DISCLAIMER : Please keep in mind that :

• a) Any message posted on BRKNEWS is NOT a recommendation or solicitation to buy or sell any financial product (e.g.: stock, bond,...).
• b) There is NO warranty concerning the accuracy of the information linked.

IMPORTANT NOTES :

• We are gentlemen here! ;-) So, if you did not find by yourself the link that you are sharing, please include the original link source "(Thanks to http...XXX)". Even if the person who found the link did not often produced its contents, it is the minimum that we owe him/her for the time spent (sometimes, believe me, that could means several hours) finding and sharing the information! Thank you in advance.
• Also, please keep in mind that it is not possible to post a link in BRKNEWS that violate the Copyrights. Only links leading to "fair use" (small excerpts) are authorized for educational purposes (for instance on various BRK message groups). More information about Copyrights in general can be found at : http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html (thanks to http://www.fool.com/help/index.htm?display=foolsrules ). Please keep in mind this important note. Otherwise I will be forced to take appropriated measures (banishment or exclusion of your membership).
• Please, if sometimes you want to copy a link you found in Brknews to somewherelse (Boards, Blogs,...), do not forget to write that you found this link in Brknews. Just add the following : "Source: BRKNEWS http://groups.yahoo.com/group/brknews/ ". Thanks in advance.
• Please, rate all rumor articles as : "L" - (RUMOR). Example: L - [Rumor] Tyco Moves to Reassure Stockholders http://www.e-topics.com/index.asp?userid=20001229063545124722&layout=stdnewsdis&hl=&doc_id=NR20020207140.6_db60001cff042289

Before the title of the message (= email subject) please add 1 or 2 thing(s) :

[One plus ("+") sign is added at the begining each time there is one more link inside the message (see examples below)]

(AND)

[Your idea of the interest of the article for other readers. The question you have to ask yourself is: how this link is related to Berkshire Hathaway? i.e. do I grade the story as :

G (for Great Interest), A (Average), L (for Little), ? (I don't know) or OT (Off Topic)].

Title of the message (= Email Subject):

G - "Mr. Buffett on the Stock Market".

The message :

G - "Mr. Buffett on the Stock Market". http://204.71.242.42/fortune/1999/11/22/buf.html

a) Maybe a longer way (<10 minutes) but Highly recommended ! : Through a Yahoo ID :

Go to this address : http://groups.yahoo.com/group/brknews/ at the upper right click on "[ Join This Group! ] "

Then , follow the instructions depending on :

a1) If you have already a yahoo ID :

Add it and your password. Now you are on this Brknews list ! :-)

Let me just point out one great feature. To save you the trouble of going to the website, you can choose to have the messages sent to you by e-mail -- either individually throughout the day, or in one mailing per day that contains all the posts from the previous 24 hours. Note: You can also choose to make your address email seen by other BRKNEWS members or not (see upper right of http://groups.yahoo.com/group/brknews/ " [ Delivery Options ] "). Please don't forget to read the other numbers of this FAQ (scroll down). Thanks.

or

a2) If you don't have already a yahoo ID (= Sorry for you, it will be a longer way (the total lenght will be less than 10 minutes), but the better one !) :

"New to Yahoo!? Sign up now to enjoy Yahoo! Groups ", then choose a "Yahoo! ID" and fill the form. Note : If you want to receive brknews to your email address, don't forget to add it in the box called "Alternate Email" for example: Alternate Email: Me@aol.com. Then, push the "submit form" buton.

Then click on the link "Continue to Yahoo! Groups".

{ It is possible that you will see on the upper right "[ Join This Group! ]". If so, click on it !. If not, forget it, it is not a problem! }

Now you must see :

So choose between "Individual emails"; "Daily digest" and "No email" [If you are not sure which one to choose just keep what is already selected. You can change whenever you want these options (see "Edit My Membership" )].

Now, click on the "join" buton at the bottom of the page.

Wait a few minutes and you will receive 2 emails.

The one that interest you is the one with the title : "Confirm your new account with Yahoo! Groups". You must reply to this email using the reply function in your email program (without adding anything).

Forget the second email called "Registration confirmation - Yahoo!".

Then come to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/brknews and select the link "sign in" (Not "[ Join This Group! ]" !] in the upper right part.

Then add you Yahoo ID and your password (you can also check the box "Remember my ID on this computer" if you want to).

Congratulations for following the instructions ! Now you are on this Brknews list. :-) [you must see on the upper right "Membership: You are a member of this group".] ;-)

Please don't forget to read the other points of this FAQ (scroll down). Thanks.

b) Fast and Easy way (Not really recommended !)

