On Sun, Sep 11, 2005 at 06:24:27PM -0700, Matt Brown wrote:
The problem with top-posting is not so much the top-posting itself, it is what it generally goes along with: copying the entire text of the article being replied to, and not being specific about what you're replying to.
Full-quoting is really annoying for those of us who read mailing lists in digest mode: it means that we have to page through reams of repeated text in order to read the new messages. Since digest mode is a useful and supported feature of the list, it makes sense to discourage people from gratuitously breaking it by full-quoting.
Full-quoting also makes using Web archives more difficult, since a chain of full-quoted messages tailing off of every subsequent reply will create false hits on search engines. If every message includes only the author's text and a minimum of quoting to establish context, the needs of per-message readers, digest readers, and Web archives are all fulfilled pretty damn well.
("I can't help but top-post/full-quote: my mail program puts the cursor at the top of the message by default" is ... well ... I'll be nice and say it isn't terribly convincing. It's right up there with "I can't click that button, I'd go off the edge of my mouse pad.")