On Mar 22, 2004, at 1:09 PM, Ray Saintonge wrote:
Poor, Edmund W wrote:
Judy Inman inman(a)powerweb.net wrote:
1. Approve the post, so it's passed on to the mailing list?
2. Reject the post with the default explanation: "Non-members are
not allowed to post messages to this list."
3. Refer the person to some sort of Reference Desk on the Wikipedia
website?
Either 1 or 3 is a good choice. 2 strikes me as rude and evasive, and
for you to do that would be very Poor PR.
Pedro has given an answer and there is no need for him to apologize.
Using 1 does not put anyone under the obligation to answer. If we can
be seen as willing to help people with queries of this sort it's all
for the better. Fortunately, Pedro was able to give specific help,
but even making the suggestion that I would look for the information
on the Website for a Madrid newspaper is a friendly act.
Of course we need to recognize it when some kid is trying to get us to
do his homework. I never even give my own son a straight answer when
he's trying to do that. :-)
But 1 puts us in the position to ignore it (rude and unhelpful), answer
it
(encouraging the list as the home for such questions), or refer them to
the
reference desk (just like 3, but less organized and more work all
around).
I vote 3.
Peter
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