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Benjy's Digest
Frequently Asked Questions

  1. What is Benjy's Digest
  2. What if I don't want a filtered version?
  3. How do I subscribe or unsubscribe?
  4. How about hotline announcements and setlists?
  5. What are the criteria for a post to make Benjy's Digest?
  6. How can I assure that my post *won't* make Benjy's Digest?
  7. How can I respond to a post I read on Benjy's Digest?
  8. How can I start a new thread of my own?
  9. I just posted something, and I *really* want it to get into Benjy's Digest. What should I do?
  10. How is Benjy's Digest different from Rosemary's Digest?
  11. Why do I get lots of digests per day sometimes, and other times none at all?
  12. Can I get back issues of the digest?
  13. Who is Rosemary?
  14. Who is Benjy?
  15. Is there more than one Benjy Eisen?
  16. I sent email to Benjy and it bounced or he never wrote back! What's going on?
  17. Who else is involved in Benjy's Digest?
  18. How can I help out with the Phish.Net? I want to contribute my energy and time!
1. What is Benjy's Digest?

Benjy's Digest is a low-volume, high content subset of the Phish.Net. It is a direct derivative of Rosemary's Digest (as is this FAQ), and the only reason for the name change is to reflect the change of the people behind it. Rosemary Dean Mackintosh came up with the idea and design of the original Rosemary's Digest. After two-years of dedication, she simply no longer had the time to continue it and handed the project over to Benjy Eisen. She also was instrumental in setting up Benjy's Digest, along with Brian Fisk, the list administrator.

The domain change also was for practical reasons alone and both Rosemary and Benjy think of this newer digest as being a continuation of the older one. If you were familiar with Rosemary's Digest, you should probably think of it in such a way as well.

Benjy hand picks articles from rec.music.phish which are then sent out via email in digest form. All replies go back to rec.music.phish so they can be read by everyone.

2. What if I don't want to read a filtered version of the Phish.Net?
Read the usenet newsgroup rec.music.phish instead.

3. How do I subscribe or unsubscribe?

Send email to listserv@archive.phish.net with the line -
subscribe benjys-digest Firstname Lastname
in the body of the message on a line all by itself and you will be automatically subscribed. You can leave the subject blank.
(Obviously, "Firstname Lastname" means YOUR first and last name) :)

If you want to unsubscribe, use the line unsubscribe benjys-digest instead, and you'll be automatically unsubscribed.

Please don't email your subscribe/unsubscribe requests to Benjy. Any e-mail sent to him, pertaining to this, will not be responded to.

The list administrator is Brian Fisk and if you have any technical problems, or questions, they should be directed to him at benjys-digest-request@archive.phish.net

4. How about Hotline announcements and setlists?
Hotline announcements, show setlists, and important news are sent out on an information-only list called phish-info. If you're subscribed to Benjy's Digest, you should also subscribe to phish-info, since the posts on phish-info aren't included in Benjy's Digest. To subscribe, send email to phish-info-request@phish.net with the word
subscribe
in the body of the message on a line all by itself. You can leave the subject blank.

5. What are the criteria for a post to make Benjy's Digest?
Basically, Benjy looks at 3 factors:
  1. Is the post Phish-related?
  2. Is the post of interest to the majority of the community?
  3. Is the post legible? (no formatting problems or too many misspellings or anything else which would make it difficult to understand)
If a post meets all 3 of these, it gets in the Digest. Of course, from time to time, there may be exceptions

An additional factor Benjy looks for is credibility: If the post appears to be spreading a rumor, or is sent by a person who's real identity is deliberately hidden, chances are it won't make the Digest.

Keep in mind also that the selection process for Benjy's Digest is purely content oriented and not person oriented.. In other words, there is no bias involving the person who wrote the post, regardless of their past history with either rec.music.phish or Benjy's Digest.

Benjy will include posts on *rare* occasion that are about a band other than Phish if -and only if- he feels that the band would be liked by the majority of Phish fans, the band is somehow related to Phish or a member of Phish jammed with them. Such posts will not be discussion of such bands, but perhaps an introductory post, special announcement or review of a show in which a member of the Phish organization is involved. Such posts will be a rare exception.

6. How can I assure that my post *won't* make Benjy's Digest
The following will automatically disqualify a post from making it into Benjy's digest:
  1. If the post makes a broad generalization without any supporting evidence or discussion. For example: "This year's Holiday Run rocked!" would *not* make it by itself.
  2. If the post contains any malicious or otherwise offensive comments directed towards another Phish.Net participant, or member of the Phish community. This holds, even if the rest of the post is Benjy's Digest worthy.
7. How can I respond to a post I read on Benjy's Digest?
You can respond to a post by creating a mail message to rmp@archive.phish.net with the same subject as the post you're responding to. Cut and paste what you'd like to follow up to, and then add your own comments. Send it off! It will go to rec.music.phish and get filtered in or out just like all the other posts. Posting directly to the newsgroup rec.music.phish works equally well.

8. How can I start a new thread of my own?
Just send your post as email to rmp@archive.phish.net -- it's a mail-to-news gateway that will post your article onto rec.music.phish where it will get read by Usenet readers and Benjy.

