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2) MACCA-L

2.1. What is MACCA-L?

MACCA-L is an internet mailing list moderated by Cathy Munro and Lynn Harvey, dedicated to the discussion and celebration of the music of Paul McCartney. Its motto: 'Paul without guilt.' A subscription allows you to send mail to the mailing list and to receive postings from other subscribers.

Information on appropriate content, and on subscribing to the list follows.

The MACCA-L home page: http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.macca-l.org/

2.2. How do I subscribe?

To subscribe to MACCA-L, send an email to http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.mccartneyfaq.com/moderator@macca-l.org explaining briefly your interest in McCartney's music, and ask to be allowed to join the mailing list.

If you would rather, you can instead subscribe to the digest form of MACCA-L, featuring a number of postings compressed into one message, sent approximately twice daily, by first sending an explanatory email message to http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.mccartneyfaq.com/moderator@macca-l.org, specifically explaining that you wish the digest format.

2.3 What is appropriate content for the list?

This is very much a fan's list, and as such, it is expected that the content will reflect this. General discussion of McCartney's work by non-fans would be more appropriately directed to the rec.music.beatles newsgroup.

Suitable content includes, but is not limited to, in-depth consideration of particular songs and recordings, discussions of McCartney's influence and influences, ideas, songwriting partners, musicianship, composition, or, quite often, simply how a song brightened your life. It is customary, though not obligatory, to briefly introduce yourself the first time you post to the list.

Some important points of protocol:

Do not include lengthy quotations from previous messages in your replies. Just don't do it. Please take the few extra seconds to delete the text of the message you are replying to, leaving a few key phrases -- one or two lines of quoted text, ideally, rather than 10 or 20.... or 50. Also please do not include any binaries, GIFS, JPGS, etc... people outside North America often pay charges by the second for downloading messages from the list, and they *very much* appreciate your consideration in this regard. The moderators take breaches of this rule seriously.

If you are posting information to the list, please try to give the source (newspaper, book, television show, person) and as much other information as you know (page number, date, time) that could help someone else track it down if they wanted to -- part of the joy of sharing information! Also remember, although we are a pretty honest bunch on MACCA-L, on the internet especially, information is only as good as your sources.

Please don't put auto-reply options on your account (vacation messages, etc), since these can be a real problem for the list and the moderators. Please also don't let your inbox on the server fill up to the extent that the list starts to get messages bounced from your account. This causes similar difficulties.

If possible, use informative subject lines. This is just standard internet courtesy, but on MACCA-L, since we have so much traffic, and people often do not have time to read all the messages, it is often worth taking a couple of extra seconds' thought, both out of courtesy and because people are more likely to read a message with an detailed subject line. 'Ringo's vocals in Beautiful Night' instead of just 'Beautiful Night' and so forth.

MACCA-L has attached to it a separate list devoted to Linda McCartney and her work and interests, particularly photography, vegetarianism, and animal rights issues. See Lynn Harvey's LindaMac-L FAQ for details:
http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.anthemion.com/mccartney/linderfaq.htm
which can be linked to from the LindaMac-L homepage:
http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.macca-l.org/~cathy/lindamac.htm

2.4. What do all of those abbreviations mean?

The internet is full of abbreviations, and MACCA-L is no exception. Many of the names of Paul's albums, in particular, are abbreviated on the list. Rudi Riet (rdrie@conncoll.edu) has kindly prepared a document containing an exhaustive list of these for the FAQ. For all your Macronym needs, please see the MACCA-L Acronym Decoder Chart.

2.5 MACCA-L affiliated projects and pages

• The MACCA-L home page: http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.macca-l.org/.

• Lynn Harvey's MACCA-L Links page contains a splendid collection of McCartney links which give a real sense for where the MACCA-L and McCartney community on the net is at: its people and spinoff projects. Some great artwork from Lynn can be found here, including her cover designs for the proposed Bogey Music tribute tape (see below). Adds materially to the MACCA-L feeling of community.
  http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.anthemion.com/mccartney/index.html

• MACCA-L Members Pictures Page -- Colin Barratt originated a page of pictures of many members of the MACCA-L community. A great way to find out what people look so you can spot them at a convention. This page is now being maintained by Amanda Beoletto, and can be found at: http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.anthemion.com/macca-l/members%20pix/ Send email to mcmembers@anthemion.com if you want to add or update your information.

