In article , Mark R Penn
wrote:
Incidentally, top posting is a crime...................

No it isn't.

It is not a criminal offence in the UK. However it does show bad manners as
it displays a lack of consideration for those *reading* what you write. By
top posting above an unsnipped prior posting you make it harder for people
to follow what points you are responding to, and to make appropriate
reponses *whilst snipping needless repetitions*.

I can see that in this group, the majority bottom post, but
in most others it's considered old fashioned and bad manners nowadays.

Well here, top posting is regarded as 'bad manners', and this is the case
on most of the usenet groups I have participated in over the years.

It isn't "bottom posting", though. It is putting your comments into a
logical order so that they are easier for people to see *in context*. Thus
my responses where I place comments after the statements upon which I am
commenting, and snip things which it seems unnecessary to remove.

To bottom post forces the users of most newsreaders to scroll all the
way down to the bottom of a message to see the reply,

That is why the division isn't between "top posting" (which forces people
to scroll down to find what you are referring to when writing) and "bottom
posting". It is between "top posting" and editing/placing your comments in
context, and making the results easier to read.

[snip]

I will say though that most of the groups I post in are MS ones, and
that the MS web interface is the clunkiest around, so that may be why I
see so many people rejecting it.

On that, we may agree. As ever, MS make things awkward... :-)

Slainte,

Jim

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