Dear Yong Peng, Piya and friends,

I am one of the (mainly lurking) members who read at the website. I
do this for all the Buddist groups I am subscribed to - from the Home
Pages, so I am aware of daily fluctuations in numbers of all these
groups. All Things Pali Group numbers are more stable than the
other groups. Some of the larger groups (between 500 and 1200
members) have large swings as window-shoppers come and go, verbal
gang wars are won and lost, or people's in-boxes give way under the
strain. One list I am on averages more than a hundred emails each
day. Many lists are buddhist in name only, and are simply discussions
on a melange of 'new age' topics. Moha, dosa and lobha reign
supreme. Rarely are the texts of any tradition even alluded to in the
posts. Many of these lists have hundreds of members who joined in,
say, 1999 and have never posted. I'm sure if the moderators
used 'probe' software they would probably find that half the email
addresses were no longer valid.

People's personalities differ. They do what they are most
comfortable doing. In a 'face to face' group, some people regularly
talk often, some make an occasional comment, some only listen. They
are all participating. All Things Pali Group is no different. I
think it is important not to define 'participation' in a narrow
sense. Participation doesn't only mean writing to the list. I have
been 'participating' for a long time, even though I have only posted
a few times.

This is a valuable list. It is extremely successful at doing what it
was set up to do. Naturally, small improvements should always be
considered, but a specialist gourmet restaurant should never attempt
to complete with the McDonald's of this world.
There is no problem.

metta,
Christine

--- In Pali@yahoogroups.com, "Ong Yong Peng <ypong001@...>"
<ypong001@...> wrote:

> Dear Piya and friends,
>
> Piya, since you have pointed out about the participation rate,

which

> I think is an important part of modern management, I have gathered
> some statistics which is only visible to the moderator. I hope you
> will find this useful and perhaps put forward some suggestions on

how

> to improve participation.
>
> Membership: 229
>
> No. receiving individual emails/daily digest: 116
> No. receiving special notices: 12
> No. receiving no emails: 101
>
> From the statistics, 116 (50.66%) members are receiving the emails.
> 12 members have chosen to receive email messages only when there

are

> important updates from the moderator [Only mails from the moderator
> and marked as a Special Notice will be sent to them]. The remaining
> 101 (44.10%) choose not to receive email. I believe a good number

of

> them read the emails by visiting the group's site regularly, while
> others may visit less frequently, however there is no way to track
> them.
>
> metta,
> Yong Peng