not 
content to solve the problem by throwing anyone out with their bath 
water (as it were) but its that "bath water" that is beginning to 
make a soggy mess of the list.
If you have something to say, by all means say it____________ we all 
benefit from your wisdom, experience, or questions.
However, if you just want to add your own "awesome!" or "way to go!" 
(etc...), please send it off-list to the person(s) you're addressing.
If all you really want to do is grandstand in front the rest of us... 
well, then I guess you have to post it to the entire list and expect 
us each to spend the time you wouldn't putting your post in its 
proper place (albiet that doesn't address the problem of the 
cluttered archives).

It is no accident that this list (and the Pianotech list before it) 
is an un-moderated, open-subscription, tool available to anyone.
It is in the interest of the CAUTs and other participants for it to 
be that way.
If the CAUT list subscribers do not take active care of the list and 
what they post, it may well begin to be just another unwieldy 
Pianotech list for which most of us can not spare the time required 
to participate.

Michelle, thanks for "volunteering" to be the poster child here; 
would that you were different than any of the rest of us.
Truly, though, most of us can rightfully put our names here instead 
of yours, and *all* of us need to attend to the list, and our posts 
to it, accordingly.



Regards,

Alan B. Crane,  RPT
School of Music
Wichita State University
alan.crane@wichita.edu