WELCOME TO THE MINI-FAQ FOR ALT.TV.HOMICIDE

Portions which are new since it was last posted are marked with a ! ; modified sections are marked with a + ***

CONTENTS

 

1.0.....Introduction, History, and Definitions  2.0.....Rules of the newsgroup  3.0.....FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)  3.1.....Homicide: Life on the Street (and what's a red-ball?)  3.2.....I heard it was based on a book?  3.3.....What is "the Board," and how do you read it?  3.4.....The Command Structure of the Baltimore PD  3.5.....Who's who (Actors, characters, and real people)  3.6.....How to tell the main characters apart.

3.7.....Major points/characters from previous seasons.  3.8.....H:LotS resources on the Web and Internet.  3.9.....Upcoming episodes and why the promo titles are different! +  3.10.....The Music.  3.11.....alt.tv.homicide in-jokes and secrets. + 3.12.....An unadorned episode list for all four seasons.  3.13.....What the #@$%# is the deal with H:LotS getting no Emmy?  3.14.....So you want to be an extra on Homicide... + 4.0.....Suggestions (a few words to the wise)

 

4.0.....SUGGESTIONS

Now, these are just suggestions, so feel free to violate them with wild abandon. Heed them, however, and I promise your posts will look better, and be more interesting. Unless the goal is to look like a gomer...

Suggestion 1, be very careful with flames, accusations and questions of a fellow poster's "authority." We have real cops (including Homicide detectives), and real H:LotS personnel who comment here frequently. And these people don't always identify themselves in every post; they are "known" to the rest of us, simply by past contact. So if you disagree with a post (or someone disagrees with you), don't embarrass yourself by accusing them of being stupid and unknowing on the subject, when in fact it's quite possible that yes, they really do that for a living!

Suggestion 2, it isn't my intention to hurt anyone's feelings, but let me disabuse you of a prevalent myth; quoting anything at length and verbatim, in every circumstance except a stage-style performance, is tacky, stupid, and nerdy. This includes song lyrics (especially if they are either pseudo-romantic or pseudo-angst-ridden), Monty Python movies (especially The Holy Grail) and comedic routines (especially if you laugh at the punch lines before anyone else). Instantly pegs you as juvenile. It's much cooler to quote a few lines, and let your comrades fill in the blanks in their minds; allusions beat out recitations every time.

Suggestion 3, good grief it's been weeks; go buy someone flowers!

Suggestion 4, confine "me too! me too!" responses to private email. It is a wonderful thing, to agree with something or someone completely. It is a boring and boorish thing, to force the rest of the world to listen to you nodding your head. If you like what is said, but have nothing to add, then just respond to the original poster (via private email) and say so; no need to drag the rest of us into it. And you'll find that one of the other great pleasures of doing this is you can strike up wonderful conversations with others like yourself.

Suggestion 5, DON'T POST USING ALL CAPITALS, unless you want to look like a tantrumming three-year-old. dont leave out punctuation and such unles u want to look lik a hack-r wana-be stuuge twitch.

Suggestion 6, when you _do_ post a response, and you need to include some of the original post as a reference, please, please, please, pleasepleasepleaseplease edit the original post by deleting ALL of the post that does not apply to your response. Don't know how to edit specific lines or passages? Then ASK your sysop; that's what they are paid for. It is the hallmark of hurried (and rude) responders to include an eight page original post, in order to respond to just one paragraph (or to just say "me too!). A good rule of thumb, in fact, is to try to keep your posts (and responses) to less than one page in length. Makes for easier digestion on our part, and makes your post seem much less cluttered.

As a corollary to this, do NOT include massive sigs on posts that are less than a couple of pages. You WILL post here again, so only include the sig (if it's more than three lines) on posts that are already long. Internet tradition is that sigs be four lines or less, anyway. Violation of this correlary is a dead give-away that the violator is a beginner.

Suggestion 7, regarding spoiler information; feel free to post information which may "spoil" upcoming episodes (the sources for spoilers are legion; trade magazines, interviews, the NBC web-site, educated guesses on your part, etc). A spoiler is any piece of information, which when read, will give away or "spoil" some aspect of a particular episode (or episodes) IF the reader hasn't seen it yet. You know, who gets the case, if the suspect is guilty, who the guest star will be, particular lines/scenes that you loved; these are spoilers. BUT; -- BUT-- mark the post as a spoiler at the beginning (by writing the word "SPOILER" on the subject line AND the first line of your post. And then leave an entire page blank before revealing whatever it is you have to relate (this is called "spoiler space"). It is common courtesy to allow others the choice of whether or not to share in your reading-the-last-chapter-first.

Suggestion 8, Be kind. It's free, and solves more problems than blustering. Don't believe me? Think through the last dozen or so confrontations you were involved in, and count how many were solved (not ended; solved) by escalation of dispute.

Suggestion 9, Do *NOT* reply to spam/cross-posted threads (unless you have a really creative way to bend it's original generic message to the theme of the group; even then, delete all the other groups from the header). Think about it for a minute. If you reply to a post that was sent to dozens of newsgroups.....your reply will also go to those dozens of newsgroups. And you will be qualified for pillorying by the denizens of those dozens of newsgroups. Additionally, when dimrods in the other newsgroups respond to your half-wit post, we (in alt.tv.homicide) will be forced to wade through them as well; a complete waste of Internet bandwidth, and of particular irritation to those among us who pay for every minute of Internet time. Remember what your Mom told you, about ignoring your little brother and he'd go away? That is the best policy here. If you must respond, then just email the original author (or their sysop). Don't know how? Then ask someone else.

And thanks to Jim King, Valkyry, Sergeant Steve, Michaela Schlocker, Joe Clark, Dave Locke, Steve Auerweck, and Cathy Brady for wise and gracious help in the correction and editing of this document.

May you live in interesting times.

______
John S. Landbeck

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