I hope you find the Highland Park Neighborhood mailing list useful. I enjoy running it, even if I am a bit pressed for time occasionally and make mistakes...! :-) Here are a few notes about this list. I apologize for the length of this message... I also promise that messages such as this one will be rare. :-) SERVER MAINTENANCE I'm moving the server that runs the list to my new home this week. The server will be down from Monday morning to sometime Tuesday if everything goes as planned... This move will have no effect on the Highland Park web site. ACCEPTABLE TOPICS Some folks were concerned that I sent messages about certain topics to this list... The problematic topics were notices of religious holidays/ceremonies, a message from a local political candidate, and "ads" for local non-profit organizations. When I created this list, my goal was to promote and inform the Highland Park neighborhood--which includes its residents, businesses/organizations, and the park. As the moderator of the list, I publish announcements based on their relevance to the neighborhood. I can't presume to speak for everyone, so I need your feedback to judge what's appropriate. If you haven't already sent me your comments, please consider doing so. I'll be busy moving over the next few weeks, but I'll still read email regularly. SUBMISSIONS TO THE LIST I encourage anyone who has something to announce to the neighborhood to use this list to do so. You can send your submissions to me, or send them to the list posting address (in the "to" header of this message). But please keep in mind that the moderation guidelines for the list may mean that your message doesn't make it to the list. Here are the current guidelines: Frequency - I *try* to send out only one message per day, and no more than a few messages per week. The mailing list will be less effective if there are so many messages that folks stop reading it. Many times I will hold a message over to the next day to keep the number of messages low. Relevance - Submissions to the list should be of general interest throughout the neighborhood. This isn't always so easy to gauge, but generally, if a message is about someone doing something interesting in the neighborhood, or about someone from the neighborhood doing something interesting elsewhere, it's relevant to the list. Sometimes I'll include announcements about unique events elsewhere such as CMU's recent hazardous waste collection event, and their upcoming computer recycling event. Advertising - It would be great to hear what local organizations and businesses are doing occasionally, but the list cannot be a general advertising medium. Local organizations and businesses are important to the neighborhood, so including messages about them is an important part of promoting the neighborhood. Local businesses get "free advertising" when they sponsor a local event--that works out well for everyone! These guidelines evolve over time, based partly on your feedback! IDENTIFYING MESSAGES In March, I added "[Highland Park]" to the subject line of all messages sent to the list to help distinguish them from "spam". Since many messages sent to the list will not be from me, the subject tag should reduce any confusion over whether a given message is something relevant to the neighborhood when the sender is unknown to you. PRIVACY POLICY The Highland Park Neighborhood mailing list operates under the same "privacy policy" as the Highland Park web site does: <http://www.highlandparkpa.com/privacy.htm> Rudy