Creating a Newsgroup At UC Berkeley

This document describes or gives pointers for creating newsgroups in:

the ucb.* hierarchy (local to Berkeley)
traditional Usenet newsgroups (comp.*,misc.*,sci.*,etal)
the Alternative Newsgroups (alt.*).

Creating a Newsgroup in the ucb.* Hierarchy

The ucb.* Usenet hierarchy is a set of newsgroups for the discussion and announcements relating to the University of California at Berkeley Community. This can cover a spectrum of things from activities, politics, classes, leisure and forsale/wanted. A newsgroup can be targeted at the campus at large, or be used as just a discussion group for a research group in a department.

Three things are needed to set up a ucb group:

a reason
a name
demand

A reason can be pretty much anything non-frivolous. As long as it somehow relates to UCB, be it an organization, activity, or current event, it could get a newsgroup.

In selecting a name there are a couple of good rules to follow: it should be hierarchical, fitting in the current hierarchy of ucb.* groups. The name should also be descriptive, that is the user should be able to tell the subject matter of the group just from its name. Avoid non-obvious acronyms. As examples: organisations such as campus groups, unions, clubs, should go under the ucb.org.* hierarchy.

As far as demand or the need for a newsgroup is concerned, we'll generally take your word on it.

Send this information to usenet@agate.berkeley.edu and, though possibly subject to a few possible suggestions, the group will be created.

If an Instructor wants a ucb.class.* newsgroup, send mail to usenet@agate.berkeley.edu, with the following information:

The NAME of the class (e.g. Engineering 77)
YOUR relationship to the class (class newsgroups can be created by the appointed instructor for the class, or a GSI, provided the instructor consents to the creation of the group
The INSTRUCTOR'S NAME (if you are not the instuctor) and EMAIL address

The naming scheme is ucb.class.<classnumber>, ie ucb.class.lis259 or ucb.class.arch134b.

Some things to consider:

There is a tendency when thinking about creating newsgroups to overspecialize or overestimate demand. In general the more general a newsgroup is the more it is used. Creating a newsgroup called ucb.hobbies.stamps is probably a better idea than ucb.hobbies.stamps.russia, ucb.hobbies.stamps.usa and ucb.hobbies.stamps.mexico. If usage on a generalized newsgroup ramps up, it can always be split into more specialize ones later.
Creating a discussion group for an organization that isn't or is barely on line can be pointless.
If interest isn't already out there in the community, the creation of a newsgroup won't generate interest. Creating ucb.hobbies.stamps.new-guinea isn't going to make anyone more interested in the subject. Having a newsgroup does help focus existing interests.
Demand is always either underestimated or overestimated. It's hard to get it right.

Creating a Traditional Usenet Newsgroup

The creation of a traditional Usenet Newsgroup (ie the comp, news, sci, misc, soc, talk, rec hierarchies) is outlined in a posting, entitled How to Create a New Usenet Group, regularly posted every two months in news.announce.newusers and news.announce.newgroups. This can be done without any local intervention.

Creating a Alternative Usenet Newsgroup

The creation of an Alternative Usenet Group is pretty unencumbered.
Some guidance can be found from the alt.* creation guide.
Read the posting Creating a new "alt" group -- guidelines posted every month to alt.config, news.groups and news.answers. After posting to alt.config and getting a consensus for the group.
Send usenet@agate.berkeley.edu mail, and the group will get created.

If you simply would like to see a pre-existing alt.* group carried by agate, send email to usenet@agate.berkeley.edu with the group name and a short description of the group (for the newsgroups file). alt.* group request are almost always honored (except in the rare case that the group is known to be bogus).

Chris van den Berg