[Culturechat] Monthly Netiquette Guidelines

Fri, 28 Mar 2003 14:47:00 -0500

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Netiquette/ Technical Guidelines

Postings: General Etiquette

Those new to Culturechat New participants are encouraged to monitor the 
messages for a few days to get a feel for what the general topics of 
conversation are. Look over Culturechat archives if you want to be even 
more familiar with the range of topics over time. (Found at 
www.untours.com) When you feel comfortable with the group, then start 
posting. A good ground rule regarding whether your post is useful is to ask 
yourself if it would add to the general knowledge of the group.

Message content: Focus on one subject per message. If you want to cover two 
different topics, send two different postings with appropriate subject 
lines for each.

Editing your reply messages When quoting another person, it is a courtesy 
(not a rule) to edit out whatever isn't directly applicable to your reply. 
People who have very full email boxes will appreciate it if you take the 
time to edit any quotations down to the minimum necessary to provide 
context for your reply.

Capitals Do NOT write in all caps. This is considered shouting. Use caps 
only to show emotions, like SURPRISE or to add emphasis to what you are 
saying.

Questions that have been covered Be tolerant of questions you have heard 
before. We invite new members all the time; they will not always be aware 
of a discussions held earlier.

Disagreement Expressing opposing points of view can be done with 
consideration for the feelings of others. If you are upset and want to 
respond to a controversial posting, a good suggestion is to wait a day 
before sending your response.

Subject Lines To help other members screen out messages that may not be on 
topics of interest to them, always include a pertinent subject title or a 
'content-rich" subject line. Doing this helps everyone: user can locate 
specific messages quickly; people can pick and choose which messages they 
want to read. If you change the subject when replying to an earlier 
message, change your subject line, or divide your reply into two messages.

Tone of voice Be careful in your use of humor and especially sarcasm in 
your communication. E-mail is not face-to-face and it is quite easy for 
someone to interpret your message in a way other than you intended.

Short messages Limit one-line responses ("me, too", "I agree"). Again, a 
good rule of thumb is to ask yourself "Does my response add substantively 
to the discussion?". If it doesn't, but you would like to express your 
appreciation, send your positive feedback to the individual member, not the 
whole list. (You do this by finding their email address, listed in the 
FROM: part of the posting. Use this as your address line to an individual 
member, rather than idyllchat@untours.com) That being said, if you think a 
brief comment adds to the discussion, short messages are also perfectly 
welcome.

Appropriate Language Use of profanity or derogatory comments is not 
appropriate. In addition, avoid personal criticism. Whether or not such 
observations are warranted, research on online communities has shown that a 
critical tone in postings intimidates other members and discourages 
participation. We want Culturechat to be a welcoming kind of community.

Technical Guidelines
Cutlurechat welcomes members with all ranges of technical expertise. Please 
feel free to participate even if you are brand new to email and computers 
in general. Technical advice from other members is just that, advice. That 
being said, technical advice is often very useful in this electronic medium 
to which most of us are so new. On this list in particular, we ask you to 
have patience with each other. Everyone was a network 'newbie' once. Minor 
errors need not be corrected. If you think a technical correction is 
warranted, send a courteous correction to the person via private email. 
Technical advice that you think is useful to everyone is greatly appreciated.

Copyrighted materials It is important to be aware of copyright issues on 
the Internet. Members should not post copyrighted information to the list 
(e.g., a travel article published in a magazine). Please note that email 
messages, like written letters, are considered copyrighted by the author of 
the message. Therefore, it is inappropriate to forward another person's 
email message to the list without permission from that person. It is 
perfectly acceptable to quote briefly from copyrighted material and provide 
a hyper link reference as to where others may read more.

Signatures It is helpful and courteous to "sign" your message or to include 
your signature with every message. Some email programs do this 
automatically; others will need to type it in their post each time.

Postings to individual members To post a message to the entire list, send 
the message to culturechat@untours.com. If you want to send a reply to an 
individual list member only, remember to change the address in the "To:" 
field of your outgoing message to that individual member's email address, 
found in their message, rather than posting to culturechat.com as a whole.

Technical questions posted to the entire group Occasionally subscribers to 
the list who are not familiar with proper netiquette will submit requests 
to SUBSCRIBE or UNSUBSCRIBE directly to the list itself. Be tolerant of 
this activity, and possibly provide useful advice to the person via private 
email, as opposed to being critical.

