On Thu, 11 Jul 2002, Derek D. Martin wrote:
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> At some point hitherto, [EMAIL PROTECTED] hath spake thusly:
> > mwl's "Reply-To" suggestion is a good one.
>
> No, it isn't. The problem with setting reply-to is that it is done so
> infrequently that a responder is highly unlikely to notice, or to
> think of it. Except in the reletively rare instances when someone
> does set the reply-to header, reply means "reply to sender only" --
> which (at least in the case where the user is using an e-mail client
> that actually does know how to handle mailing lists) is invariably
> what one wants. When one is replying to group e-mail which is not
> distributed by a list manager, this is the behavior that one expects.
> The trouble here is that mailing lists are different animals, and
> should have support for being treated differently...
>
> I know many of the people on this list personally, and often for me, a
> post incites a comment that I do want to share privately with them,
> and not with the list. Setting reply-to will pretty much guarantee
> that my private replies will be sent to the whole list. It won't take
> much of that for me to unsubscribe.
>
> A much better solution, IMO, is to use an e-mail client that
> understands mailing lists, or add support for it to your favorite
> mailer, or complain to the developers until they do.
>
I've been trying to keep my big mouth shut on this one, but I just
can't do it this time. I'm more often a lurker than not, but in this
instance, I have some personal experience.
I have a better idea... how about (this has definitely been
mentioned before) people just take a moment to note who they're replying
to? Making a mistake and replying to all when you meant to make a private
reply or vice versa is HUMAN ERROR. It is *not* the fault of the mail
client, it is not because "they had their reply-to set and I write so many
e-mail messages, I shouldn't *have* to check", or the developer's fault,
or anyone else's fault but your own. I have personal experience with
doing this (at WORK, no less...), and from what I gather, you do too,
Derek. However, I merely accepted the fact that I had written the e-mail
too quickly and had not paid enough attention to what I was doing. (The
reply-to was set to the group mailing list, btw)
People need to take the responsibility for their own actions. If
you make a mistake and send a private post to a group, or vice versa, that
is YOUR fault, and should be accepted as such. While it is certainly
understandable and *I* for one wouldn't ever give anyone any flak for it,
I think leaving a list because of that is merely giving in to injured
pride.
Anyway, that's my many-cents worth.
- Dana
--
Dana S. Tellier Email [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Student Engineer University of New Hampshire
InterOperability Lab 220 Morse Hall, NH 03824
Routing Consortium 603-862-0090 FAX: 603-862-1761
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