Plant how to questions

[Robinson, Dr. David]

Maybe our newsgroup should change its name to something like
"edu-botany" or "edu-plant" or "plantphys-ed" to hide from these
beginning-gardener types.

	-----Original Message-----
	From:	monroejd at jmu.edu [SMTP:monroejd at jmu.edu]
	Sent:	Monday, June 08, 1998 2:00 PM
	To:	plant-ed at net.bio.net
	Subject:	Re: Plant how to questions

	David Starrett wrote regarding the recent spate of gardening
questions:

	>Plant-edders,
	>[stuff deleted] it would seem that there should be some source
that is
	>better suited >to these questions.  Anyone else have a thought
on this?

	Yes, there is.  Other public newsgroups I am aware of that could
be used
	for these questions are:

	rec.gardens
	rec.gardens.ecosystems
	rec.gardens.edible
	rec.gardens.orchids
	rec.gardens.roses
	sci.bio.botany
	bionet.plants

	As Michael Dosmann just indicated, many plant-ed users are not
subscribers
	and don't know what our charter says.  All they see is the name
of the
	newsgroup and perhaps a few subjects before firing off their
question.  One
	solution is moderation.  As most of you will recall we voted
about a year
	ago to make this group moderated and the response was strongly
yes.  The
	problem at the time was a large increase in the frequency of
junk e-mail
	messages.  I asked Biosci to make the necessary changes and they
said they
	would but they haven't done it.  I suspect that they developed
an
	electronic system to screen out the junk and, if so, it appears
to be
	working.  Such a system does not, however, keep honest people
who are
	unaware of our charter from asking questions that might be
better asked
	elsewhere.  Since some of you do reply to these messages,
screening them
	out at the level of a moderator could be harmful.

	I recommend deleting messages before getting annoyed, and
replying when we
	have time and can help...

	Any more thoughts?  Please reply to the group.

	Jon

	
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