discuss the web

frequently asked questions

February 14th, 2006

Web Discuss FAQ

Last revised: July 17, 2003
Current Status: Working on it.

Table of Contents

Terminology

General

What is webdiscuss?

Webdiscuss is an organization built by some regular members of a public newsgroup, aiming to produce and maintain a public resource site to complement the newsgroup and to attract new posters in the discussion by promoting the newsgroup on the web.

Which newsgroup is that?

A public newsgroup that used to be on Linkexchange’s servers: le.discuss – Now we have moved to our own server. (click here to access it) To find out how we got there, how we met and what we’ve been doing in the past years click here.

Who owns webdiscuss?

No one person. We have equally shared the expenses of this site. We have thus constituted a small organization run by paying members also supported by content contributions from other newsgroup regulars.

What is discussed in web.discuss?

Anything. It is generally a newsgroup geared towards internet development, web design and on-line bisiness, but you’ll find that sometime other totally unrelated subjects dominate the discussion.

Do I need to be a paying member to join the web.discuss newsgroup?

No! Not at all! The newsgroup is public and free and you’re welcome to join us. Paying members are only funding this site.

Do I need to be [*] to join the web.discuss newsgroup?

No. There is no restriction. You don’t need to besomething in particular, you don’t need to know something in particluar, we don’t care how old you are or where you’re from. You can come and go as you wish say what you wish, and be a member of our community.

Posting Guidelines

What are the accpetable topics of discussion?

Let’s just say that there are no ‘unacceptable’ topics for discussion. You can talk about anything you wish. It is up to your mood and personal preferences. Similarly, it is up to other people to reply or not reply to your posts, depending on whether the topic interests them. You will find that topics related to web design, graphics, programming, internet business and technology have significant response from the newsgroup members. Most of the people here are professionals or amateurs in the field of internet technology and publishing and discussions on internet-related topics are a significant part of this newsgroup’s life.

Do you accept HTML posts?

Yes, you’re most welcome to post HTML. We all use HTML-enabled newsreaders here, and we don’t mind about the disadvantages of HTML posting as much as we mind about its advantages. Many people have set up their newsreader so that it posts their messages both in HTML and plain text form, which makes it possible to render the post on an old newsreader at a text terminal if anyone ever tries to use one. But this is not a requirement. It’s up to you. If you feel that posting plain text makes your message more accessible, you might want to try this policy for yourself. Others may not. But you can expect that all regulars here will read and post HTML.

Do you accept binaries?

Well, it’s not a problem to post an image or a screenshot when it’s related to what you’re saying. Some even use images for signatures in this group. There is certainly no prohibition about posting binaries, even sounds if you like. The spirit here is just ‘use your common sense’. Obviously if you send a 4 Mb video file just to say… ‘look at my dog.. isn’t she a sweetie?’ you’re likely to make some enemies here. (and almost anywhere you try this, except perhaps for alt.binaries.video.dogs) But you won’t hear people complaining about sending a screenshot of your browser to illustrate a question or explanation about some website, for example. Please also bear in mind that some people here download all od the group’s messages for offline reading, so if you really need to send a lot of large files, consider the possibility of uploading them on your webpage and posting just links to them in the NG. Again, there is no prohibition. You’re free to do as you see fit, but these are some suggestions that work best and keep everybody happy, out of our experience.

What about use of language?

You mean bad language? Well the spirit here is what you’d expect to deal with in a party or among a group of friend/colleagues/etc. It certainly isn’t a no-no to use the F word (and I don’t mean fertilizer) nor haven’t there been occasions of people gettin into more serious and in-your-face swearing. But as you would imagine, calling someone an asshole is highly unlikely to be the beginning of a long and loving friendship. People here are understanding and forgiving, being mostly veterans of flame wars online, but abusive language is hardly ever appreciated by anyone. Again, let’s make it clear: You are free to use as much bad language as you wish. It’s just common sense that doing so runs the risk of insulting people. If insulting people worries you, then apply whatever sense you aplly in your everyday life to avoid doing it. If it doesn’t worry you, go ahead, see if we care asshole!

