I'll second that.  The F.A.Q./do's & don'ts could go right on the thinktank info page, as well as being send to the group as a whole (maybe someone could send it to the list once per month to keep everyone fresh?).

About Thethinktank
English (USA)

The mission of the Bike Collective network is to improve and encourage communication between existing and future community bike shops. Collectively we can improve a bigger wheel as opposed to re-inventing smaller ones.

This email list is where organizers from community bike shops around the world can discuss exactly how to do that.


I like TBR's "mutal aid and respect" and "bikes not bickering" as easy take away points.  It's also important to tell people in very bold print, right up front: "if at any point you wish to be removed from the list, please go here. this link is also provided at the bottom of all thinktank emails".  A, maybe controversal, pointer could be (better worded..) "All community bike shops are organized differently.  Please try to represent your political, managment, cultural views of community bike shops in a way that respects the views of others who may not share a similar opinion."  Something like that....I'm all for learning how shops do things but don't like to be put down or feel like we're somehow less of a community bike shop because our first and only causes are mechanical education and affordable bikes.

Hope everyone has a fantastic Saturday,

Brian



Urban Bike Project of Wilmington
-a 501(c)3 non-profit bike shop-
1908 N. Market Street (entrance is in the parking lot behind the building)
Wilmington, DE 19802

Hours:
Thursday 6:30-9:00
Saturday 1:00-4:00

Visit us online at http://urbanbikeproject.org


On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 10:04 AM, Macho Philipovich <macho@resist.ca> wrote:

anyone else concerned that the volume of emails has gone way up and the signal-to-noise ratio is way down over the past week or so?

in the early days, i understand things were kept fairly open to encourage discussion.  that doesn't seem to be a concern anymore, so maybe the list could benefit from some guidelines (rather than 'rules')?

it would be nice to avoid flaming, "me too" responses, responses to the whole list that should have gone to an individual, "remove me plz" posts, way off-topic discussion, etc.  it hasn't reached a critical point yet, but the problems seem to be similar to ones in the early days of the internet & usenet, so maybe we could borrow a solution from them: a FAQ sent out to new subscribers, and periodically over the list.

other thoughts?

macho

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