[Mailman-Developers] How to lose friends and alienate people

[Greg Ward]

After upgrading our only large, busy, high-profile list to MM 2.1 a few
days ago, we've already got our first customer feedback:

"""
You've got some nerve quarantining my messages when all I've ever done on your
forum is attempt to provide specific help to people who have requested it.
Don't worry about my participation in the future.
"""

Ouch.  This, of course, is in response to the standard response to posts
to a moderated list:

"""
The reason it is being held:

Posts by member are currently quarantined for moderation
"""

Ironically, I did notice the change when I was installing MM 2.1,
decided I did not like it, but did not do anything about it.  I have
now, with a simple-stupid patch to Mailman/Handlers/Moderate.py:

--- Mailman/Handlers/Moderate.py.orig   Mon Oct 28 10:24:28 2002
+++ Mailman/Handlers/Moderate.py        Mon Nov 25 22:03:29 2002
@@ -34,3 +34,3 @@
 class ModeratedMemberPost(Hold.ModeratedPost):
-    reason = _('Posts by member are currently quarantined for moderation')
+    reason = _('Post to moderated list')

This will at least keep the wolves, err users, at bay for a while.

May I suggest the following:

  * on a traditional moderated list, where all users are moderated,
    telling individuals that *their* post is quarantined is likely
    to cause confusion at best, offense at worst (see above)

  * on a list with mixed moderation, you might not want to reveal
    to users who are moderated that there is something "special"
    about them

...both of which argue for making my little patch permanent.

        Greg
-- 
Greg Ward - software developer                gward@mems-exchange.org
MEMS Exchange                            http://www.mems-exchange.org