

Mailing Lists: What’s Wrong With Them, and How Can We Fix Them? [pdf] - Errorcod3
http://people.csail.mit.edu/axz/papers/mailinglists.pdf

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hellbanner
They've changed little in 44 years because they've worked, for 44 years. One
of the "tensions" they claimed about push-vs-pull is a client-side issue, not
the email technology itself. If you use a mailing list for critical
emergencies, everyone should be using push. Otherwise the consumer can decide.

Another one of their tensions, debating type & quality of message -- several
mailing lists I've participated in have spun off subsequent mailing lists to
discuss in detail topics (eg. a mesh network discussion on a developer list)
or moved to private conversations.

It's _good_ that mailing lists are open and people can talk about random
topics -- that's what a forum is for. Good clients let you mute or block
people you don't like to hear from.

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ams6110
Some other advantages: Almost no assumptions about the technology stack,
platform, OS, etc. of the participants; no need to create yet another account
on yet another service in order to participate; no need to expose anything
about yourself other than your email address.

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aw3c2
Oh, it is so tempting to reply with "PDF files: What's Wrong With Them, and
How Can We Fix Them". There, I did it.

Here is a 30 second summary of the paper from one of the authors:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-t0U7-BiWHw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-t0U7-BiWHw)

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JadeNB
Would you rather watch a 30-second video than read a paper? If I come across
even a mildly interesting PDF, I read it immediately or download it for later.
If I come across any but the most fascinating video, I usually move on. I hate
being forced to get information from videos.

(I am not claiming that my experience is universal, just that, I think,
neither is the one you seem implicitly to be describing.)

~~~
aw3c2
Nah, I prefer a single column website. To me PDFs are for printing, especially
such paper formats.

