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Change in the list's Reply-To setting



The members of SAA Council's Archives and Archivists List Oversight
Committee (Mark Greene, Richard Pearce-Moses, Thomas Connors, and Jackie
Dooley) would like to address some of the comments regarding the recent
change in the list's REPLY-TO setting.

As background, we considered this change in response to many messages on
and off the list complaining about the number of irrelevant personal
messages on the list.  These comments were not about messages of
questionable relevancy to the topic of the list, but primarily about
messages along the lines of "Me, too!"  And, "Bob! Haven't heard from
you in ages.  When are you coming to Kalamazoo?"  For example, recently
the first six messages of the day were private messages; those messages
included the original posts (compounded with each posting) and comprised
a quarter of the digest.  (N.b.: Given the way Listserv mail is
displayed by some mailers, these posters may have had no idea they were
responding to the list; it is precisely this kind of innocent error that
we hope the change will avoid.)

We changed the Reply-To setting for a one-month trial and comment period
during November.  While the majority of on-list comments were against
the change, messages received off-list resulted in equal numbers pro and
con.  The number of comments represented less than half of one percent
of all subscribers.

Given the small, neutral response, we considered other factors.  We had
been moved to act as the result of many complaints about personal
messages received over the years.  We were also influenced by the
experience of one member who managed a large list; Richard Pearce-Moses
had recently made the same change to PhotoHst so that replies no longer
went to the list, but to the sender.  Pearce-Moses reported that the
noise level on the list had dropped significantly without apparent loss
of overall quality (an opinion held by many PhotoHst subscribers).

We also tried to consider the effects of the change on readers with
different mail readers and readers who receive the list in digest form.
The commonly proposed solution, "Just delete it!" works reasonably well
for individuals who receive messages individually, but poorly for
individuals who read the digest form.

Our greatest concern was the possible loss of good answers.  Peer advice
requires many answers so that readers may distill and synthesize the
best solution through on-going discussion.  At the same time we were
also aware that many individuals reply directly to the poster, not to
the list; those answers are lost regardless of how the list software is
configured.  We encourage all individuals to share their answers on the
list.

Ultimately we decided that a reduced level of noise was worth the
possible loss of some answers.  We believe that most participants will
still reply to the list, even though this will require a bit of extra
work.   Using the Reply to All option or creating a nickname should
minimize the additional extra work.

Should Archives and Archivists begin to become a list of unanswered
questions, we will reconsider this decision.

Sent on behalf of the Archives and Archivists List Oversight Committee
(Mark Greene, Richard Pearce-Moses, Thomas Connors, and Jackie Dooley)
by Richard Pearce-Moses

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