[Beowulf] RFC: Restrict posting to subscribers only ?

[Jörg Saßmannshausen]

Hi all,

I am one of the many who cannot post to the list despite being a member of it 
for some years. :-/

I think the policy was that only members can post (good thing in my opinion) 
and new members are moderated. 
I am moderating an email list here as well and unfortunately the list's email 
address got to the outside world. I do get some spam but it is something I can 
cope with. 
Once a new member has established themselves as not being a spammer (and here 
I really mean the type of: buy vi online! I mean, I got vi installed on my 
machines so why shall I buy it? :D ) you can remove the moderation flag. If 
that member then becomes a spammer or troll you can them put back into 
moderation only.

Does that sound like a good idea? We do not have to rule out the usual anti-
spam mechanisms here.

My two cents from somebody who got put on the observer chair :D

Regards

Jörg

On Friday 24 August 2012 11:26:11 Gregory Matthews wrote:
> this is not a good idea - your list can become a spam mirror and
> replying to spammers is bad in lots of ways. Get a good spam filter,
> MailScanner + SpamAssassin + selected blacklists + selected
> sendmail/postfix plugins.
> 
> GREG
> 
> On 24/08/12 02:06, Christopher Samuel wrote:
> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> > Hash: SHA1
> > 
> > Hi all,
> > 
> > I'd like to solicit opinions from list members on changing the policy
> > of the list on messages from non-subscribers from the current default
> > of holding them for moderation to the position of rejecting them (with
> > an explanatory message).
> > 
> > The reason is that currently us new list admins get many dozens of
> > spams a day being held for moderation and it would be very hard to
> > spot a legitimate message (from either a new subscriber or from a new
> > member who is having messages held for moderation) amongst them.
> > 
> > It seems fairer to me for legitimate non-members to get an email
> > saying that their post has been rejected because they're not a member,
> > but pointing them to the web page to subscribe, rather than just a
> > message saying it's been held for moderation and then nothing (if it
> > gets missed).
> > 
> > It's also fairer to new members who are under moderation (as spammers
> > do sign up to lists too) as their messages won't get missed in the
> > general flood of non-member spam.
> > 
> > This is how all the other Mailman lists I run are configured and it's
> > not caused issues or complaints there.
> > 
> > Thoughts please!
> > 
> > cheers,
> > Chris
> > - --
> > 
> >   Christopher Samuel        Senior Systems Administrator
> >   VLSCI - Victorian Life Sciences Computation Initiative
> >   Email: samuel at unimelb.edu.au Phone: +61 (0)3 903 55545
> >   http://www.vlsci.org.au/      http://twitter.com/vlsci
> > 
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> > Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org/
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> > iEYEARECAAYFAlA2034ACgkQO2KABBYQAh+bKwCePy8HxXFL/cXH3HCvmcyNZcPB
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-- 
*************************************************************
Jörg Saßmannshausen
University College London
Department of Chemistry
Gordon Street
London
WC1H 0AJ 

email: j.sassmannshausen at ucl.ac.uk
web: http://sassy.formativ.net

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