• In a similar vein, Jason Childers ongoing Geographic Poll is a census, broken down by country, of all the members of MACCA-L. This is the best place to get an appreciation for just how international the MACCA-L community is, and also to find an email address you've forgotten. http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.degraff.net/geomain.html

• Kenneth McGraff has been doing yeoman service in keeping the birthday list up to date, and keeping us up to date on those special days. http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.degraff.net/birthday.html He's also been helping Jason Childers, above, with the Geographic Poll. Be sure to check out his McCartney's Nashville site, with newspaper articles, interviews, photos, and other goodies related to the Macs six week recording session/holiday in Nashville in 1974. http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.degraff.net/maccanash.html

  If you are a member of MACCA-L, why not go and add yourself to both the birthday list and the geographic poll? http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.degraff.net/update.html

2.6 What if English is not my first language but I would like to post messages?

After a suggestion by Robin Fritche (rfritche@carroll1.cc.edu), several people volunteered to translate non-English messages written TO the list *into* English. This service is for list members for whom English is not their first language, and who wish to be able to express themselves precisely.

Available languages are Danish, French, German, Italian, Norwegian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Swedish. We also have volunteers for Ancient Latin, in case there are non-English-speaking classicists in the audience!

Simply mail your message to the translator listed for your language, and they will translate it for the list. Simple as that.

You may find it useful to know that Alta-Vista has a not-very-good computerized translation facility for English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and and Portuguese (Thanks to Erin for pointing this out!). It is recommended if you use the Alta-Vista utility, that you only do one sentence or paragraph at a time. http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://http//babelfish.altavista.digital.com/

Regardless of the method used to translate into English, Lynn and Cathy ask that you try to observe the following guidelines:

1. Include the original language message with the English translation in the post to the list.
2. If you are translating for someone else, be sure to "redirect" their message with your translation to the list so that the originator's email address is in the "from" field of the post. Identify yourself as a translator for [name of originator] in the body after your translation.
3. Keep the posts trim, with quoted text and headers and signatures kept to a necessary minimum.

List of Translators:

Portuguese / English

Silvia Lunazzi (silvialu@correionet.com.br)

Norwegian / Swedish / Danish / English

Roger Stormo (stormo@unforgettable.com)

Russian / English

Aya B. Mcarova ( HariOnTr@BMMak.Usr.PU.Ru
Alexander I. Mramornov" (mramor@intsar.com)

German / English

Ute Ruehl-Gering (ruehlgering@cww.de)

Spanish / English

Robin Fritche (rfritche@carroll1.cc.edu)
Bob "Berlitz" Hemauer ( rahemaue@students.wisc.edu)
Silvia Lunazzi (silvialu@correionet.com.br)

Italian / English

Aline Marchi (Waterfalls@webtv.net)

French / English

Steph ("mjowett@istar.ca")
Alexandra Burack (beatbard@javanet.com)

French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, English

http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.altavista.digital.com/

Latin / English (for time travellers :) )

Melissa Carroll (bf18213@binghamton.edu)

Lynn Harvey (harvette@macca-l.org) is coordinating the translation effort and maintaining the list of currently available translators. See the most current version of the list of translators at: http://web.archive.org/web/20041016193918/http://www.macca-l.org/translators.htm

Please send updates to this list (volunteers for other languages, notification that you can no longer maintain your volunteer status) to Lynn Harvey (harvette@macca-l.org).

2.7 How do I gain access to the MACCA-L archives?

If you are a member of MACCA-L you may ask for permission to gain access to the MACCA-L archives. These are password protected, and access is offered only to list members. If you wish access to the archives, write moderator@macca-l.org.

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