[Groop] The Life of a Mailing List

[John T]

What does this have to do with Groo? 

John
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "E C" <mightyhero at mail.com>
To: <groop at groo.com>
Sent: Wednesday, December 17, 2003 8:05 PM
Subject: [Groop] The Life of a Mailing List


> Quote:
> 
> The life of a mailing list, from 1994. 
> 
> 1. Initial enthusiasm (people introduce themselves, and gush a lot
>    about how wonderful it is to find kindred souls). 
> 
> 2. Evangelism (people moan about how few folks are posting to the
>    list, and brainstorm recruitment strategies). 
> 
> 3. Growth (more and more people join, more and more lengthy threads
>    develop, occasional off-topic threads pop up). 
> 
> 4. Community (lots of threads, some more relevant than others; lots
>    of information and advice is exchanged; experts help other
>    experts as well as less experienced colleagues; friendships
>    develop; people tease each other; newcomers are welcomed with
>    generosity and patience; everyone -- newbie and expert alike --
>    feels comfortable asking questions, suggesting answers, and
>    sharing opinions). 
> 
> 5. Discomfort with diversity (the number of messages increases
>    dramatically; not every thread is fascinating to every reader;
>    people start complaining about the signal-to-noise ratio; person
>    1 threatens to quit if *other* people don't limit discussion to
>    person 1's pet topic; person 2 agrees with person 1; person 3
>    tells 1 & 2 to lighten up; more bandwidth is wasted complaining
>    about off-topic threads than is used for the threads themselves;
>    everyone gets annoyed). 
> 
> Finally: 
> 
> 6. Smug complacency and stagnation (the purists flame everyone who
>    asks an 'old' question or responds with humor to a serious post;
>    newbies are rebuffed; traffic drops to a doze-producing level of
>    a few minor issues; all interesting discussions happen by private
>    email and are limited to a few participants; the purists spend
>    lots of time self-righteously congratulating each other on
>    keeping off-topic threads off the list). 
> 
> OR 
> 
> 7. Maturity (a few people quit in a huff; the rest of the partici-
>    pants stay near stage 4, with stage 5 popping up briefly every
>    few weeks; many people wear out their second or third 'delete'
>    key, but the list lives contentedly ever after). 
> 
> -- 
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