Since this is a new venture for the Johannine Literature E-Group, we might have to make some adjustments along the way.  But the following procedures should help to ensure that the discussions are worthwhile, productive and manageable, both for the authors and for the group members.  Overall, it might help everyone to imagine this as a very large seminar room (with over 200 participants!) , where one person is presenting his or her research and others are responding to it.  Or, imagine this like the Q&A period at the end of an SBL session.

1. We'll discuss one paper at a time, for about one week each, beginning on Monday and continuing to the following Sunday. The one-week limit is intended to keep the commitment manageable for the participating authors, although other people could continue a discussion after the official time is over, if they wish.
2. We'll have some "break weeks" between most of the papers, to give people a chance to raise other questions and discuss other Johannine topics (or do other things necessary in their off-line lives!).
3. During the scheduled weeks, people should still feel free to post other announcements or brief questions on unrelated topics.  But it would help keep the "focused discussion" on the SBL papers if people could wait for the "break weeks" to bring up unrelated topics for more extended discussion.
4. So that none of us gets flooded with too much e-mail, we would ask all members (except that week's author) to post no more than ONE message (and not too long!) per day.  That will give more people a chance to participate and will let everyone keep up with the discussion more easily (since many people do not check their e-mail more than once a day).
   
5. The authors will read the messages posted each day (unless they are too long or too many!) and will give some type of response at least once a day.  They might write several short responses or might group several topics into one or two longer responses daily. But they are not required to answer every question or respond to every comment.
   
6. Most of the comments and questions (especially at the beginning) should be directed to the author and should remain on the topic of the paper.  Later in the week, people might also react to what others have said and/or bring up some related issues that are not dealt with explicitly in the paper itself.  But out of respect for the author of each week's paper, most of the discussion should still remain closely related to his or her paper.
   
7. The E-group moderators will announce the beginning of each focused discussion period, but they will generally not interfere in the discussions.  The authors themselves will field the questions and steer the discussion, while the moderators will remind individuals (if necessary) about the General Protocols of the Johannine Literature E-Group!