Why you should not use reply to (was Re: List identification)

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I would highly recommend that this mailing list does not default replies back
to the list. I made this mistake early in my experience with mailing lists.
The morning I woke up and found approximately 1000 messages in my mailbox taught
me why reply-to is evil evil evil in mailing lists.


If anyone on a mailing list "goes away" or installs an autoresponder on their
mail account, then all automatic replies will be sent to the list which then
trigger's the automatic reply which is sent the list which then triggers the
automatic reply which is sent the list which then triggers the automatic
reply...


If you are lucky, your mailing list software will detect loops like this and
cancel them relatively quickly. However, detection isn't reliable for a variety
of reasons and it just isn't worth the hassle when prevention by not using
reply-to do so easy.


--- eric


• Next message: Eric Fishman: "One List"
• Previous message: MONKOWSK@@watson.ibm.com: "100 most used words in the English language??"
• In reply to: L.C.Jackson@@psd.maff.gov.uk: "Re: slow "SendSystemKeys" (was BringUp "Explorer" probs)"
• Next in thread: Patricia Hawkins: "Re: Why you should not use reply to (was Re: List identification)"