I've been on USENET since 1989, and nobody ever fussed about top-posting until the very late 1990s. People did whatever they chose. (People did fuss about not trimming down quoted material from previous posts, because bandwidth really was an issue). In the late 1990s someone invented some nonexistent netiquette rule about top-posting, and people wanting to feel like members of an ingroup began to lambaste newbies about it.
If you do a Google Groups search on "top-posting" from 1981 to 1996 you will see that there are only 52 hits and _none_ of them refer to top-posting as we know it. The hits are on things like "way-over-the-top posting" and "I had been given some kind of top posting overseas" and "On our system the FAQ was the top posting."
In 1997 we start to see entries like "You can get in a lot of trouble in the Netscape newsgroups for 'Top Posting'" and "First, please stop 'top-posting'." In 1998, "I know some groups prefer 'top' posting, but I think they've got it bassackwards, don't you?" There is an exchange
If the quoted text is included at the end of your messages instead
of
the beginning, it will significantly increase the speed of reading news. If you are a fast reader, it might even double it.
I had a long argument on this with the folks in the NetScape newsgroup a while back. While I agree with your position in general, they argued that it was an issue for `newsgroup standards' (i.e. each newsgroup adopts its own practice).
It seems to me that the `core' issue is whether Newsgroup circulation is reliable and timely enough so that you usually have the earlier messages to which some response is directed. If you do, then Top posting makes the most sense, while if you do not, Bottom posting wins.
As News delivery gets more timely and reliable, we would then expect Top posting to become more and more `the rule'...
If it originated in the Netscape groups, I don't know why. Maybe, when replying to a post, Netscape Communicator's "Collabra" pre-positioned the insertion point below the quoted text and perhaps Outlook Express, or whatever AOL was using, pre-positioned it at the top? That could explain why it became such a bone of contention
By 2000, the level of discourse has become quite elevated: "Now you have all become top-posting fjuckheads with no direction at all" and "Oh, here we have a member of the top-posting newbie faggot fan club." By 2003, "STOP top posting. That is WHY YOU ARE retarded. Got clue?" and "Hands up who isn'ta top posting fuckwit" and "Good illustration of why top posting is only done by noobs."
-- Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith@verizon.net "Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print! Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/
Related to this, I think that gmail and other advanced mail programs have neutralized some of the sin of top posting, because they intelligently hide the quoted text. However, the diversity of mail programs now means a wide range of experiences for users (ie. it will bother some folks immensely, while not bothering others).
For Gmailers, a 115 message thread is manageable, but for others, it can be extremely aggravating.
-Andrew (User:Fuzheado)
On Fri, 5 Nov 2004 20:13:36 -0500, Daniel P. B. Smith dpbsmith@verizon.net wrote:
I've been on USENET since 1989, and nobody ever fussed about top-posting until the very late 1990s. People did whatever they chose. (People did fuss about not trimming down quoted material from previous posts, because bandwidth really was an issue). In the late 1990s someone invented some nonexistent netiquette rule about top-posting, and people wanting to feel like members of an ingroup began to lambaste newbies about it.
If you do a Google Groups search on "top-posting" from 1981 to 1996 you will see that there are only 52 hits and _none_ of them refer to top-posting as we know it. The hits are on things like "way-over-the-top posting" and "I had been given some kind of top posting overseas" and "On our system the FAQ was the top posting."
In 1997 we start to see entries like "You can get in a lot of trouble in the Netscape newsgroups for 'Top Posting'" and "First, please stop 'top-posting'." In 1998, "I know some groups prefer 'top' posting, but I think they've got it bassackwards, don't you?" There is an exchange
If the quoted text is included at the end of your messages instead
of
the beginning, it will significantly increase the speed of reading news. If you are a fast reader, it might even double it.
I had a long argument on this with the folks in the NetScapenewsgroup a while back. While I agree with your position in general, they argued that it was an issue for `newsgroup standards' (i.e. each newsgroup adopts its own practice).
It seems to me that the `core' issue is whether Newsgroupcirculation is reliable and timely enough so that you usually have the earlier messages to which some response is directed. If you do, then Top posting makes the most sense, while if you do not, Bottom posting wins.
As News delivery gets more timely and reliable, we would then expect Top posting to become more and more `the rule'...If it originated in the Netscape groups, I don't know why. Maybe, when replying to a post, Netscape Communicator's "Collabra" pre-positioned the insertion point below the quoted text and perhaps Outlook Express, or whatever AOL was using, pre-positioned it at the top? That could explain why it became such a bone of contention
By 2000, the level of discourse has become quite elevated: "Now you have all become top-posting fjuckheads with no direction at all" and "Oh, here we have a member of the top-posting newbie faggot fan club." By 2003, "STOP top posting. That is WHY YOU ARE retarded. Got clue?" and "Hands up who isn'ta top posting fuckwit" and "Good illustration of why top posting is only done by noobs."
-- Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith@verizon.net "Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print! Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Daniel P.B.Smith wrote:
I've been on USENET since 1989, and nobody ever fussed about top-posting until the very late 1990s. People did whatever they chose. (People did fuss about not trimming down quoted material from previous posts, because bandwidth really was an issue). In the late 1990s someone invented some nonexistent netiquette rule about top-posting, and people wanting to feel like members of an ingroup began to lambaste newbies about it.
It just annoyed me because I had to scroll down to find out what he was talking about. Start reading, get confused, scroll down, cotton on, scroll up. Lots of people on usenet top-post and I wish they wouldn't.
-- Tim Starling
On 6 Nov 2004, at 02:13, Daniel P.B.Smith wrote:
<snip top-posting related email />
-- Daniel P. B. Smith
Thanks Daniel. :) Your post explains a lot, "reaches out to the ostracized", rightly ranks this issue as what it is (a matter of preference) and boldly dares to criticize the intrepid proponents of "the right way".
While I have personally never been more than a fleeting usenet-visitor (if at all), my long abstention from online activities (incl. BBS' and Internet services, especially "old school" ones such as IRC, NNTP) had more to do with German and Irish phone pricing than with any lack of "techiness". Even local calls were NEVER free/flatrate, and way back when there only was one calling plan and phone company. Which meant that even FidoNet could easily cost yer a bleedin fortune. So it felt a bit stupid to find myself on the wrong side of the fence.
-- ropers [[en:User:Ropers]] (who'll try his best but can't guarantee that he won't habitually top-post in the future, and who personally actually mostly prefers "intelligent", limited history preserving top-posting) www.ropersonline.com
Daniel P. B. Smith (dpbsmith@verizon.net) [041106 12:12]:
I've been on USENET since 1989, and nobody ever fussed about top-posting until the very late 1990s. People did whatever they chose.
My experience (since 1988) completely contradicts this.
A. Because it makes a nonsense of logical flow. Q. Why don't you like top posting?
- d.