Fate of the list

[Jim Wright]

On Sunday, August 18, 2002, at 08:45 AM, Chris Davis wrote:

> Jim Wright wrote:
>> ROFL  Progress?

> See, this is the type of negative energy on this list I find troubling.
> Seriously, you were rolling on the floor?  I give a thoughtful
> response and
> I get this?

Chris, I'm very sorry if I offended you but I truly did find the term
'progress'
amusing, since I really don't see the forums that way at all.

Now, I'm not saying that they are not useful, quite the contrary.  When
properly used, you have nice, neat threads, an original posting, the
various follow ups, etc, all right there just a few clicks away.  Doing
a search on the forums is also generally easy, and will yield results
if the topic has come up on the boards.

The problem is that I don't see the web forums living up to their
potential, and though compared to a simple mailing list they may in
fact be progress of a sort, the human factor strains against this in
its own direction.

Forums will have the same questions asked in various different ways,
each thread having its own set of responses, often a batch of 'me too'
responses.  Searches find a manageable number of hits, but most forums
haven't been around long, and so do not have extensive archives,
limiting their usefulness.

I make no secret of the fact that I prefer the list, chaos, noise, and
all.  I've already posted some of my thoughts on improving things, but
as Larry has said, it's up to us, here, now, what will happen to the
list in the future.