This has been a fascinating discussion bringing up many aspects I would not have thought about, having no background in mailing list administration or managing an online forum. The discussion of blocked access in some countries was eye-opening for me as I did not know that happened. Blocking access to music engraving software hardly seems like it could promote any goals for "international security" in any way.
Personally, I find the email based method clunky and inconvenient, even anachronistic; if there was a central official web forum, I would preferentially participate in that instead. Maybe that stems back to my initial Internet experience having been with Usenet prior to the World Wide Web taking off. Thread based discussion with all of the input being available in one place immediately just makes sense to me. Email conversations on technical topics which may have many responses just feel piecemeal to me. Additionally, I find value in the archived aspect of web fora in which all the discussions remain available in a very convenient manner. Having a system that could offer both is something I did not know it was possible. In any event, it sounds like change has been averted and we will continue as we are.