I've watched this one from the sidelines for a while, and have finally decided to throw in an opinion. Feel free to throw it out. There are lots of bright people in the world, each with their own perspective on how anything ought to be done "right." That's fine. The competition to be "better" is what provides the setting for progress. However, it's also important to respect the individual's work in this process. Because, if individuals get abused for innovating or improving, most of them will decide it's not worth it and move on to doing something more rewarding or less irritating. Eric Thomas designed, built, and supports a list manager named LISTSERV. He gave it a name. Respect for his work, if not his concepts, design, or implementation, give him the rights to its proper name. Others certainly have a right to build list managers. They also deserve respect for their work, the right to name it distinctly, and to promote it in comparison to other work. I think, however, that they would be distressed to see someone else sign their personal name to a note because the implication would be that it was their message. If I were Eric, I would be distressed to see something that I have worked on for years have its name used by others, making his work and contribution ambiguous. For example, Lotus makes 1-2-3 and Microsoft makes EXCEL. They both are quite comfortable advertising themselves as spreadsheets. Likewise, with Microsoft Word and WordPerfect being word processors. Why not agree to call list managers just that and give different proper names to each individual? Eric used and has rightful claim on LISTSERV. Let anyone else build a better list manager and call it whatever they want, as long as it uniquely identifies their work. -- B. Alton Brantley, Jr [log in to unmask] The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center Penn State College of Medicine Hershey, PA USA 17033