Dear Michael (and all),
> (though I suspect some of them were meant for general consumption:
> not everyone seems to have grasped that the default reply setting
> for this list is now to reply to sender only. Duncan: I assume
> this is deliberate, but do all list members understand its
> implications?)
Thanks for raising this: there's a paragraph about it in the "german-
studies" Introduction file, but I'm sure it would help if I just run over
list policy.
Yes, I did deliberately change the default reply setting for this list
to "Reply to sender" (from the standard Mailbase/JISCmail default,
which was/is "Reply to list"). The main rationale for "Reply to list"
is that the setting generates more traffic when a list is small and/or
in its early stages, but neither of those applies to "german-studies"
(est. 1998, currently 574 subscribers).
Whichever default setting a list has, some people will forget it.
From my experience of other lists it seems to me better if
someone forgets that a list is set to "Reply to sender" than if they
forget it's set to "Reply to list" (when the result can be highly
embarrassing). The downside of this is that occasionally people
will send replies intended for the list as a whole just to the person
who sent in the original message. In that case (and if you're quite
sure that's the case - best to check with the sender), you can
always forward the message to the list address. Otherwise if you
mail a query to the list and receive lots of replies off-list, then feel
free to send a summary of the responses back to the list, for the
benefit of other subscribers.
I recognise that a list set to "Reply to sender" tends to be more of
an announcements list than a discussion list, so changing policy
on this would actually have quite a significant effect on the nature
(and, above all, volume) of list traffic. Since the "german-studies"
list has had the same setting since the start, though (in this
respect, at least), and everyone has signed up to it in the form it
currently has, I'd be very loath to change it.
All the default "Reply-to" setting means, of course, is that when
you read a message from the list and click the "Reply" button, the
e-mail address of the original sender will appear in the "To:" field of
your message, so if you want to direct a reply to the list as a
whole, you can always just re-address your message. One other
thing to note: if you are forwarding a message to the list and would
rather people responded not to you but to someone else, your e-
mail program ought to allow you to designate a different "Reply-to"
address for your mail, and the JISCmail software will respect it. I
do this all the time when I'm forwarding things, so that people don't
reply to me.
DL
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Dr Duncan Large
<[log in to unmask]>
Department of German, University of Wales Swansea
Singleton Park, GB-Swansea SA2 8PP
Tel: +44 (0)1792 295170; Fax: +44 (0)1792 204167
http://www.swan.ac.uk/german/large.htm
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