> With Mike's permission, I am moving this over to gossip because it is
> of general interest.. Like everything else, I think this boils down to
> cost versus benefit.
Greetings Jeff,
Not so surprisingly, I'm the list owner Mike M. is encouraging to get
set up with you!
And he has independently identified my only real concern at this point.
> The reply to button in message pages was used 610 times yesterday. I
> don't know a better way to commiserate with someone whose pet bunny
> rabbit had an impacted molar back in 2002 on a defunct mailing list.
Yep, that'd be very sweet of you.
> We have several mechanisms in place to discourage automated abuse.
Yes. From my reading of your FAQ and www.turnstep.com/spambot/ I can
see that you've made it quite hard for spambots to comb your site for
working addresses.
> You are totally correct that a bad guy can get an email address. If she
> just wants one, it is trivial. And yes, an email address along with
> knowledge of the recipient could aid targeted phishing.
As I mentioned in my reply to your Improvements thread, this is my
worry... It doesn't even have to be a 'bad guy' per se, but just a
*stranger* from a Google hit.
My members know each other. New people join and everybody welcomes
them, we know each others' names or handles. Hearing from another list
member isn't going to bother anybody. Having people we've never heard
from popping up in private e-mail, asking questions about stuff that's
sometimes slightly personal... is probably going to seem a little
creepy at times, even if the sender is well-meaning. Add in the
potential for impersonation, harassment, and other forms of malice, and
I can see some of my members worrying.
Within your existing framework, as I understand it, I see a couple of
possibilities (besides me accepting things as is, of course!):
"Manually" disable that button for one mailing list and hope nobody
else notices. (Yeah, I know, not pretty at all!)
Create a new option for *all* lists that defaults to 'button on' and
let owners request it to be changed... then deal with the one-time rush
of e-mails that will flow in while people make up their minds about the
new feature. In time it will slow to a steady trickle as archives are
started and owners change their minds.
I see it as a neat new feature! You may see it as more new work than
you want to do. I think I understand the importance of keeping things
as automated and self-tending as possible, and this detracts from that.
I appreciate your thinking about it, whatever you decide.
Thank you,
Mike D.
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