I've had similar experiences as Todd in managing my list. I run
an unmoderated, open mailing list for answering personal finance
questions. I have the entire range of users on the list, from
complete novices to experienced finance professionals. Both are
needed, because if someone posts a question, someone else has to
answer it.
Many of the finance professionals on the list are AOL, Compu$erve,
or Delphi subscribers. They perform a *vital* service for my list,
but most of them are new to the Internet. I am not a finance
professional - my role is to make it easy for them to answer questions.
It's really worked well.
Also, as far as AOL/CI$, etc. having proprietary discussions, I
have nothing against it. However, eventually, they won't be able
to compete with the variety and depth of discussions possible on
the Internet. I think they are forced to open their subscribers to
the Internet, and eventually the subscribers will figure out that
it's cheaper to get a UNIX shell account. They'll also have better
discussions. So while AOL/CI$, etc. are making a temporary profit,
they're cutting their throats in the long run. They're just educating
more users to the Internet.
Ira Krakow (ikrakow@shore.net)
Krakow Enterprises - "Your One-Stop Internet Information Center"
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