why bounced to the list?

[Richard J. Senghas]

>I'm trying to understand what is happening here. I know that when I try to
>send a post to linganth from an e-mail address which is not subscribed to
>the list the message gets bounced back to me. Why is it that all these
>requests to join the list get posted to the list? Please speak to your
>system administrator to see if there is anything they can do to fix this
>rather annoying problem.

Kerim & fellow LINGANTHers:

I'm taking this opportunity to respond publicly to the question above
because more and more often people ask me about this issue, or (judging from
the results that get to the list) don't even realize their problem.

Anything and everything sent to the main list address
(linganth at cc.rochester.edu) gets posted to the list.

Yes, the system is working as designed, but not as many (most?) users may
expect. The problem is that many folks nowadays expect all lists to act like
the listserv variety (the most popular kind), and so they aren't sending
requests to the list server system itself at the majordomo at cc.rochester.edu
address, or to the LINGANTH list "owner" accounts
(owner-linganth at cc.rochester.edu or owner-linganth-digest at cc.rochester.edu
addresses) which come only to me, and not the list. That is why we print the
owner address in our monthly SLA newsletter column.

Also, many folks who sign up don't hold on to the initial message which
gives them information about the common commands available on the majordomo
servers. These can also be obtained by sending a message with the word
"help" in the body to the majordomo address (NOT the list address):
majordomo at cc.rochester.edu

I hope this clears up the confusion.

-Richard
Linganth List Administrator
======================================================================
Richard J Senghas, Asst. Professor       | Sonoma State University
Department of Anthropology/Linguistics   | 1801 East Cotati Avenue
Coordinator, Linguistics & TESL Programs | Rohnert Park, CA 94928-3609
Richard.Senghas at sonoma.edu               | 707-664-3920 (fax)