From hungary-online-owner Thu Apr 27 01:46:36 1995 Received: from localhost (daemon@localhost) (fnord) by nando.yak.net (8.6.5/8.6.5) id BAA15290 for hungary-online-out31415; Thu, 27 Apr 1995 01:46:36 -0700 Received: from localhost (daemon@localhost) (fnord) by nando.yak.net (8.6.5/8.6.5) id BAA15281; Thu, 27 Apr 1995 01:46:25 -0700 Received: from carlson@odin.net () via =-=-=-=-=-= for hungary-online@hungary.yak.net (15279) Received: from odin.net (root@omega.odin.net [193.130.116.3]) (fnord) by nando (8.6.5/8.6.5) with ESMTP id BAA15243 for ; Thu, 27 Apr 1995 01:45:30 -0700 Received: from [193.130.116.13] by odin.net with SMTP (8.6.10/1.2-btv) id KAA11651; Thu, 27 Apr 1995 10:01:44 GMT X-Sender: carlson@odin.net (Unverified) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 27 Apr 1995 10:39:21 +0100 To: hungary-online@hungary.yak.net From: carlson@odin.net (Steven Carlson) Subject: (HOL) The natural life of mailing lists Sender: owner-Hungary-Online@hungary.yak.net Precedence: bulk Reply-To: Hungary-Online@hungary.yak.net Uh ... excuse this off-topic post =steve= -- >From email@fringeware.com Thu Nov 19 12:38:00 1992 >From: email@fringeware.com (FringeWare Inc) Precedence: list List-Server: info@fringeware.com Errors-To: owner-email@fringeware.com Message-Id: <9504170322.fw.2190@fringeware.com> X-Www-Page: http://fringeware.com/HTML/online.html#digest Keywords: modogmags requeeze piges georgies guely denver Subject: LISTS - The natural life of mailing lists. Reply-To: jim@Tadpole.COM (Jim Thompson) Date: Sun, 16 Apr 1995 13:42:56 -0500 Status: O Sent from: jim@Tadpole.COM (Jim Thompson) Forwarded-by: cgw@io.com (christopher williams) Forwarded-by: Mark S. Bailen Forwarded-by: Friese Greg [author unknown] THE NATURAL LIFE CYCLE OF MAILING LISTS Every list seems to go through the same cycle: 1. Initial enthusiasm (people introduce themselves, and gush alot about how wonderful it is to find kindred souls). 2. Evangelism (people moan about how few folks are posting to the list, and brainstorm recruitment strategies). 3. Growth (more and more people join, more and more lengthy threads develop, occasional off-topic threads pop up). 4. Community (lots of threads, some more relevant than others; lots of information and advice is exchanged; experts help other experts as well as less experienced colleagues; friendships develop; people tease each other; newcomers are welcomed with generosity and patience; everyone -- newbie and expert alike -- feels comfortable asking questions, suggesting answers, and sharing opinions). 5. Discomfort with diversity (the number of messages increases dramatically; not every thread is fascinating to every reader; people start complaining about the signal-to-noise ratio; person 1 threatens to quit if *other* people don't limit discussion to person 1's pet topic; person 2 agrees with person 1; person 3 tells 1 & 2 to lighten up; more bandwidth is wasted complaining about off-topic threads than is used for the threads themselves; everyone gets annoyed). 6a. Smug complacency and stagnation (the purists flame everyone who asks an 'old' question or responds with humor to a serious post; newbies are rebuffed; traffic drops to a doze-producing level of a few minor issues; all interesting discussions happen by private email and are limited to a few participants; the purists spend lots of time self-righteously congratulating each other on keeping off-topic threads off the list). OR 6b. Maturity (a few people quit in a huff; the rest of the participants stay near stage 4, with stage 5 popping up briefly every few weeks; many people wear out their second or third 'delete' key, but the list lives contentedly ever after). --- Steven Carlson moderator/publisher - hungary-online Critical Mass Media Inc internet trainer, consultant [+361] 133-4647 in Budapest, Hungary carlson@odin.net ############# # This message to Hungary-Online@hungary.yak.net # was from carlson@odin.net (Steven Carlson) # # To unsubscribe, # send "unsubscribe" to # An announcement-only subscription (less volume) is available # at # Send mail to for more information, # or to if you need human assistance. #############