On Sat, 26 Sep 1992 22:53:01 EDT W. K. Gorman said:
>On Sat, 26 Sep 1992 15:58:04 -0500 John B Harlan said:
>>     I sent Gelson a note, too.  Not cool, such massive crossposting.
>
>Gee, out of 94 lists to which the message was posted, I only
>saw it on one. I feel left out. :^)
 
I didn't count (Mel's conclusion of 94 may be accurate), but I did
notice that Dr. Gomes included a number of peer'd list entries.  I
thought it ironic that someone alleging to be qualified to offer the
proposed content would know so little about the LISTSERV system.  I also
assumed that LISTSERV's usual checks for redundant posts of the same
message would bounce those peer'd posts back in quantity :)
 
One of the included lists was LINKFAIL (not a wise choice for a shotgun
broadcast as LINKFAIL has an extraordinary fraction of readers likely to
complain directly to the source host's postmaster).  I attributed some
of the "Dr. Gomes's account has been canceled" reaction to what must
have been a truly impressive complaint level.  I DID NOT copy the
postmaster (I figured plenty of others would; over the last several
years I've acquired lots of sympathy for postmasters--whose mailboxes
tend to get bombarded by even small problems); however, I DID receive a
personal reply to the observation (that he take the course himself ;)
that I sent directly to Dr. Gomes.  I conclude that the postmaster must
have collected all response to the post (presumably to make sure that
anyone whose reply might indicate an interest in sending money be asked
not to do so).
 
I think I agree that the would appropriate response a postmaster might
offer when one of those shotgun broadcasts occurs would be a one-liner
"We apologize; appropriate action is being taken at this end to educate
users about network etiquette."  On the other hand, as I said above; I
sympathize with the postmaster (usually, a relatively new staffer who's
assigned the task on top of a primary responsibility) under siege (or
likely to feel "siege" fits).
 
/s Murph Sewall <[log in to unmask]>