[Techtalk] Re: [Volunteers] The Techtalk list

[Val Henson]

(Sorry for the crossposting - I assume this thread will eventually be
limited to one mailing list.)

On Wed, Jan 09, 2002 at 11:54:21PM +1100, Jenn Vesperman wrote:
>
> * do we want a supplementary technical list? An explicitly mixed-gender
> one? An explicitly female one? Might it help? Is it worth trying one,
> and seeing if it -would- get trolled/slashdotted/whatever?
> * does anyone have other ideas?

I recently joined Systers, www.systers.org, which is a female-only
list, and so far I've seen no trouble with trolling.  To subscribe,
you have to write a convincing introduction saying that you're female
and involved in the technical aspects of computing.  The list
administrator is reasonably active - she approves new subscribers, and
blacklists topics that get out of hand.  Presumably, she desubscribes
people who turn out to be trolls, but I haven't seen that happen yet.

It works REALLY well.  The list is shockingly polite and extremely
helpful.  In the month(?) I've been on it, it averaged around 20
messages a day, and yet we've had only one flame war (which was shut
down by the list administrator).  Several people unsubscribed in
outrage afterwards. :) Can you imagine if that happened on any other
list?  It'd be empty in no time.

Conclusion: female-only mailing lists are possible, and they work
extremely well.

-VAL