From: shell@gandalf.Berkeley.EDU (Shelly Culbertson)
Newsgroups: rec.music.phish
Subject: Re: Jimmy...
Date: 20 Nov 1992 05:05:39 GMT
Organization: Dept. of Statistics, U. C. Berkeley
NNTP-Posting-Host: gandalf.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Nov20.042551.19668@uvaarpa.Virginia.EDU> MIBOWMAN@ccmail.sunysb.edu writes:
> I think it a good idea 
>to expand the FAQ phile and send it to all new.netters... It would stop a lot 
>of these mindless flames.

what mindless flames?...I don't think I've seen many, if any, of those around
these parts?...

As for sending the FAQ to all new Phish.Net users, this has been brought
up before.  I can tell you my opinion on it, but I don't think it should
be a unilateral decision on my part, so if others feel differently, discuss
it on the net (not in my mailbox, since it's not my decision!).

First of all, there are two ways of accessing the Phish.Net - through
the newsgroup rec.music.phish, or through the digest.  When someone new
starts reading the newsgroup, there is no subscription process, and
thus no opportunity to send them *anything* automatically.  So in any
case, there are some folks who cannot be reached with introductory information
when they join the group.

When folks sign up for the email digest, they are sent a copy of our 
welcome message, below.  Personally I think that sending the FAQ as well
would be too large a chunk of text to throw at them at once, especially
since many new netters are not yet terribly familiar with the best ways
to manipulate large text files or their system mailboxes at their site.
Also, this welcome message gives explicit directions on how to obtain the
FAQ, so that should make it pretty easy --

Shelly

ps.  where's the St. Mike's setlist???  ;-)

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Newsgroups: rec.music.phish