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BurmaNet News: Building the Net
- Subject: BurmaNet News: Building the Net
- From: strider@xxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 12 Nov 1994 08:01:00
************************** BurmaNet **************************
"Appropriate Information Technologies, Practical Strategies"
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BurmaNet News: Saturday, November 12, 1994
Issue #60 SPECIAL ISSUE: BUILDING THE NET
[The regular news for November 12 will be distributed separately]
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Contents:
BURMANET: A REQUEST TO THOSE DISTRIBUTING INFORMATION ON BURMA
BURMANET: BURMANET NEWS AVAILABLE VIA SNAILMAIL
BURMANET: CONTACT REQUEST--USERS OF BURMESE, MON AND KAREN FONTS
BURMANET: CONTACT REQUEST--UNIVERSITY CAMPAIGN ORGANIZERS
BURMANET: READERSHIP AND MONTHLY HOUSEKEEPING ANNOUNCEMENT
BURMANET: LIST ETIQUETTE
BURMANET: HOW TO SUBSCRIBE TO SEASIA-L
BURMANET: PRIVACY AND SECURITY ON THE NET
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BURMANET: A REQUEST TO THOSE DISTRIBUTING INFORMATION ON BURMA
November 11, 1994
U Ne Oo, a Burmese activist in Australia has circulated a letter to
others in Australia informing them of BurmaNet's existence.
BurmaNet would like to request that anyone publishing a newsletter
about Burma reprint his letter or an abbreviated form of it. The
essential message to communicate to people interested in news about
Burma is to first, get on the Internet and second, send a message
to strider@xxxxxxxxxxx
********
Date: November 8, 1994.
Dear Friends:
RE: BurmaNet News for Burma
---------------------------
Since early this year, there has been a news group called
soc.culture.burma operating within Internet. It is an un-moderated
and informal network for discussing issues relating to Burma and is
available to the public.
BurmaNet News is an electronic newspaper covering Burma, which now
publish daily - a kindful voluntary commitment made by the
co-ordinator. The news items covered are standard news as well as
original contribution from writers, expatriate organizations and
pro-democracy groups. BurmaNet news is broadcasted onto
soc.culture.burma, soc.culture.thai and bit.listserv.seasia-l.
As the Internet has been distributed worldwide, I have often seen
that there are contributors from as far away as Norway, Germany and
Japan; and also from Thailand, United States, Canada and United
Kingdom.
There has also been a semi-private mailing list, known as
reg.burma-list, with the total number of subscribers is said to be
about 100. The subscribers appear to be some journalist, academics,
activists, NGOs together with a larger contingent of Burmese
students. Your subscription to that list can be made in an
anonymous fashion, if preferred, and only the coordinator of
BurmaNet would know of your participation.
To have BurmaNet news, you would need to have a computer with modem
and a computer account. There is an organization in Australia -
which I am aware of - provide such accounts for general public:
the Pegasus networks or Peace-Net, and usually a small operating
fees is applied. If you are a university student, you can get a
computer account (and automatically having access to the Internet).
Subscription to BurmaNet, however, is free of charges once you have
a computer account.
If you and your organization would like to have the Press Release
and public letters broadcasts through Internet, I would be happy to
assist in doing so. Anyone who have access to Internet can do the
same and is encouraged to do so.
Best Regards,
U Ne Oo.
***************
Co-ordinater of BurmaNet: strider@xxxxxxxxxxx
By fax: (in Thailand) (66)2 234-6674
Attention to BurmaNet, care of Burma Issues
address of Pegasus Network in Australia: agarton@xxxxxxxxxxx
Pegasus Networks
P.O. Box 284
Broadway QLD 4006,
Australia
**************************************************************
BURMANET: BURMANET NEWS AVAILABLE VIA SNAILMAIL
November 12, 1994
The BurmaNet News is now available to readers in Thailand and
Southeast Asia who do not have access to electronic mail. A
volunteer has offered to download, print out and mail the News to
people without net access. A subscription fee will be charged to
cover the cost of mailing and printing, which should be about 8
Thai baht per day. This service is available to readers outside of
Southeast Asia but it will be more expensive and you should expect
a mail-delay of at least a week.
If there are groups or individuals in North America, Europe and
Australia who would be willing to distribute the News via snailmail
on a regular basis, please contact strider@xxxxxxxxxxx
If you forward the News, please let BurmaNet know. Thus far,
readers in San Francisco, New York city, Texas and Sydney are
redistributing the News.
