Questions about being here

History and community life

Who operates this place? How did it get started?

The original P&P2BB, a one-horse web bulletin board (message board) for those addicted to the adaptation, started by Amy, spun off in July 1996 from AUSTEN-L, an email discussion list. In Nov. of 1996, Amy formed an informal partnership with Myretta and they, along with the volunteer committee, have seen the community through many changes to become The Republic of Pemberley as it is today. The community was nomadic for a time, but settled in at a fine ISP in Boston in March 1997, when we registered our own domain name. Amy and Myretta managed the site together until 2000. Amy has has moved on to pursue other interests. Myretta now oversees the day-to-day operations of the site and the committee.

Every once in a while we update the look of our site. We have made albums of our previous designs. You can find them here: 1997-2003 2003-2011

All kinds. Though some people, who take pleasure from generalizing, say we all speak French, play the piano and own a cat. Read our bios on our Pemberleans Board.

Yes. Because our board software does not support online registration, the only way we can keep track of our posters is if they introduce themselves on our Newcomers' board. It may be old fashioned, but it works for us (and we tend to be a little old-fashioned anyway). When you do introduce yourself, check our List of Names in Use and then use a unique version of your real name. Please do not use honorifics, just initials, or aliases. Using our real names fosters our sense of community and is one of the things that differentiates us from many other online communities.

• Before bursting upon the scene and posting, spend some time getting to know us and what we talk about.

• If you like to be rude (or love a brawl), you will not like our company. If you don't like our ways, don't come here. We do tease and needle each other in a Lizzyesque fashion, but endeavor not to be so mean as Emma was on Box Hill, and strive never to let our differences get personal.

• If, as you have done your "getting-to-know-us" lurking, and after reading the list of names currently in use, you discover that a regular poster shares your name, please affix a number to your first name, use a middle name, incorporate your geography as an identifier, something like that -- but stick to it! Only one name per customer.

• Use your own name. We find it helps to keep things friendly, civil and accountable when people can't hide behind aliases. Just be yourself -- we have never found it to be a problem here. There are a few exceptions made for charter or nearly-charter posters. Also, aliases are expected on the Lady C board, where you may be certain that the venerable old bat will keep matters of civility well in hand.

• It's polite to read all or at least the latest posts in a thread before posting to it. If you end up repeating the same view another participant voiced earlier, it tends to make that other participant think, "Didn't anybody listen to me?"

• Please do not quote excessively from messages to which you are responding. Readers can easily click on the post and reread it, if they are so inclined, and our server does not need to serve up the same information twice.

• Don't correct people's grammar or spelling, please. The threat of being corrected may impede discourse, and we want people to feel comfortable here.

• Typing in all capital letters means that you are shouting. So, unless you mean to shout, don't.

• Don't post links to your own commercial ventures, or collect our e-mail addresses for unsolicited mailings.

• Please do not post pictures from other websites within your messages without asking permission of the owner. Pictures use up quite a lot of bandwidth for which the person hosting the picture usually has to pay. When you post it within a message, it is loaded every time someone reads your message at a cost to the person who put it on the web. If you particularly want us to see a picture, it would be better to post a link so that it is not forced to load when the message is opened. Either way, however, the polite thing to do is ask first. Conversely, please do not post a picture hosted at Pemberley at another site.

• We do not discuss religion, politics, or sports (this includes hunting) -- even on the Ramble board. So many other things to talk about, and lots of other places to talk of those things.

• We do not discuss the personal lives of actors, authors or other celebrities. You may say what you like about their work, but let's let them have whatever privacy they can get. Please don't make rude personal remarks about them, either.

• Some of our aging eyes have a rough time with all lowercase messages. There's no rush here, as in a chat room, so if you're inclined to make your messages a little easier to read, by starting off sentences with capital letters, the grannies would really appreciate it.

• Several of the boards have guidelines that go a little beyond those enumerated here. So, please check the Ramble Guidelines, Milestones Guidelines, Life and Times Guidelines and Lady Catherine & Co. Guidelines before posting at those boards. You will be able to find these guidelines linked from the top of the their respective boards.

For more explicit rules for this site, please visit our Terms of Use and Privacy statements.

Pemberley is safe for children, and we like to keep it that way. We have registered the site with the Internet Content Rating Association (ICRA), and have an almost perfectly safe rating. The only things that keep us from absolute purity follow:

• We had to admit to showing revealing clothing. What else could you honestly call Regency dresses such as those worn in the adaptations?
• We admitted to allowing slang, but the RSACi deems this lapse a lesser blemish than "mild expletives."

It might surprise you to learn that we have kids as young as nine years old who frequent Pemberley. To be sure, they are precocious if they're reading Austen and liking it enough to want to discuss the fine points with us -- but they're still nine! So, keep those little faces in mind when posting out in to the faceless void. We appreciate your help.

A group read is not as elaborate as it might sound. It is merely what we call it when we determine on reading and discussing a book. Pemberley group reads take place on the Group Read board, which is only open for the duration of the particular group read. More information on group reads, including upcoming schedules and links to past group reads, can be found at the Group Read page which is always linked at the top of the Library board.

We do not help with homework of any sort. We love Jane Austen and want others to discover her for themselves. For a more complete explanation,see our homework policy. If you would like to read Jane Austen's novels (which we encourage you to do), you can find searchable electronic texts of all her novels right here at Pemberley.

To reuse the content of the Republic of Pemberley for any reason, including classes, websites, and books and articles, please visit our Terms of Use page and check the paragraph about Copyrights and Trademarks.

Checks should be made payable to The Republic of Pemberley and addressed to:

The Republic of Pemberley
P.O. Box 560223
Medford, MA 02156
USA

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