Perhaps Usenet groups might be able to involve more people, but for technicians who are not at a university where they get internet access, Compuserve or AOL are easier to get access. Compuserve just added usenet access and AOL has it. I think you missed the point about PTG presence on Compuserve, because of its international nature there is no way to expect direct return of business from the activity. This is promotion of the whole guild by having info available. The compuserve forums are very similar to Usenet groups except that they incur extra charge. So the people who will get the PTG info are people who are looking and paying for it. We had considered putting a directory of RPTs available for download. Whoever got the business from that is just random chance. I don't know what it takes to start a new newsgroup. Does it need to have someone to provide the host computer as this mailing list does? Something I read suggested that new newgroups need to be voted on by newgroup participants. I agree that rec.music.makers.piano is trying to serve both the technical questions and piano playing questions. A newsgroup for technical questions would need a commitment of time from technicians to keep the answers from being "put a light bulb in your piano." Ron Ron Berry ronberry@iquest.net
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