On Fri, 16 May 1997, Chris Bergstrom wrote:

Hey guys! Check out 100% Anime Fanfiction! It's completely automatic.
Allows users to automatically add fanfics to the database, and allows
users to rate the fanfics that are there. Currently at over 100 fanfics,
it's the largest automatic anime fanfiction site on the web!

http://www.smoky.org/~cberg/fanfics

Check it out, post your own fics or your favorites, and get c/c from the
users! Remember to also check out all the rest of 100% Anime, and just
like 100% Anime Fanfiction, it's all completely automated!

This gives me an idea.

Stop looking at me like that.  :P  No, I mean it.  This list has gotten
far, FAR too big.  No one can reasonably read even a significant
percentage of the list traffic coming through consistently, day to day,
unless he or she has a GREAT deal of free time on his or her hands.  And
that doesn't include actually *writing* fics instead of merely
reading/C&C'ing them, or whatever.

Now, this suggestion might seem a bit extreme, but hear me out.  When
the FFML first started in August of 95, there were maybe, *maybe* ten or
twenty people here.  By November, it had grown to around 100, I think.
Between August and October, there were *rarely* more than 50 posts a
day, and usually much less.  Anyone who cares to go through Gopher's
archives can see this for themselves.  November brought it closer to 100
a day, but not quite.  My point is, the list was still very small, and
people had "breathing room" to get to know each other without having the
individual voices drowned out by sheer volume, like it is today.  If you
go back and take a look at some of the posts, you'll see this.  Take a
look at the "bounty hunts", for instance.  The "poker game" a couple of
months later was another good example of people taking the time to
get to know each other.

Consider:  what would happen if we divided the FFML into four or five
separate lists?  Not based on content, but just to get the volume of
people down?  We could still archive the posts, and 100% Anime
Fanfiction could be the repository of the fics from *all* of those
separate lists, for those who aren't quite satisfied with the fanfics
being posted to whatever single list they're subbed to.

Everyone would be free to pick one (or two, or whatever) sublist to
subscribe to, and get to know people.  Granted, this might tend to make
things a little cliqueish, but I think the benefits GREATLY outweigh the
pitfalls.

Comments?

Damon Casale, damoo@carmelnet.com
Spam, spam!  WONDERFUL spam!  ^_^