Push Button Paradise

I'm not exactly sure how it happened, but at some point I fell off the webdesign-l list and never got back on. Admittedly, it was unusually painful for a mail list, for example not having any sort of online archives, except by an arcane request-blocks-of-messages-and-get-them-via-email interface. Lots of knowledge is in there, but way too hard to get at, browse, or search.

Now, the list has transitioned to Mailman. In some sort of side-effect, I got auto-resubbed in digest mode--which I welcome. (Note that as I write this, the web side hasn't yet updated and still shows all the instructions for the old list software.)

The big question: should the new archives be public or member-only. It's interesting to look at some opinions here. Of those wanting private, the main reason is spam-protection. A less common reason is for beginners who want to be able to ask newbie questions without the whole world noticing their newbieness during routine searches.

The other side argues that existing list software routinely obsfucates email addresses in archives, rendering them useless to spammers, and that a really determined spammer could just subscribe then harvest, so things might as well be public.

Needless to say, I'm really hoping that some kind of agreement will be reached where this treasure trove of information will be available to everybody, not just the 2200 subscribers. -m

posted at: 21:24 | under: 2005-10 | 0 comment(s)