soc.religion.bahai charter
drgoplayer
here is the welcome and instructions for this news group.
Tom (moderator)
Soc.Religion.Bahai Charter
Source: http://newsgroups.derkeiler.com/Archive/Soc/soc.religion.bahai/2008
-06/msg00169.html
Welcome To Soc.Religion.Bahai
Last-modified: March 23, 2006
SPECIAL NOTE
Occasionally people receiving soc.religion.bahai via the bahai-faith
mailing list have complained that they are unable to correctly
identify
the original sender of articles. Please provide a signature with your
name and correct e-mail address (preferably in Internet format) at the
end of your article; do not rely on the article header's From: field
to
identify you, as this will not necessarily contain your correct e-mail
address.
Welcome! to the soc.religion.bahai newsgroup and its equivalent
mailing
list, bahai-faith@xxxxxxxxx This article is one of several that shall
be
posted periodically. The current list of periodically posted articles
is
Welcome
Introduction to the Bahá'í Faith
Bahá'í Resources on the Internet
[Up to date versions of these postings can be obtained via the web at
http://www.bcca.org/services/srb/
PURPOSE
The newsgroup will act as a non-threatening forum for discussing and
sharing information about the tenets, history, and texts of the Bahá'í
Faith. Prior to its formation there was a good amount of traffic on
this
topic in other newsgroups; this group provides a "single point of
contact" for such discussion.
Examples of posts that fall within the group's scope are:
The Bahá'í Faith's relation to other religions Relevance of Bahá'í
principles to current world events/problems Analysis of particular
scriptural passages or themes General Q & A
MODERATOR POLICIES
The newsgroup will be subject to standards of Bahá'í consultation, a
decision-making process whose salient features include frank yet
respectful statement of views and the concerted, open-minded search
for
truth. In practice, the moderators will reject personal attacks
(flames)
directed at individual posters, similarly inflammatory attacks
directed
at religious institutions, and articles which use offensive language.
These guidelines are intended to regulate only the tone of the
discussions, and not their contents.
The moderators will weigh the guidance available from the Bahá'í
Institutions such as the Universal House of Justice, National
Spiritual
Assemblies, Continental Counselors, and Auxiliary Board members in
determining the appropriateness of postings to the newsgroup. However,
it should be understood that the moderators are an independent group
not
reporting to, or directed by any of those institutions.
To avoid confusion, postings which contain unpublished, personal,
unauthorized or provisional translations of Bahá'í texts must be
clearly
identified as such to distinguish them from the authorized approved
translations provided by the Bahá'í World Center.
Posts which argue for or promote a succession of authority outside the
Covenant of Bahá'u'lláh will not be posted. This does NOT preclude po
sts which ask about, explain or elucidate the Covenant of
Bahá'u'lláh .
Repetitive postings (such as multiple responses to one request for a
book reference) may also be rejected.
The moderators will not intentionally accept posts from individuals
who
can not be reached by email. Note that this policy does not preclude
anonymous mailers, but a back-channel must exist.
Any rejected article will be returned to the sender with an
explanation.
The moderators may also, when it appears helpful, insert clarifying
remarks in posts, with the intent of maintaining a good signal/noise
ratio.
In order to maintain a high signal-to-noise ratio, the moderators will
not accept "me too" posts. In general, the new material should be at
least 5021777521f the length of the quoted material. Please snip your
quoted
material to limit it to that portion you are replying to.
SRB accepts top posts, interspersed posts, and bottom posts, but if
you
bottom post, (that is, if your new material is after the old
material,)
we ask that you place the comment "AT BOTTOM" at the top of the post.
SUBSCRIPTIONS
At USENET sites, one is subscribed to all available newsgroups,
including soc.religion.bahai, by default. If soc.religion.bahai does
not
appear on your system, request that your news administrator make it
available.
The soc.religion.bahai newsgroup is gatewayed to USENET from the
moderated Internet mailing list, bahai-faith, which shares
soc.religion.bahai's policies. Those without USENET access should
address subscription and unsubscription requests to
bahai-faith-request @ bcca.org
If you have access to both USENET and Internet email, the former
medium
is generally preferable, as it requires fewer network resources per
additional subscriber.
SRB is also available for both reading and posting at
http://groups.google.com. Google provides a complete archive of all
posts in soc.religion.bahai to date.
SUBMISSIONS
Readers of bahai-faith submit articles to the moderators via usenet,
by
posting at google, or by mailing them to
bahai-faith @ bcca.org
Please note that the distinction between the bahai-faith and
bahai-faith-request addresses is that administrivia is handled at the
latter. (This distinction applies to most other mailing lists as
well.)
