[conspire] mailing list, forum and social networks

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Ivan Sergio Borgonovo (mail at webthatworks.it):

> I used to have my own website where I was used to put things that I
> need and may be needed by others and link to interesting stuff.
> 
> I always enjoyed mailing lists way more than forums since they are
> asynchronous and they generally have a public archive.
> 
> I've never really used a social network till recently and mostly as
> a social experiment rather than a tool.
> 
> Now that I've tried social networks whenever I read an email that
> has quality content, I miss the feature to "like" it, to make it
> more important and let more people read it.

I'm a little clear on what you're saying.

It's possible your primary point is about the appeal about certain sorts
of social media.  FWIW, I've relaxed one of my standards and been (for
most of this year) participating lightly on a proprietary, hosted
social-media service called NextDoor, which basically would like to be
Facebook when it grows up and has a number of sinister design elements
accordingly, except (1) it purports to require participants to use their
real names and semi-prove their physical locations, and (2) permits
interaction only with other people in your approximate physical
neighbourhood, requires that participants disclose who and where they
are, and forbids disputations about non-local issues except in special
ghettos reserved for that purpose.

I started using that service about a year ago, when our cat disappeared,
because informed opinion said NextDoor was the currently effective place
to try to get out the word about lost pets, and the best chance at
re-finding them.  (Sadly, we never re-found her, and her fate is
unknown.)  I've remained there because it's proven to be a
semi-effective way to remain in contact with people in my area, and has
a sincere anti-Facebook ethos, i.e., there are specific measures taken
to keep it from being a noise and misinformation machine.  

If you're saying indirectly that you appreciate recent Conspire
postings from someones-or-other, then you're-welcome-I-think.  ;->
(And, if you mean you happen to think well of something *I* said, then, 
thank you kindly, good sir!)

Being Scandinavian and thus under the dire influence of the Janteloven
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Jante), I personally am conflicted
about things like 'like' indicators.  Because public actions in
hopes of public approval is Very Uncool and Not Done.  ;->

(i highly recommend English journalist Michael Booth's hilarious book
_The Almost Nearly Perfect People:  Behind the Myth of the Scandinavian
Utopia_, which mercilessly takes the stuffing out of each of the main
Nordic countries in turn, and has a marvelous section about the Janteloven.
https://www.amazon.com/Almost-Nearly-Perfect-People-Scandinavian/dp/1250081564)