Posting question section

Subject: IBM-MAIN: Quoting
   Date: 1999-01-29 12:19:26 -0600
   From: darren@BAMA.UA.EDU (Darren Evans-Young)

>Date:    Thu, 1999-01-28 17:27:14 -0600
>From:    "William M. Klein" 
>Subject: FW: IBM-MAIN
>
>I know that there has been a discussion on this, furthermore, I
>understand that particularly for those outside the US who often have to
>pay for connect time, this may be a problem.


It also has to do with how much text one has to page through, especially
digest readers. Quoting part of the original text is one thing, but quoting
a reply to a reply to a reply is ridiculous. Selecting a good subject line
is also important.

>ON THE OTHER HAND,
>As has been pointed out by others in IBM-MAIN, there is a repeated
>problem with the IBM-MAIN listserver and Usenet Newsgroup not getting
>all the posts put out to the other.  It is my (personal) opinion, that
>often quoting the entire message to which one is replying is the ONLY
>way to see to what the reply relates.

Those that read the newsgroup should be subscribed to IBM-MAIN and their
list option set to NOMAIL. Personally, I could care less about Usenet. I
did that as a courtesy several years ago. IBM-MAIN is a discussion list.
Also, note that IBM-MAIN has been virtually spam free.  99 44/100% of
spam comes from Usenet. Requiring folks to subscribe and confirm those
subscriptions has kept spam to a minimum. You should see some of the
crap on other discussion lists that dont require subscriptions.

>This is just one vote for being able to keep much (if not all) of the
>replied to message - in order to understand the reply - at least until
>someone fixes the problem with getting all posts reflected in both
>places.

Now that the gateway is setup two-way, the only postings that the entire
group wont see are from those that post to the newsgroup and are NOT
subscribed to IBM-MAIN.

Now, I have quoted your entire post and responded to each individual
part.  That is the way it should be done. A reader can see quoted
material and my response to that part. Note that I did NOT include my
original text that you responded to.  It's ok to quote, but to always
quote the entire post that may include several quoted replies is
unacceptable.

Darren

Subject: ADMINISTRIVIA
   Date: Wed, 1999-01-27
   From: darren@BAMA.UA.EDU (Darren Evans-Young)

Folks,

Could we PLEASE start limiting the amount of quoted material?!?!! It is
absolutely ridiculous to make a two line reply and then quote 200 lines
of a previous post.  I'm going to start issuing warnings to subscribers
quoting entire posts when they reply. Too many warnings you get booted.
I hate to sound like a hard***, but with this many subscribers and daily
postings, we need to cut down on the size of postings.

If you can turn off sending attachments, HTML formatted email, and
return receipts, please do that too.

I was recently swamped with email because someone subscribed from a
USA.NET address and then had their mail forwarded from USA.NET to an
AOL.COM address. I was getting a rejection from AOL.COM for each posting
to IBM-MAIN. Of course, that AOL address was not subscribed.  I had to
individually send email to each USA.NET subscriber to see which one
bounced. I was not happy.  If you do this kind of forwarding, please
unsubscribe if your target email address is going away.

Also, if you feel there are problems with the list, please send them to
ME and not the list. Thanks to those that do this already.

Darren Evans-Young,
IBM-MAIN List Owner

Subject: ADMINISTRIVIA
   Date: 1999-09-13
   From: darren@BAMA.UA.EDU (Darren Evans-Young)

Mon, 1999-09-13, Bruce Black wrote:

>Personally I quote the entire message in my reply, but then I edit it
>down so that just the relevant points I am answering are included.

And this is what should be done. But *MANY* of you are including the
entire post and not doing ANY editing at all!  There is no excuse for
quoting a previous post, even a short one, and not editing out 12 line
signatures and 30 line legal disclaimers.  What perturbs me the most are
the one to two lines replies that have 100 lines of quoted material.
Please be respectful of other subscribers when replying and edit out
unnecessary material.

Also, please send personal replies to the original sender and not the
list. A post that just says "Thanks Joe!" and includes 80 lines of
quoted material is not good.

I want to thank those that have started to  their replies! Keep up
the good work.

Darren Evans-Young,
IBM-MAIN List Owner

Subject: ADMINISTRIVIA
   Date: 1999-08-11
   From: darren@BAMA.UA.EDU (Darren Evans-Young)

OK Folks. Things have gotten out of hand and its time for me to correct
some things. IBM-MAIN recently has exceeded the 175 postings per day
several times. I do not want to keep increasing this limit. If the 175
postings were about IBM mainframes, that would be ok. However, this list
has become FULL of off topic posts that have nothing to do with
mainframes. Not only that, the subscribers that are posting off-topic
items are excessively quoting previous posts. I can no longer tolerate
this.

From this point on, if you post an off topic item to the list, you will
be set to NOPOST. If you excessively quote, you will be set to NOPOST.
If you send a personal reply to the list that does not benefit the rest
of the readership, such as "Meet me at Burger King", you will be set to
NOPOST.

If you are set to NOPOST, do not take it personal. It is only for you to
contact me so we can discuss what rule you may have violated. After we
come to an understanding about the rule(s), you will be set back to
POST.

Remember, being a member of IBM-MAIN is a privilege, not a right.

There is now a limit to the number of times a subscriber may post to the
list per day. Please consider combining your responses into a single
message or reply directly to the original sender.

Please think before posting! Will your post help other subscribers or
enhance the list?  If not, DO NOT send it to IBM-MAIN!!!!

If you have constructive comments about these rules, you may email me.

DO NOT DISCUSS THIS POST ON IBM-MAIN!!!! Or you will be set to NOPOST!
Comments are to be sent to me.

I want to thank those that have made this list the best resource for
information on mainframes. I plan on keeping it this way.

Darren Evans-Young,
IBM-MAIN List Owner
darren@bama.ua.edu

Date:         Mon, 1997-11-10 12:19:23 CST
From:         darren@BAMA.UA.EDU (Darren Evans-Young)
Subject:      ADMINISTRIVIA: Vendor Advertising on IBM-MAIN

First of  all, thanks  to all who  sent me mail  on your  thoughts about
vendor advertising. The  vote is roughly 70% for, 30%  against. So, here
is  what I  have decided  to do.  I'll allow  vendors to  post pertinent
advertisements  to   IBM-MAIN  no   more  than   once  per   month.  All
advertisement will  be sent to me  and I will  then post it to  the list
with the  subject line  beginning with ADVERTISEMENT:.  I have  only had
two such requests, so we're not  talking about being bombarded with ads.
Ads will be brief and will  (should) contain pointers to web pages, etc.
Nothing here is  set in stone. If I start  getting overwhelmed with ads,
then they will cease.

Darren
IBM-MAIN List Owner
darren@bama.ua.edu

Date:    Fri, 2003-02-21 14:53:40 -0600
From:    Darren Evans-Young (darren@BAMA.UA.EDU)
Subject: ADMINSTRIVIA: Off Topic posts

I'm getting a little irritated about all of these off-topic
posts going on. I've killed more threads in the last couple
weeks than in the history of IBM-MAIN. And once I kill one,
someone starts another one. Please keep your posts to mainframe
topics! Putting OT: in the subject line does NOT make it
ok to post something off-topic.  If the noise continues, I will
start setting the violators to REVIEW. If you are set to REVIEW,
your posts will be approved or not approved when I get around to it.

Darren Evans-Young,
IBM-MAIN List Owner