Subject: soc.history.war.vietnam FAQ: Admin Info and Posting Guidelines
Supersedes: <603155571@panix3.panix.com>
Date: 18 Mar 1996 03:08:16 -0500
Summary: This FAQ contains administrative information on    
     soc.history.war.vietnam, the location of the archives, the moderators
     names and address, and the posting guidelines as well as the appeal
     process for the newsgroup.  It also contains a brief listing of other
     shwv FAQs.

Archive-Name: vietnam/info-and-guidelines
Posting-Frequency: monthly

This announcement supersedes any previous ones.

Contents of this FAQ

1. SHWV FAQs.
2. Administrative Information
3. Posting Guidelines
4. Archives


Part 1. SHWV FAQs 

     Currently, there are five FAQ messages: this one; a recommended
reading list; and a 3 part FAQ on the Australian involvement in the
Vietnam War.

     Others on people, places and events of the various Indochina Wars
are being worked on, and will be posted as available.

     The moderators of the newsgroup, in accordance with the Charter,
have the sole responsibility for the development and content of any
newsgroup FAQs. Any person who believes that they have specialized in-
depth knowledge of a topic that wishes to submit a FAQ for review is
encouraged to do so by sending it to vietnam-request@panix.com.

     FAQs will be posted for comment on the newsgroup for a period of
at least one month.  More time maybe allocated at the discretion of
the moderators.  During this period, the designation [RFD] will
precede the subject in the header.  FAQs will be submitted to
news.answers and soc.answers upon completion of this process.

All FAQs will be archived at the following ftp sites:
1. rtfm.mit.edu in pub/usenet/soc.history.war.vietnam
2. byrd.mu.wvnet.edu in the directory 
     pub/history/military/vietnam/soc.history.war.vietnam.  
3. mccaskill.ssn.flinders.edu.au in pub/history/Vietnam-war 

Part 2. Administrative Information:

     The moderated newsgroup soc.history.war.vietnam is dedicated to
the discussion of the Vietnam / Indochina wars, their antecedents and
their aftermath.  All points of view and disciplines are welcome.  It
is our hope to create a "flame-free" environment in which discourse is
possible, and perhaps even some healing and understanding.

     Articles may be submitted in two ways. You can use normal
newsreaders to post to the list.  These will then forward your article
to the submission address for approval.  Or you may send e-mail
directly to the submission address: vietnam@panix.com. The second way
should be faster.

     For your information, the Charter of the newsgroup is reposted on
shwv each month on the first.

The current moderator and co-moderators for soc.history.war.vietnam
are:

     John Tegtmeier      tegtmeie@panix.com
                         Current Moderator
     Co-moderators:
     Edwin E. Moise      EEMOISE@CLEMSON.EDU
                         History/Faq Advisor
     Richard Rohde       rohde@uhunix.uhcc.hawaii.edu
                         Anthropology/FAQ Advisor
     Brian Ross          brian@coombs.anu.edu.au
                         Archivist and Backup Moderator
     Craig E. Thompson   thompson@super.zippo.com
                         Veterans Contact and Backup Moderator

     Requests for information should be addressed at to the contact
address:  vietnam-request@panix.com

     Please feel free to contact us with any question or suggestion. 
We hope that you all will enjoy and profit from the newsgroup.


Part 3. Posting Guidelines:

     The criteria for postings is contained in the Charter.  To assist
those who wish to post articles to the newsgroup, the posting
guidelines below were developed. 

     The submission of an article to this newsgroup implicitly gives
permission for that article to be archived for distribution, and for
quotation of that article within this newsgroup for the purpose of
discussion.  All other rights are assumed to remain with the
contributor.

     Please remember that this is a moderated newsgroup.  We are not
on-line all day long (this is all volunteer work) so there may be some
delay from the time you post to the time your article appears on the
newsgroup.  We will try to get articles up as soon as is possible,
normally within a 24 hour time frame.

     1. Topics.

          The charter requires that postings deal with the Indochina
     Wars, their antecedents and their aftermath.  This is to include
     political philosophy and social factors.  This also means the
     mind set of all the participants at the time, and in the present
     to the extent that this reflects on the aftermath of the wars.It
     was made clear from the outset that this was a multi-discipline
     newsgroup, not just history.  It is set up as such in the
     charter. 
          Posters should restrict their comments to the above.  Posts
     containing ANY material not included within the scope of the
     newsgroup, or legitimate rebuttal to material already posted,
     will be returned.  The decision as to an article being admissible
     resides with the moderators, who were named as part of  the
     voting process for the newsgroup, and their successors, as
     provided in the charter.  Further comments on the propriety of
     material shall be deemed as flames, and rejected.

