Warning, this has nothing to do with PEST, but my long message at the
weekend on the Wellcome survey (any sign of the full report?) has reduced
y'all to silence so I thought I'd try this one on you.
As my brain cells fade away, I find myself making such silly mistakes as
hitting the "reply" button when I want to respond to a message that appears
here. This is usually a mistake on my part as this list is uniquely
configured for replies to go back to the person who wrote the original
message.
Now, I may be dense, but I can't reveal that I am not alone. I too have
received messages intended for wider distribution. (They often turn up later
on the main list.)
When I remember, I hit the "reply to all" button and remove the individual's
address. But as the list has changed hands fairly recently, I thought I
would raise the broader issue of the way it works.
Should we prevail upon our new minder to configure it so that "reply" sent
messages back to the list? Would people prefer it if that is how it worked?
I mention this now because a note has gone out on another list that I watch.
It says:
the list "has always been set so replies go to the list, *not* just to the
original sender. Most jiscmail list owners prefer this arrangement as we
believe it facilitates online discussion."
There is another reason for preferring this mechanism. Most list managing
software is intelligent enough to filter out the messages from thoughtless
people who turn on the "autoresponder" every time they go out for a fag.
(Must be a lot of incipient cases of lung cancer at the Science Museum.) As
the list now works, every time someone sends a message to it, they get up to
half a dozen of this: "Vanessa is sunning herself in Wigan..." or "Boris got
fired last week and now works for..".
MK
_______________________________________________________________________
Michael Kenward OBE / Phone: +44 (0)1444 400568 Fax: 401064
/
Science Writer & Stuff / For light relief visit http://www.absw.org.uk
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