If top posting is so awesome, why aren't the comments on his blog above the text?
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Abandoning bottom-posting
41–50 of 58 posts
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#42If top posting is so awesome, why aren't the comments on his blog above the text?
Where do you read that it's so awesome? He doesn't say that at all, just that technology now routes around it for the most part. Try reading before responding.
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
> As far as I'm concerned, a top-poster is either a narcissist or very inexperienced in Internet communications. Or both. I bet you've not been exposed to many corporate email chains. Top-posting makes a lot of sense there. I often get copied on an email chains from which only the last part affects me. For example it will be a long discussion about some task and then I'll get copied because I'm the person who does X…
There's another reason bottom- (or interspersed) posting does not work well in corporate email chains: Outlook flatly doesn't support it. Quoted text in a reply is not indented by default. The replier has to do extra work to put their reply in a different font or color so it's clear what's quoted text and what's new text.
> There's another reason bottom- (or interspersed) posting does not work well in corporate email chains: Outlook flatly doesn't support it.
Yes, I remember this now. It was an item on a long list of reasons I gave up on Windows years ago. But I'm not sure it counts as a "reason", because it's more an uncorrected defect. Even if you have good arguments to top-post, Outlook takes away your choice. Like Windows itself.
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#44The article misses the point that abandoning bottom -posting only works if you don't quote content from the message you're replying to. If you do, then by all means bottom-post. The worst case is a long exchange with multiple participants, all quoted, some top-posters and some bottom-posters. And finally, if you quote multiple passages and reply to them individually within a single post (as I often do), you simply mu…
> As far as I'm concerned, a top-poster is either a narcissist or very inexperienced in Internet communications. Or both. I bet you've not been exposed to many corporate email chains. Top-posting makes a lot of sense there. I often get copied on an email chains from which only the last part affects me. For example it will be a long discussion about some task and then I'll get copied because I'm the person who does X…
> I bet you've not been exposed to many corporate email chains. Top-posting makes a lot of sense there.
Yes, but only because replies don't typically intersperse quotes from the original. Once a choice is made to reply point by point, the argument for top-posting falls apart. So I imagine detailed quoting and replying, as opposed to simply replying, is rare.
Example original post:
"Here are my concerns, please provide a detailed response:"
"1. What about issue A?"
"2. Have you addressed issue B?"
"3. Item C has bothered many people in the front office."
And so forth. Replying in detail simply isn't meaningful without interspersing your replies with the original queries. And that, in turn, isn't possible if one top-posts.
To me, top-posting signals that the reply isn't (indeed, cannot be) a detailed response to the points made in the original. And maybe that doesn't matter, if people are talking past each other.
> Both styles have sense in different environments.
I think the above says it -- top-posting means you don't plan to reply in detail, point my point, as I'm doing right now.
Bottom-posting clearly signals that you read and understood every word of the original message. It is to post layout what the expression "I hear you" is to interpersonal relations.
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#45The secret answer is: this is bike-shedding, worry about more important things. Most of the time only the original content in a message will be read, so top-posting is probably preferred. Occasionally it will be more suitable to form a point-by-point reply to another post, in which case it's better to reply inline. Ah, but I hear you asking "but what about when new people get added to a thread or a thread is complex…
> and the best solution is to take the effort to add a "state of the discussion checkpoint", list out all of the working assumptions and conclusions so far in the thread and state them explicitly. That's indeed the very best way to deal with it. But the problem (as this comment nicely illustrates, being bottom posted under a small bit from your excellent comment) is that such effort is typically deemed to be too much…
> Communicating well takes an extraordinary amount of time and the speed with which most internet communications take place precludes quite a bit of the work that should go into it.
Good point, well taken, but only applies to casual conversation environments such as here.
Do we need to establish a "best practise" for environments where accurate communication is imperative, eg diplomatic offices, and how would we go about doing so?
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#46The article misses the point that abandoning bottom -posting only works if you don't quote content from the message you're replying to. If you do, then by all means bottom-post. The worst case is a long exchange with multiple participants, all quoted, some top-posters and some bottom-posters. And finally, if you quote multiple passages and reply to them individually within a single post (as I often do), you simply mu…
> As far as I'm concerned, a top-poster is either a narcissist or very inexperienced in Internet communications. Or both. I bet you've not been exposed to many corporate email chains. Top-posting makes a lot of sense there. I often get copied on an email chains from which only the last part affects me. For example it will be a long discussion about some task and then I'll get copied because I'm the person who does X…
Agreed - top posting is how corporates do it.
Don't try to be the kid who doesn't play the game like everyone else. And noone in corporates will use mutt. Hell why do that, its 2013 for crying out loud
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#47I'll give up bottom posting (and inline posting) when I die. Well, that's what I want my position to be anyway. But, truth be told, it's a lot of work to re-jigger things for bottom posting with many modern email clients. And so I do find myself sometimes falling back to top-posting out of laziness - especially when emailing from my phone using GMail.
Most of the time, however, I bottom post. Maybe I'm just showing my age, but top-posting kinda annoys me. Now you kids get off of my lawn.
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#48Email is broke to the degree that we have to think about this. Maybe even more.
Could you explain what you mean?
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#49Bottom-posting, due to its falling out of favor in the mainstream, has become a shibboleth that signifies a certain degree of competence with technology and Internet communication in general. While I'd certainly prefer it if everyone I corresponded with followed proper quoting etiquette, I have to say that it's also fairly convenient to glance at an email message and immediately be able to infer with reasonable confi…
Seriously? I have come to associate this particular style as meaning the emailer/poster is going to be an unhelpful, holier than thou, pedantic ass-hole. It's a shibboleth without doubt, but not for the clique you think. > I was walking down the street Better known as a sidewalk > when I had a revelation Oh what pray tell? >that not many people actually use NoSQL There's a distinction between idiots and people you fa…
Bottom posts often send up the hairs on the back of my neck for this reason
Re: Abandoning bottom-posting
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
> As far as I'm concerned, a top-poster is either a narcissist or very inexperienced in Internet communications. Or both. I bet you've not been exposed to many corporate email chains. Top-posting makes a lot of sense there. I often get copied on an email chains from which only the last part affects me. For example it will be a long discussion about some task and then I'll get copied because I'm the person who does X…
> I bet you've not been exposed to many corporate email chains. Top-posting makes a lot of sense there. Yes, but only because replies don't typically intersperse quotes from the original. Once a choice is made to reply point by point, the argument for top-posting falls apart. So I imagine detailed quoting and replying, as opposed to simply replying, is rare. Example original post: "Here are my concerns, please provid…
Actually if someone asks you something point by point there's nothing to stop to you from copying the questions to your top post and replying "inline" there.