Am 23.07.2015 um 16:34 schrieb Valeri Galtsev <galtsev at kicp.uchicago.edu>: > > On Thu, July 23, 2015 8:43 am, Windsor Dave (AdP/TEF7) wrote: >> >> Perhaps I should say instead that it "strongly encourages" top posting, >> and all our internal emails follow that convention. >> >> It's habit-forming.... :-) >> > > Well, my habit for regular e-mail exchange is "top posting" thus the > person reads my message thus is right to the point why this particular > message message was sent in a first place... But when mail lists are > concerned, I do an opposite, that is I follow mail lists conventions. I > never thought about rationale behind them, I'm just following them. I > believe, if some day someone gives reasons why top posting is bad in case > of mail lists it will really be great. The only reason I can come up with > myself would be: whoever reads message received through mail lists usually > has no idea about previous exchange in this thread, thus needs all > exchange in chronological order. Which I'm not certain is a good reason, > so those who know and insists strongly about "no top posting" are > encouraged to give others the reasons behind that. Again, I'm not "top > posting" on the lists. However, _this_ ("top posting") is my regular way > in private exchange (and it has good reasons behind it). well, as you wrote: ... because in conventional spelling systems of western languages, text is written from the top to the bottom (applies also for reading). To rephrase it: the "usability" is higher while reading bottom posted messages. Furthermore stripping is normally done more (footers, disclaimers etc. disappears) when bottom posted. This cleans the context additionally ... The problem gets worse when both styles are mixed. Try to read a correspondence from a year ago in such a style. Its horrible ... :-) -- LF