This message is crossposted to several lists... In the past several days I have received two "odd" letters in reply to messages that I have posted to Rootsweb "-L" lists that indicate that some subscribers to mailing lists don't understand how the lists work. I generally receive 10-15 letters per day in reply to my list postings either asking for help or offering help -- those such as the one following are not conducive to good genealogical collaboration. If someone writes a message to the list that asks "does anyone have any information about..." then that message is going to every single subscriber to the list (in some cases 100s of people and on a few lists 1000s of people) and is not intended for any specific individual. That's the strength of posting to a message board - you may connect with others studying the same families. To get a reply to such a message that reads "I allready told you I don't know about them people. Stop asking me about them."[sic] makes me wonder why this person thinks that a list message was directed at them personally. At least the reply was directed back off list but, in the future I am going to forward such nonsense back to the lists. Posts like that or those "we've already discussed that issue..." really discourage new genealogists and new computer users. When a message is posted to a mailing list, most folks don't expect that every reader of the list will reply to the message. If they did all reply then our lists would be full of posts reading "Nope, not me. Never heard of them..." which doesn't help most researchers even a little. Might I suggest that it is perfectly acceptable to not reply to list posts if you have no information to add to the query... Mailing lists and list servers are a great genealogical tool. The rootsweb lists are among the best (IMHO). ### end of tirade - returning to your regularly scheduled program ### Coach Turner CoachTurner@Softhome.net list admin for SCCherok, Pharr, Gidney, Kepley, and others not the list admin for Holt-L