**************************************************************
BURMANET: CONTACT REQUEST--USERS OF BURMESE, MON AND KAREN FONTS
November 12, 1994
A request for information about Mon fonts has come in so if you are
designing or using a Mon Windows font, please contact BurmaNet.
The letter suggests that language font users and developers
cooperate to avoid duplication of efforts:
...there are several people working on making fonts and
typing systems in various minority languages using
SEAsian scripts. There is already a Sgaw Karen font
available, and others as well. It would be a pity if
people start inventing the wheel several times, and we
end up with texts with different character codes. We will
discuss this matter in a computer user's forum in some
days, but the general opinion is that we should make our
character codes and keyboard layouts public. That may
avoid getting into incompatibilities later. (Of course,
some font files may be transferred into public domain as
well, and not only the character codes.)
If you have developed or are working on a font for a language used
inside the Union of Burma, and would be interested in being put in
contact with other developers, please contact BurmaNet at
strider@xxxxxxxxxxx
**************************************************************
BURMANET: CONTACT REQUEST--UNIVERSITY CAMPAIGN ORGANIZERS
November 12, 1994
BurmaNet has received a request from a U.C.L.A. student for
information on other groups organizing university campaigns. If
you or someone you know is involved in a boycott or selective
purchase campaign, please contact BurmaNet and you will be put in
contact with others involved in the same issue.
Here is an extract from the original request:
...a group of students at UCLA in the Environmental
Coalition is pushing for a Pepsi Boycott on campus and a
selective purchasing agreement with the University. I
wanted to find out on the Net or wherever you think it
would be appropriate what campuses are doing similar work
to share resources. I don't know how to send out this
kind of request or where to send it but it would be
really helpful to us. Do you have any ideas? I'd really
appreciate it.
**************************************************************
BURMANET: READERSHIP AND MONTHLY HOUSEKEEPING ANNOUNCEMENT
November 10, 1994
Since the BurmaNet News mailing list began four months ago, the
number of subscriptions has risen to 133 with with 42 additions in
the past month.
DIRECT SUBSCRIPTIONS AS OF:
NOV 10 OCT 10 SEPT 10 AUG 10
TOTAL: 133 91 80 62
_______________________________________________________
Breakdown By Domain:
-------------------------------------------------------
com: 29 18 16 11 COMMERCIAL PROVIDERS
edu: 37 23 22 15 UNIVERSITIES IN USA
gov: 1 1 1 1 U.S. GOVERNMENT
net: 6 4 3 2 NETWORKS
org: 10 9 9 6 NON-PROFIT ORG.
au: 10 8 5 7 AUSTRALIA
ca: 7 2 2 2 CANADA
de: 0 0 1 1 GERMANY
lv: 1 1 1 0 ???
jp: 2 2 2 2 JAPAN
nl: 2 1 1 1 NETHERLANDS
no: 5 5 5 4 NORWAY
sg: 1 0 0 0 SINGAPORE
th: 14 12 7 7 THAILAND
tw: 1 0 0 0 TAIWAN
uk: 4 5 5 4 UNITED KINGDOM
us: 1 0 0 0 UNITED STATES
_____________________________________________________________
If you have announcements or news articles of interest to the
on-line Burma community, you can send them to BurmaNet at
strider@xxxxxxxxxxx or post them yourself. If you want an article
included with the BurmaNet News, please indicate whether you want
to be credited as the contributor or would prefer
to remain anonymous.
If you would prefer to post news articles or announcements
directly, then by all means do so. Here are the addresses you will
need.
For the BurmaNet News:
reg.burma@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
For the soc.culture.burma newsgroup:
soc.culture.burma@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
For the seasia mailing list [see note about subscription below]:
seasia@xxxxxxx
If your article has anything to do with Thailand, the
soc.culture.thai group
should be included as well:
soc.culture.thai@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
The soc.culture.burma newsgroup has an approximate readership of
2,000 at sites all over the world. The soc.culture.thai newsgroup
has a readership of about 10,000. The seasia mailing list has a
subscription of over 500 and is echoed as a newsgroup to several
thousand more. With all of these however, it is impossible to tell
how many people read any given article.
