We have two threads going within this one. The first is the title question, about the etiquette of the list. The second is whether the guy in Maine was incompetent. I won;t comment on the latter, as I don't know enough, but he seems to have lost his boat and made some mistakes. But on the former -- list etiquette -- I tend to agree with Rick D. If someone says he is sailing around the world on his new-to-him 1972 Widget 21, and what is the stick on front, he deserves to be flamed a bit. If someone asks a basic question with not enough information, it is OK to tell him there is not enough information, but the dripping with sarcasm approach, or the "you are a moron" approach do not accomplish the desired objective. Some people will stick with it, but others get embarrassed and don't ask the kind of questions they would really benefit from. Actually, this forum is not the worst I this regard, but the lectures on wasting our bandwidth by asking a question are really kind of ridiculous and counterproductive. One man's opinion.