Just add your email address (example: ilovebrknews@aol.com ) in the following box and click on "join now!". A confirmation message will be send to your email address. Simply reply to that message to confirm your subscription to the group.

But be careful, with this "easy way" there are 2 main problems: you CANNOT have access to the archive (messages already posted and messages that will be posted in the future in Brknews), and, you will receive all the messages posted to Brknews individually (it could be around 3 emails per day but it may be much more !).

At the contrary, if you follow the instructions of the longer way (see before "a"), you could also choose to receive the messages from Brknews either individually, throughout the day, or in one mailing per day that contains all the posts from the previous 24 hours.

Note: Exceptionally I can change these options for you. But Brknews requires me a lot of time, and I don't want to spend my time for people who even didn't take the time to follow the detailed instructions shown before where they can do that thing and much more on their own ! Thank you for your understanding. ;-)

c) The last chance ! (Not really recommended for the same reasons than those of the fast and easy way !)

Just send me an email if you still don't arrive to subscribe. But please respect me ! Because it took me a lot of hours for typewriting all these instructions in details. Do not send me an email before having tried really hard by following the a) and b) instructions shown before [It sould work even if you are not a computer expert]. My email address is : Don't forget to add that you want to subscribe to Brknews and that you already tried. So you must tell me where something went wrong. If you don't do so, I won't insert your email address inside Brknews. Thank you for your understanding. ;-)

ERROR #1/ Problems with long links

This is important because all BRKNEWS members may not be able to have access to the articles.

Here are some examples :

from http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/brknews/post :

Or

This problem appears when a member is posting from a "non-HTML format" email system. As you can see the blue link is stopped at "...00" (see right part of the image) in this example. So the end of the link ".html" (circled in red in the image) is not in blue like the rest of the link. That's means that no BRKNEWS member will have access to the article (unless he copies and pastes in its internet browser the full link with the missing end). ;-(

So you need to settle your email program in HTML (or Rich-Text Format)! If you don't know if you are sending HTML emails or not, please read this part of the BRKNEWS FAQ

ERROR #2/ Forget to give a grade (G, A, L, OT or ?)

Again, If you forget to give a rate, I cannot accept your post. And I will have to first, contact you by email asking for a rate. Then, wait your answer (alas none usually!). So the result is a loss of time and nobody is happy! ;-(

ERROR #3/ No "Fair" rating

Please keep low expectations and be realist when you are using your best guess in order to rank an article.

Ask yourself this question:

Relative to Berkshire Hathaway, is it an article of [Great (G)?, Average (A)? or Little (L)] importance or an Off Topic subject (OT) ?

Again, I would be very happy if this is correctly done (meaning : do not rate an article as a (G) link because you think it is great to read, but is, in fact, an (OT) relatively to Berkshire Hathaway! Sorry to say that, but it already happenned!).

Note: I am not saying that this is an exact science and that I never do mistakes on that subject!

ERROR #4/ Indirect (and delayed) posts

A member sends the links of an article directly to me. That is great! ;-) But alas I don't have always the time to add it to my posts.

Moreover, each time I am loosing time in order to integrate his article. So I would prefer that this member sends directly his message to BRKNEWS even if it is just one article.

Note 1 : If you are bothered with too much BRKNEWS posts, you can always change your settings and receive one post a day. See your yahoo egroups settings : see at the upper right of http://groups.yahoo.com/group/brknews/ "Delivery Options").

Note 2 : This is not valid for "ads" messages. For instance if you are a book writer. let's say that you want to send an article about your book in BRKNEWS, send an email directly to me at Thank you.

ERROR #5/ Buffett spelling error

At the beginniog, most people do the same spelling error at the Buffett name. They write it "buffet" with only one "t". ;-(

The correct spelling is with two "t" : BUFFETT. Thank you. ;-)

ERROR #6/ [CTRL+F] Keyword missing

Sometimes you don't have to bother to read fully an article because there are only a few quotes related to Berkshire Hathaway. In such a case, when posting a message, add this:

[CTRL+F "Keyword"]

Example: A - Rockies Pipeline Addition Seeks FERC Approval for May 1 Opening [CTRL+F "Buffett"] http://quote.bloomberg.com/cgi-bin/fgcgi.cgi?T=marketsquote99_relnews.ht&s=APpsd5RYhUm9ja2ll

a) You utilize an email program Outlook Express (or Eudora,...) :

If you use Outook Express. Do the following: Go to "tools", then "Send", then " HTML format for (sending + receiving) and select "normal"].

