I've seen them offer to replace books when someone posted about losses sustained in a fire. And I've seen people offer job leads to the unemployed, romantic guidance to the lovelorn, and child-care advice to frantic parents. With 10,000 users, many of whom have been around for several years, the WELL is in many ways a model of self-regulating civility. The regulars will send e-mail or guide people to let them know what they're doing is great or not great. Unfortunately, on the bigger services, mailing lists, and Usenet, that kind of indoctrination doesn't often occur.
People come and go so quickly and under so many guises that it's harder to build a community.
And in places without a group of regulars who care about the tone of the conversations and are willing to speak up, it's easy for everything to go to pot. I routinely deal with people who stamp their virtual feet and hold their cyber-breaths at the very idea that some kinds of communication are not OK in some situations. These are people who, I suspect, don't go around telling grandma to suck their dicks or the boss to eat shit. I could be wrong. Maybe they do.