[Thomas Wouters]
The script responsible for sending the password reminders, cron/mailpasswds, specifically uses the first public list it finds to send all password reminders. I'm not entirely sure why this is done, except for some marginal performance issue.
I think the reasoning went like this: As any reminder message can contain info about more than one list membership, it's impossible to use the "correct" list for delivery. Thus, as Mailman can't get this completely right, it rather chooses the easiest solution available; use the same list for all deliveries.
Of course, as non-public lists shouldn't be advertised, Mailman shouldn't "implicitly advertise" a non-public list by using its message delivery mechanisms (which currently implies putting the list's name in the message headers) for sending out passwords.
mailpasswds should probably be rewritten to either use a list the user is on, or use a fake list... I'm not really sure which is best, considering people with mailfilters based on Sender and such.
I think the last option would be best, because it's the least complicated thing to implement, and thus less error-prone. Besides, there also are other reasons for wanting a non-list-specific Mailman entry point address.
Harald