Dragaera

Straw Poll about "Reply-to" (was: Damiano's Lute)

Fri Nov 29 14:23:43 PST 2002

On Fri, Nov 29, 2002 at 09:21:50AM -0600, Nancy Thuleen wrote:

>  > 1. Have you accidentally sent a private reply instead of posting to
>  >    the list?

Yeah.  If not hee, then elsewhere.

>  > 2. Have you received an accidental private reply that was meant to go
>  >    to the list?

Yeah.

>  > 4. Has the Reply-To behavior of this list caused you confusion when
>  >    posting to other mailing lists, perhaps even causing you to

No, this list just confuses me for itself.

> (discussion-based lists), and with only one exception, they all have the
> reply-to set to the individual poster, just like this list -- correctly, in
> other words. :)  Do I just belong to unusual lists, or is this really not
> the norm?  One list I've been on since 1993 has had it that way forever,

In my own experience, such behavior is exceptional.  Most lists I'm familiar
with set Reply-To to the list.  Of the two others which don't, one is a simple
sendmail group alias -- there's no software to munge headers with, or
subscribe with (owner does it all manually) and one (the Cherryh list) only
comes out as a digest from the list owner.

> and all of the others have had that set since their inception.  Only one
> list -- and the one I'd characterize as less technologically-savvy, that

I joined the extropians list in 1993; it had already been around for a few
years.  It's very tech-savvy, and has always set Reply-To to the list.  That's
hardly a new thing; majordomo is old.  Or VMS LISTSERV.  AFAIK cypherpunks
also sets Reply-To, and you don't get more savvy than that...

Before using mutt, I did find it annoying to reply privately to individuals.
But these were discussion lists; I rarely wanted to do such a thing.

-xx- Damien X-)