Jeff,
 
  It's not  as easy as you  think. First, all  the outbound copies of  a given
file  are not  identical because  of  the 'prologtext'  feature. Whenever  the
prologtext is ^= '' I must send the file individually. Second, a file sent via
DISTRIBUTE may  arrive from another  LISTSERV than  the one sending  the file.
Some  servers might  be AFDed  to  the file  and  be programmed  to perform  a
particular action  when the origin  is LISTSERV@XXXXX,  but not just  when the
origin is [log in to unmask] Lastly, you will  generally be AFDed to the server
nearest to you. This means that, in case  the file is one available on ALL the
LISTSERVs, DISTRIBUTE would just end up  sending the stuff directly and eating
30s  additional CPU  to do  so. If  the  file is  not available  from all  the
servers, then DISTRIBUTE would be useful.
 
  A possible solution: use DISTRIBUTE for  those subscribers who have an empty
prologtext, unless disabled by  a flag in the filelist (which  I would set for
all the "Peers= ALL" files). Do you  think there are many servers which need a
DIRECT send WITHOUT prologtext?
 
  Eric