[Tutor] banned function

[Sean 'Shaleh' Perry]

On 18-Feb-2002 kirk Bailey wrote:
> I am considering adding a global 'banned' file function, so email from
> a banned identity will automatically be rejected by tinylist. Although
> useful to block spam and vicious users, spammers usually send from
> throwaway accounts, and get a new one for the next run, and so can a
> drooler, if enough brain cells still work to think of it. Any
> discussion?
> 

A tact taken by many mailing lists (tutor being one of them) is to only allow
mail to enter the list from those subscribed to it.  Anything else is bounced,
either to an admin to act or to /dev/null.

This is not a bad tactic.  However, some people (myself included) like to
subscribe a wrapper mail account to lists and then post with a real address. 
To allow for this mailing lists created with mailman give subscribers the
ability to subscribe an email address and then set it to not receive mail. 
This is also handy for those going on a week or two vacation and do not want
hundreds of mail waiting for them when they get home.

I believe that implementing vacationing and whitelisting (defining the list by
inclusion rather than exclusion) are a better way to approach this problem.