[FAQ] Posting guidelines for misc.kids.moderated

(revised 3/28/2001)

Welcome to misc.kids moderated! This is a moderated newsgroup for
parents and other people concerned with raising children. Following
are the posting guidelines for this newsgroup.

This message includes the following sections:

1. Topics and posting policies from the misc.kids.moderated Charter
2. Additional posting guidelines
2.1 Netiquette guidelines
2.2 Posting form requirements
2.3 Guidelines on signature (.sig) files
2.4 Guidelines on excessive quoting
2.5 Guidelines on pointers to outside sources
2.6 Guidelines regarding questioning someone's suitability to parent
2.7 Guidelines regarding name-calling
2.8 Guidelines regarding civility
2.9 Other unacceptable topics
2.10 Subject tags

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1. Topics and posting policies from the misc.kids.moderated Charter

Misc.kids.moderated is an inclusive on-line community of parents and
other people concerned with raising children. Participants are
invited to engage in open discussion of parenting issues and
exchange information about raising children, in an atmosphere of
civility, friendship, and fun.

Acceptable topics include but are not limited to questions about
parenting issues, tips on various aspects of child care, and sharing
of parenting experiences and insights.

Unacceptable posts include but are not limited to commercial posts,
website announcements, posts promoting or defending pedophilia, etc.
Crossposts are permitted only to these newsgroups:
- misc.kids
- misc.kids.breastfeeding
- misc.kids.computer
- misc.kids.consumer
- misc.kids.health
- misc.kids.info (moderated)
- misc.kids.pregnancy
- misc.kids.vacation
- alt.parenting.solutions
(maximum three newsgroups, including m.k.m)

Posters are encouraged to state their own views and share their
experiences, but to refrain from making assumptions about the
motivations of other parents. Posters are expected to maintain a
basic tone of civility. Prohibited uncivil discourse includes but
is not limited to name calling. Posters should avoid the derogatory
labeling of child-rearing practices as "child abuse." Posters are
asked to keep in mind that every family is different.

Posts containing unsolicited advice questioning the right, worthiness,
suitability and/or readiness of any individual (or members of any
group) to parent are unacceptable in this newsgroup. If an individual
chooses to post asking for advice on when or whether to have children,
respondents should be careful to address their comments only to the
original poster and not explicitly generalize to others in similar
situations.

Commercial Policy:

Commercial postings are not acceptable, whether they are initiated by
established businesses or enterprising individuals. Posters may
include their business address and URL in a .sig of reasonable length
(8 lines or less). Also, posts offering occasional "for-sale" used
childcare items from individual posters are permitted; such posts
should be tagged [FS].

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2. Additional Posting Guidelines

2.1 Netiquette guidelines

Participants who are new to Usenet should familiarize themselves with
the "netiquette" of Usenet as well as the particular posting guidelines
for this group. Several useful posts for "newbies" can be found on the
newsgroup news.announce.newusers or on the WWW at
http://www.faqs.org/faqs/by-newsgroup/news/news.announce.newusers.html

Particularly helpful articles a
Welcome to Usenet!
Rules for posting to Usenet
Hints on writing style for Usenet
A Primer on How to Work With the Usenet Community
Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette
Answers to Frequently Asked Questions about Usenet


2.2 Posting form requirements

Any article that falls into any of the following categories will be
automatically rejected:

A) Articles that contain original text of more than 75 characters
per line
B) Crossposted articles to newsgroups not included in these
Guidelines
C) Articles that contain more than 400 lines
D) Encoded binary files (except PGP and other short digital
signatures)
E) Attachments to posts


2.3 Guidelines on signature (.sig) files

Many people close each article they write with a few lines of common
text.
This may be a cute quip or quote, or may include information about their
family, contact information, or disclaimers required by their employer,
for example.

Signature files used on misc.kids.moderated posting must be no longer
than 8 lines.

The content of a poster's signature need not be relevant to parenting,
but it must not violate any of the other posting guidelines. (For
example, name-calling that would not be acceptable in the body of a
message is also unacceptable in a signature.) Posters may include URL's
and business addresses in signature files, provided they comply with
all the other guildelines regarding signatures.


2.4 Guidelines on excessive quoting

Posts more than 20 lines long that also have more than 75% quoted text
will be carefully reviewed by a moderator to determine if that degree of
quoting is warranted. Posts with excessive quoted text may be rejected.

