There is an interesting trend: many listservers have established corresponding yahoogroups, for example

• Leica User Group, the LUG has a presence at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/leica-users/
• An AOL subminiatuire photography set up a Submini-L yahoogroups

Yahoogroups do have advantages, such as 20MB of file space for members to upload photo, which in many cases are very useful, in addition, Yahoogroups can attach jpg files; when discussing topics such as blur in pictures or bokeh, it helps to have picture attached Yahoogroups also have additional 30MB of photo space for member to upload.

Also moderator can set up polls, such as "Which Leica you own ?" "What is your favourite rangefinder " etc etc I do not subsribe to LUG on yahoogroups, so I don't know how these two link up.

-- martin tai (norpinal@yahoo.ca), December 06, 2001

Answers

As a longtime member of the LUG this is the first I have heard of any LUG/Yahoo connection. There was somebody named Duncan posting messages on the LUG trying to get people to visit some sort of Leica group he had started on yahoo. Personnally I do not need anymore groups.

-- Steve LeHuray (icommag@toad.net), December 06, 2001.

Hello Martin,

Yes they did, but when you "master" English as well as I do, it's not far from "chineese characters"; they ask a lot of passwords ... too much difficult for my poor head which can only understand a Leica M6 :-)but not how to enter in "Leica M6 group :-(

Alain

-- alain.besançon (alain.besancon@chu-dijon.fr), December 06, 2001.

Hi Alain Yes, yahoogroup does ask for yahoo id and password. I am just curious about the Leica-users at yahoogroups, I don't know how it works, unfortunately there is no messages in the yahoo site I once subscribed to LUG, but too many messages, I rather like Tony's forum, where I can selective which threads to read

-- martin tai (norpinal@yahoo.ca), December 06, 2001.

Thanks Martin,

I was only able to have a "password" with difficulties, which permit me to receive other questions .... and just before drinking :-) Fortunately, Mister M is much more simple and I understand quite (?) everything.

Regards Alain

-- alain.besancon (alain.besancon@chu-dijon.fr), December 06, 2001.

Yahoo groups, in my opinion, are a two-edged sword. While they offer certain benefits, there are also distinct drawbacks. The registration process required to access Yahoo groups places the person's name and contact information into the Yahoo database. Yahoo, in turn, pays for the benefits offered to the groups by selling those names and contact info to various marketing groups, who then sell their name lists to other marketing groups, and so forth.

Personally, I already get far too much spam, so I tend not to participate in Yahoo groups. I suspect many other people have already experienced the "benefits" of being on the receiving end of the Yahoo firehose of spam, as well. Thus, Yahoo groups tend to be self-limiting, and of dubious value as a result.

-- Ralph Barker (rbarker@pacbell.net), December 06, 2001.

I'm stayin' here.

-- jeff voorhees (debontekou@yahoo.com), December 06, 2001.

Serves 'em right.

-- Willihum (bmitch@home.com), December 06, 2001.

I more or less had to register to a yahoo group in order to get some files for my university programme. Every two or so weeks, someone uploads a file to that lively place; after the third attempt to log in, y*hoo accepts my password. I registered with 01/01/1900 as date of birth, btw--noone ever bothered to verify the data I gave them. And I use several email addresses to separate the data from the spam.

Oh damn, where does all the advertising for geriatric medication in my mailbox come from...

-- Oliver Schrinner (piraya@hispavista.com), December 07, 2001.