But more to the point. I agree that H-Net needs to think beyond the listserv. I belong to several lists, and I too get tired of constantly deleting things that don’t interest me.

I like your idea, and I think it’s a very good one. When the whole exchange about H-Net started coming up – and it’s not just the blog and the podcast; I’m an H-Net editor, and it was all over the internal editor’s list, too – I found the whole issue very thought-provoking.

The *one* benefit I see of H-Net as it is: people can’t easily fake who they are. Some lists require an academic email address, so *real* identities come into play much more than they do on LJ.

Put another way: many of us blog or LJ pseudonymously (I do both). What I love about H-Net is that it connects me up with scholars so easily – I’ve exchanged correspondence with several bigwigs in my field, for example.

The thing that would need to be rectified with LJ or a similar interface would be the issue of identity; pseudonyms should be out, in that case, and there would need to be some way to verify identities. I’m sure this is easily resolved, but something to think about.

I find the listservs I’m on not terribly intrusive. I’m on about 5-6 of them, and most post only a few times a week. Of course, there’s always the digest feature. The biggest thing that bothers me is that I subscribe to the Announcements list (for CFPs, funding, etc., etc.) AND several of my lists seems to feel the need to re=post those each day. I’m able to sift through the mail in general very quickly, though, which helps.

But I think you’re on the right track with this idea. And I’d just love to see the field in generaly become more technology-integrated.