[p2p-research] More efficient (P2P?) usage of email

[M. Fioretti]

On Sun, Oct 05, 2008 09:24:05 AM -0400, Samuel Rose wrote:

> I love this problem... Because I actually hate doing this stuff in
> email... now there are much better ways... wikis have over a
> decade's worth of proof that more valuable shared meaning can derive
> from pursing discussion in http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/
> mb.pl?MixedMode
> ...
> So, trim your posts. But also maybe think about moving asynch text
> based discussion out of email if you ever want to do anything beyond
> point/counter point discussion (or in the case of forums software,
> if you at least want to use something more efficient, and get a few
> hours back of your limited time on the earth)

Samuel,

what you say makes a lot of sense if one only does one thing and only
has one interest and only entertains one kind of discussion with more
or less always the same few people who also have no other interest or
discussion ongoing, and/or when purpose of the discussion is, from the
beginning, for all the members, to produce ONE common document
etc... In any other practical case, the opposite is true.

I am much, much, much more efficient when every discussion comes to me
in one inbox where I have much more control on how I display it, I
have MY own macros and spell checker configured as it makes more sense
to me etc... than if I had to jump every day among ten or twenty
different wikis, brainstorms and what not, each configured to write
the way *its* administrators think best. And there's no way in hell I
may ever convince everybody I **need** to interact with to go wiki
instead of email. If nothing else because, as I said, wikis make sense
when the purpose is, since the beginning, to create one common
document

If I had to work that way instead of through email I'd get 20% done of
what I manage to do now, best case.

You're probably right in theory, and I don't wish to start a flame war
on which system is theoretically better. The reality is that we're
stuck with email, or at least I, Christian (thanks Christian
for confirming my point) and many other are.

If you prefer other ways, and convince the majority of subscribers to
shut this list down in favor of a wiki, brainstorm, whatever, OK. Me,
I'll simply stop following these discussions, no problem, really,
friends as before and all that.

Until it's got to be email, though, trust me: the most efficient way
is the one I suggested. (which besides trimming, included no HTML).

Thanks,
		Marco

-- 
Your own civil rights and the quality of your life heavily depend on how
software is used *around* you:            http://digifreedom.net/node/84