The web archive is back online for a while now. However, the mail server, in spite of not refusing connections per se, still turns down any incoming messages. The ongoing congestion definitely requires the maintainer's attention.
You know, I have never used the archive before. How do you access it?
So out of curiosity, why is the venerable Ars Magica mailing list associated with Berkeley (I assume that's University of California at Berkeley)? Are there any old-timers who can enlighten us? (I go back far enough to hazard a guess, but maybe someone out there knows for sure.)
Please follow this link. The first link on the resulting page takes you right to the archive that you can browse and search by date, author, thread, or subject. At some point, you have to log in to get access to the archive, which means you have to be subscribed to the list.
Project Redcap provides extensive documentation on ArM-related mailing lists here.
The domain csua.berkeley.edu tends to support this guess. The first messages seem to date back to around 1994-1997 (although the earliest ones look as if just being inserted and added for the purpose of archival storage), a time when being granted access to a fully-featured mail server was not that common, and universities could be counted upon to belong to the exalted inner circle of facilities able to offer such services.
I remember the day when schools had the massive servers, the scope of which filled a room and can now fit into a cabinet. The question I have is why Berkley? Were the early sagas played by students there? Is that were Johnathan Tweet & Mark Reinsplat Hagen went to school? Or someone else associated with the early game?
I just checked out the archive. Memory lane 
Doesn't go back as far as i thought it would though. The archives stuff from the 90's is spotty, and almost all of it is missing. My old e-mail identity from years ago is knocked off the membership too (go figure, I haven't had aol in 9 years, lol).
I lived in Berkeley in the early '90s, and I knew of at least two active Ars Magica groups besides the one I ran. If I remember correctly, one of them included Matthew Seidl, who is still the list's maintainer, though I don't believe he lives there any more. I think there was just a lot of people on the campus who had been exposed to the game and regularly played it, and they probably had access to a list server in the computer science department. I think there was an Ars Magica MUSH hosted there, too, which I remember visiting once back in the day.
That is pretty much what my guess would have been. Back in 1992-93, a lot of grassroots organizations were setting up bulletin boards and the like, but Web-as-marketing-tool had not been imagined yet.
So, is there still a big Ars Magica community at Berkeley, or is there a kind of alumni diaspora?
I still know a lot of folks there, but according to them they haven't been able to find very many games. Lots of players, though; most gamers I talk to have at least heard of it. There's several game stores in the area that stock the books (I check whenever I go in), so it seems like it still sells, though I don't know where they're all going. It may be that there are private games, or there could be a lot of people in the area who like to read the books but who don't actually play.
I admit that I was a closet Ars'er for a long time before coming out (any such thing as Ars Anonymeous?)... I read and feverishly collected the game for 2 editions and more than half a decade before getting to play it. But I always wanted to!
For me, it comes and goes. The old Berk list is what brought me to the game, and times I wasn't playing it kept me connected with the game and the community. I have had times where there was no gaming for a few years, and been able to start right up again. Ars is the only game I am interested anymore. I have no idea how AD&D has developed after 2nd edition, I haven't a clue what happened to WW and their WoD. I don't keep up because I don't care. Groups such as this, and more importantly the Berklist, have kept me connected through the various editions of the game.
And I think the Berklist being temporarilly down has affected the Atlas Forum. That's why I am here (been a reading member a while, never posted before). I have spotted many others too.
AND I have learned that the perception that the Forum is more civil and polite than the list to be utterly untrue. Won't say more than that, just that I feel that they two (forum & list) are different yet in a way equal.
Mark, I respectfully disagree.
That is not to say that people on the forum cannot at times happen to be less than civil to one another, but I personally experience them as being very different.
And I respect that you disagree 
It is a different kind of snarkiness, I'll grant you that. Some people feel more comfortible with this format. I myself feel more at home over there, but this is nice too. I have just seen some amusing quibbilings here and there on the Forums, that's all. The conversation over there is more unrestrained, which I think is a good thing, but I understand (better) that this is not for everyone.
Meh,
~Laters
Well. First of all you will of course find quibblings, but my experience is that most people will respect it when being told they're out of line. And you wont find wholesale bashing of other people (whether author or not)... at least you'd soon be shown the door. And for those cases inbetween there's the option of ignore.
On a completely different notion, there's always the case of whether one prefers one sort of medium or another - forum vs. mailing list.
The option of "being shown the door" may cause some people to alter or restain their meaning. I'd rather hear the full blast honest truth, even if it's me getting blasted. And Berklisters respect when their peers tell them they've gone to far (case in point, me 
). Over there you may have Flame Was, but over here I see "Ice Wars".
I also think the Berklist has headier conversation, but one advantage the Forum has is this: motivated conversation generation. The Berklist can be fast and furious sometimes, but sometimes it gets real slow and stiff. Here, I have noticed a constant string of conversation stimuli, and it's broken up into topics so you are not bored by subjects you are not interested in.
The formats are different, each has its own pros and cons. Each fills a different niche and fufills a different sort of need. I would like to see some cross pollination of ideas between the two though.
Honestly I think it is an often repeated mistake to mistake liberty to voice ones opinons with liberty to do it in a harassing way and vice versa. It is not about meanings. It is about how they are voiced. I've never seen anyone be policed because of their opinions- and the only person I recall being sanctioned, beside bots, was clearly harassing another person.
As for self-moderation - of course there's that. I wouldnt mount to call them "Ice Wars", but I actually cherish if people take time to count to ten before exploding, whether this is natural to them or is due to a code of conduct on a forum.