The distinction is significant in that the moderators do not
administer
bahai-faith; the two addresses denote entirely distinct recipients.
At USENET sites that provide automatic mailing in support of moderated
newsgroups, posting to soc.religion.bahai will transparently mail the
article to the moderators. At other sites articles will need to be
mailed explicitly to the moderators, by means of the mailing list
address
:
bahai-faith @ bcca.org
The moderators attempt to handle each incoming article in a timely
manner, either posting it publicly or responding to its author
privately
within four days of receipt. If a post has resulted in neither of
these
actions after four days, it should be assumed that one's site is not
configured to support submissions to moderated groups, and the article
should be resubmitted by mail to the above address.
Please provide a signature with your name and correct e-mail address
(preferably in Internet format) at the end of your article; do not
rely
on the article header's From: field to identify you, as this will not
necessarily contain your correct e-mail address.
NETIQUETTE
Please bear in mind that, because of the gatewayed nature of
soc.religion.bahai and bahai-faith, each posted article will appear in
both a USENET newsgroup and an Internet mailing list. The combined
technical limitations of these forums require that a "least common
denominator" approach be used in posting articles.
Specifically, authors should be aware that:
USENET news has a massive readership, as articles are replicated on
literally thousands of hosts; mailing list readerships are generally
much less extensive
Except for the Subject: header, mailing list articles have no built-in
way of referencing previous articles That is to say "article in reply
to" threading is NOT RELIABLE in soc.religion.bahai. PLEASE include a
short quotation of the article you are responding to in order to
facilitate following threads.
Whereas news facilitates the direction of responses to either the
entire
readership (via a "Follow-up") or an individual author (via a
"Reply"),
a mailing list requires that the user explicitly rewrite an address
for
one of these tasks (depending on the list's configuration) by altering
the default To: header or possibly just adding a Cc: header in a mail
reply
A mailing list subscriber's host may have quite limited mail storage,
so
article length is a concern. In general, SRB will not accept posts
which
exceed 200 lines.
Many readers' terminals are limited to 80 character lines
Therefore, the following suggestions are offered for your
consideration
before posting.
An option in requests for specific information (how do I reach
someone,
where is this quotation to be found, etc.) is to ask explicitly that
all
replies be mailed directly to the poster, who may then post a summary
if
it is of general interest. This would result in only 2 messages (or
perhaps just one) being seen by all subscribers, which could be
desirable in some contexts. Likewise, responses to such requests may,
in
some cases, be most appropriately addressed just to the original
poster.
Please use line lengths of no more than 75. This keeps your text
within
the 80 character per line limit of most terminals, in both your
initial
article and in any followup articles, where it is customary to prefix
each line of quotation from another article with a few additional
characters to indicate the material is quoted.
Please be merciful to small mail systems by limiting articles to 50
KiloBytes in length. Posts that exceed this limit should either be
pared
down or subdivided; or one could submit an announcement of the item
instead, asking that readers respond via private mail in order to
obtain
the actual item.
If you quote a previously posted article, please limit the amount of
quoted text that you include. One may generally assume that readers
have
already seen an article to which one is responding. Therefore, you
need
only quote as much as required for establishing a context.
Please choose your Subject: heading carefully!
In the spirit of sharing ideas rather than wrangling over same, please
consider the following two contrasting quotations and the questions
that
appear after them.
The shining spark of truth cometh forth only after the clash of
differing opinions. `Abdu'l-Bahá , in Bahá'í Administration, p. 21
If two souls quarrel and contend about a question of the Divine
questions, differing and disputing, both are wrong. The wisdom of this
incontrovertible law of God is this: That between two souls from
amongst
the believers of God, no contention and dispute might arise; that they
may speak with each other with infinite amity and love. Should there
appear the least trace of controversy, they must remain silent, and
both
parties must continue their discussions no longer. `Abdu'l-Bahá , in
Bahá'í World Faith, pp. 428-429
In my article, is an idea being offered, expanded or clarified, or its
implications being explored?
Has it been stated previously? Or is it mostly being reiterated and/or
defended?
Have others indicated a desire to move on to another topic?
If responding to an earlier article, is it best in this case to
respond
to each paragraph therein? Or is there one statement that succinctly
summarizes the earlier viewpoint? Or should a paraphrase be attempted?
Does the article express facts, or opinions? More important, is it
easy
to discern which is which?
Our thanks for your help in maintaining a good "signal to noise"
ratio.
With best wishes,
--The Moderation Staff: