As an aside, I suppose this is not a particularly tangential thread, if it gets long.....we should be able to talk about ourselves once in a while...
Having been on this group for a few years now and watching many discussions, I remember from earlier days some *significant* negative sentiment to setting up an acid jazz newsgroup. Personally, I don't care all that much, except for the effects it may have on this list. If the address of our list gets posted to the newsgroup (which it will), we will see an influx of people that might ultimately overwhelm and provoke negative reaction from the members. As it stands now, I will say that our list is very accepting of 'newbies' (though we can't stand the idiots who post unsubscribe messages to the list), because everybody has a point where they're just getting into the music and many people, including myself, have found this list to be a valuable source of information about the music we love. The only reason that this list is a valuable source of information is because the DJs, producers, promoters, and the avid consumers who have significant exposure to the music share thei!
r ideas and thoughts about current releases. If this list gets populated by a bunch of people who want to talk about how acid jazzy Alanis Morrisette is or how funky Hank Williams, Jr. is, the above mentioned contributors will the first to go.
I don't know if anyone else feels the same way, but I'd say that this list has turned out to be one of the most interesting things I've seen manifest itself out of the emerging technologies that are spreading all over the world today. In addition, it mirrors the spirit of the music that it is dedicated to. Like the music, it has to be 'found', and like the music, it embodies and embraces a 'collective' attitude. I am quite open to inviting anybody and everybody to come learn and enjoy this music (none of that this music is so cool cause it's underground stuff), I just feel that the spillover effect from the newsgroups would kill this list. The few I've read are absolute *crap* in content, and subject to flame wars and are easy targets for the personality deficient people in our universe who like to post sensless garbage just to see their voice appear on a screen. Furthermore, newsgroups don't clog your mailbox, which I think is one of the technological reasons why dedic!
ation on this list continues - if the mail appears, you're much more likely to read it, but surfing & reading newsgroups is voluntary. The end result is that a new, bad forum for discussion of our music would emerge, and the old, trusty, interesting one would start to die out.
I totally admit that this is just as likely to occur as no effect, I surely can't predict the future. I guess I just had to let off a little steam, as well as voice the sentiment that was expressed on this list before.....also, if any discussion does happen on this topic, I am interested to know whether or not it would make sense to post a message to that alt.config address stating the above. I wonder whether or not it's valid, so I therefore guess my real appeal is to sailinit@aol.com, being that you reconsider your attempt to start the newsgroup.....
OBAjazz: Going to the Greyboy Allstars tomorrow (with a fellow list member, would that happen on a newsgroup?), if anybody'd like to meet up, mail me.
Jay B