Well it's quite simple in fact. With  the outrageous weights we've put on all
the links  going out of CUNYVM  and PSUVM, DEARN  is much closer to  NIHCU than
UGA. Therefore UGA  rerouted Roger's subscription to the  "best possible" node,
DEARN.
 
  The term "service area" refers to a parameter in the list header which can be
used  to cause  LISTSERV to  reject all  subscriptions from  people not  in the
defined  service area,  regardless of  node  distances, of  whether you're  the
nearest server or not, etc. It's just a "I don't want any people not from (list
of nodes, countries, etc) at all on my server, period." Its main use is to pro-
tect local PUBLIC  lists against intrusion by people not  from the local nodes.
For example I can  define a list of all FRECP11  users interested in discussing
our local  TDT package  (a SCRIPT/DCF  user interface  in french),  let anybody
subscribe to  it without my having  to confirm the subscription,  and yet avoid
the list  being plagued with hundreds  of weenies from everywhere  in the world
-- the kind of weenies who issue a  LIST command and then (try to) subscribe to
ALL your lists. I've already received about 20 requests for subscription to our
local INF-L list which lists... all the "general CS" department students in the
school who  have access  to the  mainframe!! That  was before  I changed  it to
"Subscription= Closed".
 
  The only  sensible solution  would be  to manage to  modify the  link weights
table to have everybody stay on his side  of the pond... and I'm afraid this is
a real challenge...
 
  Eric