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with these messages. Of course, if you complain, you'll be bombarded with messages about the First Amendment and artistic expression -- or worse, with another cascade. The only thing you can do is ignore them, by setting up a killfile.

There are also certain newsgroups where killfiles will come in handy because of the way the newsgroups are organized. For example, readers of rec.arts.tv.soaps always use an acronym in their subject: line for the show they're writing about (AMC, for example, for "All My Children"). This way, people who only want to read about "One Life to Live" can blank out all the messages about "The Young and the Restless" and all the others (to keep people from accidentally screening out messages that might contain the letters "gh" in them, "General Hospital" viewers always use "gh:" in their subject lines).

Both nn and rn let you create killfiles, but in different ways.

To create a killfile in nn, go into the newsgroup with the offending messages and type a capital K. You'll see this at the bottom of your screen:


AUTO (k)ill or (s)elect (CR => Kill subject 30 days)

If you hit return, nn will ask you which article's subject you're tired of. Choose one and the article and any follow-ups will disappear, and you won't see them again for 30 days.

If you type a lower-case k instead, you'll get this:


AUTO KILL on (s)ubject or (n)ame (s)

If you hit your S key or just enter, you'll see this:


KILL Subject: (=/)

Type in the name of the offending word or phrase and hit enter. You'll then be prompted:


KILL in (g)roup 'eff.test' or in (a)ll groups (g)

except that the name of the group you see will be the one you're actually in at the moment. Because cascaders and other annoying people often cross-post their messages to a wide range of newsgroups, you might consider hitting a instead of g. Next comes:


Lifetime of entry in days (p)ermanent (30)

The P key will screen out the offending a

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