[Mailman-Users] Tell if a recipient reads the newsletter?

[John W Baxter]

At 11:24 -0700 1/14/02, Ashley M. Kirchner wrote:
>Problem is, you have to send out
>HTML.

Other problem is that not all users who receive the newsletter will let the
HTML be interpreted.  Since the population was "customers," you can't
control that (unless you have really eager customers).  [Some of us, while
processing SPAM for potential blocking, unplug the Ethernet cable...but
that's unlikely in context.]

And even THEN it doesn't prove the recipient read or even saw the mail...it
might have been the 5 year old tossing out the boring stuff.

>If I wanted to know if the recipient
>actually read (or at least displayed) the message, I would request a MDN
>(Message Disposition Notification).  All of this (requesting) happens
>within the SMTP protocol, so you have to construct your messages as such
>- I'm not sure Mailman can do this right out of the box.

There are two kinds.  Our mail servers don't honor the old kind (which
merely indicated that the mail got somewhere [network] close to the
recipient, anyhow).  And I almost never OK the confirmation alert my MUA
puts up for the new kind asking whether I want to send the receipt, and
NEVER in a list.  I would for personal email from friends, but my friends
know better.

  --John

-- 
John Baxter    Port Ludlow, WA, USA
I am NOT out of the office.  I will respond if and when I get around to it.