On Jul 5, 2006, at 5:16 PM, Ben Parker wrote: > On Wed, 5 Jul 2006 10:38:57 -0500, "Muth, Jane" <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > >> Is there an easy way to edit or delete messages to a listserver. >> I've >> read a section in the L-Soft manual regarding this, but I'm a bit >> confused by the process and was wondering if there was an easy way >> to do >> this. It would be nice if L-Soft created an edit or delete button. > > Aside from academic and law enforcement (or other) institutional > applications > where the "chain of evidence" (connected flow of previous list > messages) > should never be allowed to be broken by editing, there are > circumstances in > businesses and other kinds of institutions with closed (non-public) > lists with > limited audiences, where editing of the archives may be necessary > or even > desirable for reasons that are agreed to by that list/audience or > where such > editing may occasionally be necessary for legal compliance reasons > (e.g. > HIPPA, SOX, etc.). Just after I responded to the original message appeared where this question was posed today, a colleague rushed into my office with a look of dread on his face. His face was red as a fire engine! He asked me if I could stop our LISTSERV from sending a message he sent to a list. I told him that the message in question would have already been distributed. He showed me the message in his list's archives. It was a very erotic message that he sent to various and sundry managers by mistake. Oops! I pointed this colleague to question 8 on the List Owners FAQ on how to get rid of that message and then I heard him apologizing to his manager, who took the incident in stride.