This file supersedes all previous FAQs for this newsgroup.
Revised Aug 31, 2000
RE: READ THIS BEFORE YOU POST A QUERY
****ANSWERS TO FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ****
This message is posted once a month to provide answers to commonly asked questions on this forum.
If you have any contributions or changes to this document please send me an e-mail message. If you never wish you see this document again, please add the above subject in your KILL file.
Sincerely,
Stephen Graham (graham@ee.washington.edu)
soc.history.war.world-war-ii FAQ Maintainer
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Contents:
1) History of this forum
2) Charter (Original Text)
3) Moderation Policy
4) Appeals
5) Moderators List. Add/del policy. Setup
6) Why this forum exists
7) Where & How to submit articles
8) Some Helpful tips
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Subject: 1) History of this forum
Newsgroups: soc.history.war.world-war-ii
Description: History & Events of World War Two.
Status: moderated
Proponent: Joel Furr (jfurr@acpub.duke.edu)
Request for Discussion: Feb 21, 1994
Call for Votes: March 23, 1994
Voting Ended: April 13, 1994 23:59:59
UTC Vote Taker: UVV
Votes: 181 in favor, 17 against
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Subject: 2) Charter (Original Text)
Author: Joel Furr
Discussion of the era 1939-1945 in particular, but ranging as far back as 1918 and as far forward as the 1950's for discussion of events leading to the War and post-war events such as the occupation of Japan and Germany. The discussion will be limited to social, political, military, economic, technological, demographic, and historical aspects of World War II, including discussion of:
* Arms limitations treaties in the 1920's, intended to head off any
future war
* the Weimar Republic
* the rise of the Italian Fascists
* the Japanese war with China
* the rise of the Nazi Party
* American isolationism
* Franco-British appeasement
* Italian misadventures in Africa
* German occupation of the Sudetenland and Austria
* the war proper, 1939-1945
* the Manhattan Project
* the Holocaust
* Post-war occupation of Japan and Germany
* Post-war governments of Europe
* and so on.
In other words, the mandate for soc.history.war.world-war-ii is intended to be broad, rather than narrow, with moderation in place less to limit discussion than to keep out Gannon and the Holocaust Revisionists and other malicious posters. Should Dan Gannon or Serdar Argic submit articles which actually discuss World War Two rather than spreading their brand of conspiracy theory, their articles will be approved for submission as well.
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Subject: 3) Moderation Policy
Soc.history.war.world-war-ii will have a very relaxed moderation policy. The main purpose, as noted above, for moderation of this group is to prevent it from turning into a revisionist flamefest akin to misc.headlines or soc.history. As such, any message which actually discusses World War II will be approved for posting, provided that it does not attempt to claim that events such as the Holocaust never happened. There are other groups for discussion of that question, most notably, alt.revisionism.
English is the standard language for this group. You may post in other languages. However, if none of the moderators can read what you've written well enough to determine the content, the article won't be accepted.
The moderators will use their discretion in determining which articles are suitable for rejection. Grounds for rejection:
* Holocaust revisionism: any article denying the existence of the Holocaust or a substantive attempt to discredit historical evidence. The moderators will determine which articles meet this criterion.
* Discussion of moderators or moderation policy: the moderators will reject any article referring to an individual in their role as moderator or discussion of moderation policy. Questions and complains about moderation policy shall be sent to ww2-mod@acpub.duke.edu.
* Lack of original thought: articles comprised of extensive quotes from other works with little or no comment.
* Blank messages, test messages, advertisements, and Spam.
* Excessive quoting: articles with less than 50% original and substantive text, except if the quoted text has been trimmed as far as possible. Articles should not be substantially padded with garbage or repetitive material. Blank lines may be added to meet inews posting requirements.
* Excessive signature length: signatures of more than four lines.
* Valid e-mail addresses: the article must contain a valid e-mail address for the sender, either in the article headers or in the body of the article. Addresses may be altered to defeat address harvesters. However, the correct address must be easily decipherable from the altered address.
* E-mail replies only: An author may request that he be sent a copy of any reply by e-mail. However, he may not request that replies be e-mail only unless the replies will be summarized and posted to the group.
* Looking for WWII veterans: any such article should be posted to soc.veterans rather than soc.history.war.world-war-ii.
* Announcements of scholarly works will be accepted, regardless of commercial nature. The moderators will not endorse such posts.
* Announcements of regional events: regional events, include live events, television or radio broadcasts, or similar events of a strictly regional interest or accessibility are not acceptable. Reunion announcements should be posted to soc.veterans. Announcements of conferences, exhibitions or events of international scope and interest will be accepted.
