Why do people detest top posting so much?

[Bart Silverstrim]

Pete Clapham wrote:
> Derek Broughton wrote:
>> Odzangba K. Dake wrote:
>>
>>  
>>> Ok, I just have to ask... what is so wrong with it. I admit that I 
>>> prefer
>>> bottom posting because, well, it makes reading easier but quite a few
>>> people on this list (and on others) actively detest it and quite often
>>> snap at you if you bottom post.
>>>     
>>
>> "Bottom post"?  Surely you meant "top-post".  I've never seen anybody
>> snapped at for bottom-posting itself, though you might get a testy 
>> response
>> if you quote 200 lines to add a line at the bottom that says "me 
>> too!". More likely nobody will actually read the post...
>>
>>  
>>> What's the deal here?     
>>
>> As my standard response says:
>>
>> "Please don't top-post.  It makes it hard to have a conversation".
>>
>> Conversations are "he said... she said...".  Reversing it confuses 
>> people.
>>   
> May I humbly point out that if you're actually following the 
> conversation, you've read the previous messages.  

I'd humbly point out that even following the conversation, reading a 
message in the morning and then reading more at night means I often 
don't recall what was being said, and I'm sure that there are plenty of 
others that have better or more pressing things to remember than the 
history of someone else's free trouble tickets on a list serve.

>Bottom posting forces 
> you to go through all that again until you find the answer you're 
> interested in.  Top posting makes it easier to continue a conversation.

A) WHY KEEP THE OLD MATERIAL THEN IF YOU'VE MEMORIZE THE WHOLE THING?
B) Archives for reference, or your own systems INDEXED FOR SEARCH trash 
and sent items.
C) *inline* posting. Not bottom post, unless *composing* a message 
dictates that it makes your intentions and message CLEAR.

> May I also humbly point out that each listserve has its own customs.  
> /Every/ other listserve that I am involved in prefers to top-post 
> because it makes communication easier.  

Easier to hand out a brain belch. Too lazy to properly format a message, 
too properly to actually compose a message to others...top posting is 
the older generation's equivalent to txtspeak. "easier" means "I don't 
have to trim the post or actually put thought into what I'm trying to say."

>If this one prefers bottom 
> posting, then fine.  But to suggest that top-posting is somehow bad and 
> snapping at people for it is, shall we say, inappropriate at best.

Telling them they should be shot instead of just filtering their 
messages is inappropriate. But it is definitely bad for people who spend 
a lot of time reading and not trying to decode and sift through crud.