Stupid netiquette question

Not even sure, don't care really, if i spelled it right but for the net
nannies:

After snipping and replying to usenet posts for some time now, I agree top
posting is a pain in the arse to follow at times, but why is top posting
such a usenet no-no when responding to email, top posting is quite common
and acceptable?

A dummie wants to know

On Wed, 25 Feb 2004 21:12:07 -0500, "Wayne Knight"
wrote:

Not even sure, don't care really, if i spelled it right but for the net
nannies:

After snipping and replying to usenet posts for some time now, I agree top
posting is a pain in the arse to follow at times, but why is top posting
such a usenet no-no when responding to email, top posting is quite common
and acceptable?

A dummie wants to know

It's a rare usenet thread that consists solely of an initial post and a single
reply.

Following more typical, multi-response/multi-responder threads is a heck of a
lot easier if the "transcript" follows the same chronological order as the
posts...

/daytripper (pretty simple, really)

"Wayne Knight" wrote in
:

Not even sure, don't care really, if i spelled it right but for the
net nannies:

After snipping and replying to usenet posts for some time now, I agree
top posting is a pain in the arse to follow at times, but why is top
posting such a usenet no-no when responding to email, top posting is
quite common and acceptable?

A dummie wants to know



Mostly history. Usenet began in the day of text terminals, or even
teletypes! With top posting, you'd have to page through the most recent
post to see what the hell the person was referring to, and going back to
the top of the post was a PITA.

Nowadays, w/ graphics terminals, paging back and forth is easier on most,
but not all, newsreaders. The bigger problems comes in forming a cohesive
reply post when some people have top posted, and some have bottom posted,
according to preference. Best to have all people posting one way, and
bottom is the historical preference

Scott

daytripper wrote in message . ..
On Wed, 25 Feb 2004 21:12:07 -0500, "Wayne Knight"
wrote:

Not even sure, don't care really, if i spelled it right but for the net
nannies:

After snipping and replying to usenet posts for some time now, I agree top
posting is a pain in the arse to follow at times, but why is top posting
such a usenet no-no when responding to email, top posting is quite common
and acceptable?

A dummie wants to know

It's a rare usenet thread that consists solely of an initial post and a single
reply.

Following more typical, multi-response/multi-responder threads is a heck of a
lot easier if the "transcript" follows the same chronological order as the
posts...

/daytripper (pretty simple, really)

as long as some of the threads have been here in ROFF, they are not
unique.
some of the soc.religion... groups from earlier days had single
threads spanning more than a year. trying to follow a theological
discussion with a mix of top and bottom posting was near impossible.

it is just a whole lot easier to follow the running conversation
reading down the page as is the convention for western languages....

(Rob S.) wrote:
trying to follow a theological
discussion with a mix of top and bottom posting was near impossible.

I suspect the sequence was the easiest part to decipher. ;-)

Chas
remove fly fish to reply
http://home.comcast.net/~chas.wade/w...ome.html-.html
San Juan Pictures at:
http://home.comcast.net/~chasepike/wsb/index.html

"Wayne Knight" wrote:
Not even sure, don't care really, if i spelled it right but for the net
nannies:

After snipping and replying to usenet posts for some time now, I agree
top
posting is a pain in the arse to follow at times, but why is top
posting
such a usenet no-no when responding to email, top posting is quite
common
and acceptable?

A dummie wants to know

As a follow on to this, I'm wondering if my practice of cutting out
most of the prior discussion and just leaving the parts I'm replying to
is considered a good practice or not. My presumption is that people
have a newsreadeer that shows then the messages arranges as threads so
they can look above to prior postings for the rest of the info. Is
that right, or am I expecting too much?

Another dummy wants to know too.

Chas
remove fly fish to reply
http://home.comcast.net/~chas.wade/w...ome.html-.html
San Juan Pictures at:
http://home.comcast.net/~chasepike/wsb/index.html

(Greg Pavlov) wrote in news:403e4119.17073830
@news.individual.de:

On 26 Feb 2004 13:19:55 GMT, Scott Seidman
wrote:


Mostly history. Usenet began in the day of text terminals, or even
teletypes! With top posting, you'd have to page through the most recent
post to see what the hell the person was referring to, and going back to
the top of the post was a PITA.


This never made sense to me, and I first read usenet
stuff on early Decwriters through 1200 baud connections.
If the new stuff was on top, you only needed to go into
the quoted stuff far enough to recall the subject and
you could bail out as soon as you did. The alternative
was to wade through *all* the quoted stuff just to get
to the new. Top-posting made a heck of a lot more sense.
For a long time I, and other people that I am aware of,
would bail out if someone top-quoted more than 20 - 30
lines' worth (later a screenful).



Usenet was not really time or cost effective on 1200 baud decwriters. Its
a much more efficient time sap now!

Scott

Chas Wade wrote in news:Z9s%b.129328
$uV3.645040@attbi_s51:

As a follow on to this, I'm wondering if my practice of cutting out
most of the prior discussion and just leaving the parts I'm replying to
is considered a good practice or not. My presumption is that people
have a newsreadeer that shows then the messages arranges as threads so
they can look above to prior postings for the rest of the info. Is
that right, or am I expecting too much?

That's actually preferred.

Scott

"Chas Wade" wrote in message
news:Z9s%b.129328$uV3.645040@attbi_s51...
As a follow on to this, I'm wondering if my practice of cutting out
most of the prior discussion and just leaving the parts I'm replying to
is considered a good practice or not. My presumption is that people
have a newsreadeer that shows then the messages arranges as threads so
they can look above to prior postings for the rest of the info. Is
that right, or am I expecting too much?


I am using OE for newsgroups and it shows the threads as you
presumed! I am usin the same technique as you. Top posting is bad, because
I have to move my eyes continuously up and down - up and down -...

OsmoJ

In article Z9s%b.129328$uV3.645040@attbi_s51,
net says...
As a follow on to this, I'm wondering if my practice of cutting out
most of the prior discussion and just leaving the parts I'm replying to
is considered a good practice or not. My presumption is that people
have a newsreadeer that shows then the messages arranges as threads so
they can look above to prior postings for the rest of the info. Is
that right, or am I expecting too much?

You should trim your followup so that just enough information is left
for the reader to understand what you are replying about.

Every newsreader I've ever used, deletes (or at least hides) articles
after I read them. If I read a post today, and someone responds
tomorrow I'll have no idea what exactly the second person is replying to
if they remove all the text.

Looks like you are doing fine.
- Ken