At 12:00 AM 8/17/00 -0400, you wrote: As to the reason why there is little to no input from researchers into newsgroups, ... I seem to be the only visible gov't. presence on the two major internet newsgroups. This has puzzled me for the several years .... I think this has to do mainly with the information overload that most of us are experiencing due to the internet, numerous publications available, etc. Also, at least on this list, there seems to be an awful lot of uninformed speculation. It makes for interesting reading but it tends to drive away some of the scientific types.... pb