

Ask HN: Why open-source prefers Google Groups as discussion engine? - pankratiev

Node.js
http://groups.google.com/group/nodejs<p>Ruby on Rails
http://groups.google.com/group/rubyonrails-talk<p>etc<p>What benefits or special features do Google Groups have? Posting via email?
======
huxley
If you ask around, you'll find that most of the people running Google Groups
either hate or dislike Google Groups, however when their groups were first
started it had a low-entry cost: it was free of charge and Google handled most
of the annoyances of running a mailing list. New groups get added because it
is still simpler than running your own mailing list.

<http://ejohn.org/blog/google-groups-is-dead/>

One should never underestimate the power of inertia.

~~~
pankratiev
Thanks.

> running your own mailing list

As I understand its key feature is posting and reading via email? But does it
make sense in the era of StackOverflow and Quora?

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mindcrime
They're free and they work reasonably well. They're not substantially better
or worse than the other freely available mailing list services, in my
experience. For projects that don't feel like running their own server and
hosting a Mailman (or whatever) instance, they work fine.

------
xorglorb
It's simple. It works. It's free.

