Re: Off-topic: Mailing List usability

On Thu, Dec 14, 2000 at 12:27:48PM -0000, Baker, Thomas wrote:
> If the administrator of this list is reading, they might think about
> implementing some of this:
> 
> http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20000820.html
> 
> Not least the unsubscribe instructions on the end of every message.

In my experience, a better solution is for the list software to
look for requests that were apparently sent to the wrong address,
and bounce those messages to the list maintainer for manual
processing.

Our list software does this, but until now it didn't look for
'remove' in the subject. I just fixed that, so you shouldn't see
any more of those messages on the list.

Note also that our lists have List-* headers a la RFC 2369, so
mail user agents can make it easy for people to unsubscribe
without needing to learn how it's done on any given list.

Regarding message footers, I don't think mailing list software
should modify message content before distributing it to the list.
(That goes for footers as well as headers like reply-to, subject,
message-id, etc.)

By the way, please send requests like this to
<www-html-request@w3.org>, not the list. (all internet email
lists should have a corresponding -request address.)

-- 
Gerald Oskoboiny       <gerald@w3.org>  +1 613 261 6630
System Administrator   http://www.w3.org/People/Gerald/
World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)      http://www.w3.org/

Received on Thursday, 14 December 2000 13:51:45 UTC