Date: Mon, 12 Apr 2004 20:59:11 -0400 (EDT)
From: "Keith F. Lynch" <kfl at KeithLynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: This list is 26 months old today
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

Elspeth Kovar wrote:

> This phrasing has been bothering me for some time, and brings me
> back to the suggestion that a list be set up for WSFA business.
> Trustees slates, convention plans, financial discussions etc. rather
> than our usual chatter, with an effort made to keep it to that.

This list barely has critical mass as it is, as is shown by the way
the message volume fluctuates wildly, and the fact that just four
people have written more than half the messages.  I believe that
splitting this list in two would render both halves moribund.

Also, I haven't heard anyone claim that they don't subscribe because
there's too much non-WSFA-business discussions here.  All officers
except our retiring president, our treasurer, and our current Capclave
chair are already on this list.

Also, at least one former (?) WSFA member becomes very upset at
receiving *any* email.

There are four other lists, the first two of which are supersets
of this list:

* Urgent announcements, such as a change in meeting place.  I started
  this last June at the club's request.

* Announcement that the latest WSFA Journal is available online.
  Started in March 2001 at the request of the Austerity Committee.

* Directions to the next WSFA meeting.  Intended for new people who
  email me to ask me this, after finding our website.  (I usually
  send them directions before each of the next several meetings.
  Unfortunately that means when I eventually drop people from that
  list, they sometimes get the false impression that they're no
  longer invited.)  The necessity of this list is implicit from the
  club's decision not to put directions to our meeting places online.

* The WSFA Journal.  Not an email list, but it functions something
  like one, and may to some extent compete with this list for the
  writings and the reading time of WSFAns.

I notice that the street addresses and phone numbers of all paid-up
WSFA members used to be published once or twice every year in the WSFA
Journal.  Presumably this was to encourage members to phone and write
each other.  (Since we have a policy of not placing current street
addresses of WSFA members on the web, placing these issues of the
Journal online has driven me to distraction.)

>> As of this month, the list email address is finally on WSFA.ORG,
>> rather than KEITHLYNCH.NET.  The recent move of WSFA.ORG from
>> HOSTING.COM to PANIX.COM made this possible.  (The old address will
>> also continue to work.)  The list now runs entirely on PANIX.COM,
>> giving it fewer possible points of failure.

> Bravo and well done!

Thank you.

>> Elspeth Kovar       178   ekovar at worldnet.att.net

> Speaking of chatter . . .

That's only 1.6 messages per week.  I wish you, and the other quiet
ones, would post more.
--
Keith F. Lynch - http://keithlynch.net/
Please see http://keithlynch.net/email.html before emailing me.