Managing Mailing Lists: Majordomo, LISTSERV, Listproc, and SmartList

Would you like to set up an electronic discussion forum for your customers? Or how about a mailing list to announce meetings of your local hobby group? Email is the universal Internet application, which makes mailing lists an ideal vehicle for creating electronic communities. All you need to run a mailing list is access to a system that is connected to the Internet, a mailing list management software package, and a bit of know-how, which is where this book comes in. Managing Mailing Lists is full of practical information for the list maintainer and system administrator alike. This book covers four mailing list packages: Majordomo, LISTSERV, Listproc, and SmartList. All of these packages run on UNIX systems; LISTSERV runs on a number of platforms, including Windows NT. If you are a system administrator, Managing Mailing Lists tells you what you need to know to pick a mailing list package and get it up and running on your system. It also offers advice on working with the people who are actually maintaining mailing lists on your system, so that you can give them the support they need to run effective, useful lists. If you are charged with establishing and running a mailing list, Managing Mailing Lists covers everything you need to know about setting up and maintaining the list, from writing the charter for the list to dealing with bounced messages. Depending on what mailing list software is running on your system, you'll need to work with your system administrator to set up various aspects of the list. This book lays out all the decisions you need to make and tells you what information you need to pass along to the administrator. Mailing lists offer a great deal of flexibility. For example, you can create a moderated mailing list, so that you can control the content on the list, or you can let anyone post whatever they want, for a more free-form discussion group. You can also exert control over who can subscribe to the list, if you want to limit membership based on certain criteria. You can give your subscribers the option to receive individual messages or message digests and you can archive list postings and make them available to your readership.

Although mailing lists are hardly one of the more glamorous aspects of Internet communications, they remain one of the most useful, effective, and popular methods for group discussions. Many organizations and businesses use them to keep in touch with members and customers. But while mailing lists are simple to use, they can be confusing for newcomers to run.

This comprehensive guide is for anyone who wants to run or manage a mailing list, including the busy system administrator who needs to ensure that user-owned mailing lists run as trouble-free as possible. Schwartz concentrates on Unix systems and software because they are well proven, stable, and free (plus, most mailing lists are based in Unix systems). Discussions of Unix systems and commands can be dry, but Schwartz is thoughtful enough to interject some humorous examples. He covers the technicalities of list operation, including the selection and use of all the leading software. He also goes into the pros and cons of the various strategic questions that list managers must face, such as whether or not a list should be moderated or whether or not to allow nonsubscribers to post to a list. This book will save any new list manager a great deal of time and trouble. -- Elizabeth Lewis