One aspect of the Internet which did make it a better place for intelligent discourse was the relative speed at which 'Ground Rules' were set for what behavior was acceptable. More specifically, some of the standard pitfalls of BBSes and other online forums that could turn a somewhat intelligent trade of ideas into a useless war of words were addressed quite well in the 1980's Internet.
Among the most fascinating of these ground rules were the "Frequently Asked Questions" lists, or FAQs, which laid down all those dumb questions that anyone coming into a subject for the first time would be inclined to ask, even though everyone already involved already knew the answers. These FAQs were occasionally made by a single person, sometimes made by a committee, but what really made them shine were how over a relatively short period of time, they were these white-hot nuggets of information on a subject. Between these FAQs and the Discographies and other lists maintained on the Internet, a stunning array of human knowledge could be passed among participants quickly and efficiently.
The FAQs stand as what the potential of the Internet truly was, in how much they streamlined and improved the trade of ideas.
| Filename |
Size |
Description of the Textfile |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
2600faq.txt | 6656 | FAQ: alt.2600 FAQ, Version 2.0 by Jvarley
| 2600survival.txt | 5497 | FAQ: The Alt.2600 Survival Guide by Voyager and Will Spencer (October 14, 1995)
| 3dcfaq1.txt | 34008 | FAQ: The PC 3D Graphics Accelerators FAQ v0.6 (August 9, 1995)
| 3dcfaq2.txt | 38545 | FAQ: The PC 3D Graphics Accelerators FAQ v0.6 (August 9, 1995) (Part II)
| 3dfaq.txt | 92909 | FAQ: The PC 3D Graphics Accelerators FAQ v0.9 (September 27, 1995)
| 3dprog.faq | 22833 | 3D Programming FAQ (May 6th, 1994)
| a86.txt | 11390 | FAQ: The x86 Assembly Language Programmers FAQ (November 23, 1998)
| abdomtrn.faq | 20368 | The Abdominal Training FAQ from Misc.Fitness (April 22, 1994)
| acedb.faq | 37485 | Common Questions about ACEDB (The A Caenorhabditis Elegans Database) version 1.1 (May 6th, 1994)
| acsiiart.faq | 27147 | The ASCII Art FAQ by Bob Allison Version 1.7 (April 18th, 1994)
| activeng.lst | 37514 | A List of Active Usenet Newsgroups (April 22, 1991) from Gene Spafford
| afs.faq | 82787 | Frequently Asked Questions about the AFS Filesystem, by Paul Blackburn Version 1.77 (April 29th, 1994)
| afu.faq | 81601 | FAQ: Alt.Folklore.Urban Frequently Posted Legends (March 29, 1993)
| afu_flam.for | 3472 | Standard Alt.Folklore.Urban Reply Form
| afu_surv.gui | 8923 | The Alt.Folklore.Urban Survival Guide by Terry Chan (February 27, 1993)
| afufaq.txt | 40109 | FAQ: Alt.Folklore.Urban (September 17, 1991)
| aipart1 | 60323 | Anonymity on the Internet Frequently Asked Questions Part 1 (May 9th, 1994)
| aipart2 | 60919 | Anonymity on the Internet Frequently Asked Questions Part 2 (May 9th, 1994)
| aipart3 | 66546 | Anonymity on the Internet Frequently Asked Questions Part 3 (May 9th, 1994)
| aipart4 | 59518 | Anonymity on the Internet Frequently Asked Questions Part 4 (May 9th, 1994)
| alt-magick_faq.txt | 10526 | FAQ: The Alt.Magick FAQ List
| alt_folk.faq | 18380 | FAQ: Official Usenet Alt.Folklore.College Frequently Posted Legends (March 31, 1993)
| altbeer.faq | 15052 | The Alt.Beer Frequently Asked Questions, by Dan Brown (January 17, 1994)
| altcreag.faq | 21340 | So You Want to Create an Alt Newsgroup, by David Barr (May 10th, 1994)
| altdrug.faq | 34901 | The Alt.Drugs Frequently Asked Questions (February 21st, 1993)
| alternet.txt | 12350 | AlterNet General Information (April 17, 1992)
| altnews.lst | 36161 | The Alternative Newsgroup Hierarchies by Gene Spafford (April 22, 1991)
| altsouri.faq | 9514 | Alt.SOurces Frequently Asked Questions (April 29th, 1994)
| amethyst.faq | 26585 | The Alt.Pub.Coffeehouse.Amethyst Frequently Asked Questions version 1.3 (February 18, 1994)
| amiga.faq | 55230 | Frequestly Asked Questions Regarding the Amiga, from Kajetan Hinner (September 27, 1993)
| amiuucp1.faq | 28157 | The Amiga UUCP FAQ Version 2.A.2 (August 2, 1993)
| amiuucp2.faq | 37971 | The Amiga UUCP FAQ Version 2.B.12 (November 6th, 1993)
| angst.faq | 9686 | The Alt.Angst Frequently Asked Questions (May 3rd, 1994)
| animal_rights_faq.txt | 48132 | FAQ: Animal Rights Frequently Asked Questions (April 29, 1995)