* URLs: the moderators will reject posts which consist solely or largely of URLs or posts that announce websites. An article which has substantial original text and includes a URL as a source for further information is acceptable. The moderators will make exceptions to this for a minimal number of trusted posters or websites. The rationale behind this is the difficulty in checking dozens of URLs each day for appropriate content. URLs in signatures are acceptable.
* "Do My Homework": articles that are clearly requests to do someone's homework for them.
* Discussion of modern politics: the moderators will reject any article whose focus is modern politics.
* Lack of context: articles in a thread must contain enough quoted text or summary material so that the context of the discussion is not lost.
* Non-text files: articles which include anything other than plain text, including HTML code, binaries, attached documents in uuencoding, binhex or other formats, etc.
* Poor formatting: articles must be readable with reasonable effort.
* Duplicate articles: multiple identical or near-identical articles from a single poster.
* Ad hominem arguments: any post that attacks or insults another poster. Historical figures are fair game.
* Inciting a flame-war: any article that the moderators judge likely
to start a flame-war, including but not limited
to derogatory articles about a race or ethnic group.
Again, these are only possible grounds for rejection. The moderators may accept articles meeting one or more of these guidelines at their discretion.
The moderators reserve the right to suspend posting privileges of anyone who routinely and intentionally violates the posting guidelines. Due warning will be given. This will be used only as the last option when all other attempts to correct the abuse have failed.
The moderators will either outright reject any article or suggest revisions to bring an article in accord with the posting guidelines. Revised articles should be sent directly to the original moderator. Do not post them or send them to the regular submission address.
As noted below, the group will be group-moderated, to minimize delay between submission and posting and to keep the group running when the traffic becomes heavy.
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Subject: 4) Appeals
Any poster may appeal the rejection of an article. To do so, send e-mail to ww2-mod@acpub.duke.edu. Include the reason for the appeal and the entire text of the rejection notice. The moderation panel will consider your appeal. Decisions will be made by majority vote of moderators responding to the appeal.
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Subject: 5) Moderators List. Add/del policy. Setup
Moderators will be added by majority vote of the existing moderators and moderators will be removed by 2/3 vote in the event that a moderator is shown to be failing to do the job (i.e. not posting anything).
LIST OF CURRENT MODERATORS FOR soc.history.war.world-war-ii
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Dated: March 6, 2003
Phil McGregor <aspqrz@curie.dialix.com.au>
Stephen Graham <graham@ee.washington.edu>
MODERATION SETUP/APARATUS
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This group will be group-moderated using a Majordomo listserver. It has been configured so that each article received at ww2-sub@acpub.duke.edu will be sent to the next moderator in turn, using a list of subscribed moderators. Hence, the *submission* address for articles will be ww2-sub@acpub.duke.edu. The *contact* address for the group, once created, will be ww2-mod@acpub.duke.edu.
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Subject: 6) Why Does This Forum Exist?
Author: Joel Furr
A war includes more than military events. A war includes social, political, economic, military, and demographic events. Discussion of a war typically includes the *war era* and not just the war. Present groups which exist to discuss military issues are very specific: sci.military, alt.folklore.military, alt.war. All of these tend to focus very strongly on the military aspects and less on the historical and other aspects. Soc.history.war.world-war-ii will encompass all aspects of war. Discussion of World War II and wars in general takes place on a wide range of newsgroups, many of which specialize on recent military history. The most notable example of war discussion taking place elsewhere is the World War II mailing list, which averages 800 kilobytes per month of traffic and which almost closed down after presenting far too great a load on its moderators than they could handle. The moderators of the list are in support of the proposed newsgroup as the subject is far larger than can be easily dealt with in mailing list form. A newsgroup is needed.
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Subject: 7) Where & How to submit articles ?
There are two ways to do so:
A- through USENET
While reading newsgroup soc.history.war.world-war-ii simply respond to the article or post a new article. The article will be automatically routed to one of the active moderators for review.
B- Through E-MAIL
You may submit your article to the following address. Again, your article will reach one of the moderators for review.
The e-mail address is:
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Subject: 8) Some Helpful Tips
It may take up to 1-2 days for your article to be reviewed and another day or so for the article to reach your site after being posted from a moderator's site.
Articles not deemed fit for posting on the forum will be returned by the moderator with an explanation citing a rationale & the guidelines of the forum.
1. Always save a copy of your article you submit till it appears on the forum.
2. If the article does not appear on the newsgroup and the article was not returned back by the moderator AND 3 days have elapsed: Please contact the moderators, ASAP, at the following e-mail address:
Do not repost the article yourself.
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