Greg Donald wrote:
> On 5/2/05, Alex A. Smith MCP <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>> Time straped as it is, I'll type in what ever my Default Email prog wants
>>me to
>
>
> Laziness is no excuse. Takes all of 2 seconds to turn it off.
>
>
Just to prove it.... in Thunderbird:
Edit=>Account Preferences=>Composition and Addressing=>uncheck "Compose
Messages in HTML format".
Done (just had to do it myself, since I've *finally* got Gentoo
reinstalled --who missed me ? :) -- and this is thus a new T-bird install).
Really, it's the right thing to do. HTML mail is "OK" if you're getting
an email newsletter from a store or or Activision or whoever (it's not
really "OK", but at least the product kinda justifies it, and you can
reasonably expect that it's "safe", being from an authorized source).
But there's no reason whatsoever to use HTML on a mailing list that
might be read via
1) a text mail client
2) a text newsgroup reader
3) a gui mail client or news reader that doesn't support all the HTML
features your mail composition program does
4) a web browser that doesn't support all the HTML features your mail
composition program does (hey, there's a lot of GMail users here, and
they could be accessing GMail via "unsupported browsers", which drops
you to "Basic HTML view" which could mean anything in terms of ultimate
mail display, over and above the service's feature limitation that is
explained for this condition)
5) on any computer that doesn't have all the same pretty fonts installed
(unless you embed your fonts in the mail as well, which would cause at
least me to come after you with --at the very minimum-- a big axe, and
at preference, a huge amount of somewhat heavier weaponry. I hate people
embedding fonts in their emails like my mail server has infinite space
to hold their bloody mails so they can be as big as they feel like they
want).
Ultimately, HTML mail to a mailing list like this one is extremely
inconsiderate without adding a thing to the content of the mail.
And since the main point of writing to a mailing list is often to *ask
for a favor* ("please help me with this problem, o knowledgeable
complete strangers"), being inconsiderate is not really a good way to
start. Nor is making the content more difficult to read.
Holly
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