At 3/24/01 01:42 PM -0800, you wrote:
OK. I've heard people mention this thing called top posting. Can someone tell me what it is, so I don't do it unintentionally? :-) Seems like a sure way to make enemies...
Top-posting is posting my reply at the "top" of the message, while leaving a copy of your original message at the bottom. Contrary to popular belief, this is *not* a matter of preference but of standards as defined by RFC's.
The primary problem is with careless people, who keep replying and replying and never edit anything, so that eventually you're sending back and forth entire copies of 15 emails, plus all the assorted signatures and stuff. In personal correspondence no one cares, but when you do that on a mailing list where someone gets the digest, so they get 30 copies of the same email over and over in your trailing stuff... they get mad. With reason.
Post at the bottom, and only include in your mail such parts of previous correspondence as are actually relevant. Do a little cutting. This is one of the best ways to show good manners on the Internet.
-- Rodolfo J. Paiz rpaiz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx