Received: from GLINDA.OZ.CS.CMU.EDU by A.GP.CS.CMU.EDU id aa22605; 16 Mar 95 15:25:38 EST Date: Thu, 16 Mar 95 14:40:25 EST From: Mark.Kantrowitz@GLINDA.OZ.CS.CMU.EDU To: ai+ai-jobs@cs.cmu.edu, ai+ai-postdoc@cs.cmu.edu, ai+ai-predoc@cs.cmu.edu, ai+lisp-jobs@cs.cmu.edu, ai+prolog-jobs@cs.cmu.edu Subject: Admin: Results of mail/news survey. Sender: ai@A.GP.CS.CMU.EDU I received 68 messages requesting that we retain the mailing lists and not switch to a newsgroup. Also, nobody volunteered to administer the newsgroup creation process. So we will be sticking with mailing lists. I've appended a summary of the comments I received to this message. In addition, I received mail from several people who found their current job through the list, and from several employers who found an employee through the list. Several people also commented that they liked my Prime Time Freeware for AI book/CD-ROM. One person asked me to archive the messages somewhere in the AI Repository's Web pages. This is already being done; I just forgot to announce it to the list. All postings sent to the list are automatically archived in appropriate subdirectories of ftp.cs.cmu.edu:/user/ai/jobs/ The equivalent web page is http://www.cs.cmu.edu:8001/Web/Groups/AI/html/other/jobs.html Right now posts are given a filename based on the date and time received. My decision is to remain with the status quo. If I ever decide to create a newsgroup, it will be in addition to the mailing lists, and will be moderated. There wouldn't be much additional effort on my part (aside from the newsgroup creation bureaucracy), because posts to a moderated newsgroup get sent to the moderator. Incidentally, I get some of the job announcements from newsgroups. I wrote a PERL program that scans several newsgroups every night for AI-related job postings, and saves them to a directory. About half of them are junk, headhunters, or repeats, so I delete them, and the remainder get posted about once a week. The rest of the announcements are direct from the employers. It takes me only about 5 to 10 minutes a week to manage the lists because of this automation, and most of that time is spent dealing with bounces. Unfortunately, the scanner isn't sophisticated enough to detect certain kinds of AI-related job announcements. For example, it cannot retrieve AI Planning jobs, because the word "planning" is in about 75% of all job postings (i.e., jobs that require employees with good planning skills). Mark Kantrowitz mkant@cs.cmu.edu Here is a paraphrase of some of the comments I received: + Can't read netnews. + Many employers do not permit employees to read newsgroups, but they do allow email. + Employers who do permit netnews, do not always carry a full feed. Employees might feel very awkward asking them to carry the new newsgroup. + Doesn't have the time to read news regularly. + Mail messages are easier to redistribute. + More likely to read messages via email. + Mailing list has a high signal to noise ratio because it is effectively moderated. + Mail is received quicker and in a more timely fashion than news. News posts are often delayed by days. + News feed is unreliable, especially overseas. + When actively searching for a job, mail is better. + News expires and mail doesn't. + Mail can be batch downloaded and read offline, keeping costs down. + Can't use mail filtering tools with a newsgroup. + The minimal effort in subscribing to a mailing list keeps riffraff out. + Employer: Gets better and higher quality response from mailing list. + Too much volume in news. + If we switch to a newsgroup, it must be moderated. An unmoderated newsgroup would have more junk and noise than real announcements. + The volume of posts might not support three newsgroups, so may have just comp.ai.jobs. + Call the newsgroup comp.ai.announce.jobs to prevent it from being used as a gripe forum. + Permitting resumes is a bad idea -- it would increase the noise. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This message | Submissions ai+ai-postdoc@cs.cmu.edu was sent via | Subscribe/Unsubscribe ai+query@cs.cmu.edu the AI-POSTDOC | Available mailing lists include mailing list. | AI-JOBS, LISP-JOBS, PROLOG-JOBS, AI-POSTDOC, AI-PREDOC