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(FAQ)  

Please respond to my assignment to post to this newsgroup.


Originally from
ftp://garbo.uwasa.fi/pc/link/tsfaqn.zip
Questions from Usenet and Timo's answers

We are taking this Internet class. Our lecturer assigned us to post a message to the Usenet news as part of the course. Please respond to this posting, so that I get my assignment done.

First of all, are you sure you have understood the assignment correctly? Was the assignment really to post to a newsgroup that propagates outside your institution? If it indeed was, I am afraid that that is not a considerate assignment from your lecturer. Please convey my regards to him/her, with a reference to this WWW page. Test postings should be made in test newsgroups. In the case of assignments strictly local test groups, which do not propagate anywhere outside, are the most suitable ones. In particular, international newsgroups like alt.newbie and news.newusers.questions are meant for new users' questions. These international newsgroups are not proper testing grounds. One should have genuine content for a bona fide posting even if considering the nature of these newsgroups the miscellaneous nature of the postings is more than understandable.

It gets even worse if the assigned task is to post a fixed question. Making a lot of students to post exactly the same message into an international newsgroup like news.newusers.questions is highly irresponsible net behavior from the part of your lecturer. A good lecturer on Internet and Usenet news usage should really know better than that. What on earth does your lecturer think would happen to the Usenet news if, say, a 10000 lectures would give their classes an assignment to ask the same question? The inevitable fact of the case is that your lecture needs to acquaint him/herself with the basics of the netiquette. For more netiquette points please see e.g. Links to Timo's FAQ materials.

What is said here goes for email as well. It is very irresponsible from his/her part if your lecturer has assigned you the task of making indiscriminate international email contacts as a part of the course. It shows your lecturer's ignorance, and subjects the students to the potential repercussions from the riled targets.

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