On Sat, 2006-12-30 at 17:58 -0600, Aaron Konstam wrote: > I hope this is not the Tim who makes it clear that he is not reachable > through his return address. Someday I need to share my rant about > people who have unlisted telephone numbers. That would be me. But I am not "uncontactable". I can be reached on the list. I don't really expect personal mail on here, but on the rare chance someone wants a personal response from me, they can request it. I have conversed with some people directly, in the past. Though there'd have to be a good reason for me to want to respond, that way. My own, and other's, past experiences have shown, however, that many who send private mail to list members only do so to get away with behaving in a manner that they wouldn't dare do so in front of an audience. I tend to reply to such messages back on the list, with full quoting. Those who know me outside of mailing lists have no problems contacting me. I am listed in phone directories, and other internet places. And with a modicum of effort, it's usually not to hard to work out who someone is on a mailing list, even when they use it semi-anonymously. I don't list personal contact details in list mail, because there is no way to avoid it being harvested. At least if it's only provided directly to someone, there's less chance of abuse. Temporary addresses can be created too, should someone have a pressing need to work through something. I understand your point about unlisted numbers, I've struck that myself. And that's the sort of point I was making about Robert being impossible to contact. Fair enough if he doesn't want strangers off the list contacting him, I feel the same. But to filter out *all* mail from anywhere other than some predefined sources is madness. You won't know to unblock someone that you'd want to be able to reach you. They've no way of arranging it. I only take that ruthless approach with the mailing list, by posting from another address. My other contact methods aren't over zealously guarded.