What about flame wars?

Flame wars are inevitable. Again, free speech is the norm here and most of the regulars will go a long way to protect your and their right to speak themselves out. In speaking themselves out, people of a diverse locality, age and social background are bound to find themselves in conflict sooner or later. Common sense is your only guide, once again. You can flame, you might get flamed. You are free to say what you want, and others are free to reply as they want. If you don’t like flame wars, stop reading the thread when it escalates into one. If you like them, make sure you type fast because there’s likely to be another 3 people replying to your posts the minute you make them here.

So… no bad feelings?

Yep. No bad feelings. At least, mostly. I have personally flamed almost every single regular in here at various occasions, and I have received my fair share of flames in return. We have exchanged harsh language in many cases, but I still believe we’re all friends here and there’s no room for keeping hard feelings. At least I don’t. Of course, once again, common sense prevails. However understanding and forgiving people may be, everybody has his button. There are some things that will seriously insult each person. If you discover them and deliberately abuse a sensitive issue, you might make an enemy. In general, I find it practical to try constraining my verbal attacks to the topic that is being argued upon. Switching your attcaks towards the person that you’re arguing with, rather than the arguement itself is not a good idea. You’re free to do that if you wish. This is just what my experience in here tells me.

What about SPAM?

We are immune to spam. We’ve seen so much of it that we can now recognize it and filter it away from the buyer-lobe of our brain. Posting spam here will not increase your sales. We will just be pissed off and one of us is sure to trace you back to your ISP and make sure you get into trouble. So, forget the mere thought of spamming us.

What about use of emoticons?

Use of emoticons or other punctuation, tagging or tone-of-voice expression symbols is widely use in this newsgroup for pretty much the same reasons it is used everywhere across the internet: to express what can be transparent with plain text. Emotion and tone. There is no standard use in here. Some poeple use them, some not. I harldy understand half of the ones used, others understand most. You are free to use them and misunderstand them. There is a brief explanation of some of them on the terminology section of this FAQ.

Terminology

TOOMA/TOOYA/TOOHA

Talking Out Of My/Your/His Ass.

RFC

Request For Comments. Usually used in a subject line, indicating that a poster is demonstrating a proposal or something he/she has recently created (web page, article, graphic, etc) and asks for people to express their opinions on it, provide critique and suggestions.

RFP or CFP

Request (or Call) For Participation. Usually used in a subject line indicating that the poster wishes people to read through a message and participate in some sort of action described in it, for example voting for somthing or joining and effort.

URLSI (pronounced: EARL-SEE)

URL Slip-In. A genuine new term that has sprung from the habit of many regulars in this newsgroup to invest a lot of effort into twisting their words as to lead to an insertion of the URL of their site in the text of their post. The boundaries between URLSI and spam are blurred and subjective. Regulars of this newsgroup include quite a few connoiseurs of the art of URLSI, resulting in phenomena such as direct and immediate posts expressing appreciation when some other poster invents an innovative method to perform one. Proficiency in the art of URLSI brings respect and social merit among members of web.discuss.

Flame (War)

A very standard and loosely interpreted USENET term. It is said that someone is flaming someone else, when he is using bold (or even abusive) language to propose or defend an argument. The situation where a discussion escalates into a long exchange of flames between two or more posters, is commonly referred to as a flame war.

Emoticons

Emoticons or smileys are combination of puctuation marks that look like little faces when looked upon with your head tilted to the left. They are used to express tone of voice in a voiceless channel of communication based on text. We are not poets here so we sometimes need some ‘explicit documentation’ to make a point as to how we mean something. You will see things like:

πŸ™‚ happy
πŸ™ sad
πŸ˜‰ blink eye (joking, or insinuating something)
πŸ˜› tongue out (taunting)
:O surprised, astonished

All of them have their alternative appearances. For example πŸ™‚ can be shown with a thin nose like πŸ™‚ or a perky nose like :^) etc…

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