And at least some of the pro-thread people (including me, who started the discussion) were convinced by the anti-thread arguments and therefore shut up.

Basically, we talked it over, more people thought nay than yea, and it became the case that we talk war/politics in Natter, as we have done today. Is it really a problem, the war/politics posts in Natter? I think we've been remarkably civil, these past few days.

Unless what we have now is really broken, I'm going to stand with Betsy's waitaminnit and say that old decisions should be treated like voted in or voted out proposals, and should thus have a waiting period.

I really don't want to have to threadsuck Natter and search for war posts, and conversely I don't want my posts getting lost in baking tips, and baby stories (not that I don't have posts about those either).

It will always be the case, for any topic, that several people are interested in just that topic, and would prefer not to have to read through everything else in order to get to that topic.

Our experience has been that creating a new topic increases bandwidth.

I oppose creating topics for that reason alone.

Actually, I should just put this out there, unless someone thinks it's a bad idea and wants me to take it down. These are the results I came up with. I used a spreadsheet and moved people who changed their opinions over to their final stance as of brenda m "Bureaucracy 1: Like Kafka, Only Funnier" Feb 19, 2003 7:34:13 pm EST. [Though I probably should have kept a different column for them.]

Please let me know if I have incorrectly interpreted your stance:

In favor (6): Am-Chau Yarkona, amych, Cindy, Gandalfe, Holli, Steph L

Opposed (26): Angus G, Anne W, Betsy HP, Beverly, brenda m, Burell, Consuela, David J. Schwartz , DavidS, Fred Pete , Hil R., Jeff Mejia , jengod, Jess PMoon, Jim Eaton-Terry, Kat, Laura, Michele T., Nilly, Perkins, PMM, scrappy, Shawn, Susan W, victor infante

Undecided (2): Liese S, Lyra Jane

If I've misrepresented you, please let me know. Also, I apologize for any and all spelling errors in your names.

old decisions should be treated like voted in or voted out proposals, and should thus have a waiting period.

Absolutely. Or some of us will lose our minds.

I changed to opposed, don't know if it wound up in there.

Bitterchick, I proposed it, heard everybody's arguments, and decided they were right and shut up. So I should be counted as opposed.

Updated.

I've changed to opposed, too--the only reason I was ever for is it seemed like war/politics talk in Natter was getting shut down. That's changed, and Natter now seems like the appropriate place for it.

it's not an actual consensus

Yeah, it's not a consensus consensus but I don't think those actually exist in the real world. It's more a mostly consensus consensus.