In order to check if it has worked. Open a new message in Outlook Express and typewrite some words. You should see these options available when you write that new message :

b) You utilize a Web-based email manager : Yahoo mail (or hotmail,...) :

When you create a new message, set your message not in "plain text" but in "formatted version"(=html). Like that, every link (long and short) will work for every Brknews subscribers :-)

Usually you know that you have set up your email program in HTML when you see these options available [Bold (B) Italic (I),..etc See image below ] each time you are composing a new email.

[By the way, I think Yahoo messenger(http://www.yahoo.com/r/p1) is a great tool to download]

c) You are an AOL email User :

c1) For receiving a html link (even a long link) from Brknews without having to paste the entire link in the Aol web address field. Do the following:

In your AOL Program, go to "Mail" then select "preference - mail". Then, select the option "show the addresses in form of a link".

Now it should be fine :-)

(Note: For users of the old AOL 5.0, you have to scroll down to have the entire link available)

c2) For sending a message to Brknews:

Unfortunately there is no solution for sending a link through Aol that will appear as an html link in Aol.

The best thing to do is :

Create a new email address at Yahoo : http://www.yahoo.com/r/m2 [You can also do the same thing from an hotmail account or any POP3 accounts. But remember to settle your email sender in a html format. For instance, if you use Outook express. Do the following: Go to "tools", then "Send", then " HTML format for sending and select "normal"].

[By the way, I think Yahoo messenger(http://www.yahoo.com/r/p1) is a great tool to download]

Then when you create a new message, settle your message not in "plain text" but in "formatted version". Like that, every links (long and short) will work for every Brknews subscribers :-)

D) If you don't know what you are using, here are the main principles :

The goal is to set your email program in a HTML format. So that each time you are writing a message it will appear in HTML. Usually you know that you have set up your email program in HTML when you see these options available [Bold (B) Italic (I),..etc See image below ] each time you are composing a new email.

If it doesn't work , maybe a good thing to do is to create another email address at Yahoo (http://www.yahoo.com/r/m2). Then, please see above : click here.

Otherwise, you can use the free services of http://tinyurl.com/ or http://www.makeashorterlink.com in order to post shorter links. So all BRKNEWS members would be able to access to the linked articles. ;-)

"Message Delivery :

Individual emails = Send individual email messages

Daily digest          = Send many emails in one message

No email               = Don't send me email, I'll read the messages at the Web site ..."

Tips #1/ Your eyes are hurt each time you read articles on a computer screen

First, use the butons on the front of your computer screen and set your contrast and brightness settings [trial & error essays will help you. ;-) You can also have a look at the color feature]

Then, depending of your computer screen :

a/ CRT screen (the big ones)

Usually I set 40% for contrast and 60% for brightness in order to read articles online.

Check with the butons on the front of your computer screen that the frequency is set up to 85 Hz vertically (data for a resolution of 1024*768). [This way is better than by checking with the property options of your video card given by Windows].

If it less (like 60 Hz vertically) don't be surprised that your eyes are hurted! So ask your computer dealer to help you set your video card frequency to 85 HZ vertically.

Another thing to do IMHO is to buy a good screen filter (at least $50. More depending on the time spent online).

b/ LCD screen (the slim ones)

On a LCD (the recent one are incredibly bright!) I set 5% for contrast and 0% for brightness in order to read articles online. I also use a small freeware made by NEC called "Brightness controler" for lowering the background collor of the screen.

These screens are far better for reading articles online (less headache!). ;-) They are a lot of different LCD features available. Here is a good website for comparing LCDs http://www.tomshardware.com.

FYI, even with an LCD screen some people also add a screen filter. It is also great to rotate the screen upside down a little bit (increasing or decreasing the light).

Tips #2/ A great multi-tab internet browser: Maxthon (freeware) http://www.maxthon.com

Download it and install it on your computer. The multi-tab feature is really very useful. Small example: hit the thrid buton of your mouse on a link and a new tab is open. In fact they have many more useful features. ;-)

Sometimes, when you click on a link inside a BRKNEWS message, the link isn't loaded in your internet browser (usually internet explorer for Windows users).

A way to slove this is to hit the key called "SHIFT" on your keyboard at the same time than when you click on a link. Note: Usually the "SHIFT" key looks like an arrow pointed at the top. It is also close to the "CTRL" key.

Tips #4/  For AOL users only

Did you know that you could use another internet browser than the one given by AOL ?

IMHO you should give a try to one the multi tab browser quoted above. ;-)