The newsgroup idea has a lot to recommend it, for a number of reasons.

Firstly, the traffic on the mailing list already runs in threads -
conversations surrounding problems raised by subscribers fit nicely into
the newsgroup structure.

Secondly, it'd increase the profile of the project as a whole, which would
on balance be a good thing...

The procedure for the creation of a comp.* newsgroup seems fairly formal,
but would likely be worth enduring.

Dan.

(Now with a happy Ether3 driver :-)