I hope that you will read these guidelines and say to yourself, "Well, I'd never do anything like that!" The guidelines are pretty much common sense and common courtesy and so the sort of things Mothers' Union members naturally wouldn't do. But a responsible list administrator will always have a set of guidelines against the unlikely event that someone gatecrashes the mailing list, and they're printed here for reference.

Trevor Jordan
List Administrator

The Mothers' Union Mailing List for York Diocese

Guidelines for members

A mailing list is a forum for a group of people to share ideas and exchange comment and information. A person sends an email to one email address and that address then sends a copy of the email to everyone who has subscribed to that list. This is not like a chat room because the exchange is not always immediate and can take place over a longer period of time with more people.

I hope that this mailing list will become rather more than a simple "chat list". Hopefully, subscribers will feel that they are a part of, and in touch with, the wider community of our Diocesan MU and beyond that of the national and world-wide organisation that is Mothers' Union.

The list is intended to be a place where we can share our prayers: a sort of electronic prayer circle. It is also a place to let others know of interesting forthcoming events around the Diocese: a sort of notice board. It can also be used to seek advice or assistance or ideas: a helpline. Or it can be used for a general natter about all things Mothers' Union: like a garden fence!

But like all communities, the list will run best if we agree certain standards of behaviour. This document attempts to give guidance on those standards so that members have a framework within which they can engage gently with each other. It may look more formidable than it actually is but most of it is simple common sense and courtesy. In practice it should very rare to have to refer to 'the rules' on this list, and you are unlikely to feel that your contributions are being 'regulated'.

Currently the list is open to anyone who applies to join through the form on the web site. Members may invite guests to join the list.

Members are asked to keep in mind the purpose of the list: it is meant for the discussion of Mothers' Union matters, though of course some personal material and some other material might occasionally be of value.

The following should NOT be posted to the list:

Matters which are best addressed by direct communication with one of the officers of Mothers' Union in the Diocese of York.
Virus warnings, since the overwhelming majority are hoaxes. Information about which warnings are real and which are hoaxes can be obtained from various sources, such as www.symantec.com/avcenter/. It is acceptable to report receiving a virus attached to a list message.
Copies of messages received from others, or from other email lists, unless you have the express permission of the author to do so. In virtually all cases the copyright of these messages remains with the author. You may (in fact you are requested to do so, see below) quote messages posted on the list, and all contributors to a list are assumed to have implicitly given permission for quoting in this way back to that list.
Copies of material available on the Internet. If you want to alert other users to something available on the Internet, please post a brief message about it and include the web address.
Material that is still in copyright, except for short extracts. Under no circumstances should more than 400 words be quoted. An author and reference should always be given for material that is not your own, or at least an admission that you can't remember where the quote comes from!
Attachments of any type. If you would like to share photographs you should send them to the list administrator with a request to put them on the Diocesan Mothers' Union web site.
Messages including other addresses in any header field, as this is a breach of the privacy of the people whose addresses are included.
Advertising other than forthcoming Mothers' Union events unless the express permission of the list administrator has been sought and given.
'Spam'
Anything illegal or libellous.

Please make sure your emails are sent in plain text.

List etiquette

Users of the list are asked to show at least as much courtesy to others in their list messages as they would face to face; and to show at least as much courtesy to others as they expect to receive. However, bearing in mind the irregular verb 'I speak plainly, you are brusque, he or she is downright rude,' the following guidelines should be observed on the list regardless of your own views...:

Anonymity. Because the list is intended to be the basis of an on-line community, the use of aliases is strongly discouraged. Those who have good reason for joining a list under a pseudonym should discuss this in confidence with the list administrator if it is not otherwise clear to the membership that they are doing so.
No description of other denominations or perspectives within Christianity should be used if it is likely to be offensive to those described. If someone objects to a description you use, please apologise and do not use it again.
Whilst vigorous debate on issues is encouraged, it should not be conducted at a level which would result in raised voices if you were face to face. Debate should also never descend to the level of personal attack.
This is an open list, and people may read it without contributing. It is best not to say anything on this or any list that you would not want your minister, congregation or local newspaper to see.
Just as you should not post messages from other sources on this list, please do not reproduce material from these lists elsewhere (either in electronic or print form) without the permission of the original poster. This not only shows a lack of courtesy, it may also breach the original writer's copyright. The only exception is where something is CLEARLY intended for free distribution, such as a press release.

Frequency and length of posting

Different people have different ideas about how many messages it is acceptable to get from a list such as this. Experience has shown that busy lists are more often seen as having too high a volume than too low a volume, and that this can result in people leaving the list. To minimise this problem please:

Don't feel you have to reply to every post! Reply only to those where you have something specific to say, that doesn't repeat a point you have made in a reply to someone else.
There is no fixed limit to the number of posts per week, and the list administrator does not want to impose one. Equally, however, it is discourteous if a few people dominate a discussion by the sheer volume of their postings. It is therefore suggested that if you REGULARLY post more than 10 messages a week to a list you consider carefully whether that is appropriate.
Consider whether your message is of general interest, or only of interest to the original poster. If the latter, reply personally and not to the list. Always check your message headers to ensure that a message that is intended to be private is not sent to the whole list.
Before pressing 'send', check that the message subject still accurately represents the content. If not, change it. This helps people to skip subjects they are not interested in.
Please read all the messages in a thread before replying, since someone may already have satisfactorily answered a query.
When replying, DO please backquote - preferably using angle brackets at the beginning of each line quoted:
>like this.
However, please do NOT quote the WHOLE of the original message unless it is short, and it is necessary to do so for clarity. In general, please try to be as concise as possible. Long messages are unlikely to be read in full by most people, unless warranted by the depth of argument contained within them. Conversely, messages that are excessively truncated and full of abbreviations are likely to be inaccessible to many readers.

Warnings and lockouts

Usually the postings from the list administrator have no greater importance than those of anyone else. On the rare occasions that such messages are posted referring to behaviour on the list, and signed off as 'speaking as List Administrator/ etc', please pay particular attention to what they say. They will normally be highlighted in the message title as 'Official - all please read'. Similarly if you are emailed by the list administrator in an 'official' capacity in relation to the list, please take what he says very seriously: he might not always be right, of course, but he does has certain responsibilities which he will try to fulfil as best he can.

In extreme circumstances, the list administrator reserves the right to impose a temporary or permanent exclusion from posting to the list. Normally this will follow warnings and the agreement of other senior members of the Trustee Board of Mothers' Union in the Diocese of York, but conceivably an immediate lockout might have to be imposed until further consultation can take place. This is likely to be an extremely rare occurrence.

If, despite all that...!

If, despite all that, you still want to join the list, you can do so from the form below. Please be reassured that your email address will not be used for any other purpose.

Trevor Jordan
List administrator
May 16, 2008

Joining the Mailing List
chat@muyorkdiocese.org

chat@muyorkdiocese.org

Your email address will be used only for the purposes of the Mothers' Union Diocese of York mailing list.