3.1 The rtfm.mit.edu archive

All postings in the List of Periodic Informational Postings (LoPIP;
see Section 3.2), including all the documents about the *.answers
newsgroups themselves, are archived at rtfm.mit.edu (18.181.0.24).  A
posting does not have to be cross-posted to any *.answers newsgroups
to be stored in the rtfm.mit.edu archive, it just has to be in the
LoPIP.  In particular, any PIP which is submitted to the *.answers
moderators, and for which we can determine the author, Subject, and at
least one newsgroup, will be listed in the LoPIP and archived at
rtfm.mit.edu.

Any file at the rtfm.mit.edu archive can be obtained by anonymous FTP 
or using an email file server.  To request a file, send email to mail-
server@rtfm.mit.edu containing:

    send usenet/FILENAME

in the body of the message.  If you want to find out more about the
mail server, send a message to it containing "help".

Most postings are stored under several different filenames, using hard
links to save space.  For a posting which is cross-posted to
news.answers, the most stable name will be the one derived from its
archive name: /pub/faqs/ARCHIVE-NAME

Other informational postings which do not have archive names are saved 
in directories corresponding to their Newsgroups, under names derived 
by replacing spaces in their Subject lines with underscores.  For 
example, a file with the following headers

    Subject: Foo Faq (v. 2.5)
    Newsgroups: alt.foo

will be stored as /pub/usenet/alt.foo/Foo_Faq_(v._2.5) as well as in
several other places.

3.2 The List of Periodic Informational Postings

Unless you tell us otherwise, we will add any postings submitted to
*.answers to the "List of Periodic Informational Postings" (LoPIP)
articles which appear in news.answers and news.lists.misc, and thus
begin archiving them at rtfm.mit.edu.

Even if you don't want to submit your posting for *.answers at this
time, we would be glad to add it to the LoPIP.  You don't need to
follow any guidelines (apart from appropriateness); just send us a
copy of the full headers of your posting, and keep us updated with any
changes.  All posts listed in the LoPIP are archived at rtfm.mit.edu
whether or not they are cross-posted to *.answers.

If you would like to get a copy of the LoPIP postings, to see what 
they're like or to check if your posting is already listed, see the 
instructions in Section 4.6.

3.3 Why we have guidelines

These *.answers submission guidelines serve to ensure that three 
overall goals, established when the *.answers newsgroups were created, 
are met by postings which appear there.

    A. Automatic archiving
    ----------------------

    One of the main points for having *.answers newsgroups is that
    they can be archived automatically in order to build up a database
    of periodic informational postings.  Requirements such as the
    "Archive-name:" line further that goal.  Listing home newsgroups
    first in the Newsgroups header also helps by providing better key
    information for index lists and catalogues of periodic
    informational postings.

    B. Appropriateness
    ------------------

    Only PERIODIC, INFORMATIONAL postings that are intended to be read
    by people belong in the *.answers newsgroups.  Requirements in the
    guidelines such as a valid "Followup-To:" line (to help prevent
    replies to particular periodic informational postings from
    appearing in the *.answers newsgroups or being mailed to the
    moderators) further this goal.  Likewise, listing the home
    newsgroup(s) first in the Newsgroups line minimizes accidental
    postings to the *.answers newsgroups from people using buggy
    newsreaders.

    C. Usefulness to people
    -----------------------

    The postings should be as useful as possible, both for the people
    who read them in the home newsgroups and for the people who read
    them in the *.answers newsgroups.  Requirements such as
    descriptive "Subject:" lines and carefully chosen "Newsgroups:"
    lines further this goal.