At Stardate 20030620.0335, David Hobby wrote:
> Can we top post on this list? I hate bottom posting it makes you scrol down > to the bottom every last time. All I end up doing is scrolllllling. > > So tell me if you want me to stop... > > I think Kiln People would be good since it is probably the most freash on > everyones mind. I havent't actualy finnished it yet, but I would if we were > going to do that one. >
Why not bottom post, and DELETE most of the previous posts? If you just save enough for context, there is plenty of room below it.
That is indeed the preferred method: only quote relevant parts of the message you're replying to and snip the rest, then place your own comments below it.
I don't believe bottom posting really requires more scrolling than top posting. With top posting, you'll still need to scroll down to read the quoted original message. With bottom posting, you'll need to scroll down to read the reply. Unless of course the entire message is short enough to fit on-screen in its entirety, in which case neither applies.
Bottom posting has the benefit that you can read quoted messages and the response in the order in which they were written. This is especially practical when the quoting goes several levels deep (messages that quote something that already contains quotes itself). Further, it becomes a real mess when you go several levels deep and some people use top posting while others use bottom posting. You'll end up with something like this:
<Fourth message, quoting third message>
<Second message, quoting first message>
<First message>
<Third message, quoting second message>And that's just when people quote only the parts they reply to and snip the rest. When quoting entire messages, combined with the mixed top/bottom posting, it becomes a real pain to read messages and figure out who wrote what.
I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to figure out what message #10 in a thread could look like when you have full-quoting plus mixed top/bottom posting. <SHUDDER>
Therefore, even though you won't be thrown off the list for top posting, bottom posting combined with adequate snipping is preferred. And while you're at it, please also snip the ads from the message to which you reply. I've seen messages that contain more ads than actual content...
Jeroen van Baardwijk
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