Mailing List Types

There are three main types of mailing lists: announcement lists, moderated discussion lists and unmoderated discussion lists.

Announcement Lists

Announcement lists are designed to only allow specific members of the list to send email to the list address. If a member is not designated as an administrator, their message would automatically be rejected by the server. These lists are designed for highly controlled communication.

Moderated Discussion Lists

Moderated discussion lists allow any list member (or potentially non list members as well) to submit an email to the list. However, that email will not be distributed to the entire list until it has been approved by a list administrator. Although this gives a list administrator the ability to filter appropriate content for the list, it does require a good bit of time and oversight.

Unmoderated Discussion Lists

Unmoderated discussion lists are designed for uncontrolled, unfiltered email correspondence with all members of the list. The list can be configured to accept mail from only members or from anyone in the world. These messages do not require approval but are simply routed directly to the members of the list.

Exchange Distribution Lists

Exchange Distribution lists may be created when membership is fairly constant and open to èßäÊÓƵapp addresses only. These lists are typically only created for departmental correspondence and are not managed using the List Manager software, but by OIT on the Exchange Server. The addresses appear in the Global Address List. Request for exchange distribution lists may be made via the .

Other Configuration Settings

In addition to the main list types, there are a number of different settings within each list that can be configured. These include (but are not limited to):

  • Member subscriptions: can be configured to require approval before someone can join a list.
  • Message Size: can be configured to limit the size of messages sent to the list.
  • Reply To address: can be configured to automatically route replies to the list, sender or another specified address.
  • Parent / Child lists: Lists can be configured to include other lists as members. This is ideal for a large master list with various sublists containing a subset of the audience.