Much of what has become accepted practice on the Internet is very wrong.

People send each other information in proprietary formats without even being aware of it. People join social networking sites without understanding what is happening to their privacy. Worse yet, they provide my name and email address to big businesses as part of their invitation process.

As a student of Internet as a medium, I continously search for the right policy and the right etiquette for behavior when using various aspects of Internet.

Below are some of the basic policies that I follow which are often in conflict with the sheepish common behaviors.

Confidentiality of Email Communications

I determine the confidentiality of email communications based on the context of communications.

I give hints to my expectations for confidentiality through my use of the from line -- e.g., public@ - activism@ ...

Many lawyer types include disclaimers at the bottom of their emails declaring the email confidential. That does not cut it. And the lawyer types that don't like this get to choose.

3rd Party Involvement in Communications

Quite often I receive ecards from an acquaintance for a certain event (birthday, holiday, ...). In the process that acquaintance has given a 3rd party my name and my email address and something about the nature of our relationship.

As a policy, I ignore ecards when a 3rd party is involved.

The beauty of the Internet is its End-to-End paradigm.

If you want to send me somthing let it be just between us.

Invitations to Join Social Networks

Quite often I receive invitations to join social networks.

The current paradigm of social networks is designed to suck information from people.

As a student of the medium, I have joined LinkedIn to experiment with social networking. So, please join me there if you wish.

Format of Information Exchange

Quite often I receive documents in Microsoft Word format or Microsoft Powerpoint formats. In response, I often send the following canned email.

Subject: I Prefer Not to Receive Informaton in Proprietary Formats

This is an automatic message:

You sent the document in Microsoft Word format, a secret proprietary format, so it is hard for me to read. If you send me plain text, HTML, or PDF, then I will read it.

Please recognize that this note is not about what you may have wished to communicate in that document. You have made the implicit assumption that I would be able to easily read the document in that format. That assumption is a mistake.

Distributing documents in Word format is bad for you and for others. Receiving Word attachments is bad for you because they can carry viruses (see
http://www.viruslist.com/eng/viruslist.html?id=7). Sending Word attachments is bad for you, because a Word document normally includes hidden information about the author, enabling those in the know to pry into the author's activities (maybe yours). Text that you think you deleted may still be embarrassingly present. See http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3154479.stm for more info.

But above all, sending people Word documents puts pressure on them to use Microsoft software and helps to deny them any other choice. In effect, you become a buttress of the Microsoft monopoly. This pressure is a major obstacle to the broader adoption of free software. Would you please reconsider the use of Word format for communication with other people?

To convert the file to HTML using Word is simple. Open the document, click on File, then Save As, and in the Save As Type strip box at the bottom of the box, choose HTML Document or Web Page. Then choose Save. You can then attach the new HTML document instead of your Word document. Note that Word changes in inconsistent ways--if you see slightly different menu item names, please try them.

To convert to plain text is almost the same--instead of HTML Document, choose Text Only or Text Document as the Save As Type.

Your computer may also have a program to convert to pdf format. Select File => Print. Scroll through available printers and select the pdf converter. Click on the Print button and enter a name for the pdf file when requested.

Regards,

...Mohsen

PS: For further reasons why .doc should not be the format of choice when exchanging information electronically, I invite you to read
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html It may be long, but it certainly exposes the compromises both you, as the sender, and I, as the receiver, are making by exchanging Microsoft Word documents.