[Techtalk] private replies/ list replies

[Akkana Peck]

Carla Schroder writes:
> The last few times I've posted questions here, I got bales of nice helpful 
> replies- offlist. I don't understand this. I expect list questions to be 
> answered on the list, so that everyone can benefit. Is there some sekrit 

I was in the middle of a long reply, then saw Telsa's posting, where
as usual she said most of what I was going to say, only a lot
more succinctly.  So, "What Telsa said"!  "And Devdas, too!"
But I'll add this:

  The golden rule I follow for mailing lists is: Do I think this
  posting will be helpful to a significant number of people on the
  list?  Does it add enough new information to justify sending it
  to hundreds of people and archiving it perhaps forever?
  If the answers are no, then I send private mail.

I'm on some mailing lists which are full of postings consisting only
of metoo, or thanks, or it was nice seeing you saturday followed by
oops I meant that to be private.  It's really hard to wade through
lists like that to find anything useful.  Linuxchix lists have a
very high signal to noise, and I really like that.  I try not to
be the one to drag it down.

Carla Schroder writes:
> No one benefits if only questions, and no answers, 
> are posted!

I'm with you there!  That's why posting a summary is so important if
the answer turned out to be from a private message, or from further
research.

	...Akkana