On Wednesday 16 September 2020 11:32:03 Dan Youngquist via tde-users wrote:
On 09/16/2020 04:52 AM, phiebie@drei.at wrote:
nauseating mails with quote on quote on quote... 6, 7 or 8 levels deep the full original text and then one or two lines reply. In vain, the old bad habit is seamlessly continued here.
Am I the only one here, who finds this a nuisance?
I do as well, and apparently there are at least several others. It makes it much more difficult follow the discussions where it's done. One would've thought it wouldn't happen on a list where most users are fairly computer-savvy and many have been around computers from the early days, but here it is. I hate to suggest it, but maybe we need a rule for that?
I certainly will plead mea maxima culpa here; but usually the threads go off-topic, then spin out-of-control, by little steps.
One offhand comment, or joke, then everybody piles on, and I alone am not responsible for that. And by the way, we did try making a rule, which is to change the heading, create a new thread from scratch (rather than reusing the thread).
We could stick to "strictly business"; which I am sure would please the no-nonsense people here, but alienate others. For what it's worth, I also don't like reading the threads when they get too far disconnected from the original topic. But how far is too far? No jokes at all? No witty retorts?
I say, take it private (chat or private email), if it goes more than, say, one step beyond the topic. No harm in having private conversation (or even a group private conversation). Not everybody is interested.
When it goes off-topic, it becomes like a snowball effect, hard to stop when it gets momentum. We need to stop or divert it before that point.
Bill