I think the current system is a reasonable compromise. If the thread name was longer the message list would be that much longer too.

You can use the filter command fairly effectively if you know a word that was in an older message.

In a way your two requests are mutually exclusive, the individual titles would be more informative but the list would loose meaning because the space taken up by each thread would push titles off the screen.

Simple conventions like, using ? for all questions and A: for all responses or answers might make the smaller thread title more meaningful.

bo