Hi, everyone -- I apologize for the length of this post but I feel that this is an important topic. From several other posts on the list recently, I know that others agree. I'd like to comment on remarks by Julia <julia.clarke@sothebys.com> (12 Oct), also by Jürgen <genealogy@ib-fritsche.de> (15 Oct) and finally by Joneen < binkywa@worldnet.att.net > yesterday (16 Oct). First, I want to apologize for not replying to this issue before now. "Real life" concerns got in the way and I just didn't have the time I thought it deserved, to put my thoughts together and get them written down. Secondly, I agree absolutely with what Julia, Jürgen & Joneen had to say and I really appreciate that they all put this issue onto the list. I also thank them -- and others, both on and off list -- who have given words of support for the list. When I started this list in January, I envisioned it as a place where English was the predominant language (as it says in the welcome message) but where other languages would regularly appear, partly because of the nature of the research being shared but also because I hoped that we would have quite a few participating subscribers from European countries (or familiar with research in those countries). Naively, I had no real idea how to make all this happen -- I guess I thought it would just happen naturally <g> -- but that was my vision. I deliberately included list guidelines in French and German to emphasize this, with tentative plans for guidelines in Dutch at some future time. However, it has turned out that, overall, the info on this list leans in the direction of research done in the UK, which has concerned me. This is partly due to my own personal bias and research -- as you all know, I have a lot of info to share about English sources, which I regularly post. However, I think I should have been more vigilent here and attempted to maintain more balanced geographical info on the list. I want to thank Jürgen for his offer to post on German lists. I was also interested to learn what he had to say about the low numbers of people in Germany and France who are not as yet connected to the Net. I would also welcome hearing, off-list, from (in Julia's words) "energetic members" who would be willing to "test the waters on foreign language mailing lists and Internet sources and report back". A few months ago, I did contact the list admins of many English and Irish lists to let them know about H-W-E but had not yet done this for European lists. I think that Joneen has already contacted one German mailing list and -- it can't be coincidence! -- we've had eight new subscribers join us today! (Welcome to all and thanks to Joneen.) Before I wrap this up, I feel I must bring up another issue here. It's the other side of the coin. While it's important to reach out to European researchers, for this list to flourish, more people who are *already* on this list should be participating. It's that simple. For example, after my "list silence" post on 10 Oct, most subscribers continued to remain silent. There were several posts to the list, true, and I did get some messages privately but well over 200 subscribers did nothing at all. As I've said before -- a mailing list is for *sharing*. Certainly, there is *taking* of info from the list but there should also be *giving* to the list in return. That's what sharing is: give & take, isn't it? I hope by saying this I have not caused offense to anyone, resulting in a flurry of unsubs. OK, I'm climbing down from my soapbox now. Any comments and views, fellow listers? Andrea (in my list concierge Hallowe'en costume <g>)