Help!
You can email us with any problems you're having with other OzME members. We'd rather try to sort out problems privately so write to us, not the list.
RULES
No personal attacks.
"Flaming" and personal attacks are NOT allowed. Disagreements may occur, and healthy skepticism or discussion is fine, BUT the list discussion is intended to be supportive of all members.
No aliases.
OzME is a private list - only members are allowed to post, read the messages, or browse subscribers' email addresses.
In this relatively protected environment, we expect you to be prepared to reveal your identity to the list owners and your fellow members. That means using your real name when you post.
Don't post other people's private emails to the list.
Posting private correspondence (emails meant for just one person) is a violation of privacy. Please check your message headers carefully before pressing REPLY or SEND. We understand brain-fog, though. If you do inadvertently repost someone's private mail, the best response is abject public and private apology.
No commercial advertising.
It's OK to tell people about a product you are using and where they can buy it from, how much it costs etc, but you should make it clear that you are doing this to be helpful and that you don't have a financial interest in selling it.
Don't name doctors on the list.
It is a custom on OzME that we don‘t name doctors (either wonderful ones or those we don't like) openly on the list. There are several good reasons for this. If someone posts asking for recommendations for doctors in their area, please send them your suggestions by private email.
Stay on-topic (most of the time)
lf you want to share some of your life outside of ME/CFS/FM with us that's fine, we'd love to get to know you, but please keep most of your postings at least somewhat related to CFS/FM.
In particular, don't post jokes, advertisements, virus alerts, or chain letters. And as a general guide, posts about religion, sport, and the beginning or end of the universe are nearly always off-topic. (So are hobbies and pets except when they relate to how we cope with our illness especially fur-therapy!) There is another list called OzME-Chat for social chatty posts that would be off-topic on the main OzME list.
Format of posts
Post in plain text, not rich text format (rtf), HTML or formatted.
Please snip your messages.
(see below)
Don’t send attachments.
Surveys, research projects, etc
If you want members to participate in surveys or research projects, please ask the list owner first.
What happens if someone breaks the rules
These rules are normal for a list of this kind
and are consistent with "net etiquette" (netiquette) worldwide.
The rules are practical ones for protecting the list and its members.
OzME is a valuable resource and support for some very sick and isolated people. The moderators won’t tolerate behaviour that interferes with the smooth running of the list or the well being of the majority of subscribers. We never want OZME subscribers to suffer stress as a result of belonging to it, or to feel that the list is not a safe place to be.
If the rules are broken, the moderators will take action, usually by pointing out what has happened and asking the person not to do it again. If the mistake was an honest and the result of brain-fog, that's OK. We will try to be helpful and nice, but if we're not sure you've got the point we will put you "on moderation" and check your posts before they go to the list. We will do this until we decide it's OK to restore full posting privileges.
If someone keeps breaking the rules we will remove the offender from the list. And in serious cases we will unsubscribe them straight away.
This list is not a democracy.
Nor is it a public forum - belonging to it is a privilege, not a right.
You are expected to obey the rules and follow the directions of the moderators. We are not going to get involved in debate with anyone who thinks we are violating their freedom of speech. We will decide what is inappropriate or unacceptable.
List members are asked not to get involved in administration matters. If people write critical or angry letters to the list it can make things worse. Contact the moderators at [email protected] if something is wrong, and let us deal with it.
List etiquette - some advice for avoiding problems.
One of the worst things that can happen on a list is a "Flame war". This is when people have arguments and send nasty posts to the list criticising what others have said. The discussion can quickly become heated, which is especially distressing on a list like OzME where almost everyone is ill. Unfortunately because we are ill we are not only less able to cope with unpleasantness, but also more likely to start it by accident.
Patience and tolerance.
Don't automatically assume that a disagreement is a personal attack. People are entitled to their opinions and will sometimes disagree with you. Sometimes when you’re sick this is hard to deal with, but learn to recognize the difference between them attacking an IDEA, and them attacking YOU. And remember, it is not necessary to convert everyone to your point of view!
Wait before you post
It is possible to read emails and reply to them very quickly. Unfortunately you may often regret the result. If someone writes something that you disagree with and you find yourself writing an angry or sarcastic reply, DON’T send it straight away. Read it again later when you've cooled down a bit. You may want to edit the email. You may even decide not to send it.
It's very easy to cause a nasty atmosphere on the list or start an argument with a few ill chosen words.
Don't invite disagreement.
It's considered good form to remind fellow list members that you only speak for yourself.
Try not to talk in absolutes ("X happens"), but about yourself or what you've found ("X happens for me", or "I've found that X happens").
Internet shorthand like IMHO ("in my humble opinion") or AFAIK ("as far as I know") can be useful.