**************************************************************
BURMANET: LIST ETIQUETTE
If you are going to post articles directly, there are some things
you should keep in mind. First, soc.culture.burma and the other
USENET newsgroups are anarchical and anyone can post anything to
them.
The BurmaNet News mailing list however is semi-private and a couple
of conventions should be adhered to. First, a number of
subscribers prefer that the list volume remain low because they
have to pay for each message received over the Internet. If you
are distributing news articles, it will save these subscribers
money if you pack several articles together in one message
rather than sending them separately. If you put several messages
together,putting an index at the beginning is also helpful.
Some BurmaNet News subscribers also prefer not to receive messages
of the
"screw SLORC" variety.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Here is one of the complaints BurmaNet has received on the subject:
"I
hate SLORC, you hate SLORC, we all hate SLORC. So what? If
someone is going to say they hate SLORC, then they should at least
tell us why and if possible, do it in a way that is original."
One more thing to keep in mind is this. It is easy to
inadvertently give offense in an e-mail message. The medium
encourages quick notes rather than carefully prepared letters.
Without external signs like tone of voice or body language, it is
easy to interpret the tone of an e-mail message as being harsher
than the writer intended. If you are writing an e-mail message,
keep this in mind and be careful. If you are reading a message
from someone and it sounds peremptory, try giving the writer the
benefit of the doubt.
**************************************************************
BURMANET: HOW TO SUBSCRIBE TO SEASIA-L
Some readers have requested information on subscribing to the
SEASIA mailing list. To subscribe to SEASIA-L, send an email
message addressed to:
listserv@xxxxxxx
Leave the Subject, Attachment and any other information lines
blank. The body of the message should contain this line:
Subscribe seasia-l yourfirstname yourlastname
[note: you can abbreviate SUBSCRIBE to SUB]
To unsubscribe and leave the list, send the command SIGNOFF
SEASIA-L to MSU.EDU Again, this command must be sent to the
listserv, not SEASIA-L. This command must also come from the same
address that you originally subscribed from.
**************************************************************
BURMANET: PRIVACY AND SECURITY ON THE NET
No one except the listowner will know that you are subscribed to
reg.burma list unless you post something. If you don't want anyone
to know you are subscribed, don't post. If you have something you
want posted but don't want your name on it, you can either send it
to BurmaNet for forwarding or post it yourself using the anon
server.
For the greatest degree of privacy, learn how to use the anonymous
server in Finland. Send a message to help@xxxxxxxxxxxxx and it
will give you detailed instructions on how to send e-mail
anonymously.
If you have security concerns as well, learn how to use a data
encryption program called PGP (Pretty Good Privacy). You can find
instructions in the USENET newsgroup alt.security.pgp or contact
BurmaNet.
**************************************************************
NEWS SOURCES REGULARLY COVERED/ABBREVIATIONS USED BY BURMANET:
AP: ASSOCIATED PRESS
AFP: AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
AW: ASIAWEEK
AWSJ: ASIAN WALL STREET JOURNAL
Bt.: THAI BAHT; 25 Bt.=US$1 (APPROX),
BBC: BRITISH BROADCASTING CORPORATION
BI: BURMA ISSUES
BIG: BURMA INFORMATION GROUP
BKK POST: BANGKOK POST (DAILY NEWSPAPER, BANGKOK)
BRC-CM: BURMESE RELIEF CENTER-CHIANG MAI
BRC-J: BURMESE RELIEF CENTER-JAPAN
CPPSM: C'TEE FOR PUBLICITY OF THE PEOPLE'S STRUGGLE IN MONLAND
FEER: FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC REVIEW
JIR: JANE'S INTELLIGENCE REVIEW
KHRG: KAREN HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP
Kt. BURMESE KYAT; 150 KYAT=US$1 BLACK MARKET
100 KYAT=US$1 SEMI-OFFICIAL
6 KYAT=US$1 OFFICIAL
MOA: MIRROR OF ARAKAN
NATION: THE NATION (DAILY NEWSPAPER, BANGKOK)
NLM: NEW LIGHT OF MYANMAR (DAILY STATE-OWNED NEWSPAPER, RANGOON)
S.C.B.:SOC.CULTURE.BURMA NEWSGROUP
S.C.T.:SOC.CULTURE.THAI NEWSGROUP
SEASIA-L: S.E.ASIA BITNET MAILING LIST
USG: UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT
XNA: XINHUA NEWS AGENCY
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