[Mimedefang] OT: www. and "lazy users" (was Re: DNS and MX records)

[Kelson]

David F. Skoll wrote:
> (although it does have one, to catch people who are too lazy to type
>  www. into their browsers.)

WBrown at e1b.org wrote:
> Usually, domain.tld would be the same as www.domain.tld, registered 
> for those too lazy to type "www." as part of the address.  Of course 
> marketing type like to say "Visit us online at sony.com!!"

netguy wrote:
> Note that there is no reason to other than ease of use for surfers 
> because they are lazy and don't want to type in the www part.

John Rudd wrote:
> So, Lazy users who connect to http://domain.tld/* will get a redirect
>  to http://www.domain.tld/*

Am I the only one who finds this talk of "lazy users" a bit... I don't
know, condescending?  (Admittedly, this is on a list made up of
sysadmins, so I suppose that's par for the course.)

Really, the only reason websites tend to be named www.example.com these
days is tradition.  I mean, hardly anyone uses email addresses like
myname at mail.example.com anymore -- the protocol and domain are enough
for the common case, and people only tack on a hostname or subdomain for
exceptional cases.

Heck, most end users don't know, and don't need to know, that "www."
indicates a hostname.

The only real use for the www. prefix is as a visual cue indicating that
the address refers to a website.  It's shorter and more aesthetically
pleasing than http://  It's certainly not easy in speech.  "double-u
double-u double-u dot example dot com" takes a lot longer to say than
just "example dot com."  And let's not even start with "H T T P colon 
double-slash..."

As sysadmins, our jobs are to make things work smoothly for the end
users.  Sometimes that involves educating them ("Don't open unexpected
attachments!")  Sometimes that involves adjusting the system to
make it easier to use (filter out known viruses and spam.)  This seems
like a clear-cut case of the latter.

-- 
Kelson Vibber
SpeedGate Communications <www.speed.net>