"Lucy" > wrote in message
. com...

> I've decided, after a few minutes of thought,
> to post however I see fit. So, if you hate top
> posted remarks, don't read them!

Obviously, that's your prerogative. Of course, if you plan to get
along in a community, it behooves you to follow the community's
standards.

> I'm not downloading anything to move the
> cursor (although that was a kind suggestion),
> and I'm not changing newsgroup readers.

You don't need to do either of those things. The whole reason your --
and many -- news readers place the cursor at the top of your reply is
*not* so that you can just start typing; it's so that you will *trim*
the post you're replying to, thus saving bandwidth for those who are
on dial-up (and there are still plenty of those people in the US *and*
around the world) *and* making your post easier to read. For example,
insertions between the original text, as I'm doing, makes it more
clear what exactly I'm responding to and helps make my post
understandable even in the event of poor message propagation and/or
threading (poor propagation continues to be a problem with many news
servers).

> It has been my experience with computers
> that the less I change on them, the longer
> they seem to work <g>

For the purpose of illustration, I'm leaving the above sentence in; my
first inclination was to delete it, since I'm not going to respond to
it.

> So.. to horribly chop up a Plato quote...
> Let the poster post, and let the reader read!
>
> p.s. If it means so much to any individual here,
> you are welcome to pay me to learn all the rules
> and apply them with each post.

I'd have to agree with another poster down-thread; your tone indicates
bitchiness to me as well (note I'm not calling *you* a bitch, a
distinction worth noting), and an unwillingness to learn. While I
note that you say interpretation of tone says more about the reader
.... well, I would just gently remind you that the onus of clear
communication starts with the writer, not the reader. Usenet is a
written medium, and we are therefore without the benefit of facial
expression and body language to clarify your tone.

As for the rules, there are very few for you to remember; if you
follow along with how just about everyone else here posts (well, you
could *snip* more than most people here ), you'll be fine.

A couple of sites that you will find useful:
http://www.ibiblio.org/usenet-i/usenet-help.html
http://www.netmeister.org/news/learn2quote.html -- if nothing else,
read section 2: Quoting and Answering. If you follow the guidelines,
I guarantee it will make your entire Usenet experience much more
pleasant.
-j