SEELANGS Administrivia - (was Re: SEELANGS, R.I.P.?)

[Alex Rudd]

Dear SEELANGS Members,

With any luck, this message from me will accomplish three things:

1) It will address the appropriateness of the Pussy Riot thread;
2) It will address Eliot Borenstein's observations and proposal; and
3) It will inform (or remind) you of currently-existing solutions for
some of the routine issues that crop up on SEELANGS.

I will try to be brief, but anticipate failing miserably at that, for
which I apologize in advance.  (There's just a lot to cover.)

1. - The Pussy Riot Thread

I will begin this discussion with a quote:

Sarah Hurst wrote:
> The reason I talked about political discussions not usually
> being allowed is because I have seen the list owner, Alex
> Rudd, intervene before and I think even remove someone
> from the list for getting into politics. So I don't think
> SEELANGS is an unmoderated list.

For the most part, SEELANGS is an unmoderated list.  That simply means
that nearly all of the messages submitted for distribution are posted
to the list without first having been reviewed and approved by someone
acting as a moderator.  SEELANGS is not, however, a virtual place
where anything goes.  There are rules (which I've always chosen to
style as "guidelines" rather than "rules," because frankly, we're all
adults here, we're capable of adhering to guidelines if we so choose,
and as list owner, I just don't have the time to spend enforcing
rules).

The guidelines have been in place for years and years and years.  They
can be found in the Welcome message sent to new subscribers.  On
numerous occasions over the years I've posted here to explain how to
go about having LISTSERV mail you a copy of the current version of the
Welcome message.  I suspect that most of you didn't bother to read the
Welcome message when you subscribed, and you haven't read it since
then.  If every SEELANGS subscriber were to read the Welcome message
from top to bottom, and were then to comply with all the guidelines,
the list would generate many fewer complaints.  I've been exhorting
people here to use the basic netiquette embodied in the guidelines for
19 years, sometimes on the list, but usually off-list directly to a
member disregarding them.  I've also grown accustomed to being ignored
here.  But I'm not powerless; I can, and often do, intervene when
necessary, and I have all sorts of list owner tools in my toolbox.

Here are two excerpts from the SEELANGS Welcome message:

---------- Begin ----------

SEELANGS exists to facilitate discussion of topics of interest
to teachers and students of Russian and other Slavic and East
European languages and literatures.  Use the list in furtherance
of that general goal.  But please, do not treat SEELANGS or its
members with disrespect.  Profanity is not welcome, nor is
language which demeans or belittles other people or groups of
people.  It is further expected that list members will conduct
themselves in a mature and polite manner towards fellow list
members.  "Flames" will not be tolerated.  The list owner reserves
the right to take any action he feels appropriate to ensure the
smooth operation of the list.

<SNIP>

There are many people subscribed to SEELANGS.  Most are instructors
or students of one type or another, and all of them presumably have
some interest in Slavic Languages and Literatures.  List members'
specific areas of interest vary, as does the knowledge they bring
to our discussions.  Please remember that every other list member
is deserving of your respect, and conduct yourself accordingly when
posting.

Specifically, remember that "Slavic Languages and Literatures" is
what brings people to this list, yet not every post will contain
a question or comment fitting neatly under that heading.  If you
are concerned that someone has posted something falling, in your
opinion, too far from the central purpose of the list, do not
write to the entire list to express your displeasure.  Instead,
first understand that there must be some amount of wiggle room on
a list like SEELANGS, as there will be small differences in what
subscribers expect to see here.  If you are new to the list, please
observe for awhile to see the uses to which most members put it.

If you must voice your opposition to the fact that a given subject
has been raised on the list, please write directly to the list
owners, as they will be in a position to take action, or explain
why taking action is not warranted.  The list owners can be
reached by writing to:

SEELANGS-Request at BAMA.UA.EDU

For purposes of clarification, please note that the discussion of
discrete political matters is not welcome on SEELANGS.  However,
as political and other concerns have influenced Slavic Languages
and Literatures, if posting on such a theme, use common sense and
recognize when your contribution has ceased to be about aiding
linguistic comprehension, and has begun to be purely political.
There are many other discussion lists and similar on-line discussion
forums that exist solely for the discussion of politics, and you
should not confuse SEELANGS with them.

---------- End ----------

Ivan Esaulov started the Pussy Riot thread.  In fairness to him,
though, all he really did at the outset was post a message of a couple
of lines saying, essentially, "I wrote an article.  Here's the title.
Here's a link to a web page where you can read it if you want to."  If
no one had responded to that post on the list, it would have been left
at that, and no one would have had a problem with it.  Vadim Astrakhan
responded, though, with a perfectly reasonable (for this list) set of
questions, such as, "'Новиопы', 'метанойя', 'Катастрафа',
'большевицкий' -- что это все за слова?'"  It was from that point on
that the discussion began to morph and to become in parts what one
might construe as too political as to be appropriate subject matter
for SEELANGS.

