Reply to list?

[Fred Janon]

Is there a specific reason why the mailing lists are setup with the reply email address set to the author of the post and not the list itself? The Scala lists are the only one set that way of all the ones I am using and I keep responding to one person instead of the list, embarrassing. Apologies for that.

Thanks

Fred

[Steve Lianoglou-2]

> Is there a specific reason why the mailing lists are setup with the  
> reply email address set to the author of the post and not the list  
> itself?

This is one of those things that's up there w/ the old emacs vs. vi  
wars.

Here's an argument for doing it the way it's setup up on this list:
http://www.unicom.com/pw/reply-to-harmful.html

And here's an opposing view:
http://www.metasystema.net/essays/reply-to.mhtml

So, there are good arguments from both sides, I guess. I'm sure you  
can find longer diatribes if you want to look for them.

There are several lists I'm subscribed to that act this way as well,  
so I guess it's just really  6 of one, half dozen of the other

> The Scala lists are the only one set that way of all the ones I am  
> using and I keep responding to one person instead of the list,  
> embarrassing. Apologies for that.

I think one of the big counter arguments is that it there is a greater  
possibility for it to be *more* embarrassing if you end up sending a  
mail to the list which you may have intended to be a personal one.

-steve

[Fred Janon]

Ooops, I did it again! Darn Gmail "reply" button, Gmail should be smarter than that! Maybe we should ask Google to fix Gmail than?

Fred

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Fred Janon <fjanon@...>
Date: Jan 8, 2008 12:07 PM
Subject: Re: [scala-lounge] Reply to list?
To: Steve Lianoglou <lists.steve@...>

> which you may have intended to be a personal one.

Hum, I can't think of 'personal' issues that I would talk about on a programming language mailing list...? Is there any? Maybe looking look a fool asking a basic question when one wants to look really smart? Personally I do belong to about 20+ lists and none of them behave like that.

Fred

On Jan 8, 2008 11:42 AM, Steve Lianoglou <lists.steve@...> wrote:

> Is there a specific reason why the mailing lists are setup with the
> reply email address set to the author of the post and not the list
> itself?

This is one of those things that's up there w/ the old emacs vs. vi
wars.

Here's an argument for doing it the way it's setup up on this list:
http://www.unicom.com/pw/reply-to-harmful.html

And here's an opposing view:
http://www.metasystema.net/essays/reply-to.mhtml

So, there are good arguments from both sides, I guess. I'm sure you
can find longer diatribes if you want to look for them.

There are several lists I'm subscribed to that act this way as well,
so I guess it's just really  6 of one, half dozen of the other

> The Scala lists are the only one set that way of all the ones I am
> using and I keep responding to one person instead of the list,
> embarrassing. Apologies for that.

I think one of the big counter arguments is that it there is a greater
possibility for it to be *more* embarrassing if you end up sending a
mail to the list which you may have intended to be a personal one.

-steve

[Alex Blewitt]

The list should have 'Reply-To: scala-lounge@...' in it, in
which case GMail would do the right thing.

One of the thing that really f**s me off about the reply-to-people
approach on the Scala list is that GMail thinks if you've mailed
someone more than a couple of times then they're automatically a
'friend', and puts you in Google Talk. Worse, it puts any shared items
that you may have had in Google Reader subscribed to as well.*

Whilst GMail's auto-add is annoying, it's basically a problem with the
list management that is run by listes.epfl.ch not setting the
appropriate Reply-To field. All mailers respect that; there's no way
of GMail knowing that 'scala-lounge' isn't just another person on the
list otherwise.

Alex.

* This also means that idiots that you've had vociferous arguments
against on this list are suddenly deemed 'friends'; that particular
contact was deleted immediately, let me tell you.

[Matt Hellige]

I don't know. I prefer that lists be set up with reply-to the author.
There are other ways of identifying mailing lists, which gmail at
least partly supports. For instance, the Scala list correctly sets the
following headers:
  Mailing-List: contact scala-lounge-help@...; run by ezmlm
  List-Id: <scala-lounge.listes.epfl.ch>
  List-Help: <mailto:scala-lounge-help@...>
  List-Unsubscribe: <mailto:scala-lounge-unsubscribe@...>
  List-Subscribe: <mailto:scala-lounge-subscribe@...>
  List-Post: <mailto:scala-lounge@...>
If you click "show details" in gmail, it shows the Mailing-List header
and a nice link offering to "filter messages from this list." But they
don't offer any convenient way to reply to the list. Mutt has a very
nice list-reply command and key-binding. I really wish gmail offered
the same thing. But in many respects gmail offers inadequate support
for mailing lists, and I guess it is not a huge priority for them.

