AS THE semester begins, students must often maneuver through their e-mail inboxes in order to find that class e-mail or homework assignment. That's because students can receive an abundant amount of e-mails from fellow club members either to subscribe or unsubscribe from a club e-mail list. The problem lies in what often evolves into a very complicated service, referred to as a listserv, that ITC provides for student use. For students unfamiliar with the way listservs operate, there are some simple improvements and guidelines that can be given to CIOs to eliminate the cluttering of all our inboxes.
First of all, the listserv Web site (list.mail.virginia.edu) can be hard to find. The search feature on the University's main Web site does not identify the listserv Web site after searching for "listserv" and actually only registers it on the third page when searching under "list."
Once you actually find it, the Web site contains confusing information. Specifically the first line on the page states, "Below is a listing of all the public mailing lists on [the listserv page]," but there are only about 40 lists present on the page. According to Mark Smith, Manager of Desktop Computer, many listserve choose not to make their lists public on the list because the groups are then more likely to receive spam. These listservs, Smith said, must find other ways to advertise their lists to interested parties since students and faculty cannot just access this page to subscribe to the list.
While this reasoning appears sound, it has a frustrating byproduct. It is difficult for those receiving unwanted e-mail to figure out how to unsubscribe from lists. Most list administrators are knowledgeable enough to include a link to the list Web site at the bottom of each e-mail sent from the list; unfortunately, not all follow this procedure, and not all e-mails are sent by list administrators. Recipients then reply to the list e-mail, often e-mailing the entire list, requesting to unsubscribe. These are the annoying e-mails that frequently crowd students' inboxes.
There are several ways to improve this present system: Most importantly, all CIOs should be required to include the list e-mail Web site and unsubscribe option in every e-mail sent on behalf of the group. To enact such a policy, list administrators would have to approve each e-mail sent to the list, adding in the unsubscribe information if necessary. Currently, there is an option for list administrators that dictates whether members can e-mail a list freely or if the administrator must approve the message.
List administrators should be required to approve messages from their list. While this can be a huge headache, most e-mail lists do not send more than a few messages a week. This will prevent people from e-mailing the whole list in order to be added or removed from the list.
Administrator approval for each message sent to the list is just one option given to list administrators. There are a plethora of options, most of which the average student likely doesn't understand. There are a commendable amount of resources on the ITC Web site regarding use of the listserv, but all these pages of information can be overwhelming. Further, computing terminology is scattered across these Web sites, which can frustrate users who may have had little experience with e-mail lists in the past.
According to James Jokl, director of communications and support for ITC, there is no special relationship between ITC and the CIOs. "The listserv is just a service that the CIOs use," Jokl stated. He went on to explain that there are all sorts of lists created by organizations across Grounds(such as the e-mail lists for majors), not just CIOs. However, since nearly all CIOs use the listserv, it would make sense for ITC to aid the yearly transition of CIO leaders and list administrators. In this spirit, a general information session run by ITC should be held every year to acquaint the list administrators with the interface of the listserv. In addition, ITC could help explain some relevant terminology to the list administrators, making the help on the ITC's Web site more palatable.
The listserv can be one of the most frustrating and least rewarding aspects of being the head of a University organization. It requires a fairly good knowledge of the Internet and e-mail lists in general. When we take into account the frustrations that users also face, it becomes clear that we all deserve a better listserv.
Rajesh Jain is a Cavalier Daily associate editor. He can be reached at rjain@cavalierdaily.com.
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