> EWyatt794@aol.com wrote:
> > Have I really received this email a billion times?
>
> No, only a dozen or so. I had this problem months ago and absent
> mindedly sent mail to extropians from the same account that seemed
> to cause duplicate postings before (it doesn't cause duplicate
> postings on any other list, so it must be some weird interaction
> with the extropians list software and/or MTA). I've contacted
> the list administrator about it.
Ack! This is a pet peeve of mine.
The extropian list seems to function under many different names: extropians@extropy.com, extropians@extropy.org, extropians@maxwell.kumo.com, etc. The list software cannot really handle the different names. It adds "extropians@extropy.com" to the reply field, whether that is the list name being used or not. If the message was sent to one of the other list names, this results in a message using multiple/different names for the same list. Any replies to this message will go to "both" lists, even though they are really the same list. The software can't figure out that both addresses really go to the same place. The only solution is for the human to readdress all their replies to remove the different lists. This, of course, requires the human to know that these all are going to the same place, which subscribers can't really be expected to know.
The other answer is to fix the list software. In my opinion, it should add the "Reply:" field so that it matches the original address, or the original address should be changed to match the added "Reply:" field. Adding conflicting address names for the same list is what causes the problem.
I think the list administrator is trying to forward alternate or obsolete list names to the real list. If this is the case, the forwarding software should correctly relabel the messages with the real list name. Any messages sent to these alternate names will trigger duplicate messages when people try to reply to them. I have explained this before, on the list, but nothing is ever done about it.
Who is the list administrator, by the way? Who can I contact to try to get this problem fixed? It is a repeatable problem that can be demonstrated, and can be fixed.