     2.  Personal Comments.

          Articles must be free of personal attacks on individuals or
     groups of individuals in the readership on the newsgroup.  The
     public acts of public figures are, of course, open to critique. 
     The same is true of organizations which similiarly are also open
     to a higher level of critique. Posters will restrict their 
     comments to the material and the discourse surrounding the
     material.  ANY COMMENTS OF A PERSONAL NATURE REGARDING ANOTHER
     POSTERS INTENTIONS, MOTIVES, BELIEFS, ETC. SHALL BE DEEMED A
     PERSONAL ATTACK, AND REJECTED.
          Characterizations of another individual's beliefs or views
     as "ridiculous", "stupid", "lies" or any similar label shall be
     deemed not as a critique of the material, but a personal attack,
     and therefore rejected. Posters will restrict themselves to a
     rebuttal of the material in an article without including
     derogatory or condescending insults.

     3.  The Goal of the Newsgroup

          The goal of this newsgroup, as outlined at the time of the
     voting for its creation, was to promote a flame-free environment
     for discourse and to provide a forum in which various sides of
     the debate, coming from differing backgrounds, could exchange
     ideas.  Posters are asked to bear this in mind.  Posts seeking to
     restrict this open availability to all sides of the debate shall
     be considered flames, and will be rejected.

     4. Commercial 

          No articles of a commercial nature will be posted, with the
     exception of informational sources of not-for-profit groups
     which, at the discretion of the moderators, offer important
     benefits.  Announcements of forthcoming or recent publications in
     the field will also be allowed on a informational basis.  Any
     articles containing advertising of any services for fee must
     conform to the above to be elegible for posting.

     5. Copyright

          Please be aware of the copyright laws as they pertain to
     your submissions. They are a lot stricter than you may think. 
     Under the Berne convention, just about everything is presumed to
     be protected, even if not expressly stated.  The rule of thumb is
     simply that unless the person has expressly put the material in
     the public domain, it should be treated as protected. As stated
     above, articles posted to soc.history.war.vietnam may be quoted
     for the purpose of discussion on this newsgroup. If you need more
     complete information, please look at the copyright myth FAQ on
     the news.answers newsgroup.
          Quotations from published sources for the purposes of
     discussion or illumination are acceptable, as long as those
     quotations fall within the fair use provisions of the copyright
     laws. 

     6.  Net etiquette

          I would as posters to voluntarily adhere to common practice
     in regard to net etiquette and the posting of articles.  Quotes
     from prior posts should not be more than 50% of a posting, and
     those sections quoted should have a direct bearing on the
     commentary in the new article.  Signature files should be
     restricted to 4 lines.  The expansion of the number of Usenet
     newsgroups, as well as the number of sites getting news feeds,
     have increased dramatically, taxing the net's ability to carry
     the load.  Quoting a forty line article to say "I agree" is
     selfish.  Please use the editing features of your newsreaders and
     stick to the essentials.

     7. Cross-posting Articles.

          Request to cross-post articles will be honored with the
     following exceptions:

          A. Other Moderated Newsgroups. You should submit those
          individually to each moderator.

          B. alt.war.vietnam.  The moderator will not honor requests
          to cross-post to alt.war.vietnam except for general
          information postings.  The reasons behind this lie in the
          confusion some readers are having concrning which newsgroup
          they are posting to, and consequently, the allowable
          language in those articles.  This has resulted in an
          excessive number of rejected articles, and delays in posting
          for those only wishing to post to awv.  Contributors to shwv
          who wish to cross-post their articles to awv should do so by
          using the facilites of their newsreaders after the srticle
          appears on shwv.

          Posters who ar replying to aticles posted on other
     newsgroups must cross-post the original article to
     soc.history.war.vietnam, and post their replies to all original
     newsgroups named in the article to which they are responding. 
     This is to insure that articles are not taken out of context, and
     that the author of the original article has an opportunity to
     repond.

     8. Personal Narratives

          It has been our policy for quite some time to treat personal
     narratives - articles marked [PER NAR] in the subject header - as
     oral history.

          Respondents may ask appropriate questions, but the content
     of the articles is considered privileged, and may not be
     attacked.  This holds true not only for vets, but for those who
     were active in the anti-war movement.

          The rationale behind this is simple - it is more beneficial
     to the newsgroup to have oral history posted than it is for
     potential posters to refrain for fear of confrontation and
     critique of their actions 20+ years ago.  

     9.  Appeal Process

          There is an appeal process if you believe that your article
     was unfairly rejection.  Please refer to the Charter for full
     information. Essentially, all that is required to appeal is to
     send an e-mail reply of the rejection notice to all moderators
     (all active moderators will be in the rejected message's header)
     requesting an appeal review of the article.


Part 4. Archives:

     Soc.history.war.vietnam is archived.  Thanks to Larry Jewell and
the folks at Byrd, and Brian Ross, one of our co-moderator in
Ausraliat, these archives are available via FTP.  

The newsgroup logs, along with bibliographies, and the most recent
copies of all FAQS are available at the following sites:
1. byrd.mu.wvnet.edu in the directory 
     pub/history/military/vietnam/soc.history.war.vietnam.  
2. mccaskill.ssn.flinders.edu.au in pub/history/Vietnam-war 

     The archives at McCaskill are in Z compressed form. This site
also holds Tom Holloway's American casualty database.

John Tegtmeier, moderator - shwv
