[plug] Dealing with Unsubscribe problems

[Matt Kemner]

On Thu, 13 Sep 2001, Christian wrote:

> The solution is quite ingenious and I propose we bear it in mind the
> next time we get a luser who can't unsubscribe:

The solution would not work with PLUG's listserver, and I believe would
not have worked with Debian's either, unless they have modified their
version of Smartlist.

By default Smartlist is configured to bounce emails sent to the "-request"
address that have a subject starting with "Re:" straight to the maintainer
without processing them, because it is usually an indication that
something went wrong and they are replying to a message asking for more
help.

Additionally, Smartlist is configured to require a second message to be
sent as confirmation so that people cannot be (un)subscribed by other
people without their permission.  I think most likely what happened here
is the debian list maintainer got sick of the abuse being posted to the
list, and manually removed the offender from the list.

I would probably have done the same, in the same situation.  Sure, it
gives them exactly what they want, but at least it prevents all the
subscribers from receiving the abuse.

 - Matt