Ways of dealing with noise. Harald actually implemented the scheme we've been discussing about.
From: "Henrik Frystyk Nielsen" <frystyk@microsoft.com>
I love Harald's subtle sense of diplomacy!
Henrik Frystyk Nielsen,
mailto:frystyk@microsoft.com
The IETF+Censored mailing list
At times, the IETF list is subject to debates that have little to do with the purposes for which the IETF list was created. Some people would appreciate a "quieter" forum for the relevant debates that take place, but the IETF's policy of openness has so far prevented the IETF from imposing any censorship policy on the IETF@ietf.org list.
To give people an alternative, there is a list called "ietf+censored@alvestrand.no".
This list is a sublist (that is, it gets the same messages as) the open IETF discussion list. However, this list will not forward all messages; in particular, the filters have been set so that persons and discussions that are, in the view of Harald Alvestrand, irrelevant to the IETF list are not forwarded.
Because this filter is automated, the criteria include:
To join the list, [1]send the word "subscribe" in the BODY of a message to ietf+censored-request@alvestrand.no (the URL here is an RFC 2368 mailto URL that does the Right Thing).
For fun, there is a special list for the rejected messages: ietf+censored-rejects@alvestrand.no - subscribe in the same fashion, by [2]mail to ietf+censored-rejects-request@alvestrand.no
By public request, the current set of filters are listed at [3]http://www.alvestrand.no/cgi-bin/hta/ietf+censored-filters
Some statistics on postings, which may be useful in getting a perspective on the effects of the filter, are at [4]posting-counts.html (started Oct 14, 1998).
This page is http://www.alvestrand.no/ietf+censored.html, and is posted monthly in text form to ietf@ietf.org
Harald Tveit Alvestrand [5]< Harald@Alvestrand.no>
References