No responses on the main list (Was: Wizarding Education )

[a_reader2003]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "davewitley" 
<dfrankiswork at n...> wrote:
> Shaun wrote:
> > Short posts tend to get read. Long posts now get ignored.
> 
David wrote:
> It would be interesting to see if there's any objective evidence of 
> this.
> 
> It is a longstanding summer HPFGU tradition to whine about how the 
> list is going downhill.  The fact that people have crawled out of 
> the woodwork bang on cue says to me that the continuity in all this 
> far outweighs what is new.  In 2000, there was oldbie eye-rolling 
by 
> August about how newbies would ask about Dumbledore's gleam - less 
> than two months after GOF was published.
> 
> There was no golden age.
> 

Carolyn:
If it happens every summer, shouldn't we try and do something about 
it? It can only get worse, not better over the next few years. What's 
the point of regularly dis-affecting half the membership? 

Every group needs constant renewal, older members burn out 
constantly; it's just a question of managing the process. A regularly 
updated consensus on what was a FAQ might stem the flow of some types 
of post (provided there was an effective mechanism to catch these 
posts before they got on to the list, and an easy place you could 
refer people to to find the answers).

Controlling the number of posts per day might also be worth 
considering if it is not possible to come to an agreement on how 
large the group should be overall.

And although a peruse of the archives certainly reveals no golden 
age, nevertheless, there is no doubt that when groups of members get 
used to working with each other, and are familiar with each other's 
points of view, some amazing threads can result. People stack ideas 
on ideas in ever-more entertaining houses of cards. 

Although the same groups also tend to fly too near the sun in their 
excitement and fall to earth eventually, its great while it lasts, 
and leaves a permanent legacy of great theories to be picked over and 
re-mastered, or indeed, trashed by other people.

It's very rare for that kind of exhilarating thread to be generated 
by totally new people, so sorry if you think its whining, but I think 
it is quite important to try and strike a balance between the 
interests of older members and those who have just joined.

Carolyn