On the internet, no one can see you smile…
and no one can hear your tone of voice.
If your words might be interpreted as being rather stern or cross, you can soften them by using symbols like :) for a smile, or for a grin.
Leave any reprimands to the moderators.
If you feel someone has been nasty to you, or is being nasty to someone else, or has broken any rules, please leave it to the moderators to restore discipline. If the moderators doesn‘t seem to have noticed, you are welcome to email them pointing out what has happened. Writing angrily in your own defence - or someone else's - is not going to help, and will often make things worse by encouraging other people to join in the argument either for or against.
Taking the discussion "off list".
Sometimes it will be suggested that two people having a discussion on a topic could continue by private email and stop boring everyone else with it. There's nothing wrong with that and it's frequently a good idea. But if one party doesn’t want to discuss it privately and says so, leave it at that. The moderators take a dim view of people getting unsolicited hostile private emails - or worse, phone calls - from other group members.
Of course, it's OK to send helpful private emails or messages of support to other members after reading their posts or questions on the list, or to phone them if they have volunteered their number. Many great friendships have started this way, and much valuable information and support has been exchanged.
Mailing list hints and tips
When you belong to a mailing list, you should stick to sending your posts in Plain Text. Most email programs send formatted emails by default, so you may not realise your emails aren’t in plain text.
However, there will be somewhere in your email program that lets you choose to send Plain Text.
The reasons for not sending formatted emails are:
If you send formatted emails, lots of people will get a post with lots of computer code at the end. This is especially hard on members who receive their emails in a daily digest, who have to scroll past all the code to get to the next post.
Plain Text keeps the volume of the list down, emails are quicker to download, and don't use up so much memory and hard disk space on your computer.
Finally, many people with ME/CFS/FMS have cognitive difficulties, and emails that aren’t in plain text can be difficult for them to read.
Snipping (not quoting excessively)
(For people who aren’t subscribed to the Digest)
When you reply to a post, and brain fog permits, please select the main bit you're answering, or commenting on, and delete the rest of the original post, This is known as "snipping".
If you think it's important to let people know that you have done this, you can type "snip” in the gaps.
Explanation: When you answer an email, depending on how your email program is set up, the whole of the message you are replying to is quoted at the end or beginning of your new email. (There will be a symbol like this > at the beginning of each quoted line.)
In private emails this can be useful. But it is annoying on an email group, because everyone has to keep reading the same posts over and over again especially people who get the Digest version
If several or all people in the conversational thread leave the quotes in, each post on a particular topic gets longer and longer… This makes what could be a short reply into a long long email, most of which is now irrelevant.
Please check before you post, and delete as much of the previous message as possible. Just leave the sentences or paragraph(s) that are really relevant to your reply enough to let people know what you are on about.
Also try to remember to delete the automatic footers that appear at the end of each post. They get added each time, so you don't need to leave them on the message you're replying to.
So - remember to "snip". And if you yourself replying to a long requoted post, you could do us a favour and clean it up by highlighting (selecting) and deleting all the unnecessarily repeated lines.
If you receive your emails from the group by Digest and you don't snip, you will send the whole of the digest back to everyone. Digest subscribers can't just hit "reply" - ever.
Important advice for members who receive their emails in a Digest
What is the "Digest"?
When you join an email group, you usually have the option of Digest mode. This means that instead of receiving each individual email as it is sent, you get a batch of them approximately daily, all together in one long email. Some people find this easier to deal with, it reduces the number of messages in your in-box.
How to reply to posts in the Digest
If you are a Digest subscriber you MUST NOT just hit “reply”, type your message and then send it, the way you would normally do. Why? Two reasons:
1. Your post will have a silly Subject line, like
"Re: Contents of OzME digest Vol 1 #349".
2. You will send a whole day's Worth of emails back to the group a second time, because they will all be quoted at the end of your message.
What you must do: After you have written your reply, change the subject line to something meaningful. Then scroll down to the end of what you have written, highlight all the quoted posts and delete them.
Or, you may find it easier just to start with a new message. (It helps to have the mailing list address in your address book so you don't have to type out the whole address each time.) Copy the subject line from the original post, paste it into your new email, and put "Re:" in front of it. If you want to quote from the post you're replying to, you have to copy it out of the digest and then paste it into your new message as a quote. (It is best not to quote the whole thing - just a few relevant lines to remind readers about the points you're replying to.
LINKS YOU SHOULD READ
http://www.albion.com/netiquette/corerules.html
http://www.ict.griffith.edu.au/~davidt/email_etiquette.htm
http://email.about.com/od/emailnetiquette/tp/core_netiquette.htm
http://www.netmanners.com/
http://www.our-kids.org/archives/email_netiquette.html
You can email us with any problems you're having with other OzME members. We'd rather try to sort out problems privately so write to us, not the list.