| anu.faq | 9109 | Frequently Asked Questions about the ANU News Conferencing System (April 15, 1994)
| arcade.faq | 27191 | Rec.Games.Video Arcade Frequently Asked Questions (January 9th, 1994)
| arcade_c.faq | 156021 | The Definitive Arcade Video Game Cheat Sheet (April 28th, 1992)
| arch1992 | 555535 | FAQ: Welcome to sci.aeronautics.airliners! (November 13, 1992)
| artfight.txt | 11271 | The Art of Fighting FAQ by Ryo Sakazaki and Robert Garcia
| astrolog.faq | 37907 | The Astrology Frequently Asked Questions List (March 1st, 1994)
| atheism1.faq | 28013 | The Alt.Atheism FAQ Version 1.6 (July 29, 1993)
| atheism2.faq | 8171 | The Alt.Atheism FAQ Version 1.8 (October 14, 1993)
| audio1.txt | 41932 | The Frequently Asked Questions about Audio File Formats (April 19, 1993)
| audio2.txt | 43513 | Further Information about Audio File Formats (March 19, 1993)
| b5.faq | 54136 | FAQ: Alt.Fan.Babylon 5 (January 15, 1995)
| banned.txt | 61911 |
| beer-lea.faq | 33027 | FAQ: The Learning About Beer and Tasting FAQ (November 8, 1994)
| beginner.ftp | 7074 | FAQ: Getting Binaries Via FTP (May 3, 1991) by Brian O'Neill
| ben_elto.faq | 30035 | FAQ: The Ben Elton Frequently Asked Questions v1.34 by Andrew Wong (May 7, 1995)
| billiard.faq | 25800 | The Pool & Billiards Frequently Asked Questions by Ben Fulton version 1.6 (April 29th, 1994)
| birdingr.txt | 14721 | FAQ: Electronic Birding Resources by Rob Scott (March 24, 1994)
| bizconfg.faq | 16211 | The Biz.* Hierarchy Frequently Asked Questions (March 22, 1994)
| bottom_f.1 | 30279 | The Bottom Frequently Asked Questions List by Melinda Casino (October 10, 1994) Version 2.4
| bottom_f.2 | 20380 | The Bottom Frequently Asked Questions List by Melinda Casino (October 10, 1994) Version 2.7
| brewing.faq | 22868 | Rec.Crafts.Brewing Frequently Asked Questions (May 3rd, 1994)
| bulgaria.faq | 252699 | Soc.Culture.Bulgaria Frequently Asked Questions (April 22, 1994)
| buyunix2.txt | 131049 | PC-Clone UNIX Buyer's Guide Version 11.0 (February 22, 1993)
| c.faq | 125332 | Comp.Lang.C Answers to Frequently Asked Questions (November 3, 1993)
| ca_drive.faq | 104435 | The California Driver's Frequently Asked Questions (May 3, 1994)
| cablefaq | 40615 | FAQ: Rec.Video.Cable-TV FAQ (September 21, 1993)
| calendar.faq | 64601 | FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions about Calendars (August 20, 1996)
| cam.inf | 3284 | FAQ: Comp.Archives.MSDOS Announce FAQ (May 16, 1995)
| cdrom.faq | 125551 | Frequently Asked Questions about Alt.CD-ROM (March 14th, 1994)
| cellrela.faq | 71053 | The Frequently Asked Questions for Cell-Relay, ATM and SMDS Communications by Carl Symborski (April 26, 1994)
| chichess.faq | 56000 | FAQ: rec.games.chinese-chess (January 31, 1995)
| chichess.hlp | 6045 | Support Questions and Answers about Chinese Chess, by Roleigh Martin (January 18, 1994)
| classics.faq | 23034 | Frequently Asked Questions for Sci.Classics by Nathan Torkington (April 30th, 1994)
| cld9z129.txt | 38471 | FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions about the DEC PDP-8 computer (May 12, 1993)
| co_ops.faq | 11102 | Frequently Asked Questions about Co-Operatives (April 1st, 1994)
| coherent.faq | 61912 | General Information FAQ for the Coherent Operating System v2.3 (January 23, 1993)
| collfolk.faq | 20457 | Alt.Folklore.College Frequently Posted Legends Version 1.06C (March 1st, 1994)
| comp_sun.faq | 81062 | Frequently Asked Questions for Comp.Sys.SUn.Admin by Rob Montjoy (April 25th, 1994)
| compgfx.faq | 18309 | Comp.Graphics Frequently Asked Questions
| comphome.faq | 5963 | Comp.Home.Misc Frequently Asked Questions by Kresten Bjerg (March 3rd, 1994)
| compiler.faq | 23609 | FAQ: Comp.Compilers FAQ, by John R. Levine (May 1st, 1994)
| comporn.faq | 6111 | The Computer Porn FAQ (Should Universities Ban Porn?)
| compro~1.txt | 14332 | FAQ: Security Comprimise FAQ Version 2.0 by Internet Security Systems
| compvir.faq | 87447 | FAQ: Computer Virus Frequently Asked Questions (April 29, 1994)
| conscred | 110951 | FAQ: Misc.Consumers Frequently Asked Questions List (February 22, 1993)
| cooking.faq | 58205 | FAQ: Rec.food.cooking FAQ and Conversion File (February 9, 1994)
| copier | 24034 | FAQ: Video Game Recorders and Their Capabilities
| credit1.txt | 14552 | FAQ: Misc.Consumers FAQ by Steve Adams (August 25, 1992)
| credit2.txt | 30986 | FAQ: Misc.Consumers by Steve Adams (October 9, 1992)
| crypt.faq | |