North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["NAFEX List" <nafexlist@hotmail.com>]

Dear list,

The message with ADMIN in the subject line was intended to call attention to 
fact it contained the opinion of the list administrator on the subject of 
"topical messages."  Like that message, read the signature to see who wrote 
it.

There are about 344 list members.  While some group members are easiliy 
identified as NAFEX members, some email addresses do not convey a clear 
identity.  I don't know of a good way to correlate members of this list to 
Pomona subscribers, etc.  In any event, I think most people have the 
understanding that some privacy is implied in joining this list.  A 
voluntary poll is about the only way to figure out who's in NAFEX and who's 
not.  I have no plans to publish a list of subscriber identities.  (There is 
just that old-fashioned notion that people sign their messages on the honor 
system.)


This list has no moderator.  (In case you haven't guessed.)  There is only 
an adminstrator--me--who has the fun tasks of dumping the 30-50 junk 
messages that IBIBLIO intercepts each week from unsubscribed senders, and 
the occasional hands-on assistance with subscribing, vacation holds, etc.  I 
don't moderate what gets passed along for a variety of reasons, among which 
are the time involved, and the position on how much one person should 
regulate the topics of discussion.  At multiple points in the past I have 
invited the NAFEX board to issue directions if significant changes are 
desired, and that condition still applies.

While individual members (against what I consider good judgment) can waste 
seemingly endless bandwith talking about what's topical, and other 
meta-discussions, the messages do come through because there is no editting. 
 You as a list subscriber have the power to double or triple the wasted 
bandwidth by replying to those messasges.  (If you can't resist replying, 
consider sparing the rest of us by replying off-list.)

The fact that the a message get through is not a tacit endorsement of 
message's contents.  I have lost count on how many times it's been said, but 
the list operates with a "hands off" approach.  Since *some* posts by those 
"offending" individual members may be of interest to *some* subscribers, I 
don't feel the threshold of banning has yet been met.  At some point I may 
choose to ban list members, but I haven't reached that point yet.

Some group members have probably formed an opinion that much of the material 
contributed by certain subscribers is not worth the time it takes to read 
them and, choose to delete messages after a cursory glance, or even unread.  
Boors risk losing their audience--you.  If sufficiently obnoxious, they will 
end up burning up bandwidth on messages that are discarded unread.  There is 
no obligation of list members to read every message.

Each list reader can craft his or her own strategy.

regards,

Greg Miller
NAFEX list administrator

ps, there is a downside to keeping the chain of incivility alive by replying 
to worthless messages--people like Gordon Nofs throw in the towel.  (Our 
loss, for those who have been around long enough to remember his 
contributions.)  So keep it up if you want this list to be LESS about fruit, 
and MORE about how rude, stupid, or insufferable the other list members are.