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Re: My delayed complaint about spam on this list


On 06/05/2018 07:18 PM, Frank Farance wrote:
Someone suggested a moderator (or multiple moderators) that would approve messages from outsiders.  That sounds like the easiest approach because it anyone can write to the list and there would be just a short delay for those people who aren't subscribers, but the main benefit would be the lack of spam.

The GNU mailing lists use a mailman instance, and many of them are set up to use a spam filter front end coupled with a human moderator that must whitelist ALL first-time posters (whether or not the poster is subscribed; subscription is not a prerequisite), and I help moderate some of those lists. Once you've been whitelisted, further messages from you have no delay unless they are overlarge or trigger the spam filter.

Cygwin lists are hosted by ezmlm-idx, not mailman, so I'm not sure what knobs it has, and whether those knobs are similar to what mailman provides. So I'm not even sure if it is technically possible to make a change to a moderator queue. But as long as we're requesting changes, I'd ALSO like to get rid of the reply-to munging, as reply-to-all is the only sane policy for a list that allows posts from non-subscribers (that's another topic that has been frequently posted on this list). HOWEVER, per https://sourceware.org/lists.html#faq, this list is run by sourceware.org overseers, and they don't read THIS list, so complaining HERE won't make a single difference. If you want a new list policy, you must first contact overseers and convince them to make the change.


So here's my question (and it assumes that there would be volunteer(s) to moderate):

Since I already moderate various GNU lists, adding a Cygwin moderation queue to my plate is no big deal, so I'd volunteer (provided that the technology for moderating can be managed completely by email, rather than requiring me to periodically visit a webpage without an email reminder).


Question: "Would a moderation system work where subscribers could send messages directly, but non-subscribers would need a moderator to approve the message?"

Even if the overseers can't turn on human moderation, they are also the right people to complain to about spam blocking not being effective enough.

--
Eric Blake, Principal Software Engineer
Red Hat, Inc.           +1-919-301-3266
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