Friends and Volunteers of Pride Lafayette, Inc.,

Our Yahoo group announcement and discussion list is the primary communication channel for our organization. The guidelines for the use of the list are provided in the following pages of this document.

Email Discussion List Guidelines

Pride Lafayette, Inc. would like to welcome you to our discussion group and to encourage all subscribers to post information of interest to the gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and intersex community of Greater Lafayette, Indiana. This includes:

• personal introductions, opinions, questions (note our personal ads policy)
• event announcements
• discussions about organizations, services, programs
• community action alerts
• shared information about public services
• other general information for/about our community
• items of significant interest at a regional or national level

Postings by non-profit organizations are welcome. Postings of for-profit business activities are prohibited.

Do not post messages which are attacks on individuals or remarks which may constitute slander or libel.

Please read the tips and netiquette section before posting.

We reserve the right to block postings by anyone found to be in violation of these guidelines. If you feel that you cannot comply with these practices, please feel free to listen only or unsubscribe from the list.

NOTE: This is a free service provided by Pride Lafayette, Inc and powered by YahooGroups. These guidelines are determined by the board of directors of Pride Lafayette and are subject to change.

-DISCLAIMER-

Pride Lafayette, Inc. does not support or endorse individual messages posted to this list. The viewpoints expressed on this list are strictly those of the list members and not those of Pride Lafayette, Inc. or its various community programs.

Tips and Netiquette

1. Keep in mind the purpose of this discussion group when posting messages.
2. This is not a place to post personal ads or find a sex partner (see detailed policy below). There are many other groups out there for that purpose. However, posts from those looking for roommates, advertising parties, or promoting other events and resources of interest to our membership are permitted and encouraged.
3. Be mindful of how your postings contribute to the nature and overall attitude of this discussion group. Be sensitive to how your choice of words and topics can affect or be interpreted by people of different genders, races, sexual orientations, or levels of coming out. We want to make people on the list feel welcome and not scare them away with the first message they get from the list.
4. Use only one topic per message.
5. When posting an article, please include a note about your thoughts on it. This also applies when forwarding messages from other discussion lists. Moreover, please be thoughtful when forwarding messages from other listservs as many of us are on several of these.
6. Carefully consider whether a reply should go to the list or to an individual. If your post is relevant only to one member of the list, please contact that person using private e-mail.
7. This listserv is confidential. Do not forward or share others' posts or e-mail addresses without permission. Likewise, private solicitations, spamming, cruising, or other inappropriate use of members' e-mail addresses is very inappropriate and is grounds for removal from the list.
8. Avoid messages that only say things like "Me, too", "Thank you" and "I agree". Please add more to the discussion if you can, or simply send those one-line messages directly to the sender instead of the entire list.
9. Be careful with humor and sarcasm. Writing is not the same as conversation and can be misinterpreted. Use emoticons (also known as "smileys") when trying to convey a tone of voice. :-)
10. Consider carefully what you write; it's a permanent record and can be easily forwarded to others.
11. Don't overuse acronyms like BTW (by the way) or IMHO (in my humble opinion). Not everyone is experienced with this jargon and they may not want to admit their confusion - possibly losing your point.
12. Do not post chain letters to the group.
13. Read over your e-mail before you send it. Use a spell checker if available.
14. If you find yourself fighting with someone in the group, send private mail until you work it out. Do not fight your battle in the discussion group.
15. Keep confidences. Don't spread stories about people in the group.
16. Posting a message in ALL CAPS is considered to be like "shouting" in this medium and is very rude. Excessive use of all caps will lead to you being removed from the list.
17. When forwarding messages, put your comments at the top of the message.
18. When replying to messages, please copy only the portion of the message that you are responding to, preceded and followed by [snip]. This is especially appreciated by people receiving the daily digest of messages who must read your message, everything you've copied, and your sig, in order to get to the next message -- they can't just type the delete key to bypass your message.

Addendum:

PRIDE LAFAYETTE DISCUSSION LIST POLICY ON POSTING PERSONAL ADS

Pride Lafayette does not permit posting personal ads to its discussion list. The purpose of this policy is to maintain Pride Lafayette's reputation as an organization that promotes the development of social and service opportunities across all boundaries--including those of sex and gender.

Personal ads in the GLBTI community are generally directed only towards members of the same sex. Pride Lafayette wants to encourage the use of the discussion list in a way that pertains to *all* members of the community. Series of messages directed toward one specific subset of the community (men or women) will likely alienate other parts of our diverse community. This will discourage growth and use of the list and therefore hinder the growth of the organization.

Allowing the discussion list to become an open medium for personal ads would also lead to many other questions of policy. For instance: What is appropriate content for a personal ad? Can someone solicit for sex in a personal ad? Are people free to describe the size and shape of their body parts in a personal ad? The list moderators would be left to judge the appropriateness of each message of this type sent over the list. At the moment, our discussion list is not moderated, except for the first messages posted by new subscribers. We would like to keep the list unmoderated so we can devote our limited available time to other important tasks. There are other Yahoo groups available to those interested in posting personal ads. We suggest that those interested go to the main Yahoo Groups page and do a search for "Lafayette Indiana men" or "Lafayette Indiana women" to find those groups.

We appreciate everyone's understanding and cooperation on this issue. Questions or comments may be directed to the Pride Lafayette board of directors by using our contact form to send us a message.