File spoon-archives/list-proposals.archive/list-p_1995/list-p_Jun.95, message 163


Date: Fri Jun 23 13:52:16 1995
From: Tom Blancato <tblancato-AT-envirolink.org>
Subject: eng/Laurie/Jason



 
engcubbi-AT-acs.eku.edu wrote:
 
Yes and no. Yes, no two lists are alike, but I don't agree that a priori 
taxonomy are useless for those reasons. 
 
--- "a priori" taxonomies are not "fully" or "really" a 
priori. They are fully, or considerably, bound by the 
hermeneutic situation. The items of the taxonomy are 
derived, from what? They are clarified *out of* list 
engagement and thinking.
 
 
Laurie wrote:
 
The issue of unsubbing to active lists is a matter of the kind of 
discourse people expected to take place on the list. The truth is that 
very active lists and news groups develop a casual spirit among regulars 
that results in posts that are often off the stated topic of the group or 
list because people start revealing aspects of their own lives so as to 
know one another better. Meanwhile others subscribe to the list or group 
very focused on the topic and become frustrated by the off-topic 
community development. It's the case on the majority of lists and groups 
I'm familiar with. It becomes a question of the ratio of on-topic to 
off-topic posts. One newsgroup I follow went to a system of heading 
subject lines with WOTP for "warning: off topic post." The group still 
has to deal with the tension though because by its nature as a tv fan 
group for Mystery Science Theater 3000, topics that start off on-topic 
often lead elsewhere. That is ultimately a situation the group needs to 
thrash out for itself.
 
Laurie, really shutting up this time
 
This supports the point about the power/role of the heading. 
Also, it supports the idea of FPSP lists. 
 
 
 
jason wrote:
 
why does a "list-proposal" list turn to list-death and list-killing?
interesting
 
--- Because the it's one of the cheif organizing principles 
in this kind of space (as to *why* that is the case, well, 
that's another story, an endless one). The "very being at 
all", or "verybeing" is an "all or nothing" approach, and 
it's right in there with the whole ragtag bunch: crisis (we 
have to *do* something, NOW!), history (and thus began the 
list, and it was said at that time, for undoubtedly the best 
of all possible reasons...), hysteria (but what if 
*everyone*?...), polemos (ok, it's the derrida list versus 
the DG list, they're the *enemies*), and what I just call 
"verybeing" (wherein the "very being" is called into 
question: i.e., at a meeting, "I disagree, but *why are you 
even here?*, or: a list: why does this list *exist*, as 
opposed to the how of a being, etc., which opens up more 
multiple truths, it seems to me), 
sexiness/action/opportunism(this just feels right right now 
and plays on present circumstances, i.e., exhaustion of 
topics, forgetting previous issues, etc.),  immediate action 
agenda (this is what is on the table, that's off the 
agenda).
 
 
Regards,
 
Tom

---
************************************************************************

"It is only after one ceases to reduce public affairs to the business of 
dominion that the original data in the realm of human affairs will appear, or, 
rather, reappear, in their authentic diversity."  -- Hannah Arendt

Crises of the Republic; lying in politics, civil disobedience on violence, 
thoughts on politics, and revolution. Hannah Arendt [1st ed.] New York, 
Harcourt Brace Jovanovich [1972] pages 142-143

Tom Blancato
tblancato-AT-envirolink.org
Eyes on Violence (nonviolence and human rights monitoring in Haiti)
Thoughtaction Collective (reparative justice project)
521 Main Street
PO Box 495
Harmony PA 16037
412-453-0211



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