List Spammers

Ignorant, unwilling members are not the only ones who can ruin a list. Worse yet are spammers - they love to get their hands on big fat mailing list addresses, and two or three messages about Viagra or the latest weight-loss scam will have your members running for the exits, and cussing you as they go.

Some mailing list owners are tempted to sell or "rent" their lists to people who want to send ads to the list. Personally, I feel that this is just plain wrong. When someone signs up for a discussion list about scuba diving, they have consented to receive messages about scuba diving - not about get-rich-quick schemes and chain letters. Once someone else gets their mitts on your list, you have no control over what they do with it. They may use it to spam, or they may pass it on to other spammers. The members can always unsubscribe from your list, but once they get on a spam list, they're on for life. If you do plan to pass your list on to others, state this fact clearly on the list's home page, and don't be surprised if the quantity and quality of list members that you attract turns out to be small.

Sometimes, despite your best efforts, a spammer will join your list and start spewing out the spam. This is usually fairly easy to discourage. Set up your discussion list so that only list members can post to the list, and immediately remove any members suspected of spamming. Also, some mailing list programs allow you to set things up so that messages which are rejected by the list do not get bounced back to the sender. This makes it harder for spammers to figure out what's going on.

Another potential problem with public discussion lists is the tendency of people to go off on tangents, and start generating lots of messages that have nothing to do with the list subject matter. Vulgar language is an issue that often creates flurries of tangential messages. Lucy Brown uses a colorful expletive in a message, Polly Peacham tells Ms. Brown to keep her offensive language to herself, then Jenny Diver chimes in, calling Ms. Peacham a prude and extolling the virtues of free speech. This can go on for a long time - a bluegrass music mailing list which I subscribe to was once completely co-opted for about a month by a discussion of this kind.

Other popular tangents are viruses, urban legends, conspiracy theories and other similar things. Some people have an endless amount to say about viruses, and one "well-meaning warning" can set off an avalanche of virus-related anecdotes. To say nothing of stories about people having their kidneys stolen, or being shot for flashing their lights at someone on the highway, etc. etc. The pattern is usually similar to the one described above: one member posts a warning about some dubious danger, another tells him/her that he is a fool, a third member tells the second one to lighten up, and so on and on.

At the risk of going off on a tangent myself, I'll recount an amusing anecdote. A member of a stock-investing list that I subscribe to had his car stolen by some members of another racial group. Apparently he felt a need to vent his rage to as many people as possible, so he posted a description of the incident, complete with racial slurs and other immoderate language, to the list. Needless to say, a blizzard of messages came in, condemning him for his racism. This was followed by a smaller wave of messages championing his free speech rights. Later the original poster came back and apologized profusely for his racist remarks, and begged to be excused for speaking in the heat of anger. Over the next few weeks, the list featured in-depth discussions of the issues of racism, free speech and automobile security. Alas, little was said about the evils of posting irrelevant material to mailing lists, and even less about stocks or investing.

As a list administrator, of course, it's up to you to decide how to handle tangents like these. Some folks figure the more messages the merrier, but most agree that the most valuable lists are those that stick closely to their topics. On the other hand, there's a lot to be said for a free and open discussion, and nobody likes a heavy-handed admin who instantly rebukes anyone who posts anything the least bit off-topic. Personally, I prefer to let such things burn themselves out, and will intervene only if I sense an avalanche beginning, or if one of the taboo topics, like politics, religion or PC vs Mac, is broached. Then, I gently remind the list that there are many other mailing lists that discuss these topics, but we're here to talk about scuba diving (or whatever), thank you.

We've been talking about "unmoderated" lists, but if you really want to control the discussion, you can have a "moderated" list. On a moderated list, every single message goes to the list admin, and only after the admin gives his/her approval is it sent to the actual list. The advantage of a moderated list is that the "signal-to-noise ratio" is very good, and list members are never bothered by unsubscribe requests, diet pills or virus scares. The disadvantage is that it's a lot of work for the admin. If a list grows quickly, the admin may get snowed under. Then the messages will be delayed until the admin breaks out the snow shovels, and the immediacy of the list is lost. For lists which deal in time-sensitive information (like hot stock tips), the delay imposed by a moderator may be unacceptable.

Another useful feature of the main mailing list programs is the ability to create a "digest" version of the list. Instead of receiving every individual message posted to the list, many people find it more convenient to receive a single message each day which includes the text of all or most of the messages. Many popular lists give members the option of receiving the digest version. The drawback is the same as for a moderated list - somebody has to put the digest together.

On most discussion lists, you'll see the same questions being asked again and again, which becomes tiresome for the more experienced list participants. Therefore, every list should have a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) list. You can compile it over time, by picking out the most well-worded answers to frequent questions. Many FAQ lists become valuable resources on their own. The FAQ list can reside on a Web page, or can be retrieved by email, or better yet, both.

List Administration
Email-based Public Relations, or Mailing Lists for Web Sites
Putting Your Mailing List to Good Use