I would like to thank all of you for your answers to my questions on
posting to a newsgroup gatewayed to a LISTSERV mailing list.
 
Reflecting on these comments, it seems to me that the threads are
more likely to be received in time sequence, if all responders mailed to
the list rather than posting to the newsgroup.  If this is true, it would
be nice if the newsgroup headers could force this, but I am not aware of
anyway to do this and still preserve the flexibility of post,
followup, and reply offered by most newsreaders.  (I think consistent
behavior of SW is important for users.)
 
Several people mentioned digests as an alternative to news gateways,
especially for lurkers.  It seems to me they don't offer many of the
advantages of newsgroups: threaded reading, ignoring uninteresting
topics, easy response, easy personal archive of selected articles, no
action required when moving or going on vacation, etc.  Prehaps I am not
aware of the tools for handling disgests.  If everyone had a method of
bursting them into messages and could then handle them
as ordinary mail, some of these objections would disappear.
 
Eric stated that only 5% of the LISTSERV lists are gatewayed to
news groups.  What is the basis for deciding whether a list should be
/will be gatewayed.
 
I would also appreciate a pointer to which manuals and policy statements
I should read before asking more questions.
 
Thanks again for the help,
--
John Bacon
[log in to unmask]