As a practical matter, I try assiduously to keep up current with list
mail.  Each message is delivered promptly to my smartphone and I
generally read everything that's posted.  Sometimes I skim.  Sometimes
I fall a couple of days behind.  In this case, I just didn't notice
what was happening with the Pussy Riot thread until it had taken on a
life of its own.  (Ultimately, a list member brought it to my
attention off-list.)  Had I noticed it earlier, I probably would have
suggested that its participants take it elsewhere.  (Note to Sarah
Hurst and others who were wondering why the discussion was "being
allowed": always feel free to write me with your concerns.  I might
simply not have noticed whatever it is concerning you.)

Without singling anybody out, I hope everyone (re)reads the Welcome
message and resolves to adhere to the SEELANGS guidelines.  If you
find yourself in need of a copy of the current version, compose a new
e-mail message to:

LISTSERV at BAMA.UA.EDU

Put anything (or nothing) in the Subject: line (it gets ignored), and
in the main body of the text put only the following single line:

GET SEELANGS WELCOME

Before switching gears entirely, one more comment on this:

Kevin Moss wrote:
> Since SEELANGS is a group associated with AATSEEL and in
> order to be maximally clear, I'll respond to the Pussy Riot thread
> in English.

First, although it's not set in stone anywhere, it's generally
understood that English is the language of the SEELANGS list.  It's
probably not a good idea to get into the habit of posting entirely in
Russian.  As we've seen over just the last couple of days, issues
involving the encoding of the Cyrillic text inevitably arise and
people whose e-mail clients are incapable of decoding the text get
frustrated.

Second, just so everyone knows, there is (no longer) any official
connection between SEELANGS and AATSEEL.  My understanding is that
there might have been some sort of official association between the
two 20 years ago, but not since then.  Of course, many AATSEEL members
subscribe to SEELANGS, and AATSEEL officials often make use of
SEELANGS to reach some of their members here.  AATSEEL exercises no
control over the list, though.

2. - Eliot Borenstein's Observations and Proposal

Eliot Borenstein wrote:
> The current exchange of screeds about Pussy Riot has finally
> crystalized something for me:  SEELANGS, in its current
> incarnation, has outlived its usefulness.

Based on several of the responses to Prof. Borentstein's initial post,
it's clear (to me, anyway) that SEELANGS has not outlived its
usefulness in the minds of all its subscribers.  Many people like it,
and like it just the way it is.  (By the way, when I took over
administration of SEELANGS in March 1993, there were about 300
subscribers.  In early 2000 there were about 950 subscribers.  Today,
in March 2012, there are 2700 subscribers.  That's what the kids today
call a "trend.")

Eliot Borenstein wrote:
> The solution is moving to an entirely different platform.
>
> Consider this: in the best of times, most of the information
> exchange on SEELANGS is of an interest to only a small
> subset of its subscribers.  But we stay on, because we don't
> want to miss something unpredictably relevant. Eventually
> a political topic emerges, and, for  a week or so, the list
> degenerates into competitive victimology.  And many of us
> get annoyed that our "inboxes are being clogged up" by this
> stuff.
>
> The problem here is that the material is irrelevant, but not
> irrelevant enough.

I understand the issue generally and your frustration in particular.
A move to an entirely different platform, though, would be fraught
with pitfalls and problems of its own.  Blogs require the taking of
affirmative steps to read them.  E-mail is passive; it comes right to
us.  Some blogs don't present well on small devices, such as
smartphones.  E-mail is flexible and does just fine on smartphones.
E-mail is easily archived and the archives are easily accessible.
(You can even search the archives using e-mail.)  Posting on blogs is
usually restricted to the blog owner, who must enter a password to
authenticate himself or herself.  If you open it up to everyone, you
open it up to spammers.

For a solution you might find useful in the here and now, see Section 3, below.

Eliot Borenstein said:
> Many of our posts are hyperlinks, some of which get
> garbled when they're put on the list.

This is true.  For anyone posting a hyperlink to SEELANGS, if the URL
is very long, and especially if it wraps to a second or even third
line on your screen, don't post it as is.  It is likely to break, such
that recipients will have difficulty getting to where you want them to
go.  Instead, take advantage of a URL-shortening service.  My favorite
is Tinyurl.com.  For example, the SEELANGS Web interface's URL isn't
very long, but running it through http://tinyurl.com/ yields this:

http://tinyurl.com/7g8ek27

You can click on that link and you'll be brought to the SEELANGS Web
interface.  This is very useful with URLs that contain Cyrillic
characters.