That is not by far what I've experience the years I've lurked on it!
And even so, why do you need to be told in the first place? What if the silent majority never steps up? The funny thing is that his place isnt more tranquil because of heavy policing - as I recall next to none have been sanctioned - but simply because most people, even very much at odds know it's a dead-end to demean yourself to outright flaming.
I do agree to that - at least in the sense as headier as more rash and violent. In the other sense, as clever or shrewd, I also agree that the barklist has talented and knowledgeable people that might enrich this place also. Still, at times I wonder if it survives for anything but due to nostalgia and the handfull of people who for various reasons dont want to join the forum?
Woops! 
That was actually not intended - maybe a Freudian slip? Besides, anyone would know that if I were to call the Berklist by names, I would have call it the Bezerkerlist!
I am a member on two forums on D&D - ENWorld, which has a very strict "PG-13" policy, and Circus Maximus, which is its sister site with absolutely no moderation (except for spam etc.). I thought I liked ENWorld, until I joined CM. But not for roleplaying stuff. For that, I prefer the polite hushed nature of ENWorld. Lack of moderation is great for topics like politics and religion, where opinions are hot. It isn't great for issues like history, roleplaying or plot advice - where what I want is listen in to others' cool ideas and knowledge, not to delve through flamewars and heated arguments.
So I like the forum more, it's more polite. I'm also more comfortable with the medium. But the Berklist seems to have more members, having a greater spread, and more knowledgable members too in various topics (one of which problematic in other respects...).
Yair
LOL, perhaps I should clairify what I mean by that. On the Forums, I have seen little snipy arguments and subtle put downs. The Bezerk list used to suffer this back in the 90's, and it still does a bit but not as much as it used to. Little arguments aout how to run a saga and power levels are not that common, instead the arguments have to do with the role of the Divine in the universe, historical conflicts, paradigm shifts and retcons. There may be occasional hostility, but what I don't see there (and I do here) is subtle dismissive put downs and contests of dominance & submission. Over there, snark comments are met in full force, if not by the target then by someone butting in.
What do I mean by dominance & submission? Why, the Blue Oyster Cult song of course! LOL! No, I mean a sort of pecking order. Look to the left of my post, or of anyone's. There is a ranking and a number of posts to date. The only reason I dragged out my old ArM code is so that the "Soverign Regents" will know I am on the same level. Now, I know that this is in my mind, not theirs, but still. Over there, I haven't used ArM code for years! Everyone, newbie and coof, is on the same level, because it is a free will self moderated mailing list. The list is less about the mechanics of the specific edition, and more about theconcepts behind the setting and rules.
Well, I'm the exception to the rule. I BoaF'ed AG, and then realized I was wrong and sincerly apologized. It does happen. I convinced him to stay with the list. My current goal it to try and recruit people to return &/or try out the Bezerk list. For example, I see Ken K in here all the time. I remember him from the list as far back as 97. If you were a lurker Furion, then I encourage you to lurk again. Positive things are happening, and we need you to be part of it!
I also want to touch on what Yair said. You're D&D experience mirrors what I experience. The Forum and the List each have their own specific strengths and weaknesses, each has the area they are best suited to. History, Religeon, Philosophy, and Politics are not good topics for this moderated forum, but it is nice I suppose to have a sanctuary of safety.
Personally I find the latter more interesting, but I do believe youo'll find such discussions here as well. Being a forum it has many threads running side by side and the benefit is that one can easier get an overview and choose what kind of debates to join. I think that one of the reasons for those discussions being more to the forefront on the list is probably that there's a higher turn-over of membership on the forum, whereas people who's played the game for a long while, which characterized the majority of the list, might have less of an interest in discussion particular rules or rules management. That might leave more motivation for the grander discussions. But those discussions can still equally been had here.
I don't buy that. I pay absolutely no attention to neither post count not how long people have played vis-Ã -vis their ArM Code. I only take notice of how interesting or inspiring arguments people put forward and the manner in which they do it. That you might call a pecking order, though I dislike that term in this context as it infers that it is uphold by attacking others and forcefully holding people down. I prefer to just call it status - listening closely to people that has shown a record of interesting and well put points. I'd bet my old hat that that is no different on the list.
Mark, I don't intend to make this about that specific situation, but as you bring it up yourself, let me address it but as in a generalised statement: would you have recanted if it hadn't been for the growing negative reactions? Do people than take back their words, because they've cooled down and come to their senses, or only when an angry mob appears at the door? If the last is the case it doesnt come off as a very amiable system as it is bound to lead to flaming and bashing when others don't react. I was there as a witness to your and Andrew's Wizard's War (I'd call it a certamen had it been less savage) and frankly from the sideline it seemed the bashing when fine and unchecked for a long while. Only when others lanquidly startet to react, a change came about. That is not to point any fingers at anyone, myself included having been there, but only to stress out how fairness can have meager livings and be dependent on mob rule.
And oh - I do not lurk anymore. Partly because I stepped out of lurking to be among the self-righteous people reacting to the bashing, but all only doing it a bite late. And partly because having seen yet another flamewar on the list I didnt care to stay on.
I disagree! I would love more of that on the forum - and I have the notion that I've taken active part in such discussions in the past or turning some in that direction. Again the manner and not the subject is what is limited! Yes, those subject might admittedly rouse peoples' feelings easier than others (then again so can discussion over HR and RAW too), but in the end it's all about whether people can keep their wits about them and not mix feelings with argumentation, regardless of the platform for exchange of views.