Posters must show a reasonable effort to trim the post they are
replying to and to include just enough material to establish context.
"Me too!" posts are discouraged, and, when posted, must edit the quoted
material significantly.


2.5 Guidelines on pointers to outside sources

Unsolicited website announcements are not permitted. However, a
pointer to a website or other external source of information is
permitted and encouraged in cases where it is relevant to an existing
thread, with appropriate context being given in the post. A URL with
no information about what a user should expect to find there will be
rejected. A pointer to information that is off-charter for
misc.kids.moderated will be rejected, as will a pointer which itself
does not meet the misc.kids.moderated guidelines (such as a URL
containing embedded name-calling).

Moderators are not responsible for verifying the contents of any
external information source.


2.6 Guidelines regarding questioning someone's suitability to parent

The charter states:
Posts containing unsolicited advice questioning the right,
worthiness, suitability and/or readiness of any individual (or
members of any group) to parent are unacceptable in this
newsgroup. If an individual chooses to post asking for advice on
when or whether to have children, respondents should be careful to
address their comments only to the original poster and not
explicitly generalize to others in similar situations.

Identifiable groups and individuals may not be asked/told/etc. not to
become parents, or not to parent as many children as they choose. It is
not permissible to make statements that a person or members of a
specific group "should" not, or should not be allowed to, parent. It
is acceptable, however, to make *suggestions* to this effect, presented
as one option a person or members of a group might consider.

As stated in the charter, solicited advice of this type is permissible;
however, posters must be careful not to explicitly generalize to others
who are in some way "like" the poster asking the question. Stick to the
individual asking for advice.

Note: This provision applies equally to producing biological offspring,
adopting, fostering, step-parenting, etc.


2.7 Guidelines regarding name-calling

Nastiness addressed at a person is considered name-calling. Criticizing
a person's *actions* is not, provided that it is done in a civil manner.


Attacks on an action which by their very nature include an accusation
against the person's character are not acceptable. For example,
"That's a lie" implies an intentional prevarication, and is considered
name-calling. Acceptable ways of questioning the truth of a poster's
statement include the more tactful "I don't think that's true," "I
believe you are mistaken because..." or even simply "That's not true."
"That's not true and you know it" crosses back over into name-calling,
however.


2.8 Guidelines regarding civility

By charter, posters are expected to maintain a civil tone in all their
postings. The guidelines on name-calling cover part of that requirement,
but not all of it.

In general posters are expected to consider the feelings of other
participants, and refrain from making unnecessary accusations or
assumptions about the motivations of others. A good rule of thumb
is to phrase your comments as your opinion -- "I think..." "It seems
to me that..." "This makes me wonder whether..." etc...

2.9 Other unacceptable topics

Participants are reminded that the charter also prohibits posts promoting
or defending pedophilia, and posts labeling parenting practices as child
abuse.

Posts may discuss parenting aspects of pedophilia, such as means of
protecting child from pedophiles, or helping a child who has been a
victim.

Discussions of what practices constitute child abuse should be limited
to *factual* descriptions of the laws in various jurisdictions.
Posters' *opinions* as to what practices they consider abusive are not
permitted.

2.10 Misc.kids.moderated subject tags

Since some topics tend to generate larger volume and/or are of interest
to a specific segment of the readership, subject tags are available for
use to signal those topics. A complete list of recommended subject
tags is contained in the "Subject Tags, Acronyms and Usenet Terms"
document at www.misckids.org, or by e-mail at

Most tags are optional and may be applied by the poster. Moderators
will not add them. However, the following tags are required and will
be added as needed by the moderators (posters may add them if they wish
but do not need to do so). The required tags a

[FS] "For Sale" items from individuals (if you wish, you may specify
your geographic location i.e. [FS-US] or [FS-UK])

[META] Posts discussing moderation practice and/or general
issues of interest to the operation of the newsgroup, but not
directly related to parenting. Examples include: questions
or comments related to moderation decisions, comments related
to how readers feel about specific threads, and discussions
or proposals related to activities such as regional picnics,
t-shirts or photo albums, etc.

In addition, "official" posts from the moderators or moderation board
will be tagged as either:

[FAQ] - for regularly posted FAQ documents.

[ADMIN] - for notices made about the newsgroup.