On Wed, 7 Sep 2005 09:06:29 -0700, "McRae, Richard (DSHS ASD)"
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>I've always been a little confused by the spam delay.  Can you explain it a
>little.  

The default spam-delay value for message postings is 10 minutes.  This can
be set on a site-wide level by a paramter in site.cg/go.user.  

 SPAM_DELAY=10

This can also be set on a list-level by a List Header configuration keyword.

 Loopcheck=spam-delay(10)

The purpose of the Spam Delay period is that LISTSERV quarantines "suspect"
messages for this period while waiting to see if more, similar messages come
in (from a local spam attempt), or if a SPAM-Alert comes in via the
Worldwide LISTSERV backbone identifying the suspect message as spam.  If
either of these things happens, the message will be withdrawn from posting
to the list and (usually) the message is forwarded to the List Owner with a
preamble describing its SPAM status.  the List Owner can then take
appropriate action if the message is indeed genuine. 

Messages are classified as "suspect" for the purposes of spam-delay period
if they meet any of these rules:

 -any/all messages from non-subscribers 
   (list must of course be Send=Public or Send=Editor)
 -very first message from a new subscriber to a list
   (apparently applies even if subscriber is subscribed to another 
    list on the same server)
 -there may be other rules of which I am not aware

By experiment it appears that messages from addreses with higher privileges
such as Owner=, POSTMASTER=, and Editor= are exempt from the spam-delay.

>Why do I care about the delay if the editor has seen the message
>and OK'd it?

As noted above, the message may be withdrawn from posting if it is
reclassified as spam within the delay period.  In such case it will not go
to the list even though approved by the editor and somebody may wonder why.