Welcome to Moira-Net. This message is being sent out to all of you who are from, or have an interest in the village of Moira. We have a village mailing list called Moira-Net which is meant for all people such as you.

Moira-Net boasts of having as members, people who are computer wizards, nuclear scientists, historians, writers, architects, doctors , teachers, engineers, agriculturists builders, journalists and some wonderful homemakers, among others who have attained eminence in their respective fields. Apart from an occasional storm in a cyber-teacup, we aim to build social capital for this small part of Goa.

If you have the interest of the village at heart, the moderators of Moira-Net invite you to join Moira-Net. Just send the following to

Moira Net moira-net@googlegroups.com

• A self introduction for the benefit of other members of the group
• Contact details such as phone number, house no, etc in order to avoid anonymous posters being part of the group.

On receipt of this information, you will be subscribed to the net.

Sincerely
The Moira-Net team

[Moira-Net has included among its moderators, Augusto Pinto and Tony de Sa and Frederick Noronha. The volunteers' team, meant to keep the list going, may change based on suitability of members and their willingness to volunteer

* * *

Welcome to Moira-Net, a low- to medium-volume mailing list.

It will unmoderated, and thus we all share responsibility for ensuring that the content of the list is of high-quality and suitable for anyone to read. Please remember that some of our list members could be minors; therefore anything posted to this list should not contain materials that could offend them or their families.

Ground Rules

• Mail to the group should be of broad interest to the group as a whole. On-topic content is generally posts related to the village of Moira in Goa, or people linked to the village. Off-topic posts, with the rare exception, are discouraged.
• Please be conscientious of the volume of mail posted to this list.  Send personal mail directly to the person concerned.  Brief congratulatory/welcome messages should also be sent personally rather than to the group.  Messages of one or two sentences only should not be sent to the list.
• No flaming!  Any messages of complaint about another subscriber to Moira-Net should be sent directly to that person or to the list volunteers (those who help in running the list, whose list will be publicly announced from time to time).
• The writings and opinions posted to the Moira-Net mailing list are strictly the opinions of the writer and do not contain any endorsements or guarantees of any kind, unless otherwise noted by a list volunteer.
• Postings that could be construed as defamatory, libelous, or offensive to individuals, organizations, or institutions should not be posted to the Moira-Net list.
• Membership on this list constitutes an undertaking to abide by the these ground rules and to be considerate of other members when posting mail to the list.

In addition to these ground rules, we have a guide to netiquette to help members make the best use of our mailing list. New subscribers are requested to familiarize themselves with the ground rules and the netiquette guide before posting to the list.

GUIDE TO NETIQUETTE

SUBSCRIBING AND UNSUBSCRIBING

Save the welcome message that you receive when you join the list.  It tells you how to subscribe and unsubscribe.

If your mail stops coming, and you haven't unsubscribed, please contact us and let us know. If you don't get a response in a day or two, please send in a reminder with the subjectline MOIRA-NET ISSUE.

Refrain from sending attachments to the list, without the permission of the list volunteers. They don't always translate properly. Wherever possible convert your file to a standard ASCII text file and include it in the mail you are composing.

When you reply to a message, don't include the entire length of the original message in your post.  Take the time to use your delete key and either select the small part that is pertinent to your letter or summarize it in your response.

Avoid posting "Me Too" messages, i.e., short replies to the whole list just to say that you agree or had a similar reaction or experience.  It is better to send these by private mail to the original poster.  If you have something valuable to add, then by all means send this to the list.  As a general guideline, the new content in a follow-up post should exceed the quoted context.

Label the content of your post in the subject line.  If the subject in your response differs from the one your are replying to, update the subject line to match your new topic.  The form "XXX (was YYY)" works well for changing topics.

All mail to Moira-Net should be directly related to the channel.  For example, don't send humor columns, chain letters, other people's inspirational poetry, or any off-topic information to the list, no matter how wonderful or necessary you may find it.  These things occupy valuable space.

Take care in what you write.  Remember that many people will read your post, and it will be archived by the list for a very long time. The list archives will be public, and are read beyond the borders of the village and even overseas.

Consider your audience. Email always sounds harsher than it is because there are no accompanying gestures or facial expressions.

Try not to give offense or be easily offended yourself.  When you make your points keep your tone polite.  Respond to the issues not to the personal attributes.

FLAME WARS

Flaming means sending harsh abusive mail.  It includes such things as name-calling, public criticism of another member of the group, personal attacks, baiting, raising issues, or responding to posts in a deliberately inflammatory manner.

Persistent disagreements with another person should be moved to private email and off of the list. If a discussion around a particular topic goes on for too long, the list-volunteers may take a decision to request it to be taken off-list, or to declare the discussion closed.

The best way to stop a flame fest from happening is to ignore the folks who try to start them. Please notify the list-volunteers if you feel that the discussion is getting out of hand or oppressive.

EMAIL PRIVATE - AND OFF THE LIST

Never repost private email to the mailing list (or any other forum or media) without permission of the original author.  If you have permission to repost a message or information, please credit the author and show their email address.

Don't post your phone number or address to the list if you don't want it to be widely know and available online. It is better to send personal information by private email.

FORMATTING

Capitalize words only to highlight an important point or to distinguish a title or heading.  Capitalizing whole words that are not titles is generally termed as SHOUTING!  *Asterisks* surrounding a word can be used to make a stronger point.  Don't write an entire message in lower case, either.

Don't send text to this mailing list in MIME format.  Keep your formatting set for the lowest common denominator so that everyone can read it.  Limit line length to approximately 65-70 characters and above 55 characters.  Use your automatic word wrap if available.

Keep the length of your signatures modest.  One or two lines is about right. Three to four lines max.

Thank you for your contribution to this community.

[NOTE: This set of rules borrows and adapts from other online rules for mailing lists available online, which seem to be logical and workable. Updated on 16 AUGUST 2009. --FN]