Forgive me folks. I am not spamming. At least not intentionally.
shiv
On Saturday 12 Sep 2009 8:06:46 am ss wrote:
> You may be right. But in order to illustrate a point I send this reply. The
> point may not become obvious for a while - but I am hoping to get to it.
>
> shiv
>
> On Saturday 12 Sep 2009 6:37:59 am Deepa Mohan wrote:
> > On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 10:18 PM, ss <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > Thanks for giving me the opportunity to say what I was going to say
> > > anyway even if the opportunity did not present itself.
> > >
> > > Top posting is not poor etiquette. Farting loudly in public or picking
> > > your nose and wiping snot on the tablecloth is poor etiquette.
> > >
> > > The problem with top posting is lack of clarity. This is a list (like
> > > many others) where there are multiple parallel conversations. Having to
> > > scroll down a page to figure out what was said earlier in order to
> > > invite the response you see at the top of the page leads to this lack
> > > of clarity - often
> > > for a third person who has not directly been taking part in a
> > > particular exchange.
> > >
> > > Of course most countries don't legislate against farting in public or
> > > wiping
> > > snot on the table cloth. But other than the idiocy of Blackberries that
> > > form
> > > less than 0.001 percent of email sending machines leading to arrogant
> > > laziness in top posting - it is such a pain to read top posted emails
> > > that there can be almost no excuse for not being able to avoid top
> > > posting.
> > >
> > > Just my view.
> >
> > I understand all of the above. But I also frequently hear many people
> > saying that top-posting is an obsolete practice "which only your silklist
> > friends follow" as most people look for a response on top, at the
> > beginning of your email to them and (at least in one famous instance)
> > assume that you have sent back their mail with no reply at all...until
> > they look below their...ummm...post.
> >
> > I find that the best thing is to just keep the parts of the message that
> > you want to retain for reference, delete the rest, and type your
> > responses after each part that you want to comment on.
> >
> > I personally had no problem deciphering "top-posted" messages until I got
> > on to this list, and U-know-who kept telling me that TP was a BT (Bad
> > Thing) ..for all the reasons mentioned above. And to dispute the point
> > that someone made by writing right-to-left and bottom-to-top, yes, that
> > was a bad practice to follow in English. But if it had been Arabic, the
> > right-to-left would have made sense, and the left-to-right would not
> > have.
> >
> > So...*I* think that top- or bottom- posting is just a matter of what one
> > is used to, like driving on the left or right sides of a road. On the
> > silklist, I am careful not to top post, but am not particular about it
> > elsewhere...especially after that "why can't you respond at the top of
> > your mail to me?" query. It's just that bottom-posting (is there such a
> > phrase?) is the convention on this list...so I conform, like a Good
> > Person.
> >
> > I now await the flood of mails that will tell me how wrong I am!
> >
> > Cheers, Deepa.
