ADMIN: New Introductory Membership for New Members

[John Walton]

Dear HPforGrownups members,

This message effects a change in list policy towards new members on the
HPforGrownups list. It's with some reluctance that the Moderator Team have
to make this change, so we wanted to take this opportunity to explain to you
why we feel this change is necessary.

As many of you have undoubtedly observed, the list is growing quickly,
particularly as interest in HP and the group has increased with the release
of the movie and with our exposure in the New York Times. Hundreds of new
members have been welcomed onto the list.  That's fantastic, and we expect
our membership to continue to grow as anticipation of Book 5 mounts.

The unfortunate consequence of that, however, is that the Mods -- and
members -- are seeing a dramatic spike in the number of posts that violate
one or more of our rules.  We have seen snipping problems, inattentive
spelling and grammar, posting on the wrong board, inaccurate subject lines,
and failure to read our Admin Files and ADMIN messages.

This reduces the enjoyment of the group for everyone. In fact, some newer
members (who have not seen the list at what we'd consider its best) have
left, citing reasons of post volume -- and quality.

We think that the discussion here is of a higher quality than you'd expect
from other Harry Potter lists. We *know* we have more rules than others.
This is not a coincidence. The reason HPFGU has survived without degrading
into meaningless drivel and the reason that the older members stick around
without getting tired of the repetition is because we have these rules to
keep the list running smoothly. They are for everyone's benefit -- if you
don't appreciate that now, you'll come to appreciate it soon.

For these reasons, we've decided to introduce an introductory period of
membership to the list.

YahooGroups has a handy technical option which we have been considering for
quite a while. It's called "unmoderated, moderate new members", and several
groups we've seen use it to excellent effect. This means that all incoming
members, retroactive to November 22, will be on Moderated Status for a short
period of time.  We understand that the way HPFGU works is complex, and
misunderstandings can result in repeated violations of list policy.

Moderated Status allows the Moderators to check the posts for compliance
with the rules before releasing them to the group at large. Since we have a
large number of people with Moderator privileges (the Mods, Elves and
Poltergeists), we expect that posts will either be approved or rejected
promptly. When a post is rejected, it will be sent back to the author for
revision in accordance with our list rules.

After a brief period of good posting in observance of list policy, new
members will be removed from Moderated Status and will then be able to post
as normal.

In the meantime, we encourage all of our new members to keep an eye on the
email accounts they used to register with HPFGU, as this is where you will
receive notification of any problems concerning any of your posts.  Also,
remember that if your post does not appear right away, you should give it
time, then check your email account.  Do not simply keep sending your
message over and over.

Our other lists, HPFGU-Movie, -OTChatter and -Announcements will remain
unchanged, although the number of warnings for posts not complying with list
rules will be reduced to one.

Please understand that this change in policy is by no means designed to
discourage our new members from participating in our group.  Each new member
brings his or her unique point of view to the community, and it is this
diversity of perspective, experience and personality that keeps the list
exciting, interesting and fresh.  We hope all of you will continue to offer
your insights and contribute to our discussions.

For more information, or to comment on this new policy, email the Moderator
Team at MagicalMods at yahoogroups.com.

--AJJP&N, Magical Moderator Team