Hello all, I just wanted to add my $0.02 to the discussion about brevity and purpose. I am still a novice beekeeper, entering my third year, and I have found some of the "chatting" on BEE-L about beekeeping practices all over the world to be invaluable. How else would I have learned about Top Bar Hives, which I am planning to start this spring?? Of course, I realize that I am not one of the "purists", utilizing the list to discuss pure biology, so my affirmation of this practice will probably hold little weight with the scientists, researchers, and other professionals on the list. A while back, Allen proposed splitting up BEE-L, having a separate mailing list for the science-oriented and one for the beekeepers, hobbyist, commercial, sideliner, just interested. At the time, I didn't think that this would be a good idea, as I thought of BEE-L as a kind of "ask the experts" type of forum. I can see now that I was mistaken, and that the "experts", by both their silence and their migration away from the list, feel that way as well. How difficult would it be to start another mailing list, either exclusively for researchers/scientists, or for the general beekeeping public, as BEE-L appears to be today?? Would it help solve this seemingly unsolvable problem?? I do think that Allen has a good idea with his web page, but some of us have little or no web access, even today. I think that an email solution (whatever it may end up being) should be the way to reach the maximum number of beekeepers who would benefit. Just my opinion of the situation, FWIW. Kevin Palm Grafton, Ohio