[Mailman-Developers] 1-click unsubscribe

[Dan MacNeil]

> Dan MacNeil wrote:
>> [snip]
>> current unsubscribe process take 5 steps:
>>
>> 	1) Click
>> 	2) enter email
>> 	3) click submit
>> 	4) read email
>> 	5) reply to email

[snip]

> 
> I hear what you're saying, and I'm not trying to avoid your request,
> but I want to point out that if you are willing to set personalize to
> Yes, which you would have to do anyway for a 1-click unsubscribe, you
> can collapse steps 1-3 above into 1 with something like
> 
> Unsubscribe: %(user_optionsurl)s?login-unsub
> 
> in msg_header or msg_footer, although this may be more confusing than
> just

[snip]

We do have personalize set to "yes" and we have VERP enabled and 
configured. We did experiment with including the unsubscribe URL 
in the footer, but found it hard to explain the process to people 
that cared to ask.

Right our DEFAULT_MSG_FOOTER  is:

###
To unsubscribe:
    1) send blank email to: %(real_name)s-leave@%(host_name)s
    2) reply to the confirmation email
###

...as this seems the simplest to explain, step by step, click by 
click, key-stroke, by key-stroke.

> Then my next question is do you have experience with lists that do
> implement a 1-click unsubscribe, and do you find it actually works? My
> experience (see
> <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/mailman-developers/2005-February/017851.html>)
> is that it doesn't work well, but I'm willing to listen to other input.

Thanks to the link to 2005 discussion. On discussion lists when 
there are replies to mangle and archive, your experience is 
pretty compelling.

I do have direct experience with Constant Contact and yes for 
their application (newsletter/announcement lists) and their #1 
goal (avoid being tarred as a spammer, so mail gets delivered) 
1-click works very well..

On announcement/newsletter lists  people can't reply and there is 
relatively little danger of the 1-click footer getting lost in 
the wild for accidental or malicious clicking by somebody other 
than the addressee.

I agree that for discussion lists, 1-click won't reduce the 
number of UNSUBSCIBE posts to the list and list-owner's cell 
phone at dinner time.  1-click might reduce the length  of the 
UNSUBSCRIBE, it might not.

IMNSHO, for announcement-only lists, the advantages of 1-click 
are greater than the disadvantages.

Since 2005, things have gotten a bit more ruthless on the 
anti-spam front, Particularly at the large providers so....

Given my small and narrow experience,(43 lists, 6500 members, 5 
years, 30 small organizations), I'm willing to live with 
collateral damage even on discussion lists. I'd be ok with the 
certainty of people sometimes being unsubscribed against their 
will in exchange for even a chance at reducing the number of 
clicks on the dreaded "This is SPAM" button.

http://Dreamhost.com , (70,000 hosted domains ???) feels 
differently. They encourage their customers to use mailman for 
discussion lists but FORBID them from using mailman for 
announcement lists. For announcement lists , they require 
customers to use  (home-brew?) announcement software that handles 
1-click and tracks when and how people came on the list.

Mailman is ubiquitous. (thank you!) People who use it for 
newsletters often lack the $240-$360 per year needed for 
something like Constant Contact  and they don't know that there 
alternatives like http://PhpList.com

Again, maybe Mailman shouldn't be all things to all people. That 
would be nice, but...