[Air-l] what's appropriate

Barry Wellman wellman at chass.utoronto.ca
Fri Feb 21 09:09:51 PST 2003


Folks,

I've seen too many lists torn apart by digressing from their purpose -- in
this case, discussing internet research -- to other matters. Sure,
everything is germane (I once unsuccessfully tried to get the BMW list to
discuss the class struggle as a cause of car jackings), but some are more
germane than others.

Second, I've seen too many instances where posters to lists assume that
everyone shares their opinions. It's part of the partial communities that
we belong to. There is a rough community of interest around internet
research here, but that doesn't generalize to politics, etc. In short,
political discussions belong on political lists, not here.

That's my .02. YMMV (curious if anyone remembers where the latter comes
from).

 Barry
 ___________________________________________________________________

  Barry Wellman        Professor of Sociology       NetLab Director
  wellman at chass.utoronto.ca   http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman

  Centre for Urban & Community Studies        University of Toronto
  455 Spadina Avenue   Toronto Canada M5S 2G8   fax:+1-416-978-7162

 -------------------------------------------------------------------
                	 ***** Just Out *****
		(1) _The Internet in Everyday Life_
              Barry Wellman & Caroline Haythornthwaite, eds.
                       Oxford: Blackwell, 2002

		(2) _Social Strucutres: A Network Approach_
		   Barry Wellman & S.D. Berkowitz, eds.
		      Toronto: CSPI/Women's Press
 ___________________________________________________________________





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