BTW, to further discourage SPAM, I now have the following above and below the posting interface:
ATTENTI0N SPAMMERS: These forums are gateways to opt-in mailing lists whose members are helping each other with technical questions. Any commercial messages will be deleted and your User ID and email address will be permanently blocked from this site. --- W. Curtis Preston Author of O'Reilly's Backup & Recovery and Using SANs and NAS VP Data Protection GlassHouse Technologies -----Original Message----- From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Allen S. Rout Sent: Monday, May 14, 2007 2:05 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] Looking for a broker or buyer for Finisar SFP and Qlogic HBA > The biggest problem is that newbies don't have any idea where to > post their question. They post it to a forum that's got low traffic > and they get frustrated. I disagree that this is the biggest problem. The problem you describe is a problem rooted in ignorance, whose unpleasant impact is felt by the ignorant requestor. This is undesirable, but often unavoidable. (Please don't read 'ignorant' as connoting disdain: It's just ignorance, not evil) For those who are both ignorant and unwilling to self-educate (I mean, come on: wikipedia has us, and an RSS feed, and Richard's quick facts, and so on) your site is not going to be more accessible an interface than those already present. They still won't be able to find it. But you say: > On any given day, I'd say about 5% of the postings on the list are > coming from the forum, and most of them are actually ANSWERS, not > "flyby" newbie questions that some were worried about. OK. That looks like a well reasoned counterclaim. I'm Really-really sceptical, and the first obvious example sure looks like it contradicts your claim, but what the heck. > (One concern that some people stated was that they thought that > newbies would jump in and out of a forum more often than they would > a mailing list, that joining the list was considered "sweat > equity.") Well, 'sweat equity' is a rather supercilious way to put it. More a matter of "Read the FAQ, please?" Here: "How to ask smart questions", by Eric Raymond. http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html > As far as SPAM, which started this thread, I hate it as much as you do, > and am vigilant against it. I'm actually continually working on minor > and major updates to the site to let posters know that this is not what > the site is for, and that we have a zero tolerance policy for SPAM. So here's a suggestion: You moderate incoming messages, and then report back in, say, a year or so, about how many you had to weed out? That makes the initial traffic a measure of your own reputation, and makes sure you're acknowledging it. You're taking responsibility for the (possible) flow of clueless questions, and it'll take up -your- time, not ours. > I'd hate to see TSM listed as the only product that won't allow it. Heh. So did you deliberately type that in-character as the Godfather? <husky> That's a nice piece of backup software you got there. Be a shame if something were to .... happen... to it. </husky> I'd hate for you to go out of your way to say something unpleasant about TSM too. Especially when you're confusing the official imprimatur of IBM with the evolving opinion of exactly the community you're trying to attract. Wow. I'm amazed at how much less charitable I feel towards your efforts after reading that last bit. - Allen S. Rout
