Tattva-viveka

This is for members who did not receive the recent emails about setting up notifications:

Dear Tattva-viveka friends,

Happy Kartika 2013! Jaya Radhe! Jaya Damodara!

Recently a group named Tattva-viveka was established on Facebook in an effort to revive philosophical discussion amongst Guru Maharaj's friends and students. As you may be aware, our Tattva-viveka internet forum has struggled to compete with Facebook's groups, social news and virtual association for the last several years. Though the two forums can serve similar purposes, I suspect that FB has primarily kept devotees attention because of its social focus, but also because of its system of notifications.

Over the years that the popularity of FB has grown, Guru Maharaj has repeatedly stated his preference for our Tattva-viveka internet forum for discussion of spiritual topics amongst our sangha. There is also a history of ten years worth of great content on Tattva-viveka which can be explored, researched and reviewed. Facebook tends to be a difficult forum for philosophical discussion because of the way that comments display, the difficulty monitoring the content or the audience, difficulty coming back to topics remembered, etc.

Understanding that Tattva-viveka is a superior forum for these reasons, we just needed to figure out how to bring the devotees attention back there. That is where notifications come in… I know that for myself, I would regularly visit TV if I had some reminder that it was there, and that our sangha was participating and communicating there. There is a system for receiving notifications on Tattva-viveka and I've included instructions below. It is my hope that if devotees implement the use of these notifications and a few other instructions below, we will be able to revive the rich association that we have shared on Tattva-viveka. Hope to see you there, and please participate!

daso 'smi,

madan gopal das

p.s. In about a week the Tattva-viveka group on FB will be shutdown. If you would like to see any content from there kept, I would suggest you post it on the TV board.

1. Log in to TV

2. From the home page, click on the forum "Svagatam svagatam."

3. On the right hand side, just below the "View New Content" button you will see a "Follow this forum" button. Click on it.

4. Go back to the home page and repeat this step for the other 13 forums (Announcements, Questions and Answers, etc.)

5. Once you have "followed" all the forums, go back to the home page.

6. In the upper right corner, click the arrow next to your name which displays a drop down menu. Click "My Settings"

7. Click the "Notification Options" tab on the left of the screen

8. Check/select the following boxes from the top:

-"send me news and information"

-"auto follow topics I reply to", and from notification frequency drop down menu I would suggest "immediate". Otherwise you can choose to receive updates daily or weekly.

-"Notification method to use for replies to followed topics" - check the "email" box

-"Notification method to use for topics in followed forums" - check the "email" box

Selecting the notification options as described above will allow you to receive email notifications every time there is a new topic posted in one of the 14 forums of TV. If you comment on that topic, you will also be notified of subsequent comments. If you do not comment on a topic but want to receive notifications in order to follow the discussion, you can also "follow" the topic by clicking the "Follow this topic" button the same way you followed forums above (within the topic, button on top right). Topics or forums that you follow will send you email notifications whenever new content is added.

The only drawback for notifications in this type of discussion board is that if you do not comment on a topic, have not "followed" the topic, or new comments are made on an older topic that you have not followed, you will not be notified. The solution to this problem for when you are on the TV website is to use the "View New Content" feature. From any page on TV you will see the "View New Content" link below the search bar in the upper right corner. Simply click on it and then from the menu on the left side you can select a time period to view any new comments you've missed for whatever time you choose.

I want to reinforce one guideline we have for the forum. Without the permission of the author, members of Tattva-viveka may not share content from there "outside" in other forums or otherwise on the internet. Doing so may cause your membership to be canceled. Okay, management threats end there...

With this renewal of focus on Tattva-viveka, Guru Maharaj is personally requesting that all members check the "View New Content" feature at least once daily, or once as often as you get online.

Tattva-viveka is truly the place where we can freely speak amongst ourselves, deepen our relationships with each other and get a very significant amount of personal association with Guru Maharaj. Please take advantage of this opportunity.

Also, I suspect that in the last year or two some recent initiates have not been informed of or directed towards Tattva-viveka. If you know of any members of the sangha in your area who are not on Tattva-viveka, give them a link and tell them to request membership.

daso 'smi,

madan gopal das