DavesVideo wrote:
An unmoderated news group should thus be moderated by the restraint
of the
posters. I have seen many newsgroups degenerate and become worhless
due to off
topic posting.

They only become worthless if the off-topic posts are not easily
identified, causing people who didn't care about them to waste time on
them.

If a thread drifts off-topic, whether it be towards a political
discussion or name calling, it ought to be re-named. That doesn't always
happen. When on-topic threads constantly drift into off-topic areas with
no change in the subject line, that's what ruins a newsgroup. For
example, the discussions about gardening that turn into name-calling
sessions with no new gardening content are more damaging to the
usefulness of this newsgroup than this thread, which very obviously has
"politics" in the subject line.

One can easily ignore well titled off-topic discussions even if they
amount to 90% of the traffic in a newsgroup. But if the subject lines
make it look like the discussion is on-topic, even though it's not, that
can eventually make the group worthless. Well marked off-topic
discussions only make the group worthless for people who have obsessive
disorders that require them to read every message regardless of the
subject line.

--
Warren H.

==========
Disclaimer: My views reflect those of myself, and not my
employer, my friends, nor (as she often tells me) my wife.
Any resemblance to the views of anybody living or dead is
coincidental. No animals were hurt in the writing of this
response -- unless you count my dog who desperately wants
to go outside now.
Blatant Plug: Books for the Pacific Northwest gardener:
http://www.holzemville.com/mall/nwgardener/index.html