RULES
No personal attacks.
"Flaming" and personal attacks are NOT allowed. Disagreements may occur, and healthy skepticism or discussion is fine, BUT the list discussion is intended to be supportive of all members.
No aliases.
OzME is a private list - only members are allowed to post, read the messages, or browse subscribers' email addresses.
In this relatively protected environment, we expect you to be prepared to reveal your identity to the list owners and your fellow members. That means using your real name when you post.
Don't post other people's private emails to the list.
Posting private correspondence (emails meant for just one person) is a violation of privacy. Please check your message headers carefully before pressing REPLY or SEND. We understand brain-fog, though. If you do inadvertently repost someone's private mail, the best response is abject public and private apology.
No commercial advertising.
It's OK to tell people about a product you are using and where they can buy it from, how much it costs etc, but you should make it clear that you are doing this to be helpful and that you don't have a financial interest in selling it.
Don't name doctors on the list.
It is a custom on OzME that we don‘t name doctors (either wonderful ones or those we don't like) openly on the list. There are several good reasons for this. If someone posts asking for recommendations for doctors in their area, please send them your suggestions by private email.
Stay on-topic (most of the time)
lf you want to share some of your life outside of ME/CFS/FM with us that's fine, we'd love to get to know you, but please keep most of your postings at least somewhat related to CFS/FM.
In particular, don't post jokes, advertisements, virus alerts, or chain letters. And as a general guide, posts about religion, sport, and the beginning or end of the universe are nearly always off-topic. (So are hobbies and pets except when they relate to how we cope with our illness especially fur-therapy!) There is another list called OzME-Chat for social chatty posts that would be off-topic on the main OzME list.
Format of posts
Post in plain text, not rich text format (rtf), HTML or formatted.
Please snip your messages.
(see below)
Don’t send attachments.
Surveys, research projects, etc
If you want members to participate in surveys or research projects, please ask the list owner first.
What happens if someone breaks the rules
These rules are normal for a list of this kind
and are consistent with "net etiquette" (netiquette) worldwide.
The rules are practical ones for protecting the list and its members.
OzME is a valuable resource and support for some very sick and isolated people. The moderators won’t tolerate behaviour that interferes with the smooth running of the list or the well being of the majority of subscribers. We never want OZME subscribers to suffer stress as a result of belonging to it, or to feel that the list is not a safe place to be.
If the rules are broken, the moderators will take action, usually by pointing out what has happened and asking the person not to do it again. If the mistake was an honest and the result of brain-fog, that's OK. We will try to be helpful and nice, but if we're not sure you've got the point we will put you "on moderation" and check your posts before they go to the list. We will do this until we decide it's OK to restore full posting privileges.
If someone keeps breaking the rules we will remove the offender from the list. And in serious cases we will unsubscribe them straight away.
This list is not a democracy.
Nor is it a public forum - belonging to it is a privilege, not a right.
You are expected to obey the rules and follow the directions of the moderators. We are not going to get involved in debate with anyone who thinks we are violating their freedom of speech. We will decide what is inappropriate or unacceptable.
List members are asked not to get involved in administration matters. If people write critical or angry letters to the list it can make things worse. Contact the moderators at [email protected] if something is wrong, and let us deal with it.
List etiquette - some advice for avoiding problems.
One of the worst things that can happen on a list is a "Flame war". This is when people have arguments and send nasty posts to the list criticising what others have said. The discussion can quickly become heated, which is especially distressing on a list like OzME where almost everyone is ill. Unfortunately because we are ill we are not only less able to cope with unpleasantness, but also more likely to start it by accident.
Patience and tolerance.
Don't automatically assume that a disagreement is a personal attack. People are entitled to their opinions and will sometimes disagree with you. Sometimes when you’re sick this is hard to deal with, but learn to recognize the difference between them attacking an IDEA, and them attacking YOU. And remember, it is not necessary to convert everyone to your point of view!
Wait before you post
It is possible to read emails and reply to them very quickly. Unfortunately you may often regret the result. If someone writes something that you disagree with and you find yourself writing an angry or sarcastic reply, DON’T send it straight away. Read it again later when you've cooled down a bit. You may want to edit the email. You may even decide not to send it.
It's very easy to cause a nasty atmosphere on the list or start an argument with a few ill chosen words.
Don't invite disagreement.
It's considered good form to remind fellow list members that you only speak for yourself.
Try not to talk in absolutes ("X happens"), but about yourself or what you've found ("X happens for me", or "I've found that X happens").
Internet shorthand like IMHO ("in my humble opinion") or AFAIK ("as far as I know") can be useful.
