listservs

Listservs

Overview

Despite the multimedia excitement of the World Wide Web, e-mail remains the most frequently used application of the Internet. Many people who have access to the Internet at school, home, and work use the Internet for no other purpose than to send and receive email. Electronic mailing lists are a powerful communications tool and have been since they were introduced on private computer systems. On the Internet, mailing lists have become even more powerful.

Programs commonly referred to as Listservs make the tasks involved with creating and maintaining large e-mail distribution lists relatively simple. While the volume of messages or content may cause some mailing list administrators to act as moderators on listservs, the programs themselves can run and maintain the mailing list with virtually no human intervention after they’ve been set up. Hundreds of thousands of electronic mailing lists are currently in operation on the Internet thanks to these automated, self-maintaing programs.

Listserv

A listserv is defined as a centralized electronic mailing list. It is used to distribute e-mail to a large number of addresses. More accurately, Listserv is the brand name of one of the more popular mailing list distribution programs. Just as Kleenex has become synonymous with facial tissue, Listserv has become synonymous with these types of programs. (http://www.lsoft.com)

Listservs Explained

Listservs can be setup for one-way or two-way communication. They can be configured to simply broadcast an e-mail to the distribution list. In this setup, the subscribers have no interaction with one another, much like mass communication. They can also be setup so that each message a subscriber sends to the Listserv is sent to all other subscribers, which is more similar to interpersonal communication. Listservs are often configured to do both, which makes them a real hybrid as far as defining if they fall under mass or interpersonal communication.

Listservs are usually centered around a particular topic, allowing people with similar interests to communicate their thoughts and ideas on a given subject matter. Because the list is centralized, only one version of the list must be maintained and updated. Users send a message to the list address and it is sent out to all list members. Their appeal is the value of the content produced by the members. For example, if you had an interest in playing golf you could join a listserv to share your experiences and learn from the experiences of others that also play the game.

They have some similarity to magazines in that when you join a listserv, you subscribe to the list and to stop receiving e-mails from the listserv, you unsubscribe. Unlike periodicals, however, listservs can send you an e-mail message the instant a member replies to the list. Many high volume listservs offer or only send a collection of messages on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. You can find an indexed list of Listservs on the web at http://www.tile.net/lists/.

Listservs work by automating the functions of an electronic mail list. The listserv software is installed on a sever. The administrator of the listserv is provided with an interface to do the following functions:

· Create a mailing list

· Add and Delete addresses from lists

· Limit email size

· Set security levels

Their popularity is due to the fact that they automate most of the administrative functions. Individuals subscribe or unsubscribe by sending an e-mail message to the list address. These commands are sent directly to the list server by sending an email to the list server’s address, which would be something similar to: listserv@domainname. The commands are simple and are sent either as the subject line or in the body of the e-mail message depending on the listserv program being used to run the list. Some common functions are:

· Subscribe and Unsubscribe

· Receive digest version

· Vacation, stop mail

· Resume Mail

· Get list of subscribers

· Receive copy of your posts

The History of Listservs

Electronic network distribution has been around about as long as computer networks. One of the first known electronic mailing lists, called CTSS, was created in 1965 for the MIT Computer network. In the 1970s, MIT, along with dozens of other small networks, linked to the Department of Defense’s experimental open-sourced network called ARPANET. This collection of inter-networked networks would eventually become the Internet. At that time, mailing lists were seen as a waste of system resources by many participants. The DOD even began denying the requests of some universities that asked to be connected to ARPANET in an effort to regain control over the use of the network after some officials became angry that taxpayers were funding a mailing list for science fiction fans called SF-Lovers.

In 1975, a mailing list on ARPANET was created to discuss the problems of mailing lists called MsgGroup. The mailing list was maintained by various volunteers over the years, individuals that maintained the list by hand. Administrators not only had to add and delete users, but also forward all the messages on to the subscribers. In 1979, the MsgGroup administrator planned a trip to attend a conference and would be unable to forward the messages for a week. At the same time a flame war had broken out on the list. When the administrator notified the subscribers that the list would be on hiatus during his absence, a list member at MIT that had a strong desire to keep the flame war going responded with a program that would automate the forwarding of the messages. The first automated two-way e-mail messaging software was the result of a flame war. A complete archive of MsgGroup can be accessed on the web at http://www.tcm.org/msggroup/.

BITNET

ARPANET continued to evolve into the Internet but many universities that wanted access could not get it from the DOD. In 1985, many universities used a network developed for IBM mainframes called the Because It’s Time Network or BITNET to share information. BITNET was especially helpful to foreign universities. Eric Thomas, a programmer in Paris, had bartered for access to BITNET with a university. He found the mailing lists on the network to be the most valuable resource available but found the program running the lists to be lacking. BITNET’s mailing list server was called LISTSERV, but it didn’t allow any interaction with the users. An administrator still had to maintain the lists. So, Eric wrote a program that allowed the users to send simple commands to the list server. A few years later, he was starting his own company (http://www.lsoft.com) to sell his mailing list software that he still called Listserv. Today, his software is still one of the leaders in mailing list programs

Moderated Lists

Despite their automated nature, some listservs moderated in order to filter messages, or provide digest versions of the content produced by the list. When a listserv grows to a large number of email messages being sent every day, many list creators will offer a digest version of the list. Subscribers to the digest version will receive a daily, weekly or monthly synopsis that’s been edited by the list administrator.

The Purpose of Listservs

Today listservs are usually created for one of two reasons; to share information or to make money. Lists with no aspirations to increase revenues are generally created from a desire to share in a collective environment. Money making lists may have similar aspirations but are also setup to provide financial support for the list owners.

Why would someone pay to join a Listserv?

In a world where huge amounts of information are being distributed for free, some people will pay to join lists where the very best pieces of information are filtered out form the rest. For example, Strategic News Service is a list about computer technology and issues that sells two levels of access to information (http://www.tapsns.com/). You can pay $495.00 a year for basic access or $795.00 a year for premium access. The value in the list is in its’ members, which include computer luminaries such as Bill Gates and Michael Dell. In addition, Mark Anderson, who maintains the list as creator, editor and human filter has a great track record for prediction. He analyzes all the data contributed by the list members and uses it to predict what will happen in the computer industry.

Active Participation

It can be argued that if you were somehow able to remove the World Wide Web from the Internet, the Internet would fundamentally remain the same. However, if you could remove multi-person email communication from the Internet, the Internet would not be the same. Without the interactive communication of e-mail, the Internet would be closer to traditional mass media, a broadcast medium with millions of channels, a place where the big and the financed deploy increasingly complex schemes to capture our attention. Listservs require the active participation of its subscribers. Growth comes from word of mouth, from the literal gesture of taking a few seconds to forward a message. You can't easily buy or manipulate that kind of participation. The real power of listservs lies in the active participation of the subscribers. The active participation that occurs on listservs is something that can’t be bought, pre-packaged and sold.

Mailing List Etiquette FAQ

L-Soft, the makers of Listserv

Search, or Find Lists of Lists, Newsgroups, & FTP Sites

Topica - Commercial E-mail Lists

Impluse Research Corporation's Info about Lists