Hello people;
 
Here at Temple University, we run a  rather busy Listserv on our academic IBM
3090 system. The  editor of our local computer center  newsletter asked me to
write an article for the next  issue. Since I am Temple's Listserv Postmaster
and a major proponent  of Listserv here, I decided to  write my article about
Listserv technology.
 
Temple's Listserv hosts 61 lists. Most of  them are active, but some are only
visible here  at Temple.  My understanding is  that as of  a few  months ago,
Temple's Listserv  was among  the top  10 busiest  backbone Listservs  in the
world. What I would like to do  with my article is to include some statistics
such as  how many messages  our Listserv processed  during the past  year. If
possible, I  would like  to know  how many  messages passed  through Temple's
Listserv on their way elsewhere and how also many outgoing messages the lists
here generated  on their own.  Any info about the  number of files  that were
requested from  Temple's Lists's archives  would be interesting too.  If this
can all  be broken down by  months, it would be  great. I also would  like to
know how many  Listservs are in operation at this  time. Further, since Lsoft
is probably fairly active at marketing its software, I expect that the number
of Listserv is increasing, but roughly at what rate?
 
This kind  of quantitative information  about Listserv is  probably something
that my  bosses will be  interested in seeing on  an ongoing basis.  You see,
the VP  who runs  my department  is a  statistician by  training and  he gets
excited whenever I can offer him any statistics about the way our systems are
utilized. As such, if  there is some way I can get at  this info on a regular
basis without  bothering anyone for  it when I need  it, please let  me know.
 
In addition  to statistics,  I intend  to write  up a  little info  about how
people at Temple  use Temple's Listserv. During  the past two years  or so, I
have been slowly,  but surely encouraging various course  instructors here at
Temple to  use our Listserv to  host discussion groups for  their students in
the courses  they teach.  The past two  semesters, this has  been a  hot item
here.  This  semester,  its  been  going  like  wildfire  in  the  number  of
instructors who are  interested in using Listserv as a  instructional tool. I
even talked  one of the  professors that  I have now  for one of  my graduate
courses  to  do this  too.  The  Listserv list  for  that  course seems  very
successful even though I just set it up  a few days ago.
 
What I would like  to know is if any Listserv  Postmasters are using Listserv
technology  for instructional  purposes.  If  so, please  send  me a  private
message (I don't want to clutter  up LSTSRV-L) with your experiences about in
that regard.
 
Thanks very much for any info anyone can provide.
 
 
  Stan  Horwitz  Internet: [log in to unmask]  Bitnet:  STAN@TEMPLEVM
  Temple University  -- Senior  Consultant (My  views are  all mine!)
  Manager of the Help-Net and Suggest lists and Listserv Postmaster.