Clicking on a link that's been shortened with a URL-shortening service
might be scary to some people, because your browser will be
redirected, and you won't know the destination URL in advance.  But
with Tinyurl.com, you can know in advance.  Just insert "preview" in
the shortened URL and see what happens.  For example:

http://preview.tinyurl.com/7g8ek27

3. - Currently-existing solutions for some of the routine issues that
crop up on SEELANGS

Let's start with the most obvious:

Eliot Borenstein wrote:
> The digest format as an alternative.  I've been getting
> the digest format for years.  It's better for me than
> receiving individual posts, but it's still ridiculously clunky.
> For example, I was reading this last set of posts in a digest
> on my phone.  At least one of the posts included all the
> previous posts, in multiple copies because of multiple
> embedding.   This is laborious on a small screen.

and,

Erika Wolf wrote:
> Like Eliot, I read the posts in digest format. Often, the bulk of
> the digest is earlier messages that sometimes spread like
> cancer at the end of posts. Similarly, I sometimes read my
> email on a smartphone -- and usually have no patience to
> bother with reading any SEELANGS posts.
> At the very least, it would be most appreciated if individuals
> could follow proper Netiquette and delete the message to
> which they are responding.

This looks like an appropriate place for a quick reminder of the
following SEELANGS guideline, taken straight from the Welcome message:

---------- Begin ----------

***** QUOTING TEXT FROM ORIGINAL MESSAGES *****

Because all posts to SEELANGS are archived, and because disk
space is a finite resource, list members are asked to pay
close attention when they reply to messages on the list and
quote text.  Including portions of original messages is fine,
as long as it's done to provide context for the reader and
is done selectively.  However, quoting entire original
messages within the body of replies, when the original messages
are more than just a few lines, is prohibited.  Not only
does it fill up our disk space with extraneous text, but
those list members receiving SEELANGS in DIGEST format are
forced to read through the same messages three and four
times.

---------- End ----------

The fact that this continues to be a problem is reflective of a
societal shift to what Paul Gallagher referred to as "top-post[ing]."
You're reading an e-mail message.  You click "Reply."  By default,
your e-mail client quotes the entire original message, and puts the
cursor above the quoted message.  You don't think twice about it and
just compose your reply, including everything when you finally click
on "Send."  In some contexts, such as the business world, top-posting
might actually be the preferred default format.  Here, it's not.  It
would be much better if everyone would quote selectively as the
guideline requires.

But people are lazy, and 90 percent of the subscribers won't even have
read this far in my post, so... for those people who've stuck with me,
here's something concrete you can do:

Ditch the DIGEST format.  Why is everyone still using DIGEST?  INDEX
is so much better!

Set to INDEX, you will continue to get only one (or perhaps two)
e-mails per day from SEELANGS.  However, rather than get the full text
of all the messages posted to the list that day all bundled together,
you'll get only a listing (index) of the messages posted to the list
that day.  The list includes the message number, the sender, and the
subject line for each post.  Looking at the listing, you can then
decide which messages you want to read.  To read a message, you just
click on the message number and the post opens in a Web browser
window.  Once you're viewing the message in your Web browser, you can
use controls on the page to navigate to the next or previous message
in the thread, etc.

If you'd like to try it, send the command:

SET SEELANGS INDEX MIME HTML

in the body of e-mail to:   LISTSERV at BAMA.UA.EDU

If you choose to use the INDEX option, you must also register a
LISTSERV password, which LISTSERV uses to authenticate you as a
subscriber authorized to access that message.  To register your
LISTSERV password, you will need to use your Subscription Address (the
e-mail address from which you are currently subscribed to SEELANGS)
and a password of your own choosing.  You can register a LISTSERV
password here:

http://bama.ua.edu/cgi-bin/wa?GETPW1

The first time you click to read one of the posts in an INDEX message
you will be prompted for your subscription address and LISTSERV
password.  However, once you enter that information and click the
Login button, your information is saved in a cookie on your hard drive
and you will not be bothered with that intermediate step again (unless
you change subscription addresses or delete your cookies).

The INDEX option will work with smartphones, by the way, but I can
understand if you don't want to read list mail in your phone's Web
browser.  So, another thing you can do is consider using a Gmail
address for your SEELANGS subscription and changing your Subscription
Options from DIGEST to MAIL (i.e., SET SEELANGS MAIL or SET SEELANGS
NODIGEST (does the same thing)).  Gmail is great because it groups
threads together by subject line, and also because it hides all that
quoted text from view.  Even if it's there, you see only an ellipsis,
which you can click can expand if you really want to see the quoted
text.  Gmail accounts are free.  Gmail is built into the Android
operating system and Gmail clients exist for iPhone and Windows
Mobile.  You can even configure your Gmail account to make it appear
that e-mail you send from it is coming from your work or school
account.

That's probably more than enough for now.  If you have any questions
or comments, please feel free to write me off-list.

Regards,

- Alex, list owner of SEELANGS
--
Alex Rudd
List owner e-mail: seelangs-request at bama.ua.edu
Personal e-mail: Alex.Rudd at gmail.com
http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
Any opinion expressed above is not necessarily shared by my employers.

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