In the July 1995 issue of this magazine, Jim Davies wrote: ‘On the Internet there are hundreds of conferences and news groups relating to religion, humanism, atheism and sub-sets of these . . . Surely we should be promoting our ideas through this electronic forum?’ Unbeknownst to Jim, such ideas were already brewing, but encouraged by his letter we have now made a formal proposal to the UK and NZ SoF steering committees to establish a SoF World Wide Web site. The UK steering committee has given initial approval to our proposal, with the understanding that we would use both this magazine and the online SoFNet discussion group to solicit any comments. We have therefore summarized the proposal below, and invite you to forward any comments or concerns to us by 31 January.
Introduction
Most people will be familiar with, or at least have heard of, the global network of computers known collectively as the Internet; the World-Wide Web is an exciting development of this which allows organisations or individuals to put together pages of information (e.g. publicity material) which can be viewed on-line by the entire world in an attractive, easy-to-navigate format. This material can include photographs as well as text, and even extends to sounds and video clips.
We believe that the World-Wide Web offers great possibilities to Sea of Faith, for example: the Web is a useful means of ‘promoting’ knowledge of SoF thought without aggressively ‘proselytising’. Our potential audience would be greatly expanded to include millions of Internet users worldwide. We would surely find many sympathetic people who would subsequently join the network. It would provide source material for those wishing to start SoF networks in other countries. The Internet is still primarily the communications medium of young people. SoF does not yet seem to attract very many under 30s — perhaps this venture could help redress this balance. Keynote articles, resource material, useful addresses, book reviews, conference announcements etc. can be included. We might even make entire newsletters or magazines available on-line.
We would have a means of regularly providing information about SoF without relying on media interest for publicity.
What material would we put on a Web site?
Most Web sites are primarily read-only material, but there are also Web forms which users can fill in and email back to the moderators of the site. Also some graphics or more light-hearted material keep the site from being too ‘heavy’. Some options: ‘Home’ or title page: a good but simple graphic and introductory thought — the cover of the July 1995 SoF UK magazine would be excellent, or the SoF logo if the current competition for designing a logo turns out to be successful. Basic orientation and contact information: What is Sea of Faith? How did it get started? How to join; interactive membership forms for UK and NZ. E-mail addresses to which readers can forward queries or membership forms. Theory, or ‘the non-realism’ debate: major articles from SoF magazines and newsletters; articles from other press (e.g. Guardian, Modern Believing); keynote speeches from conferences; material from Five Years of Making Waves; related documents of interest, e.g. the Humanist Manifesto.
Practice, or what it feels like to be a non-realist: articles from SoF magazines, e.g. the recent article on how SoF members celebrated Easter; poems by SoF members; material from Surfing: Women on the Sea of Faith. Resources: suggested bibliography, with book reviews where available; information on other booklets, e.g. by Saint Andrew’s Trust, and how to order them. Upcoming events: news of conferences, lectures, etc. The lighter side: jokes or cartoons about radical religion; the quiz from the ’95 UK conference. We will of course need to identify sources of material and ensure that we have copyright permissions where applicable. We should also expect that the site will generate queries and membership applications, which we will need to respond to. David and I are happy to respond to most queries and to receive UK membership/subscription applications for forwarding to Ronald Pearse. We will need to identify someone in New Zealand to whom we can e-mail applications for NZ membership.
We estimate that this venture may cost up to £200 per year to cover the costs of renting disk space on the host machine, paying the host organisation to post regular updates to the information, and other miscellaneous costs. The SoF UK Steering Committee has agreed to underwrite these costs.
Approach and timescale
This proposal was submitted to the UK SoF steering committee on 9-10 October and approved subject to circulation of the proposal to the NZ steering committee and via the SoF magazine and SoFNet for their comments. We propose proceeding as follows: circulate final proposal to SoF Net, NZ steering committee and any other suitable channels for comments by 31 January; research available material and determine what ‘core’ material should be obtained before the site goes ‘live’ and what can be added in later phases; begin gathering material, converting to Web format, scanning graphics, obtaining copyright permission where applicable; agree service provider and negotiate site costs; build and test pages, planning to launch by 1 March 1996; ‘launch’ site by advertising/publicizing where appropriate (related usenet groups, Internet magazines, Internet resource sites, April SoF magazine, Guardian, etc.); incorporate Web and SoF Net information into the basic information sent to all new members. The maintenance workload will depend on what new material comes available and how many queries we receive from readers. At a minimum, we can post new articles from the UK and NZ quarterly magazines, but it would be best to add something to the site at least once a month.
Other thoughts about the future
The present SoFNet, an e-mail discussion group formed by Ralph Pannett of SoF New Zealand, has roughly 20 members. It provides a forum for SoF folk in both UK and New Zealand to exchange ideas and information (e.g. newsletters, conference reports, book reviews).
The amount of e-mail traffic is fairly low at the moment. However, if the SoF Web site attracts a lot more members, all of whom have e-mail, there is very likely to be a corresponding increase in SoFNet.
The present system, where each member maintains his or her own list of other members by hand, will rapidly become unworkable. We will then have to think about one of two options: someone could set up a list server to take over this maintenance task; or we could set up our own Usenet newsgroup (public conference); this has the advantage of using a special newsreader program which organises people’s responses into easily navigable threads.
Hence an original posting and all the replies thereto could be read in one go. Newsgroups are also accessible by e-mail for those who do not have Usenet news.
We favour the second of these.
There is the possibility (as with all religious or political newsgroups on the Internet) that it will attract extreme elements (note that a mailing list is private to subscribing SoF members whereas a Usenet group is public). SoF members should not, we feel, regard this as a reason for ‘keeping ourselves to ourselves’; rather we should welcome those who seriously wish to discuss a completely different point of view and simply ignore irrelevant or ‘flaming’ messages. Someone could moderate the group to remove inappropriate posts, but this would potentially be quite time-consuming.
The Web site itself can be added to as disc space rental costs come down (as they most likely will). We could then add audio and video clips to the site if we felt that they would enhance it. It would be difficult at present to make much use of these because of the amount of space they consume.
Conclusion
We believe that making SoF ideas available on the Web will be valuable both in strengthening SoF itself and in offering an alternative to non-members interested in finding a community of radical theological thinkers. We are interested in any ideas of concerns you may have about this proposal in order that we can ensure that the proposal fully support SoF’s mission. We can also send copies of the full proposal (including technical information) to interested readers. Please send any comments or queries to Patti Whaley or David Herbert at the addresses below.
Patti Whaley, 145 Petherton Road, London N5 2RS, +44 171 359 4869, pwhaley@amnesty.gn.apc.org. David Herbert, 67 Howard Close, Cambridge CB5 8QU, +44 01223 561060, davidh@gn.apc.org. The editor of SoF Magazine can also be reached by email on: anthony@imprint.co.uk