Just curious...

[Kelley]

I'm wondering -- how many folks here also own / mod / help run a 
Yahoo group?  Or used to?  I know plenty have and do; just wondering 
if there's a significant number of 'mods' here on Feedback, I suppose 
in comparison to the proportion on the main list.

Also curious, in how many groups are people here typically active?  I 
mean, I belong to a jillion, but am only really active / actively 
lurk on about a dozen or so.

What's sparked my curiosity is that I belong to a few groups 
specifically for people who mod Yahoo groups, for the sharing of 
info, advice, etc.  One group in particular (well organized, tightly 
run, very active) sends out their group rules in a file the same way 
we do the HBF, and it's unbelievable how similar the rules are to 
ours.  I mean *stunningly* similar.  They state straight out that 
they do not copyright the wording of their rules, and in fact they 
encourage folks to lift them directly for use in their own groups, so 
I'll upload a copy here for any who are interested.

At the moment, there's been quite a discussion in one of those groups 
about "digest readability" (basically "snipping") and "top posting 
vs. bottom posting" (top posting -- new comments placed at the top; 
bottom posting -- our convention of quoted material first with new 
comments following).  Not surprisingly, there are as many opinions as 
there are list members, <g>, but there are decent points made about 
both options.  

The basic sentiments seem to boil down to how easy or not is it to 
determine who said what, that people hate trying to decipher the out 
of control chevrons/carets (whatever people call them -- >, >>, > > 
>, etc.) and that no one likes to wade through loads of text they've 
already read to see a one-line response.  (There are probably other 
general consensus thoughts; those are just the ones occurring to me 
now.)

Anyway, considering how many times the list elves have discussed 
these issues, it's just kind of amusing to me that so many others are 
having the same discussions. <g>  Also reinforces that attentive 
moderation and posting rules can be Good Things. ;-)

--Kelley