What is Megabyte University?MBU was a discussion list (founded in 1990) composed of professors, teachers, grad students, and administrators in Rhetoric and Composition, and more generally in English or language studies. They represented several different levels of institutions: secondary and community college as well as university graduate students and faculty. MBU physically ran at Texas Tech University, in Lubbock, Texas, and was administered by Fred Kemp. Photos of some members of MBU are featured in my Conference Photo Gallery. Now that MBU exists in the past tense, this FAQ will refer to ACW in all technical matters (such as how to subscribe, etc.), but will continue to use MBU as a concept--the spirit of the community, if you will.
How is ACW distributed?You can receive ACW in at least three ways.
How do I subscribe to ACW?Send a one-line message to listproc@listserv.ttu.edu:
subscribe acw-l [your name]
To unsubscribe:
unsubscribe acw-l -or- signoff acw-l
How do I temporarily "turn off" my ACW mail?Send a one-line message to listproc@listserv.ttu.edu:
set acw-l mail postpone
When you're ready to return to receiving mail:
set acaw-l mail (ack / noack / digest) [one of those three]
Display a fuller list of LISTPROC commands
Are there archives of MBU discussions stored anywhere?MBU has been archived at Texas Tech since June 1994 and is available
through the web:
http://www.ttu.edu/lists/mbu-l/
ACW archives are in a similar place, by the way:
http://www.ttu.edu/lists/acw-l/
For the period before June 1994, some MBUers have saved parts of it. Bob
Boston keeps every scrap of MBU material that passes his way (with the exception
of a period in 1993[?]). Leland McCleary
has most of the period (with a few small gaps) from October 1992 through
June 1994, and has indexed from October 1992 through December 1993, using
WordCruncher software.
Where can I get a copy of this FAQ?Since you're reading an HTML version of it right now, you could merely copy it from this screen. Here are other ways:
What is a LAN? What is a WAN? What is the difference?A LAN is a group of computers joined together with network hardware,
and who generally have access to a common fileserver. Many LANs are attached
to a single fileserver, but there may be others. LANs make two things very
easy: moving data around and sharing printers.
The term "WAN," or Wide-area Network is being used less nowadays,
and is generally being replaced by "The Internet." Originally,
a WAN referred to a grouping of LANs, so you had a cluster of LANs linked
together by some sort of "backbone" which enabled the different
LANs to share information between themselves.
Networking has gotten much more sophisticated in the past couple of years,
and the distinction between the "local" connections and the "wider"
groupings is becoming blurred.
What are the printed academic journals that cover these
topics?Generally, the Rhetoric and Composition journals like College English
and CCC will occasionally have articles on these topics, and Writing
on the Edge (UC Davis) has also carried such articles
More specifically, however, are
Computers and Composition (Ablex); Computer Assisted Composition
Journal (163 Wood Wedge Way, Carolina Trace, Sandord, NC 27330)
How do I cite electronic information?Kehoe, B.P. (1992). Zen and the art of the Internet (2nd.
Ed.), [Online]. Available WWW (World Wide Web): http://whatever.the/address.would/be.html
(on the date you found it). [This example is taken from Computer-Mediated
Communication Magazine ] U of Michigan
English Department. Teacher Resources, [Online]. Available via
Gopher: machine.name/directory/directory/ (the "last revised"
date or the date you found it)
Flood, Tim. "Re: why we teach composition." 17 April
1995. Online posting. Megabyte University (mbu-l@ttacs6.ttu.edu). Kolko, Beth. "Wyoming paper proposal."
E-mail to the author, 5 April 1995. Wilson,
Kim. "Re: the continuing crisis." 22 April 1995. Online posting.
News group comp.edu.composition. Usenet. 23 April 1995.
If you're referring to a stored transcript of a chat, then you can use
the ftp / gopher / www citing mentioned above. However,
if you are the only person who made a log of a conversation, then you should
use interview citation, e.g.:
Taylor, Paul. Personal electronic interview. MediaMOO (mediamoo.media.mit.edu
8888), 17 April 1995. --> The new
MLA guide is out, and some of the above is from there. Generally speaking,
however, you might refer to: Xia Li and Nancy Crane. Electronic
Style: A Guide To Citing Electronic Information. Westport CT: Mecklermedia,
1993.
--or--
The Electronic stylesheet constructed and maintained by Janice Walker and
endorsed by the Alliance for Computers and Writing:
http://www.cas.usf.edu/english/walker/mla.html
]
What is happening on lists like MBU?Fred Kemp answered this recently, and I hope he doesn't mind me quoting him:
Information distribution. The people who got the info provide it to people who don't got the info, much as happens in paper media. Lurking (lurning or learking) simply provides the necessary and honorable receiving end of the info distributing process. No one can blame the person who doesn't know the answer for not speaking up.
The forming of a learning community. Regardless of what information is sought or provided, if the majority of talkers on a list imply a common set of beliefs and values, then a group, however loose, begins to coalesce, and all the dynamics of group formation begin to occur. On a national list, a group identity begins to be asserted, one that people can tap into and employ in their professional and personal pursuits in complex but important ways. Although the social element of learning is much talked about these days, how this is manifested over the Internet is not well understood.
Giving voices to new members of a discipline. The list is more egalitarian than previous media or processes of idea exchange. Notice the word "more," which is often confused by the critics as a claim of "perfectly egalitarian," which the lists are not. But more is better than less. Here people can say what they want when they want; what they say may or may not be read and responded to, but that is a function of their own rhetorical ability and interests, not the result of outside elements selecting and encouraging or suppressing. If women or minorities don't express themselves as frequently or with as aggressive a voice as the traditional loud white male, it is not because the medium (the list) privileges the loud white male; it is because the habits of face-to-face encounter (which do privilege the loud white male) cannot be shucked in a year or two.
What is evident is that graduate students or junior faculty are not suppressed or ignored simply because they are graduate students or junior faculty (as often happens on campuses), mainly because it is hard to know who is and who isn't a graduate student or junior faculty. Eventually the graduate student or junior faculty member stops thinking of herself or himself as such and starts acting like a producing member of the community, and THAT becomes the transforming moment when the passive consumer of prior knowledge becomes the researcher, the active producer of new knowledge. Then we old hands no longer have to beat interesting ideas out of them with grades and such; we have to start running faster ourselves just to stay up with them. The Internet is, I think, the most important catalyst we've ever had in encouraging that all-important transition from student to researcher, from those who want to read about the best way of doing things to those who want to create the best way of doing things.
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Please send any amendments, requests, questions, and gripes to:
my University of Texas account: (
locke@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu ) or
my Daedalus Group account: ( locke@mail.daedalus.com
)
This FAQ is also available at http://www.daedalus.com