| From: | Andrew Korn |
| Date: | 29 Aug 2000 at 05:17:41 |
| Subject: | ADMIN: README |
**DO NOT RESPOND TO THIS MAIL WITHOUT CHANGING THE SUBJECT HEADER**
The Amiga Active mailing list is a forum for readers of Amiga Active to
discuss the magazine and related subjects with the people who produce it and
other readers. We hope that it is a useful resource for our readers, and to
try to maximise its usefulness we have a few rules and regulations that we
expect all subscribers to stick to. Whilst some of these regulations may not
be shared by all other lists, in general our rules are a matter of simple
etiquette and shouldn't need to be said. Nevertheless for the sake of clarity
and the more forgetful amongst our subscribers, we post a reminder to this
list from time to time, along with specific reminders when necessary. It
seems that now would be a good time.
First and foremost, we ask that you remember what this list is about. This is
an e-mail list for group discussions about the Amiga and Amiga Active
magazine. It is not a forum for discussing movies or the price of beans. Nor
is it a private IRC chatroom. While we feel that to avoid stifling a free
flow of conversation it is fine for people to veer off topic from time to
time (especially when it is funny), we expect people to apply a little common
sense when doing so. Remember that there are hundreds of people receiving
your mail, and those people signed up to read about the Amiga and the
magazine, so think very carefully before you mail each and every one of these
hundreds of people with a message about something completely different.
If a thread has veered off-topic, then think carefully before answering it.
If the off-topic thread has gone on for a couple of days already, then it is
time to let it drop.
If you find that you are posting to an off-topic thread that only one other
person is replying to, then it's a fair bet that they are the only person
interested in it, so send the message to them and stop spamming the rest of
us.
If a thread has gone on so long that several people have mailed complaints
about it, then it is past time to stop the thread; take it off-list if you
want to continue.
Try to keep message subjects on topic - if the subject of a thread changes,
change the subject line to match. You can use the form "New topic (was: old
topic)" to let people who are following the thread know. This is particularly
important if you go off-topic as it lets people who don't want to read it
know. It also lets you know when you have gone on too long - when a thread
with a title like "re:OT GCSE Results" goes on for days on end, the culprits
may be using sensible naming conventions, but they should notice that the
thread has gone on too long.
Edit your messages properly. Only quote parts of a mail you are replying to
that are relevant to your reply - never quote headers, footers or sigs, and
trim irrelevant parts of the message out. Please use proper quoting - i.e.
the quoted text should be attributed to the correct poster, and should be
indented with a ">" symbol. If you don't have time to edit the message
properly before you reply, then you don't have time to reply properly - so
don't. If you find that the quote is much larger than your answer, it's a
fair bet that you have quoted too much.
Do not crosspost to this list. If you want to send your message to this list
as well as to other lists or directly to someone, then send it as a separate
mail, do not use multiple to: addresses or CC your post.
Do not spam the list. This list is not for advertising. If you want to inform
someone of a service you provide in direct answer to a question posted to the
list then that's fine, but otherwise you should consult one of the list
moderators (myself, Neil Bothwick or Dave Stroud) first.
Do not troll. Mailing the list for no reason beyond causing upset or trouble
is not allowed.
Do not flame. If someone says something stupid then feel free to explain why,
but don't insult them for it. If someone says something you disagree with
then my all means dispute their claims, but do so politely. If you find
someone's comments to be offensive, then do not respond in kind; instead mail
a complaint to one of the list moderators.
Keep your sigs short. The world doesn't need to know your life story, and
certainly doesn't need reminding every time you post. Anything over five
lines is excessive.
Remember that this mailing list is an open forum. Mails are meant for
everyone, not just for you, and you don't need to answer everything that is
posted here. Only answer mails if you have something to say, and try to make
sure that you aren't just repeating something that someone else (or indeed
you yourself) has not already said.
Do not multi-answer. Your views will not be more forcefully made if you make
them again and again, they will merely become more boring.
Please do not complain on the list about spammers. The moderators read the
list and are aware when it happens, and make complaints to the appropriate
people. It's as annoying to us as it is to you, but there's no way we can
stop people subscribing to the list for the purpose of sending junk mail
other than banning them after they have done so. Remember that a three
complaints about a spam means that the spam has created four times as much
pointless traffic as the original spammer sent.
Read all mails with the subject line ADMIN:README and pay attention to the
requests of the list moderators. Never post to the list with the subject line
ADMIN:README unless you are a moderator.
There are probably one or two other rules, but I can't think of them right
now. If it seems that there are an excessive amount of rules for this list,
then think again - these are simply outlines for keeping the list running
smoothly and ensuring that as many subscribers as possible enjoy the list.
Most these rules are nothing that you would not do anyway as a matter of
course if you are being a good netizen - think of these rules as rules of
etiquette rather than rules of law. For reasons that psychologists will no
doubt be discussing for generations to come, there is a tendency for people
to lose many of the inhibitions of polite society when using e-mail. As a
general rule, if you wouldn't do it when you were talking with a group of
people face to face in a social situation, don't do it on the list either.
I've noticed a distinct downturn in the state of this list over the past
couple of weeks. This has included people who should know better (because
they have been warned in the past) breaking some of the cardinal rules of
list etiquette. For the sake of the large majority of subscribers, be they
lurkers or regular posters, the moderators are going to be watching the list
closely over the next little while and handing out list bans to repeat
offenders. We'd rather not ban anyone, so please don't make us.
To the large majority of you to whom decent list etiquette comes naturally:
my apologies for the long rant, but I'm sure you all recognise the need for
it!
Cheers,
Andrew Korn.
Editor, Amiga Active Magazine
editor@amigactive.com | http://www.amigactive.com
Quote carefully and read all ADMIN:README mails