At 11:29 PM 29/08/2006, you wrote:

>I think I went through the same bruhaha three years ago. You post to
>the devel list and you get a "members only" automated reply. It
>suggests you cannot post - full stop.

It's not "automated". Every twit who tries to post to the list
without subscribing first is a job for one of us mugs who moderate
the list. We could stop to subscribe the senders of bona fide
messages (a different interface from the one with messages for
approval) but multiply this task by ~ 30 lists and you'll understand
why at least I think that enough bounces will persuade people to
exert themselves and subscribe.

>However, the post is in a queue to be reviewed by the list admin and
>once it is certified as non-spam you become a member.

Not true. The list admin can either approve it or reject it. Either
way, you're still not a list member until you subscribe yourself.

>This can take a
>few hours to a few days, depending on how busy the list admin is.

What a joke!

>Perhaps the initial bounce message should be made more clear in saying
>that the initial post will be accepted once it has been verified as non-
>spam and that the poster will be added to the members list.

You gotta be kidding. The software provides a standard rejection
message according to Reason, that has to be modified manually per
instance to become sweet and polite. People in our line of work
should understand better than most that, when all else fails, read
the instructions. If we didn't exert moderation on these lists you
would be getting swamped with spam.

Helen