Maturity and signal-to-noise.

[Ben Fenner]

I'll try to make this brief, as I am up too late as it is. I wanted to 
voice my experience on the subject of maturity and signal-to-noise ratio 
of this mailing list vs. the sr20forum.

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Tornado Performance Booster
Link:
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First I'll explain where I'm coming from.
I joined the mailing list in July of 2000 shortly after buying my car. I 
was 17 years old at the time, and fit in nicely. I worked well with the 
list, and vice versa. Obviously I missed the most active time of the 
forum, so I can't relate to the people who were here in the early/mid 
nineties. Oh well.
I needed only the mailing list for 6 years. I then found a need for the 
forum, and joined.

I heard bad things about the forum in my time on the mailing list. A lot 
of complaint about signal-to-noise ratio being not what they prefer. 
Honestly, it kept me from joining for a while.

On to the meat of the issue. The maturity level here is greater by far. 
There are many, many factors at play (average age, the e-mail medium we 
use, etc.) but that can't be argued. We are mature on this list.

The maturity level on the forums, while lower, is user dependent. 
Obviously... There are many mature users, and many immature users. If 
you can filter out (mentally) the immature users, you're left with a 
pretty good bunch.

--------------------------------------------------------------
AIRTEX FUEL DELIVERY SYSTEMS
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That brings me nicely to the signal-to-noise ratio. Yes, it's pretty 
high if you consider everything on the forum (every post, every user, 
every section). With a little mental filtering and ability to stay away 
from certain sectrions of the forum, all of a sudden you're left with a 
really decent bunch of people, discussions, etc.

There is a point (and I'm not knocking the list here) where 
traffic/content, even if a bit suspect, is better than no 
traffic/content at all. I dunno... Maybe I'm going nowhere here.

All I know is what I've experienced. Tell me, was I wrong to go to the 
forums to begin to buy up my factory GTi-R turbo parts?
Was I foolish when I found Shawn B's gigantic suspension thread ( 
http://www.sr20forum.com/driveline-transmission/170794-b13-b14-b15-suspension-information.html 
) and decided (rightly so) that maybe racing coil-overs weren't the best 
choice for me, and while the Hypercos are the greatest replacement 
spring offered, the new Road Magnets are almost just as good, linear, 
and less expensive?
Is there any way on the mailing list to keep a running 
list/tally/summary of anything (similar to Shawn B's supension thread, a 
project thread, or my engine management comparison thread)?
Is there an easy way to show pictures to others without having to 
tediously click links?
How many of you know the true reason our transmissions fail above 275 
HP, and how many of you learned it here? Has it even been spoken about? 
I know why because of the forums. Do you?

--------------------------------------------------------------
American Racing "Black Burn" Wheels
Link:
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In the late '50s, the original five-spoke American Racing Torq Thrust ® 
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I'm sorry, this is starting to sound like an attack on the list. This is 
certainly not what I want to do. I like it here. I prefer it here. As do 
the rest of us. I'm just saying, obviously the forum has it's good 
aspects. Enough of them for me (at least) to join, become active, and 
care enough about the service it provides/provided to worry about it 
when something like this happens.

By the way, Larry has introduced a couple new features to the mailing 
list. There will be minor advertizing interlazed seemlessly with all new 
messages. Also quoting previous messages is no longer allowed.

Have a nice day.

-BenFenner
1994 Black SE-R (VEMS, going turbo)
1994 Black SE-R (sunroof FTL)