Fwd: [Hidden-tech] Question about list topics

[Tish Grier]

>From the perspective of someone who has not been a longtime member, who has not attended tons of social functions, and who works in a wired kinda way, I find the emails quite helpful.  Email lists are often how I find out things about fellow members of Hidden-Tech.  I don't think I would have found out that Eliane G. is working with Second LIfe, nor would I have discovered Ron Miller's writing had I not read email by these people--one on a topic I raise, another on an unrelated topic.   
   
  I often do not go over to forums of any kind because I have other things I'm working on that would make it rather time-consuming and awkward to go over to a website, login, read, figure out how to post, etc.  It's easier for me to check my email, filter messages by Re: and then either read or delete. 
   
  It's up to me--my personal choice--to read the email or not.  No one is compelling me to read all of Hidden-Tech's email, and I don't feel like I'm missing anything if a tid-bit of conversation on house painters ends up as a discussion on dvd players.  If I don't need a house painter, or a bookkeeper, and don't feel I have anything to add, I just delete the message.  And the conversation thread on dvd players will probably get picked up again somewhere...
   
  Doesn't bother me that the messages are in my trash.  I just empty my trash at the end of the day... real easy--just press a button...
   
  All of this is personal choice, contingent on how I manage my time and my work.  I am always on, always wired--or at least until very late in the day, and have just so much personal bandwidth to work with on a daily basis.  So, managing my email, which have to do not just with HT but with the myriad of other media related email alerts I receive, is part and parcle with my work.  
   
  Lerning to manage the barrage of information we receive from all over the place is a daunting task, with many folks suffering from "information overload" and feel there is no time in the day to adequately process so much information.  That's where I've had to be kind of zen about information, and really take the time to figure out what in the overload is important to me.  Working in new media--where the competition for eyeballs/attention is wicked fierce-- makes that hard at times.  I'm always looking for a scoop, but if I miss something, I've had to accept that it is what it is, another will come along, and I can only do what I can do.
   
  It is, though, the fact that I can choose for myself, that I have that ultimate freedom to gather and glean from so many sources, including the HT email list, that I find so darned exciting.
   
  Tish G.
   


Mary Malmros <malmros at verizon.net> wrote:  ** The author of this post was a Good Dobee.
** You too can help the group
** Fill out the survey/skills inventory in the member's area.
** If you did, we all thank you.


webmaster wrote:
> [snip]
> My question to Mary, and others, what basis leads you to:
> 'discard the large majority of hidden-tech messages'
> since I don't think the majority violate our rules.
> 
Well, it's been a few weeks since I emptied the trash, so let's look 
through the trash and see what I've got from hidden-tech:

- 5 posts on backup power
- 10 posts on best wiki software
- 28 posts on biznik
- 10 posts on blogs vs. newsletters
- 6 posts on cellphone reception
- 4 posts on collective printer
- 7 posts on copying video to DVD
- 6 posts on file sharing
- 13 posts on how to sell on ebay
- 10 posts on free web hosting for nonprofits
- 5 posts for a house painter
- about half a dozen ads for office space or various goods and services
- about a dozen announcements
- about half a dozen job postings
- 5 posts on international mail
- 4 posts on PDF-to-text converters (that was mine)
- 4 posts on Massachusetts healthcare "reform" (mine again)
- 31 posts on music downloads
- 16 posts about promotion/self-promotion
- about a dozen looking for various tech- and business-related services
- 13 posts about what kind of computer to buy
- 4 video chat
- about 16 for web design for the Northampton Survival Center
- 11 posts about botnets
- 8 posts about windows security

I started a couple of those threads, and contributed to a couple more. 
The messages cited ended up in my trash for a variety of reasons: 
because I didn't know anything/have anything to contribute; because, 
while I might have had something to contribute, I didn't consider them 
on-topic; because it was an angels-on-pin discussion that I didn't want 
to get into; because, while the actual discussion might have been 
interesting and relevant, it was hidden by a subject line that screamed 
"irrelevant!". BTW, the "gimme info" thread that I started -- re PDF 
converters -- I only did after spending several hours doing research and 
finding myself unable to conclude from available info what product would 
actually do what I wanted. IOW, I didn't do it lightly. 
> And a further note, you can get the day's postings as a digest so you 
> get one message per day -- personnally I prefer individual messages.
> 
You may find this paradoxical, but when I'm finding the wheat-to-chaff 
ratio to be low, I find individual messages to be easier/better than a 
digest. I don't want to keep around a digest just for one useful bit of 
information. 
> As a side note - as for clearing your inbox - that is what filters on
> email clients are for.
> 
Hmm. That's a bit...condescending, no? More to the point, it's not 
really a solution. I've been using filters for as long as they've been 
around, and I know how to filter out both subjects AND individuals that 
I don't want to read. If a thread comes along today titled, "Searching 
for left-handed wankel rotary engine," I certainly know how to filter it 
out. How does that help when someone starts a thread tomorrow titled, 
"Floor wax or dessert topping -- what's your opinion?" 

--
Mary Malmros malmros at verizon.net
Some days you're the windshield, some days you're the bug

_______________________________________________
Hidden-discuss mailing list - home page: http://www.hidden-tech.net
Hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net

You are receiving this because you are on the Hidden-Tech Discussion list.
If you would like to change your list preferences, Go to the Members 
page on the Hidden Tech Web site.
http://www.hidden-tech.net/members


 
---------------------------------
Don't get soaked.  Take a quick peak at the forecast 
 with theYahoo! Search weather shortcut.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.hidden-tech.net/pipermail/hidden-discuss/attachments/20070123/8d0667cb/attachment-0005.html