UUA Email List Manager Guide
So, someone talked you into managing a Unitarian Universalist-related list? Great! You, the list manager, have two main responsibilities:
- Enforce Policies/Etiquette: use tact and polite messages both on and off the lists. Think of yourself as the host of a party, or the convener of a meeting. You are in charge, but everyone else has a right to talk too, and to express their own opinions.
- Review the list manager policies and rules.
- Enforce the UUA's email list rules.
- Keep the discussion on track and discourage inappropriate behavior.
- Deal with complaints from (or spitball-fights among) subscribers.
- Provide Technical Help: be familiar with the Subscriber Guide, and you'll be able to talk people through most common list procedures.
- Help people get on and off the list.
- Help people use various mailing list options, like getting messages as digests.
- If the list is moderated and you are the moderator, approve messages to be posted to the list.
- (Optional) Control the configuration of the list.
- See also: "Troubleshooting."
You're not alone in this venture—here are the other folks you can call on for help:
- The UUA Web Team: web@uua.org
- Subscribe to the discussion list for UUA list managers (all managers of public discussion lists must be on this list)
All list managers are automatically added to the UUA-List-Owners announcement list, so that the Web Team can notify you about changes in the list software, the list rules, uua.org downtime, virus issues, or other list-related news.
Each list must have at least two active managers, so one person can cover while another is away. Also, if disputes arise, you will have someone to consult about the best way to proceed. The UUA Web Teammust approve all new list managers, and must also be informed when a manager retired from their position.
Technical Notes
Many of the web and email addresses in our technical help pages include the placeholder text "listname" which must be replaced with the actual name of the list in question. You can click on the links, or copy and paste them into your web browser window, but you'll need to edit the text in your browser's "Address" bar. (http://lists.uua.org/mailman/admin/listname for instance, would become http://lists.uua.org/mailman/admin/UUA-L) You may also search http://lists.uua.org/mailman/admin for links to your list's main administration page.
Your list adminstration website (http://lists.uua.org/mailman/admin/listname) can be used to control a number of list and subscriber settings. To access these pages you need to know the password for the list you manage—you chose this password when you applied to create the mailing list in the first place. (Write to the Web Team if you've forgotten it.)