MISC.LEGAL.MODERATED POSTING INSTRUCTIONS AND CHARTER
Bernard Cosell
[Revised 1 August 2005]
MISC.LEGAL.MODERATED POSTING INSTRUCTIONS
1. Posting should be done in the ordinary manner by using news
software. DO NOT MAIL POSTINGS TO THE MODERATOR. If you can't post using news
software, mail your message to <mailto:misc-legal...@moderators.isc.org>.
If you need to contact one of the moderators, send your email to
<mailto:mlm-r...@rev.net>
2. This is considered a public forum, and, in addition, many participants
follow the newsgroup using one or another of the usenet archive services. As
such, you should expect that all approved submissions will be archived. The
"X-no-archive" header will be removed.
3. Nearly all submissions will either be approved by the moderator,
or rejected and returned to the sender. If you post a message and it
isn't rejected and doesn't appear on misc.legal.moderated, one of 3
things is most likely to have happened:
a. your news software or your news server's software is broken
or misconfigured,
b. you submitted a post with munged headers, or
c. you sent spam (and were reported to your provider; have a
nice day).
Note that since this is a moderated forum, there is an inherent delay between
when you submit an article and when it is either rejected or posted. Depending
on the moderators' other commitments, this delay can sometimes strecth to a few
days. Please be patient before contacting the moderators about a missing post
or reposting it.
4. The moderator will evaluate each message based on the criteria
listed in the misc.legal.moderated Charter (see below). The following
factors will be considered:
a. The percentage of the message devoted primarily to issues
of law (as described in the Charter).
b. The amount of quoted material in the message, relative to
the amount of original material added by the poster. Quoted
blocks longer than 22 lines are presumptively overlong; edit
or summarize the original as needed; the summary or brief
quotation should come at the beginning of the post. Conversely,
followups which provide no context at all (no quoted text or
summary of the prior article) will probably be rejected.
c. The degree to which the message is repetitive of prior
messages, including multiple posts of the same article in
different newsgroups.
d. Commercial solicitation (absolutely prohibited).
e. The civility of the message and its *ad hominem* nature.
Potentially defamatory submissions will be rejected; the
problem can often be remedied by "John Doe"-izing references
to specific persons or organizations.
f. The degree to which the message contains blatantly false
assertions of law.
g. The degree to which the message contains legal assertions
which, while not obviously false, are completely unsubstantiated.
h. The "value added" by the message to the thread. Note that in
particular, posts that consist of little more than "thanks for the
help" will _not_ be approved. The moderators understand that thanking
people for help is a polite thing to do, but nonetheless, that isn't
appropriate for the forum. If you would like to thank a particular
poster for their comments, it would be best to do so privately via
email.
i. Proper formal elements such as legible formatting (e.g.,
lines no longer than 75 characters; no HTML), accurate
attributions, apposite subject lines, and concise .signature
blocks (4 lines is plenty for anyone). These are age-old Usenet
rules, and will be enforced.
5. Generally speaking, the moderator will post a warning message when
a thread is veering away from appropriate subject matter, but the
moderator reserves the right to reject posts without prior warning if
they are blatantly inappropriate.
6. Posters are free to munge headers (such as
From: bi...@willy.NOSPAMloman.org
and leaving aside forgeries in the name of an actual third party).
Spammers harvest mail addresses from Usenet, unfortunately, and munging
headers is one way to escape their clutches. Acceptable on-charter
submissions will be posted notwithstanding header munging or
anonymizing.
However, if an article fails to meet m.l.m posting criteria, it will be
rejected as usual and it is likely that the poster will not
receive the rejection notice if the 'From:' address has been munged.
This applies even where the true address of the author may be evident
but might require decoding or extraction (for example:
janedo...@some-isp.net or d*o*g*b*e*r*t@a*o*l*.*c*o*m) or where the true
address is listed elsewhere (e.g., in the .sig block).
If you are posting something to which you are expecting a response from one
of the moderators, please have the common sense and courtesy _not_ to use a
munged address. And in any event, such inquiries are better emailed to
mlm-r...@rev.net.
==============================================================================
CHARTER: MISC.LEGAL.MODERATED [original text, with additions in
brackets]
Name: Misc.legal.moderated
Status: Moderated. Larry Kolodney has volunteered to serve as initial
moderator.
[Effective 12/27/94, Mark Eckenwiler named co-moderator.]
[Effective March 1998, Larry Kolodney resigned as co-mod.]
[Effective June 1998, Bernie Cosell named co-moderator.]
Charter: Misc.legal.moderated is for the discussion of law and
legal theory. It is recognized that these are
contested terms, and contested terrain, and that law's
domain varies from country to country. The group is
intended to provide a home for well-tempered
discussions including, but not limited to:
1. Current developments in the law including but not limited to
court decisions, legislative enactments, and executive
actions with legal implications.
