Archive-name: clarinet/intro

		       Introduction to ClariNet

Welcome to the ClariNet Electronic Publishing network.  ClariNet provides 
an "electronic newspaper" and more, in formats used by popular electronic 
conferencing systems.  You can read and access a full range of electronic 
news on your own computer, with your own software, at your own pace.  

The primary format for ClariNet news is the USENET message interchange 
format, which is used by a wide variety of electronic conferencing systems. 
USENET began in 1979 when two universities hooked together their Unix  
computers to exchange messages.  Since then, the number of hookups has 
grown, and currently USENET is the largest electronic conference in  the 
world.  

USENET has no central authority or structures.  Sites simply share messages 
and pass them on to their neighbours.  When you post a message, your 
computer sends it on to all your neighbours, and they tell two friends,  
and they tell two friends, and so on, and so on, until the entire network  
receives the message.  

These systems were created for both discussion and the dissemination of 
announcements.  The structure of the network, however -- a free form 
anarchy -- was great for plain open discussion, but left no mechanism for 
the electronic publishing of copyrighted material.  

The ClariNet network was created in parallel to allow for this.  It uses 
the same file format and transmission mechanisms, so subscribers can read 
the news with no extra effort.  Unlike USENET, however, it is controlled, 
and subscription fees are charged to pay the copyright holders.  

This manual is primarily for those with some familiarity with USENET.    If 
you are unfamiliar with USENET, a later chapter provides some extra  
information.  Your system will also contain documentation for USENET tools 
and newsreaders.  

All news on USENET and ClariNet is divided into what are known as 
"newsgroups."  A newsgroup can be an electronic conference (like a bulletin 
board), a channel for the distribution of software, an edited discussion, 
or an electronic publication.  Almost all ClariNet newsgroups are 
electronic publications -- in most cases, categories of news.  

You can think of many ClariNet newsgroups as vaguely analogous to pages in 
a newspaper.  Our baseball group, for example, has all the information that 
you will find on the baseball pages of a newspaper.  

Differences:

Those familiar with USENET should be able to ease right into reading 
ClariNet news.  All ClariNet newsgroups begin with the prefix "clari" and 
fall into one of a small number of product hierarchies.  You subscribe to 
and read these groups in the same manner as USENET groups.  

There are some fundamental differences, however, that you will want to 
consider: 

 o ClariNet articles have a meaningful headline prepared by a professional 
   journalist.  You can scan the headlines quickly to see what you wish to 
   read.  

 o ClariNet articles are keyworded using the topics the article covers.  

 o ClariNet articles aren't discussions, they are news.  There are no
   followups, though reference chains exist.

 o ClariNet articles come with a wide variety of extra headers providing 
   useful classifying information about the article.  

 o ClariNet articles come fast, and network links are designed to propagate 
   them quickly.  They also become stale more quickly, turning into 
   "yesterday's news." 

 o ClariNet articles on big stories are updated frequently.  Each update 
   cancels the previous article and adds a new one with the latest details.  
   You will thus find lots of gaps in ClariNet newsgroups where canceled 
   articles used to be.  

 o As a consequence of the above, ClariNet feeds generate hundreds of 
   cancel messages every day.  

 o ClariNet articles are all copyrighted, and may not be distributed 
   without permission.  See the licence terms.  

 o Most ClariNet articles are crossposted to 2-4 groups, if their subject 
   matter falls in multiple categories.  

 o You can't reply to, or follow-up ClariNet articles.  They are 
   publications, not discussions.  Some groups exist for the discussion of 
   ClariNet and articles within it.  Most ClariNet groups are marked as 
   "moderated," but you may not submit to them, even by mail.  

 o Some ClariNet articles make heavy use of underlining as understood by 
   many newsreading programs.  (Underlining is done by prefacing a character 
   with an underbar and a backspace.) 

[ Note to regular readers -- we will not be putting out diffs with changes
to these documents.  Rather, we announce news about ClariNet in the groups
clari.net.announce and clari.net.admin ]