****
Update:
- There's a less sweary version here
- I wrote a Perl module that attempts to fix bad quoting and superciting here
- if you're forced to use Outlook or OE then have a look at these Outlook & Outlook Express
- And this forces reading of Outlook mail in plain text.
- This blocks image in HTML mail
****





> > P.S. Please reply _below_ original posts. Please. I'm asking you nicely.
>  Why since that is alien to most email programs?

No, it's alien to sh*te email programs. Even Outlook has an option
somewhere to quote underneath.

It's actually an RFC, RFC 1855 (which is really FYI28)

http://rf.cx/rfc1855.html

      - If you are sending a reply to a message or a posting be sure you
      summarize the original at the top of the message, or include just
      enough text of the original to give a context. This will make
      sure readers understand when they start to read your response.
      Since NetNews, especially, is proliferated by distributing the
      postings from one host to another, it is possible to see a
      response to a message before seeing the original. Giving context
      helps everyone. But do not include the entire original!


The thing is because it's an RFC and not therefore an actual ISO
stanadrd Microsoft trampled all over it despite the fact that people had
been happily conforming to RFCs for years. Of course now you get a
hundred and one marketing f**ks and AOL pissants who think they know
better than years of collective experience.

Want a good reason to quote underneath. Apart from the reasons given in
the RFC above I can give you several. I can demonstrate it much better
than explaining ...


> > > > > > > who works on this forum?
> > > > > anyone??
> > > > > > > ___________________________________________________________
> > > T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16
> > > Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
> > > > ________________________________________________________________________
> > > Start an Email List For Free at Topica. http://www.topica.com/register
> > > > > ___________________________________________________________
> > > T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16
> > > Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
> > > > ___________________________________________________________
> > > T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16
> > > Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
> > > > ________________________________________________________________________
> > Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com
> > > ___________________________________________________________
> T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16
> Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics


I've snipped out all the emails that came before it. In that particular
email (which was JollyBoy's "100%" email a few minutes ago) there were 445
words and 85 lines of quoting. There were 44 words over 9 lines of
actual content.

How much f**king wasted bandwidth? And what the f**k was the point of
quoting all the previous emails in the thread. Just quote the most
immediate one. If I want to go further back up the thread I'll just look
at old emails.

And even if you did want to quote all the previous emails then what was
the point of quoting all the f**king Topica sigs.

And what if you want to reply to specific points in a mail. With your
system I have to keep scrolling down to the bottom of the mail and then
back up again. You may notice that if I ever reply to everything I only
ever quote the relevant lines which aren't, except under exceptional
circumstances, more than 3 lines long.

If I want to quote multiple points I split them up into seperate quote,
reply paragraphs.

A f**k of a lot easier to read than your system.

The problem is that there are too many f**king lazy people around who
can't be arsed to chop off the bits of a reply that they don't need but,
by logical extension, these same people are definitley too f**king lazy
to scroll down and chop off stuff after the email they've just written
so they just fire it off and clog my harddrive with megs and megs of
crap which I never needed.

It's the same people who think that a joke (if that's what they are) is
still going to be funny after it's been forwarded five hundred times by
similar Nathan Barley or middle management types and has a an
impenetrable amount of forward-ing cruft and reply marks attached to it.

See these ...

http://email.about.com/internet/email/library/weekly/aa011000b.htm

http://www.iwillfollow.com/email.htm (See "Quotes")

for more arguments. I can't be arsed to argue any more since it'll only
get ignored by people who will do the online equivalent of patting me on
the head and saying "there there, calm down little boy, no need to get
so angry, here have a sweetie, everything will be better now that
Microsoft run the Internet"


Angry enough for you?