In a recent posting, Colin Macgregor Stevens
<[log in to unmask]> writes:
>Please remember that your readers are from all over the world. You can save
>everyone some time by including the "what and where" in the title e.g. "Job
>posting - Curator - TX, USA". People can then tell from the title if they
>want to open the message or not.

I second that.  Not only will you save us time but you will reach more
of the people you want to inform or from whom you want help.

Remember that some of us are using newsgroup software which allows us to
download just the header information initially.  We then use the subject
heading to determine whether or not we download the full message next
time we log on.  Life is too short to read messages of no interest to
us, nor can we afford unneccesary connection costs (in many parts of the
world we pay for all our calls).

I only read postings which I am fairly sure will be of use to me or
where I think I might be able to help the enquirer.  So messages with
vague subject headers like "Help wanted" or "Information required" just
don't get read, whereas I always read postings with informative subject
lines which appear to relate to my own area of expertise, such as
"Classification systems - Help wanted" or "Information required on UK
cataloguing software".

A related problem sometimes arises when people hit the reply button when
they want to raise a new topic.  This is fine provided you change the
subject line to reflect your new message.  Otherwise your posting
appears to be following on from whatever message you had on your screen
when you hit reply.  This can be very irritating to those of us who
download messages selectively and/or have software which "threads"
newsgroup articles.

Perhaps we need a regularly posted FAQ document to help new subscribers
get the best out of museum-l?

Stuart
------
Stuart Holm, Heritage Documentation Projects     Fax: +44 870 055 3623
2 New Road, Reepham, Norwich NR10 4LP, UK     E-mail: [log in to unmask]
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