List Lurkers (Added Value)

[beverly_robinson -at- datacard -dot- com]

Some additional reasons this Lurker lurks:

I get the digest. I spend the first half-hour or so of my day reviewing list
traffic from the previous day Often, by the time I have a chance to read the
previous day's posts, list members who receive individual messages have
responded to "pressing [tools] problems" with the solutions I might have
proposed or they've responded to the more philosophical questions with points of
view similar to my own. In either case, I see no reason to consume band width
with "me too" posts.

I don't have the time to compose a thoughtful response to every question on
which I have an opinion. As the lone writer in my development group, it's all I
can do to squeeze out the aforementioned half-hour a day for the list. The rest
of my time is fully subscribed in team meetings, specification and interface
reviews, writing, QA, and production tasks. I truly admire list members who
apparently can compose thoughtful responses quickly, and I envy members who have
more free time during the day to respond to questions, but that's not my
situation.

On the other hand, there have been a few times when I've responded to questions
directly without posting to the list. Usually this is because I felt the
response wasn't of general interest or because I wasn't comfortable exposing my
processes to the public. If my response is read by a competitor and tips them
off to a not-yet-announced strategy my company is pursuing, I'm betraying my
employer. So I check out the original poster's company web site to make sure
they aren't a competitor before sharing my ideas. In the future I'll post to the
list a reply stating that I have information that might be helpful but isn't for
public consumption and invite other list members to contact me directly.

OK, composing this message has pushed me way over my half-hour for today so I'll
return to lurk mode now.

Beverly



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