If you have an account here, you must obey the following rules. They are designed to protect the server, its network access, your fellow users, and the good reputation of the Greens. Your account is donated because I think you will use it to advance the Green movement and Green values in the world. If what you do with the account causes a stream of complaints, you're doing something wrong and I will have to disable your account if you don't stop.

These rules also apply to users on my other computers.

1. No Spamming. Electronic mail is not a medium suited for unsolicited advertising. It is designed for one-to-one, intentional, consensual communication. You may send all the mail you want, as long as everyone you send it to requested it in some way. Details. The same goes for Netnews. No posting stuff where it doesn't belong.

2. No sharing your password. As the Green movement grows, we can expect to have lots of users sharing this machine. Each person must use his or her own account. If more than one person will be working on your group's project, read this.

   The donation policy is designed so you will never have a money reason to share your password.

3. No interfering with other people's use of the system or the services it supports. In particular, flooding a forum with offensive or nonsensical drivel, in an effort to make people unsubscribe, is not allowed. Freedom of speech implies not having your speech drowned out by jerks. I will not kill an account for expressing an unpopular opinion, but I will kill it for expressing it over and over and over. The former is exactly what freedom of speech is for. The latter infringes others' rights, and it's patriarchal, dominating, violent behavior, inconsistent with the Ten Key Values of the Greens.

4. No copyright violations. Even as we work to keep our common information heritage (of the biosphere and of human culture) free for all to use, we must respect individuals' and their corporations' rights to what intellectual property they lawfully own.

   Certain copyright violations may be intentional acts of conscience, but these must be considered as carefully and undertaken as seriously as any other act of nonviolent civil disobedience. When you lend a friend your Microsoft Office[tm] installation disk, are you making a public protest? (No.) Are you willing to endure law enforcement for it? (I'm not.) Isn't there a better way to protest Microsoft's predations? (There is!)

   Do not distribute software you don't have a right to, in any way that is connected with this system. This includes computer software, music, poetry, literature, images, etc. However, ``fair use'' quotations are okay.

5. No illegal activity. Do not use this system to conspire to break the law, except in the context of thoughtful, nonviolent civil disobedience. Details.

6. No ``cracking.'' People have a right to secure their systems against unauthorized use. You are not allowed to attempt to defeat anybody's computer security measures using this machine in any way. Even if their security measures are laughably lame! Details.

7. Remain available. I must be able to contact you. Details. THIS IS MANDATORY. I need to be able to contact you in an emergency which threatens our connectivity or presents a legal liability. If I don't have a way to contact you when I need it, I may have no choice but to disable your account and remove your files.

8. Keep your software current. This is new, January 2005.
   Security problems are found in popular software every day. If you install software here, you must watch the place you got it for security-related news and code revisions. If the package has a security newsletter or other mechanism, you must subscribe. You must remain able to revise or replace your software. When a security-related revision or patch is announced, you must revise your installation right away. If your installed software is out of date or seems to be causing a security or abuse problem, or comes from a source with a history of security issues, I may remove or disable it without notice.

   This requirement applies to the client system you use to log in here, too. If your operating system, email software, Web browser, or libraries and utilities are out of date, your system can become vulnerable to spyware which can compromise the security of any server you log into. Make a reasonable effort to keep your system(s) current. Subscribe to your software vendor's update service and check for updates before you log in here or download email and active documents or visit untrustworthy Web sites. If you use Microsoft, install programs to search for viruses, trojans, spyware, and adware, and keep them current. (Beware that the most popular "antivirus" products do not remove spyware and adware.)