Advaitin List 2009 Annual Progress Report

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Dear fellow members:

 

Originally, the list started its service during June 1998 at the coollist.com.

Then on 31 August1998, Advaitin List moved to which became

. Finally was taken over by the . The

membership grew from 20

members when it started to over 2100 at present. Unlike other lists, membership

is voluntary and non members can view all the postings available in the public

archive (advaitin/messages).

 

Here is a brief summary progress report of Advaitin List:

 

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Advaitin List Membership Growth: (# at the end of the year)

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1998 65

1999 155

2000 324

2001 495

2002 689

2003 935

2004 1120

2005 1325

2006 1532

2007 1686

2008 1883

2009 2103

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Currently the list site at

advaitin/message/ contains the archived

messages (42,500). It is possible to search the archive using keyword

or author or by title. Members can download and/or print the messages

for their personal use. List Membership is open to everyone interested in

learning and discussing advaita philosophy and closely related philosophies.

 

You can visit the homepage, http://www.advaitin.net for further information on

the list scope and FAQ.

 

We want to express our sincere thanks to every one of you for your friendliness,

cooperation and support. We take this opportunity to wish you a very happy new

year.

 

Happy New Year to everyone!

 

Moderating Board consists of the following members (Year 2009);

 

S.N. Sastri - Chief Moderator

Ananda Wood

Dennis Waite

V. Krishnamurthy

Kuntimaddi Sadananda

Shyam MD (Chief Moderator for the year 2010)

Sunder Hattangadi

Ram Chandran

Gregory Goode

 

 

More on List Moderation and Members' Responsibility:

 

We want to take this opportunity to explain the role of members and moderators

(explained in FAQ and list guidelines). Members who are not familiar with the

goal of this list(see FAQ advaitin list) and posting guidelines (list

guidelines) should :

advaitinModerate/ and read the appropriate

files. A careful reading of the available documents in the file folder,

<Moderate> will be very helpful for members to understand their privileges and

responsibilities.

 

The moderators have the added responsibility to make sure that the subject

matter of all discussions fall within the scope of the list and members follow

the stipulated guidelines. Moderators have the authority to intervene during the

list discussions when they find the interpretations and/or statements from the

posters are not validated with supporting evidence from advaita tradition as

established by Sankara or other authoritative sources. Members are reminded

that the moderators will exercise their RIGHT to intervene at appropriate

moments. During the past 10 years moderator have exercised this extraordinary

privilege only very few times under the following situations: (1) when a member

divert the discussions by focusing on the personalities instead of the subject

matter; (2) when a member repeatedly violate list guidelines; (3) when a member

makes insulting remarks on another poster or religious texts; and (4) when

discussions get diverted and dragged away from the subject matter. It should

be pointed out that the list's guidelines have been continuously get updated by

incorporating constructive suggestions from the members.

 

In general members should polish their language and focus on the subject matter

and exhibit scholarship with humility. One of the best ways to control anger,

frustrations and arrogance is by restricting as much as possible to post a

maximum of 2 posts (list guidelines stipulate only 2 posts per day!) and we

expect members to follow this honor code.

 

" Words inspire. Words bind too. Words are like a boat which we must use to cross

a river. We must leave the boat and walk to the other shore. Attachment to

verbosity has held back many a spiritual seeker from higher possibilities. The

Upanishad says in Mantra 15: " When covered by the power of words (sound) one

does not know the Self (called the sky or space here) being enveloped in

darkness. When the darkness (ignorance) is destroyed, one sees the oneness,

being the One " . We earnestly request the members to take more time to

contemplate before exhibit their reactions.