The Natural Life Cycle of a Mailing List (fwd)

[Grant White]

This arrived this morning. Thought you'd all be interested.

GW


> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>
> THE NATURAL LIFE CYCLE OF MAILING LISTS
>
> Every list seems to go through the same cycle:
>
> 1.  Initial enthusiasm (people introduce themselves, and gush alot about
>     how wonderful it is to find kindred souls).
>
> 2.  Evangelism (people moan about how few folks are posting to the list,
>     and brainstorm recruitment strategies).
>
> 3.  Growth (more and more people join, more and more lengthy threads
>     develop, occasional off-topic threads pop up).
>
> 4.  Community (lots of threads, some more relevant than others; lots of
>     information and advice is exchanged; experts help other experts as
>     well as less experienced colleagues; friendships develop; people tease
>     each other; newcomers are welcomed with generosity and patience;
>     everyone -- newbie and expert alike -- feels comfortable asking
>     questions, suggesting answers, and sharing opinions).
>
> 5.  Discomfort with diversity (the number of messages increases
>     dramatically; not every thread is fascinating to every reader; people
>     start complaining about the signal-to-noise ratio; person 1 threatens
>     to quit if *other* people don't limit discussion to person 1's pet
>     topic; person 2 agrees with person 1; person 3 tells 1 & 2 to lighten
>     up; more bandwidth is wasted complaining about off-topic threads than
>     is used for the threads themselves; everyone gets annoyed).
>
> 6a. Smug complacency and stagnation (the purists flame everyone who asks
>     an 'old' question or responds with humor to a serious post; newbies
>     are rebuffed; traffic drops to a doze-producing level of a few minor
>     issues; all interesting discussions happen by private email and are
>     limited to a few participants; the purists spend lots of time
>     self-righteously congratulating each other on keeping off-topic
>     threads off the list).
> OR
>
> 6b. Maturity (a few people quit in a huff; the rest of the participants
>     stay near stage 4, with stage 5 popping up briefly every few weeks;
>     many people wear out their second or third 'delete' key, but the list
>     lives contentedly ever after).
>
>
Grant White
University of Newcastle
Central Coast Campus Information Resource Centre
ulgw at dewey.newcastle.edu.au
Ph: 043-484022
Fax: 043-484215

"......and the man climbed back
Out of the marvellous as he had known it."
Lightenings VIII
Seamus Heaney