Cliff, Thanks for pointing out some areas where one might not want to receive gateway messages. Em ----- Original Message ----- From: "Cliff Lamere" <clifflamere@nycap.rr.com> To: <nyrensse@rootsweb.com> Sent: Saturday, July 05, 2008 12:02 AM Subject: [NYRENSSE] The negatives of gatewayed messages > The list administrator asked our opinion about whether to keep the > gateway system, so I have tried to evaluate it. Nobody has said > anything negative about this system, so let me be the first. > > I'm not trying to talk anyone into abondoning the system. I just offer > some facts to weigh. Here are some reasons why people might not like it. > > 1) You can't tell who wrote the gatewayed email (not even your own) > without opening it. They all come from "gc-gateway". It is fairly > important to know who wrote the email. For example, if Pat Connors > writes an email, I will always open it no matter what the subject is. > > 2) People seldom use even their first name at the end of a gatewayed > message, so you don't know who wrote the message, which makes them > definitely less personal. > > 3) Most of the time you don't know, and can't learn, the email address > of the sender, so you can't answer privately. > > 4) You can read the gatewayed email, but the previous message is not > included in it. It is therefore very often hard to understand the > answer. When a subject has several respondents at once, you just can't > tell to what the incoming email is responding. Even if there is only > one respondent that day, you still can't tell what they were answering. > This becomes even worse when the question was posted several days, > weeks, or months earlier (as is often the case with message boards). > This kind of confusion is avoided by using the message board the way it > was intended; by visiting it. > > 5) Gatewaying forces you to go online and do some research if you want > to understand many of the emails. > > 6) BUT, when I tried to do that twice in the past three days, the link > to the online message took me to a screen advertising Ancestry instead > of to the message board. I did learn that if I closed the browser > window and clicked on the email link in the message a second time, that > second time I would be taken to the correct place. Most people would > not have tried it a second time. > > 7) The current system sometimes generates duplicate messages to the > mailing list. > > 8) Gatewaying confuses a large number of the mailing list members. > Sometimes they try to answer the question being posed on the message > board, but they are only sending their answer to the mailing list > members. The person who asked the question doesn't always see a helpful > answer. > > 9) As one member complained, somedays there are a lot of these messages > that have to be deleted. For those who check mail once a day, that is > not a problem. For those whose computers alert them to the fact that > there is an incoming email, checking to see what that mail is, then > deleting it is not much of a problem. But, the large number of > gatewayed messages on some days can mean checking many extra times. I > suspect that some people find that to be annoying. > > 10) Unlike in past years, the mailing list Archives no longer shows who > wrote most of the emails, because the ones that are gatewayed don't list > a sender or their email address. They just list a "handle" of seemingly > nonsense letters which usually makes it impossible to recognize the > sender's name. That means that it will be harder or impossible to > contact the sender when a genealogist finds an interesting message in > the mailing list's Archives. > > That is a lot of negatives. You may think of others. > > Despite all of these negatives, a small percentage of list members are > no doubt being helped, and a higher percentage don't want to miss the > chance that a message board message might help. But, this can be > resolved a different way. A line could be added at the bottom of each > email from the mailing list that tells how to reach the message board. > And an email reminder could be sent every two or three months to the > mailing list suggesting that we check the message board. People who > use a message board usually ask to be notified when someone replies to > their message. So, it would not be harmful to the list member if they > didn't read the message on the day it was written. > > I believe the negatives of gatewaying much outweigh the positives. > However, the list administrator knows things about the mailing list and > message board that few of us know. She knows how she would like things > to operate, what would be easy and reasonable for her, and what would be > best for the mailing list. I think she is in the best position to make > the decision. > > I don't care one way or the other. I just tried to present an analysis > of the situation. > > Cliff Lamere > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > Pat Connors wrote: > >>Side note from admin: I believe a couple of years ago, as a list, we >>decided we wanted to be gatewayed to the message board. If a majority >>of the list would like to change this, I am open to a discussion. >>Thanks Cliff for the explanation. Also, if you don't want to read a >>message, you can just delete it. >> >> >> >> >>>taking place on a message board. It has been arranged so that this >>>mailing list also receives the message board messages (they are >>>"gatewayed" to the mailing list). >>> >>> >>> >> >> >> > ====NY-RENSSE Mailing List==== > Check out the mailing list's website at: > http://www.connorsgenealogy.com/NYRensse/ > Add/check you Rensselaer County surnames on the surname registry at: > http://www.rootsweb.com/~nyrenss2/ > (under Links) > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > NYRENSSE-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message

AS a list owner in the Rootsweb system, I see both sides of the Gateway issue. The ultimate decision is Cliff's to make. The Boards 'used to be" a really nice way to get people together, but now they just seem to be oriented to MAKING us go to Ancestry's site to transact the business that is more easily transacted on the mail lists. It is designed to bring you in, get hits on the Ancestry server. People used to find out the messages were going both places and would join the mail lists. Now you don't know who the sender is unless you chose to CLICK Through. Those click through counts equal revenue, because the click-through percentage is leveraged against the ad rates. More clicks, higher ad rates, and $$$$ for Ancestry. This is what pays the rent on these lists, They have to be a positive for the bottom line to make having them worthwhile for the Company. It is a part of the re-branding that recently got implemented, on the websites hosted by TGN. The business is working towards drawing in the most people possible. To quote the USER agreement, "if you don't agree, stop using the service." Jeff