unix-wizards-request@BRL.ARPA (01/27/87)
Good morning, This note is mostly to inform the BITNET subscribers of recent changes in the handling of the mailing list for UNIX-WIZARDS, and soon, INFO-UNIX. It appears that the WISCVM.WISC.EDU BITNET<->ARPA gateway is overloaded, and that a large percentage of the traffic over this gateway consists of mailing list distributions. In an attempt to reduce this traffic, someone has managed to invoke the proper incantation to produce volunteers to manage redistribution lists on the BITNET side of the gateway. This allows me to send just one copy of the traffic through the gateway. I was led to believe that as the redistribution was instituted, the BITNET subscribers would be notified of the change, and what to do about it -- namely, to contact the info-unix-request or unix-wizards-request address as appropriate to be deleted from the ARPA mailing list as soon as each BITNET subscriber was convinced that the redistribution worked. This was apparently not the case, as I have already read two complaints in approximately ten messages (out of around 200 currently outstanding). Note that a similar changeover will occur for the INFO-UNIX mailing list shortly after I send the list of BITNET addresses to the person managing that redistribution list (soon). To recap, UNIX-WIZARDS is, and INFO-UNIX soon will be redistributed from a volunteer on the BITNET to all other subscribers on the BITNET. Once you start receiving the redistributed version, and are convinced that it appears to be working, send a note to unix-wizards-request or info-unix-request as appropriate requesting deletion from the ARPA mailing list. I hope this clears up some of the confusion. --for Mike Muuss, Later, Bob <reschly@BRL>