After having noticed an increase in both unwanted commercial postings
made to my list as well as requests to me asking permission to make
such postings, I instituted the following policy for my list. The
list is for discussion of very low fat vegetarian diets and can be a
target for snake oil saleslime. I wanted to avoid these, yet still
allow some posting of products for sale -- specifically products
offered by active members of the list (and in one case, a book
influenced by my list and credited in the book). So here is my first
cut at a policy (it is included in the files sent to new subscribers):
3. No Commercial/Advocacy Postings (unless pre-approved)
Commercial or advocacy postings may not be made to FATFREE even
if the posting itself is purely informational. A commercial
posting is one made by a person or on behalf of a person or
organization selling a product or service containing
information about that product or service. An advocacy
posting is one aimed at collecting mass organized support for
a political, economic, or social cause. Explicitly prohibited
postings are posts of the type: "X is a great new product with
all these benefits, email me for more info". Announcements of
seminars where products (vitamins, etc) are sold are also
prohibited. This prohibition does not apply to unaffiliated
end-consumers making unsolicited recommendations on products
and services (note, the key here is *unaffiliated* and
*unsolicited*).
From time to time I *pre-approve* limited, on-topic commercial
postings. Pre-approval is required (email me at
fatfree-REQUEST@hustle.rahul.net). Usually the only postings
approved are book/cookbook/food product postings with specific
relevance to very low fat vegetarian diets, made by long-term
members of the FATFREE list. It helps if readers of the list
are offered a genuine discount on the product or service that
is not available to the general community.
I will remove postings in violation of this policy from the
digest.
Oh, and though I do not mention it above, I have no restrictions on
what may be contained in a 4-line sig to on-topic postings. Even
blatant and off-topic advertising is permitted in 4-line sigs to
otherwise on-topic substantive postings.
--
Michelle Dick, artemis@rahul.net, Owner: FATFREE Vegetarian Mailing List
"Feminism seeks to expand the roles accessible to women, including the
role of voyeur and sexual subject." --Marcia Pally
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