SPECIFIC LISTSERV COMMANDS
Subscribe
To subscribe to the Maine Libraries Discussion List, omit the subject line and send the email message SUBSCRIBE MELIBS-L to the address listserv@maine.edu. Substitute your own firstname and lastname. You will receive a return message asking you to confirm by reply mail that the correct email address was indeed submitted. Once your request has been processed, you will start receiving all messages sent to the discussion list.
Post a message
Create the message normally and send it to melibs-l@lists.maine.edu
Leave the list
Send the message SIGNOFF MELIBS-L to listserv@lists.maine.edu
Suspend / restart receiving messages
Send the message SET MELIBS-L NOMAIL / MAIL to listserv@lists.maine.edu
Force MELIBS-L to "echo" a copy of all your postings
Send the message SET MELIBS-L REPRO to listserv@lists.maine.edu
Force MELIBS-L to confirm distribution your postings
Send the message SET MELIBS-L ACK to llistserv@lists.maine.edu
Turn off the above echoing and/or acknowledgement
Send the message SET MELIBS-L NOREPRO / NOACK to listserv@lists.maine.edu
Get a list of available monthly Archive Files
Send the message INDEX MELIBS-L to listserv@lists.maine.edu
Get a copy of a particular archive file (names are of the form LOG9904 for April 1999)
Send the message GET MELIBS-L LOGxxxx to listserv@lists.maine.edu
Receive all MELIBS-L messages as a single daily "digest" rather than individual messages: Send the message SET MELIBS-L DIGEST to llistserv@lists.maine.edu
View a list of MELIBS-L subscribers
Send the message REVIEW MELIBS-L to listserv@lists.maine.edu
Prevent your name from appearing on a review list
Send the message SET MELIBS-L HIDE to listserv@lists.maine.edu
Get additional information about Listserv commands
Send the message INFO REFCARD to listserv@lists.maine.edu
General Tips
1. Be careful with the "Reply" function. Make sure the comments you are sending are intended for the entire list and not just the person who posted the original message.
2. In general, give consideration to whether a given posting or reply to a posting has interest for MELIBS-L subscribers generally or could be better treated as a message sent directly to one or several individuals.
3. If you quote text from a MELIBS-L message in a reply sent to MELIBS-L, strip MELIBS-L@MAINE.EDU wherever it appears in the quoted text. Failure to do so will cause the message to be rejected by the listserv software and languish until the list owner has time to manually forward it.
4. Courtesy and reasonableness are appreciated. Think first, then type. Remember that email is a medium in which it is very easy to appear to SHOUT!!!! and engender responses proportional to the perceived volume of the shouting.
5. MELIBS-L is intended as a relatively relaxed and tolerant environment. Postings should have something to do with Maine libraries and the concerns of the Maine library community, but it is inevitable that some postings will be totally irrelevant to the interests of some subscribers.
Subscribers come from widely varied backgrounds and have a broad range of experience with technology and communicating in the electronic medium. What is transparently obvious to some may represent a new and exciting and/or disquieting discovery to others. Once again, the result is a mix of on-point and off-track messages depending on a particular subscriber's expectations and experience.
The administrative response to this is to avoid strict rules on what is posted and how, offer tips on good practice from time to time, and only respond to egregious mis-use of the list -- of which there has been essentially none so far.
