[X-Newbies] Top posing in mail?

[B.ru c-e •K1u-tch-k0]

On May 19, 2005, at 7:00 AM, Jamie Kahn Genet wrote:

> Tony Johansen <tjoh7019 at bigpond.net.au> wrote:
>
>
>> Couldn't agree more, long live the top posters!
>>
>
> Yes! Long live inconsiderate people! Who gives a sh*t about others?
>
> Regards,
>  Jamie Kahn Genet
> --  

In my experience, business email ends to reply to longer writings and  
more often is not distributed on a mailing list (where bottom posting  
would convey the logical sequence of events to people who didn't  
write the originating email). More likely business email is a reply  
to a person or a group of people, all of whom were aware of the  
contents of the original
email. In this case, it is not so terrible to show the reply first --  
this way, people know what the original email was, and they are more  
interested in seeing the reply.

On mailing lists, it can become very hard to determine what the heck  
is going on when top posting is used. This is for the reasons already  
stated - that many people will read the email, but almost none of  
them will know the contents of the email that is being replied to. So  
a logical flow of events makes things clear.

Outlook dominates the business world and is a defacto standard for  
such writings. Most business people expect top posting and are  
confused by bottom posting. Outlook does not take into account the  
needs of other users - for example, people who subscribe to mailing  
lists. It is possible to bottom post in Outlook, but the vast  
majority of its users don't know how.

Perhaps a really good email program in the near future will be able  
to examine quoting levels, then rearrange received emails according  
to one's preferences. And we'll never have to spend countless hours  
debating the issue.

Just call me a flexible top and bottom poster.
-- 
B-r-u -c-e