Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

["Michael D. Thomas" <mdthomas AT mindspring.com>]

>Gee and I believed the web site...

>People like ourselves, savvy folks with an overriding interest in
>technology, particularly as it exists in the networked world, but
people >who also are aware of the intersection of technology and
politics, and >culture, and business, and art. People who like to
discuss all of it among >themselves!

>Mike, I want my money back!!!

Sorry, no refunds. InterNetWorkers is kinda like social security. The
time and energy you give to InterNetWorkers is spent immediately. We
keep no reserves and have no insurance.

Every flamebait post threatens to scorch and shrivel the supporting
timbers of INW. This INW house is fragile. It can burn to the ground and
the ashes spread to the winds before we could even email 911. That small
"flame between friends" you start today could lead to destruction of the
INW way of life tonight. INW is built in sand -- it can blow away in an
invisible breeze of sarcasm. INW is built in a floodplain. Every flood
of emails threatens to carry us to the most improbable places. One part
of INW may end up perpendicularly perched atop a South Carolina knitting
circle Yahoo group. Another part may be impaled into the side of a D.C.
think tank address book.

It's a precarious world in which we live.

As for the attempt to cite the INW "charter" to justify and/or defend
speech, actions and intentions -- there is no INW charter. You know the
drill:

This community is what you make it.

That said, there have been quite a few unsubscribes over the past few
days. One unsubscribe had a vt.edu address. Just think, maybe if subject
lines were appropriately self-deprecating then this individual would
have hooked everyone up with some of those t-shirts.

I personally would like to see our discussions be more technology based.
But building such a wall around our discourse would be draining of the
INW community resources. We can barely keep a roof on INW as it is.

There's only one way we can get this list back on topic.... we'll all
have to pull together. So link in to a nearby topic and pull towards it.
Please don't pull towards a topic that is already too far aflame --
you'll get no leverage and you'll destroy your rope.

Cheers!