UUBF-L List Manager's Guide

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General Issues

To begin with, what do the managers do? What jobs need to be allocated between us?

  1. Promoting and defending the list culture, as described in the main part of this Guide. Pointing people to the front page of the Guide when questions arise about "what's on topic?" Modeling those values when dealing with members who have failed to respect them.
  2. Helping people who can't figure out how to manage the medium.
  3. Sending reminders to the list.
  4. Maintaining and developing the Guide.
  5. What else?

Email Reminders

Reminder Messages to send to the List

These messages are integral to the use of the Guide. The UUA wants something like the first one sent regularly to all UUA lists; I think the other two would be a good idea too.

At some point it may be possible to append them to all messages as temporary footers; until then, they can go out as individual messages.

  1. "Welcome New Members" [Quarterly?]
  2. "The UUBF-L User's Guide" [Quarterly]
  3. "The Help Command" [Monthly]
  4. "Going Nomail" [1 May, 1 June, 1 July, 1 August, 1 December, 1 March
  5. "The UUBF-L Archives" [probably only when someone asks]

1. "Welcome New Members" [Quarterly?].

When new people join the list, the list administratots get notices. Then if the list is in one of its quiet periods, we may worry they'll think there's nothing happening here and unsubscribe. (We also get unsubscribe notices all the time.)

So periodically we'll post a message encouraging new people to

  • post a brief introduction describing your relationship to Buddhism and to UUism
  • ask any questions or start conversation on any subject in our scope that interests you.

Sometimes the messages are thick and fast here, and sometimes we'll go for weeks with none. If I could figure out a way to keep the conversation going at a nice, even pace I'd be in list-manager heaven. Until then, we still get some pretty interesting talk going.

What would you like to talk about?

2. "The UUBF-L User's Guide" [Quarterly]

This list is for Unitarian Univeralists to explore Buddhism, and how Buddhism and UUism meet. Others are welcome, and all are expected to abide by a code of courtesy and kindness.

For details see the UUBF-L User's Guide at <uua.org/uubf/uubf-l/index> or contact list managers Bill, Catherine, Michelle and Sam at <uubf-l-admin@www.uua.org>

3. "The Help Command" [Monthly]

To get a list of email commands for Mailman, the UUBF-L list server, send a message to <uubf-l-request@www.uua.org> with the word "help" in the subject line, or in the body of the message (omit the quotation marks).

4. "Going Nomail" [1 May, 1 June, 1 July, 1 August, 1 December, 1 March]

Please be a good list citizen in regard to your summer plans.

If your emailbox fills up while you're on vacation, your ISP will reject (bounce) further messages. On the eighth day Mailman gets a bounced message, it will disable delivery of messages to you (set you to "nomail"), and notify Sam and me that it has.

If this happens, you are still a member, but you need to reset your mail delivery option:

  • Go to <uua.org/uubf/uubf-l/mechanics.html>
  • OR contact me and I will tell you how to do it via email.

Best would be if you disable mail delivery temporarily before you go on vacation. If you don't take care of this yourself, then Sam and I have to remember to notify you that Mailman set you to nomail, because there's no automatic reset.

Especially important: please do not leave mail delivery enabled and set up an automatic reply telling everyone who emails you that you're gone. This creates a loop which can fill up your email box *and* the list's!

Thanks for your consideration and have a great time!

5. "The UUBF-L Archives" [probably only when someone asks]

Our list's archive is here:

<http://www.uua.org/mailman/private/uubf-l/>.

To get in, you will need the password you were given when you joined the list (or what you have changed it to).

If you don't remember that, go to <http://www.uua.org/mailman/listinfo/uubf-l> and at the very bottom of the page, enter the email address which you have subscribed to the UUBF-L from. That will take you to the Member Configuration Page, where you can request a reminder of your password.

List Manager Tips

How to handle certain situations

People trying to post from an address they're not subscribed from: 

   * Add the unsubscribed address, set that subscription to no-mail, and notify the member, asking them to unsub it if they leave.

Mail loop: 

  1. Set the sender to nomail, then after a while (two weeks?) try sending them a private message
         * telling them you have
         * pointing them to the vacation warning 
  2. OR unsubscribe the sender
  3. OR temporarily make the list moderated [?need to get ECC permission?]

Useful Links for List Managers

UUA Policy & Resources

UUBF-L Mailman Info

Info on Mailman from its developers

The Origin of the Guide

The Guide to the UUBF-L was created to give the group a mission statement, and to describe expectations of the community in regard to list behavior. It came about as a result of some members posting messages that were not consistent with these goals. There was no way to deal with the problem until we had established standards. The UUA requires them, for exactly this reason, and we need them in order to follow UUA procedures for dealing with problems.

I assembled a group of list members to create the Guide: some founding members of the UUBF, some original members of the UUBF-L, and various volunteers who had shown concern with community-building on the list. I tried for variety: people who would not necessarily agree with each other but represent a range of opinions. In addition I brought up the subject on the list, and some useful conversation resulted there.

Here is the roster of those who participated in the formal group:

  • Wayne Arnason
  • Patrick E. Bruckart
  • George Buchanan
  • Bruce Burrill
  • James Ishmael Ford
  • Robert Oliva
  • Robert Senghas
  • Sam Trumbore
  • Rebecca Vinson
  • Jeff Wilson
  • and myself, Catherine Holmes Clark.

Sam and I were the list managers at the time. Everyone's writing went into the pages that now make up the Guide; I edited it all and constructed the site.

To Do

  1. Can we have UUBF-L list footers? (ask list-owners' list)
  2. Does the Mailman info mention no MIME?
  3. Wiki "Gardening" - Making edits where necessary after the conversion

UUBF-L :: UUBF-L: What We Do on the List :: A Code of Courtesy and Kindness :: Important List Mechanics

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