Topic threading tech (not this list in particular) (was: Dividing The List Considered Harmful)

[Mark E. Mallett]

On Tue, Mar 27, 2007 at 09:15:13PM -0400, Ben Scott wrote:
> On 3/27/07, Mark E. Mallett <mem at mv.mv.com> wrote:
> >Oh, and back to a previous subject... simply changing the subject text
> >isn't really enough.  When a threat mutates, you really want a new one,
> >which means getting rid of the "References" links.
> 
>  Hmmm.  Interesting take.  I've always found the References links
> *useful* for keeping track of the "bigger picture" of how a
> conversation came about.  I've been annoyed when reading archives and
> found things out-of-sequence when those links are broken.  It never
> occurred to me that someone might see that as a feature.  Hmmm.

Ah, interesting take :)  Well, I was coming at it from the other end of
the continuum, i.e. subject substitution instead of subject morphing.
The extreme example of that is when somebody decides to start a new
thread, and instead of posting to the list, finds an old posting and
hits "reply" -- thinking that simply changing the subject will be good
enough.  I can't really fault people who don't use threaded readers
for doing that.  However, this peeve is a favorite hobby-horse of mine
and I like to ride it whenever I get an opening.

As far as wanting to know the surrounding context when a thread morphs-
yeah, I suppose.  But you can go too far.  Threads are a great
convenience for keeping conversations separated, and it seems to me that
it's not always possible to both keep a new conversation separate and
keep it attached to where it came from.  Then again, I'm an inveterate
thread-killer, and I often get bitten by finding (later) that something
interesting was buried deep at the bottom of some thread cascade,
subject change or no.  Like when you find that a thread about ideal
computer cases has turned into one about stand-up comedians; at some
point I think it's prudent to start a new one.



>  As far as implementation goes, any idea what mail readers (if any)
> implement this functionality natively?  (That is, provide a function
> for "Reply without References".  You could always do it with
> cut-and-paste, of course.)

Dunno.  Mutt lets you reply and then remove the References header, but
you have to remember to do that.  You can also do a thread-break and
then reply, I suppose.


>  Shouldn't a good threaded reader with thread-kill capability be able
> to kill just a designated fork/subthread?

Yes.  Or have commands to break a thread or join threads together in
one's own mailbox.


> >mm  (my opinionated.info)
> 
>  I'm such a geek.  I actually looked that up with whois to see who
> owned it.  Turns out it really *is* yours!  Well done!  :-)

heh.  Yeah, it seemed like a good name for a blogsite, then I realized
that having a blog involves work.

mm