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Re: OT: Top Posting Vs. Bottom Posting: Case Closed!
de John Corliss 04/21/2006 11:04
Frankly, I've always thought that top posting makes more sense.
John Jay Smith wrote:
> http://unbreakable-blog.blogspot.com/
>
> :-)
>
>
Top Posting vs. Bottom Posting: Case Closed!
Dr. Schneider head of ECDL Research, study for human – computer
interaction said:
After the request from the European ECDL program (European Computer
Driving License), our computer science team (that included 10 of the top
computer scientists in Europe) conducted a study that involved 1200
people of an age group, from 16 to 60 in a period of 9 months to test
the speed in which they use various applications and the internet. One
of the subjects we studied closely was to see if top or bottom posting
in newsgroup environments is the best method of posting.
Some of the test included brain scans with MRI while the user was
interacting with the computer to see the brain activity in real time,
along with various sensors for body reactions. After the tests were
finished they asked the participants to answer a list of questions. ”Out
test lab consisted of a network of 20 windows XP and Linux machines
connected to a 20 M internet connection, fast enough to ensure that
there would be no delay from the transfer of information.
What we saw was astonishing!
The people who top posted were more efficient in every manner. Their
speed of reading and replying to post was 20% faster since they did not
have to scroll all the time to the bottom of the page, those who were
new users found it more natural to top post. After each session
questions was asked to each user to verify if they had comprehended the
nature of the threads. It was remarkable to see that the top posting
group comprehended the threads 10% better and could recall more of the
information in comparisson with the bottom posting group. The
physiological and mental measurements also showed that the brain
functioned more harmonious when top posting, and the blood pressure and
heart rate were are more normal levels, showing that the users had less
stress.Another measurement done was the stress placed on the hand, the
so called Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. Since top posting needed less movement
on the hand to scroll with bars or use the scroll wheel we would see a
great improvement in this area.
After this study I think that we have to conclude that top posting in
newsgroups is better in every way, as long as they follow the simple
rule to include small parts of the previous message only when needed.
The previous conception that top posting would be confusing to readers
since it had new information on the top and older information on the
bottom, did not stand. It seems that the users who top post adapt to
this very fast.
The new windows vista that is due to be released at the beginning of
2007 will have some newsgroups pre installed in the news client, so more
and more people will be using newsgroups. Fortunately the windows mail
client places the cursor on top, so top posting will come naturally to
more and more people. Several Linux distributions are considering
modifying their news clients to confirm with our new data.
The reason for bottom posting began when the internet was very young and
slow, with low resolution screens. It is time to change the way we
interact with the internet leaving the older dinosaur habits behind.I
won’t be surprised to see HTML messages with embedded audio images and
video be commonplace in the near future. These are all considered still
forbidden in newsgroups.”
--
Regards from John Corliss
I don't reply to trolls like Andy Mabbett or Doc (who uses sock puppets)
for instance. No adware, cdware, commercial software, crippleware,
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software, trialware, viruses or warez for me, please.