tweeters -

This issue of using 4-letter banding codes in messages has come up in
several other lists recently (including inland-nw-birders which I
administer). My suggestions in handling this are the following:

1 - banding codes should not be used in subject lines so they can be browsed
quickly
2 - banding codes should only be used in the message body if the full
species name has been used already (which makes them easy to decipher)
or
3 - some kind of key is provided in the message body (I have seen this used
where regular postings are made from banding stations, hawk watches, etc.)

In most cases it really doesn't take much longer to type out the full name,
I have tested this and I am a lousy typist!

thanks, Charles.

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Charles E. Swift
Moscow, ID, USA
charless at moscow.com
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