That said, it would be fine if scala lists switched the reply-to to
the list. I don't care much either way, and I know this is way
off-topic, so I promise this is my last message on the subject.

Matt

PS Alex, I'm afraid your idiot is me. I know we've argued in the past,
and as I said, I'm sorry for being a jerk! Anyway I hope you don't
hate me so much that you can't stand seeing my name in a contact list.
:)



On Jan 8, 2008 8:16 AM, Alex Blewitt <alex.blewitt@...> wrote:

> The list should have 'Reply-To: scala-lounge@...' in it, in
> which case GMail would do the right thing.
>
> One of the thing that really f**s me off about the reply-to-people
> approach on the Scala list is that GMail thinks if you've mailed
> someone more than a couple of times then they're automatically a
> 'friend', and puts you in Google Talk. Worse, it puts any shared items
> that you may have had in Google Reader subscribed to as well.*
>
> Whilst GMail's auto-add is annoying, it's basically a problem with the
> list management that is run by listes.epfl.ch not setting the
> appropriate Reply-To field. All mailers respect that; there's no way
> of GMail knowing that 'scala-lounge' isn't just another person on the
> list otherwise.
>
> Alex.
>
> * This also means that idiots that you've had vociferous arguments
> against on this list are suddenly deemed 'friends'; that particular
> contact was deleted immediately, let me tell you.
>

--
Matt Hellige / matt@...
http://matt.immute.net

[Alex Blewitt]

It's got nothing to do with identifying lists; that's easily done if a
message is sent to: or cc: something (or indeed, about any other
headers like the ones below).

It's about *replying* to the list; for example, I almost sent this
reply to just you and not, as mailing lists usually are intended to
be, to the list itself. The normal behaviour is 99% of the time to
reply to everyone; why are we optimising for the 1% instead of the
99%?

For what it's worth, no, the idiot is not you ;-)

Alex

On Jan 8, 2008 4:35 PM, Matt Hellige <matt@...> wrote:

> I don't know. I prefer that lists be set up with reply-to the author.
> There are other ways of identifying mailing lists, which gmail at
> least partly supports. For instance, the Scala list correctly sets the
> following headers:
>   Mailing-List: contact scala-lounge-help@...; run by ezmlm
>   List-Id: <scala-lounge.listes.epfl.ch>
>   List-Help: <mailto:scala-lounge-help@...>
>   List-Unsubscribe: <mailto:scala-lounge-unsubscribe@...>
>   List-Subscribe: <mailto:scala-lounge-subscribe@...>
>   List-Post: <mailto:scala-lounge@...>
> If you click "show details" in gmail, it shows the Mailing-List header
> and a nice link offering to "filter messages from this list." But they
> don't offer any convenient way to reply to the list. Mutt has a very
> nice list-reply command and key-binding. I really wish gmail offered
> the same thing. But in many respects gmail offers inadequate support
> for mailing lists, and I guess it is not a huge priority for them.
>
> That said, it would be fine if scala lists switched the reply-to to
> the list. I don't care much either way, and I know this is way
> off-topic, so I promise this is my last message on the subject.
>
> Matt
>
> PS Alex, I'm afraid your idiot is me. I know we've argued in the past,
> and as I said, I'm sorry for being a jerk! Anyway I hope you don't
> hate me so much that you can't stand seeing my name in a contact list.
> :)
>
>
>
>
> On Jan 8, 2008 8:16 AM, Alex Blewitt <alex.blewitt@...> wrote:
> > The list should have 'Reply-To: scala-lounge@...' in it, in
> > which case GMail would do the right thing.
> >
> > One of the thing that really f**s me off about the reply-to-people
> > approach on the Scala list is that GMail thinks if you've mailed
> > someone more than a couple of times then they're automatically a
> > 'friend', and puts you in Google Talk. Worse, it puts any shared items
> > that you may have had in Google Reader subscribed to as well.*
> >
> > Whilst GMail's auto-add is annoying, it's basically a problem with the
> > list management that is run by listes.epfl.ch not setting the
> > appropriate Reply-To field. All mailers respect that; there's no way
> > of GMail knowing that 'scala-lounge' isn't just another person on the
> > list otherwise.
> >
> > Alex.
> >
> > * This also means that idiots that you've had vociferous arguments
> > against on this list are suddenly deemed 'friends'; that particular
> > contact was deleted immediately, let me tell you.
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Matt Hellige / matt@...
> http://matt.immute.net
>

[mscurtescu]

The main purpose of a mailing is is to facilitate communication, and the default
behavior IMHO should be to reply to the whole list.

Yes, there is the relatively rare occasion when you want to reply off
list to a message,
but this is the exception, not the rule.

Marius


--
http://marius.scurtescu.com