Re: A survey for Emacs users

[Jean Louis]

* Skip Montanaro <skip.montanaro@gmail.com> [2020-10-31 14:54]:
> >
> > There is an open survey at the moment for Emacs users. It is not
> > official Emacs developers' survey but the content is interesting and
> > this mailing list a relevant audience.
> >
> 
> Thanks for posting this, Teemu. I find it interesting/odd that the survey
> author didn't directly post the survey here or mention this group in his
> list of places to post. Is this not where the cool kids hang out anymore?
> (Maybe it never was?) It seems to be the closest thing to an Emacs users
> mailing list. Has r/emacs supplanted it?

Author did ask on Emacs Development mailing list for opinions. 

There are many people and people are individuals so there is freedom
for everybody to make any survey or associate with different groups
than the assumed group. There are many subsets of GNU/Linux users and
free software users including many people not knowing they use free
software. So it is.

There area also newsgroups on Emacs:
https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/EmacsNewsgroups

Back in time, it would be logical for me to first go to
newsgroups. Today this may not be, people may go to Stack Exchange for
Emacs or Reddit or similar. Times are changing and people's habits are
shaped by corporations.

One group of people discovers friendly help-gnu-emacs mailing
list. Other group may discuss in full anonimity on various forums
using bad language. Other groups will go stompedo against Emacs.

Is the list discoverable? I do not think so. It is well hidden from
Emacs users.

Install the package Hyperbole and you may see how they implement that
users find the mailing list, it is straight in the menu. If user needs
help, one can click in the menu and write email. Great. And that is
for package users.

Emacs has a good system and background welcoming that people send bug
reports including features, but it is not clear that bug report could
be for features as well.

It would be best to have under Help menu possibility to send emails
straight to help-gnu-emacs mailing list, not only for bugs.

Jean