From harelb Sun Apr 28 18:36:31 1991 Date: Sat, 27 Apr 91 18:22:23 -0400 From: harelb (Harel Barzilai) To: activ-l@umcvmb.bitnet, harelb Subject: Net concerns about us... and possible "commercialism" in our upcoming group... Reply-Article I just posted follows... (I can't keep up with the Net so if peaple could let me (and ACTIV-L ingeneral) know of such concerns (/accusations/etc) on the Net I'd appreciate that. Harel ################################################################## Newsgroups: news.groups,alt.activism,alt.sex.bondage Subject: Re: Resources-->activists is power-->people, not "advertising" Summary: Expires: References: <1991Apr26.012340.16885@dartvax.dartmouth.edu> Sender: Followup-To: Distribution: Organization: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH Keywords: In article kaul@icarus.eng.ohio-state.edu (Rich Kaul) writes: >In article <1991Apr26.012340.16885@dartvax.dartmouth.edu> harelb@cabot (Harel Barzilai) writes: > In article kaul@icarus.eng.ohio-state.edu (Rich Kaul) writes: > >What I am curious about, though, is how exactly you plan to agree with > >current Usenet guidelines on advertising. > > Our charter and goals are *not* "advertising" > >Good. At least you're that aware of Usenet policy ;-). Now if you >could only find a dictionary to discover what advertising is... > > It is part of our charter and goals to make available to activists and > to inform activists of the existance of *resources* including but not > limited to available speakers, videos, publications, books, listings > of peace groups/names/addresses, listing of telephone numbers of > government representatives, etc, 99% of the books-videos etc coming > from *non-profit* organizations. [Have you seend the 50-cents type > prices on AFSC's pamphlets?] > >These are good goals. The propagation of information (and even >disinformation ;-) is good. However, I really don't care about the >prices, nor the fact that they come from non-profit organizations. >It's still advertisement, plain and simple. As such it is not >supposed to be on Usenet. Further, it's not supposed to be carried on It is not any more "advertisement" than alt.sex.bondage folks exchanging information abou there to get the best leather, feathers, oils, etc. (in fact, having long "listings" posts only about this). If this is not to become political persecution (which I'm not asserting you are attempting, but such have clearly surfaced on the net before) we must be given the same amount of leeway as far as *context* and *intent* as other groups -- and many other example groups could be given (yes, I'm aware that we "leftists" (the term for people trying to stop murder etc even when it's our govt doing it) are even "worse" and hence less deserving any slack than the whips&chains crowd, which at least are marginally tolerable ;-) ****************************************************************** > Effective activism means having an organized and readily available > access to such multi-media and information resources. > >Then why don't you just announce the availability of the resources and >leave a number/address for further information? Including a full >subscription form to a newsletter (all 31 lines of it) with full Partly we will, by reminding people periodically of resource files available through the archiver. But it's all a matter of degree and perception, and so long as concerns are articulated in a context free of any air of political persecution, you will find us fair and reasonably accomodating. If there was a UseNet concensus against giving out prices, for example, we could abide by that. Phone numbers and addresses are a more subltle point, where too we can compromise... But if you want a total ban on these... >prices, etc. is a heck of a lot different than saying "Further >information can be found in the Frobnitz Letter, available from >Glasnost Publications (999) 555-3862." (are you against Glasnost? :) ...it will have to be net-wide and enforced equally (tel numbers and addresses were given for companies and products of interest to a.s.b. people) Personally I feel a fair amount of leeway (depending on context and intent, again) should be given in general -- e.g. in the case of a.s.b. -- and that in the case of discussing resources available from non-profits, even more should be given. (How dangerous can a bunch of Quakers (American Friends Service Committee [AFSC]) be as "commies" anyway? And the old lady down your block writing letters for Amensty? We promise to keep those "christics" on a short leash, though ;-)