Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!bionet!hayes.ims.alaska.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: bcsaic!carroll@beaver.cs.washington.edu (Jeff Carroll) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Telecom Art Message-ID: <14854@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 20 Nov 90 06:46:58 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Organization: Boeing Computer Services AI Center, Seattle Lines: 64 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 836, Message 1 of 10 In article <14462@accuvax.nwu.edu> reverend@pro-exchange.cts.com (Mitchell L. Silverman) writes: >This is strange, I know. But could all the people who post messages >to the TELECOM Digest take a second to make sure that they have a >geographical address in their signatures? I ask this for two related >reasons. This seems to run counter to Our Fabled Moderator's desire to minimize the size of .sigs. Would PAT care to enunciate official TELECOM Digest policy regarding this request? >First: I (and, I assume, other TELECOM Digest readers) are curious to >know the geographic span of messages posted here. Long-time computer >users (myself included) sometimes get jaded about what their toys can >do, but surely the thought that this Digest enmeshes such a large part >of the globe and connects such a geographically diverse group, must >occasionally instill a sense of wonder in its readers? I generally refrain from posting more than my name and my email address because (a) email is generally the simplest and most reliable way for people out of town to reach me; (b) I change offices, and hence mailing addresses, frequently; (c) I generally assume that most people know that almost all of Boeing is in Seattle; (d) I think long ostentatious .sigs are tacky. On the other hand, I do get a kick out of receiving email and downloading anonymous FTP from places I've never been, such as Oz. >conceptual art installation using HyperCard. And THAT is what I'd >like to do with the Digest -- conceptual art. Readers, PAT, what do you >think? I don't understand this at all, but then I was too busy between majoring in engineering and minoring in beer to take any art :^> Jeff Carroll carroll@atc.boeing.com [Moderator's Note: I'm not sure I understand it entirely either, but assuming the original author knows what he is talking about, here is my .sig policy: Name, email address and US Mail address are allowed, as is a disclaimer message when required. Cute sayings, borders, stars, dashed line, graphics and similar are all removed. I used to allow full .sigs, but found that as the Digest traffic got quite heavy I was able to free up ten to fifteen percent of the space in each issue by eliminating the aforementioned. There are technical considerations: The Digest gets along best with the mailers enroute if the maximum size is around 16-17 K. It be larger, but I get more complaints of duplicate deliveries and missed deliveries when they are. If I can recover a thousand bytes by deleting the dashes around your .sig, that's enough room for another message. Then too, dash marks (-----) have a particular significance to the digesting/undigesting software, particularly when they are flush with the left side of the file. Likewise, the word 'From', or any word at the left margin followed by a colon is significant. I was leaving a few small .sigs in for awhile, then there were complaints of favoritism from the folks whose (much larger, garish) .sigs got removed. So now I just remove them all. After all, the more .sigs I remove, the more Moderator's Notes I can add with ease! :) PAT]