12/28/03

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This document describes the ISGA culture and customs. They have been developed over time and were shamelessly plagiarized from the USENET netiquette guide. All new subscribers should read this message to find out how the ISGA mailing lists work. Old users could read it, too, to refresh their memories.

This document is intended as a guide to using the lists in ways that will be pleasant and productive for everyone.

This document is not intended to teach you how to use the lists. Instead, it is a guide to using them politely, effectively and efficiently. Communication by computer is new to a large part of the community, and there are certain aspects that can make it a frustrating experience until you get used to them. This document should help you avoid the worst traps.

The easiest way to learn how to use the lists is to watch how others use it. Start reading the messages and try to figure out what people are doing and why. After a couple of weeks you will start understanding why certain things are done and what things shouldn't be done. There are documents available describing the technical details of how to use the software. We won't do that here.

Because your interaction with the network is through a computer it is easy to forget that there are people "out there." Situations arise where emotions erupt into a verbal free-for-all that can lead to hurt feelings.

Please remember that people all over the world are reading your words. Do not attack people if you cannot persuade them with your presentation of the facts. Screaming, cursing, and abusing others only serves to make people think less of you and less willing to help you when you need it.

If you are upset at something or someone, wait until you have had a chance to calm down and think about it. A cup of (decaf!) coffee or a good night's sleep works wonders on your perspective. Hasty words create more problems than they solve. Try not to say anything to others you would not say to them in person in a room full of people.

Sometimes, you may find it necessary to write to the system administrator or list manager about something concerning the lists. Maybe it is a case of the software not working, or a control message escaped, or maybe one of the users on the list has done something you feel requires comment. No matter how steamed you may be, be polite to the sys admin and list managers -- They may not have any idea of what you are going to say, and may not have any part in the incidents involved. By being civil and temperate, you are more likely to obtain their courteous attention and assistance.

Remember, the mail you send will be read by members of the ISGA using every conceivable computer system. Our members use MS-DOS based mail readers, Windows 3.1, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 98se, Windows ME, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows NT, Pocket OS, UNIX, Linux, SunOS, Solaris, Auspex OS, Cray OS, DEC MVS, virtually every popular computing system on the face of the planet. Use of Microsoft Word or HTML in your mail will render it unreadable by some members.

Remember, it is rude to send mail into a heterogeneous environment when it requires Operating System applications to be read.

Please remember -- you read this list; so do many other people. This group quite possibly includes your boss, your friend's boss, your girl friend's brother's best friend and one of your father's beer buddies. Information posted on the net can come back to haunt you or the person you are talking about.

Think twice before you post personal information about yourself or others. Postings can include information about the personal life of third parties that could get them into serious trouble if it got into the wrong hands.

Never say in ten words what you can say in fewer. Say it succinctly and it will have a greater impact. Remember that the longer you make your post, the fewer people will bother to read it.

Don't post binaries. Binaries are pictures, audio files, movies, or anything other than a plain text e-mail. Plain text has two major advantages. First, it is readable by the largest number of computers and printable on the largest number of printers. Second it is the shortest means of conveying your thoughts.

A page of plain text is about 2,500 characters. That same page in a Word or Word Perfect document may be 10,000 bytes or more. As a scanned in picture, uuencoded for mail, it may be as much as 5,000,000 bytes in length.

The mailing list will cut off excessively long posts. It takes about 15 minutes to transmit a 1,000,000 file over a 14.4kbps modem. Since many people pay about $10 for their internet connection, sending a picture via the list can cost these people $2.50 or more. Further, when you post to the list, your message must be mailed independently to each member of the list. Assuming 6 minutes per Mega Byte and 100 list members, a 1,000,000 byte file will take ten hours to transmit.

Most people on the lists will know you only by what you say and how well you say it. They may someday be your co-workers or friends. Take some time to make sure each posting is something that will not embarrass you later. Minimize your spelling errors and make sure that the post is easy to read and understand. Writing is an art and to do it well requires practice. Since much of how people judge you on the net is based on your writing, such time is well spent.

The subject line of a post is there to enable a person with a limited amount of time to decide whether or not to read it. Tell people what the post is about before they read it. A title like "Car for Sale" to rec.autos does not help as much as "66 MG Midget for sale: Beaverton OR." Don't expect people to read your post to find out what it is about because many of them won't bother. Some sites truncate the length of the subject line to 40 characters so keep your subjects short and to the point.

When you post, think about the people you are trying to reach. Asking UNIX(*) questions on rec.autos will not reach as many of the people you want to reach as if you asked them on comp.unix.questions or comp.unix.internals. Try to get the most appropriate audience for your message, not the widest.

It is considered bad form to post both to misc.misc, soc.net-people, or misc.wanted and to some other newsgroup. If it belongs in that other newsgroup, it does not belong in misc.misc, soc.net-people, or misc.wanted.

If your message is of interest to a limited geographic area (apartments, car sales, meetings, concerts, etc...), restrict the distribution of the message to your local area. Some areas have special newsgroups with geographical limitations, and the recent versions of the news software allow you to limit the distribution of material sent to world-wide newsgroups. Check with your system administrator to see what newsgroups are available and how to use them.

If you want to try a test of something, do not use a world-wide newsgroup! Messages in misc.misc that say "This is a test" are likely to cause large numbers of caustic messages to flow into your mailbox. There are newsgroups that are local to your computer or area that should be used. Your system administrator can tell you what they are.