Requests regarding administrative tasks When you would like to make 
technical changes to your membership, e.g. be added or subtracted, or 
change your email, temporarily disconnect from Culturechat, you can do that 
yourself by going to the Idyll website (www.untours.com) You will find a 
link to Idyllchat Discuss Untours on the home page. Please do not post 
these requests to the general list. Try making the changes using our 
website. If you have technical problems making the changes yourself, we 
will be happy to do them for you, and you can send such requests TO: 
marilee.taussig@untours.com, SUBJECT: Culturechat Administrative Request.

Attachments Generally, you should not post attachments to Culturechat. . 
Because many list members may not be interested in the attachment, it is 
discourteous to require them to spend downloading time and disk space (some 
members may be paying for time and disk space) for a document they don't 
want to read. Some email systems are unable to handle large attachments. 
Also, many list members are concerned about viruses that may accompany an 
attachment. Links (hypertext/ web addresses/URLs) are not attachments. It 
is OK (often quite useful) to include links to web sites in your posting.

Marilee Taussig,
Idyllchat Administrator

Marilee Taussig,
Marketing Director
=================================================
Untours - Independent Travel With Support!
Tel.: 888-UNTOUR-1 Web: <http://www.untours.com>

Join IdyllChat, an email discussion group on European travel!
Visit: <www.untours.com/idyllchat/>

"Most Generous Company in America, 1999" awarded by Newman's
Own & George magazine. For information on the Idyll Development
Foundation, visit: <www.untours.com/idf>

Marilee Taussig,
Marketing Director
=================================================
Untours - Independent Travel With Support!
Tel.: 888-UNTOUR-1 Web: <http://www.untours.com>

Join IdyllChat, an email discussion group on European travel!
Visit: <www.untours.com/idyllchat/>

"Most Generous Company in America, 1999" awarded by Newman's
Own & George magazine. For information on the Idyll Development
Foundation, visit: <www.untours.com/idf>
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<html>
Netiquette/ Technical Guidelines 
 
Postings: General Etiquette 
 
Those new to Culturechat New participants are encouraged to monitor
the messages for a few days to get a feel for what the general topics of
conversation are. Look over Culturechat archives if you want to be even
more familiar with the range of topics over time. (Found at
<a href="http://www.untours.com/" eudora="autourl">www.untours.com</a>)
When you feel comfortable with the group, then start posting. A good
ground rule regarding whether your post is useful is to ask yourself if
it would add to the general knowledge of the group. 
 
Message content: Focus on one subject per message. If you want to
cover two different topics, send two different postings with appropriate
subject lines for each. 
 
Editing your reply messages When quoting another person, it is a
courtesy (not a rule) to edit out whatever isn't directly applicable to
your reply. People who have very full email boxes will appreciate it if
you take the time to edit any quotations down to the minimum necessary to
provide context for your reply. 
 
Capitals Do NOT write in all caps. This is considered shouting.
Use caps only to show emotions, like SURPRISE or to add emphasis to what
you are saying. 
 
Questions that have been covered Be tolerant of questions you have
heard before. We invite new members all the time; they will not always be
aware of a discussions held earlier. 
 
Disagreement Expressing opposing points of view can be done with
consideration for the feelings of others. If you are upset and want to
respond to a controversial posting, a good suggestion is to wait a day
before sending your response. 
 
Subject Lines To help other members screen out messages that may
not be on topics of interest to them, always include a pertinent subject
title or a ‘content-rich” subject line. Doing this helps everyone: user
can locate specific messages quickly; people can pick and choose which
messages they want to read. If you change the subject when replying to an
earlier message, change your subject line, or divide your reply into two
messages. 
 
Tone of voice Be careful in your use of humor and especially
sarcasm in your communication. E-mail is not face-to-face and it is quite easy for someone to interpret your message in a way other than you intended. 
 
Short messages Limit one-line responses (“me, too”, “I agree”). Again, a good rule of thumb is to ask yourself “Does my response add substantively to the discussion?”. If it doesn’t, but you would like to express your appreciation, send your positive feedback to the individual member, not the whole list. (You do this by finding their email address, listed in the FROM: part of the posting. Use this as your address line to an individual member, rather than idyllchat@untours.com) That being said, if you think a brief comment adds to the discussion, short messages are also perfectly welcome. 
 
