>>----- Guidelines for Postings / Netiquette -----<<

[Kazza]

The customs that users have evolved on forums and chatrooms generally apply here in RootsChat.  No-one is born knowing them,  we pick it up as we go along,  so don't be embarrassed if you find you are not following them all.

Here are a few pointers to help you out:

Avoid writing messages using all capitals.  IT LOOKS LIKE YOU'RE SHOUTING! (see Reply #2 also)

To add humor and personality to your messages, and to help convey your meaning,  use smilies. 

Keep your communications to the point. Some people pay for Internet access by the hour. The longer it takes to read your messages, the more it may cost them.  Remember,  if you are asking for someone's help,  you would like them to read your message.

Remember that anything you post on RootsChat can be read by other members and visitors to the site.  Our pages are indexed by search engines,  that's how a lot of new members find there way here.

When replying to a thread,  stick to the topic. Don't indiscriminately post unrelated comments, or worse. 

RootsChat discourages flaming.  What is flaming? Flaming is treating others rudely online.  Sometimes you might offend someone unintentionally,  or they may offend you.  Do not attack back,  report it to a moderator who will deal with the situation.  To contain the heat, the best response usually is no response at all.

To keep messages short,  there are some common abbreviations in use:
<BTW> means by the way.
A <G> enclosed in brackets indicates grinning.
A good one to keep handy in case you're worried about offending someone is <IMHO>,  In My Humble Opinion.
One of my favorites is <ROTFL>, which stands for Rolling on the Floor Laughing.

FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) are handy documents to read before asking questions.  On RootsChat,  boards often have message stuck to the top,  entitled *How to use this Board* or something along those lines.  Consult them when available,  they may save you some time and trouble. 

Remember though that RootsChat aims to be a friendly,  helpful forum.  It is also a lot of fun,  so have a look around,  visit the Beginners Board and the Common Room for a flavour of what we have to offer.

[Welsh Jen]

If you wish to brush up on your online netiquette in general search for Netiquette in your search engine or try this link:

http://www.albion.com/netiquette/corerules.html

or a more official one used by Oxford University:

http://www.ox.ac.uk/it/rules/etiquette.html

[Berlin-Bob]

         !!  Be sparing with capitals in topic titles !!

Please be aware that many Internet Service Providers (ISPs) will block e-mails with too many capitals in the title, as potential SPAM

Any e-mail notification from RootsChat includes the topic title.
Therefore some ISPs will suppress these notifications.

In the worst case, the whole domain www.rootschat.com will be placed on the ISP "black-list"
and nobody from RootsChat on that ISP will receive mail at all
("You have received a reply to topic .....", "You have received a PM from ....", RootsChat anouncements, etc.)   

As a guide for future posts: one SURNAME in capitals, maybe even two, will probably be OK,
but please avoid titles with only capitals.

Moderators may edit "capitals only" titles.
 
If you have any older posts with the capitalised titles, which are still being answered, perhaps you could help us by editing these titles yourself (Click on "modify" in the first post in the topic).
Thanks !

ps.
Here is a second reason to avoid too many capitals in titles:
It makes it easier for everybody to recognise the SURNAME 

[Berlin-Bob]

Some more Netiquette comments from RootsChatters:

Contributed by Donna-Paul:

 rules of netiquette

i particularly like no 10

Rule 1: Remember the Human
Rule 2: Adhere to the same standards of behavior online that you follow in real life
Rule 3: Know where you are in cyberspace
Rule 4: Respect other people's time and bandwidth
Rule 5: Make yourself look good online
Rule 6: Share expert knowledge
Rule 7: Help keep flame wars under control
Rule 8: Respect other people's privacy
Rule 9: Don't abuse your power
Rule 10: Be forgiving of other people's mistakes

from http://www.albion.com/netiquette/corerules.html

Contributed by Falkyrn:

a quote from RFC 1855 Netiquette Guidelines

A good rule of thumb: Be conservative in what you send and liberal in what you receive

Contributed by Goggy:

[...]although not approving of lack of etiquette,or bad spelling etc;I  welcome  the communication,people do thier best,it should be appreciated.We have all taken diiferent paths to Rootschat,all with the same aim,if not education.
        Regards,Goggy

[Berlin-Bob]

     Please do not include personal contact details in postings

This includes e-mail addesses, postal addresses, telephone numbers, names of living relatives, etc.

There are many so-called SPAM-ROBOTS on the web. These are programs that cruise the web, looking for e-mail addresses.  These addresses will then be used for sending SPAM (both to this address and for spoofing, i.e. sending SPAM to others, as if it comes from this address)

Furthermore, there are also lots of people who cruise the net, searching for personal data, which can then be used for "less than nice" purposes (the "Dark Side of the Web")

The moderators will delete personal data.
Please use the Personal Message (PM) system for exchanging personal data.

Public data (Addresses of Registry Offices, Archives, Museums, etc), will be left in messages, as this is part of the necessary  information. In order to protect these people from SPAM, too, please modify an e-mail address so that it wont be recognised by a spam-robot. The simplest way is to replace the @ with [AT].
(for example: info[AT]registryoffice.com)

Added 08.04.2006:

For more information on SPAMBOTS, please read this article at Wikipedia:

Here's more information on the spidering

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spambot

There is also a link in the article to:
Email Address Harvesting: How Spammers Reap What You Sow
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/alerts/spamalrt.htm

[Berlin-Bob]

This was posted on another topic, but I am answering it here, as it belongs to this theme:

You can either email me at (*) or post a cd to
(*)
:
:
(*) Moderator Comment: e-mail and address removed, to avoid spamming and other abuses. Please use the PM system for exchanging personal data.

I hate such censorship, I am a grown man not a child and am quite capable of deciding whether to include my various addresses if I desire.
 If I was at all frightened of spamming or other abuses I would not have given my email address or postal address.
I have had my contact details on a number of websites for over eight years with no problems.
:
:

Nothing personal, it is just general RootsChat policy to remove e-mail addresse, mainly because of Spam robots and viruses.

Unfortunately, not everybody uses the available measures to protect themselves from spam and virus infections, so we try to make things a bit safer for the majority.

An interesting point was raised in another topic that Microsoft raised their "default" security settings, because people hadn't bothered to set them themselves, with the result that many people now complain that they cant'do 'this' or 'that' any more !

As we neither have, nor want to have, a list of those who do allow e-mail addresses and those who don't, we just delete them all, and refer everybody to the PM system !

Bob