The Natural Life Cycle of Mailing Lists

[Vince <groups@xxxxxxx>]

Someone mentioned this and I thought it appropriate to send it again ;-)

Just to keep this on subject anyone know how I can automate my delete key
on my home PC?

Vince

PS. Here's the original URL for those interested in more:-
http://www.rider.edu/users/suler/psycyber/lifelist.html
PPS. Any votes for what stage ukha_d is this time?

The Natural Life Cycle of Mailing Lists
Kat Nagel - KatNagel@xxxxxxx


Every list seems to go through the same cycle:

1. Initial enthusiasm (people introduce themselves, and gush a lot
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). 



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