On 01:30 PM 7/6/02, David W. Tamkin wrote:
>{I was once trapped by a similar mistake to the one I was describing. A list
> had been abandoned by its manager; left on autopilot it was going into the
> toilet. A member created a replacement under the same name on a different
> server. I wanted mail from the two lists in the same folder, and the only
> thing their headers had in common was the local part in From_. So I put in
> a procmail recipe that checked the string between 'From ' and '@' and
nothing
> else.
>
> Well, a short time later came the initial wave of vanity domains. One
member
> chose to subscribe (and post) to every list he was on as
listname@his.domain.
> I sent a private response to a post of his. He wrote back to me from the
> same address, quoting some of my own text back to me. But I had not noticed
> that he was using this new vanity address, so when his private reply to my
> private message landed in my folder for the list, I thought he had posted it
> and I ripped him a new one. He replied puzzled, acknowledging that what I
I've had this happen when I replied to a message from a hobby list that
uses the list identifier in the subject line. I hadn't changed the subject
line in my *private* email to the author, but the author saw the subject
line and assumed the message was "from the list". I've had private emails
quoted and replied to on the list, and I've had people scream at me "how
could you post such and such about me" when what I had sent was private email.
It's one reason I detest list identifiers in subject lines. I think this
solution causes more problems than it solves.
> thought he had done would of course have been wrong but denying that he had
> done it. When his second private message also went into my folder for the
> list, I looked at his headers and saw what was going on. I apologized
to him
> for my error but left it clear how he had contributed to it. Then I changed
> my procmail condition's regexp to OR the two list servers' domains
instead of
> ending with the at-sign.
>
> I don't have, want, nor need a domain of my own, at least not the way my
life
> and the net are in 2002 [both may change over the next few years]; but I
have
> subdomains from three providers where I can create addresses with any
syntac-
> tically permitted local part I choose, but if I ever were to set up
different
> addresses for every list I'm on, for sure I would not use the list's name,
> nor any string including the exact list name, as my address on the
list. Ab-
> breviate the list's name, pun it, encipher it, reverse it (unless it's a
pal-
> indrome), but don't copy it. Don't lay traps for people. And that's
besides
> the inherent arrogance of using the list's name for yourself as if you were
> the list and your posts were official announcements about it.}
I see a lot of these addresses (and have used a fair number of them
myself), and I run into a lot of problems with people trying to remember
which address they used for this particular list. Using the list name is
the system that requires the least bookkeeping to remember which address
goes with which list. After you have seen it a few times, it no longer
causes others to think the address is an official address of the list
management.
jc
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