On the internet, no one can see you smile…
and no one can hear your tone of voice.
If your words might be interpreted as being rather stern or cross, you can soften them by using symbols like :) for a smile, or for a grin.
Leave any reprimands to the moderators.
If you feel someone has been nasty to you, or is being nasty to someone else, or has broken any rules, please leave it to the moderators to restore discipline. If the moderators doesn‘t seem to have noticed, you are welcome to email them pointing out what has happened. Writing angrily in your own defence - or someone else's - is not going to help, and will often make things worse by encouraging other people to join in the argument either for or against.
Taking the discussion "off list".
Sometimes it will be suggested that two people having a discussion on a topic could continue by private email and stop boring everyone else with it. There's nothing wrong with that and it's frequently a good idea. But if one party doesn’t want to discuss it privately and says so, leave it at that. The moderators take a dim view of people getting unsolicited hostile private emails - or worse, phone calls - from other group members.
Of course, it's OK to send helpful private emails or messages of support to other members after reading their posts or questions on the list, or to phone them if they have volunteered their number. Many great friendships have started this way, and much valuable information and support has been exchanged.
Mailing list hints and tips
When you belong to a mailing list, you should stick to sending your posts in Plain Text. Most email programs send formatted emails by default, so you may not realise your emails aren’t in plain text.
However, there will be somewhere in your email program that lets you choose to send Plain Text.
The reasons for not sending formatted emails are:
If you send formatted emails, lots of people will get a post with lots of computer code at the end. This is especially hard on members who receive their emails in a daily digest, who have to scroll past all the code to get to the next post.
Plain Text keeps the volume of the list down, emails are quicker to download, and don't use up so much memory and hard disk space on your computer.
Finally, many people with ME/CFS/FMS have cognitive difficulties, and emails that aren’t in plain text can be difficult for them to read.
Snipping (not quoting excessively)
(For people who aren’t subscribed to the Digest)
When you reply to a post, and brain fog permits, please select the main bit you're answering, or commenting on, and delete the rest of the original post, This is known as "snipping".
If you think it's important to let people know that you have done this, you can type "snip” in the gaps.
Explanation: When you answer an email, depending on how your email program is set up, the whole of the message you are replying to is quoted at the end or beginning of your new email. (There will be a symbol like this > at the beginning of each quoted line.)
In private emails this can be useful. But it is annoying on an email group, because everyone has to keep reading the same posts over and over again especially people who get the Digest version
If several or all people in the conversational thread leave the quotes in, each post on a particular topic gets longer and longer… This makes what could be a short reply into a long long email, most of which is now irrelevant.
Please check before you post, and delete as much of the previous message as possible. Just leave the sentences or paragraph(s) that are really relevant to your reply enough to let people know what you are on about.
Also try to remember to delete the automatic footers that appear at the end of each post. They get added each time, so you don't need to leave them on the message you're replying to.
So - remember to "snip". And if you yourself replying to a long requoted post, you could do us a favour and clean it up by highlighting (selecting) and deleting all the unnecessarily repeated lines.
If you receive your emails from the group by Digest and you don't snip, you will send the whole of the digest back to everyone. Digest subscribers can't just hit "reply" - ever.
Important advice for members who receive their emails in a Digest
What is the "Digest"?
When you join an email group, you usually have the option of Digest mode. This means that instead of receiving each individual email as it is sent, you get a batch of them approximately daily, all together in one long email. Some people find this easier to deal with, it reduces the number of messages in your in-box.
How to reply to posts in the Digest
If you are a Digest subscriber you MUST NOT just hit “reply”, type your message and then send it, the way you would normally do. Why? Two reasons:
1. Your post will have a silly Subject line, like
"Re: Contents of OzME digest Vol 1 #349".
2. You will send a whole day's Worth of emails back to the group a second time, because they will all be quoted at the end of your message.
What you must do: After you have written your reply, change the subject line to something meaningful. Then scroll down to the end of what you have written, highlight all the quoted posts and delete them.
Or, you may find it easier just to start with a new message. (It helps to have the mailing list address in your address book so you don't have to type out the whole address each time.) Copy the subject line from the original post, paste it into your new email, and put "Re:" in front of it. If you want to quote from the post you're replying to, you have to copy it out of the digest and then paste it into your new message as a quote. (It is best not to quote the whole thing - just a few relevant lines to remind readers about the points you're replying to.
LINKS YOU SHOULD READ
http://www.albion.com/netiquette/corerules.html
http://www.ict.griffith.edu.au/~davidt/email_etiquette.htm
http://email.about.com/od/emailnetiquette/tp/core_netiquette.htm
http://www.netmanners.com/
http://www.our-kids.org/archives/email_netiquette.html
