Homestead mailing list

[Lee Flier <lflier AT mindspring.com>]

Yep, I sure am!

We have 179 members - not sure how many actually have active email 
addresses.

I've been a part of many online communities over the years, and in my 
experience, most of them do seem to have a life cycle. It might be a 
vital and vibrant group for 5 to 10 years, but eventually it starts to 
resemble a clique - the established folks talking amongst themselves in 
a way that discourages new people from participating, or if a newbie 
does show up, the senior members get irritated with them asking 
questions that have already been discussed to death (not the newbie's 
fault, of course).  Meanwhile the senior members have run out of things 
to talk about and, in the absence of new blood or new subject matter, 
the group often just dies out.

That was beginning to happen with this group anyway, and Tvo's death was 
a particularly tough blow. But for awhile, instead of just dying out, 
the group became completely dominated by political discussion. Any small 
suggestions I made to the effect that this might not be good for the 
health of the group were greeted by an avalanche of hostility from a 
couple of long time members who apparently thought the merest attempt to 
steer the conversation in a different direction was "censorship" and 
abuse of my moderating privileges.

I found this a truly bizarre attitude, and I'm not at all interested in 
being a babysitter. I felt that if this type of discussion was what most 
of the established community wanted, I wasn't going to interfere - I 
would simply withdraw from discussion (since I had no interest in 
participating) and do nothing except keep the lights on and the spam 
cleared. I'm not really able to turn over control of the list to someone 
else - this server space is here because of a personal connection of 
mine, and frankly I did not want to draw attention to what this group 
had become. Had the host seen what was going on here he would have just 
shut the list down immediately. So, eventually it simply died out and I 
figured that if anyone else was that interested in re-kindling the list, 
there are plenty of other places to do it (Yahoo and Google groups, 
Facebook, etc.)

Of course I'd be happy if the good discussions started up here again. I 
do miss the old days of the list, and it's nice to hear from some of you 
folks that I have not been in touch with elsewhere. :)

On 12/29/2012 5:29 PM, Robert Walton wrote:
> So is there a way to find out how many subscribers are on this list?
> Lee???? You out there by any chance?
>
>
> On Sat, Dec 29, 2012 at 2:44 PM, Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com> wrote:
>
> > On Dec 29, 2012, at 12:45 PM, Robert Walton wrote:
> >
> > > The political talk seemed the cause of the final throes of this list,
> > but I
> > > think that it ran deeper and maybe was a symptom and not the cause. There
> > > was a time when this list was a place to ask questions and discuss
> > answers.
> > > At some point, the answers were "that's been discussed" or "did you
> > bother
> > > to google that topic before you asked"?
> > >
> > > Somehow we stopped getting pleasure out of discussing homesteading.
> > That is fair, Rob. After one answers the same basic questions many times,
> > it becomes tedious and time-wasting. That is one of the advantages of
> > books: the author is highly motivated to write the material and get it out
> > there to the readers. Then they go on to the next subject.
> >
> > I'm guess I'm showing my age. Perhaps it is simply generational.
> >
> > I very much enjoyed the back-and-forth with Tvo.
> >
> > Gene
> >
> > > I'm not sure the list is dead. Can it be revived? I have no idea who is
> > on
> > > this list for starters. The www and other more modern means of
> > > communication may have taken something away form the listserv, but I'd
> > say
> > > that's not the issue here.
> > >
> > > It's a shame we can't seem to get our discussion on. The thing I always
> > > like about this list is that it was hard core, straight-forward
> > discussion
> > > of homesteading with no censors.
> > >
> > > Rob - Va
> > >
> > >
> > > On Sat, Dec 29, 2012 at 12:20 PM, Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>
> > wrote:
> > > > On Dec 29, 2012, at 9:04 AM, Rob wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > I woke up this morning wondering what happened to the homestead list.
> > > > >
> > > > > An e-mail list is (was?) a new type of community, a group of people
> > > > > with almost instant written communication drawn together around a
> > > > > common theme. In this case a the concept of homesteading.
> > > > >
> > > > > For many years this was an active & vibrant place to be and then it
> > > > wasn't....
> > > > > Did everybody give up the homestead dream? Did the world change so
> > > > > much that the group was not necessary?  I think "not" to both of
> > > > > those, there are still active groups in the internet world and
> > > > > somewhat on facebook. The dream (or necessity) of doing it yourself
> > > > > is still there.
> > > > > A lack of leadership? Maybe, leadership on a list is hard to pin
> > > > > down. The leader could be a knowledgeable regular poster or a list
> > > > > owner who both posts & keeps order it is rarely the totalitarian who
> > > > > rules with the iron fist, lists have to be at least a little fun to
> > > > > keep people.
> > > > > Did one person manage to poison the well? That is possible, people
> > > > > left the list rather than deal with the poison.
> > > > >
> > > > > I think enough people left (for whatever the reason, I'm guessing
> > > > > poison & no leadership) that the dynamic of the list fell apart and
> > > > > the community that was people, their words and ideas collapsed & is
> > > > gone. Sad.
> > > >
> > > > Rob, I agree with all you have written above. Lee was the owner but she
> > > > did not care enough to manage. The unrestrained political garbage
> > posted by
> > > > two members repelled me.
> > > >
> > > > Gene
> > > >
> > > > _______________________________________________
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