[jghn]

This was a huge debate on USENET in particular, as well as in the email world until Outlook effectively made top posting the standard.

RFC 1855 [1] makes it clear that the correct way is to quote relevant text and then reply.

[1] https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc1855

[richardwhiuk]

RFCs aren't really a suitable document for agreeing this sort of communication conventions.