Re: [Sheflug] Use of mailing lists and online forums

[Tim Dobson <personalwebsite@xxxxxxxx>]

Robert Holland wrote:
> Following on from James Vasile's talk last week I'm trying to get a feel 
> for free software community collaborative tools. In particular I 
> wondered how people view the advantages / disadvantages of using email 
> lists compared with forums.

The other actual thing to bring into the comparison is Usenet.

I find web forums are annoying because I have to fire up a web browser 
and *go* to that site  to check for new posts etc, as opposed to my 
mail, which i check at least once a day, and getting discussion in the 
same place makes sense.

I'm not a NNTP person really, but if I chose to use usenet, and there 
are reasons why one might, like the anti-(email)spam groups, then I 
would probably be pleased my mail client could do that for me as well.

For serious discussion, I think mailing lists are great because they 
don't allow moderation after posting (i.e. admins can't delete a 
troublesome thread).

I am on quite a few lists. These are different communities. Many are low 
traffic.

If each mailing list was a forum, then I wouldn't be able to mix and 
match that I wanted to be on sheflug AND manlug because I'm equal 
distance from each.
I would have to check TWO forums for new posts.

Once you start thinking like that it becomes clearer I think


Tim


-- 
www.tdobson.net
----
If each of us have one object, and we exchange them, then each of us
still has one object.
If each of us have one idea, and we exchange them, then each of us now
has two ideas.   -  George Bernard Shaw

_______________________________________________
        Sheffield Linux User's Group
  http://www.sheflug.org.uk/mailfaq.html
 GNU - The choice of a complete generation