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Re: Change name of this group
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Subject: Re: Change name of this group
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From: ajt@rri.sari.ac.uk (Tony Travis)
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Date: 20 Mar 1995 19:01:54 -0000
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Apparently-To: plantbio@dl.ac.uk
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Article: 5764 of bionet.plants
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Distribution: bionet
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Newsgroups: bionet.plants
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Organization: Rowett Research Institute
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References: <95319204130.~INN-OXBa00165.bionet-news@dl.ac.uk>
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Reply-To: ajt@rri.sari.ac.uk
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Sender: lpddist@mserv1.dl.ac.uk
Gerald W. Roe (en767@cleveland.Freenet.Edu) wrote:
: It seems to me that confusion would be avoided if this group's
: name was changed to bionet.botany or something similar. The word
: "plants" is understandably misunderstood to have to do with
: [...]
Well, being the originator of this group and having been out-voted when
I proposed it should be named bionet.botany I guess I can have the last
laugh!
The group name was chosen after a lot of discussion on bionet and, even
though 'botany' means 'the scientific investigation of plants' I
accepted the consensus that 'botany' is synonymous with plant taxonomy
for many people. Not that I have anything against taxonomists, of
course, but we wanted the group to be more general.
Personally, I don't find the 'gardening' questions a problem but some
people are evidently still reading the list with mail/news readers that
insist they read every message ;-(
A facility to read a brief description of a newsgroup is available in
most newsreaders so there should be no confusion about bionet.plants.
I'm much more concerned that, apart from the occasional Q&A session,
no-one seems prepared to have a meaningful scientific discussion here.
But, mention the possibility of changing the group's name or excluding
'undesirable' drug-related or gardening threads and everyone comes out
of the woodwork.
So, what do we want bionet.plants for?
I see a useful role for it in conference announcements, student
questions, posting of interesting plant-related URL's and general
plant-related chit-chat - not quite what we had in mind originally.
Tony.
--
Dr. A.J.Travis, | JANET: <ajt@uk.ac.sari.rri>
Rowett Research Institute, | other: <ajt@rri.sari.ac.uk>
Greenburn Road, Bucksburn, | phone: +44 (0)224 712751
Aberdeen, AB2 9SB. UK. | fax: +44 (0)224 716687