Installment two:
Organizing with mailinglists
I'm an engineer. I've worked as the senior Unix administrator for a Large Internet Service Provider, as an information security analyst, do information security consulting, programming, and currently work at a company that develops legal document software for the real estate industry.
I thought to do something nice, and to sway a little bit out of the arena of politics for a minute, I would, from time to time, dispense some advice on technology that can make your life better. Most people don't have time to research new software, but I have to, it's part of the gig. This is the second installment of some friendly advice: Organizing with mailinglists.
Other Installments:
1. A better browser
Part I, Why am I taking about this?
During the primaries, every time I turned on the news, I heard from a different newscaster: "Dean's using the internet to organize -- we've never seen anything like this, it's
amazing." I thought to myself: what is this guy doing? What new, revolutionary techniques have they developed, what do they have going on that's so shocking and different in this campaign's use of the internet as compared to other campaigns that have come before? Then I went to his website. It was pretty nice, but basically, it was a regular website. Next, I subscribed to email updates, and I got some emails. I didn't get it: what was so extraordinary?
Then, it hit me: Most people in the political world had never been exposed to the origins of the internet; they had never used real mailinglists, or newsgroups, or Bulletin Board Systems, where using the internet to help each other get things done, get information, and facilitate, organize and manage projects. I was amazed. I was kind of sad. I figured once they were exposed to a little of it, the message would go out, the Internet Caucus would step up, and get the word out and help educate activists and campaigns. Looks like they've been slacking.
Part II, What is an email list?
Before we talk about how to setup a mailing list, lets go over what it is. An email list, at it's most simple is one email address (say list@foo.com) which delivers mail to multiple email addresses. For example, I run a list for democrats on the west side of lost Angeles. There are about 45 people subscribed, and to send an email to them, one would email "lameetup@nicholasbernstein.com" and it would be delivered to all of the people subscribed.
There are a few different categories that an email list can fall into:
1. Announcement lists
2. Discussion lists
and two different ways of functioning:
1. Top down
2. Open
An announcement list sends an email out, and sets the address of the reply to the person who sent the message, so all replies go back to the sender, not to the list. A discussion list is the opposite, when an email is sent, the sender of the email's address is set to the same as the list, so all replies go back to the list. For example, if I sent an email to lameetup@nicholasbernstein.com from my no_spam@nicholasbernstein.com email account, instead of the email saying "From: no_spam@nicholasbernstein.com", it will say "From: lameetup@nicholasbernstein.com" This allows everyone on the list to see replies and to comment on those replies, leading to a discussion similar to the comments section on this site.
In terms of the different ways of functioning, a top down list is the one most people are familiar with. There is one address, an "administrator" account, which can post to the list, but no one else who is subscribed can. These kind of lists are best represented by the kind of emails you get from the Kerry campaign, or from the DNC. An open list differs in the sense that anyone who is subscribed to the list can send a message to the list. While Top down lists are always announcement lists, and "open" list can be either be a discussion, or an announcement list.
Part III, Why Should I care?
Email lists are extremely helpful. They can be useful in almost any area of interest, but in our case, I'm going to focus on how they are useful for the grassroots democratic organization. Lets say you've been attending meetups, or are volunteering for a particular cause. Odds are, you are going to meet a lot of like minded people in your area; people who are active and volunteer. If something comes to your attention, where you think there is a need to mobilize, you are going to want to rally the troops. If you were smart, and setup an email list, you could, with one email, get in touch with all of those people you know would be interested. Likewise, if one of them finds out about an important issue, you probably would like to know. This streamlines the process. This is an example of an open announcement list. Anyone who is subscribed can quickly and easily bring the issue up to the rest of the local democratic community. Since it's software based, one person doesn't need to be in charge of the email address management: the initial people subscribed can send a link to a signup page, and their friends in the area can join the list, it grows exponentially, and over time all of the active democrats in your area can quickly organize very large groups of people with ease.
Another example is one of building community. An open discussion list is a wonderful way to discuss policy. People in the area can debate the pro's and con's of issues, and while doing so, build a community of activists. This can lead to discussion of how to organize events, how to submit policy, etc. All this, and without having to physically meet each other. While it is nice to get together, imagine a list for los angeles county - potentially, there could be thousands of people; it would be nearly impossible for all of those people to get together in one place to discuss things. They could go to a rally, and be talked to, be motivated, be pointed in a direction, but they couldn't all participate on the discussion leading up to the rally. They couldn't help set the agenda, decide how to motivate people, etc. A mailing list allows you to do that; it take decision making, and brings it to the grass roots level where everyone can have input.
How do I do this?
Generally speaking, setting up a mailing list has been reserved to the technically adept. Everyone else just takes a list of names, separates them with commas and sends out an email. Unless you have your own mailserver, know how to setup a domain, etc., setting one up on your own is still not possible. There are, however, a growing number of web hosting/email hosting providers who offer this as a service.
If you are a technical person, and are interested in setting a list up, here are links to the two most popular mailing list programs:
http://www.gnu.org/software/mailman/
http://www.greatcircle.com/majordomo/
If you do want to run a list like this, but don't want to learn how to set one up, and worry about the technical details, don't worry, hosting is available. I use ion-web to do my webhosting, and they charge $2.95/month, which (I think)is pretty cheap. I'm sure that there are other hosts available, but you'll need to check with individual companies. Odds are, if you have webhosting, they'll probably include mailinglists for free.
Who should I invite
I think the best place to set up an email list is either with people who volunteer with you for a particular cause, or at meetups. If you bring a sign up sheet to a meetup, odds are most people will be interested in signing up. Just enter their names into the web-administration interface, or give out the website address or the subscribe email address (generally, mailing lists have a feature where people can be subscribed by emailing "subscribe-listname@domain.com").
The point is, it's very easy to get people to join. Once they do, and everyone gets used to the idea, they are a very effective tool in the grassroots arsenal.