Re. " all the people who don't like mailing lists. There is a self-selective nature at work - mailing lists work for a percentage of the people, but maybe not even a majority"
My sense is that most people prefer mailing lists to the alternatives - or at the very least, prefer to have messages "come to them" - checking forums, drupal sites, etc. is very tedious, and the number of forums that have 0 entries is incredibly large. The dynamic changes when forums (like this one) automatically send you an email when things change - but then things start to behave more like a mailing list (new stuff shows up in your mailbox).
Having said that, FaceBook and Twitter seem to have created a new dynamic, and spam creates a counter-dynamic to email based interaction. But still....
Seems to me that every project, organization, interest area, .... that I'm involved with centers around a mailing list. Seems like a core component of community building to me.
Authored Comments
Re. " all the people who don't like mailing lists. There is a self-selective nature at work - mailing lists work for a percentage of the people, but maybe not even a majority"
My sense is that most people prefer mailing lists to the alternatives - or at the very least, prefer to have messages "come to them" - checking forums, drupal sites, etc. is very tedious, and the number of forums that have 0 entries is incredibly large. The dynamic changes when forums (like this one) automatically send you an email when things change - but then things start to behave more like a mailing list (new stuff shows up in your mailbox).
Having said that, FaceBook and Twitter seem to have created a new dynamic, and spam creates a counter-dynamic to email based interaction. But still....
Seems to me that every project, organization, interest area, .... that I'm involved with centers around a mailing list. Seems like a core component of community building to me.