On Fri, Jul 17, 2009 at 9:04 PM, Jim Arnott <jrasite@eoni.com> wrote:

>  PLEASE!!!!!!!
>
>  Trim the replies.

At 10:37 AM 7/18/2009, Jake de Villiers wrote:
>I've heard those words before but have no idea what they mean.  Is this
>something I'm supposed to do as well?
>
>Perhaps you could explain for those of us who aren't computer professionals.
>
>Thanks, Jake

It means to trim off those parts of the message you're replying to
that are not necessary to establish continuity.  A decent rule of
thumb is to leave no more of the original message than twice as much
as your own contribution.

The particular message that reached Jim's breaking point was quoted
seven levels deep, and had not been trimmed in any way by any of the
seven previous posters -- then the current poster added six words to it.

Trimming replies is a long-accepted part of list etiquette worldwide,
and one that we on this list tend to do rather badly.  The universe
seems to be divided into those who think this is important and tend
to get stressed when it isn't done, and those who neither notice nor
care.  Those of us who think it is important think so partly because
it reduces the load on the listserver and the internet and people's
dialup connections; but *primarily* because it reduces the load on
*us* to read and understand the thing -- that's where the etiquette
part comes in.  Those of us running the list think it's important and
it is therefor a list policy that it should be so, although we have
been extremely lenient on enforcing it.

Cheers,

  --
David Beierl - Providence RI USA -- http://pws.prserv.net/synergy/Vanagon/
'89 Po' White Star "Scamp"