o Point number one, re: list etiquette in general:

  One thing I have learned from being on the Net since
  the dawn of email's popularity is that list etiquette
  discussions recur on every list I have ever been in,
  even the good ones. They take up bandwidth, and do
  absolutely no good.

  No matter how much a person soapboxes about his
  personal hot points, citing everything from RFCs and
  the Hacker's Dictionary to the Bible to make their
  points, while some few may learn a thing or two and
  revise a habit now and then, in the end most do not.

  Shortly after the thread dies down, the list is
  joined by more of the unenlightened who will quote
  entire digests and bottom-post "me too", send HTML
  and attachments (unless it's outright banned and
  enforced), send paragraph-length single lines,
  include foreign character codes, ignore punctuation,
  misspell three-letter words, and compose text as
  though human speech is their second language, until
  someone gets sufficiently irritated to start the
  cycle once again.

  I finally learned about five years ago not to read
  messages that I don't like to *look* at. Period. That
  alone cut my load about 90%, especially where I used
  to work.

  Meanwhile, I strive to present the best example I can
  in my own posts, because I'd rather have people
  imitate what I do than what I say. Sometimes people
  even write me offlist and ask me how I do
  such-and-such. (Particularly proper citation.)

o Point number two, re: top-posts versus bottom-posts

  I had to reflect to even know what that means, but
  finally figured out it refers to the practice of
  quoting a whole message and adding your own content
  at the top or bottom respectively. If I
  misunderstand, someone please correct me.

  When responding to a message I always, always,
  *always* quote the message, indent it with citation
  strings, and then intersperse my own comments. And I
  always, always, *always* delete the words that are
  irrelevant, both before and afterward, often
  inserting ellipses before and/or afterward. This way
  I can break a line precisely at the most effective
  word, so there is no guesswork as to what points on
  which I am commenting.

  One simple reason so few do this is that they either
  use inferior editing systems, are keyboard
  challenged, or simply have never taken the time to
  learn how to use the power built into the tools they
  have available. I've observed this is most often true
  of people who come to Linux/Unix from a Windows point
  and drool environment where they are provided by
  default with software that allows them to insert
  attachments of the latest Steven Spielberg movie in
  DVD format, but don't provide them with some of the
  most fundamental editing capabilities, such as the
  ability to transpose letters, sentences, or words in
  a keystroke, or to re-fill paragraphs after deleting
  or adding text.

  Some things will never change. The best we can do is
  just get over it, and try not to be part of the
  problem.

Respectfully,

-- 
Lynn David Newton
Phoenix, AZ