Crossposting

Crossposting is the act of posting the same message to multiple forums, mailing lists, or newsgroups. This is distinct from multiposting, which involves posting multiple identical messages, each to a single forum, newsgroup, or topic area.

Crossposting can be helpful if the message is of interest to a larger audience. However, crossposting to groups that are irrelevant to the message posted could be considered spamming. Moreover, excessive crossposting is generally considered bad form because it multiplies traffic without adding any new content. In the extreme case, if all messages were crossposted to every group, then every group would look exactly the same. A crossposter can minimize this problem by specifying that all responses be directed to a single group.

Crossposting in Usenet

In Usenet, the destination newsgroup(s) for a particular message is indicated in the "Newsgroups:" line. Most commonly, just one newsgroup is specified. For example;

Newsgroups: sci.space

However it is possible to specify that the message is intended for more than one newsgroup.

Newsgroups: sci.space,comp.simulation

In this case, the message will be visible both in the sci.space and comp.simulation newsgroups. Despite appearing in two separate places, only one message has been posted. This has several advantages.

• A crossposted message takes up less server storage space, and creates less network traffic, than if individual messages had been posted to multiple newsgroups.
• Usenet reader software can intelligently track whether or not the user has already viewed the message in one newsgroup, even though they might currently be looking at another newsgroup. If multiple individual messages had been posted (i.e. the message's content was multiposted), each would appear to be a new unread message in each newsgroup.
• Replies to crossposted messages will be, by default, also crossposted, and so conversations can occur between readers of the multiple newsgroups without any confusion, so long as nobody "breaks the thread" by changing the groups they post their reply to. This enables readers of one of the newsgroups in the crosspost to provide corrections, etc. to information posted by somebody in a different newsgroup. By adding a "Followup-To:" line a poster can indicate that answers to his post should be posted to another set of newsgroups than those listed by the "Newsgroups:" line.
• It avoids the fragmentation of replies which tends to occur with multiposted messages. It helps to avoid time wasted on writing a reply which has, in essence, been posted on another newsgroup but which the replier hasn't seen because he/she doesn't read that newsgroup or hasn't yet looked there.

Crossposting is usually practiced when material is relevant and of interest to the readers of more than one newsgroup. However sometimes it is used maliciously to begin a thread between newsgroups whose readers are likely to have violently differing opinions, in the hope of provoking a conflict. This is a form of trolling.

Crossposting to more than a small number of newsgroups is likely to be counterproductive. A commonly suggested limit is three newsgroups.

Some NNTP servers drop posts which are crossposted to more than a set number of newsgroups, especially if no "Followup-To:" line exists.

Other meanings

A second meaning has evolved on some internet message boards. Crossposting (also known as x-posting) occurs when two persons post responses to the same message thread at almost the same time, often rendering the slightly later post irrelevant, funny, meaningless or inappropriate.

A third meaning involves posting the same material to two or more different blogs.

A fourth meaning refers to the newspaper industry wherein newspaper classified advertisements are cross-posted to different employment job boards specializing in niche markets. For example a newspaper may choose to offer its advertisers the opportunity to cross-post their employment advertisement to a specialty Hispanic job board like Latpro.com or to a niche Healthcare site like Hospitaljobsonline.com. The newspaper may work with a company like Cross-Post LLC, the industry leader, which enables newspapers to seamlessly cross-post their classified advertisements to more than fifty niche job boards.

External links

• Why and how to crosspost
• Advice about crossposting
• Multiposting vs Crossposting
• How to find the right place to post (FAQ)
• Zen and the Art of Internet - Usenet News
• Crossposting service for blogs