[ih] History of Flaming

[Dave Crocker]

On 5/17/2013 6:43 AM, Laboha wrote:
> I think there must have been some flaming in the mgsgroup - can anyone
> remember this? I have found some kind of flaming in the header group.

I believe msggroup was the first arpanet-wide mailing list. (I sometimes 
confuse it with hdrpeople, since it was also about email, but it was 
more technical, as we were developing format standards for mail.)

Anyhow, msggroup is the one I had in mind when I described the learning 
process, to reduce flaming, that we all went through, except for a 
couple of people...

FWIW, I think that the tone and style of flaming hasn't changed much, 
for flaming among an 'organized' group.  That is, a group that can be 
called a community.  I believe having some actual association to each 
other produces some limits on what is posted, even though it might not 
seem like it.

In contrast, the sorts of things posted by random people on public lists 
today sometimes has no limits at all.


> Dave: Can I quote you, from what you wrote? I think you nicely
> summarized the beginning of electronic flaming with the reply button!

Sure.  I've been offering roughly the same summary for probably 30 years...


d/
-- 
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net