[Tutor] Replying to the tutor-list

[Michael P. Reilly]

On 2/16/07, ALAN GAULD <alan.gauld at btinternet.com> wrote:
>
> > However, the "standard behavior" at the time was that
> > replies went back to the mailing list, not to the original sender.
>
> But the mailing list was the original sender so it was all wonderfully
> consistent. Reply  goes to sender only, which happens
> to be the list server...
>
> Ah, the good ol' days :-)
>
> Alan g.
>
> Alan,

The issue is not what the mailing list does, but what the user expects and
should do.  Listserv was the first mailing list system from 23 years ago.
The users expected, as standard behavior, that replies would go to the
mailing list, not to the original sender.  You had made a claim that more
than 10 years ago (when listserv was still in use) that the standard
behavior was that mailing lists was that users would reply to the original
sender.  I'm just offering up one, very well-known example to refute that.

Myself, I'm not a person who cares how the mailing list goes.  I'll adapt.
But it does irk me when "standards" are applied because of misunderstandings
of applications.  For example, the usual convention is that people attach
their comments below the respondent's.  At my work, they have tried to
convince me that the "standard" is to put it above simply because Outlook
does that.

When making arguments, please make the arguments on a technical basis, not
on "this was how it has been done in the past".  If that was the case, then
all the stuff you get in your mailbox isn't "spam" since spam related only
to cross-posting on newsgroups (anyone remember the Spam Wars?).  However,
the general collective has decided to expand the standard definition.

Times change, standards can evolve. Sometimes not for the better.  Make an
argument for keeping the "standards" how they should be technically, not
historically.

  -Arcege
-- 
There's so many different worlds,
So many different suns.
And we have just one world,
But we live in different ones.
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