Be familiar with the group you are posting to before you post! You shouldn't post to groups you do not read, or post to groups you've only read a few posts from -- you may not be familiar with the on-going conventions and themes of the group. One normally does not join a conversation by just walking up and talking. Instead, you listen first and then join in if you have something pertinent to contribute.

Without the voice inflections and body language of personal communications, it is easy for a remark meant to be funny to be misinterpreted. Subtle humor tends to get lost, so take steps to make sure that people realize you are trying to be funny. The net has developed a symbol called the smiley face. It looks like ":-)" and points out sections of articles with humorous intent. No matter how broad the humor or satire, it is safer to remind people that you are being funny.

But also be aware that quite frequently satire is posted without any explicit indications. If a post outrages you strongly, you should ask yourself if it just may have been unmarked satire. Several self-proclaimed connoisseurs refuse to use smiley faces, so take heed or you may make a temporary fool of yourself.

Avoid posting messages to more than one list unless you are sure it is appropriate. This reduces network overhead and lets people who subscribe to more than one of those lists see the message once instead of having to wade through each copy.

When you are following up someone's post, please summarize the parts of the post to which you are responding. This allows readers to appreciate your comments rather than trying to remember what the original post said. It is also possible for your response to get to some sites before the original post.

Summarization is best done by including appropriate quotes from the original post. Do not include the entire post since it will irritate the people who have already seen it. Even if you are responding to the entire post, summarize only the major points you are discussing.

When you request information from the network, it is common courtesy to report your findings so that others can benefit as well. The best way of doing this is to take all the responses that you received and edit them into a single article that is posted to the places where you originally posted your question. Take the time to strip headers, combine duplicate information, and write a short summary. Try to credit the information to the people that sent it to you, where possible.

One of the biggest problems we have on the network is that when someone asks a question, many people send out identical answers. When this happens, dozens of identical answers pour through the net. Mail your answer to the person and suggest that they summarize to the group. This way the net will only see a single copy of the answers, no matter how many people answer the question.

If you post a question, please remind people to send you the answers by private mail and at least offer to summarize them to the group.

Before you submit a follow-up to a message, read the rest of the messages in the list to see whether someone has already said what you want to say. If someone has, don't repeat it.

Most mail software has provisions to specify that follow-ups to a post should go to the individual rather than the entire list. Sometimes the list for follow-ups is totally inappropriate, especially as a thread of discussion changes with repeated postings. You should carefully check the list and distributions given in the header and edit them as appropriate.

Once something is posted onto the group, it is *probably* in the public domain unless you own the appropriate rights (most notably, if you wrote the thing yourself) and you post it with a valid copyright notice; a court would have to decide the specifics and there are arguments for both sides of the issue. Now that the US has ratified the Berne convention, the issue is even murkier (if you are a poster in the US). For all practical purposes, though, assume that you effectively give up the copyright if you don't put in a notice. Of course, the *information* becomes public, so you mustn't post trade secrets that way.

When posting material to the list, you should be aware that posting movie reviews, song lyrics, or anything else published under a copyright could cause you, your company, or members of the ISGA community to be held liable for damages, so we highly recommend caution in using this material.

If you are using facts to support a cause, state where they came from. Don't take someone else's ideas and use them as your own. You don't want someone pretending that your ideas are theirs; show them the same respect.

Every few months a plague descends on USENET called the spelling flame. It starts out when someone posts an article correcting the spelling or grammar in some article. The immediate result seems to be for everyone on the net to turn into a 6th grade English teacher and pick apart each other's postings for a few weeks. This is not productive and tends to cause people who used to be friends to get angry with each other.

It is important to remember that we all make mistakes, and that there are many users on the net who use English as a second language. There are also a number of people who suffer from dyslexia and who have difficulty noticing their spelling mistakes. Do not make comments on the spelling and grammar of other users. It simply is not a productive expenditure of energies.

Signatures are nice, and many people can have a signature added to their postings automatically by placing it in a file called "$HOME/.signature". Don't overdo it. Signatures can tell the world something about you, but keep them short. A signature that is longer than the message itself is considered to be in bad taste. The main purpose of a signature is to help people locate you, not to tell your life story. Every signature should include at least your return address relative to a major, known site on the network and a proper domain-format address. Your system administrator can give this to you. Some news posters attempt to enforce a 4 line limit on signature files -- an amount that should be more than sufficient to provide a return address and attribution.

Try to keep your text in a generic format. Some of the people reading Usenet do so from 80 column terminals or from workstations with 80 column terminal windows. Try to keep your lines of text to less than 80 characters for optimal readability. If people quote part of your article in a follow-up, short lines will probably show up better, too, therefore, a length of 70 characters may be more appropriate.

Also realize that there are many, many different forms of terminals in use. If you enter special control characters in your message, it may result in your message being unreadable on some terminal types; a character sequence that causes reverse video on your screen may result in a keyboard lock and graphics mode on someone else's terminal. You should also try to avoid the use of tabs, too, since they may also be interpreted differently on terminals other than your own.

Although many have e-mail readers which can understand Microsoft Word, Word Perfect, and other word processors, many do not. The de-facto standard for information interchange between different computer systems is ASCII. Please use ASCII for all material intended to be viewed by the group. If you wish to send Word documents, private e-mail is a more appropriate venue.