GeckoFood's Journal: Opinions wanted

I am looking for opinions on something I encountered recently.

I like to comb usenet, and on one particular day recently I found a discussion in rec.food.baking that got my attention. There was a post by a young lady that was clearly a newbie to the newsgroup that was responding to a post inquiring about where to find 4x6 recipe cards. She runs a small printing business and was looking for a way to advertise, and by responding to the post in the newsgroup, she took the opportunity to say, in a nutshell "Hey, I sell those! Here's a link to my website."

One thing she overlooked. The original post was in 1996. She responded in 2004. Oops.

The participants in the newsgroup immediately jumped all over her, saying that she was spamming the newsgroup and that she should immediately go hang herself from the nearest oak tree with a noose made from barbed wire. Well, ok, maybe they weren't quite that nasty, but they got all over her case and essentially frightened her away from the group.

My question is simply this: Was her message spam?

I am of the opinion that is was not spam, as she was trying to respond to a post (granted, it was way old), and what she was trying to sell was very much in context in that newsgroup. She wasn't peddling junk medicine, she wasn't inviting people to check her out on her webcam, and she wasn't selling home loans - she was selling 4x6 recipe cards in a news group that was dedicated to baking. I don't really see a problem, other than her failure to check the original post date.

What says you?

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

I think it was not spam

[Jotaigna]

furthermore i think if you take to seriously the response from old users to newbies, the rate of newbies eventually would drop to zero because it would be too traumatic.

The "bashing the newbie" dynamic appears in all sorts of group activities but in online ones, is where ppl are the most agressive, since there are no direct consequences against them; imagine a 2mt tall 120kg newbie u want to bash but u cant, because he is too big, that doesnt happen online.

Well im off to metamoderate now...c ya!

not spam

[SolemnDragon]

ill-advised, perhaps, but not spam, and they should play nicer.

spam

[turg]

Participating in a newsgroup and pointing to your web-site when it's the answer to a question is okay.

Promoting your own web site on your first/only post to the newsgroup is spam.

I suspect she was searching google groups for messages to which she could give this reply (you don't just accidentally run across an 8-year-old message). That's not participating in the discussion. That's looking for an plausible excuse to post advertising where you know that none is allowed.

The GNAA...

[the_mad_poster]

... does not endorse the above post, but I do.