2. The content and effects of existing constitutions, laws, and
rules of court at all levels: international, multi-national
(e.g. EEC, EFTA NAFTA), national, state/provincial/
departmental, and local/communal.
3. Proposals for changes to the above which have a 'legal'
content, e.g. technical proposals for changes designed to
achieve political ends (e.g. draft language for a statute or
constitutional amendment).
4. Legal doctrine, legal theory (jurisprudence), and schools of
legal interpretation and thought.
5. Legal history, legal sociology and other interdisciplinary
work of interest to lawyers, judges and/or legal scholars.
6. Professional ethics and professional discipline of legal
professionals, both in public and private life, and of their
associates and matters relating to the role of law and
lawyers in society.
7. Posts by practitioners concerning legal problems they have
encountered that may be of interest to the legal community.
8. _First-person_ anecdotes and commentary by non-practitioners
concerning encounters they have had with lawyers, the
police, the courts or other entities which administer the
legal system.
9. Legal education and the type, quantity, and terms of
employment for lawyers and other legal professionals.
10. Posts (including those from non-lawyers) asking specific
factual questions as to the content of the law, and replies
to those posts, so long as the context of the exchange makes
it clear that **legal advice is not being provided**.
11. Posts by persons seeking legal advice, or seeking to engage
a lawyer, which are to be replied to by private e-mail.
Such persons are reminded in advance that legal advice
obtained via email is inherently unreliable, and is almost
never a good substitute for direct consultation with an
attorney.
12. Legal humor.
The ordering above is for convenience only and does not reflect a
preference ordering among the various topics.
The role of the Moderator
=========================
13. Although no legal relationships are created by this
document, the moderator is expected to behave as if she or
he were in a fiduciary relationship with persons reading and
posting to the group.
14. Posts by persons offering legal advice for remuneration will
not be permitted. The moderator will enforce this rule.
This rule is not intended to prevent individuals from
publicizing the existence of non-profit advocacy
organizations which provide legal counseling and
representation.
15. The moderator will use his or her discretion to decide when
discussions drift too far from 'legal' content, and will
close threads accordingly. The moderator will notify the
group when taking such actions. The moderator will request
voluntary compliance before taking such actions.
16. The moderator will be encouraged to return posts to senders,
perhaps with a suggestion of a more appropriate newsgroup,
if the posts are those that he or she believes more properly
belong in another newsgroup. It is intended that the
moderator will use this discretion more aggressively when
there exists another group in which the thread appears to
belong.
17. Posts that deal with general questions of social policy are
disfavored unless they make specific reference to particular
laws, legal doctrines or jurisprudential theories implicated
by the topic. Similarly, discussions of general political
issues are disfavored unless they are informed by reference
to specific legal aspects of such issues. The moderator
will enforce this rule.
18. The moderator will have discretion to reject posts
containing factual assertions about the current state of the
law (as opposed to why the law should be changed) which the
moderator believes are plainly inaccurate. The failure of
the moderator to exercise this discretion does not signify
the moderator's agreement with or approval of the post, and
is in no way to be seen as the moderator's endorsement of
any legal conclusion or opinion expressed in that post.
This moderator is encouraged to use this discretion in a
manner that permits a wide range of colorable arguments to
be presented.
19. The moderator will have discretion to reject posts which are
unduly repetitive and/or contain personal attacks on
previous writers. The failure of the moderator to exercise
this discretion does not signify the moderator's agreement
with or approval of the post, and is in no way to be seen as
the moderator's endorsement of any legal conclusion or
opinion expressed in that post.
Moderator Selection and Replacement
===================================
20. A moderator serves until she or he resigns. A moderator may
resign at any time. The moderator is requested to give the
group adequate notice in order to ensure an orderly
transition.
21. The moderator may designate a substitute moderator to serve
for periods of not more than four consecutive weeks. The
moderator will not designate substitutes for more than two
months per calendar year.
22. A sole moderator may appoint a co-moderator. Co-moderators
may appoint additional co-moderators, if all serving
moderators consent, so long as no more than five moderators
are active at any one time. Moderators may share their
duties in any manner mutually acceptable. Differences among
the moderators shall be settled by majority vote, or in
cases of tie, by lot, or by other means acceptable to all
the moderators. In the event that the group has multiple
moderators, all references to a sole moderator in the above
paragraphs shall apply to all the moderators, collectively
if the context permits.
23. A resigning moderator, whether or not she/he is a sole
moderator, selects his/her successor. Moderators are
requested to consider the opinions of readers of the group
when choosing their successors. A resigning co-moderator
may, with the unanimous consent of the other moderators,
choose not to appoint a successor.
Amending This Charter
=====================
24. This charter can be amended at any time, by following the
procedures then in effect for newsgroup creation.
[end]