> Forwarded message:
> > From: tyagi@HouseofKaos.Abyss.com (nagasiva)
> > are made for moderated newsgroups). I agree there has developed,
> > over the years, a certain amount of (I'd say often unwarranted)
> > prestige and authority attached to FAQ-writing, and peer-pressure
> > does tend to keep competing FAQs from developing.
> As for developing new FAQ's, unless you hold totally different views
> from the original FAQ maintainer (likely for news.admin.net-abuse.misc,
> say :) ), unless the original FAQ maintainer no longer improves his/her
> stuffs regularly so it becomes obsolete, there is no point to work on
> a new FAQ to be "better" than the first work.
>
I've seen a few places where competitive FAQs occur. I
think this was at one point at least going on in the Java newsgroups
and perhaps in one of the other programming groups. As a reader, I enjoy
seeing alternative views.
To bare the soul a bit though, as a FAQ maintainer, it can be at times a
bit of a 'thorn in the flesh' so to speak (a splinter in the finger?).
Particularly if no one ever comes out and says to you that there is
anything particularly wrong, or different, or whatever about your faq -
they just seem to prefer for no apparently reason someone else's work.
I suspect that authors see this all the time. For someone whose only
exposure to having some ego tied up into a public work is a FAQ, it can
be a painful, but hopefully maturing, experience.
-- Larry W. Virden INET: lvirden@cas.org <URL:http://www.teraform.com/%7Elvirden/> <*> O- "We are all Kosh." Unless explicitly stated to the contrary, nothing in this posting should be construed as representing my employer's opinions.