alt.2600 Survival Guide

                                by

                              Voyager
                            Will Spencer
                        will@gnu.ai.mit.edu

                      Last Updated: 1995/07/22

Welcome to alt.2600, the Internet newsgroup for readers of 2600
Magazine. On alt.2600 we discuss telephony (phreaking), computers
(hacking), and related topics.

The purpose of this guide is to help you fit into the newsgroup, and
avoid being flamed (insulted and abused) by the other users of this
newsgroup.

When posting to alt.2600, there are many previously unwritten rules
you must follow in order to receive an answer instead of a long round
of abuse.

The most intelligent thing you can do to avoid being flamed on
alt.2600 is to read the newsgroup for approximately two months before
you begin posting.  This will give you a good feeling for the social
climate existing in the newsgroup.

When you do post, either a new topic or a response to an existing
topic, try to make your post meaningful.  Try to include some useful
fact or bit of information.  alt.2600 readers tend to be technical
types, therefore chatter and opinions do not interest them.  They WILL
flame you.

When creating a new topic, keep the topic close to other topics you
have seen in the newsgroup.  Do not create topics on dogs, cars,
women, etc... There are appropriate newsgroups for all of those
topics, so please do not bother us in alt.2600 with them.  We do not
care, we WILL flame you.

If you are posting a question about the location of a file, state that
you have done an archie search for that file and had no success.
Mention all of the places you have looked for the file.  If you do
not, you will be flamed for wasting the time of thousands of alt.2600
newsgroup readers.

As a general rule to use when posting a question, state what other
methods you have used to locate the information you are seeking.
alt.2600 readers pride themselves on being hackers.  A hackers seeks
out information by every available means.  If the newsgroup readers
feel that you are asking the question without having done sufficient
research, you WILL be flamed.

If you are posting a question about how to locate a piece of
commercial software, state that you are aware it is commercial
software.  If you do not, you will be bombarded with replies informing
you that the software for which you are looking is commercial
software.  This will not be terribly helpful to you.

If you are posting looking for commercial software without any
intention of paying for it, you WILL be flamed.  While most newsgroup
readers have no ethical objection to violating copyright law, software
piracy is seen as a "lame" thing because of it's lack of technical
content.  alt.2600 is not a warez newsgroup.

Before you create a new topic, read the topic names of each and every
topic in the newsgroup.  If you create a topic that duplicates an
existing topic, it wastes the time of every participant in that topic.
You WILL be flamed severly.

When asking a question, make sure that the answer is not in the
alt.2600/#hack FAQ.  If the answer exists in the alt.2600/#hack, I
WILL flame you.  This document is posted regularly to the alt.2600
newsgroup.

In addition, the alt.2600/#hack FAQ may be found via ftp from:

rahul.net      /pub/lps/sysadmin/
rtfm.mit.edu   /pub/usenet-by-group/alt.2600/
ftp.clark.net  /pub/jcase/

Or on the World Wide Web at:
http://www.engin.umich.edu/~jgotts/underground/hack-faq.html

Or on my BBS:
Hacker's Haven (303)343-4053


Occasionally, you WILL be flamed for no reason at all.  This happens
to everyone.  Some newsgroup reader with a room temperature IQ will
misread your eloquent post and rant about your idiocy in a 400 line
tirade.  Forget about it, there is nothing you can do.  It's not even
worth your valuable time to try to straighten it out.

One important thing to remember is that unless you are exceptionally
stupid or exceptionally brilliant, few newsgroup readers will remember
your name from topic to topic or from post to post.  You might be
screaming adversaries with another newsgroup reader in one topic, and
close allies with the same newsgroup reader in another topic.  And you
may never notice it's the same person.  It's the post that's
important, not the poster.

To summarize, here are a few important rules to remember:

1. Read the newsgroup for two months before posting.
2. Make posts factual and meaningful.
3. Keep your posts on topic for this newsgroup.
4. State what homework you have done before resorting to asking on
   alt.2600.
5. Do not use alt.2600 for software piracy.
6. Check the alt.2600/#hack FAQ before posting a question.

If you keep these rules in mind and abide by them faithfully, you will
still get flamed.  However, you will be able to retaliate with a clear
conscience that you have done everything possible to preserve the
social culture of alt.2600.

EOF

-- 
/*  Will Spencer / Voyager        :  The advancement and diffusion  */
/*  Member: TNO, The New Order    :  of knowledge is the only       */
/*  alt.2600/#hack FAQ Editor     :  guardian of true liberty.      */
/*  Writer, poet, hacker, human   :               -- James Madison  */
-------------------------------