9. I just posted something, and I *really* want it to get into Benjy's Digest. What should I do?

Wait. If the post fits the criteria, it will get in. Please do not mail a copy of the post to Benjy or put a line in the post saying "Benjy, please include this post in your digest." This will only discourage him from using it.

However, Benjy isn't perfect. If a few days go by (and really allow a few days, because Usenet news is notoriously slow) and you haven't seen your post, and you truly believe it should have been included, email Benjyy at benjy@archive.phish.net with a copy of the post. It may have been accidentally left out. It's deliberatly called Benjy's Digest to remind readers that there is a human being doing the filtering.

10. How is Benjy's Digest different from Rosemary's Digest?
As stated earlier, it is essentially no different. The difference in the name is meant to remind people who were subscribed to Rosemary's Digest that there is a different person doing the filtering now. While the criteria remains relatively the same, Benjy and Rosemary are two different people, and thus they may differ slightly in what posts they feel meet the criteria.
11. Why do I get lots of digests per day sometimes, and other times none at all?
The number of digests totally depends on the number of posts chosen by Benjy. If there are a lot of good posts (like when an album is released, or when the band is touring) there will be considerably more digests than when nothing special is going on.

12. Can I get back issues of the digest?

Yes. In fact, there are three different ways, depending on your personal tastes.

The "official" web-based distribution is on NetSpace, the host machine, using the standard Listserv archive server at http://www.netspace.org/lsv-archive/benjys-digest.html. The Listserv archives are available as individual messages (not entire digests), and a search utility is available. Postings appear here as Benjy posts them to the digest.

David Gunnells also has an archive of entire digests. These are available at http://www.marko.net/phish/phish/benjy/.

Finally, if you don't have web access, you can get weekly archive files directly from the list server by email. Send mail to listserv@archive.phish.net with a body of

get benjys-digest logYYMMW

and replace YY, MM, and W with the year, month and week of the month (using the letters A through F for the week). Or you can get an index of all the files available by sending mail to listserv@archive.phish.net with a body of

index benjys-digest

13. Who is Rosemary?
"Rosemary" is Rosemary Dean Mackintosh. She's a big Phish fan, and not affiliated with the band in any way. She thinks that there is great discussion available on the Phish.Net but that too much of it gets lost in the ticket grovels and "phish sucks" posts. She wants to give people who don't have the time or energy to find the good stuff a chance to stay involved in the discussion. Rosemary lives in southern New Jersey, works full-time, and is married to John P. Speno. Rosemary doesn't get paid to do the Digest. It's a labor of love for Phish and Phish fans. She still appreciates any comments, thanks, questions, and feedback of all sorts. You can reach her at rosemary@cyberenet.net

14. Who is Benjy?

Benjy Eisen is a Phish fan who has been making posts frequently to the Phish.Net since early '94. He lives near Harrisburg, PA...that is, when he's not zapping through time in his infilliumDINGER transport. He goes to a large amount of shows and enjoys meeting and talking to other Phish.Netters at shows. There's a good chance that you've either seen him, or maybe even met him at a show before. If you ever run into him, feel free to introduce yourself.

What he does for a living is a mystery: rumors that have circulated include claims that he's a roller-coaster engineer, that he's a writer, and/or that he's a student at UMass, Hampshire or Simon's Rock College. He's been seen at all of them. The best guess, probably, would be that he's a founding member of NewMarket Productions, a live concert production company in Central PA, but even this is just speculation.

15. Is there more than one Benjy Eisen?
Benjy has two e-mail addresses and two spellings of his name. The "correct" way to spell Benjy is with a "y" although it doesn't bother him when people spell it with an "i." Due to a Confidential Mistake, his personal e-mail address spelling is benji@ezonline.com. He still uses this e-mail address to make most of his posts to the newsgroup, as a contributer to the discussions. As the Digest editor, however, he uses benjy@archive.phish.net. Please note the difference in spelling and please use the second one if contacting him in regards to the Digest.
16. I sent email to Benjy and it bounced or he never wrote back! What's going on?
This could be one of two things:
  1. Benjy got your email but hasn't had time to respond to it. Benjy gets an enormous amount of email and it sometimes takes a while for him to respond. If you wrote him an e-mail to which a response was not necessary, assume that he got and read your e-mail but, due to time restraints, could not respond. If you feel a response from him is necessary, wait about a week and if he still hasn't responded then feel free to send him a gentle reminder.
  2. The message was sent to the wrong email address. Was it addressed to: benjy@archive.phish.net? Or to benji@ezonline.com? Did you get use an "i" instead of a "y" or vice-versa? (Note: Please use the archive.phish.net address for Digest-related mail.)
17. Who else is involved in Benjy's Digest?

Aside from Benjy reading all the posts, Brian Fisk, the system administrator for www.phish.net, volunteers to keep the mailing list running and is the technical director of the digest. Eddie Dinel and Robert Johnson have also helped out on the technical side of things.

Shelly Culbertson and Sean Kennedy at phish.net used to do this for Rosemary's Digest. Rosemary's invovement in Benjy's Digest has been vital, as she helped set-up the system, assembled the crew, aided Benjy in starting it, and of course, ran Rosemary's Digest which was the original.

18. How can I help out with the Phish.Net? I want to contribute my energy and time!
Rosemary suggests:
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