Appropriate Language Use of profanity or derogatory comments is not appropriate. In addition, avoid personal criticism. Whether or not such observations are warranted, research on online communities has shown that a critical tone in postings intimidates other members and discourages participation. We want Culturechat to be a welcoming kind of community. 
 
Technical Guidelines 
Cutlurechat welcomes members with all ranges of technical expertise. Please feel free to participate even if you are brand new to email and computers in general. Technical advice from other members is just that, advice. That being said, technical advice is often very useful in this electronic medium to which most of us are so new. On this list in particular, we ask you to have patience with each other. Everyone was a network ‘newbie’ once. Minor errors need not be corrected. If you think a technical correction is warranted, send a courteous correction to the person via private email. Technical advice that you think is useful to everyone is greatly appreciated. 
 
Copyrighted materials It is important to be aware of copyright issues on the Internet. Members should not post copyrighted information to the list (e.g., a travel article published in a magazine). Please note that email messages, like written letters, are considered copyrighted by the author of the message. Therefore, it is inappropriate to forward another person's email message to the list without permission from that person. It is perfectly acceptable to quote briefly from copyrighted material and provide a hyper link reference as to where others may read more. 
 
Signatures It is helpful and courteous to &quot;sign&quot; your message or to include your signature with every message. Some email programs do this automatically; others will need to type it in their post each time. 
 
Postings to individual members To post a message to the entire list, send the message to culturechat@untours.com. If you want to send a reply to an individual list member only, remember to change the address in the &quot;To:&quot; field of your outgoing message to that individual member’s email address, found in their message, rather than posting to culturechat.com as a whole. 
 
Technical questions posted to the entire group Occasionally subscribers to the list who are not familiar with proper netiquette will submit requests to SUBSCRIBE or UNSUBSCRIBE directly to the list itself. Be tolerant of this activity, and possibly provide useful advice to the person via private email, as opposed to being critical. 
 
Requests regarding administrative tasks When you would like to make technical changes to your membership, e.g. be added or subtracted, or change your email, temporarily disconnect from Culturechat, you can do that yourself by going to the Idyll website (<a href="http://www.untours.com/" eudora="autourl">www.untours.com</a>) You will find a link to Idyllchat Discuss Untours on the home page. Please do not post these requests to the general list. Try making the changes using our website. If you have technical problems making the changes yourself, we will be happy to do them for you, and you can send such requests TO: marilee.taussig@untours.com, SUBJECT: Culturechat Administrative Request. 
 
Attachments Generally, you should not post attachments to Culturechat. . Because many list members may not be interested in the attachment, it is discourteous to require them to spend downloading time and disk space (some members may be paying for time and disk space) for a document they don't want to read. Some email systems are unable to handle large attachments. Also, many list members are concerned about viruses that may accompany an attachment. Links (hypertext/ web addresses/URLs) are not attachments. It is OK (often quite useful) to include links to web sites in your posting. 
 
 
Marilee Taussig, 
Idyllchat Administrator 
 
 
 
 
 
Marilee Taussig, 
Marketing Director 
================================================= 
Untours - Independent Travel With Support! 
Tel.: 888-UNTOUR-1 Web: &lt;<a href="http://www.untours.com/" eudora="autourl">http://www.untours.com</a>&gt; 
 
Join IdyllChat, an email discussion group on European travel! 
Visit: &lt;<a href="http://www.untours.com/idyllchat/" eudora="autourl">www.untours.com/idyllchat/</a>&gt; 
 
&quot;Most Generous Company in America, 1999&quot; awarded by Newman's 
Own &amp; George magazine. For information on the Idyll Development 
Foundation, visit: &lt;<a href="http://www.untours.com/idf" eudora="autourl">www.untours.com/idf</a>&gt;

Marilee Taussig, 
Marketing Director 
================================================= 
Untours - Independent Travel With Support! 
Tel.: 888-UNTOUR-1&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Web: &lt;<a href="http://www.untours.com/" eudora="autourl">http://www.untours.com</a>&gt; 
 
Join IdyllChat, an email discussion group on European travel! 
Visit: &lt;<a href="http://www.untours.com/idyllchat/" eudora="autourl">www.untours.com/idyllchat/</a>&gt; 
 
&quot;Most Generous Company in America, 1999&quot; awarded by Newman's 
Own &amp; George magazine. For information on the Idyll Development 
Foundation, visit: &lt;<a href="http://www.untours.com/idf" eudora="autourl">www.untours.com/idf</a>&gt;</html>

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