From: mrl28033@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Michael R Linksvayer)
Subject: Proposal: alt.society.anarchy (2nd time)
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 08:40:32 GMT

Almost two weeks ago (July 8) I posted a proposal for an
anarchist newsgroup. There was some discussion in alt.config
in addition to emailed suggestions and encouragement. 

Although most mail I received on the topic was from people who
simply thought the newsgroup was a good idea and should be
created there were a few suggestions.
 
- Call the newsgroup alt.society.anarchism instead of
alt.society.anarchy. The problem I see with this is that
IMO 'ism' puts too much emphasis on theory and not enough on
actual working societies.

- Tone down the second paragraph in the charter regarding what
is appropriate traffic in the newsgroup. I did this by making
it a positive statement instead of a negative one.

- Moderate it. I'll probably be laughed at for suggesting that
this was seriously suggested, but it was. Someone can always
create a moderated newsgroup in the future if they want one.

As there were no objections to the group itself it will be
newgrouped in a few days barring any serious objections
between now and then.

@ Proposed Newsgroup:

alt.society.anarchy     anarchist activism,future,history,theory
			(unmoderated)

@ Proposed Charter:

Anarchism and anarchist societies have played an important yet
little-known role in human history. Anarchist activism and
ideas have spread at an unprecedented rate in the nineteenth
and twentieth centuries. Now, with statism in chaos and
disrepair everywhere, anarchism has great appeal for an
incredibly diverse set of people. 

Alt.society.anarchy is a forum for discussion and organization
of activism, future, history and theory relevant to anarchy and
anarchism.  Appropriate crossposting and posting of relevant
material to alt.society.anarchy is encouraged.


@ Why an anarchist newsgroup?

As someone said recently in alt.config (paraphrased) "I was
very surprised when I did an 'l anarchy' and found nothing."
There are many anarchists on the net - just watch people's
.signatures. Perhaps this is not surprising. A case can be
made that the net is a working anarchy.

There is an anarchist mailing list. (send mail to
anarchy-list-request@cwi.nl to be included. Btw, the creation
of alt.society.anarchy would not remove anarchy-list or create
a gateway to it.) However it has reached the point where some
people are leaving due to volume, and some discussions would be
better handled in a newsgroup format.


@ Why alt.society.anarchy?

There has been some discussion of the issue of a name on
anarchy-list. The consensus was that alt.anarchy would be too
open to people thinking anarchy=chaos and let's crosspost to
alt.slack, talk.bizarre, etc. The talk.* hierarchy was also
considered, however many people objected on the grounds that
talk groups are flamebait. There is no obvious place for an
anarchist newsgroup in soc.* or misc.*, and anything else
(comp, rec, sci) would be completely inappropriate. I believe
that alt.society.anarchy would fit in well with the other
alt.society groups, and thus that is the appropriate place for
an anarchist newsgroup.

-- 
Mike Linksvayer   m-linksvayer@uiuc.edu   +1 217 344 1326
Newsgroups: alt.config