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From: phil@amdcad.UUCP (Phil Ngai)
Newsgroups: net.news
Subject: summarizing for the net
Message-ID: <5680@amdcad.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 2-Nov-85 13:07:23 EST
Article-I.D.: amdcad.5680
Posted: Sat Nov  2 13:07:23 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 3-Nov-85 08:50:01 EST
Organization: AMDCAD, Sunnyvale, CA
Lines: 22
Keywords: summarys moderation

Have you ever seen someone posting a question on the net receive 20 or
30 followups to the effect of "ha ha you fool, James Tiptree *is* a
woman"? I know I have. Less common is for someone to post a question
and request replies by mail only, which will be summarized. But it
does happen. And when it does, the signal to noise ratio is very high.
I wish more people would summarize.

What this leads to is viewing the summary process as a kind of mini
mod group with the moderator being the original requester. A very
specific interest area is defined, and people *mail* their input.
Then the "moderator" eliminates duplicates and posts. And I think it
works well.

Perhaps if people thought of mod groups as being analogous to summarys
there would be less resistance and fear of censorship.
-- 
 The number of California lottery tickets sold is greater than
 the number of people in the United States of America.

 Phil Ngai +1 408 749-5720
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